Why do we like social-networking sites? Well, they connect us with our friends -- old, new -- and contacts in the industry. We share photos and information.
Oh, and of course, Farmville. (Not.)
But as advertisers and startups looking to profit off of social connections find clever ways of infiltrating personal and professional networks, some users may turn against the sites in which they've invested so much time and content.
One type of parasite infecting networks now is the Faux Friend or Follower. No, these aren't the people who Friend you on Facebook just to see if you've gotten fat. (We'll call those Fat-weather Friends...) These are purchasable. Companies like uSocial are selling connections as commodities, helping users beef up the body count on their Friends lists for a fee. For example, $87 will get you 1,000 Twitter Followers; $1,167.30 gets you 10,000 Facebook Fans. (The site was also selling Facebook Friends until it received a Cease and Desist letter from Facebook.)
There are a few reasons people might consent to purchasing Friends and Followers. The least sensible is simply for the sake of inflating one's popularity. We are in the age of the Bloated Friend List, after all.
Beyond feeding one's virtual ego, though, a company with a Fan page on Facebook would want to buy Fans to make the product look more popular, and to hopefully have more people to advertise to.
But the third, and most troubling, reason for buying Friends and Followers for ordinary users is the possibility of an ROI.
People with a lot of Followers on Twitter, in particular, are seen as valuable by marketers seeking "real people" to spew their messages. As marketers become hip to the idea that people are more receptive to ads that come from "Friends," those Tweeters with the most Followers stand to make decent money.
Several services are hiring Tweeters to send out ads on their clients' behalf, including two startups called Izea and Ad.ly. The New York Times reported this week that John Chow, a blogger and Internet entrepreneur, earned $3,000 in October for pushing ads to his 50,000 Followers.
So what are we heading toward? A social-networking environment in which connections are bought and sold and outgoing messages are sent on behalf of marketers? Could this be the demise of social networking?
It's hard to imagine users tolerating membership on any network where it's difficult to distinguish a real Friend from a purchased contact. Nor standing by while those they Friend and Follow become shills for dish detergent. Should these practices prevail, there's no reason that many users won't start to tune out, or stage an exodus.
Furthermore, as sites like Facebook start attracting vapid connections rather than meaningful ones, it will harm their attempts to understand social graphs -- which is kind of the whole point of all of this networking. (Facebook, of course, cares less about making sure you keep in touch with Aunt Millie, and more about how it can profit off of your wall comment about her awesome pie.)
The big deal about social networking was that the money was allegedly in the social graph, in understanding the deep connections between users. Facebook is already struggling with understanding the connections between its users. But as those connections become looser, and based on a monetary agreement rather than a childhood connection, the coils of the alleged social graph will start to unravel, leaving targeted advertisers without a bull's-eye in sight.
Isn't all media "social"? That's the point. Good article, but I don't think anyone is going anywhere soon, at least not until the next big thing comes along. As far as monetizing a social network, well, I'll leave that up to the suits. It's true, we've been social creatures since inception and surely there's always been a sly dog waiting to cash in on it, be that trading crops or buying "friends" and followers. Like others have said, use it for what it's worth and be careful what you click on or who you accept as a friend.
Unfortunately as long as we humans have this exhibitionist streak in us-We will gravitate towards Social Media.Its so much easier than going to a real party and meeting real people.Isnt it?
And actually gathering around so many friends is also part of the game-The more friends we get the Lonelier we actually become.
Friends for Sale. I guess I could sell off my twitter or facebook friends with not much grief in as much as I don't even know most of them. Although not a power user of either, I do have a few relatives and friends following or friended, but the vast majority got there by way of asking or following me for God who knows what reason.
I still am not sure how the social networking companies will ever be able to make a buck. It all seems like a high risk gamble with slim chances of a profit payoff. Not to say that they can't put money in their pockets from investors. But a real profit from sales? I'm a bit more skeptical from that end.
Now, if the social service benefits were something I'd pay for, I might see light at the end of the tunnel. But, there's nothing in sight I'd pay for yet.
just ain't gonna happen, unless people flat get tired of having 'friends' they don't even know.
I agree that Social Media began with the first tribes that followed the way of food. They had to, had to know what others knew, in order to keep the group together. Simple as that really.
I have a Facebook account, Twitter account and so on, yet I don't look at them. I know who I want to keep in touch with and just happen to have a nice little cell phone that I can make calls on and text with. If people want to be my friend on any Social Media site, well they can wait a while.
Actually, it's not a new phenomenon. Remember the old chat groups? Instant messinger? It's the same thing with a twist. Just as e-mail was before the instances above.
When the Internet was new, we kept in touch by letting each other know what we were doing. Sure we had to pay to use the Internet, by the hour, pay the ISP, just pay the piper whatever it cost. And now we pay the carrier (ISP) and the company we want to use, in my case Comcast for wireless and MSN. Sure fees are less than paying by the hour, but we still pay if we want to get online. And we can't keep up with people who communicate by email, Facebook, Twitter and so on without the carriers. It's really no difference from good old Ma Bell of old.
People now use Unified Communications for business meetings, but I wonder how much more useful if every third time it was an actual face-to-face meeting, in person, where body language could be read with ease, rather than by guess? Do people realize what they miss without seeing a person in person? I really wonder if today's young (I'm 62 so just about everyone is young) Internet users know completely what they're missing without actually meeting a person?
Just thoughts on social media and actually meeting people face-to-face rather than only online.
Although some of social networking's aspects should be reviewed, I think Social media will survive. People have many benefits from social media. They make people to feel connected to one another around the world. They help maintain friendly relationship between people who you cannot easily meet face-to-face . They also help people to have the sense of belonging to a community- a trend that tends to vanish nowadays.
I agree. I mean every new marketing discovery is going to have a group of people who figure out how to scam innocent people. To me, the fact that Social Media is still attracting the attention of the masses shows that it has staying power.
Just like an actual immune system, sometimes you have to get sick before you develop immunities. I'm pretty sure most of the people who initially fell for the scams won't fall for another one.
Sure, some people will abandon social media if they get stung by spammer stupidity. Others will stick it out because they still want to hear from the people they know, and instead will just become very picky about who they allow into their networks.
It will take time, but as long as we're not forced to hear from anyone social media will survive.
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