In any case, I think the problem of reconceptualizing what labor actually *is* in such economies becomes paramount once you have the proliferation of prosumer activities. And I don’t take it to be a mere label, like the so-called managers; I think it constitutes an actual economic phenomenon (and subject position) that we have to take into account, which is why I liked MC’s talk as a provocation, even if I disagreed with the pedagogical conclusions. What I was coming to here was the actual mechanisms of the reification: how does the “prosumer” operate once it is reified in this manner. And I think the way “digital ethics” circulates – especially in my field – shows us very clearly why this category has become so popular. But it also shows us where the real weakness in the term occurs.

On Ellie’s rhetoric. Yes, I have to quit. Must must must. Believe it or not, I’ve never wanted to or tried to quit before this year (I haven’t tried yet, but I never wanted to). So, I guess I’m on step 1: wanting to. I suspect I’ll need chemical assistance, cuz I kinda love it. I also like the idea of turning this back on her as a teenager. Now I have the text, too!

Anyway, more seriously, there are a host of other issues I’m imagining, which I’m guessing are all par for the course in the literature on this issue and therefore old hat to you (but somewhat new and hard to understand for me.) My sense of law makers, in contrast to communications theorists, is that they are always doing their best to define categories as strictly as possible, and for good reason. Consumers have rights, laborers have rights, stock holders have rights, and even non-person corporations have rights. The consumer’s rights are different from the laborer’s, etc., etc., and in order for one’s rights to be legally protected and enforced, one has to be properly identified. And I’m thinking now of how many corporations call all of their employees “managers” even though they aren’t really managers at all, because if they are legally defined as managers, then they can’t unionize. I’m trying to think of some catchy little neologism that combines “manager” and “laborer” … maborer… lanoger… manoborer… crap, not very catchy at all. Point being, the category of the prosumer (which I have never heard before and know nothing about except for what you wrote) seems like it would be most useful when it draws attention to its own non-identity, but least useful if it gets fancifully reified as the solution to the problem (as, for instance, a form of resistance to copyright law… really?) rather than the problem itself.

That said, I’d be interested in seeing MC’s syllabus…and yours… both for my own curiosity and because I’m trying to introduce some kind of writing course that might help bring my own department into the 21st century and out of the 19th.

Meanwhile, as to your more recent blog post about Ellie’s rhetoric and your pack of cigs . . . kudos to her ! ! ! And now I’m wondering how effective her rhetoric will actually be. I hope very. (And of course, she’s just given you a rhetorical tool that you can save for when she’s a teenager and use against her. You can say to her, “you were the one who got me to quit,” and she’ll be so proud of her accomplishment, she’ll never want to smoke herself…. And now I’m thinking that maybe I should get myself a kid in order to solve my own bad habits.