Jarvis vs. Morozov

Last night I read a pretty detailed review of Jeff Jarvis’ latest book Private Parts by Evgeny Morozov. To call it a “shellshacking” would be an understament…

After work I came home and saw that Jarvis had actually written a reply on Google+ and there had been a bit of back and forth (for some here and here) between Morozov and Jarvis on Twitter. I think the most interesting part of Jarvis’ response is the amount of comments from Jarvis supporters attacking Morozov’s critique. I found it interesting because many accused Morozov of being “cynical” and a “pessimist” especially against the “positive” and “forward-looking” cadre of cyber-utopians led by Jarvis and the like. It seemed that most people who supported Jarvis were from the US… It reminded me of a book by Barbara Ehrenreich titled Smile or Die: How Positive Thinking Fooled America and the World. How much is Internet-centrism a consequence of cultural norm? How much is it engrained in the “have a nice day!” society? I wrote Morozov about it on Twitter and if he responds, I’ll update the post!