If Broken Pencil founder and new-media thinker Hal
Niedzviecki needed proof for his theories on “peep culture,” he should
thank Michael Jackson. The circumstances surrounding Jackson’s
death—the almost instantaneous delivery of news via celebrity gossip
pariah TMZ and the subsequent traffic toll it took on social
networking websites—is a perfect example of our obsession with being
watched and with watching. The relentless Jackson tributes are
definitely more peep then pop: Talk about a man in the mirror.
For the accessibly smart, well-researched and humourous The Peep
Diaries, Niedzviecki interviewed bloggers, reality show
participants and others who opened up their lives for public
consumption. He also throws himself into the peep world: Niedzviecki
invites 700 Facebook friends that he doesn’t know out for free drinks
(one person shows up). He concludes that though money and a brief shot
at fame seem like motivations, basically we’re struggling to find our
individual voices in a conformist world. But because Niedzviecki is a
forward-minded thinker, he’s not making a case against the internet,
but rather against corporate systems that regulate our lives: “Peep
culture is our twisted answer to the problem of the dehumanizing of
humanity.”
This article appears in Jul 2-8, 2009.