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Singer-songwriter David Rovics: “Facebook killed the internet”

Broadcast January 2nd, 10-11:00 a.m. Central (1500 GMT) on NoLiesRadio.org, archived here. Note: TruthJihad.com subscribers can listen to shows on-demand before they are broadcast – and also get free downloads! If you are a subscriber, just log in to the members area of TruthJihad.com and go to the “Private Blog” to get early access to the shows. 

David Rovics does songs of social significance better than just about anyone. (Long-time listeners to Truth Jihad Radio will remember his “Reichstag Fire” bumper music back in our American Freedom Radio days.)

David’s latest essay “How Facebook Killed the Internet” argues:

“Because of the technical limitations of the internet for a brief period of time, there was for a few years a happy medium found between a small elite providing most of the written content that most people in the world read, and the situation we now find ourselves in, drowning in Too Much Information, most of it meaningless drivel, white noise, fog that prevents you from seeing anywhere further than the low beams can illuminate at a given time.”

We also discuss music’s potential to touch emotions, build community, and inspire quests for truth and justice; where the world may be heading in 2015; and much more.

3 Thoughts to “Singer-songwriter David Rovics: “Facebook killed the internet””

  1. Anonymous

    David and Kevin, I'm stirred to write after hearing your guys' interview of TruthJihad via NoLiesRadio…and more specifically, after hearing the elements of information sharing leading to activism in this modern era…and concluding that they are unseen atop your noses! This is a good thing and I'm not doing my BWA [Boston Wise Ass] thing… David, we had a short emailing a few years back and we may have a few "six degrees of separations" based upon: …our common times spent in the Cambridge-Boston scene sometime between 1987 and 1993-ish… …me giving friend Chris Chandler as much stage time as I could manage in the comedy-music-spoken word-poetry-storytellig room… …this happened because I invented "Street Stage" allowing many disciplines of live performances on the dual stages… …Dar Williams, Don White, other amazingly talented people took the open stage-HEY,maybe even YOU! My records are gone… …I did this at Catch A Rising Star because comedy was in decline [thankfully!] and I had two stages to fill…and I did… …so we came up wich lotsa reasons to fill the two stages at Catch-formerly Jonathan Swifts near "Out of Town News"… …and finally, if your were doing what you are doing back then, its likely that you crossed paths with Barry Crimmins with whom I worked… Anyway, attached and below please find a concept that CAN serve to take tyhe best from past public activism. Primarily I question the value big marches from nowhere-to nowhere-infront of nobody-unerreprted by corporate media, and also the process of PROTEST…I like the process of PRE-TEST instead. CI…Civil Informationing: modernizing public activism, is designed to put another, more congenial, more communicative, more informational, more conversational, more "inclusive" tactic of "public activism" to stand alongside CD [which few want to have to do] and CR, which is too solitary an act thus stripping away "community" from public activism. (to be continued)

  2. Anonymous

    (continued from above)
    I'm asking directly that you give the concept a chance and NOT to throw it away because I deeply question the value of "protest". Scott Walker of WI was right when he said: "Let them protest…" because he KNOWS that its a huge waste of time, energy, finances and emotional energies…and because he knows that they will both eventually go away with heads hung down, AND, with plenty of news clips showing all the bad stuff about SOME political activists-those are the clips that make it on the FAUXNEWS channels etc. So, this may challenge the existence of several of your ribs as you work your way through the counterproductivity of "marches and protests"-IN THE LONG RUN! You may not remember but Walker got MORE VOTES in his recall bid than his original election AND, he was just reelected handily. I stopped counting at 60 million "person protest hours" and wondered how much better off the recall efforts woyld have been if the activists had used those 60 MIL hours PRETESTING before Walker ever got elected. The liberals, lefites and FEW democrats that are left are "one trick ponies"…and can't give up the "protest-hit" habit formed last century. Anyway, my major point that I'm making here is refining what Kevin and you both touched upon…and that is what the youth's attention will turn to when all the "stupid stuff" has run its course…OR…put in a different way by me here: Once thye youth grows up to see its important to contribute to our democracy [othen a result of child bearing], they will know HOW to get good information from the webworld…and they WILL DO THIS! So we have to keep making websites…keep supporting radio like TruthJihad and NoLies, and also and other TRULY indy information outlets such as websites and the TRs of the world. I'm in the streets weekly with my signs, banners and DVD/pamphlet handouts, and I talk with the youth [imagine that-I'm 66!!!]…and they are out there…they are informed too much about silly stuff…are fairly well informed about important stuff…don't know how to assemble forces or how to create political force…and most will soon be bored by "cats" as Kevin mentioned. CI…Civil Informationing [deliberately misspelled to annoy anal lefties and liberals] needs to be tallked about because it redefines a citizen's responsibilities and behaviors supporting public political activism. CI needs to mentioned along with CD and CR as being tools to use for affecting democracy. Thanks both for what you do…two brilliant guys using their personal gifts to make the positive changes that we need! peace, love and progress… robin hordon Kingston, WA

  3. Anonymous

    Comparison between CI and 1960s-1970s tactics PIC of my set-up outside CenturyLink Field in Seattle during my "Occupy" efforts ———————————————————- Civil Informationing…modernizing public activism …with an addendum defining “Occupy Democracy-your town”… By Robin Hordon January 2002 through August 2014 CI…or Civil Informationing has been written to give citizens the opportunity to participate in public political activism without being afraid or expected to break laws or to get arrested…OR…to have to rearrange their lives to travel great distances and spend funds that they do not have in order to attend a centralized march or rally. Whether or not last century’s activists accept the following reality, the FACT is that many people have been driven away from public activism BECAUSE of the more extreme behaviors, confrontational tactics and high expectations of “the original” public activists who have actually erected these barriers over the last half century. This fully explains why more and more wonderful and caring citizens have dropped out of the dinosaur-like public political activism activities [such as marches etc.] over the years. Frankly its because these nice folk have been driven out by good meaning but narrow-minded public activists who are insensitive to the positions and feelings of the average citizens who DO care…but are uncomfortable at joining in with such “loud” behaviors. Instead, CI…Civil Informationing, as you will find out when you read this document, encourages citizens to conduct legal, peaceful, respectful and calm “information sharing” via public activism in local towns first. Additionally, at the end of this writing you will find an offspring of CI…Civil Informationing…its called: “OCCUPY DEMOCRACY-YOUR TOWN” and it’s a concept paper that similarly transitions “occupation” from occupying a physical space into occupying a wide variety of ISSUES needing attention and improvement. “Occupy” is simply redefined as: CITIZENRY GETTING MORE INVOLVED-LOCALLY FIRST! Again, this is all done without breaking any laws, without having to go far out of the way, or without having to spend monies that most people do not have.

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