Curt Monash on the Information Ecosystem

Curt Monash recently published a pair of sweeping posts about the future of the information ecosystems:

• The grand discussion on the future of journalism
• Where I think the information ecosystem is headed

They’re nice posts, and Monash does a great job of playing by the rules of the link economy (the one time I agree with Jeff Jarvis) and bringing together thinking from around the blogosphere.

But I do have some differences. I posted a comment on Monash’s post about where the information ecosystem is headed, which I’ll reproduce here:

I think you may be underestimating the challenge of transitioning from an ecosystem dominated independent information providers to one dominated by vendors or analysts motivated by self-interest.

Yes, everyone has self-interest–I’m not trying to suggest otherwise. But, much as I’m sure anyone who reads my blog takes anything I say about enterprise search with a grain of salt, I’m sure anyone who reads your blog maintains a healthy skepticism towards you say about the vendors you do business with–or about their competitors. I think there will always be a market for information that comes without conflicts of interest.

The question of course, is how large that market will be, and where consumers’ willingness to pay will intersect the cost of production, especially if independent information providers are competing with vendors or analysts who provide information for free in order to market their products and services.

And, while I’m specifically thinking about technology news / analysis, the same goes for other arenas, like politics. Do we want all of the reporting to come from activist organizations? Some would argue that’s already the case, but it could be much, much worse.