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Interesting discussion about identity versus reliable identity:

Charles Arthur talks to the man who put the "e" into e-democracy – Steven Clift – about whether we should be forced to use our real names online. Plus Meg Pickard talks about anonymity and web publishing – is it a good thing?

You need to listen from about the half-way mark.

BTW I was actually having a look around to see if there was any further discussion of this concept of reliable identity, and came across these 2004 and 2006 class notes on Techno-Identity from MIT's Sociable Media Group.

This part on individual identity is very relevant, so I've quoted it in full:

Without identity, there can be no reputation. In order for the history of one's actions and of others' assessments of those actions to become "reputation", a few things are necessary. We must be able to identify the person, we must be able to communicate, and we must have some form of memory.

In the online world, identity, communication and memory cannot be taken for granted. Whether you can know who are the others in a space, whether you can communicate with them, whether the history orf their actions or of other's reactions to them persists and is accessible - in a mediated envionment these are all matters of design. The creators of the environment can choose to incorporate them into the interface, to allow (or require) users to provide such information. Many do not. There are numerous forums in which anonymous contributors write; there a places where communication among participants is difficult or discouraged. In such circumstances, reputation cannot be a socially motivating force.

In the online world identity, the ability to connect an action to a particular person or a sequence of actions to the same being, is especially problematic. The crux of individual identity is the body, which is absent online. One way of establishing identity in the mediated world is to connect the online persona to a physical being. Sometimes this is straightforward: if I sign my writings with my real name, my email address and work place, I've provided clear ties to my physical world self, connecting the online persona to the real wold self.Yet sometimes it is less straightforward: what if 10 people are colectively creating a single virtual persona? Another way is to use history and reputation to establish an online pseudonymous identity sufficiently robust and valuable to have at least some of function of an embodied identity, in that harm to the pseudonymous persona is significantly costly. If I spend a lot of time and effort establishing an online persona, that persona can have a functioning reputation; however, its value is still much lower than that of the embodied self: I am likely to be much more willing to discard even a long running persona than I am to risk bodily imprisonment or harm.

Anonymity, pseudonymity and known identity exist on a continuum of verifiable connection to a single physical self. Anonymity means that there is no connection to a physical self and little persistence in time. Pseudonymity means that there is no connection to a physical self but there is persistence in time. A pseudonym can have a reputation.

This week on Outriders a longer discussion as Clay Shirky chats about his new book Cognitive Surplus and how he switched from theater and the arts to new media observation.

The time that we may use to passively watch television or take in traditional media could be changing as audiences become active and productive consumers, not content to sit and watch when they can create something for themselves and their friends. A tricky dilemma while traditional media formats flounder or panic about new media models, but are we all prepared to play nice with the new arenas available to us?

An absolutely great interview with Clay Shirky. You can download the podcast recording.

BTW I haven't read Cognitive Surplus yet, but in the meantime Peter Kim has posted a review on the Dachis Group blog. My 1998 review of Shirky's earlier book, Here Comes Everybody, is on my old blog.

Wired magazine's Steven Levy says the 'Hackers' of the late 20th century set the philosophical base for the digital information age of today -- and he says their mind-set will shape our future.

I remember reading an electronic copy of Steven Levy's Hackers book downloaded to a PDA (I'm pretty sure, if I recall correctly, I had a Psion Series 5 at the time) during my daily commute across Sydney harbour back in the later part of the 1990s. I remember it feeling quite subversive just to be reading an electronic text, while everyone else had their heads stuck in a newspaper! Of course, the beauty of this book is that it challenges the common view of what hacking culture is all about - less about being illegal and more about being collaborative, through open technologies and an open and experimental culture.

In this radio interview with Levy, he comments:

There were so many people who read my book and told me it changed their lives, and this was then a fantastic experience. For me, to see so many people who have read my book saying it had an effect on them.

I'm not sure this book changed my life, but it certainly was very influential. It really must rank along with other books like Cluetrain (which Euan Semple reminded us about in his workshop at Headshift yesterday) and Being Digital as one of the classics of the digital era. BTW It appears that Hackers has recently been re-released as an updated 25th anniversary edition.

PS. What other *classics* of the digital era would you recommend? Feel free to add your suggestions to the comments.

Digital Nation is a US PBS produced documentary by Rachel Dretzin and Douglas Rushkoff, which examines the digital culture we how inhabit. There is a lot of focus on the impact of digital technology on how we learn and think, particularly the impact on the current generation of children and also virtual reality.

Rushkoff you might recall presented at the Headshift/Dachis Group's Social Business Summit. He was also recently interviewed on one of my favourite podcasts, Australia's ABC Radio National's Future Tense. Both the podcast and the documentary are both well worth a look.

Hat tip to Radio National and a big thanks to PBS for allowing non-US residents to watch it online.

The Scoop - Enterprise social media

Posted: Mon 12 Apr 2010 5:00PM

Can social networking sites really advance corporate productivity and profile? CIOs must take these services more seriously if they're to capitalise on this booming industry. The Scoop is joined by Anne Bartlett-Bragg, MD of Headshift Australia and Mike Handes, Innovation Lead for Collaboration Software, IBM.