BEING, SPACE, AND TIME ON THE WEB
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Transcript of BEING, SPACE, AND TIME ON THE WEB
BEING, SPACE, AND TIME
ON THE WEB
Michalis VafopoulosVafopoulos.org
National Technical University of Athens
The Web space is:
o Everywhere o Controversialo Contradictory o Unusual o Complex o Dynamic – “live” system
the new ecosystemWhat is changing?• New issues: personal and global agenda• Prosumers: Self-powered production• Inter-creativity: Distributed collaborative
production• Non market & non property productionWhat is needed?• New analysis• New governance • New values
New analysis: Web science
before WWW after
3/18
New analysis: Web science• a trans-disciplinary field
–Web as its primary object of study–Web= techno-social artifact
• positive or negative?Transformative!
3/18
Web science
• envelope question
what technological and other changes need to be made in order for the Web to work better for more people?
3/18
Two magics of Web Science
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Web & Philosophy
Web
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Semantic Web
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Web science perspectivewhat changes need to be incorporated in the Web to best serve humanity?
Can science & philosophy help in this direction? How?
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Research question I
What are the main characteristics of being, space, and time on the Web if it is considered a self-contained system that exists in and byitself?
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Research question II
How do these idiosyncratic features of the Web transform thetraditional conceptions about physical being, space and time?
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Outline ① Hypotheses ② Being, space & time in the Web③ Applications ④ Hayek’s freedom ⑤ 3-level analysis
– The Technological Web– The Contextualized Web– The Economic Web
⑥ Results & discussion 15
Being, space & time on the Web
• Being: exists if and only if there is a communication channel linking to it
• Web beings: beings communicated through the Web
• Web space: the Web being’s URI, incoming & outgoing links
• Web time: visiting durations 16
The easy part: criticism “Web …resource” • economic and ecological connotations
– human, natural, renewable etc. – land, labor, and capital– 12 appearances in Economics classification– Wikipedia: not a word about Internet/Web
thing”• Not descriptive, too general, multiple
meanings17
Being on the Web
• practical & general definition • Include some existing theories
e.g.• “Dasein (Heidegger)• “circulating entities” (ANT), revert
dichotomy individuals - society
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Being on the Web
• “to have” (e.g., friends, connections, identities) becomes of equal importance to “to be”
• should be studied along with the various manifestations of “to be.”
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URI -1
minimal description of invariant elements in communication through the Web
borderline, interlocutor & fingerprint of Web being
enables transformation from digital to Web
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URI -2
directly connected to existence (birth, access, navigate, edit & death of a Web being)
other characteristics of Web beings may change in time
a change in URI means the death of existing & birth of a new Web being
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The Web space -1
• a division of position & place created by the links among Web beings
• each Web being occupies a specific locus in the Web network
• a 3d “geographic coordinate system” • heterogeneous
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The Web space -2
• many “gravity” & relative “distance” metrics
• Such as hubs and authorities, centrality and algorithms (e.g., community detection)
• Pagerank initially build on Web space
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The time -1• “bookkeeping” clock time
(Physics)• time is like a universal order within
which all changes are related to each other (Aristotle)
• Time is meaningless if there are no tangible events (Aristotle)
• a series of choices in space24
The Bergsonian time -1 • sequence of finite & heterogeneous
durations• irreversible (unpredictable future)
Each duration has a significance different from that of each preceding
• and following one. The transition from inner time to the time of things
• is related to memory and consciousness)
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The Bergsonian time -2 • Each duration has a significance
different from that of each preceding and following one
“These 5 min felt like a century..” • The transition from inner time to
the time of things is related to memory and consciousness
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The Bergsonian time -3 • indeterminism• heterogeneity • irreversibility • capturing the essence of human
behavior.• The time of social systems
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The Web time -1• a series of choices (visits) in the
Web space (Bergsonian durations)
• visiting selections attach semantic meaning
• casual relationships among Web beings
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The Web time -2• counting: Log file as a generic
common property & co-operation in the Web
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The Web time -3Durations are becoming: Discoverable, Observable, Traceable Processable, Massive
increases material dimension of networks
enables reconstruction of consciousness & memory of Users
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Relax the hypothesis of the self-contained Web and
describehow the Web affects physical space, time, and existence.
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Space and the WebDiscoverable & Traceable (e.g. online maps)
both expands (hyper-connected) and limits the notion of physical space (less travel)
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Time and the Web -1Human activities through or on the Web have become available • asynchronously• (in part) synchronously• continuously
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Time and the Web -2Flexibility:If physical time is an arbitrary standard that enables the division of infinite space into useful parts, the Web assists us in separating it intoeven finer pieces
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Time and the Web -3 pressure on traditional socio-economic structures (e.g. law) and
Human behavior
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Being and the Web -1 “networked individuals” – homo connectus • linking with little regard to space
(Wellman 2002)• mobilize part or all of their
information operating in a more flexible, less-bounded, and spatially dispersed environment.
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Being and the Web -1• frequent switching among multiple social
networks and modes of communication,• a different sense of belonging, flexible
business arrangements,• and intense time management• privatized space• peer production as the 4th P in property,
procurement, patronage, and peer production (David 1992).
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Research challenges• to obtain the right balance between
open access to online information and self-determination of users, on the one hand, and to provide the proper incentives to produce content and develop network infrastructure
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Research challenges
to accelerate socio-economic development by facilitating life-critical functions in the developing world and by enabling transparency, participation, and added-value services in the developed world.
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How to analyze the Web as an ethical space?
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Hypotheses Web:• ethically-relevant social machine• magma of Users and code
start from the Web assume a self-contained Web orthe “manna from heaven” hypothesis(internal ethics analysis)
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“manna from heaven” hypothesis
• Web is the only existing system • human beings are communicating
& working solely through it • a compassionate ‘God’ provides
the necessary quantity of ‘manna’, fulfilling all human needs, with no cost & effort
• Web being, space & time42
Freedom Iothe source of values o“freedom-coercion” tradeoff
–more options to solve problems collectively & innovate, but
–some of these options may be used in ways that cause coercion
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Freedom II• Theories:how to construct a system that selects, with minimum social cost which positive options to sacrifice in order to minimize coercion (or the dual problem) • start with Hayek’s approach
because confronts with most Web characteristics
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Hayek’s freedom I • State posses the monopoly to
enforce coercive power through General Rules
• Personal Sphere & Property counterweight state power
• General Rules are enforced equally & describe the borderlines between State & Personal Sphere
• Property is a basic realization of General Rules
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Hayek’s freedom II • Competition is possible by the
dispersion of Property• Mutually advantageous collaboration
is based on Competition in service provision
• effective anti-monopolistic policy: require from the monopolist (including the state) to treat all customers alike
• Individuals should be responsible & accountable for their actions 46
3-level analysisApply theory of freedom according to Web’s evolution from plain s/w to ecosystem
• The Technological Web– Internet infrastructure & Web software
• The Contextualized Web– Sets of rules enforced through trust
• The Economic Web– Economic contexts 47
The Web as a space of FreedomFreedom
free access & inter-connection of any compatible software/device
freely navigate, create and update Web Beings and links universality, openness & separation of layers in engineering, editing, searching & navigating
establish specific contexts in order to form beliefs that some Users/Web beings are trustworthy
no barriers to economize
Coercion badware applications (e.g. computer-zombies) traffic censorship (e.g.“Snooping”)inadequate quality of transmission
badware-infected Web Beings central control & censoring of traffic“walled gardens” in SN (privacy threats & fragmentation) manipulation of indexing & searching (e.g. spamdexing)un-trustworthy technologies, business & governments badware & malicious representations
concentration of power in a minority of Users inability of some people to benefit from the Web economy
Internet
Web software
Contextualized Web
Economic Web
Personal sphereIP address: can only be processed for certain reasons oWeb: log file common ownership by
design (admin & navigator) o architectural element of co-operation
oAdmin: direct access oNavigator: not straightforward access
o not proper practices for collecting traffic
oshould be further analyzed
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General rulesTreating all Internet Users, Web Navigators & Editors equally • profile customization • open technological standards• efficient business incentives
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The contextualized Web• Web 2.5: not only User-
Generated Content, but context • communication is central to
establishing trust (Habermas) • rich connectivity of the Web is
bound into its function • antitrust & coercion= the prices
for widespread & beneficial trust 51
The contextualized Webinternal Web ethics: • ensure not that antitrust
happens, but • that it is outweighed by
beneficial trust to as great a degree as possible consistent with Hayekian notions of freedom
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Challenges in the economic Web I
obtain the right balance between: • open access and processing of
online information (e.g. socially aware cloud storage, g-work)
& • provision of incentives to
produce content & to develop network infrastructure
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Challenges in the economic Web II
• accelerate socio-economic development by facilitating life-critical functions in the developing world (e.g. W3F)
• enable transparency & participation in the developed world (e.g. Open Data)
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Challenges in the economic Web III
o“Link economy” o“App economy” oexcessive market power in
Search Engine market
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Results I • centralization of traffic & data
control • rights on visiting log file • custom User profiles • interplay among function,
structure & moral values
are directly connected to the quality of freedom in the Web 56
Results II
issues about freedom in lower levels of the Web (i.e. technology) have crucial impact on the subsequent levels of higher complexity (i.e. context, economy)
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Next stepso involve more theories &
disciplineso relax assumptionsoconnect to engineering issues
(e.g. TAG)oWebizing humanity & humanizing
Web58
Webizing humanity & humanizing Web
Web: • emerged not as a business project with
hierarchical structures but • as a creative & open space of volunteers
outside traditional market and pricing• markets would have never invested such
amounts in labor costs to develop it • temporal disconnection between effort &
rewards • symbiosis between non-financial and
financial incentives 59
Webizing humanity – humanizing web
In economyo incorporate in the entire economy, the best
of the symbiosis between virtues and economic incentives in the Web
o the Web has still many lessons to take from the long-living market mechanisms on how to best orchestrate effort and reward in society
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C. Initiate interesting questions
Incorporates directly the relation and co-evolution between online and physical world• What is the quality & quantity of this
relation?• Rethink influential concepts under the
proposed framework: Embodiment, artifactualization, network individualism, privatised spaces and peer production.
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Role of philosophy
What society can learn from the Web?
What can teach it in order to become more useful?
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Thank you!
• More in vafopoulos.orgReferences• Being, space and time in the Web.
Metaphilosophy (forthcoming).• The Web economy: goods, users,
models and policies. Foundations and Trends in Web science (forthcoming).
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appendix
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The Web time“time of social systems” is • indeterministic,• Heterogeneous • irreversible • built on the Einsteinian time of
physical systems.
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The case of Net Neutrality
• QoS issues• Technological approach (e.g.
Flow-Aware Networking) • generic freedom-coercion trade-
offs are useful in framing the feasibility space but incomplete in treating more specific cases in practice (like NN)
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Flow-Aware NetworkingFAN may ensure neutrality along with the awareness of QoS create an occurrence, upon which the implicit separation will be performed solely based on the current link status (e.g. dataflow congestion, traffic bottleneck etc.). Therefore, all datagrams are forwarded unconditionally in the pipeline, but they are also “equal”, subject to be separated or even dropped when the network tolerance demands it. The main advantage of FAN-based architectures is that they differentiate the data flow, taking into account only the traffic characteristics of the currently transmitted information. Hence, apart from data discrimination, it is not possible to comprehensively discriminate certain applications, services and end-Users.
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The Being – Query ① The easy part: criticism ② The hard part: build concepts & models③ The Being-Query framework: network
inside!④ Introducing the Web: Web Beings ⑤ The Being – Query framework expanded⑥ How can this framework be useful?
– Understand & compare diverse models– Expand existing & create new concepts – Initiate interesting questions
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The hard part: build conceptsStep 1: definition & assumptions• A Being exists if and only if there is a
communication channel linking to it. (possible update based on HH)
• A Query is the phrasing of a question by a Being, usually in terms of a code. The questions are messages expressed as sequences of symbols in the query language. Beings have Queries that address them to other Beings.
up to now: an abstract model that could be described by a weighted network of Beings (not very useful!)
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… and modelsStep 2: building the framework• Users, are Beings that can “consciously”
form Queries.• Queries are organized in Topics (tractable
and processable).
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Topics
Queries
Users
Beings
The Being-Query framework: network inside!
A quad network: contraction of 4 interconnected networks
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Queries
Beings
Topics
Users
Introducing the Web: Web Beings
Beings that can be communicated through the Web. URI: The minimal description of invariant
elements in communication through the Web.
Directly connected to existence (birth, access, navigate, edit & death of a Web being)
Other characteristics of Web beings may change in time.
A change in URI means the death of existing & birth of a new WB.
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The Being – Query framework expanded
“Teleportation”, Search Engines, relevance feedback, …Search Engine: get as inputs Queries and produce collections of Web beings
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Topics
Queries
Web Queries
Users
Web Users
Beings
Web Beings
“teleportation”
Search engine
How can this framework be useful?
Networks facilitate understanding, measuring, modeling, comparing, deciding & forming policy when connections matter and today matter more than ever…
A. Understand & compare existing models
B. Expand existing & create new concepts C. Initiate interesting questions
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A. Understand & compare existing models
① Computer science [e.g. User models, TF (single: Web)]
② Network science [e.g. Barabasi (single: Web)]③ Economic modeling (e.g.)
– Stegeman (dual: Users-Web) – Papadimitriou et al (triad: Users-Queries, Topics,
Web) – Katona-Sarvary (triad: Navigators-Users, Editors-
Web, Topics) – Not yet published (quad-network models)
Possible extensions in DSS, ERP, Bus. Intelligence79
B. Expand existing & create new concepts
• Existing: e.g. Digital economy, ICT4D, internet of things,…
• New: e.g. Web goodsWeb beings with economic valueWeb UsersWeb economy
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Web Users and economy
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