Clay Shirky, born 1964 in Columbia; Missouri, is seen to many as a scholar whom has a rather optimistic view of the development of the internet technology, web 2.0 and networking. His views and beliefs revolve around the idea that connection is power, and the internet has had an extremely powerful and positive effect. “Life in the developed world included a lot of passive participation: at work we're office drones, at home we're couch potatoes.” (Shirky, 2010; 11.) From this quote we take the idea that Shirky sees there are negatives to technology, but there is a way to rectify this. Rather than seeing this as a disadvantage, he is open to the evolution and accepts it as a benefit the world needs in order to progress, and so he believes that with the internet, we can step forwards into the future and get out of our comfort zones, doing something more with technology and being an active participant in society rather than wasting time watching television. To Shirky, only development can come from technology and we can only move forward and acquire helpful information from the technological advances made,. He seems to feel that the internet is simply an extension of our need for democracy, shaping the world for the better.
Clay Shirky is a highly esteemed speaker, talking at several TED talks around the world and has spoken several times at the Web 2.0 Expo. He is also seen as a “teacher, writer and consultant” (NYU, 2012). His career has followed several routes, one of which being a lecturer in New York University. He holds a Joint appointment at NYU, and is also an associate professor at said university. He seems to have a drive to inform and inspire audiences, giving them information on the world's technology and how it can be a tool in shaping our world for the better. He gained his degree from Yale University with a BA in 1986, specialising in fine arts. After gaining his degree, Shirky went on to found a theatre company in New York. This theatre company created non-fiction pieces only using government documents as their source of inspiration. To gain this information, they turned to the internet which sparked his passion for understanding the internet and the technology surrounding it, (NYU, 2012).
Clay Shirky is a highly esteemed speaker, talking at several TED talks around the world and has spoken several times at the Web 2.0 Expo. He is also seen as a “teacher, writer and consultant” (NYU, 2012). His career has followed several routes, one of which being a lecturer in New York University. He holds a Joint appointment at NYU, and is also an associate professor at said university. He seems to have a drive to inform and inspire audiences, giving them information on the world's technology and how it can be a tool in shaping our world for the better. He gained his degree from Yale University with a BA in 1986, specialising in fine arts. After gaining his degree, Shirky went on to found a theatre company in New York. This theatre company created non-fiction pieces only using government documents as their source of inspiration. To gain this information, they turned to the internet which sparked his passion for understanding the internet and the technology surrounding it, (NYU, 2012).
Shirky has written on the socio-political and sociocultural aspects of the internet with two major books, Cognitive Surplus in 2010 and Here Comes Everybody in 2008. In Here Comes Everybody, Shirky shows that he is in favour of crowd-sourcing and the way upon which one may connect with their peers online (Shirky 2008). In Cognitive Surplus he adds to the discussion topics raised in his previous work and talks about the concept of cognitive surplus, and feels as though the active engagement one would use for the internet is a step up from the passive engagement one would have from watching television (Shirky 2010).
Shirky considers the internet a blank slate. Anyone can create things on the internet, from the encyclopaedia that changed how we find information to the silliest of internet memes. Shirky has rightfully stated that we're no longer a passive audience, and the internet has enabled us to be active in our engagement. He states in Cognitive surprlus that "the stupidest possible creative act is still a creative act” (Shirky, 2010;18), showing us that even the most trivial of actions is still an action. |
[In this video we see the way cognitive surplus will change the world, and the way in which connectivity can effect us for the better.]
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