What's Your Age in "Web" Years? - Steve Rosenbaum - MediaBizBloggers

Read below, then take the test to see if you're in tune with the emerging digital share-u-verse

If you've spent any time with folks in their twenties, then you've heard a bunch about Twitter, FourSquare, Yelp, and a bunch of other content creation communities that are crowd created.

The funny thing is listening to folks who get Twitter trying to explain it to folks who don't. At first I just thought it was a conceptual thing - some people get it and some don't. But that's not it. It's more that there's a group of humans who are living in a world that was thought of as science fiction - and if you're in it - you get it.

The world seems to be divided into two camps. Folks who think that we need to guard our independence, privacy, individualism - our island in the data stream; and folks who see the world as increasingly connected.

Every bit of innovation in technology and knowledge is about connections. Shared data, crowd-sourced recommendations, links via Facebook and FourSquare. The overall thesis that we're all making data, we're all consuming data, and the future is about filtering the stream of data that we want to allow to reach us.

The current filters are coarse and will be looked back on as wholly inadequate. Lists on Twitter. Permissions on Flickr. Groups on Facebook. Recommendations on Kindle. No one would suggest that these mechanisms do a particularly good job of helping you get a targeted and useful feed of data that is filtered to meet your needs and expectations.

Yet, we are at the beginning.

And what is clear is that all of us are creating data as we move through our daily lives. What used to be known as clickstream data now has a real time element and a location based element. Together the elements of where we are, what we're doing, and how we rank the experience rapidly create an avalanche of data that begs to be filtered and formatted.

On my Christmas Holiday this year I shot one thousand digital photographs, and an hour or so of FlipCam video. The photos were tagged with the name of the resort and the various attractions we visited and posted on Flickr. Why did I do this? Well, because before we went on our trip - in fact before I booked the room - I used Flickr to review pictures from other folks to see what the resort looked like, and if they appear to be having a good time. No one edits these pictures, so they're raw and real (not the fake happy visitors on the resort website). Folks shared their experiences with me in photos, videos on YouTube, and posts on Trip Advisor. With all that data, I arrived and found the resort to be just what I expected. It was fantastic. And now, I want to give back. To add my images and experiences to the crowd-sourced data about this place. So others can discover it and enjoy it as well. Why not?

So, there's a dividing line. Those who want to participate in the information collective, and those who don't.

It's hardly about chronology - but it is about your Web age.

The tools of the digital future will capture data. Will you share it?

TRY THE QUIZ BELOW:

Here's a Q&A test to see your Web age. Each question should be scored:

(1) No way (2) Maybe (3) I think so (4) Why not (5) Definitely Yes.

Q: -If your cell phone records your GPS position - will you let it tell people where you are. If so, who?

Q: -If your video camera has a WiFi connection, will you broadcast live?

Q: -If your tablet computer (iScribe) senses local ads, will you allow yourself to receive them based on your location?

Q: -If you have a choice between getting your content with targeted ads or ad-free with a micro payment, will you choose ads?

Q: - How many digital devices do you carry when you travel? 1 - 5

Score Sheet:

Score 22 or above - You're a connected, Crowd-sourcing, User-generated, Web 2.0 Ninja:

Score 15-21 - Your leaning in. You're trying to balance the connected Web world with your own personal space.

Score 0-14 - You're a Digital Luddite. You don't get all this sharing and swapping and open source crap.

Steven Rosenbaum is the CEO and Co-Founder of Magnify.net - a fast-growing video publishing platform that powers more than 50,000 web sites, media companies, and content entrepreneurs to aggregate and curate web video from a wide variety of web sources. Currently Magnify.net publishes over 50,000 channels of Curated-Consumer Video, and is working closely with a wide variety of media makers, communities, and publishers in evolving their content offerings to include content created by, sorted and reviewed by community members. Rosenbaum is a serial entrepreneur, Emmy Award winning documentary filmmaker, and well known innovator in the field of user-generated media production. Rosenbaum Directed and Executive Produced the critically acclaimed 7 Days In September, and his MTV Series Unfiltered is widely regarding as the first commercial use of Consumer Generated Video in US mass media. Steve can be contacted at steve@magnify.net Follow Steve Rosenbaum on Twitter: www.twitter.com/magnify

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