Wikipedia's Jimmy Wales to Advertisers: "You Cannot Control the Conversation but You Can Participate In It"

Originally published May 16 2007Digg39s got the AACSLA39s number Literally That is 790815794162126871771506399625This is the decryption key for unlocking HD DVD code the code that developers brayed even the Pentagon wouldn39t be able to crack Does Digg39s now willful violation of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act DMCA spell the demise of social media if not as a medium as a viable model for advertisersEarly consensus seems to hold that this seismic event was not wholly a blessing or a curse but that it was inevitable A bit of forensic analysis reveals a few takeaways about the nature of Web 20 and community lessons that advertisers ignore at their perilThis spring the AACSLA ceaseanddesisted Google The behemoth complied taking down or censoring pages on Blogger and other Googleowned properties Then AACSLA approached Digg the social media networkAn odd thing happened Founder Kevin Rose initially kowtowed but then the community rebelled In a matter of days some 9410 links to the key mushroomed to 22000 quotThe Streisand Effectquot dubbed for the blowback the Diva received after suing to have photos of her McMansion erased from public records of the California coastline was unleashedNYU Professor Jay Rosen a pioneer of opensource journalism offers a clearheaded coda quotWhen the whole value of your site is that a user community hangs out there doing things that create value then the nominal owner is not the actual owner The users have a lot of power It39s fine to say that there needs to be some rules But it39s naive to say that the operators of the site are in charge If the rules aren39t an expression of the user community and its core beliefs they won39t work Indeed they won39t rulequotNot everyone agrees This loss of presumptive control has both shocked and cowed bystanders Principally wouldbe advertisers Jaffer Ali CEO of EVTV1 a moderated video portal told Jack Myers Business Media Report that quotunless there is an editorial filter between incoming content and the eventual advertiser there is no longterm business Let ONE advertiser have the herd or mob turn on them and they have zero controlquotAli observed that once quota community starts to feel empowered to oversee the rules of the game they will not react passively if they discover their control was an illusion Same in the real world We are under the illusion for example that foreign policy is a democratic process We suffer many illusions in the real world but our ability to do something about it is hampered In cyberspace it is easy to have collective actionamp8230and quickquotIs this a bad thing If you want to monetize perhaps But if you are interested in setting a policy agenda JD Lasica author of Darknet told Jack Myers Business Media Report quotDigg and other social media sites will be increasingly influential when it comes to setting the agenda on particular topics a role that Big Media had enjoyed a monopoly on until nowquot Ultimately this influence will attract ad dollarsAnd Jimmy Wales founder of Wikipedia told Jack Myers Business Media Report that despite its controlled chaos that there is no shortage of advertisers His advice to advertisers wary of social networks quotYou cannot control the conversation but you can participate in itquotFor many the Digg community did not morph into a mob Rather it expressed the public39s distaste for the DMCA which prohibits even the discussion of circumventing encryption Diggers were neither wolves nor sheep They were participating not in a cyber riot but in an act of civil disobedienceProfessor Rosen offered that quotusers have the power in open systems and they were prepared to use it Kevin Rose39s only options were to shut down his own site and alienate the user community in a major way or defy the threats of legal action Attention should focus in the attorneys who sent the cease and desist notices and what they thought they were going to accomplish Now that number is everywherequot Both the EFF and the New York Times share this positionSaid AACSLA spokesman Michael Ayers quotWe hope the public respects our position and complies with applicable lawsquot Clearly notAmid an outcry over a quotloss of controlquot it39s important to acknowledge that mischief and mayhem occurs too in the bricks and mortar world Sure Stephen Colbert can have his viewers bring elephants to extinction on Wikipedia but Howard Stern can also game American IdolCommunities that balance integrity with stability will obviously win the day Current TV has such a model Content creators seamlessly share creative control with staffers Within the broad community resides an archetypical customer from a brand perspective those Current members who produce viewer created ad messages VCAMS for clients including Toyota and L39Oreal Ongoing relationships within Current mean that the community is invested in following copyright law such as properly securing music clearancesRecent events indicate that crises such as the Digg imbroglio can reveal the depth of community Not until the Copyright Royalty Board39s decision to prohibitively raise royalty rates for Internet Radio broadcasters did Pandoracom truly tap into its baseBut can Digg be weaponized further JD Lasica has his doubts quotWhat they still can39t do is galvanize a political movement around an issue like Net Neutrality They can increase awareness about a topic but turning that into action is another matter unless it39s a lowcost action like spreading a number around the NetquotSince this flap Digg has moved up from the 100th most trafficked Web site to 22 And Google It39s got the illicit number again This time it39s on YouTube

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Wikipedia's Jimmy Wales to Advertisers: "You Cannot Control the Conversation but You Can Participate In It"

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Wikipedia's Jimmy Wales to Advertisers: "You Cannot Control the Conversation but You Can Participate In It"

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