Community and personalization

In a sense, information technology has come of age. Although not all of the necessary infrastructure is in place, the capacity for efficient distribution of information electronically is a fait accompli. But do we use this capacity to communicate effectively? Providing access to content is not sufficient to guarantee effective message passing. A message delivered but ignored, or a message ingested but not digested, is not useful. In order to inform, the "recipient" must find the message content engaging and relevant. It is the contention of the News in the Future group at the MIT Media Laboratory that effective communication requires distribution of messages that are rich in description. These descriptions, when taken with consideration of the context of both the individuals and the communities receiving them, can result in messages that are both engaging and useful.