Re: [microsound] Elitism is next

[Owen Green <owen@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Jason Hollis wrote:
> a tool is a tool is a tool. 

The problem with this attitude towards technology - by far the dominant 
one - is that it leads to one of two false conclusions. If you hold it 
to be non-value laden and subject only to its own logic in development 
you end up with a determinism where we have to meekly accept what 
technology (now a supposedly autonomous force) foists upon us, for 
better or worse; OTOH, if  you believe technology to be non-value-laden 
but in the control of human development you're left putting your faith 
in an idea of 'progress', itself basically another form of determinism.

I find a lot of what Andrew Feenberg has to say on the subject interesting:

http://www.sfu.ca/~andrewf/

In the case of myspace, one very obviously value-laden aspect irritates 
me intensely (aside from the amount of personal data they're desperate 
to get one to part with), which is that when setting up a music page 
you're corralled into choosing a genre from a pre-selected list of 
nonsense industry-created labels, with the result that one gets shoved 
into 'experimental', 'electronica', 'ambient' or some such. This is 
value-laden in that it both discourages people who don't feel 
comfortable slotting themselves into one of these pigeon holes from 
signing up at all, but moreover, by clumping all square pegs into a 
undifferentiated glob under generic headings, the heading's meaning is 
(further) diluted, the search function basically just doesn't work as 
well (because you could end up with just about anything under those 
banners), and as such the functionality of site is trammelled for those 
people.

--
Owen

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