Howard Rheingold's "Multi-User Dungeons and Alternate Identities"

In the article Multi-User Dungeons and Alternate Identities, the author, Howard Rheingold, discusses multi-user dungeons or “MUDs”. He describes “MUDs” as “imaginary worlds in computer databases where people use words and programming languages to improvise melodramas, build worlds and all objects in them, solve problems, invent amusements and tools, compete for prestige and power, gain wisdom, seek revenge, indulge greed and lust and violent impulses”. In the article Rheingold discusses the many ways these “MUDs” are used, but one of the main reasons he believes that these programs are being used is to help individuals escape reality or change their identity to become a whole different person. Rheingold states, “Similar to the way previous media dissolved social boundaries related to time and space, the latest computer-mediated communication media seem to dissolve boundaries of identity as well…( people) pretending to be somebody else”.

When thinking about Rheingold’s article in relation to something that is more commonly known among the general population, the idea of chat lines comes to mind. When someone calls a chat line they are calling to speak to a complete stranger, neither the caller nor the called has any idea of the other persons true identity. This means either person can become anyone they want, a teacher can become a millionaire entrepreneur or a housewife can become a sexy model. This is very similar to Rheingold’s definition of MUD’s, both of these things help people escape the reality of their day to day lives without truly leaving that life.

Andrew Keen's "The Noble Amateur"

In Andrew Keen’s article, The Noble Amateur he discusses how he feels about the idea of citizen journalists or journalists that have no formal training or expertise, but offer up their opinions as fact. Keen very much dislikes this idea and also websites such as Wikipedia and blogs that are widely read as factual information. He states that, “we are undermining the authority of the experts who contribute to a traditional resource like the Encyclopedia Britannica”, he goes on to say that the more these free, user-generated sites are used the more it threatens the core of our professional institutions. Keen believes that because of these types of websites, we, the people are suffering because we are not finding the correct information when researching because these sites are coming up and not sites that were written by experts in that area.

I would say that I disagree with the author because I believe that without some of these blogs and citizen journalists, we, the people would suffer because we would miss out on some first hand experiences of actual events that these “journalists” are witnessing and then writing about. Like for example during Hurricane Katrina witnesses that actually were experiencing the horrible devastation in New Orleans were able to capture what was truly happening there. They were able to let the rest of America know how they were feeling and what was actually occurring, compared to some news anchor in Indianapolis just telling us about the hurricane.

Also, just because an expert is giving us the information does not mean that it is always trustworthy. Another example would be the events that led up to the Iraq war. All the information we Americans received about Iraq and the impending war was gathered by experts. We later found out that all the information the “experts” gave us was not completely correct.

Keen states in the article that these citizen journalists “lack not only expertise and training, but connections and access information”, but I ask you who has more access someone who is actually there blogging about something they have or are experiencing or some prestigious, “expert” news journalists.