Week 6, Thing #13 Democracy on the web?

Intrigued by the article on Del.icio.ous about Wikipedia, Digg, and democracy (or the lack thereof)on the web. Apparently there is more control than first meets the eye, or the mouse, on many of these interactive web 2.0 sites, with a few controlling the content of what looks like a large collaborative effort. I had a similar experience last week when I attempted to get a link from the Learning 2.0 course unblocked at my school. A large iPrism message popped up, followed by a link to an official looking pdf file, which I downloaded, filled in (pencil on paper), and was ready to put into a school envelope to send to the address indicated (Information Management Office at the District) when our tech guy walked by. He noticed the form, asked me what I needed, opened his cellphone and dialed one guy at the District office, gave him the URL, and voila! Link now links. I realized that this entire machination leads to one person, a person I know personally, and from now on I will just pick up the phone and call him. The problem is that he is not an educator, he is a "tech guy", and his reasons for blocking things come from a link of web types ("gaming" was the category that got me in trouble in this instance) and a list of forbidden words and terms which he refuses to publish since they are "forbidden." The literary me is reminded, of course, of the Wizard of Oz, the little man behind the large machine. And with all of its collective power, it is a reminder that web 2.0 is after all connecting people. The power of social bookmarking sites like Del.icio.ous is the power to connect people to information, which is what librarians are all about. Very practically, I could use it on my library web page to create bookmarked links for specific assignments. And it is nice to see that web 2.0 librarians are already actively sharing resources this way, commenting on each other's information and ideas, and collaborating to find new ways to help their patrons.