DISQUS

Cynthia Brumfield · 1 year ago

It's funny...I read this article last night (or rather scanned it) and my fleeting reaction was "huh?" I figured that because I wasn't really concentrating that I just didn't absorb it. Now that you've deconstructed the piece, I realize that I was merely experiencing a gut reaction to crap.

mathewi · 1 year ago

I had the same reaction -- and then it started bugging me, and I
couldn't stop thinking about how stupid it was. Blogging it was the
only solution :-)

Eric Berlin · 1 year ago

Amazing to see fear and ignorance of new media find its way into a usually high quality pub like Newsweek.

But as you note, content is content, right? It can come in good, bad, and ugly increments whether it's published by "users," "experts," or some point in between.

mathewi · 1 year ago

True, Eric. Maybe it was a slow news week :-)

antje wilsch · 1 year ago

heh, nice one Mathew "I like to put people's nomikers in quotes" Ingram :)

mathewi · 1 year ago

Thanks, Antje "almost always agrees with Mathew" Wilsch :-)


On Sat, Mar 8, 2008 at 5:00 PM, Disqus

Duncan · 1 year ago

Well said

Any thoughts on Jason Calacanis saying that Web 3.0 is Web 2.0 with an editorial layer?

mathewi · 1 year ago

Thanks, Duncan. I guess my only comment would be that a) everyone
wants whatever they're working on to be Web 3.0, and b) Jason has been
trying to sell that story ever since he started Mahalo.

There's already a pretty well established understanding of Web 3.0, I
think, and it is what most people are calling the semantic Web.
Although Mahalo is interesting in a lot of ways, I think it's a
stretch to include it as part of Web 3.0.

Dave Bullock · 1 year ago

Wait, dead tree media thinks that UGC is on its way out? Wow, never would have seen that coming. Funny thing how publications can't see for the forest for the dead trees they're printed on.

mathewi · 1 year ago

I guess it's not really that surprising when you put it that way, Dave :-)

rex tinsley · 1 year ago

yawn. i think you're getting hysterical over nada. content is content - bloggers, MSMs, whatever. but this one quote from calcanis doesn't seem unreasonable: "The more trusted an environment, the more you can charge for it." that will be the key in the future. if UFG is going to stand the test of time, it will need to satisfy that requirement. otherwise, keen will be proved right

mathewi · 1 year ago

Thanks for the comment, Rex, but what the heck is UFG?

Lawrence Salberg · 1 year ago

Newsweek used About.com as an example. Let me just laugh outloud for a moment. HA HA HA.... Okay, sorry about that. No, actually, that wasn't enough laughing. GUFFAW SNORT CHUCKLE!

Isn't About.Com going under or something? Didn't I read that recently that they are having financial problems.

Yes, we can all find nice-and-neatly packaged encyclopedic information at hundreds of sites. I like to nod (respectfully) toward the original CompuServe and friends. Useful at times. I occasionally get a little info from About.Com. But I never get the full answer I'm looking for there. Don't know what iTunes is? Mahalo and About.Com are great starts. Want to hack your Ubuntu Linux to play iTunes? Better find some UGC somewhere or else.

Today's UGC, if it isn't extremely temporal or base, is tomorrow's moderated and polished general information and all those sturdy sites.

Newsweek and its old school media pals believe, in their heart of hearts, that all information must be edited and packaged by professionals. And every week, some Joe Schmo from nowhere does something somewhere via UGC that out does anything we've seen before from the best journals, magazines, and television shows. They all have their place in the world. Despite the fears of the old school media, no one in the blogosphere and other UGC-mediums is advocating (or believing) that both can not peacefully coexist - each serving a worthwhile purpose. Yet, on the other side of the tracks, they probably have plans to assassinate Matt Mullenweg thinking their subscription rates will return to pre-2000 figures. They continually spew out nonsense (like this Newsweek article) that makes them look, well, suicidal.

Hey, bottom line: If they want to edit, package, and polish information in slick glossy magazines, all well and good. I haven't read a Newsweek magazine since 1987 (in high school) but I am a news junky. What magazines have I read since? Economist. Rolling Stone. Mother Jones. Wired. (and I'm a right-wing extremist). But those mags offer insight that I just can't find in Snooze Week with their little required book review column, their little required A/P world news beat, etc. Where's the insight? Where's the break throughs? I'd have to read 100 Newsweek magazines to get a really solid unique perspective. Else I wouldn't know if I was reading Time, or U.S. Snooze and World Distort. Who could know?

But I read a new and unique story every day on a blog somewhere. Or, for those that have the patience to watch videos (not me), they see something interesting on YouTube or some other video source. I just discovered winelibrary.tv. That guy is nuts and is super entertaining to watch - and I don't even drink Wine or care about it. I'd hate to see the twisted wreckage of Newsweek staffers even trying something like that. It would be like watching George Bush do the Salsa. (Sorry, El Presidente, love ya anyway!).

If N/W is going to keep hiring these dorks who don't know kuh-rap about the internet and think they can put their head under the covers for a few minutes and then write about their insights with any intelligence, they are going to be out of business soon. Ziff-Davis Media just bit the dust. Why? Because they have done nothing interesting for nearly 10 years as the net has gotten more interesting. I think every other issue was "25 Ways to Speed up Windows". What? Let me guess... uh,... defrag my hard drive? I saw that same "tip" about 50 times over the past 10 years when I flipped through it and left it on the shelf.

Let me know when Newsweek hires John Dvorak from Ziff-Davis Media. Maybe I'll actually visit their website.

Cory Hendrickson · 1 year ago

There is some validity to the statements. The balancing act lies in the ability for users with knowledge on the subject to contribute. I don't know if 'secret elitism' is the correct term, but there is value. The problem lies in the lack of viable options for expert opinions. More offerings lead to diluted content. Looking forward to whoever can aggregate this content.