What is Publicacy + Why does it Matter?

Considering how many people are affected by media world-wide, it seems a little odd how few are aware of how much media control their lives. That’s quite a mouthful, so let me take a step back and describe the so-called global media landscape of today.

Ever since the stone age, humans have been refining concepts like “media” and “publicity”.

Media originally referred to stuff like the air that carried sound waves or the water that carried boats and such. Publicity is a concept derived from the ancient notion of “public”, which today is interpreted quite differently by different groups.

The standard interpretation of a global public roughly sees in this term more or less all of humanity. In contrast, in the field of public relations, the term “public” is commonly used in its plural form … and a wide variety of different “publics” are differentiated.

Yet most ordinary folks gravitate more towards the standard (global) interpretation — and thereby they are most probably hugely mistaken. I myself do not believe that this post is in any shape or form easy to access world-wide. I am not so foolish to think, for example, that simply because it is written in English, that it therefore must be available everywhere across the globe. No, I am well aware that simply because I do not cough up money to Google or Facebook or a bunch of other companies, that they will do everything possible to prevent it from being shown instead of advertisements these companies can reap profits from this very moment. Likewise, I am also not so foolish to think any company would ever inform me of something I care about instead of making profits for their shareholders at every opportunity possible. After all: That is their entire business model.

Publicacy refers to the understanding of “how to” make information public. Previously, I have referred to “literacy” with regard to such understanding about publishing, publications, etc. But even more specialized terms such as “media literacy” are insufficient to the task, in large part because the media industry and related publishing industries are now so strongly influenced by market forces, that they no longer have any public interest as their focus. Instead, their dependency on the advertising industry leads these industries to also become ever more complicit in propaganda and manipulation of the publics which were once their chief customers.

The very low rate of publicacy is increasingly leading to ever more uninformed and misinformed publics. Large masses of men and women alike are leading ever more miserable lives of quiet (and ever more tricked out) manipulation.