The beginning of Shirky’s book related to Tapscotts observance of the Net Geners that sharing creates a community within a group of people, whether it’s just a few individuals or a huge population. An example use of community and technology was given in the format of a story in the beginning of a woman losing her phone in the back of a cab, and had someone else go through all the trouble of finding and returning it. There were a few hiccups with whether it was called stealing or “finder’s keeper’s” but in the end it was returned. Most all communities on the internet have spawned from a shared idea or concept. From the shared idea usually turns into a form of social media (i.e Facbook, tumblr, twitter).
Another anecdote given by Shirky was the use of Flickr to showcase pictures taken by people not of random things in their lives but document what was happening in the world of disasters. Taking, uploading, and tagging these photos directly gave people something to view right away rather than wait for news people to get to the scene. With the use of integrated communication and technology, there is hardly a phone without a camera in it. For example, one of the people witnessing the London terrorist attacks uploaded photos of what was happening and then assured the people viewing the photos that he was unhurt in the onslaught. Same goes with the tsunami of south eastern Asia, the photos taken and uploaded were used to possibly find missing people or to make vigils of those that could not have been found.
