Benkler

1.) Benkler draws from the great John Stewart Mill's On Liberty in a section of this reading. He speaks about how humans are like ever growing trees, not set to do one thing, but to always be branching into new areas. He makes this point in a reference for how communication works. Humans will not always communicate in one specific way, the world is ever changing and the way we communicate changes along with it. This, therefore, makes human communication a very positive thing for democratic communication. When our social network spheres change, our world views, perceptions, and ideals change with them and what could be more democratic than that?

2.)Social networking has been on the rise for as long humans have been able to communicate with one another. I feel though, that the recent trend of taking social networking online has nearly limitless possibilities. It allows family, friends, and whoever else to stay in nearly constant contact regardless of time zones or other boundries. I would agrue, however, that social networking serves an even more important role, the emerging world of online economics. Starting with Ebay in the early 2000's, people could talk about, argue over, bid on, and eventually purchase goods that they had never seen or touched. People merely relied on the online community and it's sense of social networking to convince them that they would recieve the goods that were paid for.

3.)This summer, I interned with the Des Moines Arts Festival in their PR wing. The DMAF has about 20 full time year round employees and the interaction with this group was incredibly interesting. When the DMAF came closer to happening, the 3,000 artists became a factor in the daily routine of the office and this community both in real life and online life became such a buzzing place with different perspectives, lives, cultures, and values coming together in a democratic way, it was truly amazing to see how people interacted. It was gratifying to know that I played a role in such a dynamic community.