Expert opinion vs Amateur Revolution

There is an argument, in relation to knowledge creation, about which party should be respected, the experts or the folks.  Bruns describes the experts as those who ideally develop well-behaved, universally accepted and internally consistent understandings of the world. Those apart of the folksonomic party allow for multiplicity, conflicts of interpretations and the existence of a number of alternative representations of extant knowledge which are accepted only by a subset of the entire community.  Here lie two contrasting ideals, it is the experts versus the folks. Larry Sanger heavily backs the experts in such a fight and looking at the above definitions, so do I. Well, I used to…

Sanger states many reasons of the importance of experts on a knowledge creating and sharing site,”…it is only the opinions of experts that will be trusted by most of the public as authoritative in determining whether an article is generally reliable or not”. Thus in order to be considered trustworthy, knowledge shared on sites such as Wikipedia should be provided by experts. If most of the public consider the information shared by experts as reliable then why should the information shared by amateurs be considered valuable too?

 I used to share this opinion with Sanger however; I now understand some of the benefits of the folksonomic paradigm.  Bruns explains that the lines between amateurs and professionals are blurring. Committed produsers are collaborating on information and the development and refinement of knowledge leads to information which is just as important was what is provided by experts.  For example, an article by Charles Leadbeater, from Fast Company, talks about how the “Amateur Revolution” has lead to the displacement of professionals in fields such as astronomy.  However such a movement is considered positive as these “Passionate amateurs, empowered by technology and linked to one another, are reshaping business, politics, science, and culture”.

 So, each party has the potential to make a significant contribution to the knowledge industry.  This element as described by Bruns is equipotential.  What is also reflected by the bridging between folks and experts is the flattening of hierarchies as a consequence of produsage.  It is important to acknowledge that the force behind community projects and produsage has lead to these circumstances.  It is even more important to understand how such aspects can play a relevant and helpful role in society today.

 Community lead content creation needs to be considered as reliable.  However instead of placing “blind trust” in such a phenomenon there needs to be special requirements put into place which “galvanise community involvement around a common aim”.  The acceptance that both folks and experts are important aspects of this knowledge environment is vital. Both parties need to co-exist rather then fight each other.  As a consequence of this, compromises need to be made.  The acceptance of amateur opinion needs to occur. And the acceptance that experts are not necessarily the be all and end all of information needs to occur. 

 The conclusion is thus, in the past expert opinion was the only opinion considered to be trustworthy and reliable. However with the developments of new media and the entire social, cultural, technological and political elements that coincide with it, there must be a move forward into an understanding and open acceptance of the Pro-Am revolution.

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~ by kboscarin on May 20, 2009.