Digiwonder?

When I started my job at Free Range nearly two years ago now, I asked my future co-workers what I should read to help me prep for my new position. One person recommended Don’t Make Me Think, a well-known book about information architecture, which I found very useful and informative.

The second book was Cluetrain Manifesto. For some reason, I never got to that one and it’s been gathering dust for nearly two years. But now, thanks to a grad school class, I’m jumping in. And of course I’m kicking myself for not fitting it in earlier.

The book does a good job of explaining why the Internet is what it is in our lives—completely enmeshed. According to the authors, we’re reacting to a society filled with managed structure, assembly line mass production, big media, and mass marketing that deals with many but connects deeply with few.

We crave the bazaar that the marketplace once was– that place of human interaction and of buzzing conversations.

So now that it’s so easy to connect, we’re going gangbusters. At the time Cluetrain was written, the blogging phenomenon hadn’t even hit. Cellphones were probably just about to hit their tipping point in America, so texting was probably off the radar of nearly everyone. And yet, the authors captured what was going on. As they point out, the technology almost doesn’t matter. Whether email, chat, listserves, or open source software, the Internet is about living communities where people are interacting and speaking with their authentic voices. Each new technology just makes this easier and easier.

As I’m reading Cluetrain, I’ve also been doing research for a paper on youth, the Internet and civic engagement. As I’ve been combing through articles, it’s fascinating to see the divide among academics. Some say the Internet is another TV, locking us in solitary, passive activity and contributing to society’s breakdown (Robert Putnam). On the other side, Net proponents fall in line with Cluetrain—that the Internet is what’s allowing our postmodern society to re-establish community and connectedness. And it’s community plus—now we get to interact with people around the world, who we’d otherwise never meet. Average people can reach the world, toppling (sometimes literally) hierarchies.

I say the Net is an agent of both. It just depends on the user and those generating content (who of course are now more and more often one in the same). Some folks like to just chill, perhaps solitarily downloading tunes or gaming alone. But others are interacting. They are hobbying, protesting, griping, teaching, learning, laughing, empathizing, and helping. Wasn’t life kind of like this before the Internet. Some people are people people. Others aren’t.

I’m getting gushy, but I am glad to be living now to see this phenomenon re-shape the world. Maybe it’s the geek in me or maybe I’m just one more who finds the “get real” nature of the Net a welcome relief amid the fake speak that still lingers about. Think TV commercials, White House press briefings, corporate scandals…