Invasion of the Web Amateurs
Interesting article by Steven Levy in Newsweek. Is the crowd stupid or wise? Sometimes it’s stupid, but more and more–driven by the Internet–it’s wiser than the wisest expert.
March 26, 2007 issue - Andrew Keen is not surprised at the latest twist in the ongoing saga of Wikipedia. In his view, the entire Internet movement involving “collective intelligence,” “citizen journalism” and “the wisdom of crowds” is a cultural meltdown, an instance of barbarians at civilization’s gates. He considers Wikipedia, the popular Internet-based encyclopedia written and vetted by anyone who cares to contribute, as no more reliable than the output of a million monkeys banging away at their typewriters, and says as much in his upcoming poison-pen letter to Web 2.0, “The Cult of the Amateur” (due from Currency/Doubleday in June).
