Publishing v Publicizing (2009)

This old morning, I was listening to NPR's Off-Ramp ("CyberFrequencies on Life on the Web"), as is my wont on many old Saturday mornings, and the interview was about the New digital divide. (I can't help perking up whenever I hear of a new "New" thingy.) The point being made was that today, our digital divide is not between those who have and don't have (chinese: ta men you mei you?) internet access, but rather between those who want and don't want to participate in web 2.0 social networky communication.

The interviewee sketched out the two paradigms for communication: 2-way, which the phone traditionally functions as, and broadcast, where a radio or other portal sends 1-way communication to a legion of listeners. In our web 2.0 world, the phone, twitter, facebook etc. have functionality that bridges both these paradigms. A twitter post can be read by your handful of friends and your friends can tweet right back @ you. or a twitter post can be followed by hoi polloi, as in the case of NPR's twitter feed, which has 1 million followers.

How does this relate to anything? My point is this: I could slave away at viralizing my own social networking feeds (friend a million facebook friends, etc.), and I could have the perception (and perhaps even reality) of having a huge audience. It would surely be an ego boost. But this capitalist mindset of publication and publicity -- more is better -- is foolhardy, in my humble opinion. It's far better to have a group of friends who follow your work, who you know, than to have thousands of faceless sycophants out there.

So, friend, let's be friends, not megaphone-wielding soapboxistas.