Another kind of digital divide
I drove by a Honeybaked Ham store today while running some errands. The line to get in was around the block, probably 100 people long. What the heck, I thought to myself? Then I realized: it's the day before Thanksgiving, probably one of the busiest days of the year for them. My next immediate thought was: don't these people know that they can just go online and have their food delivered to their door - no fuss, no muss, and no waiting in stinking long lines and wasting half their day? We ordered online last year for Christmas and it worked great. Then I realized: I am probably one of the few that even knows you can order your Honeybaked hams online.

I teach my students about the "digital divide" (see this post) and we define it as unequal access to technology. The term "access" not only refers to physical access to the technology but also to the ability to use the technology. Should this term also extend to simply not knowing a specific use of the technology is available? I'm sure that many of those that were in line are also online - this is Orange County after all. This can extend so much further: there are many uses of the Internet that I take for granted (maps and directions, weather reports, movie show times...) that others may not know exist or, if they do know, they have never been shown how to make it useful for them.

The concept of making use of technology for a specific reason has a term: "effective use". One of the leading writers in the field of Community Informatics, Michael Gurstein, wrote on it a couple years back here. There are many who could make effective use of the Internet if someone just showed them how. Those of us who are working for a just society and a just world need realize that just giving physical access to technology and doing basic training are not enough. For use to implement effective use, we must give people the ability to understand how to apply it to their everyday lives. We are fast approaching a time that those who do not know how to make effective use will find themselves on the outside looking in - or standing in line.

Happy Thanksgiving!  ¶ 2:24 PM 0 comments

  The Transparent Society is now ...and we are in city #2.

Let me explain: in The Transparent Society, David Brin argues that the march of technology will bring us to a point where every part of our public lives will be recorded. According to Brin, this will be accomplished via "tiny cameras, panning left and right, surveying traffic and pedestrians, observing everything in open view." The book asks one basic questions: who should have access to the images captured by the cameras? Two scenarios are given: in "city #1" the police and governing authorities have access to the images, in "city #2", the public shares access with them. He argues that, while both would lead to a large reduction in crime, the latter would reduce the abuse of power by the authorities. When I discuss this book with my students every semester, many are doubtful that this would be the case: members of the public would abuse the use of the cameras and invade privacy. But we all agree that it is very likely that this "transparent society" will indeed come to pass, and very soon.

Written in 1999, the book did not envision armies of citizen with their own personal video cameras embedded in portable phones. Since these cameras are not public, they are owned by the individuals and the authorities may or may not get access to them. In effect then, we now live, right now, in city #2. I am prompted to write this by the latest news story out of UCLA, where video images captured by a cellphone camera will be used to document their abuse of a student there. However, it is not just this story that tells me we are in city #2: just recently the Texas Border Patrol has made their cameras accessible to the public and are seeking the public's assistance in watching the border and reporting any illegal crossings. And here's another story that shows how an arsonist was captured by video footage.

It may not be the transparent society specifically depicted in the book, but David Brin saw this coming seven years ago. Check out his site and specifically the pages devoted to this topic.  ¶ 3:48 PM 0 comments

  Ministry in a flat world This week in my MIS class we discussed some of the main points in Thomas Friedman's book The World Is Flat. This book discusses the changes in technology that have occurred in the past few years that have brought about a change in the way the businesses and peoples in the world interact. Using these "flattening" technologies, power is shifting from countries and corporations to individuals and small groups. The book addresses these changes and then gives its prescription for Americans and American businesses.

In thinking about this new "flat" world we live in, I begin to wonder what it will mean for Christian ministry. Some questions to ponder, for now:

- should the priority of using the Internet, in all its various forms (web sites, podcasts, mailing lists, etc.), rise in churches and ministry-related organizations? And does this translate into larger budgets for Internet-based projects?
- should Christian ministries "offshore", that is, hire people or organizations outside the US to manage their web presence, in order to save money?
- because the Internet is global, should a church use the web primarily as an evangelism tool? A missionary support tool? Or should the focus be on the local congregation?
- what level of Internet or web literacy should be required of missionaries or pastors as part of their training?

If you have opinions on these, feel free to comment. Or to add more questions to the list!  ¶ 7:05 AM 0 comments

  Linerider If you haven't seen it, be warned: it is addicting. Click the video below to see it in action, click the link below to play.

Linerider

  ¶ 5:03 PM 0 comments

  Be purpose-driven I discussed in an earlier post my plans for research in the area of the use of web technology for Christian ministry. My initial foray into this area of research will be to simply get to know some different groups (churches, faith-based ministries) that have developed successful web sites or web resources. I want to understand what issues they encounter, what best practices they would recommend, and how they're organized. But, first, and maybe most important, is to understand what these organizations consider the purpose, or mission, of their web site.

A mission statement drives what an organization does. Understand the mission and you understand the organization. In the case of faith-based organizations, this mission will show how they move their faith into action. For example, Biola's mission statement:

The mission of Biola University is biblically-centered education, scholarship, and service—equipping men and women in mind and character to impact the world for the Lord Jesus Christ.

As a faculty member there, my work is driven by this mission. We constantly work to understand how to do this better and integrate our personal faith with this mission.

A mission statement should also exist for an organization's use of web-based resources. Unfortunately, for many of these churches and ministries, a web site is usually thrown together by a volunteer with no clear purpose in mind except to put the church or group "on the web". But this leads to a web site that is not properly maintained or ends up being forgotten. A poor quality web site may end up driving potential new supporters or members away and is a poor contrast to the excellence that should be the result of serving Christ.

A mission statement for web-based resources would help focus its direction and give it a place in the organization. Is is seen as a way to minister to members of the organization? Is it primarily a channel for raising funds? Is it to support missionaries? Or maybe it is simply another way to share the gospel. This mission statement should be in line with the organization's overall mission statement.

So, dear blog readers, I need your help: if you know of churches, ministries, or faith-based organizations that high-quality web sites that are focused on the mission of the organization, let me know! Much of my research time over the next few weeks will be finding these organizations and understanding how they integrate the mission of their organization with their use of Internet technology.  ¶ 9:14 PM 0 comments

  My wife loves me So I get home from work last night and notice something: the lawn was mowed. Even more impressive: it was edged as well. Backyard too. Since my accident, I have been unable to mow our lawn and was hoping to maybe try to do it this coming weekend. Now I don't have to: my wife asked the neighbor's gardener if she could hire him to do it this one time, and he agreed.

This may not seem like a big deal; many people hire gardeners to mow their lawn. However, we never have and I had been lamenting that it had been almost a month and our grass was starting to look "shaggy". The fact that my wife understood how much it bugged me that I couldn't live up to my responsibility to keep it mowed and then had the courage to approach a gardener she didn't know and hire him for this task showed me her love for me.

Thanks baby, you're the best.

Labels: accident, Marne

  ¶ 10:09 AM 0 comments

  This makes you think... I was teaching about the implications of "new media" in my MIS class today and how the individual now has the ability to get a message out to the world. We no longer need to go through editors, publishers, or other filters to get our message out, but instead can reach the world directly ourselves through blogs, podcasts, and videos. A friend of mine then sent me an email of this.  ¶ 3:33 PM 0 comments

  Goodbye to one of the good guys...
I recently posted about my favorite web sites, the ones I must check out every morning to get my "daily fix" and feel caught up with the world. One of those sites is now gone; Doug TenNapel has decided to stop writing his blog. The warnings began a couple of weeks ago when he stated that once he hit one million "hits" (in other words, one million people viewed his blog) he had been planning on stopping. He also stated that using a blog to air his conservative right-wing views had become a problem for his career: it was hard to get hired in Hollywood while espousing the views he was posting on his blog everyday. Doug is a conservative Christian working in Hollywood - something extremely rare. To date, it seems he has been quite successful - his most well-known work is the current series "Catscratch" running on Nickelodeon.

I did not agree with Doug's viewpoints all of the time, but it gave me good insights into the views held by others farther right in the political spectrum than I. I also found his candor about his feeling and his faith refreshing. So many times a blog is just another protected persona someone is putting up and, when you meet in them "in the real world", they seem so different. I will miss his blog.

This also raises a question: what does this do to his testimony as a Christian? Is he any weaker a Christian because he has shut his blog down? Is he "hiding his light"? Should we criticize Doug for doing this, or should we understand? There is no requirement that Christians write blogs. But once Doug had started writing his, he attracted hundreds (thousands?) of visitors a day to read it. It only took him 20 months to get to one million hits! He shared his faith many times over, as well as his controversial views on issues of the day. He shared his daily life, to the point where he wrote that his blog readers knew more about him than his family! I myself reluctantly support Doug's decision to stop - it is between him and God to determine how to best present his testimony in the future. At Biola, we talk about "Business as Ministry" - Doug is doing this every day he faces his peers in Hollywood and continues to practice the principles taught by Jesus Christ.  ¶ 7:14 AM 0 comments