Jack SantosI recently had a close friend comment “I now get all my news from facebook”.
No CNN, NBC, CBS, NPR, Local paper…facebook.
The highlights of the Republican National Convention? facebook
The latest on the Hanta virus in Yosemite? facebook
The details of a recent phone line outage due to a fire? facebook.
I don’t think she is alone. The implications are startling for our culture – balkanization of society (republicans inform republicans, democrats inform democrats), privacy and tracking issues, and the potential for mass hysteria based on false information.
OTOH – this certainly brings “news” – and the dissemination of news – close to it’s roots: the verbal spreading of information from person to person. What was once “one to one” and went “one to many” for efficiency and speed, is now a blend of both.
My current research is how “control” – and what it means - is changing in organizations, especially IT. Access and distribution of information is certainly a form of control – evidenced by dictatorships and closed societies. The facebook (social media) phenom has implications for control and how we perceive it. Can we coin this the new meaning of “crowd control”?
Category: Future Innovation IT Governance management Managment Social Media Uncategorized Tags: consumerization, culture, privacy, Social media
2 responses so far ↓
1 Aaron W August 29, 2012 at 8:36 am
It’s not much different from people who “only” get their news from Twitter. Both serve up “promoted,” supposedly newsworthy items, with a smattering of items that other people/friends have decided to like or share.
Frankly, I think it happens to be a very narrow view of the world.
2 Jack Santos August 29, 2012 at 10:11 am
Right Aaron – not much different from Twitter. But you bring out an interesting point – the opportunity to broaden exposure by access to multiple social networks – twitter, facebook, linked in; that might mitigate “balkanization”, too, and broaden the narrowness issue. But it’s a long way from the hierarchical news delivery we’ve become accustomed to in years past.