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thatguyfrombvue

Bellevue

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I'm a words & music guy I'm a songwriter & producer, and run a small… more »

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Jun 11, 2012 thatguyfrombvue updated his or her location.

Jun 11, 2012 thatguyfrombvue updated his or her bio.

Jun 11, 2012 thatguyfrombvue commented on "You Are Not a Curator, You Are Actually Just a Filthy Blogger.".

The Internet is cable TV with a billion channels - much of it dreck. The process of selecting interesting and compelling content around a certain theme and gathering it in one place does not require the study or commitment of true curation; but it is a similar task. And it's a valuable service. Separating the wheat from the chaff; making decisions to include or exclude based on quality or applicability to a theme; and ordering, highlighting, commenting, and inviting a community to comment are very cool and somewhat skilled services. I appreciate those who perform them well, and return to their sites again and again.

It's also a great way to add value to an existing content stream. I'm a content creator. On my music label page, I could post solely about my label's artists, their music and mine, my personal opinions about music, and projects in progress. I do all that, but I also aggregate and select other content which people who enjoy my original content would also enjoy and find useful. What do I call that?

I think this is a case of a word with a specific definition acquiring a more generalized meaning. And I think it has done so because there are more people doing curatorial tasks than there used to be. So it's a change in usage driven by a change in culture. When we all have flying cars, the term "pilot" will be similarly debased. Until someone coins a better phrase, I believe we will be stuck with the expansion of this one.

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