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January 29, 2005
The Great Decision: Consume or Produce
Every time I sit down at a PC and every time I walk into my office at work, I'm struck with a fundamental decision: consume or produce.
I'm talking about information. Any minute can be reasonably and justifiably spent either consuming information, such as reading research papers, news sites, emails, blogs, etc., or producing new information, such as writing my own papers, putting up blog entries, leaving comments on blogs (hint, hint), composing an email, and so on.
Some people are very content to be primarily, if not entirely, consumers. They feel little or no need to share their knowledege, opinions, and thoughts with others. Some are more biased in the opposite direction, churning out an unending stream of content. I personally try to maintain a balance, but I have no idea where that balance should be, or even if there is an ideal point. I know I'm somewhere in the middle between these extremes, but I can easily spend a day consuming and not producing at all if I don't watch myself. This blog is one example of how I try to shift back towards the middle.
A related question is this: do we actually need so many people producing content? A decade ago, the number of "voices" in the world was a fraction of what it is today, and the majority of those voices had a local audience rather than the global audience the Internet affords now. Are we better off for this shift?
Well, on the plus side, the more opportunity there is for people to express themselves, the less likely we'll be that injustice and general badness (where's my thesaurus?!) will go unnoticed. Giving a voice to the repressed, the depressed, or the angry fosters assistance and coping. In addition, the more we know about each other, the better able we should be to understand and appreciate each other, and that should hopefully move us towards a calmer, more peaceful world.
On the negative side, and going back to my original point, a minute spent producing content is a minute spent not consuming someone else's content. So the time I spend writing this blog entry is time I'm not reading about someone else's scientific discovery, social plight, or philosophical outlook. While some education comes from writing, consuming generally offers a better opportunity for gaining knowledge and improving oneself.
But, if nobody produced, there'd be nothing to consume. And, if one consumes nothing, one is unlikely to be able to produce much content of value. So there has to be a balance, which leaves me back at my original question: consume or produce, read or write? Every minute is precious...how will you spend the next one?
Comments
I’ll use this moment to produce. The answer is simple: produce, produce, produce! Why? It’s simply a matter of numbers. First, you need to understand that quality producers are few and far between. For every 1 producer there are 100 consumers (these numbers are, of course, flying from my posterior). For every 1 quality producer there are 100 spewers (e.g. “My boss is sooooo mean to me. He made me file. First I started with the As. After that I did the Bs. After that I did the Cs…….”)
Add to that the time per word costs of the two activities and you can easily see why there is dearth of quality. Perhaps you’re different, but in the time that it takes me to write one post I can read hundreds of other things.
Posted by: steve ![[TypeKey Profile Page]](http://www.gearbits.com/nav-commenters.gif)
at January 29, 2005 3:28 PM
If everybody talked, and nobody listened, what would we have?
-Davy
Posted by: Davy Fields at January 29, 2005 5:36 PM
Davy,
I agree. However, there is a huge difference between talking/listening and writing/reading: a) listening and talking share a 1:1 time ratio. b) many more people are willing to talk than write.
My point was simply that when you find someone with a) the desire to produce and b) something to say, it's usually more valuable to have that person writing.
Cheers,
Steve
Posted by: steve at January 29, 2005 7:53 PM
Thinking about the relative efficiencies of consuming and producing, it's always faster to consume. If you take into consideration quality as well as quantity, as well as consider medium richness (i.e., the ability of the medium to convey meaning), then the gap becomes even bigger.
In the end, it takes a lot of effort to produce high-value content (not that you'll find any here on this website), so I agree with Steve in that regard. However, since we know that most good things are rooted in, or make use of, other peoples' ideas, I understand Davy's point as well. Such the diplomat I am. ;-)
Posted by: craigf at January 30, 2005 11:12 AM
No brainer. Produce, and filter on the way out (Google it if you don't understand the significance).
Posted by: AJ Cann at May 5, 2008 2:45 PM
AJ, I do get the EiM reference, but I'm not clear how it resolves the dilemma I'm posing. Filter on the way out is about providing tools to users to handle the data they consume, so it's not clear to me how that helps me decide to spend a minute producing content (that others may decide to consume, with or without EiM's advice) or consuming content myself. It would be great if you could clarify. TIA.
Posted by: Craig at May 5, 2008 8:18 PM