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This is somewhat of a pre-emptive posting in case I miss Tuesday’s class. I will still try to post if I do make it to class though. Something I talked about in my blog before came up in class regarding the enforcement by second or third parties. It has to do with the amount of lies written in email compared to when written on paper. I think that this is exactly the reason why people should not believe much of what is said online, possibly unless there is some sort of community enforcement as on Wikipedia. It’s an interesting tradeoff where we have access to unimaginable amounts of information, but the quality of that information is always questionable.

The next point has to do with the evolution of media organizations. I think that many older media people are scared that the internet will replace them. However, I see the same or a greater need for media to perform a trustworthy analysis of the information available to the world to make that information actually useful to people. In other words, it could be argued that the core function of the media is to wade through the information out there and present only valid and trustworthy information to their clientele. I think that establishments like the Wall Street Journal are good examples of how reliable information can still draw in revenue in the face of the internet. However, I think that media companies do not realize the importance of reliable information. I’ve seen many TV channels use blogs and random people’s opinions and present them as “news.” I think that individuals will stop going to those media sources if they continue to provide this type of information. Therefore, media companies need to realize or choose what kind of media they provide and make a commitment to providing that quality level of information. Otherwise, they will be swallowed up by the new generations of technology.