Independent Web site and blog owners can embed software widgets -- small bits of code that function as dynamic applications when installed on a Web page -- linked to text and video clips from its shows.
If you think about it, the way NBC has asked for, and retains the rights to, any "user-generated content" The People submit to its site, this little widget could represent some sort of reciprocity with the user-generating community....
but I'm sensing some kind of 3-card monty shell game here...
Knowing there's no such thing as a free (widget-based) lunch, I wonder: what sort of code will be embedded in this widget? What sort of information will it be sending back to Big Media Brother about our "habits?" And will all this info end up coming back to bite us in form of endless adverts? Or something else? And will NBC let the user-generators know if they embed something like spyware in their widgets?
Still, will NBC only offer celebrity-soaked entertainment crud to be widgetized, or will they also let user-generators post snippetts of the presidential debates?
the latter would stimulate conversation about important democracy issues. the former will only perpetuate user-generated numbing-out.
Only time will tell if NBC decides to use its powers for Good--or for just the same old, same old...
Journalism, citizen journalism, media, web 2.0, Blogs
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