Modern Media and Freedom of Expression

I think that this idea is encapsulated in Gilder’s work when he says, “Rather than exalting mass culture, the telecomputer will enhance individualism. Rather than cultivating passivity, the telecomputer will promote creativity. Instead of a master-slave architecture, the telecomputer will have an interactive architecture in which every receiver can function as a processor and transmitter of video images and other information. The telecomputer will usher in a new culture compatible with the immense powers of today’s ascendant technology. Perhaps most important, the telecomputer will enrich and strengthen democracy and capitalism all around the world” (18). It’s true that the computer/internet has allowed for a fluidity in areas of free speech and creative expression. Through websites such as youtube and vimeo (and countless others), anyone can create a video and share it with the world and be recognized for how good or terribly bad (as in the case of Rebecca Black’s Friday video) it is. This blog speaks to the idea that modern media is freeing, in that I can pretty much say whatever I want here. As Negroponte points out, “increasingly, the tools to work with and the toys to play with will be the same. There will be a more common palette for love and duty, for self-expression and group work”. Again this idea that the computer will allow users to explore multiple dimensions of themselves in one place, satisfying their desires to work and to have fun. What Barlow discusses also touches on this freedom of expression that comes with the internet and personal computers. He says, “digital technology is...erasing the legal jurisdictions of the physical world, and replacing them with the unbounded and perhaps permanently lawless seas of Cyberspace”. Is this a bad thing? I don’t believe so. I think this endless exchange of ideas will do exactly what Gilder believes it will, “strengthen democracy and capitalism all around the world”, by allowing a freedom of speech in a very public arena that cannot help but spread ideas (18).