Humpty Dumpty, Google and power

I'm at the summit of the International Society for Information Studies in Vienna, an amazing feast of brilliant minds and ideas. Dizzying switches from one set of inspirations to the next.

This morning we heard from Luciano Floridi, always worth hearing, who talked about the nature of power in the information society. He argued that "power in mature info societies is not just about things, or information about things, but about uncertainty (questions shaping answers, giving rise to information about things)". He illustrated this question of uncertainty with Alice in Wonderland, and the way in which Alice is aware of her own ignorance and uncertainty, as well as the information that is available to her.

Floridi went on to argue that power is in the hands not just of those who give answers, but who shape the questions posed by citizens of information questions - of Google rather than Wikipedia, as it were. (Floridi is a consultant to Google so knows what he talks about).

And that talk of power made me think of one of the most striking parts of Alice in Wonderland, much quoted by Gregory Bateson (who is so present at this conference even though he's been dead for 35 years). It's the words of Humpty Dumpty:

"When I use a word," Humpty Dumpty said in rather a scornful tone, "it means just what I choose it to mean - neither more nor less."
"The question is," said Alice, "whether you can make words mean so many different things."
"The question is," said Humpty Dumpty, "which is to be master - that's all."

Which made me think further about power. Who decides what words are to mean? Who is to be the master of the words? Is it the individual, the person who uses or reads or hears the words? Or is the ones behind the words, who shape our words and understanding through the questions we ask?

In other words, who is the master of the words - is it us or is it Google?

One more thing: in discussion after Floridi's talk, my colleague David Chapman pointed out to me that words can't mean exactly what we choose, or not if we want to be understood by anybody else. They have to have some agreed common meaning if they're to be used for the purpose of communication. 

Which gives a third possibility: the master of the words (in Humpty's terms) needn't just be either the individual or the corporation - they could be the community of those who use words. It is still possible that we can collectively take power, manage our uncertainty in an information society, through the way we understand our words and understand our questions. Can uncertainty be owned by managed as a common good?