经济学人的争论

[雕刻时光]

经济学人的debate series这次的争论焦点是
Social networking technologies will bring large [positive] changes ...
但是争论的专家只是自说自话，没有什么新鲜观点（专家通常都容易这样），我反而喜欢danah boyd对此争论的回应，boyd在回应中很清晰的表述了社会网络（SNS）在正式学习（formal learning）和非正式学习（informail learning）中应用的区别和原因，概括来说就是1. SNS的是用来交友和维护关系的，2. 非正式学习与正式学习或者说是学校教育是具有不同结构特点的， 3. SNS的特性决定了它现阶段只适合应用于非正式学习。
我把boyd的文章转贴在下面
In their current incarnation, social network sites (SNSs) like Facebook and MySpace should not be integrated directly into the classroom. That said, they provide youth with a valuable networked public space to gather with their peers. Depending on the role of school in their lives, youth leverage these structures for educational purposes - asking questions about homework, sharing links and resources, and even in some cases asking their teachers for information outside of the classroom. SNSs do not make youth engage educationally; they allow educationally-motivated youth with a structure to engage educationally.

Social network sites do not help most youth see beyond their social walls. Because most youth do not engage in "networking," they do not meet new people or see the world from a different perspective. Social network sites reinforce everyday networks, providing a gathering space when none previously existed.

Educational pedagogy has swung over the years between focusing on individual-centered learning, group learning, and peer-to-peer learning. If you take a peer-to-peer learning approach, you are inherently valuing the social networks that youth have and maintain, or else you are encouraging them to build one. These networks are mediated and reinforced through SNSs. If there is pedagogical value to encouraging peers to have strong social networks, then there is pedagogical value in supporting their sociable practices on SNSs.

When it comes to socializing with friends, youth prefer in-person (unregulated) encounters. They turn to SNSs when they can't get together with their friends en masse or when they can't get together without surveilling adults. By and large, there are few free spaces where youth can gather with their friends en masse and, even then, inevitably a chunk of parents refuse to let them, thereby destroying cluster effects. So, of course, they turn to SNSs. School is one of the few times when they can get together with their friends and they use every unscheduled moment to socialize - passing time, when the teacher's back is turned, lunch, bathroom breaks, etc. They are desperately craving an opportunity to connect with their friends; not surprisingly, their use of anything that enables socialization while at school is deeply desired. This is why they text during classes. They go onto SNSs during the day to write to friends who have different schedules or to write to the whole group if a portion of them are on a different lunch. Given how regulated youth are, any open space where socializing is possible will be taken up by socializing; it's often the only place they can see their friends. This isn't something that the schools can fix, but they also shouldn't be surprised when group time turns into gossip time.

I have yet to hear a compelling argument for why social network sites (or networking ones) should be used in the classroom. Those tools are primarily about socializing, with media and information sharing there to prop up the socialization process (much status is gained from knowing about the cool new thing). I haven't even heard of a good reason why social network site features should be used in the classroom. What is the value of knowing who is friends with who or creating a profile when you already know all of your classmates?

This not to say that technology doesn't belong in the classroom. Information access tools like Wikipedia and Google are tremendously valuable for getting access to content and should be strongly encouraged and taught through the lens of media literacy. Email, IM, or other communication tools can be super useful for distributing content to the group or between individuals or even providing a channel for group discussion (in-class or out). Blogging tools and group sharing tools are also quite valuable. Having to produce for the group instead of the teacher can work as a powerful incentive; most youth don't want to be embarrassed in front of their peers and pressure to perform can be leveraged to the teacher's advantage. But why social network sites? To the degree that they support blogging and group sharing, sure... but that's not the key point of them at all. They key features that make them unique are: profiles plus visible, articulated and surfable friends' lists. I simply don't get why these are of value in the classroom.

I'm not saying that social network sites have no value. Quite the contrary. But their value is about the kinds of informal social learning that is required for maturation - understanding your community, learning the communicate with others, working through status games, building and maintaining friendships, working through personal values, etc. All too often we underestimate these processes because, traditionally, they have happened so naturally. Yet, what's odd about today's youth culture is that we've systematically taken away the opportunities for socialization. And yet we wonder why our kids are so immature compared to kids from other cultures. Social network sites are popular because youth are trying to take back the right to be social, even if it has to happen in interstitial ways. We need to recognize that not all learning is about book learning - brains mature through experience, including social experiences.

[Andy.Sun]

往普适性的演变只能是无限接近而不能重合的一个过程。
关于普适性机制对国民性的改变，我认为会有一些改变，但更多的是一种融合的过程。

[Annie]

普适性当然是一种理想状态啦，但我想特殊性会渐渐向普适性演变的。

[雕刻时光]

赞同持续性的说法，但是对于普适性我还是持怀疑态度

[Annie]

国民素质能否决定SNS在不同地域的机制特征？或者存在有普适性的同一标准形式的机制？普适性机制能否改变或重塑业已存在的国民性？个人认为类似SNS的社会网络在不同地域的运作会从刚开始的带有某地区特色的变异版逐步发展成标准化模式。也就是说，国民性在机制面前具有不稳定性。但这也得取决于机制的持续性。

[Andy.Sun]

恩恩，还有可以联合专业单位针对各种问题提供相关服务。
例如法律、会计、鉴定等。

[雕刻时光]

除了线上的解决问题，经验传递之外，还可以更open，与线下的服务相结合，比如金融、招聘、培训等

[Andy.Sun]

理解了。

你的想法和我之前有点相似，一个类似baidu知道，通过用户互动解决问题并提供有实用价值信息的站点。

综合SNS的框架和信息提供的服务后，这个项目应该会很有意思。

[雕刻时光]

所以前面说了，无法解决精神追求问题，这是完全私人性的问题，只能解决实际中遇到的问题。可以用一些感情点引起共鸣，但这和解决精神追求问题完全没有关系。应该很清楚了。
继续拿携程做例子，它帮你解决了订票订房的问题，是不是解决了你这方面的焦虑，在携程出来之前，你订票订房是不是很头疼，既没有标准也没有比较，完全一团乱麻，这个例子只能表明解决了焦虑，没有体现出SNS的作用。继续深入，如果携程假设一个SNS，让用户分享经验，评分，过滤出有价值旅游、度假信息，不但能提高它d度假产品的销量，如果你有旅游方面的问题是不是焦虑也被解决掉了。就是这个意思。

[Andy.Sun]

对，焦虑的关键是意难平。

但解决焦虑的方法没那么简单，对于生活中的问题，你会选择相信亲友的建议还是SNS朋友的建议？如何保证SNS朋友提供的意见具有较高的参考价值？何况有些事情没有亲历过别人再怎么说也是鸡同鸭讲。

所以，通过SNS互动解决个人的精神追求，我觉得可行性不大。

[雕刻时光]

焦虑包括物质和精神上的，就像精神上的无聊最后要靠物质而不是精神来解决，生活工作中的焦虑也要靠实际应用来解决，至于内心深处的焦虑，那是属于每个人自己的，任何网站也解决不了。
焦虑产生的原因就是意难平，说白了就是个人实际能力和期望之间的差距，解决焦虑问题就是要帮助用户减少甚至消除这个差距。想一想自己在实际生活中什么时候焦虑，希望如何被满足就能发现其中的机会了。精神层面的焦虑连宗教都不能完全解决，只能靠自己不断修行了。