Social Networks and the Internet Society

-- By ScottMcKinney - 07 Dec 2009

First draft is ready for comments from anyone.

Introduction

Everyday, the internet society becomes more and more interconnected in a complex web of social networks. Users now have the ability to easily interact with their social networks anytime and anywhere through the use of internet-capable smart phones. As the privacy ramifications of social networks have been covered on this wiki in detail (see Makalkika's paper, Kamel's paper, Heather's paper, and Donna's paper), this paper seeks to explore the possible cognitive ramifications of social networks.

A recent paper by Viktor Mayer-Schönberger raises several interesting questions: In the context of open-source, anarchist production of software, can reliance on social networks actually inhibit the production of innovative code? In general, is the ability of people to connect with others around the globe hurting creative thinking?

Groupthink

Mayer-Schönberger argues that social networks produce a phenomenon known as groupthink. Groupthink occurs when a social group becomes extremely cohesive and acquires the ability to function together with minimal explanations. A group is especially vulnerable to groupthink once it becomes insulated from outside influences. The negative effect of group think is that members of the group avoid radical views and are naturally discouraged from “outside-the-box” thinking—as this would disrupt the cohesion of the group.

Open-source products like Linux and Firefox can theoretically be modified by anyone. As Eben covered in class, thousands of programmers throughout the world can work to debug, fine tune, and innovate open-source programs. Hopefully, the best solutions find their way to the top. However, sometimes the groupthink mentality brought about by social networks can actually inhibit open-source development. For instance, a product like Firefox might develop quickly at first, but as the group of developers become more interconnected, innovations become more miniscule. Now, most changes to Firefox are extremely minor tweaks. Instead of huge jumps forward, radical individual innovations are either naturally discarded by the group, or not put forward at all because the individual does not want to stir the pot.

Furthermore, Mayer-Schönberger and others point out that with open-source software, a “lock-in” effect can occur. For instance, when Facebook opened up its API it quickly overtook Myspace, as third party developers became free to develop applications to work with Facebook (Myspace uses a notoriously closed system). Essentially, Facebook got thousands of programmers to develop its site for free; this open-source system worked incredibly well for Facebook. Unfortunately, after years of development using the API, it’s now much harder for Facebook to change its API, because thousands of applications within the Facebook community rely on the old API, and are essentially entrenched or “locked in” to the old way of doing things. Combine the locked in effect with groupthink, and programmers are not likely to invest time in radical innovations, because these innovations would simply not be implemented into the existing system.

Positive Developments

Despite the negative implications of groupthink, social networks and social media have positive effects on human cognitive processes and society in general. Social network users are constantly bombarded with a variety of information. People often worry that encountering too much information reduces their ability to retain it. However, a study by Sanda Erdelez shows that this is not the case. In fact, people who accidentally discover or “bump into” random information are generally able to recall that incident (it is not lost in the shuffle). Furthermore, social networks and media provide a limitless supply of unexpected opportunities. When is the last time that you discovered something new and interesting—something you would otherwise likely never have considered—through trivial use of an online social network? It happens to me all of the time. As a result, I learn new things, appreciate ideas from a different point of view, and generally expand my horizons.

Despite warnings that social networks reduce critical thinking, social networks have begun to be used effectively within the medical community. Servo is changing the way doctors think and practice medicine. It is a social network open exclusively to doctors. When a doctor comes across a medical condition that the doctor may not recognize, he or she can post a blog question to the medical community. The community of doctors rates the usefulness of the post, can answer multiple choice polls, and can leave individual comments. Through this system, doctors are able to call upon the knowledge and experience of 110,000 (and counting) fellow practitioners. Unknown maladies are quickly diagnosed, and doctors quickly learn the “best” solution to both common and rare medical problems. Asking someone else how to do something may not be “critical thinking,” but it is surely extremely beneficial in the medical field. Servo may produce an environment in which the need for innovation is diminished, but the social utility it creates surely outweighs any negative cognitive impact.

Conclusions

As a former computer programmer who worked on large projects, it seems apparent to me that at least some of what Mayer-Schönberger suggests rings true. More often than not, the truly innovative solutions to a coding dilemma come from the lone programmer, not from teamwork or an environment in which individual programmers know that their ideas will be scrutinized by committee. However, peer produced, open source programming has repeatedly proven to be extremely effective, and for many types of applications it is clearly the best way to develop software. While it may be true that the groupthink mentality, combined with the natural “locked in” nature of the net leads to less radical thinking, does this negative outweigh the positives brought about by social networks (privacy concerns aside)? No—now, people all over the world have the ability to educate themselves on any topic and communicate and learn with the entirety of humanity.

The groupthink phenomenon is simply the natural way in which humans function. While there may be some drawbacks to social networks, they are here to stay. We should therefore focus on educating the public of the possible cognitive pitfalls of social networks, and encourage them to work to prevent social network groupthink, and promote critical and radical thinking.

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