Thursday's word: Whatyado-ocracy

Whatyado-ocracy: A refined-by-discussion way of expressing the concept of Ad hoc meritocracy (which is one of the key principles of Produsage, the key term of class today).


When people earn their cool factor by what they DO rather than what they inherit (i.e. aristocracy) or their position in a heirarchy (i.e. a business).

Related to Heterachy.

Empowered words: Produsage & Produsers

I'm not sure what the word of the day from class today will be (yet) but the word I find fascinating from the readings: "Produsage" with its attendant: "Produsers"

Where I work upper management despises creative spellings. I wonder if Produsage will make it into the lexicon from the ranks of neologism?

The link above leads to a site which discusses same:

"The concept of produsage highlights that within the communities which engage in the collaborative creation and extension of information and knowledge that we examine on this site, the role of consumer and even that of end user have long disappeared, and the distinctions between producers and users of content have faded into comparative insignificance. In many of the spaces we encounter here, users are always already necessarily also producers of the shared knowledge base, regardless of whether they are aware of this role - they have become a new, hybrid, produser." (http://snurb.info/produsage)

In the typical local workplace, production is relegated to routine and innovation is left to professionals. In the typical online environment where users are given tools for production, the result can be anything from spam to high art. In the sort of environment that fosters online community and given plenty of tools and time to build, users can become produsers. I like that word.