The Internet, Blogs, Community sites, and the Ultimate Democracy
“The individuals benefit from the knowledge of other individuals, and as a mass, we become greater than the sum of us all!!!”
Facts :
- People, overall, are more intelligent and more informed than ever.
- One week’s worth of newspapers will give more information than the amount of information given to an average person living in Europe in the 1800’s… in a lifetime.
- 3,000 new books are published each day.
- In the last 2 years or less, there have been 17 Billion new web pages added to the WWW (World Wide Web). Between 1998 and 2005 (a 7 year period), the growth was a mere (well, mere compared to the recent growth) 8 Billion pages.
- Google indexes over 25 Billion web pages and 1.3 Billion images now (well, that statistic was released at least a few weeks or even months ago)
We has human beings are becoming more and more intelligent and that is due to the spreading of information. Scientists still say human beings, on average, use only between 10~20% of their brain capacity, and we can do more. The information highway, internet, is making it possible for us to learn a hell of a lot more than we ever could. That creates a transfer of knowledge and information, and the human society, as a collective, becomes more and more intelligent. The individuals benefit from the knowledge of other individuals, and as a mass, we become than the sum of us all!!!
Facts :
- Internet usage has grown by 7,000% over the last 10 years. That’s right. 7,000%. Not 700.
- The growth rate is ever increasing still. The growth chart only gets steeper.
- Despite the tremendous growth, only 16.6% of the world population has access to the internet (December 2006). For every person using the internet, there are 5 others who still don’t use it!
- Although it may seem to us in North America as if everybody is using the internet, the penetration rate of internet usage in North America is STILL BENEATH 70%.
If you thought internet is something that everybody is used to, think again. There’s still so much more to grow out towards, which leads to my next point. We’ve only tapped the potential of it. The growth is still there to be made, and more and more people will be connected. If you thought the internet as it is right now is pretty darn impressive, think again. Unless we get hit by a huge meteor that knocks us all out, we have much more to grow into.
“If you get your news from Fox and CNN and the Times Magazine, you may as well be stuck in a jailcell, getting the stories from this one guard that comes by to visit you every day.”
Facts :
- According to Technorati, there are 55 Million blogs. That banner with the figures has been up there for a while and I’m sure there are more blogs now, as they are popping up all over the place.
- With the new Web 2.0 trend, and the transferrability of data (which was achived through segregation of design and data) allows for a much higher deployment rate of blog information and other news media.
- There are, obviously, more blog pages than there are public news webpages and etc.
I hail the existence of blogs as the new wave of democracy and openness of information. Of course there are people who still want to control the information that the public gets - thinking that the public needs to be controlled and need to believe certain things in order for this world to work. But blogs ensure that everybody gets the version of a news from a different as well as a more personal angle. You may ask why this is good, but let me tell you this : the news media is heavily controlled and biased. If you get your news from Fox and CNN and the Times Magazine, you may as well be stuck in a jailcell, getting the stories from this one guard that comes by to visit you every day. Although the personalized input that you get through blogs are even more heavily biased in some ways, at least you have multiple angles on them, and as a collective, it creates a more objective source of information and opinion.
Despite the fact that our civilization as a whole is still at a primitive stage when it comes to open media, and many people remain so short-sighted and ignorant, the potential is still there for us as a collective to be more broad-sighted and open-minded.
“A true democracy of opinions can begin when the media belongs to the people - and the existence of blogs have achieved it in a very literal way.”
With blogs, we get the sides of stories that we NEVER would have gotten in this CNN-dominated North American society. Yes, it is true that there are some news stations that are not so biased such as CBC, BBC, but that’s not enough. A true democracy of opinions can begin when the media belongs to the people - and the existence of blogs have achieved it in a very LITERAL way. Think about how easy it is to start a blog these days. You can used a hosted-blog service through wordpress or blogger for free, OR you can host your own blog for not too much expenses ($5/mth for hosting, and $10/year for a domain, give or take). It is so accessible and easily manageable.
Another critical factor for the growth of blogs to take place as the new outlet and an interpretion of reported news media is the existence of community sites, and collaborative blog sites such as digg.com, netscape.com, StumbleUpon.com, and many more. The disadvantages of personal blogs was the marketing of it. Individuals like myself do not have the budget to market a site to the level of BBC, CNN, Fox News etc. But through these websites, a collaboration of the public occurs to promote the stories and posts that are deemed by the public to be important, and this is how I get access to other good blogs, and vice versa. These websites serve to make blogs as big as CNN.com, if not bigger.
“…it will bring a true sense of democracy to our world - not the kind of democracy that is used as an excuse to wage war for economic gains through petroleum.”
The existence of blogs and the continuing growth of the internet will bring a whole new face to what we could call “Open Media”, and it will allow human beings, as individuals and as a collective, to be more intelligent and capable than ever. It will create a transparency in world events, and it will bring a true sense of democracy to our world - not the kind of democracy that is used as an excuse to wage war for economic gains through petroleum.
There’s a certain sense of security to be considered, you putrid piece of sh*t. This whole open media thing can kill our society as it is. It’s disruptive, and gives people the wrong ideas.
Freedom of speech should be given as long as its within reasonable boundaries, and personally I see all these liberal, left-wing blogs that are not American and it pisses me off.
Think again about the value of freedom you have because our government works so hard for you before you write something like this.
JhonD, I’m going to disagree with you. The American government simply pours out propaganda to make its people believe that the nation is doing the world a favour, but that is not the case.
Think about the 700,000 Iraqi civilians that got killed during the war. You cannot justify their deaths through the cause of democracy - especially when Iraq is nowhere even close to it!!!
People need to know, and everybody needs to have a say. If what the US administration though tot be right was the only thing broadcasted to the public, that woudl create such an ignorant society, it would be unbelievable (well, america, especially in teh southern states, is that way already).
I agree with Jeff fully on this issue of freedom of speech - you are the putrid piece of sh*t who is brainwashed to your own demise.
John, people like you are the reason why we have silly wars. You are the reason why the Bush Administration is able to justify the massacre of hundreds of thousands of people for profit in oil and stocks.
If you can justify murdering an Iraqi for a 0.1% gain in your stock portfolio, keep it up, why don’t you?
John, you are thinking about the good of your country as a whole. That’s how a country plays to win on a global scale. You are saying that there should be some control over the mouths and eyes of the people. I agree. China is using this strategy and will dominate the U.S.A., and possibly the world, eventually.
So John, I’m sorry your country couldn’t get a handle on it’s people before they went nuts on the world stage. Your countries starting to look very desperate and nobody seems united, which makes your President look very foolish when he talks. That’s your fault for not getting everyone behind your President. Sorry to hear about that.
Oh, you’ll get mad because that’s what ignorant ears do. You seem like the kind of guy that takes offense just by looking at another human beings color. Wow, that’s the only kind of education your country is able to teach you all these days? The world feels sorry for you.
Most of the world views your country like a respectable person who got caught up with crack cocaine and is now doing crazy sh*t for money to buy more. We really feel sorry for you and your country. Get your country off the crack.
Great post Jeff, I think I saw those stats on a video I just watched a few days ago. Anyway, I think you’re right about transparency this way. It’s possible.
I was inspired by that video for sure. It was a great video, and I took my own spin on it..
I might do another blurb about the speed of transition, and the lack of importance that technology schools will have in the future…
Can’t wait to hear it. This blog is almost like reading a great magazine. I’d subscribe for sure. I like reading these kinds of blurbs. They’re very creative and influencial. It’s funny how much I reiterate from this blog when I think I’m having an intelligent conversation with someone. haha
Are you going to add a bit on real estate anytime soon? I saw how much influence you had on your phone company. Maybe you’ll be able to pick up new real estate ad sponsorships where you’re from. You said you get a lot of traffic from there.
Yes, real estate is something I put a lot of focus on. After all, most of my clients are realtors, and I get a lot of feedback and stats shoved down my throat, which also allows me to form a very valid and statistically sound opinion on the market.
The truth is, apart from my blogging end of things, I’ve been a professional columnist on real estate in Vancouver since June of 2006 or so. It’s almost been 2 years.
Blogging is only an extension of my writing career.