Charlie Tims
Associate
Charlie Tims recently co-wrote Video Republic, a look at the social and political significance of internet videos. He is currently involved in producing a part of the TED prize in London.
at 8:51am on Friday, 10th October 2008
In Video Republic we argue that, in an era when we can all make videos, we have become the new propagandists. Party political broadcasts, produced by ad-agencies and broadcasted on national TV have become (please don't gag) 'political broadcast parties' produced by all of us and distributed on youtube. But this isn't just about elections, it's about our everyday visibility as citizens. It points to new kinds of citizenship. Another manifestation of this phenomena has appeared in today's announcement from the MOD that they intend to distribute camera phones to people in Afghanistan via NGOs so that the stories of 'ordinary' Afghanis can counterbalance the internet propaganda videos produced by the Taliban. It will be interesting to see what they come up with. Common sense would suggest that just because you have a cameraphone, doesn't mean you can make a video. Experience tells us that its also very hard to predict what people will want to watch on youtube. The MOD's 'radical new plan' infers that ordinary Afghanis don't exist unless they're expressing themselves in internet videos - we wonder what it would be like if this stance was applied to citizens back here in blighty.
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