Re: peretz
Subject: Re: peretz
From: Barrett Brown <barriticus@gmail.com>
Date: 3/18/10, 14:27
To: Juan Cole <jricole@gmail.com>

Dr. Cole-

This is Barrett Brown; we spoke a few months back regarding my proposal to improve the blogosphere and increase its influence relative to the traditional media by way of a distributed cartel of bloggers, and you expressed some interest contingent on the network and associated software providing an improved means by which to research and distribute information. 

Below, you'll find a rough draft summary of the specific ways in which this network/software implementation would serve as an improvement upon existing means of both obtaining and distributing information, both for producers and consumers of content. This summary does not cover the more fundamental goals and aspects of the project, such as the intention to occasionally and deliberately generate the topical critical mass necessary to prompt segments of the traditional media to address a given issue that would otherwise be covered only by the blogosphere; I'll go into those dynamics in another document.

I met last month with the execs of True/Slant and they've decided to assist in the project by means of promotion and perhaps implementing the software within their existing network; I, Allison Kilkenny, and Charles Johnson already write for them, and since those two will be among the core bloggers from which the network will expand, it's to True/Slant's advantage to assist us by providing access to their coders and infrastructure. We don't need funding from them as the network does not require any money by which to operate anyway, but they've basically offered to assist in any way necessary. We'll have more specifics on that in a few weeks when the basic software and starting features are finished, at which point I'll be meeting with them again. Additionally, I met yesterday with Christopher Stuart, the deputy editor of The New York Observer, who wants me to write a series of articles in which I'll be making the case against various prominent columnists like Ross Douthat; I ran the project by him and he's interested, although we haven't settled anything regarding what the Observer might be willing to do specifically to assistance. At any rate, I'll be able to promote it to some extent in my upcoming articles for them. Meanwhile, I've recruited a few other bloggers here and there and will be more actively recruiting as soon as the formal announcement goes up, most likely in early April.

Please take a look at the network summary below and let me know if you're still interested in getting involved. As is made clear in the documentation, the network's effectiveness will be heavily contingent on the capability and intellectual honesty of the initial bloggers from which the network will spread, and so it would be of great help if you would agree to serve in that capacity (at the risk of sounding like a flatterer, I'll note that I many others have a great deal of respect for your efforts in reducing the amount of nonsense that is perpetuated about the Middle East among both blogs and mainstream outlets). Remember that in addition to what's discussed below, we're also going to be implementing a variety of other features by which some of the barriers to research that you mentioned to me will be reduced to a significant extent. Please let me know if you have any questions, suggestions, or requests for particular software features.

I appreciate the time you've taken to hear me out regarding the project. We have a real chance to alter the dynamics of the manner in which the citizenry is informed. Even if we are only slightly effective, we will be slightly effective in an aspect from which all other things proceed.


Regards,

Barrett Brown
Brooklyn, NY
512-560-2302

Project PM Network Summary

The institutions and structures that have developed over the past two decades of accelerating public internet use have had what we reasonably describe as a wholesome effect on information flow. But the information age is a work in progress, and thus there are potential improvements to be made. More importantly, there are improvements that can be made by an initially small number of influential participants working in coordination. The purpose of Project PM is to implement these solutions to the extent that participants are collectively able to do so, as well as to demonstrate the beneficial effects of these solutions to others that they might be spurred to recreate or even build upon them independently of our own efforts. 

The Problems

Project PM is intended to address the following inefficiencies: 

(a) Watering down of contributor quality within participatory networks: Open institutions such as reddit.com tend to peak in terms of the erudition of the content conveyed a few years after coming about, with this being due to the particular dynamics of network growth. By definition, early users are early adapters, who themselves tend to be better-informed and otherwise relatively capable in terms of the value they bring to the network. To even know of such networks early in their existence is to pass a certain sort of test regarding the potential quality of one's contributions; as knowledge of the network expands, this "test" becomes easier, and to the extent that it does, the network is less "protected" from those who did not pass such a test by virtue of the fact that they did not know of the network until knowledge became more common. Obviously, failing to be aware of some particular institution does not come anywhere near precluding one from being intelligent and knowledgable in general and thus of value to the institution, but the influx of valuable participants versus damaging participants appears to decrease after a certain level of notoriety is reached. Again, the decline in the intellectual relevance of content at reddit.com is a good example of this.

(b) Data overflow: The watering down process described above does not only result in one coming across information of relatively low quality, but also in having to contend with more of it. On reddit.com, for instance, a user who scans new submissions will find not only a certain amount of potentially useful information, but also some amount of almost certainly useless information. The watering down of contributor quality also contributes to the extent to which the latter is perpetuated within the network itself insomuch as that lesser contributors are more likely to vote up useless information, thus helping to ensure that the barriers built into the network in order to facilitate the viewing of important rather than unimportant content - in this case, a pre-established threshold of up votes necessary to bring something to the front page - will thereby lose their effectiveness.

(c) Barriers to obtaining raw data: The obvious fact of data overflow - that some data is more useful than other data - is dealt with by means of selecting certain sources of information which one has identified as being a provider of quality output relative to other sources. Bloggers and others who require a steady stream of data in order to operate have certain methods of obtaining that data, and there is of course no reason to believe that any of these methods could not be improved upon to an extent that these improvements would be worth adapting. One has RSS feeds flowing from sources one has selected (and by virtue of having been selected, the sources must have been necessarily known to the blogger in the first place); one has algorithm-based sites like Memorandum.com (which merely shows what bloggers are talking about rather than necessarily providing any insight into what they should be talking about); one has democratic or pseudo-democratic sites such as reddit.com and digg.com; and one has the fundamentally one-way outlets of television and newspapers, the content of which is decided upon by a handful of producers or editors (who themselves are working within an incidental structure that does not appear to be of much value relative to what may now be found among the better portions of the blogosphere). A means of obtaining data that improves upon these and all other methods would be of great utility insomuch as that the quality of data is of course one major limiting factor with regards to the quality of output..

The Solutions

By way of a network designed to take better advantage of the existing informational environment, Project PM can help to remedy the problems described above without significant effort on the part of participants, yet with potentially dramatic results on the efficiency of information flow.

(a) Watering down of contributor quality within participatory networks: Project PM will greatly reduce the accumulation of low-value contributors by way of the method by which contributors are brought it. The network will be established with a handful of contributors who have been selected by virtue of intellectual honesty, proven expertise in certain topics, and journalistic competence in general. Each of these contributors has the option of inviting into the network any number of other bloggers, each of whom will initially be connected only to the contributor who brought him in. Each of these new participants also has the option of bringing others into the network in the same fashion as well as offering a connection to any other participant, as will anyone they bring in, and so on. To the extent that the original participants are of value in terms of their judgement, they may be expected to bring in participants of similarly high value, and so on; meanwhile, as the network expands, participants will be likely to form new direct connections to others whom they have determined to be of particular value relative to other participants, and conversely, to disestablish any direct connections they might have established to those whose output they find to be below par. Of course, none of this precludes the network from eventually encompassing participants of low desirability relative to that of the average participant, but to the extent that such a thing occurs, its effect are largely neutralized by way of the dynamic described below.

(b) Data overflow: Information flows through the Project PM network by way of a single button accessible to each participant. When a participant either writes or receives a blog post or other informational element, the participant may "push" the item, thus sending it to all of those with whom he is directly connected in the network. In such a case as a participant pushes forward items that others may determine to be of little merit, the resulting clutter is only seen by the participant who brought such a low-value blogger into the network in the first place, as well as those whom the low-value blogger has to this point brought in himself along with those who have agreed to connect with him from elsewhere in the network. To the extent that a given participant exercises good judgment in establishing connections, then, he will only receive informational elements of value while also being able to quickly transmit them to contributors who will be able to make best use of such information. Meanwhile, below-average participants will have only very limited means by which to clutter the network, as informational elements become less likely to be pushed forward as they approach above-average participants within the network, who themselves are "buffered" from such things by way of the competent participants with whom they surround themselves by way of their connections and who, by virtue of their competence, are unlikely to push forward low-value information.

(c) Barriers to obtaining raw data: The dynamics described in (a) and (b) collectively provide for a means of information inflow that should theoretically be superior to any other medium currently in existence in terms of overall quality, both by virtue of the network's improved organizational methods as well as the relatively high competence of participating bloggers relative to members of the traditional media outlets as a whole. Accessibility to particularly valuable items of information will be enhanced further by the option to set one's widget in such a way as to display any piece of information from the network, regardless of "proximity," if such information is pushed forward (which is to say, approved of other participants) a certain number of times. This should help to ensure that, as the network expands, particularly valuable information does not become unduly "regionalized." A variant on the widget for use by readers (as opposed to network participants) displaying information that meets similar thresholds of popularity within the network would likewise provide those readers with a source of information above and beyond other existing mediums. 



On Mon, Jan 25, 2010 at 12:05 PM, Juan Cole <jricole@gmail.com> wrote:
v. Exciting. Am laid up with disc problems so feel free to call
afternoons 734 747 8211;  cell.  734 223 2071

cheers. Juan
p
On Monday, January 25, 2010, Barrett Brown <barriticus@gmail.com> wrote:
> Juan-
> This is Barrett Brown; we spoke briefly about Martin Peretz a few weeks back, and you were kind enough to look over my chapter on that poor fellow in order to ensure the accuracy of the portions that involve his wacky attacks on you. I wanted to let you know about a certain project that I announced briefly in my latest piece for Vanity Fair on Friday and which I will be explaining more formally and in further detail this week in The Huffington Post, True/Slant, Daily Kos, and a few other outlets. I'll let you know when that piece appears so that you may better evaluate the project in question, but I wanted to give you a heads-up in advance.
>
>
> The project, which we expect to launch in April, will involve two components. One is a free web application that's currently being developed by an old friend of mine who recently headed up Hearst's Digital Paper project before moving on to the financial sector (and who will soon be quitting to pursue this full-time); briefly stated, the software will provide an improved means by which websites in general and blogs in particular can "talk" to each other, transmitting information and making it easier for political commentators, for instance, to obtain, evaluate, tag/characterize/redirect, and disseminate items of information. Currently, and due to the blogosphere and even the internet as a whole being in relative infancy, all of this is done rather crudely and inefficiently by way of RSS feeds, sites like Memeorandum, blogrolls, and the like. This will be a fundamental improvement on that haphazard sort of methodology, and will otherwise include a number of other features, including several that have been suggested recently by a few other bloggers and freelance writers with whom I've been discussing this. The second component will be a sort of distributed, decentralized network of bloggers and others who produce or just relay content. These need not ascribe to any particular ideology, but must be of reasonable intellectual honesty and must also agree that the media at large suffers from extraordinary structural deficits that must be fixed largely from the outside, and who will be admitted into the network on a case-by-case basis by way of invitation from an existing participant (at least, this is the working plan on that front, subject to change based on whatever advice I receive from initial participants and others with whom I'm currently consulting). By and large, the purpose of all of this is to increase the effectiveness and reach of the blogosphere, a task which is easily doable, while also pursuing the more difficult but increasingly viable task of bringing pressure on the traditional media outlets to make some changes in the way in which they operate - to provide better science reporting, for instance, and to cease employing those pundits such as Thomas Friedman who are demonstrably incapable of fulfilling their duties in a competent manner.
>
> At this early point, I've recruited about a dozen reasonably prominent bloggers including the repentant former conservative Charles Johnson and the increasingly-visible and very progressive Allison Kilkenny - people of vastly different ideologies, and in some cases people who have made personal attacks on each other in the past and continue to do so today (I've even managed to win over a couple of people who were openly denouncing me just a few days ago by convincing them of the necessity of this project). I expect that I'll be able to bring on far more in the near future after I make the formal announcement of the project later this week and as I begin recruiting in earnest, and of course some of those whom I've recruited are already talking to their online colleagues about joining up as well. Once the project gets rolling, I will no longer be in charge; the system will combine the AI of the software and the collective input of our contributors in order to perpetuate itself.
>
> I would be honored and appreciative if you would consider associating with this project; obviously, your status, your relative longevity as a blogger, and particularly your expertise in Middle Eastern affairs and related subjects would be of great value to this project, which would not require any real time input on your part. Rather, I would want you to be attached in the short term as an informal advisor - for instance, identifying other bloggers and academics specializing in ME topics whose input and participation would increase the quality of the information that will be distributed by means of the software widget upon its release in April. Long term, my goal is to vastly increase the influence of certain bloggers in particular; in the epilogue to my upcoming book (which I have attached), for instance, I identify you and Glenn Greenwald as bloggers who, given more prominent roles as commentators, would be of great benefit to the public understanding of constitutional issues and ME subjects, respectively; I need help in identifying and recruiting other bloggers and academics specializing in other fields whom we would similarly promote in the near-to-mid future. Additionally, your association with the project would help me greatly in convincing others to participate as well; I myself am known mostly to the skeptic/pro-science community due to my first book and my few appearances on cable news outlets like Fox in opposition to intelligent design and breaches of the Establishment Clause, but otherwise am not particularly prominent yet, and am depending largely on the notoriety of folks like Johnson and the credentials and expertise of people such as yourself to ensure that we are able to bring on as much talent as possible as we go forward.
>
> At any rate, thanks again for having taken the time to hear me out; I hope that you will give all of this some thought. Give me a call if you'd like to discuss this in further detail or if you have any questions at all.
>
> Regards,
> Barrett BrownBrooklyn, NY512-560-2302
>
>
> On Thu, Dec 31, 2009 at 9:37 PM, Barrett Brown <barriticus@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>
> Actually saw that piece when you first wrote it
> Glad you liked the chapter, and thanks for taking a look. Incidentally, I just learned that you came to prominence largely by way of blogging, which is interesting because the dynamic I'm proposing as the solution to our nation's information distribution crisis is almost entirely dependent on the blogosphere's ability to take talent that might otherwise be unduly constrained by the structure of our media - a certain sort of person is likely to jump through the hoops to become a traditional newspaper columnist and a certain sort of person is not, and there's certainly no guarantee that the former personality is going to be better than the latter to any extent. And having gone through the work of people like Friedman, Krauthammer, Cohen, etc., and then compared them to the output that comes from you, Greenwald, and others that have gained relative prominence by way of the internet, I think I can show that the dynamics of the internet are obviously more conducive to bringing the better commentators to the top than are the dynamics of the mainstream media (and this may be obvious to those of us who are familiar with the blogosphere, but a surprising number of otherwise well-informed people simply have no idea of this). The other solution I'd propose would involve new internet-based structures by which a sort of elected body of bloggers would unify in order to promote the most important stories and ensure that they don't fall through the cracks; this wouldn't necessarily be dependent on ideology, either, as libertarians, greens, moderate republicans, progressives, anarchists, and whatever else might all agree, for instance, to raise awareness about such things as drug legalization. If you're familiar with sites like reddit, I think that such an apparatus could be modeled partly on that.
>
>
>
> Anyway, keep up the good work and happy New Year. I've attached a piece that I've come across recently and which might interest you if you're into media theory.
> Thanks again,
>
> Barrett BrownBrooklyn, NY512-560-2302
>
> On Thu, Dec 31, 2009 at 7:58 PM, Juan Cole <jricole@gmail.com> wrote:
> Hi, Barrett.   I enjoyed it.  No particular criticism; you nailed it.
>
> You might get a kick out of this:
>
> http://208.17.81.135/opinion/feature/2009/01/08/gaza/index.html
>
> cheers  Juan
>
> On Thu, Dec 31, 2009 at 3:45 PM, Barrett Brown <barriticus@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Just shared the document with you via Google Documents. Thanks again.
> Barrett BrownBrooklyn, NY512-560-2302
>
> On Thu, Dec 31, 2009 at 11:54 AM, Juan Cole <jricole@gmail.com> wrote:
> sure!    cheers  Juan
> --
> http://www.juancole.com
> author, "Engaging the Muslim World"
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> http://www.juancole.com
> author, "Engaging the Muslim World"
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http://www.juancole.com
author, "Engaging the Muslim World"