---
title: "Radio Ga Ga"
description: "Explore how content distribution platforms evolve: from Twitter's noise to Medium's curation. Analysis of how technology shifts reshape how we consume and share information."
keywords: ["Medium","content distribution","curated blogging","social media noise","content quality","information sharing","Tomasz Tunguz","Seth Godin","Quora","Branch"]
ai_summary: "Analyzes the evolution of content distribution platforms and the shift towards curated, high-quality information sharing."
date: 2012-08-26
lastmod: 2026-07-31
canonical_url: https://www.tomtunguz.com/content-curation/
author: "Tomasz Tunguz"
---

<p>Must content distribution platforms be reinvented every few years? </p>
<blockquote class="large">
<p>Left to its own devices, the mob will augment, accessorize, spam, degrade and noisify whatever they have access to, until it loses beauty and function and becomes something else.<br><a href="http://sethgodin.typepad.com/seths_blog/2012/08/a-tacky-mess-the-masses-vs-great-design.html">Seth Godin</a></p>
</blockquote>
<p>Given the noise and misinformation disseminated on Twitter both during the election and the <a href="http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2012/10/sorting-the-real-sandy-photos-from-the-fakes/264243/">Sandy disaster</a>, I’ve been wondering how Godin’s thoughts apply to new information networks: blogs and feeds. </p>

<h2>Sifting the feed in search of the truth</h2>

<p>There is an undeniable early movement toward editorially curated publishing. The Twitter founders have launched the most visible response. <a href="www.medium.com">Medium</a>, a low volume, high quality content site is a direct (and opposite) reaction to the high volume, noisy Twitter feed.  </p>

![image](https://res.cloudinary.com/dzawgnnlr/image/upload/q_auto/f_auto/w_auto/image_251_721134215)

<h2>Content proliferation is governed by its half-life</h2>

<p>In addition to volume reduction, Medium axes another dimension: time. Medium places no dates on its posts. Instead, Medium uses a voting system to judge and display the quality of a particular post. </p>

<p>![image](https://res.cloudinary.com/dzawgnnlr/image/upload/q_auto/f_auto/w_auto/image_251_486525128" width="500px" style="padding: 35px;"></p>

<p>Blogging has used time as the primary dimension for relevance. The posts a visitor should read are the most recent - so the assumption goes. Feeds are no different. In fact, time is the most prevalent quality metric in social products but it shouldn’t be. </p>

<p><a href="http://tomasztunguz.com/2011/11/10/content-half-life/">Content’s half-life is the amount of time required for content to reach half of its lifetime viewership.</a> Relying on time as a proxy for quality accelerates this half-life. The decrease in content’s lifespan makes writing long-form content less worthwhile despite it’s much greater intrinsic value. After all, longer content typically has deeper thought at its root. </p>

<h2>Jump on the bandwagon</h2>

<p>Medium is not alone. <a href="www.svbtle.com">Svbtle</a>, the platform I write for, is also fostering curated blogging. Arguably, <a href="www.quora.com">Quora</a> led this trend by focusing on questions. <a href="www.branch.com">Branch</a> is surfacing debates. <a href="https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/magazine-for-geeks-like-us./id557744510?mt=8">Marco Arment’s The Magazine is yet another example</a>. </p>

<p>If these efforts succeed, I think we will build the internet into a much better library - a library not made of scraps of paper but of deep and lasting thought - new Alexandria. </p>

<p>Queen said it best:</p>
<blockquote class="large">
<p>So don’t become some background noise<br>
A backdrop for the girls and boys<br>
Who just don’t know or just don’t care<br>
And just complain when you’re not there<br>
You had your time, you had the power<br>
You’ve yet to have your finest hour<br>
Radio - radio  </p>

<p>All we hear is radio ga ga<br>
Radio goo goo<br>
Radio ga ga   </p>
</blockquote>