When I write, I write for individuals. Even if my audience were millions, I’d be writing in the hopes of helping individual people within that audience, rather than for “the group.”
Groups are separate entities, and I don’t generally care for them. I like individuals, even a lot of them. I think there is fundamentally an important distinction between “many individuals” and “A Group (TM)” and you can see in how people communicate whether they’re talking to one or the other.
The thing is, you can’t have a dialogue with a group. They’re inherently entities of emotion and you can’t reason with them. They become volatile and chaotic. So when I see someone addressing A Group, I’m seeing someone either attempting to score cheap points with their own tribe or possibly just grifting, but never am I looking at someone trying to have a constructive conversation.
Conversation makes the world go ’round, but I dismiss the shouting into the masses as unproductive. I’d rather talk one-on-one, even if it’s many times over.
The Opportunity Machine 