Patrick Klepek on the Internet and Comments Culture

On PAX, Privilege, and Free Expression

I've been watching the news and opinions coming out about Mike Krahulik's statement at PAX last Monday. One issue that keeps getting brought up again and again is freedom of speech, which is a topic I've spent a not-insignificant amount of time thinking about. I'm not sure what I can really add to the discussion beyond what Rachel Edidin has said in her fantastic piece over at Wired, but I'm going to give it a shot because I want to weigh in a bit on the free expression issue.

In case you're not familiar with the situation, I'm going to crib Edidin's breakdown of the facts because she does a pretty good job at it and, frankly, it's not what I'm interested in talking about here. Do go give her piece the hits it deserves though, it's well worth it (and I feel slightly guilty quoting from it at such length):

Here’s some quick context: In 2010, Penny Arcade posted a comic strip that involved a character describing being “raped to sleep by dickwolves.” The rape joke wasn’t the point of the strip — it was an illustration of the screwed-up ethics implied by the quests in videogames like World of Warcraft, where after a player has rescued, say, five hostages or slaves, there’s no real impetus (and sometimes no mechanic) to save any of the others.
Whether or not the strip was offensive isn’t really relevant at this point: More than the comic itself, what made the most impact was how Penny Arcade responded to the readers — including rape survivors — who said it upset them. First, they mocked their critics with a series of posts and a flippant non-apology. In a subsequent “make a strip” demonstration at PAX Prime, Krahulik further needled the issue by drawing a dickwolf, and Penny Arcade even monetized the discomfort over the rape joke by making and selling “Team Dickwolves” shirts and pennants. 

Eventually, the argument died down to a dull roar.Penny Arcade made it clear that they still disagreed with both the criticism of the initial strip and the subsequent concerns from critics, but pulling the t-shirts and pennants out of the store was a significant gesture, one that — perhaps — signaled a willingness to acknowledge that this was a situation where inclusion mattered more than proving that they had the power to do whatever they wanted.More people protested, and some companies and speakers began making noise about pulling out of PAX Prime. Finally, the dickwolves merchandise was was removed from the Penny Arcade store. Krahulik made it clear that he objected to the decision to stop selling the merchandise, and would be wearing his dickwolves shirt at PAX to illustrate that point, even though he knew the dickwolves — and the sentiment they expressed — made many potential attendees feel uncomfortable and unsafe. 

And then on Monday at PAX, in front of an audience of thousands, Krahulik told business manager Robert Khoo that he regretted pulling the Dickwolves merchandise from the Penny Arcade store — merchandise he had created as a “screw you” to rape survivors who had had the temerity to complain about a comic strip. While the audience burst into applause, Khoo nodded sagely and said that now they knew better; now they would just leave it and not engage.

I still read Penny Arcade comic now and then, and I genuinely like Ben Kuchera and the other fine folks at the Penny Arcade Report.  But lately I find that whenever Penny Arcade gets my attention it's because of something awful Krahulik has said, or an aggressively defensive stance he's taken after being called out for his shitty comment. I'm not alone in making this observation. Krahulik and his perspectives are increasingly the focus of commentary on the Penny Arcade brand. Most recently he made some flippant remarks about trans-gendered people that sparked an online debate that (I felt) was at least ultimately productive-ish, thanks entirely to the bravery of Sophie Prell. The whole fiasco culminated with Krahulik making a half-hearted apology that basically amounted to "I don't feel any different but I'm sorry my perspective hurts people."

And then he brought the dickwolves thing back, out of nowhere, at PAX this week.

Chris Franklin AKA Campster -- who makes extremely awesome and intelligent videos that you should check out -- had this to say:

I'm no role model. I'm just your run-of-the-mill 30-something millionaire cartoonist with massive influence over an entire entertainment biz
— Chris Franklin (@Campster) September 5, 2013

Campster's point was in response to Krahulik's continued defence that he's "just some guy who draws comics, and was a victim of bullying." As Emma Story (quoted in the Wired piece) puts it,

The unexamined privilege in [Mike's] viewpoint is sort of breathtaking — the fact that a straight white male, a celebrity with countless followers who will agree with anything he says, doesn’t see that he is in a position of power over other significantly marginalized groups is almost beyond believing. What he is doing is bullying, no question, and it’s not excused by the fact that kids were mean to him when he was in school.

Story puts the whole thing into perspective by identifying Krahulik's position of influence and apparent refusal to recognize that power. This is the same man who, just a few months ago, said

My reaction when I feel backed into corner is to be an asshole. It’s essentially how I defend myself. It’s been that way since was in elementary school. I’m 36 now. Maybe it’s finally time to try and let some of that shit go. 

Lets set aside the fact that even in that statement Krahulik still ignores his privilege and instead focuses on his personal baggage. By bringing dickwolves up again Kraulik made it clear that he has not let that particular shit go. He clearly still feels it was wrong to take down the merchandise that implicitly mocked rape victims. He still feels like that was a loss, that Penny Arcade 'backed down' and relented to critics via self-censorship.

There it is: censorship. [noun] /ˈsensərˌSHip/ The notion of being forced to not say/do something by others. Never mind the fact that the particular thing at issue here was an aggressive response to some fans saying they were made uncomfortable by a throwaway joke. Oh no, what's important here is of course the principle of being able to say or do whatever you want whenever you want, no matter how it affects other people. That was clearly what Krahulik had in mind when he announced he'd be wearing a dickwolves shirt to PAX in 2011, and it had the desired response of rallying certain Penny Arcade fans like (the aptly named) @Teamrape, who tweeted

and remember, since @cwgabriel will wear his dickwolves shirt, it's okay to wear yours. we will show those that want to crush free speech
— RareAnimalPreservE (@teamrape) February 3, 2011

Krahulik is a mess of an Internet celebrity but to his credit he is at least trying to be better: in his "clarification" of the dickwolves comment this week he manages to sound an awful lots like the Parallel Universe Mike Krahulik that Daniel Griffiths imagines; whether it's too little too late is a matter of perspective, but at least there's that in his favour. However, what continues throughout all of this is the notion on the part of Krahulik and his ardent fans that there is censorship at work here. That somehow they are the ones being bullied by those who think all this dickwolves nonsense is unacceptable.

There's a stark difference between rights and what's right, and when concepts like freedom of expression get bandied about in relation to asshole-ish conduct then that line gets crossed. At its core this whole debate isn't -- and has never been -- about what people can or cannot say. Shy of violent or hate-promoting speech, go nuts and say what you want, just don't pretend that listeners aren't entitled to react. What's at issue here is the fact that Krahulik did something that other people found offensive, and when they called him on it he responded aggressively by questioning their right to criticize him. Since then his fans have rallied around the concept of freedom of expression and gotten into some sort of grudge match with rape victims and their supporters.

I for one am sick and tired of free expression being used as a blanket defence against reproach when people say shitty things on the Internet. In particular, I am done with it being the go-to response of dudes who feel attacked when some property they adore gets criticized. "Oh, you didn't like it when my favourite video game employed sexist art and game mechanics? Well fuck you! It's my right and how dare you say otherwise?" It's infuriating to see free expression used as the go-to flag of self-righteousness for people who want to act consequence-free, and who can't seem to see the irony of using that freedom itself as a basis for censorship -- because yes, the endgame behind all the dickwolves rallying is that the critics shut up and let the Penny Arcade guys go back to doing whatever they want.

Free expression is not about being able to speak or act with impunity. It does entail being able to express what you want and face the consequences. But there's more going on here than that because of the position that Krahulik holds in the industry and the sheer significance of his support base. As evidenced by developer Christine Love, who told Wired that "despite not feeling safe or comfortable at PAX, she was afraid to pull out of the show because it was a rare opportunity to showcase her independent work." What's more, Krahulik's fans and supporters are many of the same people that developers like Love are trying to attract with their work, so even stepping out against him entails potentially disastrous commercial ramifications.

As I've gained a larger audience, I've paid more attention to how my words affect people. That's not censorship, it's responsibility.
— Max Scoville (@MaxScoville) September 4, 2013

Krahulik has a lot to learn about his privilege and he had better do it fast because at least some people are making it clear that they're not willing to put up with his bullshit anymore. They still feel like they have to, and that's a whole mess of horrible in its own right, but that kind of influence will fade if Penny Arcade doesn't take steps to slow its fall from the pedestal of gaming icons. Krahulik and all of his fans also need to wake up and get a sense of what freedom of expression really means. Sure, it's their right to embrace the dickwolves joke as some sort of unifying raison d'être, but likewise it's ours to tell them to shove it. If the disapproval is so great as to make the great untouchables at Penny Arcade reconsider their actions then that isn't censorship. Anyone who thinks it is would do well to rethink their understanding of what free expression means, as well as the importance and meaning of other perspectives.

Quick Hit: The Walking Dead and the Birth of the State

Steven Lloyd Wilson over at Pajiba has written a fascinating article on The Walking Dead TV series, which I wrote off as a disappointment a ways back. I watched all of season one and then scattered episodes of season two, and generally felt the adaptation had actually managed to be less inspired than its source material. Needless to say I'm not a big fan of The Walking Dead in any of its forms, with the sole exception of the incredible adventure game by Telltale (but that's a story for a different post).

However, Wilson's article stands as a compelling argument in favour of giving the show another shot. Most of his points aren't really about the show so much as the basic story template set out by Robert Kirkman in the original comics, but regardless Wilson's observations make The Walking Dead seem more interesting and less derivative than it initially appeared. For example, I really like his argument that the characters living in a post-apocalyptic scenario engage in a process of forgetting and re-coding the remains of their dead society. It's the best take on the role of the prison in that story that I've ever heard, and way more interesting than my decidedly-cynical interpretation of it as a tactless literalization of the central metaphor from Dawn of the Dead.

Anyway, you should check out Wilson's article, it's a compelling and interesting reading of a show that I didn't think could give rise to one.

How Ad Blocking Hurts Good Journalism

Just over a month ago, Destructoid founder Niero Gonzales ran a piece titled "Half of Destructoid's Readers Block Our Ads. Now What?" It was a sobering breakdown of how ad revenue supports online journalism, and an interesting look at a particular type of outlet: gaming news sites. While the basic point is broadly applicable to all online writing (i.e. ad-blockers hurt writers), that harm is felt more acutely by sites that have tech-savy readers. I'm not a Destructoid reader but I liked Gonzales' piece enough to whitelist the site from my ad-blocking Chrome extension, and started to do the same on sites I do read and appreciate.

Now Ben Kuchera at the Penny Arcade Report has added to the conversation with an insightful, well-written, and depressing examination of the ad revenue model for online journalism. Again the focus is on gaming sites, but that's only relevant insofar as those readers generally use ad-blocker software. The article's real aim is at exposing how the overal model encourages bad writing, and how readers' sophistication actually makes doing good work more difficult.

Go read Kuchera's article. Here's the link again so you can't miss it. And while you're at it, make sure you check out Gonzales' piece too.

When I first read Gonzales' piece a month ago I started whitelisting websites I really appreciate, especially the independent ones. I also considered writing a blog post about it but clearly that didn't pan out. Now, having read Kuchera's much more depressing and outward-facing deconstruction of the overal ad revenue model, I'm considering disabling my ad-blocker entirely. Admittedly that's an extreme response, but if a little annoyance is what it takes to help encourage ad-dependant websites to put out better content then so be it.

The most depressing part of Kuchera's article is how it (at least partially) justifies why sites like Kotaku can put up creepy photo collections of scantily-clad cosplay enthusiasts and then in the next breath release incredible investigative journalism pieces. There's been some buzz on Twitter about whether this point is implicitly defending the sexism behind creepshot photo-galleries, and while I agree that good journalism doesn't justify that kind of exploitation, the larger point is that the model systematically encourages douchebaggery of that ilk. As Kuchera notes at the end of his piece,

Considering research, three drafts, editing, and finding images, it will have taken around six hours and four people to create this story and the images in it. In that time, I could have written around a dozen shorter stories with content taken from other sites. It would have been a better business decision to do so.

It's not ethical for an editor to instruct their writers to put out an exploitative post for the sole purpose of attracting page views, but I can understand why it happens if that's what it takes for the editor to be able to a) continue paying their staff, b) afford the costs of good work, and c) keep the site alive. This notion of lowest-common-denominator-crap bankrolling the good work is nothing new, but the ad revenue context puts it in a new light by exposing the irony that "The better your audience is - the more mature, intelligent, and plugged in - the more likely they are to run an ad-blocking program of some kind." In other words, appreciation of intelligent work is encouraging bad journalism by not supporting the good stuff, and precisely the audience that finds creepy photo galleries of scantily-clad cosplay enthusiasts exploitative is also emphasizing the systemic problems that motivate those posts.

This obviously isn't the entirety of the issue, but it is an important aspect of the financial framework behind journalism that's worth understanding and incorporating into our conduct online. The takeaway is simple: don't block ads on sites that produce good content. At a minimum you'll be helping out the authors and supporting their good practices, and by extension that will combat the ways in which the ad revenue model encourages schlock writing and sexist exploitation. That seems like a pretty big win when the cost is just the slight annoyance of seeing some ads. Also, whenever there's actually intrusive advertising that negatively impacts your experience (i.e. autoplay audio/video or pop-ups) then don't just slap on an ad block, contact the staff and let them know! It's easy enough to do this via means like email or Twitter, and if it's actually a good site worth supporting then they'll work to ensure the advertising is within reasonable limits so that you don't have to block their advertisers in order to enjoy their content.

The nature of the online medium demands a relationship exist between content producers and consumers. It doesn't take much from either side in order to make the current model work as best as it can, and Kuchera and Gonzales have made it clear that they're prepared to work with their audiences. Now it's on us to step up and show that they value the content enough to do the same.

On Chrome it takes as little as two clicks to disable Adblock for a website

Repost: Anita's Irony

Joseph Reagle has coined a new Internet law (à la Godwin's law) called "Anita's Irony," which states that "Online discussion of sexism or misogyny quickly results in disproportionate displays of sexism and misogyny." The rule comes in response to the ridiculous and depressing backlash against Anita Sarkeesian over the Tropes Vs Women in Video Games video I posted about previously. It's amusing, accurate, and all the more depressing for that.

(Via Feminist Frequency)

- - -
'Reposts' are inspired by other articles or blog posts around the Internet. They are used here with accreditation as the basis for short bursts of Max's interests.

A Dramatic Reading of Sexist YouTube Comments

The following video comes in response to that heartwarming story about a dude who hacked the original Donkey Kong arcade game to let his daughter play the game as a girl. Apparently some people took issue with the hack:

I'm torn about this video. On the one hand, it's a visceral reminder of how much people suck. On the other hand, if people are going to be shitty on the Internet then at least we can get funny videos to slightly sweeten the deal. It's a "spoonful of sugar" type deal, because laughing at people for being stupid is more fun than getting angry. Or at least the laughter helps with the anger.

Anonymous Petition to get DDoS Reclassified as Lawful Protest

Recently, the hacker collective/activist group/thing known as Anonymous launched a petition on the White House's We The People website to have distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) reclassified as a lawful form of protest. The petition analogizes between DDoS and the occupy movement, arguing that

Instead of a group of people standing outside a building to occupy the area, they are having their computer occupy a website to slow (or deny) service of that particular website for a short time.

Moreover, the petition calls for anyone who has been jailed for a DDoS to be immediately released and have their "record" cleared.

While interesting and thought-provoking, my gut reaction is that the analogy the petition calls for is fundamentally untenable. There are simply too many differences between the contexts for the comparison to work, and it relies on an unsophisticated understanding of the Internet in order to succeed.

To say that one is "occupying" a website by visiting it and/or refreshing the page from a browser is to ignore the actual ways in which the Internet operates. There was a time when legal/political minds looked at the Internet like a space (as it's often conceived in fiction or theory), but such views have long since been replaced by more literal appreciations of the Internet as a series of connections between users and data. As a result, the notion that one is "occupying" a web page by visiting it is not really accurate since you don't go anywhere on the Internet so much as you request and are sent data from elsewhere.

However, even if such a spatial conception of the Internet succeeded, there are (good) reasons why the comparison is still unjustifiable. Forgive me if I reveal my lack of technological sophistication with this explanation, but as I understand it DDoS attacks/protests/whatever-you-want-to-call-them are regularly orchestrated using various technological multiplication methods whereby targeted servers are hit with more requests than there are participating individuals. This can happen if those involved use rented/owned servers, create botnets, use something called DC++, or whatever, the point is that the usual approach is to create more requests to a server than there are actual people making the requests. This is important because in order for DDoS to succeed it has to overwhelm the receiving server with requests such that it can't fulfill them all and ends up shutting down/failing. In order to overcome the kinds of servers typically employed by the types of sophisticated websites often targeted (i.e. those of VISA, Amazon, or PayPal), DDoS necessarily requires many more requests than there are people involved.

To use the physical occupation metaphor, in order to bring the targeted space (website) to a halt there need to be an unbelievably large number of people (server requests) involved, to the point where access/movement becomes impossible. Imagine Grand Central Terminal in New York: in order for an occupy movement to shut that place down you'd need a huge number of protesters to fill the entire hall so that no one could effectively use the space. In the context of the Internet, the kinds of halls being "occupied" are exponentially larger and so they require many more "people." So many people that it's -- practically speaking -- impossible to succeed without using technology to simulate the existence of many more people than are actually involved. Although you could theoretically go out and hire a huge number of people to occupy a space with you, limiting factors like money, timing, and peoples' availability would necessarily limit your ability to essentially buy an occupy movement.

You'd need a whole lot of people to bring this place to a halt

These differences/reasons why the metaphor isn't realistic aside, the comparison is interesting from an intellectual standpoint. For one thing I like the comparison between visiting a web page and visiting a physical space, as using the Internet does feel like travelling to different (notably privately-owned) places from the comfort of your computer screen. But I just don't see it flying in a legal or political sense since the idea of the Internet as a place is kind of antiquated, and again it ignores the reality of how the Internet works. In terms of redefining DDoS as a form of protest, while I like the notion in terms of how it re-situates power back into the hands of Internet users I can also see how the technological methods described above make it potentially dangerous: DDoS can/must be carried out by a small number of people in such a way that it mimics the existence of a large number of people. This necessarily limits our ability to look at it as a form of politicized speech, and so while I believe that DDoS probably is a form of protest in its most widely publicized instances I don't think we can effectively redefine it as such.

All that said, the idea is interesting in how it reflects back on the actual occupy movement on the theoretical level. When we "visit" a website we don't actually travel to it so much as make a request for it to give us its information, and so how does this exchange compare to physically occupying a privately-owned space? Does going to Grand Central Terminal constitute more than just a physical act but also a request for information from that place? Given the assumptions underlying most advertising and the related fact that we live in a capitalist society, I'm inclined to believe that there is some truth to the comparison: when we go somewhere like Grand Central Terminal we are inundated with information about the services offered there and by its advertisers, which is not unlike what happens when you the place's website. I say this all to draw out the fact that Anonymous' comparison, while perhaps not effective or practical for the aforementioned reasons, may in fact be illustrative in changing our perceptions about how we interact with physical spaces. While "visiting" a website might not be analogous to occupying a physical space, there's more going on when you go to privately owned locations than merely being in that place. DDoS might not be more appropriately conceived of as a form of protest, but maybe the physical occupation of space needs to be reconceptualized in order to realize the kinds of relationships thereby established.

What say you, Internet?

The Best Thing College Humor Has Done in Years

I. Have. No. Words. This video is perfect. Instant classic.

CollegeHumor's Favorite Funny Videos

Facebook Law

College Humour has put together an amusing video explaining why all those "For the Record: I hereby declare..." Facebook statuses you've likely been seeing on your newsfeed. I was a particular fan of the inclusion of the Rome Statute, which (as my International Law class recently learned) gives the International Criminal Court jurisdiction over war crimes, genocide, crimes against humanity, and aggression. Whoever originally wrote the block of text that's being passed around willy-nilly clearly had a good sense of humour.

Human Sexuality in Under Four Minutes

Hank from VlogBrothers has put together a fantastic and concise video explaining the surprisingly complex subject of human sexuality. This is my first experience of VlogBrothers but it certainly won't be my last: this kind of clear and engaging discussion of difficult topics is the stuff that Internet legend is made of. It's a quick and worthwhile watch so without further ado I invite you to get to it below:

(Big thanks to Chelsey for the heads up)

Belated Media: Scream

The latest awesome thing I've found during my daily scouring of the Internet is Belated Media, a video series of film reviews steeped in sarcasm, geekery, and pretension. There aren't many videos in the series but they can all be found here on YouTube (there's also a very ugly tumblr blog and a Facebook page). Some of my favourites are the Top 10 of 2010 video and the Black Swan review (that started it all?), but the absolute best is the Scream review embedded below. Just watch it, Belated Media speaks (at length) for itself. Suffice to say it's a fantastic review of an incredible film:

This video series is the perfect match for me. It's snide and geeky and funny, and more than one person has already pointed out significant similarities between our styles. In that sense I suppose my admiration is almost an indirect form of vanity, which I am completely ok with. I'd be lying if I said that watching these videos hadn't made me at least consider putting together a video review of one of the movies I've seen recently and enjoyed (reviews are incoming, I swear). But regardless of all that, Belated Media presents witty and intelligent commentary on popular movies. You should check it out. End of story.

The Liebster Awards

The other day an old friend of mine commented on a recent post saying he was nominating me for a Liebster Award. At first I took this as just a few kind words but upon further research I've discovered that the award is real! Sort of!

Stemming from the German word for "dearest," a Liebster is a pay-it-forward, feel-good award for under-known blogs (ouch?). Basically the system works like this:

1) You get nominated for the award
2) You make a post accepting said award (you're reading this now)
3) You nominate five other blogs you enjoy that are under read (less than 200 regular readers)
4) The cycle continues

A quick Google search reveals the many winners out there, and by definition they're sure to be awesome-but-unknown blogs. My friend John over at Tauroscatology nominated me on his blog, so I guess that means I can't nominate him. Regardless you should check his stuff out because he's a great writer, and I'm sure the other blogs he nominated are fantastic too!

On that note, here are my nominations (in no particular order):

1) The Daily Protagitron - My good friend Martha's awesome blog about awesome things like movies, beer, books, knitting, etc. I always enjoy keeping tabs on what she's up to via her blog and it's a great way to find out about new, interesting stuff I hadn't come across on my own. And again, she writes about movies, books, and beer people. It's great!

2) Textual Relations - Maybe the least regularly updated of the blogs I'm nominating, Textual Relations covers books, academia, feminism, and Internet culture. If you know/care about my blog/opinions enough to be reading this sentence then you can probably understand why I'd enjoy reading about all those things. If you're at all interested in any of those subjects then you'll love this blog.

3) JusticeBlawg (specifically posts by Johanna under the name lawunion) - I recently featured Johanna's post about The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo on this blog, and this seems like another good opportunity to mention her work. Johanna's quickly becoming one of my favourite voices to read on the Internet as she's both well thought out and opinionated (a sorely rare combination) AND approaches her subjects with a candour that is beyond refreshing (both in terms of its source and the context in which it arises). It's a bit on the academic/lengthy side (hell, so is this recommendation) but if you're into that this blog/author is well worth your time.

4) Experience Points - Not totally sure if this qualifies as an "under read" blog as per the Liebster rules, but I'm realizing now that I don't really gravitate towards unknown blogs. Insert self-reflective comment about "I shouldn't only pay attention to loud voices in a big crowd" here, etc. Anyway, Experience Points is a wonderful blog that takes an "intelligent but not humourless" look at video games. This blog has definitely helped inform some of my Games As Art posts in the past and continues to be a great source for serious commentary and discussion of one of my favourite mediums.

5) ... Ok I'm throwing in the towel now. I seriously cannot come up with any more blogs I know that are criminally under-read and shouldn't be. If I can think of another blog then I'll post an update to this later, but for now that's it for my Liebster nominations. I feel like on some level I've failed the Internet as a blogger today by not being more up on other awesome but unknown sites, and for that I apologize. I'll do better in the future, I promise.

As something of a compensation I am going to give props to one of my favourite (though definitely not unknown) blogs, Topless Robot. There Rob Bricken and his cohorts post hilarious, snarky comments on geek news, daily lists of amazing things you never knew you wanted to read about. It's a wonderful place to lose yourself for a few hours and come out on the other side more uselessly informed about nerd/pop/Japanese culture than you ever wanted/needed to be.

Anyway, that's it for my Liebster noms! Here's hoping you enjoy the blogs I've linked to, let me know in the comments if there are any I missed that I really ought to mention, I'm sure I'll think of some within moments of posting this piece!

This Website Blocked

MaxRambles hasn't actually been blocked, but if the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) or the Protect Intellectual Property Act (PIPA) are passed then this blog would be at serious risk of being blocked in the United States. Today MaxRambles supports countless other online outlets in protesting SOPA and PIPA. If you're not familiar with the bills then please inform yourself about these very dangerous pieces of legislation. If you're a citizen of the USA then please write to your local media and (more importantly) your elected representatives. There must be a clear message that this kind of proposed online censorship is completely unacceptable.

For more up-to-date information on today's protest please visit www.reddit.com, which includes links to informaiton about the bills and a news feed with updates being posted throughout the day. Alternatively Google has set up a convenient hub for information on the bills and getting in touch with your local representatives.

Usage-Based Internet Billing Is a Good Thing

My dad wrote a great piece for the Toronto Star explaining why UBB is, contrary to popular opinion, a good thing. The article makes it pretty clear why UBB is not just fair for the average user but also necessary for businesses. A lot of the negative attention that UBB attracted earlier in the year was largely misinformed and came in response to Bell's bad plan for implementation. My dad's piece is a good explanation of a largely misunderstood issue and definitely worth a read if you're interested in Canadian broadcast issues. It'll be interesting to see what happens on Tuesday when the CRTC releases their revised decision about UBB.

Welcome to Max Rambles 3.0

Update: The fancy new aesthetic is now matched by a fancy new domain name! Max Rambles can now be found at www.maxrambles.com. It just keeps getting better!

Ahoy! What you see before you is the new and improved version of Max Rambles! I've been saying there would new things around here for a while now, and with this update I'm officially making good on that promise.

No longer are my thoughts constrained by a Blogger template. Gone is the oft-complained-about white text on black background design. No more will my website be comparable to an old Geocities page!

You might find yourself asking, why 3.0? Well dear reader, it's a little known fact that Max Rambles actually began as a lowly LiveJournal page. Yeah yeah, I know it's embarrassing, but those days are long gone now and look how far the site has come! In the beginning it was just a place for me to develop my non-academic thoughts while I was still in undergrad. The more coherent pieces were published publicly on the off chance that someone might stumble across the site and bother to read its contents. Eventually I started posting some of the better stuff on Facebook and got a decent response. The result was the birth of the old Max Rambles page that you knew and had a love-hate relationship with. Now I've taken the next step and transformed the site into something that's actually aesthetically pleasing!

I would like to give a shout out and thank you to Sarah over at Textual Relations. She maintains a fantastic blog and has an incredible eye for web design, and the new Max Rambles would not have been possible without her considerable efforts. I strongly recommend you check out her site. Your eyes are forever indebted to her, that much is certain.

Stay tuned for more posts as I continue to try to work this into my law school schedule. I've already off to a strong start for 2011 and I intend to keep up the momentum for as long as possible. The goal is to keep up with content that at least matches the presentation in terms of quality. Thanks for reading and putting up with my archaic aesthetic for so long, and bookmark this space for the many updates to come! I promise I'll continue to make it all worth it.

Trolls: Activists for the 21st Century?

Over the last week "trolls" from the 4chan boards have staged multiple highly-coordinated web attacks on the likes of the Motion Picture Association of America, the Recording Industry Association of America, and the Tea Party. Official websites for both the MPAA and the RIAA were brought down by massive DDoS attacks, and TeaParty.org was flooded with new users who spammed the photo section with images like this exceedingly NSFW photoshopped image of Sarah Palin.

The 4chan community is notorious for their online exploits, including inventing Lolcats, hacking the 2009 TIME 100 list, and bringing down stock in Apple with premature rumours of Steve Jobs' demise. The website is founded on the ideas of freedom of expression and anonymity, and as a result its users' content and actions are often unidentified and shamelessly perverse. In a recent trend 4chan users have committed acts of social-justice minded vigilantism, including tracking down animal abusers. The latest attacks on the MPAA, RIAA, and Tea Party are motivated by each organizations actions against the public and general assholery.

The actions of the 4chan board are a modern form of mob justice, but increasingly they have become a form of organized and militant protest. Their attacks are hugely powerful, fueled by internet users from across the globe united in their hostility towards heartless corporations, political hate-mongers, and common standards of decency. Is this a new form of political activism for the 21st century? A site for unrestricted international outcry against any and all forms of douchery? Or is this just meaningless trolling, plain and simple? Is there a difference? Time will tell, but either way the 4chan boards have made a name for themselves by displaying what can be achieved via the internet, both for ill and for good.

For further reading check out The Atlantic for some great recommendations on trolls, hackers, nerds, etc. Weeks ten and eleven in particular are relevant to this post.

Google, Verizon, and Net Neutrality

There's a lot of talk going on right now about a possible agreement between Google and Verizon for prioritized data transfer. The New York Times stated that the two companies are negotiating a deal that would allow Verizon clients to access information stored on Google's networks more quickly than other online content. Bloomberg further reports that this agreement applies only to the Verizon mobile network, not to broadband internet. If such an agreement were realized it would stand in direct opposition to the net neutrality principle that Google has repeatedly championed in the past. Both companies have issued statements denying any discussion of priority data transfer, with Google stating that it remains "committed to an open internet."

The details are still quite murky so it's hard to say exactly what is going on here. The Times and Bloomberg could both be completely off their rocker, though that seems somewhat unlikely. They were at least correct in pointing out that Google and Verizon are indeed talking about net neutrality from a business standpoint. But it would be a dramatic change of face for Google to be pursuing any sort of data prioritization policy. As Mashable points out, the two companies are more likely doing just what they say they are: discussing an official agreement on the terms of net neutrality. It is kind of a hot topic right now. Marvin Ammori posting at Balkinization does a great job of outlining how bad it would be if the allegations were 100% correct. I encourage you to give his piece a read, as well as some of his older posts about net neutrality and especially the discussions at the F.C.C.

Rather than jump to apocalyptic conclusions, lets take this as an opportunity to consider the value of net neutrality and the need for government regulations to preserve it. Right now it's easy to take it for granted that the internet is unregulated in terms of our ability to access all content equally, but that could easily change. We are incredibly lucky that companies as powerful as Google (generally/publicly) favour a philosophy so geared towards the consumer, and this event demonstrates how easy it would be for the rug to be pulled out from under us. Unless specific government regulations are set in place the control of internet access will fall on the providers. Net neutrality needs to be government policy, not just philosophy, and this all shows that the F.C.C. negotiations might not be enough to ensure that in the U.S.

Anonymity Online: Blizzard and Real ID

I've been reading a lot about last week's Real ID debacle, and its broader significance in terms of identity on the internet. In case you were more concerned with things like the World Cup finals, early last week video game juggernaut Blizzard announced that they would be implementing a program called Real ID that would force users to identify themselves by their real names when posting on the company's forums. This move directly effected a significant portion of the gaming community, as Blizzard is the developer of hugely successful international franchises like Starcraft and World of Warcraft. The response from gamers and internet users alike was overwhelmingly negative, and many expressed fears of privacy invasion and abuse. By the end of the week Blizzard announced that as a result of the feedback they would no longer be going forward with the Real ID program on their forums.

At first I didn't pay much attention to Blizzard's announcement given that I don't play WoW or post on their forums. When the proverbial shit hit the fan, however, it became impossible to ignore as more and more people started weighing in on the issue. On Saturday I listened to the latest Invisible Walls over at GameTrailers.com and became incensed as I heard Shane Satterfield talk about how Real ID could help clean up the internet. He argues that by making people identifiable and accountable we will develop a communal sense of propriety online like the one that purportedly exists in real life. Even if Satterfield weren't wrong he'd still be missing the point, as the consequences of Blizzard's plan would have far exceeded their stated aims. If you start forcing people to identify themselves online you force the real world upon them, with all its prejudices and limitations. Users are effectively robbed of the ability to have a unique online persona, and that is not a scenario we should accept under any circumstances. The possibility for identities that exist beyond physical and spatial constraints is perhaps the most valuable aspect of online interaction, and anonymity is an integral aspect of that phenomenon.

The immediate ramifications of Real ID are pretty much universally negative, beginning with the exposure and vulnerability of users who accepted its terms. In one of the uglier episodes in the debate about this new program, a Blizzard employee attempted to demonstrate the Real ID program in good faith by using their real name on the message boards only to have their detailed personal information posted by a user. This included his phone number, names of his relatives, and his address, though not all of the information was correct. While unfortunate, this does provide an example about how easy it would be for users to be preyed upon by malicious entities. You wouldn't even need to post anything to see the real names of users, and that kind of openly disseminated information is a risk. This seems especially true given that video games have led to acts of violence in the past by unhinged individuals. It simply baffles me that Blizzard would produce such an opportunity for its customers to be exposed in this manner.

Along those same lines, another evident negative to Real ID would be the outing of minority gamers. Ethnic groups, women, etc., would be exposed and left open to targeting and abuse by the same trolls Real ID was intending to stop. Susana Polo at Geekosystem notes that the current atmosphere online suggests we need anonymity to protect these groups, and that this points to an internal problem of accountability and acceptance. While true this doesn't mean that the Real ID program would do anything to promote tolerance among users, but would certainly give direction to the hatred. Satterfield argues that message board trolls would clean up their act if identified, but this perspective fails to address the core issue behind the attitudes and assumes that all such users see their beliefs as unfavourable. Polo wisely advises against Real ID in favour of greater responsibility within the gaming community, asking users to stop ignoring and thereby perpetuating examples of hatred and intolerance.

While these are certainly serious concerns, the most evident victim of Real ID would be the conversation itself. Many have commented that the Blizzard forums would see a massive drop in participation following any implementation of Real ID, and there's no doubt that's true. Whatever discussion remained might be more polite, but it would definitely be less diverse in terms of the number and range of its voices. Whatever thoughts might gestate on the board would be restricted to the point of irrelevance by the very design of the creative space. By limiting the voices you render the conversation effectively impotent, and that is the absolute last thing we should be doing.

The internet is an environment with real post-human potential, and virtual entertainment is one of the most vibrant sites for interactions that explore this new horizon. Communities are founded here regardless of countless "real world" factors that might otherwise deny their formation, and their anonymity enables them to function on their own terms. I'm not going to justify the discussions of online communities because frankly I don't have to; uninhibited debate never requires a defence. People like Sean Brooks and Clay Shirky study and endorse the positive effects of online communities, and both argue that there can be real value even in that which isn't necessarily intelligent or polite in a traditional sense. To disavow that potential because of trolls and hate-mongers simply isn't a justifiable action as the quantifiable loss would far outweigh the supposed gain. It's fine to allow for "real life" identification in cyberspace, and indeed many choose to use their legal names for their online presence. But to make it the rule is quite another thing, and any such action would be a significant step backwards in terms of progressive discourse.

As it stands Real ID isn't happening and that is a good thing, but we shouldn't let it be the end of this story. Anonymity is an important facet of the unique cultural phenomenon that is the internet, and this event demonstrates how easily it could be lost. We can bring "reality" into the fold at any time by identifying ourselves, and likewise there should always be an option to abstain from doing so. Real ID would have taken away that choice and that is not something I am prepared to accept, no matter the reasoning. I'd rather wade through a thousand message boards filled with hateful trolls (the Ain't It Cool readers come to mind) than see compulsory identification programs aimed to "clean up the internet." Progressiveness trumps propriety every time.

Cool Stuff: Creative Collaboration

Apologies for the absolute dearth of content around here lately, I've been out of town a lot and generally otherwise occupied. I've got a few things I'm working on that'll hopefully come to fruition soon, but for now I wanted to share this really cool argument/video:

Clay Shirky, an American writer and theorist on internet technologies, has an interesting perspective on the value of creative collaborative activities on the internet. This includes everything from knowledge databases Wikipedia to memes like Lolcats. He sees the internet as a significant leap forward in terms of human culture, comparing the hours spent actively utilizing it to those spent passively watching television. In describing the inherent worth of even something as trivial as Lolcats, Shirky argues that "the stupidest possible creative act is still a creative act. Doing something is different than doing nothing."

Check out the video below, it's well worth four minutes of your time, even if it is a passive interaction. I for one am on board with him, and I'd be curious to hear your thoughts.

(Via Geekosystem)

moot TED Discussion

4chan founder moot's TED talk is now available online, and you should watch it. It's a fantastic history lesson for those who don't know about 4chan or the significant influence its had on the internet and popular culture. moot also gets a chance to discuss his vision and defend the anonymity that is written into the structure of 4chan. It's a really interesting talk and well worth watching if you're at all interested in technology and culture.