Charles on… anything that comes along

Kevin’s gone off on a bit of a rant-ette about the fact that Andrew Keen still gets airtime (which is definitely strange, but fits the pattern where people who say contrary things are repeatedly quoted; perhaps it’s the pig’s bladder effect).

Sure, it’s stupid that people ask questions like “Is new media killing press freedom?”, which makes as much sense as “Are biscuits the new washing-up liquid?” People are consuming media - that is, created output, including journalism of all flavours - more than they ever have before. It’s pervasive, inevitable, inescapable.

Keen’s not happy about it, though. It all boils down to something I don’t think Keen has quite grasped, but which I always try to bear in mind when writing a blog post, or a news story that people will get the chance to respond to.

It’s like this. Perfectly simply:

The rule is this: when I write the post, I know more about that particular topic than the average person who’s going to read it. But I don’t know more about the particular topic than some of the people reading it - so if I can get them to contribute then everyone (me and the other readers) will have benefited. (And of course if I don’t know more, or suspect I don’t know more, than the average reader, I should go away and find out some more until I do.)

The trick is in writing it in a way that will get those people who do know more to contribute it. That’s tricky. Takes practise. Maybe that’s what the new journalism is about: writing in a way that raises the amount of knowledge in the average reader’s head, while encouraging the reader further up the bell curve of knowledge to pitch in too.

Oh, the blog post title? Yeah, people like it if they think they’re getting self-help. Learnt that too.

These posts might be related (the database thinks..):
• Wait, no, don't stop reading this! (12 March 2007; score: 44.4%)
• Fire up the engine of serendipity: getting the database to mine the Long Tail of this blog automagically (22 March 2007; score: 39.69%)
• The Golden Rule for deciding whether to buy the album when you hear the single (26 May 2005; score: 38.96%)