A few hours after this dismal assessment of the new media community's permanent decampment to Facebook, Rhizome.org posted about its plans for a Facebook scraper to address "the increasing importance of the art-related discourse that takes place" there. This exchange then occurred in the comments:
Randall Packer | Fri, May 30th, 2014 8:43 a.m.
Since Facebook is simply not designed for archival purposes, the larger question becomes, why not use a content management system such as WordPress for purposes of recording and indexing dialogue? It is also possible to integrate Facebook into WordPress comments, and I wonder if this might resolve the issue if Facebook needs to be used.
In sum: there are such powerful tools for discussion forums, but they are underutilized. I have seen Facebook used for serious online discussion, particularly in group pages, but it is horribly inadequate for this purpose.Tom Moody | Fri, May 30th, 2014 9:20 a.m.
Or, it is horribly adequate if you want to vent to a few friends and not have a permanent searchable archive of your comments. (Assuming Facebook doesn't then blow another set of privacy seals, as it has been known to do.)
The decision to move new media discussion, announcements, etc to Facebook has already happened. The larger question is what does the "public sphere" mean when so many people have elected to use a system of Byzantine complexity with complex code and constantly shifting rules and allegiances. Is Rhizome the public sphere, attempting to collect this material, or is Facebook, where the discussion is happening in real time?
Then later, on twitter, kelani nichole said a particular project taking place in Zuck-world should be screenshotted for "@tommoody and, you know for posterity's sake." Prompting the passive-aggressive reply-tweet that is the title of the present post. Artists are on Facebook, among other reasons, to avoid yours truly and the awesome burden of standing behind your words and ideas for all eternity.