The "Blue Chair" section: And this time, an interview with Noam Manela, a researcher in networks and digital consciousness • On the discourse between right and left: "There is a tendency to think that the right in the State of Israel uses social networks more correctly, so he also complains that he is more censored."

• Noam Menela

  Photo: 

  Joshua Joseph

Noam Menela is 



a researcher in networks and digital consciousness and



a lecturer for a master's degree at the College of Management. Business consultant to bodies and companies in the fields of high-tech, security, banking, education and communications. Chess enthusiast and author of books on the subject

Noam Manela, you are a researcher of social networks and digital consciousness. In the background call for this interview you mentioned to me that you do not read newspapers or watch TV. 

"I need online communication, and I also reach for articles in channels and newspapers in Israel and around the world. I do so because I believe that consuming media regularly, from the same sources, produces a kind of takeover of consciousness by instilling opinions and ideas. It is manifested even in certain words. Captive to an agenda from which the chances of leaving are close to zero. "

Even in the network people are in homogeneous groups, with agendas.

"But after all, the more heterogeneous network. The more diverse the system from which you receive information, the more your consciousness develops and opens up." 

Does your thesis also apply to those who read several types of newspapers on all sides of the spectrum?

"Then he will definitely have heterogeneity, but there will always be more heterogeneity on the net."

And what about objectivity, for example?

"I am against objective journalism because I think there is no such thing. Once a person writes it is no longer objective, it is over."

Do you think the change comes from below, from the networks, and not from the traditional media?

"Inaccurate. It's multi-directional. The change can come from many directions. Regarding the network, the level of directionality is infinite, the network is chaotic, decentralized. One has to think of the old, authoritative world that determined what was right and what was wrong - in terms of a crashed plane; And the web has found the black box of the world, and through it one can expose injustices, mistakes, lies - and of course produce new ones. "

Some say the networks have become "soft weapons of democracy." But now, in the face of the tension bubbling there, it seems that it is already an aggressive, violent and inciting weapon.

"There is a conflict between the spirit of the past, the so-called Zeitgeist, and the present one. It is a holistic friction that exists on the language we speak, on values, morals and in general - what is democracy, what is authority. At present the friction is very high: protests we see in Israel and in the US" In, for example, they are against disgusting democratic systems, which in the eyes of many people less serve certain groups in the population at the level of representation, for example - blacks, women, young people.

Became the creators. Joaquin Phoenix in "Joker"

"Look at the shorts protest - who even books students until recently? There's a discourse on values ​​here, and it has nothing to do with whether those tools are in the service of democracy or against it. Anyone who knows how to use networks does so. What African Americans do in the United States, For example, it's amazing - and by the way - also unusual how ISIS marketed the shocking ideas they believe in: they gave their people a vision, a knowledge. ISIS taught retinas sometime in 2013, they understood something the world did not understand. "Unlike thousands of differences, Barack Obama and Donald Trump also understood something that the world did not understand on this issue."

"Lack of change produces anarchy"

If we are talking about Obama and Trump, how much do social networks influence the choice of leaders, perhaps even the overthrow of regimes?

"On the networks you can see a strong emotional motif between the spirit of the new era and the old spirit. When Hillary Clinton, the more archaic, faced Trump who connected with the spirit of the new era, the network intensified him, compared to the traditional media - which empowered Hillary, which also made her live in La La Land.

"Dean Buckett, the editor of the New York Times, almost crashed after that election and lost many readers. Thanks to a significant change he made in the newspaper's conduct in the network world, he has brought back about 5 million readers in the last three years. This is not because he tweeted like Trump. "Because of the way he understands the treatment of what truth, authority, knowledge, how to talk to people."

There are those who question Trump's style on the networks. Direct tweets, maybe even blatant ones, affect public opinion more clearly?

"It has an effect, because the web produces an activation of consciousness. A newspaper does not call you to action, it covers. In the form of anti-government demonstrations.And if you have a tendency to hate groups - then relevant posts can provoke it, resulting in a person going out to demonstrate.The network produces movement that is violent, but also contains anti-violence movement. 

There is no clear formula for flare-ups. U.S. protest // Photo: AFP

"But consciousness does not exist in the moment of crisis but is shaped and cooked for years, and then it has peaks. When you are in the world of African-Americans in the United States and you are connected to 'Black Lives Matter,' you are exposed to racist posts every day. What remains is for a major event to occur, such as the killing of Floyd, and all the 'cooked' to take to the streets. When exactly does this happen? It's chaotic, a combination of many factors, some of them eclectic. "

It sounds like the networks are bringing us closer to a kind of anarchy.

"My argument is exactly the opposite. In my opinion, an unchanging system produces institutional anarchy. The film 'Joker', for example, transformed the creators. The character of the Joker became prominent in various protests around the world, people wore makeup like him. This character is an indictment against the establishment , Which says - 'That I'm a killer is not because I was born bad, but because society abused me.' And an unchanging establishment produces a state of anarchy, as stated. Form, because we are losing faith - in law, in the media, in science. "

What kind of movement are you talking about?

"On a synthetic movement, a constant movement between the chaotic and the order, between authority and the lack of hierarchy. It is impossible to hold the old order all the time, and one must not be chaotic all the time. One must move naturally between these spaces of consciousness. New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Arden is An excellent example of this. Why is she perceived as inspiring? She has a presence in the network world, and at the same time she can speak to the old world. How did she talk to New Zealanders about the quarantine? She opened Facebook, sat at home with a sweatshirt, on foot, and said - New Citizens Dear Zealand, Closure, what a bass.There is a combination, she also speaks in Parliament, in the media, and also talks to me from home. 

Not for censorship. The bikini protest

"Elon Musk at Tesla, for example, decided that the old organizational structure was no longer appropriate, and creativity was stuck up the organizational strata. So he announced that there is no such thing as 'circumvention of authority.' Any employee can turn to any other employee, including Musk himself. Think how many ideas he put in that way. I offered it to four CEOs of large companies in Israel. How many of them agreed to think about it? zero. I was told it was chaotic. That's right- this is chaos. "

Put the chaos in so it doesn't explode in your face.

"Exactly. That's why we are talking today about chaos, they are not enemies but complementary. From yin and yang."

You're confusing me. The incitement in the networks, the violence, are you worried about them?

"In principle, except in extreme cases, Sheaming for example, I am in favor of free discourse. I think the value of free discourse is greater than the value of incitement. The control of a few people over the consciousness of many others is more dangerous than what is happening now. So now there are battles over consciousness. "To some extent on the dismantling of the authoritative mechanisms."

"Radical transparency required"

Some compare the recent events to similar processes that took place before Rabin's assassination.

"It is difficult to compare the recent events to the intensity of the incitement to the violence that existed at the time. Although inappropriate content was used, but it is on the fringes of the fringes. But to say that it did not produce radical human activation? It is possible, and of course dangerous."

In the face of incitement and violence, should more censorship?

"A lot of democratic and liberal people want the network to censor; to me it's really scary. In general, I do not want to give a business like Facebook the power to censor me. Zuckerberg is perceived as a privacy trader. I think the network can not be expected or produced. There are no sterile areas today. A study has been published according to which doctors who upload photos of swimsuits on Instagram or Facebook do not respect the profession.What happened? The hashtag 'MED Bikini' (in free translation: 'medical bikini'; RP), and photos of hundreds of doctors of all ages in swimsuits. The discourse cannot be sterile. The world is chaotic, chaos is part of the order, with how hard it is to digest. "

And you have not yet mentioned the algorithms by which censorship is carried out.

"Algorithms between them are questionable. In this matter was the case of the Norwegian Prime Minister, who uploaded a picture of the 'Naflem girl' from the Vietnam War, an iconic picture of a naked girl injured in the war. Facebook censored her for inappropriate content. So censorship can often create more distortions than beneficial . " 

Unifying tweets? Twitter // Photo: IP

"In the not-too-distant future, systems that want life will be more transparent. Corona chief Roni Gamzo said we will create transparency. But transparency is no longer enough, I believe radical transparency is needed. What's more, if the censor starts to be too strong on Twitter or Facebook, people will move to networks Others. "

Following the censorship, what do we know about the credibility of the discourse on social media? Studies have shown that the presence of Pike News on Facebook, for example, is lower than commonly thought.

"Here the questions are asked what is Pike News and who owns the truth. Is Pike News a lie, or maybe it means showing a certain side of the map? I think people are distributors and tend to believe what fits their agenda. You could say that media also show the truth "In their eyes, there is no absolute truth, and a process of socialization is required. And here, too, radical transparency is an antibiotic for Pike News - because it produces trust in the establishment."

From consciousness to the field

You mentioned earlier a consciousness controlled by the few versus the many. A poll by the PEW Institute reported that 97 percent of U.S. political tweets came from ten percent of users. This is also the consciousness of a few versus many. 

"That's a correct point. The number of tweeters or advertisers on the net is around 20-15 percent. Most are flies on the wall, this is also true in Israel of course. And yet, 20 percent of the approximately 2 billion Facebook users is 400 million people. The media controls several hundred thousand people in the world, perhaps. "

From the tweeters and post publishers, to what extent do we see a tendency towards a particular political direction?

"There is a tendency to think that the right in the State of Israel uses social networks more correctly, so it also complains that it is more censored. The discourse between the right and the left is different, and the right discourse may be less politically correct. It is more on the edge." "Compared to the left side. I'm not sure that's true at this point in time."

Right or left, how does the discourse in networks affect real-world phenomena? It was said xenophobia or incidents of violence.

"In your question there is a separation between the real world and my network. But people's consciousness does not necessarily notice it. To download a statue of a leader, I have to see on the net that many such cases have occurred, and then I can download a statue myself. Digital and physical feed each other. My consciousness and the spaces of consciousness affect us on many levels in life. " 

If, however, a more categorical division is required, it can be said that the checks we see in various squares are fueled by checks on social networks.

"Absolutely, but they also refuel themselves. As soon as something cool happens that goes up on the networks, people connect. We saw in the United States the women's parade in 2017, which continued to put 'Who's on the agenda. "Hundreds of thousands took part in the parade and posted on Facebook to many more women, some of whom later led 'Mi Tu'." 

Following on from the "Mi Tu" movement, which gained a lot of resonance, what resonations will be seen on social media in the near future? In what directions will the discourse go?

"Sentiment, the drift of consciousness in the network, is only beginning to change, in the direction of a unifying government and not a disintegration. In the Corona period we began to see it, for example the emphasis on human brotherhood, singing balconies, caring for the earth. I hope a network is established that is more transparent and open than Facebook; "I think there will be a moment in this decade that Zuckerberg takes control of our consciousness. But it is a change that will take years. And we need more jacinths, and crowns and changes in other areas. So, I believe, we will be close to reaching our object district."



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