THE ROW OF tables along the power sockets are always occupied over at Burger King in Glorietta mall. This particular fast-food joint is popular with offering free wireless Internet connection—some 2 megabits per second, enough to download a whole movie in ten minutes. Here, dine-in customers lug laptops on their tables, sharing space with food trays filled with whoppers, onion rings, and refillable Coke tumblers.
Increasing Internet accessibility and dropping hardware costs allow more and more Filipinos to go online. Parallel to this development is a revolution shaping up fast in global information technology: the advent of Web 2.0. This more "social" web paves the way for Internet users to redefine their role in accessing media content. Where before, users merely navigate information, they now actively produce and share content themselves.
YouTube exemplifies the growing personalization of media. In this free video-sharing service, people are uploading, streaming, and tagging video content. In YouTube, the lines between information/entertainment and media producer/consumer blur even more. You can learn cooking procedures, first aid techniques, and workout routines, or should you wish, stay on for mundane pranks. Or as the website says, "Broadcast yourself."
The creativity and ingenuity encouraged by Web 2.0 is undeniably phenomenal in various social, business, and political contexts. As a case in point in the Philippines, the Makati district police prepared a series of videos to educate city residents on how to deal with common crimes and scams. The 15-segment video set reportedly averaged between 12,000 and 2,000 hits—a minimal figure, yes, but enough to save the police some P700,000 had they distributed it via DVD format. The exercise promoted crime prevention and public funds savings at the same time.
Indeed, YouTube and similar services challenge the traditional clout of big-time broadcast media. The rich multimedia content found in its interface—employing audiovisual and interactive components—are available for consumption anytime and anywhere, unlike the strategically scheduled programming of TV. This attribute frees up users with the burden of tuning in at designated times, especially since they can watch shows by merely using streaming data-capable cellular phones.
With this trend, media experience is increasingly shaped and decided by users themselves—not by focus groups, primetime programmers, or executive producers. Following Web 2.0, users are believed to be accessing site content and functions beyond the borders of the site’s pages.
However, major TV stations have also been quick to join the Web 2.0 fray. Even the websites of local media giants such as ABS-CBN and GMA Network already feed its more popular shows—news and soap operas—online. With traditional media staking its claim on the Web, the question begs to be asked: is there a difference to accessible media content, really? These media giants have production crews and technical staff that are not available to grassroots creatives.
The answer perhaps reverts back to the options that technology opens up for its users. For one, technology levels the playing field by equipping users with the opportunity to upload information by them and for them. Software—which itself undergo redefinition from being installed on computer to accessed on the Web—enable video editing and animation controls even for amateurs and enthusiasts.
The Internet is now more user-driven than ever. In real time, people are posting their comments, collaborating on online projects without personally meeting, and organizing communities of interests. In the past, big establishments claim that they produce media to satisfy audience demand when they are obviously only after advertising revenues. These days, thanks to Web 2.0, people share and access content (sometimes to viral levels) without the need for meddling moneymakers.
Furthermore, you need not visit each and every website you bookmarked since content could be served to you in a platter by way of news feeds. Your friends could even share theirs (Facebook, anyone?). And you too could easily and instantly upload photos and even videos straight to your connections.
Soon enough, however, laptop battery bars turn red and people worry about possible lost connections, with unsaved files fading into the cyber black hole. Tables near the power sockets are eyed, but Coke refills are all that can be asked for in the meantime. Raymond Calbay
