“Content is Queen.” Mark your calendar for March 8!
"Content is king" originates from the title of an essay written by Bill Gates over 30 years ago, precisely in 1996. In this essay, Gates, as a prophet or seer of modern technology, envisions the possibilities that arise from our ability to blend technological advancements with diverse areas of expertise to create an interface that facilitates the flow of ideas in an engaging, educative, and entertaining way. In sum, his proposition from yesteryears is the reality of our world today, where modalities, products, services, or crafts must combine multiple or layered elements, sensibilities, expressions, and tools that shift with the changing tides and the people who consume them.
For instance, if you teach, your resources can’t be peer-reviewed articles and academic books alone if what you teach lends itself to that. If you cook, you can’t just slap food on plates and give it to people; you must think of plating, which is the presentation of your food in ways that are neat, aesthetically pleasing, comfortable, orderly, and creative. When Hilda Baci serves rice or any small chops in the cups she uses, it is about portion control; you do not need that mountain of rice in front of you. She has applied creativity to her work with the increasing concern about diet, health, and our calorie consumption. This innovation and creativity eliminate the need for anyone to wash a plate or act as a “sa abo jo” (plate packer/washer) at events. We can talk about the environmental implications of disposable products; my immediate concern includes and extends to this issue. Most importantly, my question is, what new ways and methods are you creatively considering for serving people across genders, generations, and other demographics in the things you do and create, produce, and share?
I write all of these to say that one of the seers of history (prophets of history), Professor Saheed Aderinto, is inventing new possibilities for historical scholarship. An approach that uses diverse tools to speak to multiple audiences, embracing diverse modalities. Professor Aderinto is creating a new path that offers a possibility for how we disseminate information. He has insisted on a few things since he began creating what he calls a media archive. First, how we disseminate must change. Second, fewer jargon. Our research has less meaning if the people we study can't see themselves in it. Knowledge is meaningful when we provide language that reflects the experiences of people from the past, present, and future, using academic terminology, and present it in a format they can understand, whether through podcasting, documentaries, etc.
As far as I know, his current project, which is ready for release on 8 March 2026, meets these requirements. As Gates wrote, "Those who succeed will propel the Internet forward as a marketplace of ideas, experiences, and products—a marketplace of content."
See the poster for details.
