More Reasons Why We Write...

Did you know that AOL Time Warner owns Netscape, and CNN?

Disney, of course, owns ABC...

GE - yes, GENERAL ELECTRIC, owns NBC...

Here in Canada, Can West Global owns most of the major news papers and television stations.

What I'm getting at here, is if we are primarily making decisions based on information that we are getting from mass media, can we trust our sources? Do we want to trust that we are getting fully objective, unbiased reporting when major companies unrelated to media own the places we go to for information?

This to me, is what makes blogging all the more important. We write, not for money or fame, but because we have something important to say. When I click on Jeff Jarvis' blog, I usually learn of news before it is posted on mainstream new's sites, and certainly much sooner than I would hear of it if I only relied on television or newspapers. When I read Talking Story or blogs of other members of the online community, I really feel that what I am reading is authentic - not an on-message story drafted to sell me product.

This is why we need to write to stem the tide of subjective media that is everywhere around us. Just think about this: If we all started talking about interesting and important things that were happening in our part of the world, we would all have a good unbiased idea of world events. This would be uninfluenced by advertisers, corporate sponsors or parent companies. The implications are staggering. (please check out Ripples for much better writing than mine about citizen publishing.)

I just have one question to leave ith everyone...

When the big corporations start buying blogger and typepad. Where do we move next?