I finally lift my head up from work and take stock of the news cycle. There's this noise going on about a tax holiday for gasoline. So I try to find out what is really going on and whether or not it would work. Instinct says that anything the GOP wants is probably wrong; but, let me look into instead.
So, I go to this AP article to see what is behind the noise. No luck. He said/she said nonsense again. So many people seem to realize that our traditional media sucks; but, it keeps going on. I believe I'm better informed than the majority of Americans at this point and I haven't owned a TV since college (and even then it was the frat's TV - though I just ordered a TV online to help with raising the girls.) I seem to get better information from the personal blogs I read than the news.
Is this surprising? Well, according to dominant theories in organizational science this is expected. It turns out the most efficient and accurate way of communicating is from one "friend" to another, where "friend" is defined as a trusted person with whom rapport has already been established. This is true within corporations. This now seems to be playing out in current events. Go figure.
Update: I forgot to the link to the article.
5 comments:
I've had enormous success using that model to build my music collection. I've never been big on listening to music on the radio, and I've never gone to clubs or whatnot. Instead, I cultivate a network of friends who occasionally suggest new artists to me. It's pretty easy to get a sense of who knows your taste (who you can "trust"), and so those are the people you go back to for more over time.
Oh, here's a good post on the gas tax holiday. Every politician and economist not named "John McCain" or "Hillary Clinton" knows it's a stupid, pointless idea that won't help consumers and will in all likelihood just further line the pockets of oil companies.
Thanks for the pointer. More proof of the organizational science theory.
I've no idea about Tax Holiday issue. Then again thats why I'm not commenting on that. :)
Traditional Media (atleast for me) has lost the trust. It seems most of channels/newpapers are biased now. I know most of time even blogs are biased but then again we would rather trust a biased news from a friend now than Over-paid Media.
And this definitely works for Movies and Music reviews :P
I know most of time even blogs are biased but then again we would rather trust a biased news from a friend now than Over-paid Media.
Absolutely! That's the part of the reason why the intimate communication channel is so effective.
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