Power to the People (and Serenity Now!)

Hi folks -- the folks over at Webmonkey have an article that compares different social link sharing/filtering sites that you might find useful.

Social link sharing sites are superficially similar to other link sharing sites like Fark or Slashdot, with one important distinction: Editors don't pick the items to highlight -- the users choose (either by direct vote or other measure of popularity).

In the Web 2.0 world, there's a profusion of these kinds of link sites -- the Webmonkey article provides a table listing some of the more popular ones, with feature comparisons and mini-reviews.

(There are a bunch on that list that even I haven't heard of, and I'm supposed to be keeping up with this kind of stuff. The field is pretty big and growing fast.)

Switching gears a bit, a fan group for the canceled sci-fi Western series 'Firefly' (and its big-screen followup 'Serenity') has set up a series of charity screenings for 'Serenity' around the country on June 23:

Firefly fans (or "Browncoats") have a well-deserved reputation for their rabidity (they're responsible in no small way for having the movie being made in the first place), and they're pretty good at using the Web, blogs and other social media to come together.

I actually know one of the primary instigators behind this whole charity screening movement, Christopher Frankonis (as mentioned in the Willamette Week article about the screenings -- he's a Portland, Oregon-area blogger who'd gotten a bit of fame for his near-obsessive blog coverage of local politics.

His politics blog is now defunct, but you know you can't keep a good blogger down, so he's still rousing the rabble with this and his many other blogs and Web sites.

As for his role in the charity screenings, he claims it was largely just coming up with the idea and pitching it to other people -- there's no central authority here, just an idea, a little homework, and then using the Web site to rally like-minded folks (or, as the article says, "... harness the energy of obsessed civilians everywhere.")

Anyway, one of the lessons we can take from this is that while it's all well and good to have your own blog, the full power of blogs, the Web, and social media happens when like-minded people can get together and do something.

Thanks -- Joe

Tags: Webmonkey, Serenity, Firefly