From the age of the Masses to the age of the Self

For nearly two centuries now we’ve been living in the industrial age. Concepts originally deriving from our steam-originated ability to produce in mass have been shaping our civilization and the way we’ve been thinking.

Until the last decade. Until now.

We are witnessing a transition from an age of the masses to an age of the individual, emphasizing self-expression, uniqueness and personal innovation. The “information” part of our economy (tech, media, entertainment) is more and more distributed, relying on user-generated content consumed by niche markets through self-organized channels. At the same time, information products are occupying an ever-growing part of the system.

And this is not just the economy, either. Our ideas are no longer derived from paper-carried ideologies distributed following a hierarchical model. On blogs and social platforms, expression runs free. User-generated concepts propagate and gain a life of their own.

We are now entering an age of the Self.

 

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