Not information overload--filter failure

Clay Shirky presented "It's not information overload. It's filter failure" at Web 2.0 Expo NY. Here are my notes.

• The assumption is that the information is going to keep increasing .
• Before the Internet, the source was the filter.
  • My rewording: Newspapers and book publishers decided what was filtered because it was costly to publish (i.e., What if we publish, but no one bought the book?)
  • Now the cost of publishing is negligible so where is the filter? When the source doesn't filter, how is it information filtered? Individuals have to learn to filter.
• We have to get better at filtering and keep re-tuning those filters.
• Filters for information must be automated, manually constructed, and continuously re-tuned. All solutions for filters are temporary.
• It's not an information overload problem, it's a filter failure, and we, as individuals, have to create, rethink, and re-tuned the filters.
• Managing privacy information flow is unnatural for most of us because before the Internet, providing private information was difficult, inconvenient, and inefficient.
  • My thoughts: it's a new paradigm and we rethink the social social structure, expectations, the underlying way for which we decide what to share and not share.
• Today, we design the filters so the privacy works the way we want it?
• Large groups are tolerant of free riders where small groups are not tolerant of free riders.
  • My rewording: In large groups you can easily have lurkers. In small groups, you must be able to contribute in some way--just lurking is not permitted.
• It's a mental shift--rethinking the model--we are the same as fish in the ocean--we are just in the flow.
  • My rewording: The ocean isn't the problem. The question is: how do we navigate the flow?
• Rethinking the model because before the Internet the filter of the information was at the source. Now the filters are with the people.
• Updating the old filters is not the fix.
• We should re-think the social norms.
• When you think you have information overload, think about what filters broke.
  • How is email broken? What are the solutions? Other methods of sharing, wikis, blogs, Twitter,FriendFeed, instant messaging.
  • How are feeds from newsreaders broken? How do I streamline and choose what feeds I read? Constantly changing feeds in my reader.
  • What about other solutions? Friendfeed and Twitter for manual filtering?
  • Still not working? More solutions coming.