John Palfrey would probably call himself a “digital settler,” someone comfortable enough with technology to help open up the new realms of pervasive digital media and online social networking. I just heard him speak about the emerging population of “digital natives,” those among the 1 to 3 Billion people born after 1980 with access to the new web and/or mobile technology and who have been exposed to the ways and means of its merger with daily life. ("Digital immigrants" make up Palfrey's third and largest clump of the human population--those of us slowly struggling to make their way in the post-email new world.)
For anyone working with youth in schools or youth-serving community organizations, Palfrey’s Born Digital, Understanding the First Generation of Digital Natives, is essential reading. Since reading it last winter, I have found myself referring to it repeatedly in planning meetings about on-line privacy and security on our sites, the constructions of line identities, how advocacy and services can mesh with everyday social networking as experienced by young people today.
To see what it’s all about, before mentioning any websites, I’ll start by just passing on this youtube link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=79IYZVYIVLA&feature=related.
Most anyone who went to this year’s Nonprofit Technology Conference (http://www.nten.org) will have returned reporting the emerging mainstream sensibility of integrating facebook, youtube, twitter and more into organizational strategy. I would not call Palfrey’s perspective an antidote to this exhilaration. It’s more that he is balancing the long term risks and opportunities, particularly for young people. And he is trying to explain their perspective to the extent he can interpret it.
An academic (including at Harvard’s Berkman Center for Internet and Society), Palfrey had something to say on these matters. So being of a certain age and cultural background, naturally, he wrote a book. Likewise, I found it and read it in the traditional fashion. And I truly do recommend it.
As fits his cautiously enthusiastic embrace of our digital era, Palfrey's talk took a somewhat defensive and apologetic tone about publishing a old fashioned book. He explained that in addition to the traditional book, you can read the Kindle edition. You can also visit the Born Digital wiki at http://www.digitalnative.org/wiki/Main_Page and immerse your personal self in a constantly community-updated version of the work. You can take part in the blog at http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/digitalnatives/.
And with even more enthusiasm, he recommended absorbing the videos produced by some of his students that are bringing sections of the book to life. According to John, the one linked above was made by a 17 year old with no prior video experience. Watch the video and I won’t say skip that chapter of the book, but you’ll have the idea. Look for others tagged digitalnative on youtube or find the links on http://www.digitalnative.org (including to the book).
His point about the video was that participating in the emerging world of digital social media carries risks, but those native to it and are mastering it, are as literate and as fully contributory to social discourse as other population segments. There is much positive to be gained from the emerging digital world, and those born to it will make the most of it.
Second, more to the point of the privacy and other risks, Palfrey also said that over time, young people born to this world will likewise natively come to weigh and take hold of privacy and security issues attendant to on-line profiles and sharing. The media may focus on teenagers coming to regret underage drinking pictures on facebook, flickr and such. To generalize from Palfrey a bit, their calculations about what to put on facebook may collectively mature faster than older generations’ thoughts about Linked In.
Likewise, thinking about a recent project here, in wrestling the pluses and minuses of whether an on-line database should store such information as “sought pregnancy or family counseling,”it made sense to get closer to the needs and thinking of the participating youth themselves. Sure educate them about what lies ahead for those “born digital,” but put ourselves in their position as well.
The presentation I heard by John Palfrey was sponsored by Boston’s Jewish Alliance for Law and Social Action (http://www.jalsa.org). In the discussion, I commented how voluntary self-exposure online has to be put in the context of massive involuntary collection of school, medical, business and credit, justice system and other governmental record-keeping. Many of the participants were thoughtful, experienced civil liberties attorneys and as the discussion progressed, there were many comments about national policy under Bush, recent litigation and such. I love hearing attorneys tie our everyday experiences back to what is going behind the scenes. I listened, and watched John Palfrey hang back and let that thread run its course rather than specifically connect it to his book.
Palfrey’s message is not that we should take data gathering lightly, but that we should pay special attention to what the generation of digital natives themselves do about it. When he showed Kanupriya Tewari’s video mentioned earlier, it struck me that she wove the voluntary and involuntary data collection together in a more accessible way than the book itself. Exactly his point!
I’ll end with an image that kept coming back to me: the kid in the opening credits of The Wire (http://www.hbo.com/thewire/) who throws a rock through the surveillance camera lens. One might speculate whether that, that kid, when he settles down a bit, will have a more balanced grasp of the balance between sharing and keeping private than many of us digital settler experts.
originally posted on idealware.org/blog. Please consider subscribing to this excellent resource.
