Friday, November 16, 2007

User Generated Flubb

Thanks, Derek Powazek, for putting the phrase User Generated Content (UGC) into some context for us:

"User: One who uses. Like, you know, a junkie.

Generated: Like a generator, engine. Like, you know, a robot.

Content: Something that fills a box. Like, you know, packing peanuts.

So what's user-generated content? Junkies robotically filling boxes with packing peanuts. Lovely."

Lovely, indeed! When you use Google, you expect that you'll be able to find anything you're looking for. What about all the useless, trashy pages that come up instead of what you really want?

Or, how about the home pages of people that ramble on about their opinions regarding any and everything, offering not even a link to something factual. Lee Odden mentions, however, that it's costly to ensure that UGC is actually relevant and useful. True, it's impossible to moderate what anyone posts, but it's becoming increasingly more difficult to filter out what is credible/factual from what is not.

Perhaps opinion is what you're looking for when you need the chemical formula for benzene, but is the mass amount of UGC being produced every day going to help us out further, or will it start getting in our way?

(It's C6H6, by the way - thanks Online Encyclopedia)

16 comments:

Anonymous said...

Bring back DCRoadrage.

Map Finder said...

I'm afraid I don't know what you're talking about?

Cathy said...

you should cite your source, how can i take your word about making benzene from pure atoms?

Cathy said...

Apparently there used to be some blogger also named J.Wilson who did a blog called DCRoadrage and your anonymous poster thought it was you.

Anonymous said...
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
Anonymous said...

hey man...
thanks for your comment!
i checked your blog out and it looks good dude! haha probably has more interesting stuff than mine! im just here for fun!

so you're located in japan? also, why so into business, did you study that in college or whats up (i'm an ECON major right now so...)

Sir William McDoogavich said...

what sucks about user generated content is that technically, everything anybody puts on the web is "user generated content." but we can cut the bull... posting stupid web pages or completely irrelevant things in the world is not user generated content... it's crap :)

nice post.

Map Finder said...

Morgan, I like your comment! Thanks!

Murtuza said...

Completely agree with you.
The issue of credibility continuous to haunt the internet surfer. User Generated Content cannot be completely trusted.
I feel like the ones that can be trusted are user generated content websites that are filtered or scanned. For example wikipedia is pretty reliable content even though it is all user generated. However, it's only reliable because someone from wikipedia actually approves the stuff that you put on there

Map Finder said...

Awesome comment, Morty! I completely agree about some UGC being reliable despite it having been user-generated...

Alec Fisher-Lasky said...

I agree with Morty that filtering or scanning can make UGC reliable. Then you have constant in all the UGC that you can judge and that can develop creditability, in this case the moderators.

Guess the reliable stuff is UGMAC: User Generated and Moderator Approved Content

Allie said...

nice post!

I agree with morty! Too many UGCs don't do anything good. Those are even barriers in finding the real information I would want. Yes, when it is filtered, I would love it.

But,, how can it be filtered? it doesn't consist of text. or it would be lovely if there is a technology scanning the video.

Da Vinci said...

lol, good post I see you got many people riled up..

The Wisdom of Wislon said...

Well said

Found you via Leigh Russell

Wislon aka A.Wilson

noone said...

True, it's impossible to moderate what anyone posts, but it's becoming increasingly more difficult to filter out what is credible/factual from what is not.

It's an interesting thing the increasing amount of "noise" on the Internet. This sentence reminds me an article of Umberto Eco. I don't agree with all his words, but it's a question to think about it...

Anonymous said...
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.