There's a brilliant post today by Kathy Sierra at Creating Passionate Users on user-generated and shared content. "Collective Intelligence" versus "Dumbness of Crowds." Enjoy.
Oh, what a marvelous post over there at CPU! Now I've got Suroweicki's book on order too.
I like the closing line especially:
"No matter what, I believe that in our quest to exploit the 'We' in Web, we must not sacrifice the 'I' in Internet."
People are stupid, collectively, which is why I'm skeptical about Web 2.0 (and its disaggregation-enabling potential). People can also be great, collectively, but it's because their power is harnessed and directed by leaders within the crowd.
...then again, was it Tolstoy's theory of history that said that great leaders are just driven by the upwelling masses beneath them? Maybe no one's in control -- decision-making is an emergent property?
Oh, what a marvelous post over there at CPU! Now I've got Suroweicki's book on order too.
ReplyDeleteI like the closing line especially:
"No matter what, I believe that in our quest to exploit the 'We' in Web, we must not sacrifice the 'I' in Internet."
People are stupid, collectively, which is why I'm skeptical about Web 2.0 (and its disaggregation-enabling potential). People can also be great, collectively, but it's because their power is harnessed and directed by leaders within the crowd.
...then again, was it Tolstoy's theory of history that said that great leaders are just driven by the upwelling masses beneath them? Maybe no one's in control -- decision-making is an emergent property?