|
Arguments against the Web 2.0 phenomon abound, coming from sources as diverse as Heinz ketchup company, Nick Carr and Eric Raymond.
CNet has a funny article on how Heinz's social marketing scheme had the ketchup flying back at the company: ...companies have found that inviting consumers to create their advertising is often more stressful, costly and time-consuming than just rolling up their sleeves and doing the work themselves. Many entries are mediocre, if not downright bad, and sifting through them requires full-time attention. And even the most well-known brands often spend millions of dollars upfront to get the word out to consumers.
Some people, meanwhile, have been using the contests as an opportunity to scrawl digital graffiti on the sponsor and its brand. Rejected Heinz submissions have been showing up on YouTube anyway, and visitors to Heinz's page on the site have written that the ketchup maker is clearly looking for "cheap labor" and that Heinz is "lazy" to ask consumers to do its marketing work. Nick Carr has insightful thoughts on the Heinz situation.
Carr's website has an interesting post from Eric Raymond regarding Web 2.0: Open source is, fundamentally, about the software. Spewing a lot of Web 2.0 hype around it confuses more than it clarifies.
It's legitimate to argue that open source software is strongly suggestive that similar arrangements... might work elsewhere. But it's also way too easy to forget that some of the critical enabling factors for the open-source software movement are hard to replicate elsewhere. Of these, the most important is the fact that the correctness and performance of software can be objectively measured -- whether or not an application segfaults is not a matter of political dispute. This, not the presence or absence of particular kinds of authority structures, is why Linux succeeds and Wikipedia fails. On the pro-Web 2.0 side, Tim Lee from Cato criticizes the influx of scientists into the legal profession. Oddly, in referencing reviews he has done on various patents, Lee touts as an amateur exactly what he criticizes others for doing professionally- applying scientific knowledge to patent policy.
Web 2.0 may be interesting, or exciting, because its a relatively new phenomenon, but at the end of the day, professionals are professionals, amateurs want to be professionals and amateurs will stay amateurs. If nobody is paying you for it, there may be good reason.
posted by Noel Le @ 4:29 PM | Free Culture Movement
Link to this Entry |
Printer-Friendly |
Email a Comment | Post a Comment(0)
|
