Political policy in a multi channel universe

The expansion of pluralistic ownership of communications has grown alongside the persistence of unpopular or unpopular governments. eg Bush administration. Mass marketing and social media can be see as tools of governance.

Politics is trying to catch up with the available technology, and the way people are organizing themselves/interacting in a wired world. Seth Godin refers to rifting. Room for big innovation in politics and the dissemination of social policy these days.

[ from Clay Shirky's many-to-many blog]
"Technology ushers in new forms of social organization that escape notice precisely because they are invisible to adherents of the old paradigm. By the time anyone notices the impending social transformation, it is too powerful to contain, and social transformation cascades across the landscape. Or so the theory goes.

Powerful forces can kill you. Unhappy industry groups. Media owners. Foreign governments. There is a need to compromise to keep these groups in the tent, while fulfilling need number 3, within reason.

People still crave feel-good nonsense. How else do you explain the large, continued use of Television, and our penchant to oversimplify complexity using feel-good anti-intellectual labels like "flip-flop"?

A long as people like to follow good leaders are needed. One the one hand, reassuring people ( if possible) that their reptilian instincts are OK, good, in the right - at the same time, ushering in a future that necessarily replaces and possibly undermines the things we think are solid.