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…“gossiping over the back fence or dishing dirt at the beauty shop, solving the world's problems in the barbershop or shootin the bull at a pool hall, praisin the lord in church or fellow shipping with friends, bringing snapshots to work or sharing favorite dishes, having a heated conversation at a cocktail party or an argument with your brother-in-law at Thanksgiving dinner” That's it Cynique! I have a buddy that makes this argument and as result embraces social media--he is all in. Again the problem I have is that social media has monetized this natural human activity that you've described so well. They have monetized it to the point that all other indie site must struggle and fight to survive. Again Black sites must fight harder than any others, because we lack the supportive infrastructure that majority run indies run have. This is why I have opted out, for the most part, of social media for personal use and I limit my activity for business matters to posting links to my website (btw thanks for sharing ). I simply refuse to contribute to my own demise... Still, I don't assume Facebook will continue to be as popular as it is today, next year, or in five years. Now I know the typical Facebook user does not care about this stuff but, we know Facebook's reach for publishers is down; this article calculates by 42%. Facebook has one significant difference than the other massive websites like Amazon or Google: I have only paid Facebook, while I have gotten a check from Amazon and Google every month for well over a decade. Plus Google drives more traffic to AALBC.com than Facebook ever will. Companies like Facebook are like Ponzi schemes; they can't continue forever, extracting wealth from people and return nothing in return. Now if Facebook starts paying people in some fashion I'll feel differently. Until then we will continue to be taken to taken to the cleaners.

Chris I would be very careful in confusing what we practice here in the United States with capitalism. What we have is an oligarchy; in which a handful of people control everything. This is not capitalism, nor is it democratic. Our friends at Google can put me out of business tomorrow. But worse there is NOTHING that any other Black person, or group of Black people, who would do to stop it. Of course this does not have to be the case, but we lack the desire to control our own destinies. So for now, I serve at the largess of Google. Also, and please consider this carefully, when you write, "... in small pockets their [sic] are extraordinary success stories and they are becoming more common." This is a myth. Yes there are some successes, but they exist to create the illusion that success is possible, which is necessary to keep the ponzi scheme going. It is worse than the myth of professional sports, where Black kids in schools across the nation believe they have a chance to become a professional football player. Sure there is a chance, but it extremely slim and even if they make it they'll last on average 2.5 years. The result is that so much talent that could have been used in other ways is wasted in pursuit of something that is unlikely. The kid who wasted their time pursuing football would have been better off doing something with their brain... The same goes for musicians it is fall less likely for a musician to make a good living today than it was in 1990. Again, there are successes we can all point to but the reality is that there are a great many very talented musician who will stuck struggling with the dream of making it. The same goes for webmasters of Black book websites. This is no different the lottery, sure someone will win, but the VAST majority of us will loose. It makes no financial sense for anyone to play the lottery given the odds. But again the marketing and promotion of it dupes us into believing that it makes perfect sense to play. Indeed I'm sure someone reading this is thinking what harm does the lottery cause--and that is my point. The amount of wealth the lottery extracts from poor communities is staggering! Nothing is returned to the community as a result--except for a pipe dream. We aren't even the ones who profit from the sales of lottery tickets in most cases! You know you are in a poor community when you go into a grocery store, run by someone not black, and the most prominent thing you see is a lottery machine and cigarettes. We are in a battle for the very minds of our people. Our biggest problem is we don't even recognize who our opponent is...

On October 10th, we in the Black community, celebrate Dr. Ivan Van Sertima. His master work, THEY CAME BEFORE COLUMBUS, is required reading in our community. It should be read by all Americans. Ivan Van Sertima builds a pyramid of evidence to support his claim of an African presence in the New World centuries before Columbus. Combining impressive scholarship with a novelist s gift for storytelling, Van Sertima re-creates some of the most powerful scenes of human history: the launching of the great ships of Mali in 1310 (two hundred master boats and two hundred supply boats), the sea expedition of the Mandingo king in 1311, and many others. In They Came Before Columbus, we see clearly the unmistakable face and handprint of black Africans in pre-Columbian America, and their overwhelming impact on the civilizations they encountered.

I definitely think the discussion here is a foundation for a damn good book. You both are right. I don't really have much to add. I take that back... Facebook is fine because as I've said often it appeal to the emotional aspect of online interaction. In that arena Facebook is king and that won't go away anytime soon. it's a matter of marketing and how people are inevitably tied to a specific brand because the brand has been able to humanize its brand. Apple has done this. Nike has done this. Facebook has done this. Google has done this. I mean consider you couldn't even maintain your Huria Search engine due to Google's dominance in search. I can't gain a fraction of a tenth of a percent in the footwear industry because Nike owns the minds and hearts of the world. We are all damaged by the marketing machine when we are small business people, but the rest of the world isn't into business ownership so these companies will remain as powerful and influential as we move more and more towards online interaction in our daily lives. I don't use Facebook as much as I used to, but I am still there just as you are. I also find some pretty engaging things there as well. It has become a part of the routine, but it is wearing thin for me... this only means that I will be replaced by the next person and the machine keeps rolling. That's okay because that is the way of capitalism. The person with the deepest pockets, or biggest computer always wins. However, in small pockets their are extraordinary success stories and they are becoming more common. That's what keeps me motivated.

"Unrelenting" LOL! The other stuff seems pretty insightful, I don't know how accurate it is, but if it was right on the money, I would not be surprised at all. If Sara did write a book on the seminole wars, it defies logic that she never posted information about it here. It wasn't that Sara wanted to put a positive spin on all things Chicago, it had to be the positive spin her way. This is what made it literally impossible for me to dialog with her. Recall I wrote Chicago, not Harlem, should be considered the Black capital I sited things like Ebony, Third World Press, etc, and Sara disputed and shot down my reasoning by citing some inconsequential mural, as if I was unfamiliar with either city. Still I learned some things as a result of Sara posting if not directly, indirectly; while I was familiar with the seminole wars, I was promoted to look into it more as a result of Sara's posts, and learned more about them as a result. President Jackson was a busy and wicked little devil... I think the Sara experience also helped me become a better moderator too

We shouldn't be surprised at how ubiquitous FaceBook has become. Everybody talks about how insidious it is but it is a natural evolution in the ongoing transformation of Society. In the last century, trains and automobiles replaced horse-drawn carriages. Electric lights replaced candles.Telephones replaced way-of-mouth communication. Radios and movies replaced stage shows and plays. And these upgrades took place in just the first part of a century that subsequently saw more advancements like airplanes and television and other quick fixes that made our lives more convenient and enjoyable. Time brings change. So what would one expect in the 21st century??? Asking this question, may serve to keep things in perspective. Once the computerized age dawned and a new century began, what this introduced was not only convenient, but magical. Logged on to the Internet, with a few taps on a keyboard, a whole spectrum opens up to us, including sites where we can share our thoughts and our images with friends and strangers, near and far, - where we can be kept abreast of the worlds of pop culture, politics, sports and music, where we can exchange ideas and opinions And all it costs is the surrender of your identity to an icon or hash tag. In today's world that's progress. Like all of the other things that time and technology have modernized, social media is a condensed equivalent of gossiping over the back fence or dishing dirt at the beauty shop, solving the world's problems in the barbershop or shootin' the bull at a pool hall, praisin' the lord in church or fellow shipping with friends, bringing snapshots to work or sharing favorite dishes, having a heated conversation at a cocktail party or an argument with your brother-in-law at Thanksgiving dinner. The difference is, that a new way of doing all of this is just a click away. Welcome to 2016. Your alter ego has just found a stage! Critics call FaceBook and Twitter a trivial waste of time and an affront to intelligent discourse. But where is it carved in stone that we always have to cater to a higher calling? Social media is a fanciful facet of the prism that is our existence. We just have to avoid allowing it to reflect all of the light. It is a choice on the internet menu and as, in all indulgences, moderation is the key. For forum fans, what is an alternative to social media? You can continue to belittle it and focus solely on actually experiencing life in an attempt to derive some deeper meaning from it, or for it. But the harsh reality is that life, itself, does not promise to be more fulfilling; it's difficult, it's capricious, alternating between exhilaration and disappointment - even defeat A finger tap cannot download a better version of it, and you're left to your own devices and survival mechanisms to muddle through situations that even great mental prowess cannot vanquish. There is a reason why social media has become a favorite form of escapism. Philosophically speaking, in confronting the dilemmas spawned by the cyber world, retreating into the sanctuary of your skull, opening your mind and getting in touch with yourself is an ideal option. This, after all, is the ultimate destination in our life's journey. But along the way, can we take a break from time to time and just let it all hang out? A steady diet of serious topics discussed by the erudite can dull the appetite. In any case, it's not as if dissidents can do a lot about their aversion to social media or the white profits that it generates. But discussion forums will never become extinct because they fill a void in the field of communication and communication is one of society's pillars. Occurrences go in cycles so it's predictable that as the social media fad levels off, in the scheme of things, AALBC forums will revive and reclaim their popular niche and even inspire input from noteworthy black contributors as they come to realize their obligation to help their own. All is not lost. Meanwhile, as progress continues its course, a "black minds matter" movement could improve on the outdated "black lives matter" one, pointing us in a new direction that could hopefully benefit from the power of suggestion. Just another point of view... .

There are certainly more than enough smart Black people out there to participate on this forum to a greater degree than we see today. Indeed, it is not like the people who used to participate here got dumb all of a sudden. Besides the site is not limited to just Black folks, and you don't exactly have to be a member of Mensa in order to get something out participation. Rather, I think our best and brightest tend to prefer the large corporate sites. As Jaron Lanier says, and I paraphrase, the one with the biggest computer wins. Couple this with the fact that Black folks tend to marginalize Black owned entities and you have an have an environment that is tough for an indie website and essentially hostile for a Black owned one. I've seen actual geniuses, like Ishmael Reed, write at length on Facebook. They write stuff that Facebook can give a shit about, that I love to have here on this site. But when asked it they would post something here, they simply won't do it. Now these are people who I actively support and whose books I sell. But they refuse to lift a finger to support AALBC.com. I've griped about this in the past, but image how all the Black owned entities would benefit, if all the terrific Black writers lining up to write for the HuffPost for free decided to write for sites like AALBC.com? Again those with the biggest computer wins, but at what cost? HuffPost gobbled up BlackVoices then buried it. Sadly the most prominent Black websites are not owned by Black people. Still, I appreciate that AALBC.com in general content is written at too high a level to appeal to the masses. In general I need to "webify" my content: it needs to written for someone with a 5th grade education, short articles, big text, videos, images, large text, click baity headings etc. The HuffPOst has nailed all of these things: I'm aware of all of these issues, I also understand the growth of mobile has put increased pressure to eliminate long form articles, as they are harder to read on this platforms. But again, there more than enough people who want something more than this. In fact, it is those people who have helped AALBC.com last this long. AALBC.com only grows with their support--your support. Plus AALBC.com is more likely to actually pay a writer. But if good writers decide to write for the Huffington Post, or Facebook for free, why should I pay them for the same content? When writers give rich corporate sites content for free they hurt themselves and other writers. So a byline in the HuffPost or a bunch of likes on Facebook may feel good, but it does nothing for us as a people. I live for the day when the Ish Reeds of the world (not trying to pick on Reed he just popped into my mind first), get the same feeling of seeing their work on an AALBC.com has they do on Facebook. As far a collaborative effort on a book I'm down for that. I hope to being publishing books next year. Maybe this project could be one of them.