After reading “The future of reputation” by Daniel J Solove, and “It takes a village to find a phone” by Clay Shirkey, I noticed a common thread. Both of these articles prove that communication through technology makes a big difference in how society communicates today.
To start, communication through new technology has an uncanny ability to enable a new form of “group-formation.” I believe that this is largely done through social media. Through social media, people are able to unit with those who share similar beliefs and interests. They then have a stable platform in which they can share ideas, pictures, and they can also work together to plan events in support of their cause.
In the article “It takes a village to find a phone” by Clay Shirkey, an interesting concept is presented. Shirkey refers to Tim O’Reilly’s concept of “Architecture of participation.” Architecture of parcipation simply put is the transfer of professional class’ abilities to the general public. This is evident in this article because Evan is not a journalist, yet he was able to bring this story to millions of people through the web. In addition, he tracked down the person who stole the phone without being a private investigator.
After reading these two articles, I learned that it is very easy for people to put information out there for everyone to see. You really don’t have to be an experienced journalist if you want news or a story to reach large quantities of people. Much like “It takes a village to find a phone”, “The future of reputation ” shows that even through a small time blog, news can reach millions of people. People also begin to feel motivated when they see things online that might concern them. Blogs in particular are great for connecting people of a certain demographic, and also by where people are located. When people see an issue that they believe they can fix, that is what motivates them, and sets things in to action that can ultimately prove very positive for society.