Mmm… actually I think (and this goes for quite a lot of other things you’ve said in this post) we need to keep in mind that what’s real and what’s not are not always a matter of opinion or talk. Sometimes they just ARE. So in this case it’s not really about “justifying proclamations”, it’s about “being”. IS social media effective for brand marketing or is it not? Is traditional media effective or is it not? Any media agency will tell you that these things can be measured, and they can be measured pretty accurately.

I’m kind of reminded while reading this of people who say they’re not influenced by advertising (as they throw another pair of Nikes into their Crumpler and head for MacDonalds).

I think you’re right that “The real question is how we will coexists? Which of the different roles will either Social Media or Traditional Media take up. Which new systems will be in place to allow, if not, improve the way existing roles are played out.”

As we continue to hurtle into accelerating information abundance I think we’re all finding that it’s not about “finding information” anymore, it’s about evaluating it’s value and credibility, curating it, self-editing it and filtering it. We’re increasingly struggling to keep a lot of information OUT while letting only the trickle we think is valuable to ourselves in. Sorting the signal from the noise, as you put it.

I’m reading fiction from Neal Stephenson (Anathem) at the moment. In his future, the reticulum (internet) has come to rely on reputation filtering. People, data, sources… everything has a reputation value attached to it and it’s through these values that people know what’s reliable and what’s not.

It’s just sci-fi fantasy, so how do we, here and now, evaluate what’s reputable and what’s not, what’s first-hand and what’s hearsay, what’s objective and what’s biased, fact from opinion?

We’ve seen some exciting evolution in the roles of all media in the past couple of years and it’ll continue to evolve faster and faster. Whether “Such questions are of the kind we need to ask going forward with further open room sessions” I don’t know. It’ll happen with or without the navel gazing. It’s going to be exciting to be part of though!