Google as the 5th Estate

July 28, 2010 Leave a Comment

Wikipedia lists the “5th Estate” as an ambiguous addition to the traditional “estates,” including the clergy (1st Estate), nobility (2nd Estate), commoners (3rd Estate), and the press (4th Estate). The term (according to Wikipedia)has been used to describe Max Headroom in Our Ethertrade unions, the poor, the blogosphere and organized crime. It can also be used to describe media outlets that see themselves in opposition to mainstream (“Fourth Estate”) media.

If you believe Larry Page, a co-founder of Google, their vision is to marry artificial intelligence with search engines so powerful they would understand “everything in the world.” A couple of years ago Google further stated a corporate vision to “organize the world’s information and make it universally accessible and useful.”

A very compelling and interesting vision, until you begin to understand the extent of that capability. On a positive note it gives us a way find and access codified knowledge we’d never gain exposure to under normal conditions (pre-Google and Internet “normal conditions”), but on the other end of the spectrum personal information and confidential information is also collected, indexed, and made available to anybody with access to a search engine.

Posting a blog entry may get you indexed within seconds, as would posting pictures of your family. Your tax records, home information, educational records, and other personal information, if not guarded with near military discipline (oops, forgot about wikileaks.com), will expose parts of your life never expected to the other 4.5 billion people around the world who may have a voyeuristic or nefarious interest in your life.

Going Nose-to-Nose with a Sovereign Nation

However, perhaps the most interesting step into uncharted territory with Google is in their recent conflict with China.

Google took issue with China’s censorship of search engine results, as well as cyber-terrorism it alleged was raged by Chinese government hackers, who obtained confidential information and email data from Google as well as at least 20 other private companies in what Google described “as a highly sophisticated attack.” (Red Herring)

The issue here is not censorship, the issue is the rights of a sovereign nation, versus the development of a global utility that transcends the control of a nation over its citizens. Kind of a new United Nations of Cyber managed by Google.

China is a good target, as self-righteous citizens of western countries reject the socialist political/cultural environment in the world’s most populous country. Of course those who believe in western conspiracy would note that Google has been linked to the CIA and other global intelligence agencies since inception (1), (2), (3), etc., by a variety of mainstream media and private websites.

But what does happen when a private company reaches a level of power that allows it to set both foreign and domestic policy in sovereign nations? Is there a point when the UK, must check with Google for approval before signing privacy or security policy into law? At what point does a private company “cross over the line” of providing a global utility and become a global “big brother?”

Max Headroom Returns to Our Ether

We’ve written about Max Headroom in the past, and he recently pop-p-p-p-ped up in conversations and magazine artiocles, including Wired Magazine. Max Headroom’s world, although brought to us in 1985, is almost creepy in its relevance to modern times. Just swap Television, studios, and TV with Internet and SEO ratings.

“In the post-apocalyptic future where television sets are more important than food, TV ratings are the all important currency of the nation. A new technique of preventing viewers from channel surfing proves somewhat detrimental to particularly sedentary couch potatoes. The top studio becomes concerned: dead viewers make for low ratings. Edison Carter, top news reporter, is sent to find out more. After a motorcycle accident, his mind is preserved by wizz-kid Bryce and becomes his wise cracking, computer generated alter-ego: Max Headroom, who manages to boost ratings above those of any live hosts to date…”

Is Google and Google SEO the new global currency? Is Google search engine placement more important to a company than Euros, RMB, or Dollars? Is Google the next Max Headroom, an omnipresent component of all aspects of our life, more important than our national or cultural identity?

Maybe it is Time to Change

Our lives are now wired with laptop computers, smart phones, Netbooks, Twitter, Facebook, Google, Yahoo, and Internet. You cannot walk a block without being presented with license plates, billboards, handouts, or airplanes pulling banners or skywriting URLs flogging some Internet site or service. Part of every person’s life in our current world. And Bluetooth has drilled it into our heads with Skype and other applications transcending the government controlled communications infrastructure with packetized everything-over-IP applications.

Binding this together brings Facebooks and Googles into the basic infrastructure of the new world, almost to the point of transcending the value of fiber optics, wireless networks, routers, servers, and switches.

While uncomfortable to us 50-somethings, we are witnessing a harbinger of the future. The future is wired. The future is a global community with little respect for borders and culture. The wired world is the 5th Estate. Only question is if Google or Facebook will join the first four estates as individual companies as representatives of the 5th Estate.

Filed under International ICT, Internet and Telecom, Social Issues, Social Networking Tagged with , , , ,

Social Media Enabling Asia

July 15, 2010 3 Comments

The Huffington Post recently posted a blog by Thomas Crampton highlighting some of the differences between social media use in Asian countries vs. the United States. Much of it driven by broadband deployment in technically advanced countries like South Korea, Japan, and Hong Kong (yes, I know…), much of it a burning desire by young people in developing countries who want to expand their social and intellectual evolution.

Indonesia is now the second largest user of Facebook in the world. Poor broadband access (generally), low disposable income to buy personal computers, and moral guidelines pressuring young people to follow religious values. How is it possible they could develop that fast?

Growth rates in broadband and mobile access are astounding, with statistics such as Vietnam’s mobile Internet users growing 846% in 2009, 84.3% of Japanese online to the Internet with a mobile phone, and 48.6% of Hong Kong mobile users connecting with a smart phone.

Oh, and mobile phones in Asia are inexpensive. Really, really inexpensive. Almost anybody can afford a mobile phone, and many do – occasionally at the expense of clothing, food, and shelter. In fact, I was able to buy a prepaid phone with around 250 minutes in Jakarta for less than US$20, with messaging, simple data access, and other net-enabled applications.

So the mobile phone represents a means of communication, added to a basic social status issue, and a door to emotional and intellectual exploration and freedom.

What is different in Asia than in the US?

Well, a couple of things for certain. When you start with nearly zero social and technical penetration, and you have the benefit of receiving a relatively mature technology, then it is easy to statistically go from zero to nine hundred miles an hour.

Also, consider the average young person in a country like Indonesia or Vietnam. You go to the occasional movie, you have an opportunity to watch foreign television shows, and you realize it is a very, very big world. Lots of diversity you would not be exposed to without the benefit of technology. Even more, you understand there are real people living in that huge world who are not simple digital renditions of a movie producer’s fantasy.

The Internet helps bring a young person in Jakarta, Samarinda, Semarang, Banda Aceh, or Merauke to Paris, Cape Town, or Burbank. Facebook puts a name and face to distant lands, cultures, and people. And when that young person goes home to their dormitory, house, or relocation home they have a glimmer, even if it is a faint glimmer, of hope that life could be better than it is today.

And Internet access, with social networking provides an additional escape. Whether it be joining a virtual gaming community, or chatting with persons on a different continent, you are able to escape your surroundings for a brief moment. That moment may be in an Internet café (WarNets in Indonesia), it may be in a home, or it may be at school.

Of course, not everybody in Indonesia, Vietnam, Malaysia, Cambodia, or Laos are poor or underprivileged.

Social Freedom

Asian culture is different than western culture. In many countries it is not easy to be open with relationships, activities, or personal preferences. While American kids certainly find their escape in gaming and social networking, it is even more of an outlet for many young people in Asia.

If you live in a strict religious environment – as many in Asia do, which restricts your ability to freely express yourself in the local “real” community, being able to develop new ideas, discover new ideas outside the control of your “thought leaders,” is an attraction. Facebook and other social networking sites offer a global conduit of hundreds of millions of other people who may also desire to share experiences and ideas.

And the Future

In the past, Americans enjoyed a fair level of economic and social security based on high levels of education, and the desire to increase their status and quality of life. We looked at developing countries with little interest, and in fact many Americans still cannot find more than a dozen countries on a world map.

Young people in developing countries such as those in Asia, who are included in those astonishing statistics of locations rapidly embracing technology and social networking, are hungry. Hungry not only for knowledge, but also hungry to improve their quality of life, with an added hook of national identity and pride.

The intellectual skills gained through accessing Internet and diffusing global communications into their life will give those persons in developing countries the same intellectual tools American enjoy, putting them on a level intellectual playing field. With the additional ability to participate in eLearning, those intellectual tools become more important – particularly when compared to the dwindling education levels and achievements in America’s education system.

Social networking sites may help draw young people to the Internet, but once there the skills learned far outweigh the social value Facebook or other sites provide. With the largest countries in the world representing the fastest growing component of the internet (China, India, Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand), within another generation or two those young people may intellectually match or exceed the capabilities of their age group counterparts in the United States and Europe.

This is all good, as educated people generally are much more likely to quickly recover from disasters, are less likely to become involved in extremist movements, and are more likely to break down political, cultural, and secular barriers that have polarized nations in the past.

It is scary to Americans, as we will need to prepare ourselves to accept the rest of the world as our intellectual and economic equals. It is inevitable.

Filed under Burbank, International ICT, Internet and Telecom, Open Topics, Social Issues, Social Networking Tagged with , , , , ,

Riding the Economic Roller Coaster of TransJakarta Route 1

July 3, 2010 1 Comment

The little girl, not more than 4 or 5 years old, was lying motionless in a fetal position, discarded like trash, on a ramp leading to the Sarinah station on TransJakarta‘s Route 1. Passersby displayed only one emotion – annoyance they had to step over, or step around the little body. A little body that had never known the joy of a birthday party, the warmth of a nurturing family, or a family picnic in the park.

Showing the main routes, including Route 1Two stops down the road, at the Tosari Station, sits Plaza Indonesia, an icon to opulence with customers slurping iced lattes and munching scones at a Starbucks, taking a much needed break from power shopping at Christian Dior or Cartier.

The TransJakarta is Jakarta’s attempt at building a mass transit system within the capital city. With 7 major routes, it rivals cities such as Los Angeles in the ability to serve large numbers of people needing to get around the large metropolitan area of Jakarta. All riding on buses traversing dedicated busways which bypass some of the epic traffic jams which routinely gridlock nearly all areas of the city.

Route 1 begins at Blok M, and slices its way through the city center to Station Kota at the north end of Jakarta. Riding the route takes about 40 minutes, and you get to experience all the good, the bad, and the ugly of Jakarta.

Starting at Blok M

Medium qaulity mall near Blok M StationBlok M is known for both shopping and nightlife. With shopping malls running from hundreds of small kiosks in the Blok M Terminal, to new higher end shopping malls within 100 meters of the terminal, Blok M has all the shopping you can handle. But it is the nightlife that most foreigners and expats consider when heading to Blok M. Blok M is known for loud bars, with wall-to-wall working girls, and taxi drivers who take the dumber tourists on long rides throughout the city of Jakarta while enroute to hotels and other destinations.

Station from top of RampThe other part of Blok M is the dust, the trash piling up on streets and sidewalks, and grubby little kids asking for money. Always the kids asking for money.

You work your way up Route 1 to the beginning of a scattering of high end shopping malls, including Senayan City, Pacific Place, Plaza Semmangi, and Plaza Indonesia. Immediately adjacent to most high end shopping malls are small communities of homeless people living in cardboard boxes or lean-to shacks. There is the irony, you go shopping or eating donuts a J. Co at City Walk Mall, and the trek back to your hotel passes through a fairly large homeless community surrounding the Intercontinental Hotel or le Meridien.

The Le Meridien Pool next to Abandoned Construction SiteEach station requires you to walk up a ramp, cross an over pass, and walk down another ramp to the bus ticket stand and platform. Passing children and a photo album of disabled persons with ailments that – if you do not harden your heart and soul to the images, will keep you up long hours at night thinking.

The entire corridor leading from Senayan City to the area around the National Monument (MONAS) resembles a deep ravine resting between skyscrapers hitting 60+ stories housing every multinational company in existence. There is a tremendous amount of money passing back and forthnear the Monument MONAS Bus Station between the buildings creating this Grand Canyon of Jakarta. You can dine at the Jakarta Hard Rock Café, the Outback Steak House, Tony Romas, or Burger King and McDonalds – all within a 15 minute bus ride on the TJ-1.

Heading North to the Kota Station

As you pass the National Monument, Jakarta’s landscape starts to change back to the dust and poverty we started with at Blok M. The buildings start to show more and more signs of decay, the people showing more and more signs of despair, and the smell of open sewage hits your senses. Then you realize it is actually a small stream, a living part of the sewage system, and there are children playing next to it.

You cannot escape the smell near streamsAdd the thick, syrupy smell of diesel exhaust, 2 stroke motor engines, and sidewalk vendors cooking over open fire, and you wonder how a child could possibly make it to 5 years old without serious lung problems.

You pass Mangga Besar and Olimo, famous in the expat community for its massage parlors and prostitution, and finally find your way to the end of the line at Station Kota. Straddling the port on one side, a shopping mall on the east (Mangga Duo), and a concentration of museums adjacent to the station, it is a mix of images and senses that don’t quite fit into one small geographic postage stamp in the city.

A poriton of sky scraper alley in JakartaOne afternoon, 20 bus stations, and a million images, emotions, and memories. Nowhere in the world can you observe the best and worst of life in such concentration. As a foreigner, taking pictures of everything I see, you would expect a reaction of annoyance and contempt from those who become part of your album. But not once did I receive a negative response, a sharp comment, or even a cold stare. Almost a feeling of people wanting the scenes to be recorded, preserved forever. Recorded so nobody forgets Jakarta the way it is, was, and provide a basis for what Jakarta can aspire to for the future.

I won’t use a picture of the little girl on the ramp, as it would be a dishonor to her memory. But I won’t forgetObama at Plaza Indonesia that a little life, and her memory is recorded, and the image will never be lost. Too bad she couldn’t beg, I would have given her something, anything.

900 words in a blog cannot describe Jakarta. It is a wonderful city, one of the great cities in the world. Great memories, horrifying memories.

LA has South Central, San Francisco the Tenderloin District, Chicago has the South Side, and Honolulu has Hotel Street. We cannot be sanctimonious, as every country and city has poverty and rough areas.

Bus station near Le Meridien HotelAt some point, whether it is the Philippines, Mongolia, China, Indonesia, Thailand, Mexico, Uganda, or Palestine, poor areas all start looking the same. The sad thing is that once they all start looking the same, we become accustomed to seeing poverty, and it does not bother us any longer. It almost becomes expected and natural to step over little girls discarded on the side of a road.

Then we are in an airplane, 16 hours later we pop out in Burbank, and again prioritize worrying abHigh Tech mall near Station Kotaout getting a jaywalking ticket for walking across San Fernando Road outside of a painted cross walk on your way to Fuddruckers.

It is a roller coaster

NOTE:  You can see full sized pictures by clicking on each photo.

You can see all photos HERE

Filed under Burbank, Social Issues Tagged with , , , , , , , ,

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