This week has been marked by two almost under the wire speculative thoughts in new/social media Is the internet dead asks the Economist? “A virtual counter-revolution: The internet has been a great unifier of people, companies and online networks”.

The Economist argues that the Internet is under threat and that commercial forces are threatening to balkanise the internet. I suspect they are right.

The other question ‘is blogging dead?’ Or as Steve Rubel puts it ‘crawling to a halt’ The death of blogging is something RCJ at BBC wrote about 2 years ago (in a blog which is still going strong). He was right then ‘ … what I think we’re seeing is the development of a mixed economy, where blogging has many forms, professional, amateur, micro and mega.’ and is right still.

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This week has been marked by two almost under the wire speculative thoughts in new/social media Is the internet dead asks the Economist? “A virtual counter-revolution: The internet has been a great unifier of people, companies and online networks”.

The Economist argues that the Internet is under threat and that commercial forces are threatening to balkanise the internet.  I suspect they are right.

The other question ‘is blogging dead?’ Or as Steve Rubel puts it ‘crawling to a halt’ The death of blogging is something RCJ at BBC wrote about 2 years ago (in a blog which is still going strong).  He was right then ‘ … what I think we’re seeing is the development of a mixed economy, where blogging has many forms, professional, amateur, micro and mega.’ and is right still.

Then there is the continuing old media v. new media conversations. ‘Science journalism: Supplanting the old media?’ And conversely; ‘The FaceBook for science is dead: What’s next?’ The truth – or one element in a multifaceted truth is it’s all evolving – it always did and it always will.

How this broad new/emerging media is evolving is the interesting story.  One aspect is how traditional media businesses are working with new media.  Locally with UTV and PropertyPal ‘UTV seals property website deal’  (congratulations guys) and internationally Hogging the remote Old-media firms are firmly in control of internet video

But increasingly important is the growing importance of ‘local’ and ‘mobile’. ‘Local’ used to be a pejorative word. Local = parochial, narrow, unsophisticated even cheap.  Local was not ‘Metropolitan’.  The League of Gentlemen reflected what metropolitans thought about local – “This is a local shop for local people.  There’s nothing for you here.” [Video]

Local Radio – not as good as National Radio (yeah? Often – prehaps always -  more popular, though.) The global internet is reviving local. Google’s New Mobile Ads Take Users From Search To Store ABI: Location-Based Marketing To Reach $1.8B In 2015 Mobile devices need custom maps The next billion geeks: How the mobile internet will transform the BRICI countries Are You Stuck in The Mobile Divide? The new site Groupon a ‘deal of the day’ web site localised (only available in the US and Canada – come on NI entrepreneurs – here a great idea to adapt to local needs)

To say nothing of the location ‘games’ Gowalla and Foursquare which Kevin Anderson has been thinking about

So the internet isn’t dead.  Blogging isn’t dead.  They are both evolving and evolving fast.  Local is the new metropolitan.  Local is potentially the new global too as it becomes easier to reach the rest of the world while staying at home.