They say a picture is worth a 1000 words. So what does the fact that Flickr has 2 billion pictures uploaded and Facebook has over 4 billion mean in terms of quantity of communication. (Thanks to Michael Arrington of Techcrunch for his post detailing the numbers).

  MIKE ARRINGTON AND HIS FATHER

As Marshall McLuhan (1911 - 1980) said in 1967 (when refering to TV) '...we all live in a global village...' We like to share our experiences and our view of our section of the global village. Social media platforms help that process. The pictures we choose to upload (silly and serious) says a lot about us. Take a look at what Michael has to say himself about a picture he has chosen to show on his bio page. Does that not tell us more than the posed PR shot that maybe on his company bio?

    MARSHALL MCLUHAN

Marcel Mauss (1872 - 1950) in his book ,The Gift, explores what drove exchange and obligation to reciprocate in ancient and native societies. Much of his pioneering work has relevance today in how people undertake social exchanges - the gift of information about ourselves. With ever more powerful communication tools how and why are we 'sharing' ourselves so much?

  MARCEL MAUSS