Here Comes Everybody

Shirky (2008),

“By making it easier for groups to self-assemble and for individuals to contribute to group effort without requiring formal management (and its attendant overhead), these tools have radically altered the old limits on the size, sophistication, and scope of unsupervised effort (the limits that created the institutional dilemma in the first place)” (p. 21).

Shirky (2008),

“ One way to think about the change in the ability of groups to form and act is to use an analogy with the spread of disease. The classic model for the spread of disease looks at three variables – likelihood of infection, likelihood of contact between any two people, and overall size of population. If any of those variables increases, the overall spread of the disease increases as well” (p. 159).

Shirky (2008),

“Motivation, energy, and talent for action are all present in those sorts of groups – what was not present, until recently, was the ability to coordinate easily. Seen in that light, social tools don’t create collective action – they merely remove the obstacles to it… Revolution doesn’t happen when society adopts new technologies – it happens when society adopts new behaviors” (pp. 159-160).

http://www.shirky.com/

http://www.herecomeseverybody.org/

http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/mediaberkman/?s=shirky

Shiky, C. (2008). Here comes everybody: The power of organizations without organizations. London, England: Penguin Books, Limited.