Since the invention of mass media we have been taught that media is to be passively consumed. Someone has already done all the hard work for us and we are supposed to sit back and enjoy the show. The business model of selling masses of passive readers/listeners/viewers to advertisers actually requires that the consumers can not react to non-relevant content or advertising. When the consumers have a voice, media companies have to work twice as hard to please both advertisers and consumers.

I believe people are fundamentally lazy. We like consuming media the easy way. Sitting back, relaxing and accepting anything adequate. And that is fine for mass media, they can offer us content that just barely exceeds our threshold of acceptability. Content that gets as many people as possible to watch/listen/read and not go away. Lowest common denominator -content.

The question is: just how lazy are we? If we really are as lazy as it seems today, then mass media is going to be just fine for quite a while. People still will not put in the extra effort required to find the content that they enjoy more than the content that is automatically pushed to them. On the other hand, if laziness is just a bad habit then mass media is in for the ride of its life. People will trip over themselves to find all the wonderful content about the subject they are passionate about. And that will truly change the media game.

The smallest form of participation is actively finding content that suits your needs. Not being content with content that someone else thinks suits your needs. And there is the participation divide. The divide between people that are willing to actively search for personally relevant content and those that are happy with the stuff that is pushed to them.

Digital natives have already crossed the participation divide. Old habits do die hard, so I am predicting that it will take a few years for the masses to start hopping over.