More second life ;) Speaking of on-line communities, these have been around since the late nineties. I had friends who would make an account for on-line games and build up the avatar and then sell it on eBay. The would also sell the game currency or other items on-line. It was like a job for them, but they had fun at the same time.
We as a society need to be careful how far we allow these game to replace our own lives. People get so immersed in these worlds that they won’t eat, sleep or even go to the bathroom. This leads to health problems, and in some cases death. Eventually, when these are completely immerseable, people will never leave the world, as they could just spend their life fulfilling their fantasies. Society would collapse.
I agree that companies need to take advantage of user customization. One of the other books that was on the reading list “The Long Tail” deals with this. The author predicts that the future is mass customization of products. Nike already allows you to custom design your shoe on its website. You also see it with do-it-yourself renovations. Lowes and Home Depot cater to this market. However, when someone adjusts the product, and they are injured, who is liable. If there was no warning label, would you be able to sue?
People are selling hacks all the time in Chinatown in Toronto. You can buy customized versions of the PSP or Nintendo DS that have all the bells and whistles mentioned in the chapter.
The music industry needs to get over itself. It is grasping to a dying business model and the industry has resorted to suing its customers for not using its products in ways they see fit. In the news the other day, a woman lost a suit against the RIAA and has to pay $20,000 for each song downloaded. That is insane.
With regards to news, not everyone wants user created content. I read the New York Times and Washington Post because of the quality of writing. If they were to cater to the public at large, the articles would be dumbed down so much they wouldn’t be worth reading. The New Yorker experienced this a few years ago when the publisher thought they could sell more magazines by catering to the general public. The Editor in Chief said that that was not the target market, and doing celebrity profiles would tarnish the magazine and alienate the market. He was right and won out. Also, newspapers want editorial control, which user generated content removes. Many news outlets downplay or ignore certain news items for various reasons. User generated content removes this power, and they will not want to give it up.
2 comments:
I totally agree with your point about people being sucked into online communities. (And yes, I wrote my blog before reading yours and I happened to use Nike as an example of consumer customization as well).
About the newspaper thing- don't you think the aim should be "smartening up" society instead of "dumbing down" news ? Most newspapers are supposedly written at the 6th grade reading level. Don't you think that with all the info (blogs, user created news, videos) that people have to at least think about what to believe and which source their news comes from?
I agree that people must draw a line with how far they get involved with online communities. I feel like many people are getting sucked in to these and it's weirdly gross. What will happen to socialization skills? I'm just happy that not as much was around when I was in high school. Kids just seem to be too involved online.
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