Speed Interview with Geert Lovink
For the French magazine Technikart (http://www.technikart.com)
Questions: Marine Thommerel
MT: Avez vous entendu parler du terme de «microcelebrité» soumis par Clive Thompson dans le magazine «Wired »? Have you heard of the expression «micro celebrity» that was proposed by Clive Thompson in the magazine Wired?
GL: Chris Anderson is Wired’s editor-in-chief and author of the Long Tail. No doubt he’s related to this piece as microcelebrity sounds like a variation of Anderson’s theory. Instead of Warhol’s fifteen minutes of fame in the broadcasting and print media we now get fifteen fans in our social network. Isn’t that self-evident? What we need is speculative theory, not this self-glorifying stating the evident that Wired got stuck in for so long. The trends are clear. We do not need to describe them merely in techno-marketing terms. Instead, there is a task here of the European intelligentsia to put these phenomena in a cultural and aesthetic context. Paris, where are you? Get online!
MT: Comment expliqueriez vous le fait que «les sous célébrités» issus de la real TV soient zappées pour laisser place à la «microcélébrité»? How would you explain the fact that second-rate celebrities who have emerged from reality tv are been eliminated to give way to micro-celibrities?
GL: What you describe here might be short-term. The problem, if there is one, is the introduction of celebrities on all levels: in schools, offices and sports clubs. The celebrity is replacing the formal leadership within organizations and embodies the rise of informal power relationships. It is post-democratic and suits perfectly within the ecology of networks. The celebrity does not guide us, he or she relieves us the constant pressure to improve ourselves. There is no moment of identification in a positive sense. When enjoying the celebrity, and their all too human characteristics, we take a break. Obviously, as you indicate, there is a market situation here. They come and go. But I am quite positive: if you want to become a celebrity, do it: sign up for Idols or Big Brother. Or start straight away on YouTube and play out your own Reality Show. There is still plenty of room for opportunities. There is no recession at this level, as of yet.
MT: Les réseaux comme myspace, facebook, youtube: révélateurs de talents ou Nébuleuse de savoirs faire? Networks like myspace, facebook, youtube (….): talent revealers or unclear grouping of know-how?
GL: Instead of judging social networking sites as a stepping stone to some other level, we should regard these platforms on their own terms. It is funny that you use the term ‘know-how’ in this context. The knowledge that is being extracted from these networks are the prime assets of the companies that owns them. What these networks with sometimes over 50 million users reveal is a deep insight of lifestyles and communication patterns, and, not to forget, music choices. These statistical data are sold to advertisers. So the ‘grouping of know-how’ might be unclear to us, but not to Google, Yahoo! or News Corp who own these social networking services.
MT: Y’a t-il une plus grande satisfaction à s’être fait découvert via un réseau de «friends» (ou parfois même presque par «accident») que via une politique marketing préméditée et bien ficelée? Is the satisfaction greater when we are discovered through a network of «friends» (or even by accident) rather than through a premeditated and well thought out marketing campaign?
GL: You are already giving the answer. Naturally we prefer informal networks over anomymous approaches. In marketing there is already so much knowledge available and the shift from mass to viral marketing has been happening years ago. It is indeed sad that as a result of this trend the term ‘friend’ has been so discredited. But I am sure that SMS and skype and email also produce new forms of (global) friendships. We should not romanticize the endless offline summers we spent with friends during our childhood. There are already enough novels about the 20th century.
MT: Quand vous parlez de l’éclosion de nouveaux réseaux sociaux (comme myspace, facebook ect..) qu’entendez vous par «émergence des cultures de niche» ? When one talks about the hatching of new social networks (like myspace, facebook etc.) what does «the emergence of niche cultures» mean to you?
GL: Social networking sites give possibilities for more and more groups and individuals to (digitally) express themselves. Their intention is not to rival the Anglo-Saxon global culture of Harry Potter and Spiderman. Instead, they are ‘talking back to the media’ as a way to talk to themselves and their peers. Media are mirror in this respect.
MT: La mort lente des médias, accéléré par le processus du net participatif, promet elle la reconversion vers une nouvelle Religion: celle du web? Quelle en serait la nature ou le sens? The slow death of the media, accelerated by the process of participative internet, does it foretell a reconversion towards a new religion: that of the Web? What will the nature or meaning of it be?
GL: The least understood aspect of Web 2.0 is its dialogue function. We should stop reading the web as an extension of print or television. Maybe we need more vitalism here. These networks, blogs and chats are our contemporary form of life. Internet and society have collapsed into one. Technology is not some alien form that has invaded our daily life. Participation meaning living. We communicate, exchange rumours, make appointments, coordinate our busy lives. The problem of the ‘media’ approach is that we read as content with a deeper meaning. The fact that dynamic social relations are now becoming ‘readable’ is confusing us.
MT: Enfin, le net participatif: triomphe du nihilisme et d’une médiocrité facile d’accès? Ou glorification de la Banalité? To end, the participative net: the triumph of nihilism and of an easily accessible mediocrity? Or the glorification of banality?
GL: What we see happening is the democratization of banality. There is a mass production of low-meaning content. The reason for this is not a sharp turn downwards of the human condition but the sharp drop in prices of capturing devices, telecommunication and most of all: data storage. The fact that thousands watch a video clip of a jumping cat does not equal glorification. We better read as an expression of mass experimentation to get to know the manual for these new media. What we need are photography clubs in schools that teach montage theory of Einstein on a mobile phone. We need more competitions and serious criticism of participatory culture. If you are interested in overcoming nihilism then let’s delete the moral debate and start creating art works! Even if is for fifteen people.