June 22, 2005

Ch' Ch' Ch' Changes...

Terry Heaton's essay on TV news in the high-tech postmodern era, Chaos at the Door, is a must-read, even if you aren't in that business, because it is about so much more than teevee.

The paradox of power is that discontent increases with opportunities for acting on it. The more the bottom is given the tools to make and distribute their own media, the greater their power; the greater their power, the greater their discontent and, along with it, the opportunity for acting on that discontent. This bubbling caldron of energy is profoundly anti-elitist and anti-institution, because the more the bottom surveys the landscape these days, the more they realize that our culture has failed them, and this energy is palpable in the halls of power.