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BEING, SPACE, AND TIME ON THE WEB

BEING, SPACE, AND TIME ON THE WEB. Michalis Vafopoulos Vafopoulos.org National Technical University of Athens. The Web space is:. Everywhere Controversial Contradictory Unusual Complex Dynamic – “live” system . the new ecosystem. What is changing?

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BEING, SPACE, AND TIME ON THE WEB

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  1. BEING, SPACE, AND TIME ON THE WEB Michalis Vafopoulos Vafopoulos.org National Technical University of Athens

  2. The Web space is: • Everywhere • Controversial • Contradictory • Unusual • Complex • Dynamic – “live” system

  3. the new ecosystem What is changing? New issues: personal and global agenda Prosumers: Self-powered production Inter-creativity: Distributed collaborative production Non market & non property production What is needed? New analysis New governance New values

  4. New analysis: Web science beforeWWW after 3/18

  5. New analysis: Web science • a trans-disciplinary field • Web as its primary object of study • Web= techno-social artifact • positive or negative? Transformative! 3/18

  6. Web science • envelope question what technological and other changes need to be made in order for the Web to work better for more people? 3/18

  7. Two magics of Web Science Web & Philosophy

  8. Web

  9. Google

  10. Semantic Web

  11. Web science perspective what changes need to be incorporated in the Web to best serve humanity? Can science & philosophy help in this direction? How?

  12. Research question I What are the main characteristics of being, space, and time on the Web if it is considered a self-contained system that exists in and by itself?

  13. Research question II How do these idiosyncratic features of the Web transform the traditional conceptions about physicalbeing, space and time?

  14. Outline • Hypotheses • Being, space & time in the Web • Applications • Hayek’s freedom • 3-level analysis • The Technological Web • The Contextualized Web • The Economic Web • Results & discussion

  15. Being, space & time on the Web • Being:exists if and only if there is a communication channel linking to it • Web beings: beingscommunicated through the Web • Web space: the Web being’s URI, incoming & outgoing links • Web time: visiting durations

  16. The easy part: criticism “Web … resource” • economic and ecological connotations • human, natural, renewable etc. • land, labor, and capital • 12 appearancesin Economics classification • Wikipedia: not a word about Internet/Web thing” • Not descriptive, too general, multiple meanings

  17. Beingon the Web • practical & general definition • Include some existing theories e.g. • “Dasein (Heidegger) • “circulating entities” (ANT), revert dichotomy individuals - society

  18. Beingon the Web • “to have” (e.g., friends, connections, identities) becomes of equal importance to “to be” • should be studied along with the various manifestations of “to be.”

  19. URI -1 • minimal description of invariant elements in communication through the Web • borderline, interlocutor & fingerprint of Web being • enables transformation from digital to Web

  20. URI -2 • directly connected to existence (birth, access, navigate, edit & death of a Web being) • other characteristics of Web beings may change in time • achange in URI means the death of existing & birth of a new Web being

  21. The Web space -1 • a division of position & place created by the links among Web beings • each Web being occupies a specific locus in the Web network • a 3d “geographic coordinate system” • heterogeneous

  22. The Web space -2 • many “gravity” & relative “distance” metrics • Such as hubs and authorities, centrality and algorithms (e.g., community detection) • Pagerank initially build on Web space

  23. The time -1 • “bookkeeping” clock time (Physics) • time is like a universal order within which all changes are related to each other (Aristotle) • Time is meaningless if there are no tangible events (Aristotle) • a series of choices in space

  24. The Bergsoniantime -1 • sequence of finite & heterogeneous durations • irreversible(unpredictable future) Each duration has a significance different from that of each preceding • and following one. The transition from inner time to the time of things • is related to memory and consciousness)

  25. The Bergsoniantime -2 • Each duration has a significance different from that of each preceding and following one “These 5 min felt like a century..” • The transition from inner time to the time of things is related to memory and consciousness

  26. The Bergsoniantime -3 • indeterminism • heterogeneity • irreversibility • capturing the essence of human behavior. • The time of social systems

  27. The Web time -1 • a series of choices (visits) in the Web space (Bergsonian durations) • visiting selections attach semantic meaning • casual relationships among Web beings

  28. The Web time -2 • counting: Log file as a generic common property & co-operation in the Web

  29. The Web time -3 Durations are becoming: Discoverable, Observable, Traceable Processable, Massive • increases material dimension of networks • enables reconstruction of consciousness & memory of Users

  30. Relax the hypothesis of the self-contained Web and describe how the Web affects physical space, time, and existence.

  31. Space and the Web Discoverable & Traceable (e.g. online maps) both expands (hyper-connected) and limits the notion of physical space (less travel)

  32. Time and the Web -1 Human activities through or on the Web have become available • asynchronously • (in part) synchronously • continuously

  33. Time and the Web -2 Flexibility: If physical time is an arbitrary standard that enables the division of infinite space into useful parts, the Web assists us in separating it into even finerpieces

  34. Time and the Web -3 pressure on traditional socio-economic structures (e.g. law) and Human behavior

  35. Being and the Web -1 “networked individuals” – homo connectus • linking with little regard to space (Wellman 2002) • mobilize part or all of their information operating in a more flexible, less-bounded, and spatially dispersed environment.

  36. Being and the Web -1 • frequent switching among multiple social networks and modes of communication, • a different sense of belonging, flexible business arrangements, • and intense time management • privatized space • peer production as the 4thP in property, procurement, patronage, and peer production (David 1992).

  37. Research challenges • to obtain the right balance between open access to online information and self-determination of users, on the one hand, and to provide the proper incentives to produce content and develop network infrastructure

  38. Research challenges to accelerate socio-economic development by facilitating life-critical functions in the developing world and by enabling transparency, participation, and added-value services in the developed world.

  39. How to analyze the Web as an ethical space?

  40. Hypotheses Web: • ethically-relevant social machine • magma of Users and code start from the Web assume a self-containedWeb or the “manna from heaven” hypothesis (internal ethics analysis)

  41. “manna from heaven” hypothesis • Web is the only existing system • human beings are communicating & working solely through it • acompassionate ‘God’ provides the necessary quantity of ‘manna’, fulfilling all human needs, with no cost & effort • Web being, space & time

  42. Freedom I • the source of values • “freedom-coercion” tradeoff • more options to solve problems collectively & innovate, but • some of these options may be used in ways that cause coercion

  43. Freedom II • Theories: how to construct a system that selects, with minimum social cost which positive options to sacrifice in order to minimize coercion (or the dual problem) • start with Hayek’s approach because confronts with most Web characteristics

  44. Hayek’s freedom I • Stateposses the monopoly to enforce coercive power through General Rules • Personal Sphere & Property counterweight state power • General Rules are enforced equally & describe the borderlines between State & Personal Sphere • Propertyis a basic realization of General Rules

  45. Hayek’s freedom II • Competition is possible by the dispersion of Property • Mutually advantageous collaboration is based on Competition in service provision • effective anti-monopolistic policy: require from the monopolist (including the state) totreat all customers alike • Individualsshould be responsible & accountable for their actions

  46. 3-level analysis Apply theory of freedom according to Web’s evolution from plain s/w to ecosystem • The Technological Web • Internet infrastructure & Web software • The Contextualized Web • Sets of rules enforced through trust • The Economic Web • Economic contexts

  47. The Web as a space of Freedom Coercion badware applications (e.g. computer-zombies) traffic censorship (e.g.“Snooping”) inadequate quality of transmission badware-infected Web Beings central control & censoring of traffic “walled gardens” in SN (privacy threats & fragmentation) manipulation of indexing & searching (e.g. spamdexing) un-trustworthy technologies, business & governments badware & malicious representations concentration of power in a minority of Users inability of some people to benefit from the Web economy Freedom free access & inter-connection of any compatible software/device freely navigate, create and update Web Beings and links universality, openness & separation of layers in engineering, editing, searching & navigating establishspecific contexts in order to form beliefs that some Users/Web beings are trustworthy no barriers to economize Internet • Web software Contextualized Web Economic Web

  48. Personal sphere IP address: can only be processed for certain reasons • Web: log file common ownership by design (admin & navigator) • architectural element of co-operation • Admin: direct access • Navigator: not straightforward access • not proper practices for collecting traffic • should be further analyzed

  49. General rules Treating all Internet Users, Web Navigators & Editors equally • profile customization • open technological standards • efficient business incentives

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