The panel on history blogging at the AHA brought up some good discussion about the utility of blogging for historians. One question in particular addressed the place blogging had in larger technological trends and chages. Much has actually been discussed about this in the web developments world, especially with regard to the development of the much cited “Web 2.0″ movement. Here I outline a few of these developments and hint at what implications they have for historians pondering the changes taking place on the Web. This post is partly a response to issues raised in that panel, and to Stephanie’s recent post on “Re-envisioning History, New Media Style.”
I’ve advocated on several occassions that one way we as history bloggers can make our ventures more legitimate (for lack of better words) is the encourage people to look beyond the medium in which we publish (books, articles, blogs, what have you) and focus solely on the content. What’s really great about blogging (and about Web 2.0 in general) is that the focus is less on technology and more on state-of-mind and attitude. That includes the attitude that content is king, and that the content matters more than medium in which it is accessed. Web 2.0 is, as Tim O’Reilly states, more an approach and a mentality than any specific technology. It’s a mentality that widens networks, disrupts hierarchy and strict control of information, and embraces cooperation and collaboration.
Blogging, one Web 2.0 technology that replaces the static personal homepage, is one technology among several that promotes community-building, collaboration, and fast exchange of information. Historians are a particularly solitary creatures, preferring to work individually on project than work together. But blogging includes several technologies that make community-building and information exchange not only possible, but required. Permalinks, trackbacks, pingbacks, and RSS all create the means to create connections across cyberspace. Permalinks established the means to link directly to individual “posts”. Trackbacks and pingbacks made it possible, almost instantly, to see the people who have found your blog post and have written their own post in response to yours. Commenting on blog posts has allowed conversations to extend beyond blog posts into broader discussions. Finally, RSS feeds allow people to subscribe to a blog and access posts in a variety of ways decided by the users themselves.
Web 2.0 also seeks to change the way information is controlled. The Wiki and folksonomy in particular break down hierarchy and authority by providing relatively unlimited trust in users. Wikis allow anyone the ability to write and edit information, a virtual collaborative authoring environment. Folksonomy, or “tagging”, replaces taxonomic systems of ordering inforation (think of the early years of Yahoo!) by allowing users to “tag” inforation with keywords. “Instead of using a centralized form of classification, users are encouraged to assign freely chosen keywords (called tags) to pieces of information or data….” Folksonomy relies on users to decide what information gets tags, and what tags are associated with that information. For instance, TagCloud is a service that allows users to create or upload a blogroll, and then a tag cloud of common keywords from the contents in those blogs is generated instantly. While Wikis are collaborative authoring environments, folksonomy is a collaborative way to order information.
Another significant aspect of Web 2.0 is the idea that web applications and information are not products to be bought and sold but services to be shared and enhanced. Many Web 2.0 services, including GoogleMaps, Ning, Flickr, and del.icio.us are provided free of charge and rely heavily on users to improve upon and share developments in technology and information. Access to the GoogleMaps API, for example, has allowed CHNM to create a tool on the Hurricane Digital Memory Bank that generates a map tied to the site’s database. Put simply, “content is more important that its container.”
Blogging can also be seen as a service to be shared instead of product to market. History blogging has done much to bridge divides between academics and enthusiasts and blog authors have done so free of charge. Many feel an obligation to share their research and ideas with the public, while others benefit from the exchange of ideas that come with cross-linking and commenting by blog readership. In the opinion of open-access publishing advocates, scholarly work is in many instances a public services, often supported by public funds, and should share their research with the public. Blogging provides the perfect mechanism for accomplishing this. Ungated, unfettered, and easily accessible.
Is blogging just one step in a larger movement that historians can take in adopting the Web 2.0 attitude? Is it possible for historians to make use of other techologies and approaches? Is it possible for us to think of our publishing more as a “service”, free of charge and open to anyone who can connect to it? For blogging to truly have an impact on academia, it seems necessary that it encourage moves to embrace other technologies and mentalities inherent in the Web 2.0 world, technologies and approaches that break down barriers to access and redefine how information can be used. Blogging is just one tool in an entire world of technologies and services that make up Web 2.0. Historians can and should participate in these emerging technological trends.
A whole post of things I’d have liked to say in the session if I’d had time! Nice one.
(On an unrelated technical issue, something very odd is happening when I tab between the fields on the comments form – instead of going straight from one field to the next it tabs to the top of the page and then to the next field. I’m using Firefox.)
Thanks Sharon. I’d been thinking about writing a post like this for a little while not, but the gentleman’s question during your panel about other technologies made me think about it further.
I actually had lots of trouble earlier this week when I tried to upgrade to WordPress 2.0. I had to backup my database, completely wipe all of the tables in my database, install WordPress 1.5, then upload the backup of my database. Though that’s probably not causing the tabbing problem, I’ll bet the reinstall has messed up my spam filters, cause your comment was in my spam box. Sorry about that!
You raise a lot of good questions and important issues here.
One thing I struggle with is the whole content v. presentation/ medium issue. While I totally support “separation” of structure and content in the “behind the scenes” parts of web design, I wonder how much the medium changes our (the historian, scholar, educator’s) content? We have ideas about what we are trying to convey and then seek to do so in a new medium (harnessing all of its “powers” etc). But I wonder whether we are actually aware enough of the cognitive changes that are occurring as a result of new technology and adapting our content appropriately? Are we using the true strengths of the medium or applying old methods to a new format?
In print studies we have a similar debate. Scholars argue over whether the content of early modern newspapers proved liberating OR whether it was the very act of reading that instead inspired people to feel more independent and therefore to move towards more liberal political activities. (Roger Chartier, for examples, argues this—the act of reading as liberating—of the French newspapers preceding and during the French Revolution.)
While it’s not exactly the same argument, I think it has the same overtones of trying to get at how much the medium affects people as opposed to the message. Where the diving line is, I am not sure. But, I think it’s an important thing to keep thinking and talking about…
I certainly think the medium is important. No one can deny the impact that the Web has had on our society and culture.
My point about separating the content from the container is focused, in one way, on the idea of ownership of the content. I would hope that my “message” here about History and Web 2.0 can be accessed and shared in a variety of ways: RSS feeds, here on my site, copying and pasting it into an email, printing it and reading it, heard through a screenreader, etc. By making the content accessible to a wide variety of people and in a wide variety of ways, we enable people to use the content to learn in ways they like best. A Word document is virtually meaningless unless someone has a copy of Microsoft Word (or some way to convert the file to a format their machine can understand).
I still think the message is key; no matter what the medium is, people still have to be able to have access to and understand the message. I would hope that less control over access and sharing the message would enable people to accomplish this. Despite where I work and what my minor field is (history and new media), I still hold out for the day when we stop calling it “digital history” or “history and new media” and simply call it “history”. Likewise, stop referring to “history blogging” and “history bloggers” and simply call them “history” and “historians”.