Tuesday April 11, 2006

Today, like many days, the phrase "user generated content" left my lips in the course of conversation. It's a habit. OK, maybe it's a bad habit. Since Tim Bray posted about his hatred for the label, I've been increasingly self-conscious about using those words. I agree, it's laden with exploitative connotations. Derek Powazek adeptly decomposed the nastiness further. Yes, not long ago editorial, movie editing, audio mixing and other tools of creation were only accessible to the pros. Yes, the burst of creativity that has accompanied the mass-amateurization of media of all kinds begs for an improvement of the vernacular. However, Scott Rosenberg, lamenting the absence of a credible replacement, reminds us that content from the pro's still has value (Seymour Hersh didn't blog the latest plan of attack, now did he?). Breaking habits often requires conscious adoption of an alternative. So, what? People Contributed Media? Individual Creations? Actually, I'm more intrigued by "user distributed content" but maybe I'll post about that later and then I'll have to wring my hands over a better name for it.

user generated content  

I've always been fond of public libraries, they can be a great resource and it's so... non-web (2.0 or 1.0). I've used 'em for youth sports coaching materials, current non-fiction, jazz CDs and such. They can also be real funny; sometimes they have contemporary titles but other times there's no hope in getting what you want without going out to the bookstore to buy it. I did a search for a title, "What Would Buddha Do at Work" on Contra Costa Library catalog and the first hit was for What would Buffy do? : the vampire slayer as spiritual guide. Buh!

books   buddha   buffy