Jeff Jarvis at Toronto’s Third Tuesday – Introducing Public Parts

November 18th, 2011, In Must Share, Online Publishing, by Beverly Crandon

Last nights, Third Tuesday event, on a Thursday mind you, in Toronto, was one I could not miss.  The nights speaker was Jeff Jarvis, someone I admire given his multi-faceted background, which encompasses both traditional and new media.  Nonetheless, his talk was not just centred around getting Canadian’s familiar with Mr. Jarvis and his views , but also to promote his latest book Public Parts.  Given the book’s theme, much of his talk surrounded privacy and what it really means, from a global perspective.  His global discussion was much welcomed, as often times speakers focus on US positioning and forget that the rest of us exist.

Jarvis referenced his bout with prostate cancer and how he made his plight public, to aid or in certain support of others going through the same thing.  While communicating about his personal  health matter, he shared a funny story in which he was verbally castrated by someone who thought he should not be sharing this type of information on the public web, much less syndicate it using social media. Javis’ response was a colourful ‘f-you’.  The ‘aha’ moment here was when Jarvis asked the audience why society put such a stigma on discussing health, and health was used as just one example, but the question can be asked to many who move to limit openness.  In the end, he chalked it up to fearing a loss of control.  ’If I share this information which was once deemed private, I am relinquishing control over a part of my life that was once protected’.

 

Jeff Jarvis did say that he believes that not everything that we do should be shared, at which point he referenced Twitter and our many misuses of it –  ”what we had for breakfast”.   With that being said, he did push for a majority openness, as, the way he put it, “being open helps us all”.

He closed his talk by saying this, that he thought the Internet as we know it today, is still in it’s infancy.  There is much learning and transformations still in store.  His concern was that if we moved to control something that we do not yet know the full potential of, we as a society, could be manacling our ability to utilise the Net for good and in ways we haven’t yet conceived of.  After that bit, you couldn’t help but think, he does have a point!

What are your thoughts on privacy and openness?

 

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