There’s already a mix of elite + mob in our current everyday web, in that the contributors (to blogs, forums, bookmark site, social sites) tend to be motivated individuals who want to participate in the conversation. The truly dumb in our society are less well represented on the web than the really smart, and those really smart types are aware of cues, call them ambient editorial cues, of the web environment. A really good critic/commentator gets attention and respect, and an ambient influence flows from them. That’s what is (successfully) replacing the old top-down command-and-control model. And it does not take as much time as biological darwinism, as you argue. People paying attention to other smart people gets things moving along quickly. I think we are just getting used to the availability of this type of editorial influence, and as the cues become more understood, ingrained and accepted, intelligent information will be produced on the web in a less haphazard way. Posted by Gordon Whiting on February 13, 2008 at 1:31 AM