Summary Part Two of "Here Comes Everybody"

Wikipedia has millions of articles in
many different languages.  

In the book, Here Comes Everybody, Clay Shirky takes a look at how social media is revolutionizing our world and how powerful social media truly is.  Shirky first examines the concept of the popular website  Wikipedia.  Wikipedia, "the online encyclopedia", is a website where anyone can create and add to millions of topics.   This collaborative website allows people to find information about almost any topic along with a list of links to other websites with additional information about the topic.  Shirky notes that even though there are many people that contribute to the articles, the majority of the articles are written by just a few.  He then relates this back to Flickr.  For example, The Coney Island Mermaid Parade in 2005 had about three thousand uploaded pictures.  Two hundred and thirty eight photos were posted by Czarina, the next largest sum of photos posted by one person was one hundred and twenty eight.  The average number of photos uploaded was twenty six.  As the number of photos increase the number of people who post lots of pictures decrease.  Shirky also mentions the rapidness in which information is spread.  In this modern age of media, people are able to receive news instantly on news websites, blogs, and other forms of social media.  Information spreads like wild fire and there is nothing anyone can do to stop it.  It is difficult for people who do not want their issue shared with the world to keep it private because there is so many ways stories are shared.  Shirky next explores the new fad of flash mobs.  The first flash mob took place in 2003 inside of a Macy's.  Flash mobs are often just for fun but sometimes they are a form of protest.  At first, the government was not sure how to handle flash mobs.  They were peaceful so there was no reason to take action however, it was still a form of protesting so they felt that addressing the matter was needed.  Similar to flash mobs, the government was unsure how to deal with posts placed on social media.  Social media is new to everyone and society as a whole needs to decide how to handle the power of it.

Shirky, Clay. Here Comes Everybody: The Power of Organizing without Organizations. New York: Penguin, 2008. Print.