Rumors in the age of unreason

[chuck]

An interesting read from the New Yorker.

Here we are, quadrillions of bytes deep into the Information Age. And yet information, it seems, has never mattered less.

According to Cass R. Sunstein, the situation was to be anticipated. Sunstein, who for many years taught at the University of Chicago Law School, recently became the head of the White House Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs.



Sunstein begins with the relatively uncontroversial premise that a vigorous exchange of information is critical to the democratic process. As he acknowledges, the Web makes virtually unlimited amounts of information available; it is now possible to sit in a coffee shop in New York and read not just the newspapers from Chicago, Boston, and Los Angeles but also those from Cairo, Beijing, and London, while simultaneously receiving e-mail alerts on the latest movie openings and corporate mergers.



From this, it is often argued that the Internet is a boon to democracy—if information is good, then more information must be better. But, in



Sunstein’s view, the Web has a feature that is even more salient: at the same time that it makes more news available, it also makes more news avoidable.


“The most striking power provided by emerging technologies,” he has written, is the “growing power of consumers to ‘filter’ what they see.” Many of the most popular Web sites are still those belonging to the major news channels and papers—CNN, the BBC, the New York Times. Increasingly, though, people are getting information from these sites in a customized form, by subscribing to e-mails and RSS feeds on their favorite topics and skipping subjects they find less congenial.



Meanwhile, some of the fastest-growing sites are those which explicitly cater to their users’ ideologies. Left-leaning readers know, for example, that if they go to the Huffington Post or to AlterNet they will find stories that support their view of the world. Right-leaning readers know to go to the Drudge Report or to Newsmax to find stories that fit their preconceptions.

And what holds true for the news sites is even more so for the blogosphere, where it’s possible to spend hours surfing without ever entering new waters.

The last couple of threads on here show some of the signs of what's discussed in the article - particularly how those of one opinion rarely talk to others of differing opinions.

Having argued my way through a few threads (when I was hot-headed and fervourish) back in 2001 and 2002 - I'm not blameless. I read what mongoose is spouting and wonder if I ever came across like that.

Anyway - thoughts?