Clay Shirky's TED talk explained how cognitive surplus will benefit our society as a whole. My mind was opened by many of the concepts he introduced, but I felt overwhelmed. Just as I would begin to grasp the subject he explained, he would move on to the next topic. Many times it was difficult to see how all the topics related. I really wish he would have kept his speech more basic leaving the audience with a single goal to consider. I am going to keep this in mind for my own TED talk. I want my classmates to walk away from my speech being able to summarize my speech in one sentence and feel the power of the goal I am trying to convey. Nevertheless, I understand that Clay supports the idea of cognitive surplus and collaborating as a whole society. Ushahidi, the new program designed to distribute information to the Kenyan society after the disputed presidential election, is the perfect example of a design with civic value. Immediately I thought of Wikipedia because in the same way it is accessible to everyone and is a collaborative website providing information. Based on my knowledge of Wikipedia, I would say it maintains civic value because it has a positive effect on the world. With modern technology and people's intrinsic motivation to learn, create, and share, people can use the Internet to make a vast impact. I would say it is much easier to create an impact today than it would have been even 30 years ago because of people's proximity to computers and access to the web. Also, I think that the world of today is more connected to information and each other because of the Internet. In the case of Wikipedia, people can document information and link it to other information expanding the way people can research and learn. Therefore, we must use it to our advantage to create information and ideas of civil value through cognitive surplus. Through blogging websites online, Steve in America can instantly communicate with people in other countries. I wouldn’t say blogging and chatting websites uphold civic value, but they are certainly a way to share information and gain knowledge by expressing opinions and viewpoints. One of the points Clay made was that when we collaborate we develop some really great ideas but also many stupid ones. He gave the example of Lolcats (pictures of cats with funny captions) which only impact people who are interested in them. This has a communal impact instead of a world impact. However, this is something that someone created and shared with people so it still has importance. All creations fall into a spectrum of mediocre and good work. But the people who developed them still made a creation that some would find significant. All great people have their faults just like all great ideas come with a few bad ones, too! I thought it was interesting that Clay showed a graph of the increase in people who showed up late to pick their kids up from daycare after being asked to pay a fine. It showed that when people paid money to the people watching their kids it released the guilt that they felt for coming late so they ended up coming even later. I thought it was interesting that they were more motivated without a fine than with one. I think that guilt plays a role in people's motivation. For example, I know that when I don’t go to church on Sunday’s the guilt that I feel sticks with me throughout the day. Therefore, I feel increased motivation to get up out of bed and attend church and avoid a guilty weekend. The drive is increased when guilt is on the line. I have a better day when I get my homework done early or go for a run in the morning. In this instance, I believe that it’s my intrinsic motivators that drive my actions. Our human nature is to be self-motivated and collaborative beings.
No comments:
Post a Comment