• I think this is an extremely important comment. One partial explanation that those who do work often with wikis will of course understand is that there are many people here to whom the experience is new, so they are doing a predictable thing: they are using a new tool in a familiar old way. In this case, they are blogging with it. We will start active refactoring later this week, which will melt most of the blog commentary away very quickly, because on editing we will find there's much repetitive rhetoric and unsupported speculation, which we don't need to retain. A few good points have been made along the way, and they will look all the more impressive when they're not enmeshed in the back-and-forth of commentary as they are now. But you can't learn anything about what we've read, or even about the less controversial and more theoretical portions of the ideas I have wound around the arguments we have read, by reading the wiki. Makalika is not only right that there's been much heartfelt blogging, but also that this has displaced doing the intellectual job one might have thought the wiki was here to help us do. I said the wiki was for active listening, and instead it's turned out to be for arguing with me and worrying about whether I am so retributive towards people who are arguing with me that people might stop arguing with me. We can and will change the direction, working together to use the wiki in a more conventional and collaborative fashion. But I think the best part of Makalika's comment isn't just that she has shown a problem. It's that she's asked us to think about why we have the problem--not only in the sense of determining what it costs us, but also what it helps us to do, and in what therefore its attractiveness consists. And that's a very important question. Because inexperience in using wikis is not by any means the only cause in giving this one--made in this community's image--the character it has.

Barb, thanks for your constant support. Makalika, I admire what you say. You burst my bubble in a tenth of the time it took me to blow it up. My response is, To take on a "consilient" view of the class and the world it's about, I have conflated the class's form with its content. The use of the TWiki itself, and everything else unconventional about the class management, is part of the education. Everything in this class is so new, to legal education and to us, that it must be an experiment. For better or for worse, I have started a dialogue that will permit us to EXPERIENCE firsthand the ideas we're talking about. That seemed to me to be the preexisting theme of the course. I suppose I might have asked privately, but I also assumed that in WikiCulture? , Secrets Secrets Are No Fun.

Your last sentence is the most compelling. It does teach me a lesson, which is that I should stop asking meta-questions of "What is this class about," and confront the material head-on. Still, at some early point I internalized the idea that the class is precisely About Questioning Authority. It's entirely possible I just brought that assumption to the table -- a chip on my shoulder. Either way, it makes me hesitate to take any one stand against the material. It makes me schizophrenic. Really, can anyone in this class distinguish, for certain, the Form from the Content?

P.S. Eben, there is one thing I'd like to apologize for, and that is setting a precedent for referring to you in the third person. I need to fire my proofreader.

-- AndrewGradman - 26 Jan 2008

I'm freaked out that we need a Constitution, Bill of Rights, revolution, etc.

The way this community is using the wiki is really interesting and new to me. I've seen wiki's used in lots of companies (I even implemented MediaWiki? at my last job, woohoo me) and their general purpose is to centrally store facts relevant to the community (a funny example I've seen is a wiki category devoted to providing definitions of nonsensical words that a co-worker notorious for making up her own adjectives commonly used).

I guess there's no "wrong" type of content, but my point is that the general tone of conversation seems odd. I sort of expected more discussion specifically on ideas relevant to our readings, notices of other references to check out to expand understanding, etc. We so far have some of that, but we also have a lot of elaborate discussion on classroom management, predictions about what Eben is feeling or "wants" us to say/think, and general venting. I'm not trying to criticize, but let's think about this. Especially because, although participation in wiki discussions is probably limited by many factors (time, general interest, comfort with the technology, etc) I think the direction that the existing conversations take will influence how many people participate in this community at all.

-- MakalikaNaholowaa - 26 Jan 2008

Andrew and Daniel, In case you’re curious about what someone thinks about this “free speech” issue who has been, according to another observer, “blasted” by Eben, I agree for the most part with Daniel, but would tweak and expand the analysis a little further: I don’t think his critiques are meant as "anti-speech," but I assume he is aware that his critiques lead, as you say, to some of our brains occasionally exploding at the collision. And what is the nature of this collision? I think it is largely his refusal to meet our expectation that teachers respond to our remarks with a modicum of diplomacy, fewer and less intense episodes of histrionics, and more of an exhibition of what is currently termed "emotional intelligence." [Don’t get me wrong on the emotional intelligence part: I don’t think he’s devoid of it, I just think he refuses to show much of it.] In other words, it’s not so much what he says that tends to chill expression, but how he says it. I don't think he can't meet our behavioral expectations, it's just that he refuses to do so. Why? Perhaps to get us to think outside of our little self-imposed boxes, and he knows he can do this more effectively by lobbing his data, observations, and opinions into the classroom arena in this manner. My suggestion (for whatever this is worth): try not to take the theatrics too seriously (or personally), listen to what he says, but think for yourself.

-- BarbPitman - 26 Jan 2008

We must protect free (TWiki) speech.

Your ideas of "free speech" and prior restraint are almost completely at odds with mine. Prohibiting "critiques that deter people from speaking freely," if you could do it, would be a prior restraint. The critiques are not restraint--they're speech. Prior restraint would be Eben's deactivating your account or running your posts through a moderation queue.

Eben's critiques probably /chill/ speech to some degree, but they aren't some distinct sort of "anti-speech"--even if our brains occasionally explode at the collision.

-- DanielHarris - 25 Jan 2008

How should we use that potential?

We must protect free speech.

AdamCarlis suggested some values. Fortunately, I don't think anyone's violated them yet. But I'd like to add: No Prior Restraint. That includes critiques that deter people from speaking freely. If suppressing those critiques advances free speech, then we should sacrifice a piece for the sake of the whole.

Shall we defend free speech on our TWiki, from enemies foreign and domestic? Answer here, or don't answer at all: either will answer my question.
-- AndrewGradman - 24 Jan 2008

I say the prisoners should take over this prison. For a few reasons. First of all, because we all believe in free speech. __. Second, for those of you who are concerned about grades, I've thought really hard about the rules of the game, and I think that's what we're supposed to do to win.

AdamCarlis got us started on a Bill of Rights.

democracy by default, I believe we must protect our democracy.

I don't know if I can assert that I see the TWiki as being designed for free speech. I don't remember Prof. Eben presenting it as being ofr that. If anything, I remember him discussing it as a manner to evaluate contributions/participation to a degree. Because of this element, I can see some people being very concerned about what they say, how they say it, how many times they contribute etc as opposed to a townsquare. I think the Bill of Rights is an interesting idea. I might just say I think the operating norms is more useful because a Bill of Rights implies there is an enforcement mechanism. However the problem with operating norms is that unless enough of us see them and agree to them, they may not work towards a useful purpose. Sadly as I write this I wouldn't want others not to speak freely, I just feel I'm being honest about how people interact.

-- MichaelBrown - 25 Jan 2008

Begin Garbage

More garbage: Words on the TWiki should not be subject to this constraint, because I think of the TWiki as our asylum That saddens me, and the TWiki is the best forum for us to hear each other, and the safest forum for us to learn from each other. None of us responded to Barb’s post online before Eben did in class. (Admittedly, her post went up just a few hours before class, so it's not like Eben pre-empted us: we were just lazy.) Eben responded generously, thoroughly, cogently. And, I imagine that Barb was looking for peer insight; perhaps that's why she raised the idea on the TWiki. Had she introduced her ideas by raising her hand in class, I worry that others may now feel uncomfortable responding—even here, on the TWiki, and not just to Barb but to others in the future. My own opinions are irrepressible, but What we say here, and what the professor says in class, is Free Speech. And we all agree that

End Garbage.

Maybe the values of free speech can be advanced by sacrificing a little free speech. Public speech conveys private values, and not all private speakers can be treated equally, even in the forum. Some private values are best understood by a limited audience. These ideas need to gestate there before they can be challenged publicly.

Eben, I am not saying that you, the teacher, should not critique the TWiki! The TWiki is a DMZ, not an insane asylum. We all should critique the TWiki. But we should also shape those critiques to encourage responses, even if those responses can't survive anywhere—except the TWiki.

What do you guys think—was the TWiki designed for free speech? If so, is its design successful, both internally and accounting for exogenous forces? Am I exaggerating the chilling effects of Free Speech by Authority Figures? If you won't risk your own hides to answer these questions, that's fine too: Say nothing until class next week, and we will learn the answer experimentally.

Last week, I would have told those classmates what I posted under ClassNotes17Jan08:
The professor believes in open information, and … this class is, after all, about challenging authority. I grant that Eben presents a difficult classroom environment for that. But I theorize that he asserts his opinions so strongly in class to force us to absorb them ("listen"), so that we can only critique them later—i.e., after thinking—i.e., intelligently. He reserved the TWiki as our forum for that critique.

I value the power of free speech to hone ideas. If anything, Eben, your rhetorical style prepares us for the disputes we should expect if we hope to become passionate intellectuals debating other passionate intellectuals, and that is why I enjoy confronting it—here, on the TWiki, where no one can shut me up.

But TWiki censorship also emerges from social forces external to its rules. Free Speech that deters Free Speech is a "prior restraint" on speech, functionally if not legally. Authority figures can mobilize laughter, which is a kind of public force. And many of us respect teachers as authority figures. And many of us confuse descriptive statements for prescriptive ones, since that is what humans do. And many of us can't learn to think like lawyers by learning to argue like lawyers, because we who can't yet argue like lawyers will default to surrender.

Eben, I am not saying that you, the teacher, should not respond to the TWiki, here or in class! But maybe the values of free speech benefit by sacrificing a little free speech, and this applies to us all. Public speech conveys private values, and not all private speakers can be treated equally, even in the forum. Some ideas are best understood by a limited audience. Some ideas need to gestate publicly before they can be challenged publicly.

What do you guys think—was the TWiki designed for free speech? If so, is its design successful, both internally and accounting for exogenous forces? You don’t have to go out on a limb to answer these questions: Say nothing until class next week, and we will find out the answer experimentally.
-- AndrewGradman - 24 Jan 2008

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