As promised. Part two in my series of posts on why content, conversation, context and control is important issues on the net. Today, it’s all about…
Conversation
I have mentioned Cory Doctorow and how he question that old saying that content is king. It seems like the people that combine content and conversation is on to something.
Have that in mind. MySpace and YouTube is about the combination of content and conversation. They use the internet as a communication channel. MTV is still mostly about content. And they still think about the internet as a distribution channel. If your bosses talk about this new distribution channel and the information society you should tell them about this new communication channel and the conversation society.
People still want professionally produced content and huge hits, but it must be made available and it must be possible to discuss it.
Yes, I know. 90% of the pages on MySpace are crap and 90% of the comments on YouTube are crap. Still it is important. It makes people feel in control. We feel like we own a part of it. We feel important. And we are. Even if 90% of the stuff we create and discuss is crap.
And the conversation gives you google juice. You know. That magic that makes your stuff hit on page one in Google. Because the discussion is not only taking place on your page. It is all over the internet. And people are linking. My readers have discussed my pretty detailed list of media center alternatives on their blogs. Currently it is among the first ten hits of 70 million if you search for “free media center software” in Google. The conversation got it up there.
Other stuff:
How did I make that ugly illustration? Like this.
eirikso 
…does this mean that you think there is actually a stunning 10% “non crap” (read good) pages and videos on MyTube? Surely, the Google fall cleanup has been more effective than I dared to hope for!
Seriously though, I think a better example would be the number of blogs, forums and podcast related to hit shows like Lost and BSG – enhancing the experience for the viewers, creating niched communities and bringing back the “stuff you talk about tomorrow”-feeling from the day when everybody had one channel and watched the same thing every night.
Yes, I live by Sturgeon’s Revelation: “Ninety percent of everything is crud.” And I mean everything.
And you have a point. Traditional media still think that we need to see the same thing at the same time to have something to talk about around the water cooler the next day. Point is that we find our communities where we can talk about stuff, and the internet is actually also making an agenda. When was the last time you discussed a video that everybody just saw on YouTube? A channel that have no fixed schedule, still it creates an agenda.