Authority Ownership and Mechanics

Three things change the way we’re using these tools for social media: authority, ownership, and mechanics. These are three of the five sources of a revolution, as stated by Moshe Yudkowsky in a podcast I heard recently. In the case of my point, let’s say that authority is answering “who has the ability to change things?” Ownership means “who owns what we create?” Mechanics is “how do we put it all together?” If you look at what matters to us in this age of making social media, using the web our way, and sharing information, I believe these are the three forces in play.

So now, the question becomes: how do you, as a professional, as a business, as someone with a product or service, contemplate those forces on YOUR ideas, products, services, deliverables? Are YOU the sole author of your efforts? Do YOU own the intellectual property, or have you open sourced it? Who can tinker with how it is used / displayed / consumed?

It’s easy to think about these things when we’re talking about someone else: “Record industry: let music be free,” but does it become a bit more difficult when you consider YOU and your relationship to these ideas?

Authority, ownership, mechanics. How do these forces impact what you’re doing?

Inspired by a presentation given by Moshe Yudkowsky about Revolutionary Telephony

Photo credit, ul_Marga

The Social Media 100 is a project by Chris Brogan dedicated to writing 100 useful blog posts in a row about the tools, techniques, and strategies behind using social media for your business, your organization, or your own personal interests. Swing by [chrisbrogan.com] for more posts in the series, and if you have topic ideas, feel free to share them, as this is a group project, and your opinion matters.

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