Social bookmarking and news sites have turned the web on its head, and are redefining how many people find content. Whereas at one point getting your news in USA Today or The New York Times was the goal of every company seeking publicity, now with sites like Digg, Reddit, Mixx, etc. and thousands of bloggers able to point their readers to content, it doesn’t seem to matter as much these days where your news is placed. What matters more now is if people actually are interested in that news.

In many people’s minds it is glamorous to have your news in a print publication or on TV, but I think the future will change that viewpoint. I wrote previously on how a web clip is more important than a print clip, and I stand by that. But even on the web your news is but a needle in an unfathomably large haystack. It has to be extremely sharp to make an impression.

Don’t underestimate the power of a story on a small blog, it can end up having more impact, be read more intimately, and end up having a deeper impression than the story told with less punch and more words in a larger circulation newspaper. Also, the open link structure and sharing qualities of the blogosphere and social web make it so easy to spread news. I don’t always find this to be the case on the mainstream media’s web properties (although they are catching up).

Many of the web’s users trust an individual’s opinion more than a mainstream media perspective. And, you can’t really blame them with the amount of media bias we’ve seen in the past decade (I hope I don’t need to cite examples, I’m sure you can think of many off the top of your head). We’d much rather listen to one of our own than someone from the outside.

The trust that is being lost with much of the mainstream media may never be won back.

I’m not saying all sources are created equal, with viewership and subscriber numbers varying widely. And of course, a source’s reputation does matter (for both mainstream media and niche media).

But, it does seem like the Web is headed in a direction where the specific source of content does not matter as much as the idea, especially with social tools that link everyone together and make the compelling content rise to the top.