The Crowd Can do Some Pretty Fantastic Things (Photography By Corey Graham 2.0)
As a social media marketer / consultant I have to trust in people a lot, believe in them and have faith in them. A prerequisite of social media is for you to trust the intelligence of the crowd. I know it sounds weird " the intelligence of the crowd". Many of us have grown up in a world where – "Don't follow the multitude to do evil" was the order of the day. The world that has gone before was a pretty distrusting and oppressive place to the crowd. The expected norm was for a few people to run the operation while everyone else follow like sheep. Our past speaks of systems like dictatorship, monarchy, slavery and the list goes on. The crowd was not seen as have much value. All the nominal tasks where handed over to the masses to fulfill.
Technology is now allowing us to release the intelligence of the crowd. Is now easier and cheaper to have conversations with persons wherever they are and at any time. Its easier to participate in discussions with persons of different backgrounds and with different perspectives. It easier to share your thoughts and Ideas in the public domain. Collaboration is also pretty fantastic with free technologies like google docs that allow 2 persons to edit the same document at the same time and see each other's edits in REAL TIME!
In the world today we are seeing the collective intelligence of the crowd slowly being harnessed. We have communities (online) today that we turn to help us solve many of the problems that pop up in our daily lives. We can find online communities to help us with some pretty complex problems whether its logical or emotional. The collective intelligence of the crowd is establishing itself a renewable resource unlike anything the world has ever experienced before.
In the last couple of days, I have gained tremendous insight and wisdom from persons who not long ago were just another face in the crowd to me. I rediscovered how important it is to trust the intelligence of the crowd. It's pretty fantastic stuff and I can tell you it hit me like a brick.
You are not alone in this world anymore there is a crowd over yonder that just requires your participation and some fantastic things will happen both in your personal or professional life.
Go ahead and book that lunch date, strike up a conversation with that random Joe or Jane, take time to really add value to a discussion of interest.
Participate in the crowd activities and re-discover your crowd today.
Interesting post. Have you ever read the book “The Wisdom of Crowds?” – it makes a ton of sense when considered from the angle of social media, and really sheds some light on the stupidity or the strength of crowds (and crowd-sourcing, etc).
-Katie
I am checking it out now. It sounds very interesting, you just might have gotten the author another sale.
Thanks for the reference!