“You have to have something to say,” a journalism professor implored me, back when I was a freshman and thought I knew everything. “If you don’t have a point, and by that I mean something that no one else is saying, then no one will care that your mouth is open,” he continued with a sneer. I never liked that guy much, but he was right.

I’m frequently reminded of this thesis as I get older, especially as the competition for eyeballs erupts into a frivolous frenzy. With no barriers to entry, the Internet is exploding with outlandish claims, hyperbolic opinions, and the hedonistic whoredom of celebrity culture. There’s no longer a devil’s advocate or contrary opinion or even a true loyal opposition; it’s every opinion for himself, no matter the fact or even prevailing wisdom. Everyone gets a chance at the podium, even if there’s not an audience.

Giving everyone and anyone a bullhorn is enabling and a positive force in democracy. But as we attempt to aggregate and filter, it would be nice if there were a bovine excrement detector. For example, I wondered what questions Michael Agger’s editor had for him when Agger submitted this article “Has the iPod changed anything?” to Slate.com.

After all, can anyone take a quote like this seriously?

“Still, the iPod does not match the star quality of the Walkman in its heyday.”

What’s happening here is that as the market becomes more and more crowded with voices (via the low barriers to entry), editors are beginning to realize that there are a lot of writers—and therefore, publications—saying the same thing. Anyone (and now, everyone) can get an interview with (fill in the blank), the hottest new band out there. Anyone and everyone can go see a show and write about it. The limits to access are that there are none, the “news” is almost always a commodity, and if every rectal orifice has an opinion, it’s probably already online somewhere competing for the same advertising dollars. It’s like when you book an airline flight: amazingly, if you don’t reserve the seat soon, you’ll find out that there are a lot of other people out there who want to travel exactly when you do.

iPod deniers like the one above and shockingly (but predictably, given the source) ignorant ones in its wake place an unsubstantiated value on novelty, like that Arby’s campaign with the “Different Is Good” motto. The commoditization of media makes “different” tempoarily stick out in the long tail, a shadowy niche that isn’t there or one that is simply too small to ignite market passion. It’s not enough to have something “different” to offer, there has to be a substantial reason for offering it in the first place. I think that’s what my prof was trying to tell me.