The Contrast and Tension In Quality Between Online Aggregation and Original Content Explored - John Blossom

Quality is as quality does"may not be a saying that came out of Forrest Gump's mouth but it's a simple formula that seems to be proving itself on the Web as traditional sources of quality content lose audience share to search engines and social media sites. At the same time, though, the ever-increasing popularity of social media sites does not always seem to be balanced by mature quality control. But don't mistake immature techniques with inadequate potential: the techniques used to generate social media are carving out a new path to content quality that's here to stay. Professional publishers find themselves oftentimes railing against the Web as a devil's den of half-baked information and hailing the quality of their content. And, as underscored by ongoing issues with Wikipedia content quality and conflicts of interest, there are some real concerns out there in the world of user-generated content.

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Here's how to decentralize the web and reclaim your privacy from the IT Information Pariahs

Diaspora - the privacy aware, personally controlled, do-it-all distributed open source social network We are four talented young programmers from NYU’s Courant Institute trying to raise money so we can spend the summer building Diaspora; an open source personal web server that will put individuals in control of their data. What is it? Enter your Diaspora “seed,” a personal web server that stores all of your information and shares it with your friends. Diaspora knows how to securely share (using GPG) your pictures, videos, and more. When you have a Diaspora seed of your own, you own your social graph, you have access to your information however you want, whenever you want, and you have full control of your online identity.

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How Can Social Networks Constructed by Technology Understand Friendship?

When Google launched Buzz, a microblogging social network, several months ago, the company boasted that the network had been generated automatically, by algorithms that could connect users to each other based on communications revealed through Gmail and other services. However, many users balked at having what they perceived as mischaracterized social connections, forcing the company to frantically backpedal and make the Buzz service less automated and more under users' control. This incident notwithstanding, many companies are increasingly interested in automatically determining users' social ties through e-mail and social network communications. For example, IBM's Lotus division offers a product called Atlas that constructs social data from corporate communications, and Microsoft has investigated using such data to automatically prioritize the e-mails that workers receive. But researchers say there are a lot of unsolved problems with generating and analyzing social networks based on patterns of communication.

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Facebook’s Gone Rogue; It’s Time To Reclaim Our Privacy | Epicenter | Wired.com

Are we beginning to see the emergence of a social and critical movement attacking the hegemony of social media, allowing us to take back our identities, return privacy into our own hands in the process returning real meaning to the word " friend" . Maybe not, but his article from Wired is thought provoking. Facebook has gone rogue, drunk on founder Mark Zuckerberg’s dreams of world domination. It’s time the rest of the web ecosystem recognizes this and works to replace it with something open and distributed. Facebook used to be a place to share photos and thoughts with friends and family and maybe play a few stupid games that let you pretend you were a mafia don or a homesteader. It became a very useful way to connect with your friends, long-lost friends and family members. Even if you didn’t really want to keep up with them. Soon everybody

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Managing Information In The Enterprise and The Cost of Failing To Do So - New Forbes Global Survey.

In their effort to turn piles of data into actionable information, large global enterprises are applying rigorous strategic thinking to using information management to contain costs and provide a competitive advantage. This study uncovers significant trends, misconceptions, and underlying roadblocks to better information management. How important is this? The study found that data-related problems could be costing most enterprises more than $5 million annually.

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