Unlike other authors we have read, Benkler does not seemed concerned to find variable X that causes Y or even to prove that variables A through X cause result Y. For example, rather than accept the logic of power law distribution, Benkler instead suggests that the success of websites such as StopSinclair.org are not “genuine flukes.” In fact, “intuitively, it seems unsurprising that a large population of individuals who are politically mobilized on the same side of the political map and share a political goal in the public sphere – using a network that makes it trivially simple to set up new points of information and coordination, tell each other about them, and reach and use them from anywhere- would in fact, inform each other and gather to participate in a political demonstration” (245).

From Benkler’s perspective, our intuition is correct and the power law is wrong. This seems quite startling. After all, even cultural theorist Raymond Williams went to great lengths to demonstrate the empirical, as opposed to intuitive, value of his work. For example, Williams provided both a long and short range empirical study of “flow” that he documented with evidence from American and British television (97-120). Perhaps the apotheosis of this approach was provided by Claude Fischer in his multi-variable multi-methodological approach to the telephone.

Why does Benkler seem less concerned with causality than other authors we have read? Benkler, as a law student, was almost assuredly required to take a class on torts that almost assured provided a legal perspective on causality. In the law, there are at least two forms of causality (actually, some would argue that there are three forms of causality, but to keep this simple, I am going to focus on the most recognized forms).

First, there is but for causality. But for causality can be explained best through an example. Let us assume that, god forbid, the State of Illinois Building in Chicago is bombed while I am in it. As the explosion occurs, I am eating some nachos that I bought at the Taco Bell in that building’s food court and I am killed. Is the location of a Taco Bell in the food court a cause of my death? Of course. I would not have been present in the State of Illinois building but for the presence of a Taco Bell. If there was no Taco Bell, I would have kept walking until I found a Taco Bell, or perhaps a Chipotle.

Yet, is Taco Bell legally liable for my death? Of course not. This relates to the second form of causality, referred to as proximate cause. Proximate cause is concerned with issues of forseeablity. Was it foreseeable when Taco Bell opened its restaurant that years later a terrorist attack would occur leading to my death? No, Taco Bell cannot be held responsible.

At this point, you may question my interpretation. After the attacks on the World Trade Center, one might argue that attacks on other tall buildings were foreseeable. Taco Bell should have realized that tall buildings were vulnerable and removed its restaurants from any tall building in order to save my life.

The proper response, yeah right. This brings us to issues of evidence that intersect with causality. What makes a violation of the civil law foreseeable? The best answer is that forseeability is a very ambiguous concept and it cannot be defined in advance. A more useful answer is that a violation is foreseeable if a jury (or in a bench trial, a judge) believes it to be so. This means that, depending on the state, if you can convince 6-12 people or one judge that something was foreseeable, it was. Good luck convincing them that Taco Bell caused my death.

This understanding suggests that you should present the evidence that a jury or a judge would find most convincing. For Claude Fischer this would seem to be a complex set of statistics, and even Williams attempts to provide this type of evidence. However, a law professor would have been taught in his studies that statistical evidence is not always the most convincing. For example, in McKlesky v. Kemp, the Supreme Court rejected David Baldus's empirical study of the death penalty in Georgia , an incredibly sophisticated regression analysis that statistically demonstrated that race influenced whether a criminal defendant was sentenced to death. Years later, Justice Powell said that he rejected the argument because he could not understand the statistics.

Therefore, the evidence presented in favor of your argument should be something that is simple and if the evidence is not simple, it should be explained in a manner that makes it as easy to comprehend as possible. Thus, in Benkler’s work the reader uncovers many examples and analogies. For example, the complex technology of the Internet is broken down into a physical layer, a logical layer, and a content layer (396-451). Likewise, Benkler proves himself to be a very structured writer. He includes previews and reviews of his argument in order to encourage retention in the reader. Lest readers get frustrated with his book, he even provides guidelines for sections that they can skip if they accept his premises or have a background in the material he is discussing.

The differences between Benkler and other authors we have read this semester is based on assumptions related to causality. Benkler wants to convince the reader that causality operates in the manner he describes. Fischer wants to prove that he is correct in an absolute, empirical sense.

This assumption results in different methodologies. Benkler relies on stories that a reader will likely find interesting and enjoyable. Fischer relies on statistics that scientists will likely find convincing. Williams seems to lack confidence in his own approach, and dabbles in the techniques of Fischer to bolster his argument.

Benkler would likely applaud Fischer for at least putting his most scientific evidence in appendixes and summarizing this information in easier to understand terms in the body of his work. Benkler would likely suggest that Raymond’s empirical of evidence of flow is unnecessary and if anything distracts the reader from his arguments.

Fischer would likely be unpersuaded by Benkler’s argument and accuse him of arguing without sufficient evidence. In contrast, were he alive today, Raymond Williams might read Benkler’s work and ponder, “Why didn’t I think to do that?”

Skill: Students will develop skills to argue and present an argument on an issue that does not necessarily reflect their own viewpoint.

Content (Prior to class): Benkler, 59-90 (Peer Production and File Sharing), Courtney Love, “Courtney Love Does the Math”

Content (In class): Excerpt from Bridgeport Music v. Dimension Films, 383 F. 3d (6th Cir. 2004).

Opening: Play a portion of George Clinton’s “Get Off Your Ass and Jam” and the NWA song, “100 Miles and Running,” the songs at issue in this case.
-Ask students if the songs sound similar.
-Ask students if they can define peer production or file sharing
-Ask students if they can see a connection between file sharing and sampling
-Explain that the NWA song contains a 3 second sample from Clinton’s work, and
that in a case they will read in class, a court found this sample to be illegal

Activity: Have students read the excerpt in class, hopefully this excerpt would only be a few pages in length. To summarize, in this case the court found that it was too difficult to determine how much sampling would be a violation of copyright laws. Therefore, the court found that any unauthorized sampling, even a sample that was three seconds long, was a violation of the law.

The purpose of this activity is to demonstrate to students that ones position may impact their perspective on a particular issue. In this activity, students are assigned to groups that represent various positions in the file sharing debate. Students may not develop a position that corresponds to the general perspective of the group they are assigned to. However, this is acceptable because some members of a group, such as Courtney Love, may not represent the dominant posiition in their industry.

Divide students into six groups which represent the following:

1. Members of the music industry.
2. Singers and performers.
3. Songwriters.
4. Members of the computer industry.
5. Students who download music.
6. Librarians.

Ask each group to write an outline for a brief speech they will give toward the end of class that represents the position of the group they were assigned to represent. Ask students to specifically consider how their assigned identity impacts their argument. Remind students that they should strongly consider citing examples from the assigned reading or other scholarly sources that they have read in the past.

Have each side present its position.

Discussion: The purpose of the discussion is for students to share their work with the class and uncover important principles related to file sharing and sampling. Likewise, students will develop basic skills in evaluating the credibility of evidence and arguments.

Ask students how their assigned identity impacted their argument.
Ask students if there were any arguments that they made in spite of their assigned identity.
Ask students what made each argument successful? Did the identity of the group represented affect their evaluation of the argument?
Ask students if they ever sample others work? Hint: what about when they write papers?

Closing The purpose of the closing is not only to summarize materials discussed in class but also to leave students with an idea to ponder after class is over. This closing encourages students to view activities they may have previously thought were apolitical, as potential forms of protest. This closer also encourages to recognize the poltiics involved in legal disputes over file sharing. It also emphasizes how strictly courts will punish sampling. I have heard the songs from Downhill Battle, and while they all contain the same three second sample, they sound nothing like Clinton's work or the NWA song.

Discuss the activism of Nicholas Reville and Holmes Wilson in regard to the Bridgeport case. Explore how sampling can be used as a form of cultural protest.
Play songs from Downhill Battle (if I could find them, the site has apparently been banned)

Howard contends that the new information technology campaigns are different from mass media campaigns because they operate at greater speeds and with more content than traditional media. Also, communications technology make symbols transient by allowing for simulations of offline interaction, quick circulation of signs and meanings, and allow messages to be rapidly transformed. These changes are qualified, because new media campaigns are structured “over and above” traditional media (207).

These changes are the result of technological and political developments that no longer require the self-reporting of data. Information is collected from data that has not necessarily been freely given and the individual is placed into a very specific and discrete identity category (128). This demographic analysis, similar to the rhetorical concept of interpellation, attempts to activate identities that the citizen is asked to recognize as already in his or her possession (141). Unlike mass campaigns, modern political campaigns activate existing identity traits rather than attempt to persuade the masses to adopt a particular position or support a particular candidate. In some ways, the connection to interpellation troubles Howard’s argument. For example, Maurice Charland, inspired by Louis Althusser, before the invention of many of the technologies explored in Howard’s book, was already exploring some of Howard’s ideas under the heading of interpellation in the development of Quebecois identity in Canada in the 1980’s.

However, Howard’s argument differs from or at least expands Charland’s idea because new technologies “make it less necessary for us to be attentive to our political lives” (176) whereas Charland’s argument is based on individual attention and connection to a public identity. Likewise, Howard’s argument is based on the idea of individualized, private consumption, rather than a form of mass consumption (184). Charland’s work recognized in the 1980’s that identity could be constructed through hailing rather than persuasion, by telling an individual, “You already support this position because you already have this identity.” Howard’s work suggests than by the 2000’s, individuals need to engage in even less “interpretive labor” and no longer need to be fully informed. Through data profiles, citizens do not even need to be aware that they are being represented or possess a specific identity (187), a distinct contrast from what Charland observed in the 1980’s. As Howard notes, “in an implanted campaign, lobbyists and politicians select voters to represent them (189); at times an identity need not even be activated.

Likewise, identity is much more transient than it appears in Charland’s work. Campaigns are evolutionary and “ [r]epresentation is no longer a singular event occurring in the act of electing a representative on election data but a continuous process of feeding data, sometimes unwittingly, to organizations that claim to represent us” (195). Unlike the political identity of the Quebecois as explored by Charland, modern political identity is easily changed and ephemeral. These technologies have led to decreased citizen agency because individuals have little choice in determining who can claim to represent them (197) whereas from Charland’s perspective, at least in the 1980’s, citizens had to recognize a pre-formulated identity as their own.

Furthermore, there are aspects of Howard’s argument that expand far beyond the role of identity creation. Unlike older forms of organization, new forms of communication technologies through their implementation by campaign participants have resulted in an epistemic heterarchic form of organization, (164-165) that contains some common elements with the forms of social organization associated with open source coding. These new technologies and the individuals who possess the skills to use them have led to a form of political campaign that is quite different from the hierarchic mass media campaign.

Finally, new technologies, and the manner in which they were implemented by campaign managers and coders contain normative values. The technology itself has been imbedded with normative assumptions related to ideas connected not only to how a campaign should be managed but to other normative beliefs, such as the importance of direct democracy (203). Communication technologies “embody value choices of their designers” and these value choices that have become embedded in technology have led to campaigns that are more individualistic and less mass-oriented.

Modern political redlining demonstrates three characteristics. It includes determining which portion of the population is less likely to vote and designing information only for likely voters. Also, redlining encompasses the practice of filtering political information for website users who have registered for content. The message a user receives is based on his or her identity which is determined through the manipulation of data. Finally, redlining occurs when individuals favor some information sources over others, for example, by relying on Web rings (132).

Howard uses the concept of redlining to highlight some important ideas. He emphasizes the political implications of this idea. Through redlining a campaign might decline to serve a community if its votes are not in contest in the election. Likewise, redlining is discriminatory and factionalizes the public (133). For example, Howard explains filtering techniques that DataBank.com used as strategy in their campaigns. They focused on humanizing candidates by making the candidate appear similar to the potential voter exposed to a particular message. The message was simplified and several key themes were chosen based on the receiver’s traits. Furthermore, this information was emotionalized based on key words that were chosen based on the identity of the potential voter. Finally, the user is offered an increased status in exchange for participating (82). This reflects Howard’s conclusion that “political campaigns in the United States are increasingly manipulative” (3).

I find this idea analytically useful. Howard’s argument seems to focus on the disadvantages of redlining, as opposed to its possible positive aspects, which might be better expressed using a more positive word, such as “narrowcasting.” I believe that this concept is helpful because it emphasizes a common element found in all three elements of the definition. All three versions of redlining involve a decision to select some information and reject other messages. The idea of redlining highlights the dangers of moving from a mass to individualized campaign and from a more objective to a more partisan political environment.

One assumption that this concept seems to depend upon is newness. The modern form of political redlining appears to be the result of communications technology and the new technology professionals who have become involved in political campaigns. I question whether the modern form of political redlining is completely new. For example, Gary Wills, in his book Lincoln at Gettysburg, suggests that when Abraham Lincoln was campaigning for the Senate he tailored his message based on the region in which he was campaigning. Lincoln’s speeches more strongly opposed slavery when he was speaking in Chicago or in Northern Illinois and his language was more tempered when he was speaking in Southern Illinois. This corresponds to an early form of filtering. Although it was based only on one variable, geographic location, Lincoln filtered his messages and was engaged in an early form of political redlining. I do not believe that this seriously damages Howard’s argument. Howard demonstrates that redlining has become much more significant than it was a few years ago, let alone in the time of Lincoln. However, I am left wondering if redlining is a new practice or simply represents a return to a more partisan form of politics, similar to the political environment in the United States prior to the Twentieth Century.

Finally, this concept suggests a causal relationship that I find fairly credible. Redlining is understood by Howard as potentially leading to disenfranchisement (134). Simply put, some voters do not matter in the world of political redlining and campaigns ignore them. Other voters matter but they receive specific messages. Like Lincoln, politicians who adopt this technique support one set of issues, perhaps abortion and gay rights to one voter and support another set of issues, perhaps union rights and minimum wage increases to another. One question I have concerns what happens when a politician gets caught talking out of both sides of his/her mouth. Howard suggests that this will be uncommon, because many hypermedia users do not even realize they are receiving specially tailored messages. However, the circumstances would seem ripe for a rival politician, or a blogger who supports that politician, to scrutinize these messages of an opponent and uncover contradictions that could be used as political weapons.

Agency exists in Price’s account, and the most important agency resides with the most powerful entities. Price is interested in the agency of governments such as the United States and understands agency in terms of power. Those with a great deal of power are likely to possess more agency. For example, the V-chip corresponded to a demand for a V-chip like device among American politicians. These political needs led to the conception of the technology and its development (126). Political self interest can influence the development of technology.

Agency does not reside merely with the government. For example, a scholar such as Lawrence Lessig can possess agency and shape the law, especially when powerful entities, such as the Supreme Court, lack knowledge or experience with technology (151). In some ways, Lessig is an exception. Individuals and those with less power tend to have decreased agency in this account. However, the masses certainly do not lack agency. The powerful, and politicians in particular, are themselves influenced by public opinion, as seen in the information policy concerns raised by the World Trade Center attacks (177).

Furthermore, the products of agency, such as law and technology, seem to possess an interesting agency of their own. For example, Price states, “Media laws are to be evaluated not merely in terms of a relatively simplistic notion of cause and effect. Laws and their adoption have a pervasive aspect themselves, in structuring society that cannot be measured in terms of an occasional impact” (49). Price’s main point is that a law may not have its intended result, and even if it does so, the law may have unforeseen cultural implications outside of the courtroom. Likewise, technology may have a causal role. “Every new technology reorders the world around it.” (145). For example, the V-chip may block potential avenues for free speech (136).

Price discusses many variables, and the process of obtaining different results is complicated. It seems that one could change a variable and it could modify the web of relationships between these different causal factors in unforeseen ways. One could pass a law designed to promote the media and democracy only to find that the law has the opposite effect. Fortunately, Price provides some guidance. Price highlights what he sees as the most important agents. “The world is a kind of force field where blazing technologies interact with gargantuan media entities and transformed geopolitical realities. Together, these lead to new forms of social and governmental response” (228). If one wants to promote change, technology, the media, and government are of primary importance. It would help to have at least one of these factors on your side. Furthermore, Price understands most concerns to be settled through compromise. For example, self-regulation represents a compromise between media and government (104). From this perspective, those with agency (that are human) balance their interests. In order to change society, obtain a good bargain. Change is not so much about altering society as it is about reconciling competing interests.

One of Innis’s contentions is that the defeat of John Adams and the repeal of the Alien and Sedition Acts of 1789 were a tribute to the power of the press (157). This makes me suspect that Innis would be very interested in the power of blogs on the Internet. He would be intrigued by the Swiftboat bloggers in the election of 2004 and might even go so far as to attribute John Kerry’s defeat to the rise of this new technology, just as the power of the press determined the election of 1800.

Additionally, Innis would be interested in the political nature of blogs. He would be curious to understand the connections between bloggers and politicians. He would want to determine if bloggers had ties to political campaigns in the same manner that newspapers, such as the United States Telegraph, were connected to various Presidential administrations (164). Innis would be quite curious to learn with whom the swiftboat campaign truly originated.

He would also follow with a similar concern. Just as the election of 1800 demonstrated the power of the press, so too did it demonstrate the rise of a partisan press. Innis would be concerned that blogs demonstrate the rise of a partisan Internet and that once again, “Freedom had become license” (157). Furthermore, in his history Innis notes that “Technological advances in the production of newspapers and of paper supported the competition of a new type of newspaper” (159). Innis would see the development of technological innovations in the production of websites as leading to a new form of website, the blog. He would suggest that the technology of the blog challenges other websites, such as those found at CNN . Likewise, this “new type of newspaper… emphasized more sensational news” (160) just as blogs emphasize more sensational items.

Innis, of course, would attempt to relate blogs to other forms of technology. Innis argues that the press used the new technology of the telegraph to its own advantage (167). Innis would want to determine how blogs have been used by the modern media. He would search for examples of how the popular press used information found on blogs to their own advantage. For example, Innis would ask how the swift boat campaign become adopted by the major media. He would want to understand blogs as a potential resource for more traditional forms of journalism. Just as the telegraph led to demands for faster news (168), Innis would be interested in how the rise of blogging led to a demand for more personalized and interactive news, and would be particularly interested in any mainstream media sources that adopted blogging strategies.

Innis would also be interested in the implications of this technology and its use of language. Innis contended that, “The existence of a large population with a single language gave the telephone a position of greater importance in the United States than that of the telegraph in Europe with its numerous languages” (173). He would likely find that blogs are more important in the United States than elsewhere for the same reason.

He might find that the political disturbances of the early Twenty-First Century were the result of a period of adjustment in which other forms of mass media adapted to the Internet and to blogs. This parallels the political disturbances of the late 1800’s that were caused by the adjustment of newspapers to the telegraph (175). He attributes the election of Franklin Roosevelt to fourth term to the power of the radio (188). Likewise, Innis would suggest that the demand to impeach the current President or at least remove his cronies, is a result of the partisanship of blogs and the inability of the media to provide credible forms of commentary.

Innis contends that history is cyclical and that the cyclical nature of history has not been fully explored in the field of communications. It is important to study history because it might repeat itself (xxvii). In the case of the Internet, and blogs in particular, Innis would likely make this connection. Innis might claim that we need not interpolate his ideas to the Internet; they are already present. In the Bias of Communication, he had already written “the book” on the Internet.

One of the ideas contained in Innis’s work is that the development of the radio caused specific political effects. One of Innis’s broad conclusions is that, “an appeal to the ear made it possible to destroy the results of the Treaty of Versailles as registered in the political map based on self-determination. The rise of Hitler to power was facilitated by the use of the loud speaker and the radio” (81). Innis’s argument is that the radio allowed the creation of an appeal to (German) language communities living outside of the German state.

In some ways, this is a very useful idea. However, Innis’s “idea file” approach leaves much to be desired. Because this idea, like most of Innis’s claims, is neglected and not fully developed, it is difficult to accept. One of my greatest concerns is that Innis fails to fully recognize that one need not be a native speaker of a language in order to communicate in that language. Innis briefly mentions propaganda in a sentence (81) but fails to explore the meaning of that sentence. Fortunately Susan J. Douglas, although writing about a different time period, does so. She notes that even the early radio was used by Germany to present its case to the American public and this was also attempted by the British Marconi Company (275). While radio might encourage language communities, Innis’s idea needs to more fully address why the ability of others to communicate in another nation’s language lacks importance.

Likewise, Innis’s thought contains an interesting understanding of German language communities prior to the resolution of World War II. In essence, he is arguing that Germans composed a diasporic community. While this idea is not explained further, prior to the defeat of Hitler, ethnic Germans lived in nations that were reachable through radio broadcasts from Germany, and were located in places such as Czechoslovakia and Poland. I think the idea that radio technology, compared to print, is more effective in reaching diasporic communities is potentially useful. However, Innis needs to explain why these diasporic communities were so easily tapped by Hitler. In contrast to Innis, Miller and Slater explore how the Internet has connected the Trini diaspora. For example, they note that “Internet facilities- above all the chat room- provide places in which to be Trini, and as part of this they become Trini places” (88). The Internet performs a similar function for Trini’s as Innis argues the radio did for Twentieth Century Germans. Yet, the Trini’s are not attempting to establish a Trini empire. While this may be due to Trinidad’s lack of military power, I do not think this is the main explanation. Innis needs to explain how the radio led to the conquests of Hitler in much more detail. Why was the German diaspora such an easily tapped resource?

Finally, I believe that many of the concerns I have with Innis’s work are related to his emphasis on structure at the expense of agency. Innis’s argument seems to suggest that once a technological structure is in place, certain results will follow. The radio is created and Hitler and World War II is its result. However, this account does not explain why these results are not seen across the board. If the radio creates a drive for empire, then why have we not seen every diasporic community become a foundation for empire? For example, there has historically been a large Chinese diaspora. Yet after the creation of the radio, television, and the Internet, we have not seen the rise of a movement to unify the Chinese diaspora living in states not historically associated with modern China under the control of the Chinese government. While China has recovered Hong Kong and would like to establish control of Taiwan, it does not seem interested in taking control of geographic locales such as the Philippines or Singapore, where there are large ethnic Chinese communities. The explanation seems to be at least partially due to agency. Not every culture or every individual experiences the medium in the same way.

Furthermore, how does a nationalist voice compete with a foreign propagandist? This cannot be explained through language or the medium alone. It is probable that a foreign enemy can find a native speaker to convey their propaganda or a non-native speaker that speaks the language as well a native speaker. The reason seems to rest in agency, listeners encounter and experience propaganda differently depending on whether it originates within or outside of ones own nation. The radio cannot fully explain Hitler’s success unless the agency of ethnic Germans is considered.

Did the radio play a role in Hitler’s rise to power? Probably. Was the radio also used to contest Hitler's power? Probably. However, Innis does not provide us with enough information in order to reach a conclusion. In any event, I cannot accept that the role of the radio was as straightforward as Innis claims. While the radio may have aided Hitler, it did not give birth to him. Innis’s broad structural contentions provide sites for more nuanced explorations. However, their deterministic, structural presentation suggests that these are more “thoughts” or “idea files” than developed, detailed arguments that one can easily accept.

Miller and Slater’s argument is partially based on Trini culture. They explain that, “it is worth noting the ability to obtain things for free is seen as a national trait that is mentioned with pride in any of the joke lists that relate to the specific character of ‘being Trini’” (169-170). Also, this argument is based on the evidence that MP3 is one of the most popular search terms online for Trinis and that many Trinis use the Internet to obtain access to magazine content and to obtain software and games (170). They also note that the biggest savings was related to the reduced number of overseas phone calls required (170).

This understanding of decommodification is not dominant in Susan Douglas’s exploration of the radio. In her book, Inventing American Broadcasting, Douglas notices a wide number of elements related to the development of the radio. In its early history, Douglas suggests that radio promotion focused on the decreased costs of wireless telegraphy and that radio would decrease the power of telegraph companies (25). This story is not primarily about decommodification; it is about market competition and obtaining services at a lower cost rather than for free.

Douglas does note that some writers recognized the potential for radio users to save money. For example, with radio, one author argued that individuals who could not previously afford to attend concerts could now hear the music over their radios and that radio reduced the need to have the financial resources to obtain good seats at a concert (308). However, Douglas ultimately concludes that “In these press accounts there was no tension between corporate ambitions and individuals desires: they were really the same thing (314). While the potential for radio broadcasting to provide information content for free is mentioned, it is not framed in terms of decommodification and it is not a dominant idea in Douglas’s account.

The easiest manner to explain this phenomenon is by exploring each author’s method. Douglas is largely conducting a discourse analysis of the radio’s development. The newspapers and promotional materials she examined did not mention the decommodifying potential of radio. In contrast, Miller and Slater conducted ethnographic and survey research. Their informants mentioned the decommodifying potential of radio.

This explanation, while likely accurate, does not explain why individuals living in the early age of radio did not consider decommodification seriously and why those in the early age of the Internet chose to mention it. This might be explained by differences in technology. There are more free things that can be obtained via the Internet that can be possessed in tangible form. MP3’s obtained over the Internet are pieces of property that can be stored on ones computer or burned to a compact disc. Magazine articles can be printed out. In contrast, radio broadcasts are ephemeral. The common radio user would not have the ability to store radio recordings in a permanent form until the invention of the cassette tape (or possibly the eight track?). This may partially explain why decommodification did not play as large of a role in the conceptualization of the radio.

However, other factors recognized by Miller and Slater, such as the money saved through email communications, do not reflect a form of decommodification related to tangible property. This would seem similar to a potential use of wireless telegraphy/ telephony. With the radio, amateur operators no longer had to pay for postage just as with the Internet emailers no long have to pay for long distance phone calls. I would not attribute this to a difference between Trini culture and American culture. However, I would attribute it do a difference between culture at the beginning of the Twentieth Century and culture at the beginning of the Twenty First Century.

In the early days of radio, in the United States and Western Europe, where radio was first developed and where Douglas focuses her work, it generally was not a good idea to be associated with socialism. If the “free” aspects of radio were discussed by the press, this would likely be understood as a threat to the American way of life. I would argue that the liberalism at the turn of the century was if anything harsher than the version of neoliberalism being advocated today and that threats to property were not smiled upon. Furthermore, the ideas of communism and socialism boded for the American public in the early Twentieth Century. The revolution in Russia was very real and individuals believed that it could spread. In contrast, communism is not understood as a serious threat to the United States today, or its close neighbors such as Trinidad. Indeed, the difference between property rights and commons is today often portrayed by authors (Benkler provides an example) as that between sharing and not sharing. Tropes of communism and socialism are not required components of the discussion. Therefore, it is easier for journalists and informants to talk about ideas such as file sharing and magazine reading as decommodification today as opposed to one hundred years ago. There is little risk that one will lose her job, friends, or social standing for doing so.

Furthermore, many of the businesses and individuals involved in the promotion of radio were concerned that radio might be nationalized by the American government, and the Navy actually did take over control for a short period of time (Douglas 276). Emphasizing the decommodifying potential of radio could have encouraged greater governmental control, something no large group involved in radio outside of the Navy wanted. In contrast, government ownership of the modern Internet is not understood as a serious threat, although the concept is still debated.

The contrast between Douglas and Miller and Slater is certainly methodological. However, the larger explanation for this difference likely is due to differences of technology, culture, and business interests.

This dynamic is analytically useful first of all, because Miller and Slater believe that it accurately describes what has occurred in Trinidad and perhaps for the Internet in general. Miller and Slater believe that the Internet, for example, allows the recreation of the traditional Trini family and that the Internet has been used to realize ideas of free markets and entrepreneurship (11). Another useful component of this approach is that it addresses the complex nature of media interaction (55). Miller and Slater seem to be arguing against an approach that creates a binary between the virtual and the real, and the idea of expansive realization shows how new media interact with the “real” that exists without the use of communication technology. This concept is also useful because it helps explain behavior as well as describe it. For example, a Trini family may exert pressure on another branch of the family to get the Internet out of a desire to realize the closeness of the Trini family (57-58) and its support potential (60).

This idea is applied in chapter three of the book. In terms of the family, the Internet allows Trinis to reconstruct their traditional family structure. Many Trinis live in a diaspora community that ranges from England to the United States. The Internet has been used by Trinis to increase contact with family members through the Internet, as opposed to less frequent and less intimate letters, Trinis could engage in playful communications (57) that were more similar to traditional family communication than the communication found in formal letter writing. Likewise, the Internet was adopted by Trini school children to reinforce their non-school identity. The Internet provided a technique not only for children to make new friends, but to chat with their friends from “real life.” It helps them realize their identity as limers, which may not have been as easily established without the Internet because of curfews and possible parental supervision.

Furthermore, the structure of the Internet helped Trinis develop traditional kinship networks. As Miller and Slater note, even before the introduction of the Internet, the Trini family structure of kinship was more a potential network rather than a mere series of circles. Kinship in Trinidad was more pragmatically oriented than in other nations (80). The qualities of the Internet reinforced the pragmatic and networked nature of these kinship relations (81). This is an interesting argument, because it suggests that for the Trini people the Internet allowed the expansive realization of the Trini family whereas in other cultures, where kinship is structured more circularly, the Internet might offer an expansive potential to construct a new family, or a new network of relationships. It also suggests that Trini communication more closely corresponded to methods used to communicate on the Internet than those used in other societies.

One of the assumptions associated with this approach is that while the Internet and “real life” do not exist in a binary, they do represent different concepts. The dynamics of realization assume a self that is constructed prior to the Internet and prior to the construction of identity through Internet technology. In short, nothing could be realized without its prior existence or conception. This idea may have been more useful in 2001 than it will be in the future. Many children in Trinidad are now growing up with access to the Internet, as the authors note, “the Internet is already huge in Trinidad” (27). The identity constructed by these children will not have developed outside of the Internet or communication technology. Therefore, it will be difficult to find a dynamic realization since their identity has already been partially created through the use of Internet technology.

Likewise, this use is related to the ethnographic approach developed in this book. Miller and Slater note that their approach understands the Internet to be embedded in a particular location, that it also interacts with and changes (21). Their approach is focused on the “long-term” and was one based on interviews that were both formal and informal (22). The dynamics of objectification and expansive realization seem especially useful for this approach. The dynamics of realization explores the relationship between the culture and identify of a particular location and how it interacts with the Internet. Also, the dynamics of realization do not often occur overnight. It takes time in order to realize elements of identity such as the Trini family, for example other family members must go online before this identity can be realized. This approach might raise concerns that it is too limited. However, the authors correctly note that ethnography should “form part of a comparative project” (22). Therefore, many of my methodological concerns are reduced. Even if the close fit between their authors approach and the idea of expansive relationship have the potential to hint at a methodological bias, this concern becomes less serious because of Miller and Slater’s encouragement to consider other approaches.