The decline of mass media doesn’t necessarily imply the decline of mass culture. Social networking services can create mass circulation without mass media. iLike, a music sharing application, acquired one million users on Facebook within a week of its introduction there. Observing that Paris Hilton was mentioned more often than Facebook, iPhone, and Google at … Continue reading the future of mass culture
In the Reformation, decentralized communication of Luther’s thesis contrasted sharply with highly controlled Catholic Church communication. … Read the post Martin Luther: trade-off between textual control and distribution
Discussion of tails and popularity seems to be maturing into more comprehensive considerations. Folks aiming for uber-geek status might chat about the difference between power laws and log-normal distributions. This difference has similar consequences to the difference between non-stationary and stationary macroeconomic time series. If those terms are obscure to you, you might just chat … Continue reading lack of power laws and other popularity problems
Once again men are heatedly discussing tail size. Just ponder this queston: How large is the long tail? Personally, I’m going to keep looking before I decide for myself. While it’s novel to bring mathematical precision to such matters, unfortunately it seems to me that this mathematical model focuses attention on misleading features. The model … Continue reading more discussion about tail size