Tag: SNS

Social Networks, such as MySpace, are not just for freeloaders and bands anymore. Eric Pfanner of the New York Times reported today that Cartier, the luxury jeweler, has established a MySpace page and is seeking to accrue as many friendships as it can (currently it stands at around 3,800). Pfanner finds it interesting, and rightly so, that a luxury brand name such as Cartier has chosen to take this avenue to marketing its product. Corinne Delattre, Cartier’s director of communications, didn’t seem nearly as nonplussed, explaining that they “work with people moving fast. They use technology. They are ahead in their way of life.”

Pfanner also quoted Ben Hourahine, Leo Burnett futures editor, who observed that using social networks to advertise is “appropriate at a time when consumer attitudes about luxury [are] changing.” Pfanner whips out a shocking statistic: these days, only 7 percent of American consumers perceived “luxury” to mean “being part of an exclusive club” (according to a 07.25.08 survey by Leo Burnett).

At a high level, bystanders might realize an important change is happening – one more significant than a luxury brand claiming its swath of online territory in a social networking neighborhood. The luxury brands that we grew up with boasted an aura of unattainability. They didn’t come to you; you came to them – if they accepted you. Now Cartier, for example, has come sniffing, looking for a place to find us when (and where) we least expect them. This, of course, begs the question: to friend or not to friend?

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> Pfanner, Eric. “A Jeweler Joins Its Friends on MySpace.” The New York Times. 07.31.08.

> Leo Burnett website.

For those number-oriented folks out there who have a vested interest in social networks, Michael Arrington with TechCrunch delivers your Christmas gift early. In a thoughtful and thought-provoking piece, he provides a perspective which, I think, threatens to overturn our current (e)valuation of social networks – on both a fiscal and a social level. In Modeling the Real Market Value of Social Networks, Arrington suggests that the true worth of a social networking site should be measured not by how many unique users have registered with it, nor how many page hits it has per day/month/year, but rather by how much advertising is spent on each individual user. Arrington and company have built “a model taht looks at social network usage by country/region and compares that to available data on total Internet advertising spent in each of those countries. The model is then able to turn an apples-to-oranges comparison into an apples-to-apples comparison.” As he goes on to state, “the early results are surprising.

Although I’m deep down uncomfortable with assigning different human beings with varying levels of value, I have to admit in the current state of affairs, such a formula only makes sense. Were the world totally flat, as Thomas Friedman imagines in The World is Flat, then each user might be valued totally equal to every other user. After all, their opportunity to “plug in” will be the same as everyone else. Now, though, the Internet pie is uneven and inequitable. As many respondents have pointed out, Arrington’s model has some flaws. Nevertheless, I find the perspective refreshing and am excited to see what comes out of later models.

If you thought Facebook and MySpace were the height of social networking, think again. Likely you’ve already heard whispers about sleeping giants like SecondLife which are touting the same opportunities to “find” and proclaim one’s identity, but are also making their services more “sticky” through creating a virtual world in which its users can do more than just interact, but also participate. Like the July 14 Business Wire article entitled “Gaia Online Completes Series C $11 million funding” goes to show, it seems that SecondLife isn’t alone. Already more than 5 million individuals have plugged into Gaia’s network and the number is climbing. Although the trend of people turning towards online landscapes for socializing surely doesn’t surprise you or I, what should capture our critical attention is the manner in which they recruit the generation of boys, girls, men, and women currently coming into their own. After all, what reflects more accurately upon a group than the advertising ploys that suck them in?

As you can see from the picture I’ve included below (taken from Gaia’s homepage on July 18, 2008), the biggest persuasive element is the bold, flashy phrase “Express Yourself.” The captioning below that runs “There are millions of members on Gaia, but there’s only one you.” Our individuality, or particularity, is so crucial to us — even the designers at Gaia recognize that, and yet still we attempt to express our particularity through a medium which cannot possibly contain or communicate it (see Dr. Corey Anton’s essay “Agency and Efficacy in Interpersonal Communication: Particularity as Once-Occurence and Non-Interchangeability” in the Atlantic Journal of Communication). And while issues of expression are legitimate and demanding, I must confess to being amused by another persuasive element which apparently appeals to today’s teens: right above the “Start Here” button rests the caption: “Registration is easy, secure and not boring.” Not boring? Hallelujah.

The latest from PC World is as ironic as it is fascinating. Robert Strohmeyer reports on a burgeoning new crop of websites which are unlike anything we have seen before. These novel services are predicated on the impulse people feel to connect on social networking sites (SNS) and seek to drastically enhance the layperson’s ability to connect online. Recognizing that many SNS users are generally active on not just one but a swath of SNS, these services capitalize on the fundamental trusim of their market generation — that multitasking is always a plus — and condenses the SNS a person is active on down to one convenient loctaion.

From my perspective (increasingly not the norm, I find), the irony lies in the fact that where one might suspect a person seeking “authentic” connections online might desire to put all of his or her eggs in just one basket, rather than spread them out all across the farm, now we see a service which allows you to spread all of your eggs across the farm, and hold a digital basket where you can keep your eyes on them at all times. It provides the illusion of solidarity, but promotes quite the opposite.

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See
Robert Strohmeyer, “Web Apps Manage Social Networking Overload” (Pc World, June 2 2008). [Click here]

Jemima Kiss, writing for PDA: The Digital Content Blog recently wrote an article covering wadja.com, a relatively new social networking site headquartered in Athens, Greece. Although nothing stands out as particularly exceptional about Wadja.com itself, it has gained increased attention lately due to a controversial move by Facebook. Apparently, perhaps out of fear for unwanted competition, Facebook has banned messages which include the words “wadja” or “wadja.com.” On reading this, I was initially skeptical. Not willing to take Jemima Kiss’ word for it, I logged into my Facebook account and tried to message one of my friends about wadja. Sure enough, the message wouldn’t process, even upon repeated attempts.

Although this sort of corporate underhanded behavior shouldn’t prove overly surprising in the current era of cutthroat business tactics, it strikes me as odd and out of character for organizations belonging to this particular industry. Can social-networking combines, such as MySpace and Facebook, ardently claim socialization and networking among people as their top priorities and then comfortably pull stunts like this without fear negative PR? It seems to me that in light of this recent event, any member of Facebook has gained the right to seriously question this service’s dedication to seeing its members connect with other individuals. Not to mention Facebook looks especially bad when contrasted to the cavalier demeanor of Wadja.com’s managing director Alex Christoforou, who observes that despite “Facebook [banning] the word Wadja.com throughout the whole site,” he simply found it “weird and quite amusing. Here is this big Silicon Valley social network banning the word Wadja, an outfit based in the Mediterranean, having fun connecting people.” Since when did “having fun connecting people” cease to be the goal for Facebook?

Are we social network consumers left to believe that combines such as Facebook and Myspace aren’t having fun connecting us any longer? Have we become the numbers that they energetically affirm we are not? Additionally, perhaps more importantly, are we being subjected to the tyrannical control of our free speech, thinly veiled as a measure to protect us from “spam?” With this sort of arrogant display of un-legitimized power we could be witnessing the foreshadowing of a significant shift in social networking industry for the worse.

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See

Jemima Kiss, “Elevator Pitch: Wadja’s social network is big in Greece – and in big trouble with Facebook” (pda: the digital content blog, 30 May 2008).

Marshall Kirkpatrick, “Facebook Censoring User Messaging: Spam Prevention or Unaccountable Control of Conversation?” (ReadWriteWeb, 21 May 2008).