"It's a PEOPLE DRIVEN economy, stupid."

-Erik Qualman, 2009.


Social Media  is Generation Y's printing press.
It isn't a fad. It isn't temporary. It's the beginning of the people driven economy.

What does that mean?

By the end of this decade, consumers and electorates will access in real-time to just about all the information they need to make a decision about who to vote for, and what child-labor backed companies to boycott. And they'll be getting this information through word of mouth, blogs, Twitter and yes, even Facebook.

This poses a huge problem for corporate giants and "election-favorite" candidates.

Why? 

Because now people can organize and respond to something they don't like in real time.
That means a serious restructuring of our economy and political culture in the next 30 years, and that small businesses and dark horse candidates have a much more equal playing field if they're aimed at becoming regional powerhouses and world leaders.

Mr Smith and Mr. Bailey Finally Have A Chance.

This video is from the activist website MOVE YOUR MONEY. MOVE YOUR MONEY focuses on getting Americans to take action against what it perceives as gross excesses by banking giants by getting everyday Americans to move their money to local community banks. It focuses on the theme that community banks look out for the little guy, while large banks have only one rationale: greed.

It's hosted on the popular social/new media site, YouTube, where it has around 500,000 views from site users with and without YouTube accounts.

What's so important about it?

About a month later during the State of the Union, President Obama announced his intention to divert TARP funds to help community banks lend more to "the people who need it most". We can only wonder where the administration might have gotten that idea. The otherwise neglected industry of community banks and savings & loans now have regular meetings with administration officials, as well as national attention to their brand(s), in part because of social media tools like the YouTube video above.

Social Media tools allow for the dissemination of information in real-time. Better than any other mode of communication we have out there (unless you believe in telepathy). It means that we're becoming a people-driven economy, where the consumer has a lot more power than the institutions they interact with.
Companies and politicians who don't take heed of that do so at their own peril.