So this is getting to be an old book, but I just re-read some of it and have to say that this is really a description of the potential and beauty of cultural organizing. If you are looking for a refresher on the book, or haven't read it at all,clicking here will download a cheat sheet from Malcom Gladwell's website.

From a NY Times article about how the increase in Americans who self-identify as Native Americans is due to a change in the way that we consider identity: "In the past, ethnicity and race seemed like fixed categories, inherent qualities of self that were not only unchanging but could also be measured, quantified and reduced to small checkable boxes on bureaucratic forms. But American diversity and intermarriage (as well as the perfect match between the Internet and deep genealogical research) have changed this singular certainty into a multiple-choice question. For most of American history, identity was centrally controlled: the census taker decided your identity by quietly writing it down while asking questions at your door. But in 1960, the census was changed to permit Americans to declare their own race or ethnicity. The most significant shift, though, came as recently as the 2000 census. Americans were permitted to declare more than one race or identity. As a result, the old categories become even more fluid."

My husband Jon was just reading Wired (like all good geeks should) and forwarded me this article by Kevin Kelly called "We Are The Web".

Talking about 10 years ago, he says: "We all missed the big story. The
revolution launched by Netscape's IPO was only marginally about hypertext
and human knowledge. At its heart was a new kind of participation that has
since developed into an emerging culture based on sharing. And the ways of
participating unleashed by hyperlinks are creating a new type of thinking -
part human and part machine - found nowhere else on the planet or in
history."

More from Jon: I think it's this collaborative culture that has a lot to do with the
internet that is exactly what is the tide and the long term hope that is
going to unseat the media giants and give us the tools to create a real
democracy, which is not so much about politics, but about people getting
together and looking out for one another.

We couldn't agree with him more. Viva la cultura!

Thinking about examples of cultural products (really need another name for this...) and remembered Shepard Fairey's Andre the Giant has a Posse campaign. Went to his web site and his opening statement about the theory behind the campaign. "The medium is the message," he writes. This is the same with cultural change, I think.