Evolving/Devolving Communication

Funny how things turn around and techniques of doing things runs in a big circle. We talk about that happening in fashion all the time, I wish I would have kept those clothes,  who knew they would have come back into style.

Communication (Photo credit: P Shanks)

That seems to be happening in thecommunication world to a degree as well. In a wonderful Twitter conversation the other evening the discussion revolved around the ever-changing face of internet and social mediacommunication. The trend for 2012 is clearly towards faster, visually based, interactive communication. The world of communication has definitely changed in the last year or so with the introduction of sites such as Visual.ly,Pinterest and YouTube. Look at Youtube for example, have you ever witnessed a 16 to 22-year-old bring up a Youtube video, more often than not the first thing they look at is how long is that video, if it’s longer than two minutes they are most likely on to something else rather than waste two minutes getting to the point.

The next generation of consumers, our potential clients wants their information in a visual, to the point, hopefully interactive format. Considering the speed of which a site like Pinterest has taken the world by storm, one could make this argument all day long. However, getting back to my original premise, I find it interesting that communication while digital and high-tech in todays format, is returning to a caveman esq pictorial form. On it’s surface at least, I mean, cave dwellers didn’t have the option to further expand the picture with a link to limitless data with a simple click  as we do today, but the opening form of communication is there.

The discussion gets really interesting when one thinks about not just the immediate

Image via Wikipedia

future of it all, but the distant future as well. What is that going to look like?  It is the job of our science fiction writers to lead the way into our future, not the shoot em up plasma gun toting sci fi we see so much of today, but a return to the “makes you think” type of sci fi in the essence of Bradbury, and Asimov. Will communication evolve/devolve into a series of grunts and snorts, or we will argue telepathically, who knows. We are already raising a generation of “abbreviated” students using text and twitter character limitations to get their point across.  I think there is a possibility that future term papers  will be delivered in the visual form, with actual text being just a piece of the overall presentation.

In whatever form it takes on,  we return to the point being that social media and technology are rapidly shaping and creating changes to our world, and as business people we need to be at the front of the train, not holding on for dear life to the caboose.

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• Why I Like Being a Pinhead, You Should Too (studmuffinmedia.wordpress.com)
• Is Social Media Just a fad or is it here to stay?(socialmediaspectrum2010.wordpress.com)