The Submission

[Twinky]

Skyrider recently posted this extract from some blog:

This Story Stinks

By DOMINIQUE BROSSARD and DIETRAM A. SCHEUFELE

Published: March 2, 2013 352 Comments

IN the beginning, the technology gods created the Internet and saw that it was good. Here, at last, was a public sphere with unlimited potential for reasoned debate and the thoughtful exchange of ideas, an enlightening conversational bridge across the many geographic, social, cultural, ideological and economic boundaries that ordinarily separate us in life, a way to pay bills without a stamp.

Then someone invented “reader comments” and paradise was lost.

The Web, it should be said, is still a marvelous place for public debate. But when it comes to reading and understanding news stories online — like this one, for example — the medium can have a surprisingly potent effect on the message. Comments from some readers, our research shows, can significantly distort what other readers think was reported in the first place.

But here, it’s not the content of the comments that matters. It’s the tone.

In a study published online last month in The Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication, we and three colleagues report on an experiment designed to measure what one might call “the nasty effect.”

We asked 1,183 participants to carefully read a news post on a fictitious blog, explaining the potential risks and benefits of a new technology product called nanosilver. These infinitesimal silver particles, tinier than 100-billionths of a meter in any dimension, have several potential benefits (like antibacterial properties) and risks (like water contamination), the online article reported.

Then we had participants read comments on the post, supposedly from other readers, and respond to questions regarding the content of the article itself.

Half of our sample was exposed to civil reader comments and the other half to rude ones — though the actual content, length and intensity of the comments, which varied from being supportive of the new technology to being wary of the risks, were consistent across both groups. The only difference was that the rude ones contained epithets or curse words, as in: “If you don’t see the benefits of using nanotechnology in these kinds of products, you’re an idiot” and “You’re stupid if you’re not thinking of the risks for the fish and other plants and animals in water tainted with silver.”

The results were both surprising and disturbing. Uncivil comments not only polarized readers, but they often changed a participant’s interpretation of the news story itself.

In the civil group, those who initially did or did not support the technology — whom we identified with preliminary survey questions — continued to feel the same way after reading the comments. Those exposed to rude comments, however, ended up with a much more polarized understanding of the risks connected with the technology.

Simply including an ad hominem attack in a reader comment was enough to make study participants think the downside of the reported technology was greater than they’d previously thought.

While it’s hard to quantify the distortional effects of such online nastiness, it’s bound to be quite substantial, particularly — and perhaps ironically — in the area of science news.

An estimated 60 percent of the Americans seeking information about specific scientific matters say the Internet is their primary source of information — ranking it higher than any other news source.

Our emerging online media landscape has created a new public forum without the traditional social norms and self-regulation that typically govern our in-person exchanges — and that medium, increasingly, shapes both what we know and what we think we know.

One possible approach to moderate the nasty effect, of course, is to shut down online reader comments altogether, as some media organizations and bloggers have done. Paul Krugman’s blog post on this newspaper’s Web site on the 10th anniversary of Sept. 11, for instance, simply ended with “I’m not going to allow comments on this post, for obvious reasons.”

Other media outlets have devised rules to promote civility or have actively moderated reader comments.

But as they say, the genie is out of the bottle. Reader interaction is part of what makes the Web the Web — and, for that matter, Facebook, Twitter and every other social media platform what they are. This phenomenon will only gain momentum as we move deeper into a world of smart TVs and mobile devices where any type of content is immediately embedded in a constant stream of social context and commentary.

It’s possible that the social norms in this brave new domain will change once more — with users shunning meanspirited attacks from posters hiding behind pseudonyms and cultivating civil debate instead.

Until then, beware the nasty effect.

It put me in mind of a book I've just finished: "The Submission." The book was longlisted for the 2012 Orange Prize for Fiction, a prestigious award. The longlist describes the book thus:

What happens when the winner of an anonymous competition for an architect to design a new memorial on Ground Zero in the immediate aftermath of 9/11 turns out to be a Muslim? This is the premise of Waldman’s audacious debut novel, also shortlisted for the Guardian First Book Award last year. With a diverse range of characters, multiple storylines and willingness to address some of the biggest questions today, The Submission marks the arrival of a significant talent.

The Financial Times says:

The best 9/11 novel to date...a deeply thoughtful and moving account of the myriad ways in which, when the towers came down, the US psyche became a casualty too.

I include the reviews so that you might take the novel's premise seriously. And it is a very good, readable book.

The plot line is that a memorial is designed, in open competition, for the Twin Towers victims. The jury sees only the designs; they don't know who has prepared the design. The chosen design is by a 2nd generation architect, quiet, gets on with his life and interferes with nobody, committed to good design, clean lines, simplicity. And he is a non-observant...Muslim.

The book moves the story on through a leak to the press and a disreputable reporter out to make a name for herself reporting this in provocative language, causing local furore, growing international furore, people become increasingly polarised in their views, and everybody is up in arms at everybody else. Local communities turn in on themselves, Americans come to fear all Muslims, Muslim countries verbally attack the USA, and physical attacks of increasing violence, culminating in the death of a totally innocent person, start breaking out. Many lies are told about each different faction and in particular about the architect, who has led a quiet, all-American life and who is totally apolitical.

The architect is blamed for all of this aggression taking place...because he is a (nominal) Muslim. Yet he has done nothing at all except submit a design, which is chosen by the committee as being the best design.

I hope the book is intended to be satirical. I fear it may not be...

The power of written words - whether on the Internet or in a book... so important to mind what we say, whether said in written or spoken words.

Do we polarise in what we say, or do we agree quickly with adversaries, those of other opinions, backgrounds or beliefs? Can we agree to differ? Can we honestly say we decide on merit and not on our own prejudices?