[tt] Guardian's reservations about Leadbeater

[Arlind Boshnjaku]

The limits of the new creativity
Libby Brooks
May 27, 2007 8:00 PM

http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/libby_brooks/2007/05/the_limits_of_the_new_creativi.html

Charlie Leadbeater is nothing if not a utopian. His
thrill about the impact of technology on human
potential is palpable. Creativity is being redefined
as a social activity, he tells the audience. People
who have previously only had the chance to be workers
and consumers can now be participants and creatives.
It's good for democracy, for equality and for freedom.

Second to utopian, Leadbeater is also collaborative,
and this is important to acknowledge. He is here at
Hay to discuss the draft of his book about the
potential of the internet which he has posted online
and invited comments on. 

Leadbeater likens sites like Wikepedia to the ancient
notion of common land. The sense of common ownership
encourages people both to collaborate and to take
responsibility. Typically we think of creativity as
being about special people is special places, he
beleives - the boffin in his lab, the academic in her
lecture hall. But the new creativity is a
collaborative process, with the growth of the internet
providing fresh spaces where larger groups of people
can create together.

It's a throughly appealing vision. But I take issue
with two points. Firstly the notion that the
democratisation of access necessarily leads to a
shared sense of responsibility. Doesn't the internet
offer just as much an escape from responsibility -
whether that's as simple as posting a vitriolic
comment on a blog anonymously, or tweaking one's
personality to make it more appealing on a social
networking site?

Secondly, Leadbeater's distinction between the
"special people" who we previously looked to for ideas
and the ideas-rich mass is wooly. He says that we will
know instinctively instances where it is more
profitable to turn to a professional for advice, but
fails to set out precisely how we will recognise them.
While it is certainly useful to dispell a de facto
deference to professionals, it is equally important to
recognise the times when only someone with a
particular set of skills can help you. 

Likewise, the utopia that Leadbeater describes risks
creating a new aristocracy of professionals - the
professional gatekeeper, who can mediate the avalanche
of information with which we are now bombarded. He
argues that, while gatekeepers are increasingly
necessary, for example, those who medaite information
on health need not always be doctors, but could be
patients too. He hails the end of the idea of the
professional gatekeeper. I'm not so convinced.

What is perhaps most appealing about Leadbeater is the
way that he offsets many people's ingrained anxiety
about the growth of new technology by insisting that
the majority of what the internet can offer is in fact
a revision of old ideas. There is nothing new, he
says, about peer review, or the voluntary sharing of
resources, or communalism or folk culture. Perhaps
not. But the capacity for big business to hijack all
of these areas for its own benefit is new. The
overwhelmingly acquisitive nature of capitalism is
reinventing itself all the time.

So, while Leadbeater argues almost convincingly that
Google is only piggy-backing on open-source
technology, and could be bettered at any time, or that
Wikepedia could never be bought because it exists
outside the reach of the market, I prefer to reserve
judgement for now.




       
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