The Cult of An Amateur: How Today’s Internet is Killing Our Culture is a 2007 book written by entrepreneur and internet critic Andrew Keen. Andrew Keen is a British-American entrepreneur and author, particularly known for his view that the current Internet culture and the Web 2.0 trend may be debasing culture and how it undermines experts and the work of professionals.

Within this book, Keen focuses on how web 2.0 is now creating a democracy of amateurs, turning intellectual traditions and institutions upside down. The “amateur” also known as a “dabbler” or “layperson” according to Keen is being celebrated within the internet world today. The democratic approach to sharing information on the internet and every individual having a say has changed the way we receive and spread our knowledge. But what Keen sees as being harmful to the world is that this celebration of democracy has become overly radical and is in fact harming the morals of scholarship and the creation of wisdom. USA has prided itself on the hard work and rewards for excellence of individuals, but like the “fifteen minutes of fame” trend, today we see “amateurs” and beginners receiving the same amount of recognition and praise. The geniuses and experts of the past, Keen believes, are the individuals who have “gone beyond the “wisdom” of the crowd and the mainstream public opinion and bestow on us the benefits of their hard-earned knowledge. So it brings up the question, how does anyone know who’s right?

My personal belief is that we need a balance between the amateurs and the experts. When information became easily accessible to the masses via the internet, it allowed for many opportunities to arise, including the user to become the producer of his or her own content. Our society sees the internet as a place where we can gather and then spread information quickly and to a large audience. But with all of this information, it truly does become hard to sift through all of it to find the truth of what we are searching for. It becomes more of a he said, she said, the site said, and our sources get lost or do not have any outside credentials. It is hard to create this balance because if we lost one, (hard-working individuals who become professionals) then we lose a lifestyle and goals or if we lose the other (individuals being able to speak freely and give their advice/input) then we lose a sense of democracy which America prides itself on. Keen has touched an issue that I think we will still face for many years to come, but the next question is, who will be next to control the information we seek?