• “You should read this book.”
• “I heard about an upcoming lecture series you’d probably appreciate.”
• “Did you hear that interview the other day?”
• “I think you’d really like this band.”

We could call these kind of recommendations recipient-centric curation. It is simply connecting the people you care about with specific opportunities and ideas that you believe hold value for them as individuals.

Now, note the wholesale difference between this laser-beam delivery of knowledge versus “sharing” content with your “friends” online by “liking” or “retweeting” it. Do you even know who will actually see any given item in your litany of posts? If you really wanted your friends to know something, why didn’t you simply deliver the information to them directly, individually? Why broadcast your thoughts through such a channel with no way of really knowing who will get the message in the first place?

Broadcasting is not somehow “morally inferior” to peer-to-peer content delivery. In fact, as a mode of telecommunication, broadcasting has done amazing things for society. There is, however, a sizeable difference between sending smoke signals to your friends across the plains versus sitting down with them around the campfire. We ought not practice one at the expense of the other, nor should we assume that one can be a substitute for the other.