Lots has been written about user generated content. But recently I have been in alot of conversations about what I call “user encouraged content.”
Recognizing that the conversation amongst readers is often of more interest than the original content being read in the first place, a number of smart web media types I know are starting to think about conversation as the content itself, and about ways to encourage, aggregate and edit conversations around interesting content.
In addition to being more engaging, conversation as content also happens to be free, making for an interesting potential business model.
Expect conversation to be an important tenet of Content 2.0.
I think we’re realizing that you *need* to build conversation around your content; without dialogue, it’s dead, a one-way street. I don’t think conversation will just happen on it’s own in most cases, either – it often needs to be cultivated.
I think there’s a parallel between the content/conversation meme (sry) and “it’s not the data, it the flow.” (http://www.avc.com/a_vc/2008/05/its-not-the-dat.html)
I also believe that “conversation” about uninteresting “content” is not very interesting. We need good content. We need to then stimulate interesting conversation. The targeted social media sites have both. Check out our Photo.Net or Craftster.Org or DavesGarden.com. All have deep content and robust conversation.
In researching current trends on “conversation as content” this post is at the top of the Search list.
While the post and high level concept is now 1/2 year old, I’m wondering, what’s actually new here?