(ed. note: This is part of an ongoing series of posts about issues in politics, entertainment, media, business, technology, etc. that do not necessarily have anything to do with the Qwidget. The posts are meant to showcase how the Qwidget can be used with any type of blog content.)
The use of extremely loud music to aid in military interrogations in Iraq, Afghanistan and Guantanamo Bay is well known at this point. It’s also hardly a new practice. Former Panamanian dictator Manuel Noriega allegedly surrendered to US troops because of the loud music they beamed into his hiding spot, the Vatican Embassy. However, a number of musicians have recently announced a campaign with the British human rights organization Reprieve to end this practice, which they say is torture.
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So far, they have have established an online petition and announced that participating musicians will hold a few moments of silence at concerts and festivals. One can imagine, however, that this initiative will quickly expand. Expect more traditional forms of protest in the near future as well as perhaps a legal challenge demanding royalties. Here’s the petition if you’re interested.
This issue is obviously going to split audiences at these concerts and could lead to some intense confrontations. It’s already splitting musicians, some of whom gladly approve of the use of their songs in such situations. Stevie Benton, whose band Drowning Pool, recorded one of the interrogators’ favorites, “Bodies” had this to say about the controversy: “People assume we should be offended that somebody in the military thinks our song is annoying enough that played over and over it can psychologically break someone down. I take it as an honor to think that perhaps our song could be used to quell another 9/11 attack or something like that.”
(ed. note: This is part of an ongoing series of posts about issues in politics, entertainment, media, business, technology, etc. that do not necessarily have anything to do with the Qwidget. I’m just posting about them to showcase how the Qwidget can be used with any type of blog content.)
My college pal Frank Lesser, a writer for the Colbert Report, sent out an email today that started like this: “So, I jumped on the bandwagon and made a vampire film.” Pretty hilarious. Here’s the film.
Besides just enjoying the film because vampires rule (duh), I was pretty excited to realize halfway through the credits that, in addition to Frank, two other friends of mine worked on it. Especially shocking was the fact that the music was done by a long lost friend from high school, Jonathan Zalben, with whom I took a three year advanced math course. How on earth do those two know each other?
I go to a website and read an article. Man, that was really great. I’d like to comment and ask the author a question. I scroll down… 384 comments. Ugh. Screw this.
His post goes on to suggest a great way to help readers sort through the “comment wasteland” that inevitably follows posts on popular blogs: Milemarkers. Jason’s concept involves bloggers or some type of community manager reading through the comments and entering a “milemarker” type comment that would highlight important questions raised up until that point. These would be graphically distinguished from other comments and would link back to the original questions posed by readers with links to relevant responses and other blog posts. Milemarkers would thereby help readers easily scan comments, picking out only the most valuable contributions.
Example of a Milemarker
Jason concludes with a thought that speaks to everything that went into building the Qwidget: “Good conversation can happen, but we need to give people the tools to make it a useful experience.” I think Jason’s idea is a fantastic way to make the commenting experience better. I would love to see Disqus, IntenseDebate, SezWho or JS-Kit incorporate it ASAP.
However, I think it, like those services, will mostly appeal to those of us who already leave the occasional blog comment. In other words, it appeals to an infinitesimally small fraction of web users. As Jason himself puts it, “I only have so much available cognitive time I want to invest before participating in a conversation.”
One good question to consider is: For the average user, how much of that limited cognitive time is spent on thinking of a way to begin participating? Just as often as I see a glut of comments and click away, I read a great article that makes me think and, with lack of immediate inspiration to say something back, I move on. In that quick instant, bloggers and web publishers in general squander an opportunity to capture greater and greater levels of reader participation. I liken it to this common situation: You’re at a party. You see someone that looks intriguing or you overhear an interesting comment. And before you can think of some cool way to open up a conversation with that person, the window of opportunity closes and you move on.
With the Qwidget, our primary goal is to make the first move towards participation a baby step.
(ed. note: This is part of an ongoing series of posts about issues in politics, entertainment, media, business, technology, etc. that do not necessarily have anything to do with the Qwidget. I’m just posting about them to showcase how the Qwidget can be used with any type of blog content.)
I streamed the 24 TV movie Redemption on Fox.com over the weekend. (Not a bad UI they’ve got. It’s no Hulu.com but it was a good experience overall.) And it got me thinking. The show is often criticized for its seeming endorsement of torture. Joel Surnow, its co-creator, famously refused to tone down the show’s depiction of torture even when asked to do so by the military brass. Will the new administration’s promise for a “new era” in American politics and foreign policy affect 24’s plotlines or its popularity?
(ed. note: This is part of an ongoing series of posts about issues in politics, entertainment, media, business, technology, etc. that do not necessarily have anything to do with the Qwidget. I’m just posting about them to showcase how the Qwidget can be used with any type of blog content.)
The Wall Street Journal reports that FCC Chair Kevin Martin is planning to push for a free national internet service:
The proposal to allow a no-smut, free wireless Internet service is part of a proposal to auction off a chunk of airwaves. The winning bidder would be required to set aside a quarter of the airwaves for a free Internet service. The winner could establish a paid service that would have a fast wireless Internet connection. The free service could be slower and would be required to filter out pornography and other material not suitable for children.
This would be incredible news for many people running a business on the web. A free nation-wide internet connection would mean that there are that many more people to buy web products and services and to see advertisements.
It would also be a godsend for those of us who would be thrilled that anyone in the US could freely access the breadth of information on the internet.
However, some are worried about how the FCC will define porn. Will the defnition be stretched to include sites that cover reproductive health issues, STDs, sexuality, art, etc?
CNN reports that Barack Obama “has said he’ll have a five-day online comment period before signing any non emergency legislation.
This is as lofty a sentiment as they come. Let the people have their say. It sums up our mission as a company. But let’s assume for a moment that Obama and his to-be-named national CTO will employ a comment system similar to the ones we see on blogs, YouTube, and web forums. Now let’s imagine that President Obama is about to sign a piece of “non emergency” legislation into place regarding a hot button issue like abortion, gun control, or affirmative action.
You can only imagine where an unstructured conversation on one of those topics would go at a national level. You would have so many soap box rants, insults, and other distractions that rational discourse would be absolutely drowned out. To elicit positive conversation, you need to foster just the right sense of community and etiquette. And what better tool to do that than the Qwidget? It could limit people’s ability to shout over others and its emphasis on private messaging will reduce the back and forth noise that discourages casual users from participating.
Most importantly, however, the Qwidget could allow the conversation about the legislation to span the entire web. Other publishers could take Obama’s question, presumably “Should I sign legislation X?”, and let their constituencies weigh in from their own sites. You could have people on big news websites, on the US government’s web site and on millions of blogs all talking about the same issue together through the qwidget. In this way, the administration could be certain that they were getting a truly representative sample of the public’s opinion on an issue.
A few days ago, Carlos Sanchez of the Waco Tribune Herald wrote a column entitled, “Anonymous online venom needs to stop.” The piece was a response to an onslaught of offensive comments left on articles about a recent criminal trial in Waco. Sanchez does a great job of listing the exact issues we at Chat Ventures faced with our web documentary series Hometown Baghdad:
Interactivity is essential to the growth of a site.
Interactivity can drive revenue by increasing traffic and engagement.
News sites, in particular, can use interactivity to further their goal to be a venue for public discourse.
Comment sections often bring out the worst in people.
The problem is this: large web publishers can’t expect anonymous, unstructured comment sections to stay positive and constructive. Maintaining a consistent presence in the community, posting clear community guidelines and enforcing those guidelines can go a long way but that requires an enormous investment of time. Furthermore, those tactics don’t always work. Some suggest enforcing registration and confirmation processes. However, comment sections are already too chaotic and time consuming for the majority of users and those extra hurdles can dissuade an already weary user base.
The solution has to be a different way to encourage engagement that’s more inclusive of casual users and less fraught with hostility than comment sections. The Qwidget is our best shot at solving this problem. Find out how it does so at www.qwidget.com.
As this is the first public blog post with a Qwidget attached, we here at Qwidget headquarters (a quarter of a loft in Hell’s Kitchen, NYC) are feeling like this is a new day. A new start for us. A big change. We started life as a company producing content only to realize that web publishers and bloggers like us needed a better way to engage their audiences around their content. So we set out to build the Qwidget.
A lot of people in America and the rest of the world are also feeling like a new day is upon us. Some are excited about that; some are not. So the first question that we are asking with the Qwidget should be fairly obvious. Please spend the few seconds it takes to create an account and give an answer. If someone else has given an interesting response, send a quick reply. They will get it next time they answer a Qwidget question (no matter what question they are answering and no matter what site they are on). A few things may not work as this the first public appearance of the Qwidget, but please be understanding with us while we improve the service. Change is never easy, you know.
Stories, Updates and Thoughts From the Qwidget Makers
What's the Qwidget
The Qwidget is a tool that publishers and bloggers install on their sites to make it easier for readers to engage in dialogue around their content.
Our mission
With the Qwidget, we are building a cross-web dialogue platform. We aim to make the web a better place for meeting new people and starting conversations about the issues and content that interest people.
This blog will tell that story. It's written by Mike DiBenedetto, the manager of product development for the Qwidget.
The use of extremely loud music to aid in military interrogations in Iraq, Afghanistan and Guantanamo Bay is well known at this point. It’s also hardly a new practice. Former Panamanian dictator Manuel Noriega allegedly surrendered to US troops because of the loud music they beamed into his hiding spot, the Vatican Embassy. However, a number of musicians have recently announced a campaign with the British human rights organization Reprieve to end this practice, which they say is torture.
This issue is obviously going to split audiences at these concerts and could lead to some intense confrontations. It’s already splitting musicians, some of whom gladly approve of the use of their songs in such situations. Stevie Benton, whose band Drowning Pool, recorded one of the interrogators’ favorites, “Bodies” had this to say about the controversy: “People assume we should be offended that somebody in the military thinks our song is annoying enough that played over and over it can psychologically break someone down. I take it as an honor to think that perhaps our song could be used to quell another 9/11 attack or something like that.”
I streamed the 24 TV movie 
(ed. note: This is part of an ongoing series of posts about issues in politics, entertainment, media, business, technology, etc. that do not necessarily have anything to do with the Qwidget. I’m just posting about them to showcase how the Qwidget can be used with any type of blog content.)
A few days ago, Carlos Sanchez of the 
Stories, Updates and Thoughts From the Qwidget Makers
The Qwidget is a tool that publishers and bloggers install on their sites to make it easier for readers to engage in dialogue around their content.
With the Qwidget, we are building a cross-web dialogue platform. We aim to make the web a better place for meeting new people and starting conversations about the issues and content that interest people.
