My Web 2.0 experience

I am sitting at the far end corner of my room. My children are sleeping a hand away on our bed & if I shift my chair twice I can open the door, see my bathroom and four steps away from my chair I can switch on the TV and watch what the world is watching. Although I’ve watched TV from the battery induced age, well since I was ten none of the TV programmes has ever given me an opportunity to collaborate, none of them has ever provided a resolution or think collectively with me although some programmes mean no harm, they do come with considerate promises but are not sympathetic enough to induce action I could take to ensure a missing child gets home and an abused mother leaves her husband. These programmes don’t bring audiences together; they leave them with more questions so that tomorrow we can watch again to see what happens next. In fact, they say “stay tuned for scenes from our next episode”.

It is exciting to know that with Web 2.0 I can go online, invite and be invited and share my thoughts and most of all learn from others who are thousands miles away from me.

It’s the same with the radio programmes, they can only accept so many screened callers & if they are not articulate enough they are not good enough to go through. There’s a sense of false emergency and immediacy but only if it fits the station’s tag line and political support. The friendships I create online is not based on the target market or the colour of my skin for Business Economic Empowerment or how much I earn but it is based on a need to be heard and a need to communicate with others.

Newspapers are great but like their cousins, TV and Radio if it is not news, it is not worth their editorial. They will cover protests and the president’s visits and cover abuse during the 16 days Of Activism Against Gender Campaign and only then will my story be told. Web 2.0 collapses these mediums in an amazing way. I can reach out, I can get support and and I can participate. I am already empowered. Halema Mohamed wrote about her experiences a year and a month ago but when I read her story, it was still fresh for me. Jade wrote her tips on tagging in November 2009 but after reading the result was visible. Is it the case with TV, Radio and the Newspaper? It’s up to you to decide.

I could have chosen to share my story of being a recovering abused single parent with two amazing children living on a tiny room that transforms into a bedroom at night, a study all day long, a lounge and bathing area on Facebook or Twitter or Blogster but I chose World Pulse because I can participate and I believe that one day I’ll be empowered enough to translate it to others.