A while back I wrote about the brave new revenue sharing world that is fast approaching. I argued that in order to infiltrate word of mouth distribution channels, companies would begin to share revenue with their users. I predicted that the result would be the total commoditisation of our social lives and I painted nightmare scenarios where we were paid to influence our friends, colleagues and loved ones for the sake of a share in the profit. I want now to explore the deeper connections between those forces which propel us toward this brave new world, and those that resist it. I argue that the revulsion we feel toward the idea stems from a deep philosophical view that has its roots in the Romantic movement. This romantic sentiment is in danger of being swallowed up and destroyed by those forces it has for so long opposed. Is it capable of maintaining its oppositional stance – and is it even a sentiment that we value any more? Or is it now just an empty myth used for entertainment and empty amusement?

I felt compelled to return to this subject when I noticed a new revenue sharing site pop up. This time it’s a social networking site called Yuwie. As far as I know, no revenue sharing site has yet gone viral – but I think it’s only a matter of time. As we might expect, revenue sharing sites are late comers to market, and use the revenue sharing as a means to buy their position. And this is certainly true of Yuwie. According to Alexa, Yuwie’s growth is quite impressive when compared to other revenue sharing sites like digitaljournal, newsvine and flixya (It already has 50,000 users in its first 2 months of operation. What’s interesting is that Yuwie is a social networking site – a breed of web 2.0 site that is particularly viral in its nature as its members rush to fill their profiles with as many friends as possible. Users of Yuwie get paid for referring people as well as for page views of their profiles. This is interesting because as far as I know, this is the first application that gives people the opportunity to leverage their social lives for the accumulation of revenue. And of course, this goes right to the heart of my concerns in this post. What effects will this have – will it be detrimental?

It’s introduced innocently enough. Have a look at this introductory video that Yuwie uses to explain its service. To quote: “What if somebody came along and told you they would pay you for something you were already doing”. It’s supposed to be a no-brainer for the prospective social networker. You’re already using these sites, investing your time, generating revenue for the owners of these sites – why not claim a share of that revenue? Of course it could never be so innocent. On Yuwienews a blog that tracks the site (I assume its a blog run by one of the developers but they don’t declare it as such so it’s hard to know for sure) admits that there is already a spamming problem with Yuwie users, in that they are hitting established social networks in an attempt to recruit new members and thus earn revenue.

Adding money into any mix – changes the mixture. Consider the other method of earning revenue on Yuwie – profile views. No doubt then, that people’s behaviour will change with respect to this aspect of their social networking experience. They’ll naturally strive to achieve more views. And to do this, they’ll adopt the same logic obsessed over by pop idols, tv producers and celebrity news magazines. Social networks have already been criticised for encouraging a superficiality with respect to interpersonal relationships. Imagine the degree to which this will be exacerbated by the introduction of revenue sharing.

Yuwie is just an example. The concept goes well beyond any particular service they might be offering. Its potential for success is mitigated by one consideration – precisely that people will see it as a ‘sell-out’, an inauthentic corporate con and hence stay away. Perhaps this sentiment has hitherto prevented any revenue sharing site from going viral. But what is the source of this sentiment – and can it stand up against the marketers who hope to convince you to hand over your soul?

In many respects, this turns out to be the key question. It’s directly related to the question that asks how might revenue sharing come to influence our intimate encounters with our social peers. We tend to think that same sentiment that causes us to reject the marketers and the corporatists is the same one that we bring to bear during those intimate moments with our friends. There is that feeling that between friends is a personal exchange the value of which is defined precisely by the fact that it’s an honest exchange between two trusting people. As individuals we offer to one another our experiences and judgments of the world, so that the other may benefit and thereby be enriched. The revulsion, then, that some of us may feel toward the revenue sharing concept seems to derive directly from a feeling that this kind of exchange, so vital to our enjoyment of life and the world, is directly threatened by the revenue sharing concept. An individual would no longer offer their contribution to us because it was their honest experience of the world – but because they stand to be rewarded for the contribution they get told to make. To make this sentiment concrete, imagine yourself asking the following question: ‘Is Joe sending me messages on Yowie because he has something he wants me to see (that he’d think I’d value) – or is it because he’s just trying to get views on his profile’.

But we can’t stop here with our analysis – this sentiment itself rests on deeper, more profound assumptions. One of these, of course, is that in an exchange between two people, there is the belief that each individual is capable of making a contribution. We assume that they are not just automatons offering outputs as determined by a program of some sort. Nor do we believe that this individual is just a by-product of consumer marketing programs, or religious brainwashing; that is, in sum, we believe that there is in fact such a thing as an individual. We believe that we aren’t just instantiations of a process or an institution. Rather we see ourselves as having that vital spark, that something deep inside of us which isn’t determined by anything external to us. And when we communicate with one another – it’s that vital spark that we touch, that electrifies and excites us.

But to what extent is this a coherent idea? It’s so ingrained in our thinking that’s its almost impossible for us to think it false or even question its meaning. But where did it come from? Have we always thought this way about ourselves? The answer is – no. In fact, this view of ourselves grew out of an artistic and intellectual movement that in world-historical terms is relatively recent. It’s called Romanticism. And I’ll provide a brief excurses into the ideas of the Romantics in order to show the deep philosophical concerns embedded in our reactions to modern phenomena like revenue sharing. For those growing antsy and bored – I urge you to continue reading. There is really no way to understand the features of our current age without having some knowledge of these cultural forces set in motion only a few hundred years ago.

Romanticism, as I’ve already mentioned, was an artistic and intellectual movement that began in late eighteenth century Europe. It was a reaction to the tradition of Enlightenment that believed in an ordered, rule governed universe. In such a universe, we were just tiny cogs in the machine. The Romanticist reaction to this world view, led by figures such as Herder, Blake, Kant (somewhat ironically), Rousseau, Hegel and many others rejected this view. They did not believe that the human spirit could be reduced under such a calculus. The human will longed to express that which originated from its source – and this expression was stifled by the enlightenment view which subsumed all things under natural law. For under such law – how could the human being claim to make any such contribution? Science was seen as the killer of the imaginative human spirit. The Romantics wanted freedom for the human soul.

This mode of thinking continued to develop in different iterations throughout the 18th, 19th and into the 20th century. Many peripheral aspects changed, but the core elements stayed the same. Isaiah Berlin in his lectures “The Roots of Romanticism” best summarises the core of the movement in two aspects: 1) An irrepressible human will that seeks to express itself, and 2) the irreducible freedom of the human spirit. These core ideas began to filter down into the popular consciousness over the years – and became the bedrock of most popular cultural expression in the modern era (a great recent example is The Matrix). It’s not hard to see why. It’s an immensely marketable idea – that we are free human spirits, the masters of our own destinies.

But despite its take up in the popular consciousness, Romanticism never succeeded in entirely usurping society away from those enlightenment ideals. Despite the supposed failure of the enlightenment project that occurred during the twentieth century (the discovery of entropy, godel’s incompleteness theorem, quantumn theory – and other discoveries that shook our faith in an ordered rule governed universe) – nevertheless, the refinement of scientific method and the tools of control continued. A kind of bifurcation of history occurred. On the one hand we increasingly bought into the Romantic view of the human individual, while on the other, we increasingly let ourselves become – so to speak – plugged into the machine.

That last claim needs justification – but I won’t try to do so here. But of course, one pertinent example would be the acceptance of a revenue sharing model that allows us to leverage our social lives for monetary gain. But this is just the latest in a long line of gradual shifts toward a hegemonic and institutionally dominated society. However, it remains a key, and perhaps final element of a long historical process. I mentioned above that the key question was whether the individualist intuition that made us rebel against the revenue sharing idea could ultimately stand up to the forces that were arrayed against it. I have subsequently identified that intuition with the old Romanticist tradition – but my claim is that Romanticism has never been a genuinely oppositional movement. At best it inspired men to react against the system – but it disavowed itself of the laws and rules of power that might allow it to act as an effective opposition. It has since become an empty myth that is fed back to us in books (Harry Potter) or movies (The Matrix) – which again are just the efforts of corporations, trying get us to hand over our capital back to them.

So I think it unlikely that such an oppositional spirit will really stand in the way of the revenue sharing phenomenon that is about to descend upon us. But if the Romantic ideology is just an empty myth then is this really something we should worry about? Is there really anything we will be losing when we hand over our individuality and our freedom to the corporations in exchange for a few pennies?

Well – before we answer that – let’s make an assumption and ask a couple of other questions first. Let’s assume that there is something right about the Romanticist view of the human spirit. Let’s assume that there is something vitally individual that must be expressed – that must seek expression and must be heard. Then what’s certain is that the domain of individual social interaction is perhaps the last place where this expression can occur without impediment from the institutional powers that be. (Actually, even this is debatable – see my post on how we help the marketers). Our media is run by those with corporate concerns – marketing is a scientific affair. But even this domain of private, individual discourse is now under threat by those that wish to infiltrate it using revenue sharing as the means. If our ability to express ourselves as individuals is truly something vital to our humanity – then our last bastion, our last outlet for so doing is in immediate danger of being made inaccessible to us.

So we return to the question – were the Romantics right? Are we about to give up something vital to our humanity. Is this brave new world going to become a nightmare? I will leave this question for another post…