Here Comes Everybody - Clay Shirky - Part 2

2017 Reading Challenge - Day 25

 January 25, 2017 

Book 6 - Here Comes Everybody - The Power of Organizing without Organizations
by Clay Shirky (2008)
 Part 2 - Pages 55-108

Reading Time - 1 hour

Here's a thought... the traditional newspaper is a dying breed. Think about it - eBay, Craigslist and other free online outlets are siphoning off traditional classified ad revenues. People are getting their news from other sites - Facebook, Twitter, counter-cultural sites. It used to be that those who had the publishing equipment (printing presses, fancy cameras) controlled the news. That is no longer the case. Nowadays, anyone can whip up a blog on the internet, or a website or share something on Facebook or YouTube. "If everyone can do something, it is no longer are enough to pay for, even if it is vital".

How many of us subscribe to the Encyclopedia Britannica? Or any Encyclopedia for that matter? Whether as physical books or online. Not me. If I need to look up info, I can search on the internet, use Wikipedia as my jumping off point and find tonnes of information on whatever topic I am interested in.

Which leads to the a completely different problem. There is a lot of junk out there! People are posting all sorts of things online - but most of it is not intended for general consumption. Some blogs are only for the friends on the poster. Yes, it is available for general viewing... but that doesn't mean it's intended to be read by everyone. It is in public, but not for the public.

In the olden days of newspaper and magazine publishing - the editors decided what to print - they decided what was good and what was bad. The model was... filter, then publish. Today, there is tonnes of stuff being published by so-called amateurs. The model now is... publish, then filter! In essence, we have gone from being consumers of media to creators of media. Some people publish and share blogs just for the love it. Whether it is is minimalism, HO trains, horses or gardening. People write and photograph and share because they love their topic. Think back to 30 years ago... and a lot of what is happening today would have seemed impossible. But when the impossible becomes possible... things can change... and we can get a revolution.

Today, at Standing Rock in South Dakota, First Nations and their supporters are engaged in a protest to preserve traditional territory and water rights against an oil pipeline. You'd be lucky to find anything about Standing Rock in the traditional media. The news of Standing Rock happened on Facebook and Twitter... only after it was weeks old, did traditional media show up to "cover" the event. Journalists aren't everywhere. People are everywhere. And today, people are equipped as mini-reporters... with smartphone cameras and social media apps. We have our pulse on the world... not the media. Who knows what can come out of that?