- Merriam-Webster said the word "blog" was #1 Word of the Year for 2004.
- Microsoft launched Spaces, its belated entry to the blogosphere. The rest of the world yawned.
- The Washington Post ran this piece, Images of Fighting in Fallujah Compel at Different Levels, in its Sunday edition.
The ability of a given entity to control the entire messaging space - an ability which has been eroding for generations - has become that much more diluted as the distributed Internet has given birth to commonly-available tools.
The resulting messages, as evidenced in this piece, are stunningly different. Think about that for a second as you consider how many of us typically take whatever we see at face value. Maybe it's time to rethink our media gullibility.
Beyond the current situation in Iraq, this evolution has broad implications for governments everywhere. How much longer can China, for example, keep its own people in the dark? Cuba? Name your own autocratic state here, then mark my words: sooner or later, technology will do to these regimes what generations of tanks and guns ultimately failed to accomplish. At least that's what I'd like to think - I guess I'm too much of an idealist.
I'll descend from my political soapbox now. What does your soapbox have to say?