You say:
“But the truth is we don’t need filters, spin doctors, and gatekeepers as much, because we feel more capable than ever before of vetting our own information. We want it fact-based, so we can decide for ourselves.”

I think we need to be careful that we’re not shouting in Echo Canyon. There certainly are classes of information that lend themselves to a frame-free source. Generally, facts of some kind; historical data, etc. But expert perspective is still important in complex situations. Learning about medicines, for example. We Google the drug name and read what we see there, but we still privilege “official” sources — the Mayo Clinic, or our local hospital site, or even WebMD. Not all information is on as equal footing as you might think.

Secondly, the Internet knows nothing that people haven’t put there. We’re left to discern the veracity of what we find, and the accuracy of that material improves over time. If we have time. Crowds aren’t wise to begin with even in the best of times. And, they risk becoming mobs, growing more stupid over time rather than becoming smarter.

We trust our friends and their versions of the truth only to the extent that they agree with us — a failing of Web tribalism is that we seek information that matches our world view rather than seeking differences of opinion. This was also increasingly true in the non-Web world, but we had more sources in common 25 years ago than we do now.

This is a caveat emptor world, and I worry that the socialization of authority will defeat accuracy, and that we’ll all wind up dumber for it.
.-= Sean Williams´s last blog ..A Manager Who Can’t Communicate Can’t Lead =-.

You say:
“But the truth is we don’t need filters, spin doctors, and gatekeepers as much, because we feel more capable than ever before of vetting our own information. We want it fact-based, so we can decide for ourselves.”

I think we need to be careful that we’re not shouting in Echo Canyon. There certainly are classes of information that lend themselves to a frame-free source. Generally, facts of some kind; historical data, etc. But expert perspective is still important in complex situations. Learning about medicines, for example. We Google the drug name and read what we see there, but we still privilege “official” sources — the Mayo Clinic, or our local hospital site, or even WebMD. Not all information is on as equal footing as you might think.

Secondly, the Internet knows nothing that people haven’t put there. We’re left to discern the veracity of what we find, and the accuracy of that material improves over time. If we have time. Crowds aren’t wise to begin with even in the best of times. And, they risk becoming mobs, growing more stupid over time rather than becoming smarter.

We trust our friends and their versions of the truth only to the extent that they agree with us — a failing of Web tribalism is that we seek information that matches our world view rather than seeking differences of opinion. This was also increasingly true in the non-Web world, but we had more sources in common 25 years ago than we do now.

This is a caveat emptor world, and I worry that the socialization of authority will defeat accuracy, and that we’ll all wind up dumber for it.
.-= Sean Williams´s last blog ..A Manager Who Can’t Communicate Can’t Lead =-.