Malcolm Gladwell: The quiet Canadian , Patrick Brethour, Globe and Mail (Apr 4)
This should hearten everyone who doesn't do twitter and blogging. Malcolm Gladwell, writer for the New Yorker and author of three popular books that explain aspects of our modern society, does not blog (2 postings a year does not make a blogger) or tweet.
"Celebrated writer Malcolm Gladwell seems to have penned the script for the first part of the 21st century, with his provocative bestsellers on ideas such as contagion (The Tipping Point), the power of instant conclusions (Blink) and the genesis of genius (Outliers). But Mr. Gladwell, who returns home to Canada briefly this week, is conspicuously and deliberately absent from a central part of modern life: social media. His blog posts are biannual, his Facebook page is a placeholder and he has never ventured on to Twitter. "
In this article he explains why he does not use social media. And he's not convinced that ideas spread through social media.
"Do ideas spread through social media? I don’t think they are vehicles. People aren’t spreading ideas on Twitter, they’re spreading observations, perhaps. The point of Tipping Point is that I was very interested in face-to-face interpersonal reactions. If social media or online communication is the means to the creation of a personal connection, it’s a fabulous thing. But if it’s an excuse to not make a connection, it’s ultimately a trivial thing."
Posted by Gwen at April 7, 2010 11:53 AM