In many of the articles I read about the Social Web, especially Twitter, the author laments that they don’t care that I had a peanut butter and banana sandwich for lunch, or what I thought of the latest American Idol. I’ve long felt that these writers are missing the point and this week I came across two sources that articulate this better than I could have. The first is Clay Shirky’s book Here Comes Everybody, he makes the point that with new advances in technology people mistake broadcasting media (1 to many) for communications media (1to 1). New tools allow people to use broadcasting media for communication. He gives this example – if you read a blog of someone you don’t know and see that they got wasted last night and today when shopping for clothes you think what’s the point? Who cares? Yet if you went to a food court in a mall and eavesdropped on the same conversation it would be clear that you are the weird one. We’re so used to the old web that we think if we can read it, it’s targeted towards us and with the new Social Web this just don’t hold true
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