The light that shines for all.
On openness and the Prismatic Self.
I am being somewhat provocative here. It is because I believe the current rhetoric on the NSA PRISM debate is directly at odds with the concept of Prismatic Self that I am exploring.
Today the source of the NSA PRISM leaks has come forward (as he always intended) and stated the reasons for his action.
I don’t question for a minute Mr. Snowden’s bravery to bring to light something that is obviously in the public interest, and I hope that all fair justice is afforded to him. But I do want to draw out the concept of openness, which is so critical to both this case and the Prismatic Self.
The maelstrom of fear around PRISM is getting tighter and stronger, as described in this NY Times article - “Data-Driven Tech Industry Is Shaken by Online Privacy Fears”. But the issue cannot be in a system created for the sole purpose of storing and sharing data (including usage metadata), but the rights and protections people assume to have over that data.
The saying “information wants to be free” is favored among activists everywhere, giving rights to leakers, hackers and coders. To assert the idea of the Prismatic Self, I believe that this (in part) is just as true of ourselves. To illustrate I draw a comparison between the NSA PRISM program and Copyright Infringement (Piracy).
Millions of people around the world have undertaken some form of piracy, in the form of illegally downloading or streaming forms of art owned by others. “Information wants to be free” is often asserted as Corporations try to enforce artificial regional restrictions in order to maximise profit. Where regional restrictions prevent people from accessing material, they use work arounds that make it so - even storing locally for easy access. It is also common for these pirated materials to be uploaded in various forms to YouTube or other sites under a perverse sense of entitlement. Individuals believe that because they have consumed the material, although ill-gotten, they then have the right to publish the material without the rights to do so.
In an interpretation of “Information wants to be free”, I believe that the nature of openness is that it does provide the viewer with some rights, which can’t be controlled by the creator. Viewing requires possessing; and possessing cannot dictate appropriate use. On the internet, once information is made open it can provide many indirect benefits; it can attract people will similar interests, draw out attention to new content, and build a profile of our behavior and preferences. In March, a study revealed that your Facebook like can even predict more personal choices, such as IQ, voting and sexuality.
But what about NSA PRISM? Use/abuse/consent/authority aside, this is another instance where information is made free, control is wrestled from the creator, and it’s power given for deeds unintended (even unsound). It would appear that open does not equal free, if you seek to control the use of that open information.
One of the biggest twists that has happened recently in the world of information management is the notion of custodianship. Long into our history and until only recently in the online world, it has been presumed that there are keepers of knowledge, and they have our best interests at heart. But this is actually contrary to what it means to be open. We live in a world where information is ubiquitous, and almost free (in many senses of the word). The power no longer resides with people who possess data, but with people who know how to capture and use it - and rarely are these people the creator or subject of that information.
