Response to Sharecropping

The article posted on Phaedru’s blog entitled “On Social Network Sharecropping” it seems to me that the community found within Facebook, Flickr, Twitter, etc. is the land for the farmers (the members) to work on.  The benefit of sites like these is the amount of sharing that takes place between people to obtain content they didn’t previously have.  The downfall of something like this comes in the “landlord” watching over the whole process, who makes the call of what can and cannot be traded.  The movement to establish a completely independent website for every farmer would be an interesting concept, but what content is not allowed, aside form the obvious, on communities like Flickr, Facebook, and Twitter that would spark a movement for independence?  I’ve had no trouble in the past finding the content I desire on those websites.  Does anyone have any idea what they are referring to?