However, many smaller groups with less pre-established agency don't operate in this manner. Movements that utilize network technologies are more akin to open source "chaos" where individuals seek different aims by different means and in doing so produce a coherent system.
Baile argues that its hard for us to accept technologically driven movements because the current corporate-technological paradigm foregrounds the means of communication over the thing being communicated. By continuing to see technology as a means to capitalistic ends, protest groups have difficulty validating their message within the context of corporate techno-utility.
Baile utilizes Burke's pentad to argue:
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"these emerging protest rhetorics utilizing technology are legitimate persuasive strategies for organic movements looking to create social change"
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"the representative smart mob’s attempt at protest is complicated by the digital scene created by corporations—a scene which follows the archetypical narrative of technology as a boon to the social status quo and corporate capitalism."
Baile argues that smart mobs creatively utilize technology that utilizes "pre-existing, well-maintained communication networks" to create a group working toward a goal but not intimately/personally familiar to one another.
" What needs to happen is a reconsideration of how we, as a culture, view technology and its uses, and a more realistic interpretation of computers, the Internet, cell phones, and the World Wide Web as everyday tools—not fetish objects imbued with a mystical quality. In showing two very dissimilar agents I hope to make plain how the Readington students and their action is just as normal—if not more so—than the aims of a corporate giant like Nokia"
---The Scene Act Ratio at Readington Middle School---
Baile looks at the "Penny Prank" at Readington Middle School where students protested the 20 minutes they were given to arrive, purchase, and eat lunch by paying for lunch in pennies. They did this to highlight how little time they were being given to have lunch.
The students' use of pennies to pay for a $2 meal utilized a formal currency that placed in jeopardy the school's responsibility to provide a nutritious meal with the time it took to feed all the students.
Burke utilizes the pentad, specifically the scene-act ratio, to explain how the students' act. He uses Foucault's archaeology to argue that the scene (western school) was built on a factory-efficiency model. The students then used the essence of the scene against the scene itself.
" By literally clogging the system with their individual bodies and ensuring that no body flowed smoothly through the cafeteria that day, the confines of the system swelled beyond its capacity and burst. While the previous metaphor likens the student bodies to water, the real action here was not bodies bursting out of the building but the introduction of entropy through a strategic use of a common action in that system, i.e., the method of payment. The disciplinarian system could continue to monitor and keep the students’ bodies in line (literally and metaphorically), but it could not work upon their bodies efficiently so as to make certain their movement through this part of the daily schedule was within the prescribed time limit"
This smart mob utilized the Internet, websites, cell phones, land lines, etc. to organize a group of disparate individuals (think of all the cliques in a middle school) toward a temporary common goal. The group doesn't coalesce around any formal organization or identity; they all shared the common concern of lunch time.
"The
ability to organize around the act of composition (composing texts to inform)
and the rhetoric of a specific cause (the disliked short lunch period) cut
across a highly stratified caste system to unite them for one specific purpose.
The act matches the scene as the school uses the physical layout of buildings,
the use of lines (a “file” in Foucault’s military paradigm) a time schedule,
and technology (to keep records, to schedule classes, to set-up the bell
schedule, to store personal files, to record test scores), to act on the
students. The students, in turn, used the layout of the building, being forced
to stand in line, the time schedule, and technology (cell phones, the
telephone, blogs, websites, email, and text messages) to resist"
---The Scene-Agent Ratio at Readington Middle School---
Baile uses the scene-agent ratio to explain why they students made the choices they did.
"Essentially, the
agents will take on the qualities of their environment and use the tools and
practices (agency) common to their scene. This group of agents used the
architecture of the dining area and the technology of the Internet against the
school, the two aspects that the school is par excellence in using as a
way to coerce and manage the student body."
The students also utilized the rules of the scene to subvert the system. They broke no rules.
---Nokia in the Scene Act Ratio---
"In the case of Nokia, we see Nokia (agent) sidestepping traditional civil society (counteragent) by using the architecture created by mobile technology (agency) that enables them to control cultural texts (act) in order to turn a profit (purpose) within a public sphere dominated by capitalists (scene)."
----
Baile finds it interesting that the Readington students orchestrated a "prank" instead of a protest.
" So, let’s play with a simile. If we think of both Nokia and the Readintgton 25 as two trains, using the same methods, i.e., the technology of steam, and the same architecture of railroad tracks, how is it the Readington train is seen as less important than the Nokia train? Why is the Readington act described as a prank and the Nokia act seen as serious and ethical?"
"Essentially, this attempt at a railroad inspired metaphor is an attempt to a make point: Nokia does not directly influence the Readington 25, but Nokia’s acts within the world scene affect the Readington 25. How Nokia deals with symbols and cultural texts decides how the Readington 25’s act is taken up by society, and in actuality, all smart mobs and their actions."
---
Baile argues that the capitalist scene frames the actions (driven by monetary gain) of agents, and we conceive of actions according to this paradigm. Therefore, the students, since they are not viewing the exchange of information and communication monetarily like Nokia does by licensing ringtones and information, their actions are devalued and termed pranks. They don't work within the system, so they are condemned by the system.
---What Does This Mean for Rhetoric?---
"With this in mind, I assert that this cultural narrative
where technology is a tool of capitalism there is only one acceptable roles
available to individuals: consumer...If
the message (“purpose” in the pentad) of an act (in the pentad sense) does not
match the narratives saturating technology (technology would be “agency” within
Burke’s nomenclature), then the message will be disregarded, or worse,
misinterpreted and misnamed."
"Simply
put, technology and its accompanying, special narratives and rhetorics
problematize Burke’s pentad; but this is due to audience expectation and their
terminsitic screens—not the smart mobs nor its methods, nor due to a flaw in
Burke’s theories."
"As I demonstrated earlier in this paper with the Nokia
example, the system these administrators live in is a capitalistic hierarchy,
one where technology furthers the agenda of global capitalism. Anything that
does not meet this standard is filtered through the terministic screen created
by this ultimate term and left on the mediatory ground as useless slag
This
“glamour,” I propose, also coerces everyday people and media pundits into
denying the possibilities technology holds outside the uses prescribed by the
American ruling class. This, in turn, means anything not fitting within this
hierarchy of terms, like smart mobs, are often overlooked, misnamed, and
misinterpreted."
"While
in the short term the Readington 25’s methods were effective, their goals, and
the methods used to try and achieve those goals, were ultimately distorted when
presented to the larger audience of observers outside their immediate locale.
To
combat this, the grand narratives of the individual hero creating ideologically
pure protest groups needs to be suspended when dealing with moments of protest.
The talk and writing that goes into the organizing either moments of, or groups
devoted to, social protest need to be examined in a new way that discerns the difference
between traditional methods of group creation and new, communication technology
enabled methods."A
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