Readers & Writers

For readers and writers, this age is history in the making.

Historically, there have been writers and readers in two watertight
compartments, like the producers and the consumers. Writers may read
stuff written by other writers, but readers have always been readers -
they never wrote. Among the readers were critiques who wrote about
what they read, but they were the only exceptions. As a rule, a writer
built up a readership base. He or she enjoyed the fruits of their
labour in solitude while the readers remained a faceless mass of
humanity. With the advent of the Internet, however, the situation is
beginning to change.

Today there are many avenues to write. There are blogs, wikis, Twitter
and Facebook, to mention only a few. The opportunities to write
increased manifold, thus enabling any one with the least inclination
to write to do so. There are no barriers to write: no critics to
satisfy, no publishers to lure, no marketing experts to sell your
stuff. The wall dividing the readers and writers began to crumble,

Readers become writers and vice versa. No group of elite talented men
and women hold the monopoly over the written word, except of course
the copyright on their work. Even criticism too is not the niche of a
few, but open to a large number of readers who are free to offer their
opinion, their reactions and experiences, after reading a book. The
lines separating the writers and the readers is blurring and we are
witness to the advent of a bold new wave of creativity that has once
been the lofty citadel of a few, while the rest ridiculed or admired
from the ground below.

But change often comes not without a whimper.

Whenever a new situation arises in the world there is always some
concern, some trepidation and some form of protest accompanying it.
The naysayers lament the degeneracy of a sublime pursuit to the
portals of mediocrity. The newbies revel in the opportunity afforded
by the medium and apply themselves unabashedly to make a mark. The
teetering humanity in between watch from the sidelines and take
tentative steps before making the plunge one way or the other.