Internet Kills the Television Blahs By Farai Chideya, AlterNet April 14, 2003

A few days after the start of the war, I was sitting in a hotel restaurant
having breakfast. At night, the eatery was a sports bar. But that morning,
fifteen television sets, some as large as five feet square, broadcast war
coverage.

Over my eggs, toast, and coffee, I watched the last night's bombing raids,
big red blooms of fireballs. Interspersed were animated graphics of
military maneuvers and equipment, like a sophisticated, nihilistic video game.

As hard as I tried, I couldn't look away. Television is mesmeric, engaging,
and according to scientific research, addictive. Last February in
Scientific American, award-winning researchers Robert Kubey and Mihaly
Csikszentmihalyi presented their findings on television addiction. It's a
term they reluctantly came to accept because the viewing patterns of
Americans (who average 3+ hours per day) fit the classic definition. No
shocker here: We feel relaxed while we're channel surfing. But Kubey and
Csikszentmihalyi were surprised that "the sense of relaxation ends when the
set is turned off, but the feelings of passivity and lowered alertness
continue."

In other words, we end up feeling slodgy and powerless right after a big TV
binge.

But online news consumers have found a very different - and highly active -
way of getting their information. Some of the most sophisticated news
consumers, including progressives worldwide, have become the "blog"-era
equivalent of news editors. By both receiving and distributing information
via email, they vote with the click of a mouse on what information matters.

"It's nice to have these `intelligent agents' - my friends and list
neighbors - passing along the worthiest columns and news stories," says
musician and radio producer David Gans. He receives information via
listservs, discussions boards, and the online community The Well, whose
Media conference he hosts. Individuals like Gans, informed and discerning
about what they send out, become hubs in this distributed information network.

Net use has grown exponentially since the first Gulf War - the "television
war" - a decade ago. Says Australian writer Richard Evans, "I prefer
[online news] to watching television as I have more control of the kinds of
images and stories I read. I also use the Google news service as a way of
getting a quick overview of a variety of sources."

Studies also show that Americans find the web outlets of major media (like
CNN.com) more trustworthy than their parents.

Print and online publications that make it easy for readers to forward
material have seen a jump in traffic. The New York Times sends out 3.7
million headline alerts each day. But their "Most Emailed Articles" feature
- which allows online readers to see what other readers have forwarded -
has come into its own. New York Times Digital spokesperson Christine Mohan
says that in March, the highest-traffic month so far, the average number of
articles emailed was about seventy-five thousand per day. But in the days
preceding the war, readers emailed up to 120,000 stories daily. "When you
send something to your colleague, the person is much more likely to open
it. It's that inherent trust," says Mohan.

Novelist Danzy Senna ("Caucasia") uses the New York Times' system to email
articles to friends and family. She also passes on alerts about upcoming
peace marches and acts of civil disobedience. Judging by online outreach
for recent peace rallies, the ability to customize and control the flow of
information produces action as well as education. And alternative news
sources may have benefited from the online news surge even more than
major-media ones. In my admittedly unscientific survey of individuals who
received and forwarded war-related news, most (including Senna) sent and
received more independent than major-media coverage.

The downside? Not all information is credible. Web producer Emily Gertz
finds some people on progressive listservs passing bad information on. "As
part of harnessing the power of networked information," she says, "there
needs to be a steady level of education about net resources and etiquette
from those of us who've been online for a long time (in my case, over ten
years)."

People who forward too much volume or too little of interest find people
begging off their lists. And unique or "sticky" information, like Tamim
Ansary's letter about Afghanistan after 9/11, travels the world lightening
quick, which opens the door for clever hoaxes.

The system is largely self-correcting, however - and growing. The only
thing that could block news "intelligent agents" from their mission is the
question of revenue. For now, most outlets don't charge for accessing or
forwarding information, happy simply that they're getting more eyeballs.

In this world, readers and publishers share the burden of distribution.

Online information fans have turned Fox News's slogan on its ear, telling
outlets "You Report, The World Decides."

Farai Chideya is the founder of PopandPolitics.com.


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