Ever wondered why you need a blog? A twitter feed? A community to spread the news via links and reposts?

Well, look no futher than the Tesla vs. NYTimes scrap. Who knows who is right or who is wrong. But what is important is they both have the power to tell their story. Power comes from two sources.

First, reach. Tesla’s CEO – Elon Musk – has more than 130,000 Twitter followers. NYTimes clearly has many. There is a difference between power and truth. The NYTimes no longer exclusively represents “truth”. That right is now with us. As Dan says, the balance of power has shifted. 

Second, and more importantly, is authenticity. Any business needs to build a capability to communicate authentically (read, without PR drivel and corporate speak).  And Tesla is doing it well. 

Beneath this is a broader and critical implication for all of us in business. How we listen has changed. Once you’d graze the NYTimes and pass the news on at the cooler. Now the news unfolds dynmically in our feeds and aggregators – every story lives in a way that is so much more dynamic than anything we have ever seen.

Brands are now not just publishers byt drivers of the news dynamic. They get to nudge the story along, set it on fire – sometimes, they get to kill it dead. They might not be telling the truth, but they have the power to tell their story — or at least their side of it — like never before. Is your brand ready?