It Is a Small World After All. And Getting Smaller

We often hear about how emerging new media are making our world smaller and the spread of knowledge faster. Today, I experienced that first hand when I had the pleasure of speaking with Scott Kesterson "live" on BlogTalkRadio. Scott, who is the only US embedded journalist in Afghanistan called into his The Words of War.

By reading the abundance of press in recent days, it seemed to me that the Taliban were gearing up for a "bloody" spring offensive. Rather than get our information through the filter of traditional media outlets, I figured direct contact with someone who is actually there might be a better idea so we set up a show with Scott to give me, and all of BlogTalkRadio's listeners, the chance to hear directly from a photo journalist on the ground.

Let's just say the report direct from Afghanistan is considerably different than what I had been reading. Scott called the reported figure of 10,000 Taliban troops wildly overstated. He seemed disturbed that the major media outlets were falling for the Taliban's propaganda campaign "hook, line and sinker."

While we were chatting away about NATO's poor handling of the campaign, Mick Fealty, called in from Northern Ireland. Mick's blog, Slugger O'Toole is the number one blog in Northern Ireland. Mick also happens to be a featured host on BlogTalkRadio.

So this is what new media is all about. I am sitting here in New Jersey, Scott is on the other side of the world in Afghanistan and Mick is in Northern Ireland. Barriers and walls of media control are crumbling right in front of us. It's make the world smaller, yes, but a better place as well.

The archived show can be heard here.