Everyone Will Become a Media Outlet.

In Clay Shirky's article "Everyone is a Media Outlet" he talks about the development of new technology and how it allows the people who were once the rare professionals to be not as rare because more and more people can do their job with the development of new technology. He gave the first example of this happening which was the scribes who were replaced by the printing press. It made doing their job easier and cheaper and available to common people. They were no longer rare and anyone could do their job.

The ability of anyone to do a task that was once only possible by professionals is called mass amateurization. It is called mass amateurization because it is amateurs becoming involved in mass media. In this day and age there are so many new technologies that allow everyday people to have access to opportunities that were once only saved for professionals. One example of this is the invention of the car. There used to be a time when people relied on horse carriage for their transportation. Later, the car was invented and eventually made affordable to everyone and allowed for the mass amateurization of transportation.

The internet allows for the ultimate form of mass amateurization. First of all, the internet allows for consumers to provide direct feed back for the first time. It also allows consumers to become producers. The internet provides a number of ways for everyday people to get their voice heard, especially with blog sites such as blogger and wordpress. Also it allows for alternative press to survive with money being much less of a factor than before the internet.

Because of the internet, people now have more of a democracy. Instead of the big companies controlling everything and being the only source of entertainment and information, we can now view alternative and indie forms of media online that don't have to worry about going out of business. Alternative media allows the consumer to have a choice in what they want. The success of alternative media is important for the nation to be more exposed to creativity. For example, the internet allows amateur artists of all kinds such as musicians, photographers, drawers, painters, writers and many more to show their work on certain online sites without having to go through companies that have to approve their work first and force them to change as they please.

Clay Shirky argues that new technologies will allow for more and more mass amateurization, not just in media but in many other aspects. I feel like this is good for most aspects because it allows consumers to have more democracy and face less corporate control. Also it allows those who have alternative ideas to get their message out their without being suppressed. They may never be rich and famous but at least they can connect with others who share similar ideas. When amateurs can become producers, it allows for individuality and creativity to flow which is something that has been becoming more scarce and needs to return. With mass amateurization, media will be run by the people and not the corporations.