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Social networking in the modern zeitgeist: an examination of why we're obsessed and how social media will define our future

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Social networking in the modern zeitgeist: an examination of why we're obsessed and how social media will define our future

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Content SOCIAL NETWORKING IN THE MODERN ZEITGEIST: AN EXAMINATION OF WHY WE’RE OBSESSED AND HOW SOCIAL MEDIA WILL DEFINE OUR FUTURE by Victor Kjoss _____________________________________________________________________________________ A Thesis Presented to the FACULTY OF THE USC GRADUATE SCHOOL UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree MASTER OF ARTS (STRATEGIC PUBLIC RELATIONS) May 2012 Copyright 2012 Victor Kjoss ii Acknowledgements I would like to thank my chair person, Jennifer Floto, for her guidance, words of encouragement and dedication to this thesis. She was a tremendous mentor during the thesis writing process. I would also like to thank the other members of my committee, Robert Hernandez and Jay Wang, for their support and feedback. I would also like to thank Peter Simonson for serving as a thesis chair and a mentor to me during my undergraduate years at the University of Colorado at Boulder. Peter was vital in helping me develop the work ethic and skills necessary to write a thesis. Most of all I would like to thank my parents for their unconditional love and support. My mom and dad are my best friends and the people to whom I owe all of my successes to. iii Table of Contents Acknowledgements ii Abstract iv Introduction: The Anti-Hipster Manifesto and A Few Words About Social Networking 1 Chapter 1: The Birth of Facebook 6 Chapter 2: Why is Facebook So Popular? 12 Chapter 3: Facebook’s Future 30 Chapter 4: Facebook Best Practices 41 Chapter 5: The Appeal of Twitter 50 Chapter 6: The Dangers of Twitter 56 Chapter 7: Twitter Best Practices 61 Chapter 8: The Future of Twitter 63 Chapter 9: Social Networking and Mobile Devices 65 Chapter 10: YouTube 68 Chapter 11: Can YouTube Programming Supersede Traditional Television? 72 Chapter 12: The Medium Will Soon Transcend the Message 76 Chapter 13: PLUS, there’s Google+ 80 Chapter 14: The Crux of Google+’s Failure: A Lack of Human Capital 84 Chapter 15: Can Facebook Be Dethroned? 85 Chapter 16: MySpace Wasn’t Murdered; It Committed Suicide 87 Chapter 17: The Blogosphere 91 Bibliography 95 iv Abstract This paper examines the psychological and sociological reasons for why social networking has become so intimately ingrained in our day to day to lives. The paper provides in depth psycho-social analysis of users from the following social networking sites (SNS): Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and Google+; MySpace’s failures and the impact of blogging are also assessed. This paper also explicates on the best ways in which marketers and PR professionals can utilize SNS to reach their target demographics. Another aim of this paper is to hypothesize on how social networking will evolve in the near future 1 Introduction: The Anti-Hipster Manifesto The desire to be cool is –ultimately the desire to be rescued. It’s the desire to be pulled away from the unwashed masses of society. It’s the desire to be advanced beyond the faceless humanoid robots who will die unheralded deaths and never truly matter, mostly because they all lived the same pedestrian life. Without the spoils of exclusionary coolness, we’re just cogs in the struggle –Chuck Klosterman, Sex, Drugs & Cocoa Puffs, 2003 Is there anything more annoying or universally abhorred than a hipster? To ensure that my readers and I are working within the same definitional framework I will elucidate on what constitutes a “hipster” and I will attempt to vividly illustrate what acts fall under the umbrella of my neologism “hipsterdom”. First let’s get the basics down and talk about appearance. A hipster is the lad or lass in the corner of the room wearing an outfit that they quite possibly might have bought for hundreds of dollars at the Beverly Center, yet the outfit also might have been discovered after skirmishing through a Venice Beach dumpster. The hipster’s clothes make you wonder: is that young whippersnapper the wealthiest fellow in the room or is he homeless, in which case should I give him a dollar or offer to buy him a sausage biscuit from Mickey Ds? Did that young lady invade and raid her grandma’s closet before she came to this party or did she purchase that brown, starkly sun faded, 1960s retro-flannel dress at a expensive Santa Monica boutique? One would be surprised how expensive it is buy clothes that make you look poor nowadays. The hipster is a dichotomy; he’s either the most fashion conscious person in the room or the least. Other hipsters, instead of sporting the “Hobo Jesus” look go down a different route and like to rock graphic t-shirts with some type of obscure quote on. If you see a dude rocking a shirt that has some quote that you suspect is lifted from a Ghani Khan poem or is a line from T.S Eliot’s “The Waste Land” you’re probably being graced by the presence of a hipster. I call this type of hipster “The Apparel Intellectual”; his or her clothes make it painfully clear that they are more intelligent than you and that 2 their heart writes in a graceful poetic style that recalls Shakespeare while yours scribbles with simplistic Hemmingway like prose. Their thoughts appear to them written in calligraphy while yours unfortunately are always written in Times New Roman. Another popular breed of hipster appearance is what I like to call the “the Napoleon.” These hipsters are the cats that saw the cult film “Napoleon Dynamite” and became enraptured with Napoleon’s sharp sense of fashion bravado. The whole film they couldn’t stop thinking: “Damn, that Napoleon is a snappy dresser. I wish he would stop talking about hunting wolverines with a twelve gauge shotgun and talk more about where he got that smoking brown sweater vest.” Another of my favorite types of hipsters is the “tattooed harlequin.” This champion has his or her skin covered in tribal tattoos for the sole reason of looking mysterious and alluring. The tattoos also are designed to perhaps hint that the hipster wearing them is the bass player in a local underground indie rock ensemble (true hipsters will use the word “ensemble” instead of the ribald descriptor “band” that the less dignified use in discussions.) One should note that hipsters are also often prone to wear Buddy Holly/ Rivers Cuomo inspired glasses; even if the hipster doesn’t need them to see it’s always a good idea for a hipster to wear a pair of thick black rimmed specs to enhance indie cred. Many hipsters will be quick to remind you that Death Cab for Cutie’s indie cred significantly thawed the minute Ben Gibbard stopped sporting a perfect pair of indie eyewear. Hipsters are the people who champion Pabst Blue Ribbon as the best beer man has ever brewed. They ride 10 speed bikes built in the year 2011 to look like they were made in 1967. They strive to eat only organic food from Trader Joe’s; unfortunately capricious circumstance sometimes forces them to eat at the more mainstream and less hip Whole Foods. They’d rather starve though than ever buy the inorganic rubbish passed off as “food” at a heinous establishment such as Albertsons, Safeway, or the wicked Wal-Mart supercenter. The hipster is convinced that Wal-Mart is the proxy by which the devil conducts trade and commerce from the darkest layers of hell. Hipsters think Wal-Mart’s symbol on the New York Stock Exchange should be “BEELZEBUB” in the interest of corporate honesty. I’ve met hipsters who possess an unwavering conviction that Wal-Mart is responsible for the extinction of the 3 dinosaurs and the beloved Dodo bird. The most venomous and malevolent insult I ever heard uttered about Wal-Mart came from my hipster friend Raphael. One day Raphael mused that Wal-Mart is responsible for the perpetual sour and hostile mood of CNN anchor Nancy Grace. If true, this is by far Wal-Mart’s most atrocious crime. Hipsters are often individuals enamored with Karl Marx and classify him as a “compassionate, intelligent, and misunderstood centralist visionary” who advocated a pragmatic form of a policy that would strip the bourgeois of their unjustified power and help us overcome the suppressive capitalist indoctrination of the masses, shatter the implicit caste system indecipherable to most of the uneducated proletariat, and help us move towards a utopian existence where true equality and self-actualization could be attained. A Portrait of the Artist as A Young Man is the hipster’s bible; Holden Caulfield is his Jesus, Andy Warhol is his God. The aspect of hipsterdom that elicits the most anger is his/her propensity to abhor all music that has obtained any degree of commercial success. Some of the most hardcore hipsters will tell you that the pop yuppie posers known as “The Beatles” were the most overrated band in the history of music. The diehard hipster thinks that “The Beatles” tried to become hip in their later years as a band but failed massively. The hipsters are the people who list nothing but obscure bands on their Facebook profiles in an attempt to display the depth of knowledge they possess about underground indie music and to make you feel like an uncultivated heathen. They are the people who roll their eyes when you say you’d rather listen to Tom Petty than some unknown Brooklyn quintet called the “The Orange Raspberry Supernova Apocalypse” that consist of two perpetually stoned dread locked dudes each playing a didgeridoo, a fellow that looks like Bilbo Baggins playing a tuba, a female front women who plays the bagpipes and sings in a style that makes Tom Waits sound like an angelic soprano, and a guy who looks like Albus Dumbledore on the harpouditar. Maybe I’m just a uneducated cretin but I don’t think two didgeridoos, a tuba, bag pipes, gravely vocals, and a harpouditar are capable of coalescing together to make any music that will prove listenable to a sober, somewhat intelligent person. 4 I think our infatuation with “the next big thing” is also starkly reflected in our language and our love of the word “innovative.” Everywhere I turn I see companies bragging about their innovation. I constantly hear teachers dropping the word “innovative” in their lectures to the extent that I wonder if the word innovative might be sponsoring them and paying them to say it whenever possible. So with that in mind –and a thorough understanding of the conundrum caused by the vocal hipsters among us, I embark on the nearly impossible task of identifying “the next best thing” for public relations practitioners to anticipate. One particular avenue where I find myself consistently thinking about “the next big thing” is social networking. Social networking is undoubtedly the most monumental enigma ever invented during my generation’s time on the planet earth. While I don’t know where necessarily the streets of the future will lead, I’m convinced that social networking will be a primary substance used to pave the streets of tomorrow. A Few Words about Social Networking Social networking sites are extremely perplexing; some people say they are helping us move us toward a more harmonious world and will be a tool that perpetuates greater international unity and discourse, while others say they’re making us take steps backwards and that they may be making our minds more infant like. 1 They’re also fascinating due to the fact that regular people can have a strong impact on their evolution. Look at the “re-tweet” on Twitter. Carol Quinn, author, cross-platform strategic advisor, and adjunct instructor at USC Annenberg, points out that the makers of Twitter didn’t create the “re-tweet” or the “RT”; the people did. “Hashtags” are also entities that were developed by Twitter users, not its makers. People can really change the way people use social networking, it’s nice to find a realm where people still have a voice and the majority is the ultimate power broker, not a small group of powerful individuals. 1 Wintour, P. (n.d.). Facebook et al risk 'infantilising' the human mind | Media | guardian.co.uk . Latest news, comment and reviews from the Guardian | guardian.co.uk . Retrieved August 23, 2011, from http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2009/feb/24/social-networking-site-changing-childrens-brains 5 Social networking is currently entering what is sure to be a memorizing adolescence. It’s in adolescence since it’s been around long enough to advance past infancy, yet its potential hasn’t fully been realized, nor is it fully understood like some of the seminal innovations that have come before it. Social networking is a conundrum that society is still trying to figure out. Social Networking is an adolescent whose crystal ball is quite opaque. With some people fervently calling for laws to be instituted concerning online behavior, online privacy issues becoming more salient in the national discourse, universities embracing social networking classes and new sites like Google+ popping up, there’s never been a better time to delve into social networking and discern where it might be headed. It’s clear that Social networking is an adolescent standing at the crossroads of its life. A lot is expected of it and everyone is captivated and curious about what its future holds. There is no doubt that that we are in the dawn of a new age; the advent of social networking is pulling us into a new digital epoch which is both mystifying and devilishly alluring. In this thesis the author will examine the infancy of social networking and its growth and then muse on its future. 6 Chapter 1: The Dawn of Facebook Be nice to misfits. Chances are, their idea is paying your salary-Harold Geneen A social networking site enables users to connect with people by creating a virtual representation of themselves (i.e, online profiles), 2 identify a list of other users with whom a connection is shared, and view and track connections made by individuals and others 3 Users can use social networking sites to maintain relationships, initiate relationships, receive information about different products or companies, post photographs of themselves, post links to various websites, etc. Facebook was launched in February of 2004 by Harvard student Mark Zuckerburg 4 . Since its inception the site has blossomed into a smashing success. The Behemoth That is Facebook Not enough, never too much-Dave Matthews, “Busted Stuff” Since its launch in 2004, Facebook has become the unquestionable king of social networking. While other social networking sites have since commenced since none have been able to obtain as copious a following as the social networking Behemoth that is Facebook. The site has more than 750 million active users 5 . To put things in perspective this means the site has more active users than the combined populations of the United States, Russia, the United Kingdom, France, Japan, Indonesia, 2 Toma, Catalina . "Affirming the Self through Online Profiles: Beneficial Effects of Social Networking Sites ." Proceedings of the 28th of the international conference extended abstracts on Human factors in computing systems 2010, Atlanta, Georgia, USA, April 10-15, 2010. New York, N.Y.: Association for Computing Machinery, 2010. 1749-1752. Print. 3 Nadkarni, A., & Hofmann, S. G. (2012). Why Do People Use Facebook?. Personality and Individual Differences, 52(3), 243-249. 4 Carlson, Nicholas . "How Facebook Was Founded." Business Insider. N.p., n.d. Web. 10 Sept. 2011. <http://www.businessinsider.com/how-facebook-was-founded-2010-3>. 5 "Facebook Statistics." Facebook.com. N.p., n.d. Web. 18 July 2011. <http://www.facebook.com/press/info.php?statistics>. 7 Canada, Norway, Australia, Sweden, Botswana, Bermuda, Chile, Madagascar, Niue, Tokelau, Svalbard, and the Norfolk Island 6 . If China allowed its citizens to use Facebook the number of active users would most likely surpass one billion. Interestingly 70% of Facebook’s users are outside of the US 7 . As of early 2010, the United States was estimated to have a population of 309, 003, 000 citizens and it was estimated that 116,010,760 US residents were on Facebook. 8 This means that about 38% of US citizens are Facebook users. To put things in a more panoramic perspective consider this: there are 6,845,609,960 humans on the planet Earth. Of these 6,845,609,960 people only 1,966,514,816 are internet users. 9 This means that about 9% of the humans on our planet are on Facebook. In the span of 8 years Facebook has been able to seduced 9% of the world’s population into joining their site. The New York Times recently cited a new Pew study that found that 50% of Americans are on social networks. In 2006 Pew found that only 5% of adults where on social networks 10 . The study reported that 83% of people in the 18-29 age bracket said they used social networking sites, compared with 51% of those in the 50-64 bracket. Young people are also twice as likely to use social sites every 6 "The World Fact Book." Central Intelligency Agency . United States Government, n.d. Web. 18 July 2011. <https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/rankorder/2119rank.html>. 7 "Facebook Statistics." Facebook.com. N.p., n.d. Web. 18 July 2011. <http://www.facebook.com/press/info.php?statistics>. 8 Saleem, Muhammed. "By the Numbers: Facebook vs The United States [INFOGRAPHIC]." Social Media News and Web Tips – Mashable – The Social Media Guide. N.p., n.d. Web. 6 Aug. 2011. <http://mashable.com/2010/04/05/facebook-us-infographic/>. <http://mashable.com/2010/04/05/facebook-us- infographic/>. 9 Acohido,, Byron. "How many Facebook users are there? - USATODAY.com." News, Travel, Weather, Entertainment, Sports, Technology, U.S. & World - USATODAY.com. N.p., n.d. Web. 18 July 2011. <http://content.usatoday.com/communities/technologylive/post/2010/10/three-stats-that-reveal-much-about- our-digital-culture/1>. 10 Sengupta, Somini . "Half of America Is Using Social Networks - NYTimes.com." Technology - Bits Blog - NYTimes.com. N.p., n.d. Web. 24 Sept. 2011. <http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/08/26/half-of-america-is-using- social-networks/>. 8 day 11 . The survey done by Pew’s Internet and American Life Project described women ages 18 to 29 as the social networking “power users,” with 89% of them using social networking sites and 69% using them every day 12 . A 2008 study conducted by Northwestern Professor Eszter Hargittai reaffirmed that women are much more active SNS users than males 13 . How Much Time Are People Spending On Facebook? It seems like only yesterday. Ain’t it funny how time slips away?-Willie Nelson, “Ain’t It Funny How Time Slips Away” Facebook’s impact on society though can’t solely be appraised by the sheer number of people that have accounts on the site; its real potency is seen in how much time people pour into the site. Humans spend over 700 billion minutes per month on Facebook and 50% of the site’s members log into the site on a daily basis 14 . That means 375 million people log into Facebook every single day. Are there any other products that have experienced exponential growth to the degree that Facebook has during its first 8 years? 11 Sengupta, Somini . "Half of America Is Using Social Networks - NYTimes.com." Technology - Bits Blog - NYTimes.com. N.p., n.d. Web. 24 Sept. 2011. <http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/08/26/half-of-america-is-using- social-networks/>. 12 Sengupta, Somini . "Half of America Is Using Social Networks - NYTimes.com." Technology - Bits Blog - NYTimes.com. N.p., n.d. Web. 24 Sept. 2011. <http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/08/26/half-of-america-is-using- social-networks/>. 13 Hargitta, Eszter . "Whose Space? Differences Among Users and Non-Users of Social Network Sites." Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication 13.1 (2007): 276-297. Print. 14 "Facebook Statistics." Facebook.com. N.p., n.d. Web. 18 July 2011. <http://www.facebook.com/press/info.php?statistics>. 9 According to statistics compiled by Neilson, the average U.S. Internet user spends more time on Facebook than on Google, Yahoo, YouTube, Microsoft, Wikipedia and Amazon combined! 15 As of January 2010, the average Facebook user spent more than seven hours per month on the site. American Facebook users spent an average of 421 minutes on Facebook per month, which amounts to more than 14 minutes per day. If you coalesce together the time American internet users spend on Google (1:23), Yahoo (2:09), YouTube (1:02), Microsoft/Bing (1:35) Wikipedia (0:15), and Amazon (0:22) each month it doesn’t equal the time users spend on Facebook. 16 Facebook Demographics If you strip down all human beings to their core, you’ll find the same stuff. You will find fear of rejection, fear of abandonment, fear of being controlled, fear of being unloved, and the desire to love and be loved”- Phil Towe, “Some Kind Of Monster” According to Nielson, the “average social networker” is between 18 and 34, likely Asian or Pacific Islander, has obtained a bachelor’s degree, and makes less than $50,000 a year 17 . The same study found that 62% of page views on Facebook come from female users 18 . While the “average Facebook 15 Parr, Ben. "Facebook Is the Web's Ultimate Timesink [STATS]." Social Media News and Web Tips – Mashable – The Social Media Guide. N.p., n.d. Web. 18 July 2011. <http://mashable.com/2010/02/16/facebook-nielsen- stats/>. 16 Parr, Ben. "Facebook Is the Web's Ultimate Timesink [STATS]." Social Media News and Web Tips – Mashable – The Social Media Guide. N.p., n.d. Web. 18 July 2011. <http://mashable.com/2010/02/16/facebook-nielsen- stats/>. 17 Miller , Miranda . "Almost 75% of Active American Social Networkers Shop Online [Study] - Search Engine Watch (#SEW)." Search Engine Marketing (SEM), Paid Search Advertising (PPC) & Search Engine Optimization (SEO) - Search Engine Watch (#SEW). N.p., n.d. Web. 30 Sept. 2011. <http://searchenginewatch.com/article/2108913/Almost-75-of-Active-American-Social-Networkers-Shop-Online- Study>. 18 Miller , Miranda . "Almost 75% of Active American Social Networkers Shop Online [Study] - Search Engine Watch (#SEW)." Search Engine Marketing (SEM), Paid Search Advertising (PPC) & Search Engine Optimization (SEO) - Search Engine Watch (#SEW). N.p., n.d. Web. 30 Sept. 2011. 10 user” is likely Asian, Facebook’s Data Team released figures in 2009 that suggests that the number of Asian Facebook users is starting to steadily decline 19 . This same study noted that the percentage of African American and Hispanic Facebook users is increasing rapidly and starting to approach their percentages of the population in the general U.S. public. The University of Texas’s Center for Journalism and Communication Research did a study in 2009 about SNS demographics that yielded some interesting results that tend to confirm the assertions that minority groups are using Facebook at a higher rate than Caucasians. The study found that 44% of SNS users are female and that 74% of SNS users are 18-34 20 . They also found that there are more Hispanic and African American SNS users than Caucasian SNS users. A lot of people may not be aware that women, African Americans, and Hispanics use SNS more than men and non-Hispanic whites. This suggests that social networking may be a potent way of reaching minority groups and explicates that socio-economic status isn’t a clear predictor of who will and won’t be an SNS user 21 . Georgetown University’s Center for Social Impact Communication has done extensive research into race and social networking and has supported the University of Texas study cited in the previous paragraph and declared that social media plays a greater role in cause engagement for African Americans and Hispanics than it does Causations 22 . The study, released in May of 2011, found that nearly one in three African American adults (30%) and nearly four in ten Hispanics (39%) say they are more likely to support a cause or social issue online than offline today, both of which are significantly higher than the <http://searchenginewatch.com/article/2108913/Almost-75-of-Active-American-Social-Networkers-Shop-Online- Study>. 19 Kirkpatrick , Marshall . "Facebook Becomes More Racially Diverse, Ought To Release Data for Outside Analysis." ReadWriteWeb - Web Apps, Web Technology Trends, Social Networking and Social Media. N.p., n.d. Web. 20 Jan. 2012. <http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/facebook_scientists_dissect_facebook 20 Wittkower, D. E.. Facebook and philosophy: what's on your mind?. London: Open Court, 2010. Print. 21 Wittkower, D. E.. Facebook and philosophy: what's on your mind?. London: Open Court, 2010. Print. 22 Dixon, Julie. "Social Media Plays Greater Role in Cause Engagement for African Americans and Hispanics." Georgetown University Center For Social Impact Communication . N.p., n.d. Web. 10 Sept. 2011. <csic.georgetown.edu/OPR_SM_GT_Eth 11 percentages of Caucasians (24%) 23 . The study also found that African Americans and Hispanics are significantly more likely than Caucasians to believe that they can help get the word out about a social issue through online and social networks, and more likely than Caucasians to look at social media as an additional source of information. African Americans and Hispanics are also more likely than Caucasians to believe that supporting causes make them feel like part of a community 24 . 23 Dixon, Julie. "Social Media Plays Greater Role in Cause Engagement for African Americans and Hispanics." Georgetown University Center For Social Impact Communication . N.p., n.d. Web. 10 Sept. 2011. <csic.georgetown.edu/OPR_SM_GT_Eth 24 Dixon, Julie. "Social Media Plays Greater Role in Cause Engagement for African Americans and Hispanics." Georgetown University Center For Social Impact Communication . N.p., n.d. Web. 10 Sept. 2011. <csic.georgetown.edu/OPR_SM_GT_Eth 12 Chapter 2: Why is Facebook so Popular? In the beginning was not the word, not the deed, not the silly serpent. In the beginning was why? Why did she pick the apple? Was she bored? Was she inquisitive? Was she paid? Did Adam put her up to it? If not, who did? –John le Carré, The Russia House, 1989 Why is Facebook so enormously popular? Founder Zuckerburg declares that the site thrives because it gives users “the power to share and make the world more open and connected” 25 . The following sections will examine various theories that explore why the site has experienced such an extreme surge in popularity Self-Affirmation Theory Both salvation and punishment for men lie in the fact that, if he lives wrongly, he can befog himself so as not to see the misery of his position-Leo Tolstoy One of the most accepted findings psychological research has yielded is the idea that people have a fundamental need to perceive themselves as: intelligent, moral, kind, and good 262728 . Humans have a stark need to preserve a stable, positive self-image and will aim to maintain a positive view of self even when they encounter evidence that contradicts their positive self-concept 29 . 26 Berkowitz, Leonard. Advances in experimental social psychology. New York: Academic Press, 1969. Print. 27 Aronson, Elliot. "The Return of the Repressed: Dissonance Theory Makes a Comeback." Psychological Inquiry 3.4 (1992): 303-311. Print. 28 Aronson, Elliot. Cognitive Dissonance theory: Revival with revisions and controversies. Washington, D.C : American Psychologist Association., 1998. Print. 29 Aronson, Elliot. Cognitive Dissonance theory: Revival with revisions and controversies. Washington, D.C : American Psychologist Association., 1998. Print. 13 The need to protect one’s positive self-concept is so puissant that people will often use a variety of defense mechanisms to maintain their positive view of self 30 . One such defense mechanism used to combat things that bloom cognitive dissonance, which is discomfort caused by performing an action that is discrepant from one’s positive self-conception 31 , is self-affirmation theory. Self-affirmation theory is the idea that people will reduce the impact of a dissonance-arousing threat to their self-concept by focusing on and affirming their competence on some dimension unrelated to the threat 32 . For example, after a student fails a test he or she might think something like “Yeah I suck at Calculus but I’m the bomb when it comes to writing.” By focusing on his competence in writing the student in this example is able to melt away the feelings of inferiority and sentiments of cognitive dissonance that likely developed after he got a 47%, which equates to basically an F-, on his Calculus exam. Facebook is a perfect means by which one can engage in self-affirmation whenever they encounter dissonance during their day to day life. One should note that the most widely used and persuasive domain of self-affirmation is personal relationships 33 . Thus, one primary allure of Facebook is that it can help us affirm our positive self-views when we encounter episodes or people that spawn dissonance and challenge our self-concepts. Facebook profiles emphasize important domains of self: social roles (university student, occupation), personal relationships (familial, dating) activities you enjoy (which are often accentuated with pictures and video footage you upload), values and beliefs (religious and political) 34 thus making it a 30 Steele, C.M. (1988). The psychology of self-affirmation: Sustaining the integrity of the self. In L. Berkowtz (Ed), Advances in experimental social psychology (Vol. 21, pp. 261-302). New York Academic Press. 31 Aronson, Elliot, Timothy D. Wilson, and Robin M. Akert. Social psychology . 6th ed. Upper Saddle River, N.J.: Pearson Prentice-Hall, 2007. Print. 32 Berkowitz, Leonard. Advances in experimental social psychology. New York: Academic Press, 1969. Print. 33 Sherman, D. K., & Cohen, G.L. (2002). Accepting threating information: Self-Affirmation and the reduction of defensive biases. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 11, 119-123. 34 Toma, Catalina . "Affirming the Self through Online Profiles: Beneficial Effects of Social Networking Sites ." Proceedings of the 28th of the international conference extended abstracts on Human factors in computing systems 2010, Atlanta, Georgia, USA, April 10-15, 2010. New York, N.Y.: Association for Computing Machinery, 2010. 1749-1752. Print. 14 perfect place to turn when seeking self-affirmation. When you feel lonely Facebook reminds you that you’re loved by 200 virtual cyberspace friends; a 2010 study found that Facebook does possess the ability to reduce perceived levels of loneliness. 35 Each time you log into Facebook and see that someone has written on your wall, or sent you a message, your sense of importance is reinforced and your positive self-concept is stroked with internet affection. A 2010 study found that using social media produced the same chemical in the brain, the generosity and trust-inducing hormone oxytocin that is produced when mothers first see their babies. 36 Each time someone comments on your status you get a jolt of joy knowing that your existence has been affirmed and that your voice was heard in a world where the individual counts for less and less and where the individual voice is being lost amongst a symphony of noise and voices shrieking for recognition. The joining of groups on Facebook that emphasize and affirm important domains of self is also done with the intention of self-affirmation more so than a desire to connect with others over mutual passions. The author does not believe Facebook group walls are typically utilized for in-depth topical communicational. The author believes that Facebook’s primary draw is its ability to act as a means of organizing self-schemata, which are the mental structures that people use to organize their knowledge about themselves and its ability to affirm positive aspects of one’s selfhood 37 . Lady Greenfield, a professor of synaptic pharmacology at Lincoln College in Oxford, and the Director of the Royal Institution has conducted extensive research on the relationship between social 35 Eler, Alicia. "Study: Why Do People Use Facebook?." ReadWriteWeb - Web Apps, Web Technology Trends, Social Networking and Social Media. N.p., n.d. Web. 20 Jan. 2012. <http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/study_why_do_people_use_facebook. 36 Kolawole, Emi. "Facebook, why can't I quit you?." Washington Post Innovations. N.p., 23 July 2011. Web. 13 Sept. 2011. <www.washingtonpost.com/business/facebook-why-cant-i-quit- you/2011/07/20/gIQANLkVVI_story.html>. 37 Von Hippel, William, Chris Hawkins, and Johnathan Schooler. "Stereotype distinctiveness: How counter stereotypic behavior shapes the self-concept." Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 88 (2001): 632-657. Print. 15 networking sites and human psychology and neuroscience. Greenfield alluded to Facebook’s ability to provide self-affirmation when she noted that social networking sites like Facebook “provide constant reassurance-that you listened to, recognized, and important.” 38 While Facebook hasn’t been studied extensively via a vis self-affirmation theory, the existing research has yielded the idea that social networking sites appear to restore users’ sense of self-worth by reminding them of the important aspects of their lives: their friendships, their identities and group memberships 39 . The author believes further research will reveal a strong tie between self-affirmation theory and Facebook. Facebook: Chardonnay For Narcissists Staring failure in the face and calling it “Winning”—that’s the closest thing we have to an American religion- Rob Sheffield, Rolling Stone, 2011 If the relationship between self-affirmation theory and SNS propounded in the previous section where to be true then it would be expected that narcissists, who are people typically in need of more self- affirmation than others, would be more likely to use Facebook than non-narcissists. This assertion has been confirmed. A 2008 study, conducted by two University of Georgia professors, found a positive correlation between narcissism and Facebook use. 40 Narcissists tend to spend more than 1 hour per day on 38 Wintour, Patrick . " Facebook et al risk 'infantilising' the human mind | Media | guardian.co.uk ." Latest news, comment and reviews from the Guardian | guardian.co.uk . N.p., n.d. Web. 23 Aug. 2011. <http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2009/feb/24/social-networking-site-changing-childrens-brains>. 39 Toma, Catalina . "Affirming the Self through Online Profiles: Beneficial Effects of Social Networking Sites ." Proceedings of the 28th of the international conference extended abstracts on Human factors in computing systems 2010, Atlanta, Georgia, USA, April 10-15, 2010. New York, N.Y.: Association for Computing Machinery, 2010. 1749-1752. Print. 40 Buffardi, Laura E. , and W. Keith Campbell. "Narcissism and Social Networking Web Sites." Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin 34.10 (2008): 1303-1314. Print. 16 Facebook. 41 These facts lend credence to the theory that there is a relationship between the time one spends on Facebook and one’s need to have their positive view of self-affirmed. Self Esteem: The Need To Belong “To love oneself is the beginning of a life-long romance” –Oscar Wilde, An Ideal Husband, 1895 No man is an island entire of itself; every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main; if a clod be washed away by the sea, Europe is the less, as well as if a promontory were, as well as a manor of thy friends or of thine own were; any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind. And therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee.-John Donne-Meditation XVII All humans have an inherent need to have a high degree of self-esteem. Self-Esteem is one’s feeling of self-worth 42 . Research has shown that having a positive degree of self-esteem pays dividends. People who feel good about themselves have fewer sleepless nights, are more persistent at difficult task, are less shy, anxious, and lonely and are just plan happier. 43 A sense of community and “the need to belong” are crucial components in human self-esteem 44 . Alfred Adler, perhaps the most respected personality theorist of all time, noted that people have an “urge to community” and need to affiliate with others and develop close relationships 45 . When we feel included, accepted, and loved our self-esteem 41 Buffardi, Laura E. , and W. Keith Campbell. "Narcissism and Social Networking Web Sites." Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin 34.10 (2008): 1303-1314. Print. 42 Myers, David G.. Psychology. New York : Worth Publishers , 2010. Print. 43 Myers, David G.. Psychology. New York : Worth Publishers , 2010. Print. 44 Baumeister, Roy, and Mark Leary. "The need to belong: desire for interpersonal attachments as a fundamental human motivation.." Psychological Bulletin 117 (1995): 497-529. Print. 45 Ferguson, Eva. "Adler's motivational theory: An historical perspective on belonging and the fundamental human striving." Individual Psychology 45 (1989): 354-361. Print. 17 rises. There is a huge correlation between self-esteem and how valued and accepted one feels 46 . The need to belong is so crucial that much of our social behavior is derived to increase our social acceptance and inclusion 47 . The 2008 University of Georgia study on the relationship between Facebook and narcissism also noted that people who have low-levels of self-esteem tend to spend long durations of time on Facebook since for them it acts as a source of self-esteem 48 . People with low levels of self-esteem are constantly striving to find ways to boost their self-confidence and increase their feelings of belonging. A 2012 Boston University study noted that social networking helps people meet one of human’s primary needs: the need to belong; since Facebook offers individuals a virtual sense of belonging 49 . A 2011 study by Junghyun Kim, a professor at Kent State University, and Jong-Eun Roselyn Lee, a professor at Hope College, found that visualizing social connections on Facebook boost one’s levels of self-esteem 50 . This study suggests that having a tangible visual form of your friendships, or accomplishments, is a salient reminder that one is important and valued. A study released in 2011, aptly titled “Mirror, Mirror, on my Facebook wall: Effects of exposure to Facebook on self-esteem” found that Facebook helps enhancement one’s self esteem; especially when a person edits information about themselves. 51 46 Kowalski, Robin M., and Mark R. Leary. The social psychology of emotional and behavioral problems: interfaces of social and clinical psychology. Washington, DC: American Psychological Association, 1999. Print. 47 Myers, David G.. Psychology. New York : Worth Publishers , 2010. Print. 48 Buffardi, Laura E. , and W. Keith Campbell. "Narcissism and Social Networking Web Sites." Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin 34.10 (2008): 1303-1314. Print. 49 Nadkarni, Ashwini, and Stefan G. Hofmann. "Why Do People Use Facebook?." Personality and Individual Differences 52.3 (2012): 243-249. Print. 50 Kim , Junghyun , and Jong-Eun Roselyn Lee Roselyn Lee. "The Facebook Paths to Happiness: Effects of the Number of Facebook Friends and Self-Presentation on Subjective Well-Being ." Cyberpsychology, Behavior, and Social Networking 14.6 (2011): 359-364. Print. 51 Gonzales , Amy L. , and Jeffrey T. Hancock. "Mirror, Mirror on my Facebook Wall: Effects of Exposure to Facebook on Self-Esteem ." Cyberpsychology, Behavior, and Social Networking 14.1 (2011): 79-83. Print. 18 Social Comparison Theory “If you compare yourself with others, you may become vain and bitter; for always there will be greater and lesser persons than yourself”- Max Ehrmann, Desiderate, 1927 The Social Comparison Theory states that we learn about our own abilities and attitudes by comparing ourselves to other people 52 . Through social comparison one can adopt others’ behavior to win approval from others and stay in line with mainstream views of appropriateness. Often one will change his or her attitude or adopt the behavior or appearance of others to avoid being ostracized or deemed bizarre. This process is called social tuning 53 . By browsing through the Facebook profiles of others one is able to easily assess and compare themselves in relation to others –Are my interests the same as my so- called “friends?” Do I have the same bands listed under my music section? If not, have I fallen behind my friends on what’s currently hip? If every single one of my friends has the “The Orange Raspberry Supernova Apocalypse” listed as their number one band maybe I need to list them so I don’t look like a totally out of touch loser who doesn’t have hip music taste. Facebook’s is more of a tool for social comparison than it is a device for true communication. We compare ourselves on Facebook constantly because so many people equate being perceived as “abnormal” as “social damnation.” We sing songs about Rudolph, but the author suspects if all of the humans on earth were turned into reindeer over night that most people would take great comfort in waking up looking like Dasher. Personal Branding “The self-portraits that we actually believe, when we are given the freedom to voice them, are dramatically more positive, than reality can sustain”-Shelley Taylor, Positive Illusions, 1989 52 Leary, Mark R., and June Price Tangney. Handbook of self and identity. New York: Guilford Press, 2003. Print. 53 Aronson, Elliot, Timothy D. Wilson, and Robin M. Akert. Social psychology . 6th ed. Upper Saddle River, N.J.: Pearson Prentice-Hall, 2007. Print. 19 One of Facebook’s most attractive attributes is its ability to allow one to engage in self- presentation and personal brand creation. The 2011 study by Boston University, which one has referenced several times previously in this thesis, found that Facebook significantly aids in helping one meet the intrinsic need for self-presentation. 54 An exorbitant amount of one’s Facebook behavior is designed to create a certain persona for one and build one’s brand in premeditated way. A Facebook status update is rarely about initiating a dialogue so much as it’s about cultivating an image and drawing attention to one’s own merits. Wired writer Erin Biba notes that “Every time you post something on Twitter, Facebook, Tumblr, or Instagram you’re influencing, or trying to influence, how the world views you. Each carefully accessible crafted 140 character message that goes out into the metaverse fills a publicly accessible database that defines you to people you’ve never met 55 . Facebook is the means by which one creates a glorified, often drastically unrealistic version of themselves for the world. Children and adults both play make-believe incessantly. Jaques is quite correct when he said in As You Like It “All the world's a stage/ And all the men and women merely players 56 .” Psychological and sociological research has shown that all people are like actors who are trying their best to convince their “audience” (the other members of society) to see them in a certain way. All people engage in impression management, which is the attempt by people to get others to see them the way they want to be seen 57 . 54 Nadkarni, Ashwini, and Stefan G. Hofmann. "Why Do People Use Facebook?." Personality and Individual Differences 52.3 (2012): 243-249. Print. 55 Biba, Erin. "Facebook: Personal Branding Made Easy | Magazine." Wired.com . N.p., n.d. Web. 13 Sept. 2011. <http://www.wired.com/magazine/2011/07/friendship_limits/>. 56 Shakespeare, William, Stephen Greenblatt, Walter Cohen, Jean E. Howard, Katharine Eisaman Maus, and Andrew Gurr. The Norton Shakespeare. New York: W.W. Norton, 1997. Print. 57 Leary, Mark R. The curse of the self: self-awareness, egotism, and the quality of human life. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004. Print. 20 Research has shown that Facebook identities don’t always correlate strongly with one’s reality. A 2008 academic study found that one’s Facebook identity appears to be the socially desirable identity that individuals aspired to have offline but don’t actually possess. 58 Another 2008 study garnered similar results finding that Facebook profiles are embodiments of user’s public persona, which is manipulated for the sake of self-presentation 59 . Facebook is about propelling information into the world that you think will win you affective capital and get others to like you. It’s a place where one can seek approval through self-publication without a filter or third party to edit one’s voice. The comedian, funny or not, can post his humor to Facebook without any interference. A band that makes cochlea piercing music can now publish their songs freely. One of social networking’s greatest appeals is it uninhibited nature. Anyone can publish anything at any moment. It is the perfect device for building one’s personal brand. Items posted to the internet are like tattoos; they are permanent. Dan Schawbel a branding consultant mused that “The internet is your permanent record 60 .” Even if users don’t post often on their social networking pages their apathy and lack of use is building a certain type of brand. Facebook Profile Correlations With Your Actual Personality One face, one voice, one habit; and two person, A natural perspective, that is and is not -Shakespeare, “Twelfth Night” 58 Zhao, Shanyang, Sherri Grasmuck , and Jason Martin. "Identitiy Construction on Facebook: Digital Empowerment in Anchored Relationships ." Computers in Human Behavior 24.5 (2008): 1816-1836. Print. 59 Tom Tong, Stephanie , Brandon Van Der Heide , Lindsey Langwell, and Joseph B Walther . "Too Much of a Good Thing? The Relationship Between Number of Friends and Interpersonal Impressions on Facebook." Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication 13.3 (2008): 531-549. Print. 60 Biba, Erin. "Facebook: Personal Branding Made Easy | Magazine." Wired.com . N.p., n.d. Web. 13 Sept. 2011. <http://www.wired.com/magazine/2011/07/friendship_limits/>. 21 While the identity that one presents on Facebook might be false, there is a correlation between one’s personality and their Facebook behavior. Studies have shown that individuals who are extroverted in face to face settings tend to engage others more and have more friends on social networking sites 61 . Shy people tend to have fewer friends than extroverts on Facebook but interestingly they spend more time than extroverts on the site. People who identify themselves as disciplined, organized, and achievement- oriented tend to spend less time on Facebook than those that don’t. Facebook and the Accumulation of Social Capital Friendship is a scheme for the mutual exchange of personal advantages and favors- Francois de La Rochefourcauld, Maxims, 1665 “Social capital” refers to the resources that people accumulate through social connections and relationships 62 . French sociologists Pierre Bourdieu’s studies have shown that it is advantageous for one to develop large social networks that were loosely organized and not particularly intimate. Bourdieu’s work suggests that those who attain leadership positions tend to have a broad social network 63 . Bourdieu defined social capital as "the sum of the resources, actual or virtual, that accrue to an individual or a group by virtue of possessing a durable network of more or less institutionalized relationships of mutual acquaintance and recognition 64 .” Social capital has been linked to a variety of positive social outcomes, 61 Eler, Alicia. "Study: Why Do People Use Facebook?" ReadWriteWeb - Web Apps, Web Technology Trends, Social Networking and Social Media. N.p., n.d. Web. 20 Jan. 2012. <http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/study_why_do_people_use_facebook.ph 62 Coleman, James. Social capital in the creation of human capital." American Journal of Sociology 94 (1988): 95- 120. Print. 63 Jain, Rachna. "4 Ways Social Media Is Changing Your Relationships | Social Media Examiner." Social Media Examiner: Your Guide to the Social Media Jungle. N.p., n.d. Web. 13 Sept. 2011. <http://www.socialmediaexaminer.com/4-ways-social-media-is-changing-your-relationships/>. 64 Ellison, Nicole, Charles Steinfield , and Cliff Lampe. "The Benefits of Facebook "Friends:" Social Capital and College Students' Use of Online Social Network Sites ." Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication 12 (2007): 4. Print. 22 such as better public health, lower crime rates, and more efficient financial markets. Some research has also yielded the notion that a high degree of social capital is related to aspects of psychological well-being such as increased levels of self-esteem and satisfaction with life 65 . Research has shown that there is a link between Facebook use and the maintenance and creation of social capital 66 and has suggested that Facebook plays a crucial role in maintaining relationships and the creation of new ones which leads to an overall increase in one’s account of social capital. This research seems to suggests that the larger number of online connections you make the greater your net worth of social capital. Nancy Baym, a University of Kansas professor of communication studies notes that “We tend to cluster in relationships with strong ties to people that are pretty similar to ourselves. So they don’t necessarily know a whole lot that we don’t know. They haven’t necessarily been a lot of the places that we haven’t been 67 .” Most people are Facebook friends with people who have similar backgrounds, education levels, income levels, and worldviews as they do; thus eliminating the possibility that Facebook will serve as a means of diverse idea acquisition for them which lessons its capacity to offer social capital. While Facebook may aid in the accumulation of social capital there is no correlation between social capital and the intimacy of one’s relationships or one’s access to resources. For example, a women may have 1,000 Facebook friends, that may seem like a lot of social capital but how many of those friends are “real” friends whose resources actually offer social capital to her? Anthropologist Robin Dunbar’s research has shown that humans are cognitively capable of connecting with only 150 or so 65 Adler, Paul, and Seok-Woo Kwon. "Social Capital: Prospects for a New Concept." The Academy of Management Review 27 (2002): 17-40. Print. 66 Ellison, Nicole, Charles Steinfield , and Cliff Lampe. "The Benefits of Facebook "Friends:" Social Capital and College Students' Use of Online Social Network Sites ." Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication 12 (2007): 4. Print. 67 Nauert, Rick. "Relationships on Facebook, Social Networks | Psych Central News." Psych Central - Trusted mental health, depression, bipolar, ADHD and psychology information .. N.p., n.d. Web. 13 Sept. 2011. <http://psychcentral.com/news/2009/03/31/relationships-on-facebook-social-networks/5060.html>. 23 people at any given time 68 .Our brains have limitations when it comes to the retention of personal information about people in our social networks. According to Dunbar, 150 is the maximum amount of genuine connections one can make where one is readily able to recall personal and meaningful information about the relationship. Sociologist Gerald Mollenhorst added potency to Dunbar’s work when his long-running study revealed that over the course of seven years, people replace 48% of their friends with new ones, though the total number of friends in our network never changes 69 . These means that our capacity for relationships is very much like a carousel. Different people will come and go but the carousel will always have the same number of seats during its spinning. A UK Gadget website, Good Mobile Phones, conducted a study with 1,500 Facebook users and found that 60% of users said they no longer knew 20% of their Facebook friends while 50% reported that they actually only speak with 20% of their Facebook friends 70 . This information is contradicted by a Pew study which suggests that one’s Facebook friends are actually “real” friends. “These are real friends,” said University of Pennsylvania Professor Keith Hampton the lead author of the Pew study, “What does a ‘Facebook friend’ really mean, well, it turns out, it really means friend 71 .” The national survey found that only 3% of respondents’ Facebook friends were people they have never met in person, and 7% were people that they met just once. Most of their friends were people they knew from high school or college, or who were relatives or co-workers 72 . The Pew study found that the average Facebook user has 229 Facebook friends and that of those 229: 22% are people from high school, 12% are extended family, 10% 68 Biba, Erin. "Facebook: Personal Branding Made Easy | Magazine." Wired.com . N.p., n.d. Web. 13 Sept. 2011. <http://www.wired.com/magazine/2011/07/friendship_limits/>. 69 Biba, Erin. "Facebook: Personal Branding Made Easy | Magazine." Wired.com . N.p., n.d. Web. 13 Sept. 2011. <http://www.wired.com/magazine/2011/07/friendship_limits/>. 70 Biba, Erin. "Facebook: Personal Branding Made Easy | Magazine." Wired.com . N.p., n.d. Web. 13 Sept. 2011. <http://www.wired.com/magazine/2011/07/friendship_limits/>. 71 Swift, Mike . "Facebook friends are real friends, study says." San Jose Mercury News [San Jose] 16 June 2011: Online. Print. 72 Swift, Mike . "Facebook friends are real friends, study says." San Jose Mercury News [San Jose] 16 June 2011: Online. Print. 24 are coworkers, 9% are college friends, 8% are immediate family, 7% are people from voluntary groups, and 2% are neighbors 73 . The Impossibility of Intimate Conversation on Facebook Kids live through computers now. They make all their friends over the internet, so they don’t understand how non-verbal communication works. They don’t understand body language or causal sarcasm. They love irony, but they never understand any joke they don’t make themselves. In a hundred years, no one will be able to talk in public. Talking will be like blacksmithing-Chuck Klosterman, The Visible Man Whether or not Facebook friends are “real” friends or not is irrelevant due to the fact that authentic and intimate conversation cannot take place on social networking mediums due to the impersonal nature of online communication and due to the fact that Facebook is a public sphere. Intimate conversation never takes place in a public realm to the degree that it does in a private sector. Wired Writer Erin Biba notes that “Real conversations don’t happen in public. You don’t go to a party and loudly tell strangers about your recent bout of depression. Or the fact that you just can’t seem to trust people enough to make a true connection with a partner. No, the kinds of conversations you have in mixed company are edited for content” 74 . Biba is right in her assessment that Facebook is a lot like a party. I remember reading an interview with Kurt Cobain that was in a Spin retrospective on Nirvana’s career that basically captured the essence of the communicational landscape of a party. Cobain said the lyric “Here we are now entertain us” from “Smells Like Teen Spirit” was inspired by the intrinsic awkwardness of parties. Kurt basically said “Parties are typically a pretty shitty experience. You have a group of 20-30 people, some of them close friends, others acquaintances, others complete strangers, some sober, some completely 73 Swift, Mike . "Facebook friends are real friends, study says." San Jose Mercury News [San Jose] 16 June 2011: Online. Print. 74 Biba, Erin. "Facebook: Personal Branding Made Easy | Magazine." Wired.com . N.p., n.d. Web. 13 Sept. 2011. <http://www.wired.com/magazine/2011/07/friendship_limits/>. 25 shitfaced, some intelligent, some stupid, and apparently somehow all of these people are supposed to have fun and find fulfillment by small talking with each other for a bunch of hours on end. To break the ice I would always say ‘Here we are now entertain us’ when I got to a party.” Biba and Cobain are accurate in their belief that deep conversations rarely occur in a public setting Facebook: The Lover of Your Complaints Lover can you help me I’m a child lost in the woods A lit path eluding me -Incubus “Black Heart Inertia For many people Facebook proves to be a great place to complain and whine about things that aren’t going well in life. Typically when someone needs a soundboard for life he or she turns to other people; now people are turning towards Facebook and letting it serve as their soundboard. Perhaps by using everyone as a soundboard we’re really using no one. Novelty Never Ceases to Rear Its Head There’s an opposite to déjà vu. They call it jamais vu. It’s when you meet the same people or visit places, again and again, but each time is the first. Everybody is always a stranger. Nothing is ever familiar- Chuck Palahniuk, “Choke” Adam N. Joinson, psychology professor at the University of Bath, School of Management in Bath, United Kingdom, conducted a study on the gratification granted to users when they use Facebook and his work produced some interesting findings. His research suggests that people primary are drawn to Facebook because of its content gratification, its ability to aid in the development of social capital, the 26 communication it allows and the surveillance it allows 75 . One has mused previously in one’s writing about social capital, the draw of surveillance, and the communication offered by Facebook. The most noteworthy aspect of Joinson’s work is found in his finding that people are drawn to Facebook because of its steady flow of novel content; Joinson has identified the heart and soul of social networking. The biggest thing that draws people to Facebook, Twitter, and comparable social networking sites is its constant flow of novel content. Even the staunchest critics of Facebook have to admit that it is a kaleidoscope of novelty. It is constantly morphing as different people and different entities post new information. A user can log into Facebook seven times during one day and the site is just about guaranteed to be different. Joinson’s study found a correlation between content gratification and Facebook users’ time spent on Facebook 76 , thus suggesting that the more content one has access to on Facebook the more time one will spend on the site. This would seem to implicitly suggest that the greater number of friends that one has, the greater amount of time they would spend on the site since a large friendship network is likely to produce more content than a small network. One thinks that the constant flow of new content is one of the primary reasons for Facebook’s unparalleled popularity. People are naturally attracted to new and ever changing enigmas. A reader may be thinking now “Wait, doesn’t almost every website offer new content every day.” This is true but the content on Facebook is much more alluring since it relates to people that you might actually have a close relationship with. Reading entertainment news about Casey Anthony, Beyoncé, Jay- Z, George Clooney or Jennifer Anniston will never be as enticing as reading about information from a large number of people that you have had a personal relationship with throughout your life. 75 Joinson , Adam. "’ Looking at’, ‘Looking up’ or ‘Keeping up with’ People? Motives and Uses of Facebook." Annual SIGCHI conference on human factors in computing systems. ACM SIGCHI. Unknown, Florence . 5 Mar. 2008. Speech. 76 Joinson , Adam. "’ Looking at’, ‘Looking up’ or ‘Keeping up with’ People? Motives and Uses of Facebook." Annual SIGCHI conference on human factors in computing systems. ACM SIGCHI. Unknown, Florence . 5 Mar. 2008. Speech.). 27 Greenfield’s work lends credence to the opinion that social networking sites stream of new content and immediate rewards has a strong psychological effect on users. Greenfield proclaims “The sheer compulsion of reliable and almost immediate reward is being linked to similar chemical systems in the brain that may also play a part in drug addiction. So we should not underestimate the ‘pleasure’ of interacting with a screen when we puzzle over why it seems so appealing to young people.” 77 She also muses that “the near total submersion of our culture in screen technologies over the last decade might be in some ways linked to the threefold increase over this period in prescriptions of methylphenidate, the drug prescribed for attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder.” 78 Greenfield even suggested that the quick responses to one’s posting on social networks could lead to people defining their identity in a different way in the future. Lastly, she writes “fast-paced, instant screen reactions, perhaps the next generation will define themselves by the response of others.” 79 Facebook: The Thirst Quencher for the Nostalgic It is sadder to find the past again and find it inadequate to the present than it is to have it elude you and remain forever a harmonious conception of memory” –F. Scott Fitzgerald During an episode of the hit series Madmen, protagonist Don Draper describes how he plans to sell a Kodak projector for home movies to the public by proclaiming the following: “Nostalgia….it’s delicate, but potent….in Greek, nostalgia literally means the pain from an old wound. It’s a twinge in 77 Wintour, Patrick . " Facebook et al risk 'infantilising' the human mind | Media | guardian.co.uk ." Latest news, comment and reviews from the Guardian | guardian.co.uk . N.p., n.d. Web. 23 Aug. 2011. <http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2009/feb/24/social-networking-site-changing-childrens-brains>. 78 Wintour, Patrick . " Facebook et al risk 'infantilising' the human mind | Media | guardian.co.uk ." Latest news, comment and reviews from the Guardian | guardian.co.uk . N.p., n.d. Web. 23 Aug. 2011. <http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2009/feb/24/social-networking-site-changing-childrens-brains>. 79 Wintour, Patrick . " Facebook et al risk 'infantilising' the human mind | Media | guardian.co.uk ." Latest news, comment and reviews from the Guardian | guardian.co.uk . N.p., n.d. Web. 23 Aug. 2011. <http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2009/feb/24/social-networking-site-changing-childrens-brains>. 28 your heart, far more powerful than memory alone. This device—it isn’t a spaceship. It’s a time machine. It takes us to a place where we ache to go again. It’s not called ‘The Wheel.’ It’s called ‘The Carousel.’ It lets us travel the way a child travels; around and around and back home again, to a place we know we are loved.” 80 In this quote Don Draper has summed up a major aspect of Facebook’s heart and soul. If a person is looking for tangible forms of memories, and a telescope into the past, Facebook is his or her Valhalla. Hasn’t Facebook turned us all into autobiographical documentarians and genealogist? The author suspects that if Facebook hadn’t been invented then someone else would have thought of creating a website that would have served as a massive genealogy scrapbook for families to post pictures and record their lives. Friendships also survive on memories. The author hypothesizes that many people in their sixties, and up, join Facebook to connect with their peers and share memories of what they consider better days. They want to talk and recollect about a time when Johnny Carson’s show was the cultural epicenter for America. They want to remember a time where Frankie Lymon’s sweet falsetto serenaded radio waves with the song “Why Do Fools Fall In Love?” They want to reminisce with people who remember a time when Bob Dylan, and music with fervor and soul, was featured on the radio instead of the soulless synthetic crap that’s currently plagues modern radio. They want to find out what became of the first girl they kissed on a spring night in May of 1967 while they danced to the The Righteous Brothers’ heart wrenching rendition of “Unchained Melody.” They want someone that knows what it felt like to live through the Cold War. A Mashable study suggests that “Social network use among Internet users 50 years old and older has nearly doubled to 42% over the past year (2011). In fact, in the U.S. alone there are nearly 16 million 80 Klosterman, Chuck. Eating the dinosaur. New York: Scribner, 2009. Print. 29 people 55 and older using Facebook.” 81 Pew did a study in 2010 that found that “Internet users over the age of 74 joined social networking sites at a faster rate than any other age group.” 82 81 Carracher, Jamie . "How Baby Boomers Are Embracing Digital Media." mashable.com. N.p., 6 Mar. 2011. Web. 10 Feb. 2012. <mashable.com/2011/04/06/baby-boomers-digital-media/ >. 82 Toor, Amar. "Pew: More Old People Using Facebook, Teens Blogging Less." Tech and Internet Industry News - HuffPost Tech. N.p., n.d. Web. 31 Mar. 2012. <http://www.switched.com/2010/12/16/pew-more-old-people- using-facebook-teens-blogging-less/>. 30 Chapter 3 Facebook’s Future Gravedigger, When you dig my grave Could you make it shallow? So that I can feel the rain -Dave Matthews-“Gravedigger” By building a large Facebook profile while you’re alive you’re actually building a memorial for yourself for when you die. When people die their Facebook pages often become electronic graves where people can give their condolences or express love for the deceased. One may not be able to travel a great distance so that they can lay a bouquet of white roses upon a tombstone, but everyone can write a few letters of love upon a Facebook wall. Adjusting your Facebook status is more similar to writing with permanent ink upon your gravestone than one would probably like to admit. Several articles have been written about the emerging “Facebook memorial phenomenon” 83 84 85 86 . Currently Facebook will memorialize a user’s page if the family provides documented proof of someone’s death 87 . Once this paperwork is completed deceased members of the site won’t show up in the 83 Kelleher, Kristina . "Facebook profiles become makeshift memorials." Brown Daily Harold . N.p., 27 Feb. 2007. Web. 21 Jan. 2012. <www.browndailyherald.com/features/facebook-profiles-become-makeshift-memorials- 1.1674763#.Txs8xfm1Xkc>. 84 Colorburned | Is Facebook a Virtual Gravestone?." Colorburned | Graphic design resources, tutorials, and more!. N.p., n.d. Web. 21 Jan. 2012. http://colorburned.com/2011/01/facebook-virtual-gravestone.html 85 Needle , David . "Facebook Offers 'Permanent' Online Memorials - InternetNews.." InternetNews - Software, Storage, Security, Server, Networking News for IT Managers. N.p., n.d. Web. 21 Jan. 2012. <http://www.internetnews.com/webcontent/article.php/3845766/Facebook+Offers+Permanent+Online+ 86 Fletcher, D. (n.d.). What Happens to Your Facebook Profile When You Die? - TIME. Breaking News, Analysis, Politics, Blogs, News Photos, Video, Tech Reviews - TIME.com. Retrieved January 21, 2012, from http://www.time.com/time/business/article/0,8599,1932803,00.html 87 Needle , David . "Facebook Offers 'Permanent' Online Memorials - InternetNews.." InternetNews - Software, Storage, Security, Server, Networking News for IT Managers. N.p., n.d. Web. 21 Jan. 2012. <http://www.internetnews.com/webcontent/article.php/3845766/Facebook+Offers+Permanent+Online+ 31 “suggested friends” portion of Facebook, nor will their status updates show up in the Facebook newsfeed. 88 Facebook Video Sharing We are used to the idea of giving witness to one’s life as an important and noble counterpoint to being unheard, especially when applied to people in certain disadvantaged, oppressed, or unacceptable situations. But in a slightly more pathological way, I’m not sure that we aren’t seeing the emergence of a society in which almost everyone who isn’t famous considers themselves cruelly and unfairly unheard. As though being famous, and the subject of wide attention, is considered to be a fulfilled human being’s natural state”-Chris Heath “Everybody’s trying to make every minute of the present last forever. Preserve every second- Chuck Palahniuk, “Choke” According to data from comScore, Facebook is, as of the end of 2011, the second biggest video sharing site in America 89 . Facebook is currently the third ranked video sharing site behind YouTube and the Sony owned VEVO 90 . In July of 2011, 51 million people watched a video on Facebook, which is up 88 Fletcher , Dan. "What Happens to Your Facebook Profile When You Die? - TIME." Breaking News, Analysis, Politics, Blogs, News Photos, Video, Tech Reviews - TIME.com. N.p., n.d. Web. 21 Jan. 2012. <http://www.time.com/time/business/article/0,8599,1932803,00.html>. 89 Davis , Noah. "Facebook Will Soon Be The Second-Biggest Video Sharing Site - Business Insider." Featured Articles From The Business Insider. N.p., n.d. Web. 30 Sept. 2011. <http://articles.businessinsider.com/2011-08- 23/tech/30080420_1_facebook-vevo-unique-visitors>. 90 Agnello, Anthony John. "Investor Place ." investorplace.com. N.p., n.d. Web. 30 Sept. 2011. <www.investorplace.com/2011/08/facebook-google-goog-youtube/>. 32 by 3.5 million from the previous month 91 . VEVO drew 62 million unique visitors while YouTube significantly outpaced the field by drawing 158 million viewers to its site 92 . Facebook, and its massive user base, could possibly kill YouTube in the coming years. In March 2011 Facebook began partnering with movie studios to offer cheap movies. Its first partnership with Time Warner offered a $3 rental of The Dark Knight, and it has been such a smashing success that other film studios are reaching out to Facebook to broker a deal 93 . Miramax Films recently opened its own Facebook movie channel, “Miramax Experience”, that lets users rent from a library of 20 movies at $3 for 48 hours. Movie rentals are now purchased with 30 Facebook Credits, the social network’s virtual currency. New York Times columnist Miguel Helft and Brooks Barnes note that if other major studios enter into similar agreements with Facebook it could create a significant revenue stream and boost the legitimacy and appeal of Facebook’s virtual currency 94 . Facebook also has signed an integration agreement with Netflix 95 . The deal will allow Netflix users to watch videos on either site and see what movies their friends are watching through the service. The service will not be offered to subscribers in America due to a 1988 US video rental privacy law 96 . 91 Davis , Noah. "Facebook Will Soon Be The Second-Biggest Video Sharing Site - Business Insider." Featured Articles From The Business Insider. N.p., n.d. Web. 30 Sept. 2011. <http://articles.businessinsider.com/2011-08- 23/tech/30080420_1_facebook-vevo-unique-visitors>. 92 Davis , Noah. "Facebook Will Soon Be The Second-Biggest Video Sharing Site - Business Insider." Featured Articles From The Business Insider. N.p., n.d. Web. 30 Sept. 2011. <http://articles.businessinsider.com/2011-08- 23/tech/30080420_1_facebook-vevo-unique-visitors>. 93 Helft, Miguel , and Brooks Barnes . "Warner Tests Renting Film on Facebook for Web Cash." New York Times 8 Apr. 2011, sec. Technology: Online. Print. 94 Helft, Miguel , and Brooks Barnes . "Warner Tests Renting Film on Facebook for Web Cash." New York Times 8 Apr. 2011, sec. Technology: Online. Print. 95 Kang , Cecilia . "Netflix pairs with Facebook, except in U.S.." The Washington Post 22 Sept. 2011: Online. Print. 96 Kang , Cecilia . "Netflix pairs with Facebook, except in U.S.." The Washington Post 22 Sept. 2011: Online. Print. 33 Facebook Virtual Credits and the Future of Shopping “Anyone who lives within their means suffers from a lack of imagination”-Oscar Wilde “Whoever said money can't buy happiness simply didn't know where to go shopping”-Bo Derek Facebook began testing its virtual credits system two years ago by allowing people to purchase games and apps through its digital currency. Facebook, which keeps 30 percent of all transactions conducted through “Credits,” wants to turn its virtual currency into a payment mechanism for an array of digital goods in the near future 97 . Users can currently purchase Facebook Credits through gift cards at major stores such as Wal-Mart, (hipsters won’t be purchasing their Facebook credits here obviously) Target and Best Buy 98 . Thus, it is quite possible that Facebook could continue to cultivate the Credits system and become a rival of PayPal and other sites that allow online transactions. The author believes that Facebook’s Credits will explode in the near future and that Facebook will become the focal point for online shopping. A Nielson study released in September 2011 concluded that “That value of the time consumers spend online and on social networks and blogs continue to grow, most visible through the influence on purchase decisions. Adults active on social networks and blogs are 12% more likely than the average user to shop online, nearly 4 in 5 active internet users participates in these activities and 70% make online purchases.” 99 Nielson’s study also suggested that social networkers are 47% more likely to be heavy spenders on clothing, shoes and accessories, and 75% more likely to 97 Helft, Miguel , and Brooks Barnes . "Warner Tests Renting Film on Facebook for Web Cash." New York Times 8 Apr. 2011, sec. Technology: Online. Print. 98 Helft, Miguel , and Brooks Barnes . "Warner Tests Renting Film on Facebook for Web Cash." New York Times 8 Apr. 2011, sec. Technology: Online. Print. 99 Miller , Miranda . "Almost 75% of Active American Social Networkers Shop Online [Study] - Search Engine Watch (#SEW)." Search Engine Marketing (SEM), Paid Search Advertising (PPC) & Search Engine Optimization (SEO) - Search Engine Watch (#SEW). N.p., n.d. Web. 30 Sept. 2011. <http://searchenginewatch.com/article/2108913/Almost-75-of-Active-American-Social-Networkers-Shop-Online- Study>. 34 spend heavily on music 100 . This study suggests that there is a tremendous amount of potential for growth for retailers and distributors through Facebook. Start-up company Sneakpeeq, launched in May, has been demonstrating Facebook’s potential to become a major online shopping site. As of May 2011, Facebook users could use the Sneakpeeq app to browse through products offered by more than 300 brands and 200,000 users 101 . Prices for the products aren’t listed, to see a product users have to click a “peeq” icon which shows the product’s price tag. Each time someone “peeqs” at the product its price goes down and it appears in one’s Facebook stream for others to see. People then have 15 seconds to decide if they want to purchase the product, if they don’t it might not available when they return. Users are afforded 10 peeqs every 48 hours 102 . A San Francisco based gourmet food service called “479Popcorn” utilized the peeq service to generate 25,000 peeqs, and 1 million impressions; more than 90% of the purchases made through Sneakpeeq was transacted by first time customers 103 . It is highly unlikely that a small brand like 479Popcorn could get this many impressions through traditional advertising and marketing channels. O’Neill Girls, a Southern California surfing company, generated 2.4 million impressions and 53 peeqs in eight days in August 2011 through 100 Miller , Miranda . "Almost 75% of Active American Social Networkers Shop Online [Study] - Search Engine Watch (#SEW)." Search Engine Marketing (SEM), Paid Search Advertising (PPC) & Search Engine Optimization (SEO) - Search Engine Watch (#SEW). N.p., n.d. Web. 30 Sept. 2011. <http://searchenginewatch.com/article/2108913/Almost-75-of-Active-American-Social-Networkers-Shop-Online- Study>. 101 Geron, Tomio. "Is Shopping What's Next On Facebook? Sneakpeeq Combines Shopping And Gaming - Forbes." Information for the World's Business Leaders - Forbes.com. N.p., 8 Sept. 2011. Web. 2 Oct. 2011. <http://www.forbes.com/sites/tomiogeron/2011/09/08/is-shopping-whats-next-on-facebook-sneakpeeq- combines-shopping-and-gaming/>. 102 Geron, Tomio. "Is Shopping What's Next On Facebook? Sneakpeeq Combines Shopping And Gaming - Forbes." Information for the World's Business Leaders - Forbes.com. N.p., 8 Sept. 2011. Web. 2 Oct. 2011. <http://www.forbes.com/sites/tomiogeron/2011/09/08/is-shopping-whats-next-on-facebook-sneakpeeq- combines-shopping-and-gaming/>. 103 Geron, Tomio. "Is Shopping What's Next On Facebook? Sneakpeeq Combines Shopping And Gaming - Forbes." Information for the World's Business Leaders - Forbes.com. N.p., 8 Sept. 2011. Web. 2 Oct. 2011. <http://www.forbes.com/sites/tomiogeron/2011/09/08/is-shopping-whats-next-on-facebook-sneakpeeq- combines-shopping-and-gaming/>. 35 Sneakpeeq 104 . Imagine how many purchases, impressions and peeqs a major brand could generate through Sneakpeeq or similar Facebook shopping feature. Sneakpeeq uses social networking to merges commerce and advertising in a unique way suggests that the potential for Facebook becoming a major shopping hub are enormous. Harry Weller, a general partner at New Enterprise Associates, notes that “The social web is turning into the merchant web: The first company to merge the two is the real winner. Facebook maybe? Google perhaps?” 105 Weller’s assessment is extremely astute. This question will inspire companies to innovate in the future and try to find a way to harness the lucrative potential for selling through social networking sites. Facebook Marketing American culture is nothing more than a pastiche of fixations. We are obsessed with health. We are obsessed with pleasure. We are obsessed with speed. We are obsessed with efficiency. In simplest terms, we are obsessed by the desire to accelerate every element of our existence in a futile attempt to experience as much life as we can in the shortest possible time. We have all entered a race to devour the largest volume of gratification before it kills us-Chuck Klosterman, IV A recent study done by Constant Contact and Chadwick Martin Bailey revealed that users prefer interacting with brands on Facebook to other social media mediums such as Twitter and LinkedIn 106 . Some of the study’s primary findings were that: 77% of consumers said they interact with brands on 104 Geron, Tomio. "Is Shopping What's Next On Facebook? Sneakpeeq Combines Shopping And Gaming - Forbes." Information for the World's Business Leaders - Forbes.com. N.p., 8 Sept. 2011. Web. 2 Oct. 2011. <http://www.forbes.com/sites/tomiogeron/2011/09/08/is-shopping-whats-next-on-facebook-sneakpeeq- combines-shopping-and-gaming/>. 105 Swartz, Jon. "Social-media start-ups find it harder to stand out – USATODAY.com." News, Travel, Weather, Entertainment, Sports, Technology, U.S. & World - USATODAY.com. N.p., 20 Sept. 2011. Web. 3 Oct. 2011. <http://www.usatoday.com/tech/news/story/2011-09-21/social-media-startups-competition/50483652/1>. 106 Protalinski, Emil. "Over half of Facebook users respond to social media marketing." ZDnet.com. N.p., 12 Sept. 2011. Web. 3 Oct. 2011. <www.zdnet.com/blog/facebook/over-half-of-facebook-users-respond-to-social-media- marketing/3547>. 36 Facebook mainly through reading post and news feeds, 56% of consumers said they are likely to recommend a brand to a friend after becoming a fan on Facebook, 76% of customers said they never “unlike” a brand on Facebook after “liking” it, 51% of consumers said they are likely to buy a product after becoming a fan on Facebook, and 45% of customers said they spend most of their time on Facebook looking at the newsfeed section 107 . Mark Schumulen, the General Manager of Social Media for Constant Contact noted that “Consumers are not only willing to connect with brands on Facebook, but those that do are also more likely to buy from and recommend brands to their friends. The key is remembering that it’s not just about getting the ‘Like;’ it’s about what you do to keep your fans engaged when they aren’t right in front of you. This means posting content that will both help you to build stronger relationships as well as to compel fans to share your content with their friends. The ability to easily share content across a wide network is what makes Facebook such a powerful referral engine.” 108 Facebook recently began offering free advertising to small businesses 109 through a program designed to "invest, educate and connect with small businesses" by teaching them how to reach customers via Facebook. Beginning in January 2012, Facebook launched “Facebook Small Business Boost” a program to award $10 million worth of free advertising to some 200,000 local businesses 110 .This announcement comes at a time when online advertising is experiencing tremendous growth; the US 107 Protalinski, Emil. "Over half of Facebook users respond to social media marketing." ZDnet.com. N.p., 12 Sept. 2011. Web. 3 Oct. 2011. <www.zdnet.com/blog/facebook/over-half-of-facebook-users-respond-to-social-media- marketing/3547>. 108 Protalinski, Emil. "Over half of Facebook users respond to social media marketing." ZDnet.com. N.p., 12 Sept. 2011. Web. 3 Oct. 2011. <www.zdnet.com/blog/facebook/over-half-of-facebook-users-respond-to-social-media- marketing/3547>. 109 Kulikowski, Laurie. "Facebook Offers Free Ads to Small Businesses - TheStreet." Stock Market Today - Financial News, Quotes and Analysis - TheStreet. N.p., n.d. Web. 3 Oct. 2011. <http://www.thestreet.com/story/11259455/1/facebook-offers-free-ads-to-small-businesses.html>. 110 Kulikowski, Laurie. "Facebook Offers Free Ads to Small Businesses - TheStreet." Stock Market Today - Financial News, Quotes and Analysis - TheStreet. N.p., n.d. Web. 3 Oct. 2011. <http://www.thestreet.com/story/11259455/1/facebook-offers-free-ads-to-small-businesses.html>. 37 experienced a 20% rise in 2011; $31.3 billion was spent in online advertising in the US in 2011 while $26 billion was spent in 2010. 111 Studies show that the average lifetime of a Facebook post is approximately 3 hours 112 . Dan Zarrella, an award-winning social media scientist, notes that the best time to post marketing content on Facebook is at 8:00 AM; articles posted at this time are shared the most 113 . Content posted on Saturday also tend to be shared more than content posted during the week 114 . Subject matter that focuses on sex has the highest likelihood of being shared by Facebook users 115 111 Swartz, Jon. "Social-media start-ups find it harder to stand out – USATODAY.com." News, Travel, Weather, Entertainment, Sports, Technology, U.S. & World - USATODAY.com. N.p., 20 Sept. 2011. Web. 3 Oct. 2011. <http://www.usatoday.com/tech/news/story/2011-09-21/social-media-startups-competition/50483652/1>. 112 Draper, Neil. "When To Connect With Your Target - ." VIRALBLOG.COM – VIRAL IDEAS & SOCIAL TRENDS - . N.p., n.d. Web. 31 Mar. 2012. <http://www.viralblog.com/community-marketing/when-to- connect/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+viralblog+% 113 Draper, Neil. "When To Connect With Your Target - ." VIRALBLOG.COM – VIRAL IDEAS & SOCIAL TRENDS - . N.p., n.d. Web. 31 Mar. 2012. <http://www.viralblog.com/community-marketing/when-to- connect/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+viralblog+% 114 Draper, Neil. "When To Connect With Your Target - ." VIRALBLOG.COM – VIRAL IDEAS & SOCIAL TRENDS - . N.p., n.d. Web. 31 Mar. 2012. <http://www.viralblog.com/community-marketing/when-to- connect/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+viralblog+% 115 Draper, Neil. "When To Connect With Your Target - ." VIRALBLOG.COM – VIRAL IDEAS & SOCIAL TRENDS - . N.p., n.d. Web. 31 Mar. 2012. <http://www.viralblog.com/community-marketing/when-to- connect/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+viralblog+% 38 Facebook Integration The more you try to erase me The more, the more The more that I appear Oh the more, the more The more I try to erase you The more, the more The more that you appear -Thom York, The Eraser At the F8 conference, in San Francisco on September 22 nd 2011, Mark Zuckerburg announced that Facebook will be introducing a “new class of apps” that will include a bunch of music applications; and integration with music service Spotify 116 . Spotify will appear as a music dashboard on Facebook’s new layout and it will allow people to see what music and artists their friends have listened to and allow them to listen to this music. It also allows Facebook users to send songs and playlist to their friends which their friends can then listen to. Spotify has changed the terms of its service to further strengthen its Facebook integration; starting September 26 anyone who wishes to register on Spotify will be unable to do so if they don’t have a Facebook account 117 . Spotify CEO Daniel Elk believes that his company will reinvigorate the ailing music industry stating that “Spotify users who connect to Facebook listen to more music on a monthly basis, but they also listen to a greater variety of music; and because they’re social, they’re more engaged. And because they’re more engaged, they’re twice as likely to pay for the 116 Eisen, Benjy. "Facebook Launches New Music Apps | Benjy Eisen | Rolling Stone." Rolling Stone | Music News, Politics, Reviews, Photos, Videos, Interviews and More. N.p., n.d. Web. 3 Oct. 2011. <http://www.rollingstone.com/culture/blogs/gear-up/facebook-launches-new-music-apps-20110922>. 117 Buskirk, Eliot Van. "Updated: Spotify Defends Facebook Requirement as 'Simple and Seamless Social Experience' | Billboard.biz." Music Business | Music Industry | Record Sales | Billboard Charts | Billboard Hot 100. N.p., n.d. Web. 3 Oct. 2011. <http://www.billboard.biz/bbbiz/industry/digital-and-mobile/spotify-defends-facebook- requirement-as-1005370802.story>. 39 music.” 118 Since the Facebook-Spotify integration plan was announced Spotify has been gaining 250,000 users a day 119 . Facebook also announced an integration pact with the online television watching site Hulu at the F8 conference 120 . Facebook’s new “open graph,” which basically serves as a more intense newsfeed, will allow Facebook users to see what music their friends are listening to on Spotify and what television programs or videos they might be watching on Hulu. Yahoo has also completed an integration pact with Facebook that will allow users to automatically share with friends the articles they are reading on Yahoo News 121 . Facebook also has integrated the video sharing site Vimeo into Facebook. Soon you will be able to know exactly what your friends are reading, listening to, and watching while on Facebook. The information about what a user is watching, reading, listening to, and what games they are playing will be shared based on a new feature called the “ticker.” The ticker will be a slim stream of updates that automatically lists users’ activity on a range of apps after users consent to the continuous sharing just once 122 . If a user clicks on an item in their friends’ ticker stream it can lead to them 118 Buskirk, Eliot Van. "Updated: Spotify Defends Facebook Requirement as 'Simple and Seamless Social Experience' | Billboard.biz." Music Business | Music Industry | Record Sales | Billboard Charts | Billboard Hot 100. N.p., n.d. Web. 3 Oct. 2011. <http://www.billboard.biz/bbbiz/industry/digital-and-mobile/spotify-defends-facebook- requirement-as-1005370802.story>. 119 Hernandez, Barbara. "Spotify Adds 250,000 Users a Day on Facebook | NBC Bay Area." NBC Bay Area - Local News, Weather, Traffic, Entertainment, Events, Breaking News Bay Area News, Sports, Weather, and Traffic | NBC Bay Area. N.p., 27 Sept. 2011. Web. 3 Oct. 2011. <http://www.nbcbayarea.com/blogs/press-here/Spotify-Adds- 250000-a-Day-After-f8-130645888.html>. 120 Oreskovic, Alexei. "Facebook builds tighter integration with music, TV| Reuters." Business & Financial News, Breaking US & International News | Reuters.com. N.p., 22 Sept. 2011. Web. 3 Oct. 2011. <http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/09/23/us-facebook-idUSTRE78L56E20110923>. 121 Albanesius, Chloe. "Yahoo News, Facebook Linkup Shares What You're Reading | News & Opinion | PCMag.com." Technology Product Reviews, News, Prices & Downloads | PCMag.com | PC Magazine. N.p., 22 Sept. 2011. Web. 4 Oct. 2011. <http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2393438,00.asp#fbid=4UfZ8215 122 Nakashima, Ryan . "Music, media firms pin hopes on new Facebook ties - Boston.com." Featured Articles From Boston.com. N.p., n.d. Web. 4 Oct. 2011. <http://articles.boston.com/2011-09-22/business/30194922_1_privacy- controls-spotify-facebook-friend>. 40 automatically being signed up for free trials of services such as Spotify and Rhapsody, many of which may eventually ask for a monthly fee 123 . The ticker will act as a huge virtual marketing stream for businesses. Hussein Fazal, the CEO of AdParlor, a firm that runs Facebook advertising campaigns for companies including Groupon mused that “"With Facebook now able to collect more data in terms of what people are watching, reading, running, doing, that's more metadata which is now going to feed into what brands and marketers target.” 124 When considering Facebook’s novel integrations one shouldn’t forget that Zuckerburg has consistently stated that he views Facebook as “distribution platform for other media companies.” 125 123 Nakashima, Ryan . "Music, media firms pin hopes on new Facebook ties - Boston.com." Featured Articles From Boston.com. N.p., n.d. Web. 4 Oct. 2011. <http://articles.boston.com/2011-09-22/business/30194922_1_privacy- controls-spotify-facebook-friend>. 124 Oreskovic, Alexei. "Facebook builds tighter integration with music, TV| Reuters." Business & Financial News, Breaking US & International News | Reuters.com. N.p., 22 Sept. 2011. Web. 3 Oct. 2011. <http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/09/23/us-facebook-idUSTRE78L56E20110923>. 125 Halliday, Josh. Facebook to launch music and film 'ticker' | Technology | guardian.co.uk ." Latest US and world news, sport and comment from the Guardian | guardiannews.com | US Network front | The Guardian . N.p., n.d. Web. 3 Oct. 2011. <http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2011/sep/19/facebook-music-film-ticker>. 41 Chapter 4: Facebook Best Practices The social world is a kaleidoscope of potential realities, any of which can be readily evoked by altering the ways in which observations are framed and categorized-M Edelman Social networking can play an important role in helping small businesses cultivate viral campaigns that will allow them to elevate themselves above the rest of the Internet’s “noise.” John Hlinko, the man behind the “DraftObama.org” viral campaign, sites “Georgetown Cupcake” as an organization that harnessed the full potential of social networking when it was starting out. 126 Hlinko notes “When Georgetown Cupcake opened in Washington, D.C., in 2008, they started a “secret cupcake of the day” promotion via Facebook and Twitter. Each morning, they would send out an update with a “secret”-flavor cupcake. If you were one of the first 100 people to come into the bakery and tell them the secret flavor, you would get that cupcake for free (one per customer). Every morning, Georgetowners who didn’t even know about the promotion would pass by the bakery, see a huge line, and think, ‘Wow, those must be the best cupcakes on the planet’—which only added to the hype. Since then, the owners of Georgetown Cupcake have not only opened up additional stores, they’ve also managed to land the reality show DC Cupcakes on TLC. And with 32,000 Twitter followers and 150,000 Facebook fans, they’ve built a base of people they can leverage for a whole host of promotional efforts.” This incentive based campaign exemplifies an excellent use of Facebook for brand promotion and augmentation. Giving users an incentive to engage with you on Facebook is one of the most astute things and company, individual or organization can do if they wish to foster a strong Facebook following. 126 Pearson, Heidi. "Social Media Pointers from a Buzz Czar : The World :: American Express OPEN Forum." OPEN Forum :: American Express OPEN Forum. N.p., n.d. Web. 31 Mar. 2012. <http://www.openforum.com/articles/social-media-pointers-from-a-buzz-czar>. 42 The 10 Biggest Douchebags You’ll Encounter on Facebook To properly understand what the “next big thing” will be, we must first examine where major mistakes are being made in the social media realm. The following is an excerpt from one of the author’s 2012 blog post that seeks to explicate on what type of behaviors one should refrain from when they are using Facebook. My friends there is currently a cancerous plague ravaging our society: the Douchedum Disease. We see it in on our roads, it’s present in our classrooms, we can view it in the workplace, it’s constantly presented on our televisions, and lord knows we see it in any situation where a copious amount of alcohol has been consumed. Douchedom is a very potent and pervasive force that seems to have lynched its claws into just about every location on this cosmic blue spiraling sphere we humans have named earth. Sadly, there is no cure for this vitriolic malady, the only way we can fight this epidemic is knowledge and patience. As our society becomes increasingly obsessed with Facebook it’s no surprise that individuals infected with severe cases of douchedom are behaving in an obnoxious and loathsome manner while on Facebook. Is there anywhere we’re safe from inconsiderate and aggressive douchebaggery? It sure doesn’t seem like it. Here are the top 10 douchebags you’ll encounter while on Facebook. 1. The Incessant Status Updater These are the losers who literally update their status close to 100 times a day often to tell the world extremely trivial information that not even the poster’s own mother cares about. No one cares that you ate at Subway for lunch Henry! You just got done working out at the gym and are about to starting writing you sociology paper? Sweet! My life is so much better now that I know that information. We get it Samantha; you have the “GREATEST BOYFRIEND IN THE ENTIRE UNIVERSE!!!!” We fully understand that your job sucks pretty hard Jeremy; you don’t have to remind us every single damn day at 43 1:36 PM that your boss is a total tool. “I’m loving this summer sunshine!” Congratulations. I’m glad you took the time to type that out in your Facebook status; I was sitting around all afternoon asking myself: “Gee, I wonder if Sharon is glad that it’s 78 degrees and sunny today? I wonder if she wishes it was raining and Los Angeles was engulfed in a monsoon. God I hope she updates her Facebook status and lets the world know her thoughts on the current weather.” I also hate the incessant status updating sports fan. This is the dude that literally does play by play of the game on his Facebook status. During a big NFL game it’s likely he’ll post statuses similar to these ones every 5 minutes: “TIM TEBOW IS GOD! Get ready to get your ass kicked Minnesota!” “These Vikings cheerleaders aren’t that hot. The Vikings’ cheerleader recruiters need to step their game up.” “TOUCHDOWN DENVER!!!!!!!!” “YOU DA MAN TEBOW!!!!!!!!!! “Come on Broncos, we gotta start letting Tebow throw the ball more. The Minnesota secondary is sh1t!!1” “This ref is a dumbass!!!1 That wasn’t pass inference. This is the NFL not YMCA flag football homie! “Interception! Broncos ball! Christian Ponder u suck!!!!111 “Percy Harvin is a punk! Someone needs to beat the crap out of that little bitch” “HELL YES BRONCOS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 2. The Vague Attention-Seeking Whore This insecure dope is always posting vague messages hoping to entice someone to talk to them and give them attention on Facebook. They post things like “Today might be the worst day of my entire life” 44 without any details on why their day was so deplorable. They’re praying that someone will come in and say “OMG Stacy what happened? If u need someone 2 talk to call me. I LUV U!” I have one comrade who is particularly fond of posting something similar to the following: “Hmmmm…that was strange and kind of disturbing. Now I’ve seen it all.” If you know someone that post ambiguous statements like this, DO NOT RESPOND TO THEM! Do not enable their douchedom. For this particular strand of douchedom there is a vaccine; it’s called “Ignore.” Seriously, don’t respond to these babies, they need to learn that they aren’t the epicenter of the universe and that their infantile and immature behavior isn’t welcome in the real world or in cyberspace. A lot of people are like dogs, they need to be trained. Anyone remember the principles of operant condition from their psychology classes? If not, you need to look it up. We as a people need to band together and ignore The Vague Attention-Seeking Whore and try to make their style of posting follow in the steps of the Dodo Bird and the Pterodactyl and go extinct. 3. The Gamer/Quiz Douche I don’t want to play a game where I get to be some type of zombie slayer! I do not want to aid you in your mob’s attempt to start an online war with a rival mafia! I will NEVER be interested in playing some game involving farm animals; do I look like Old McDonald? Have you ever heard me singing “Old Macdonald had a farm, E-I-E-I-O” when we’ve hung out before? I do not want to take your lame quiz that will tell me which member of the Beatles I’m the most like (God it has to feel bad if you take this quiz and get “Ringo” at the end.) I’m not taking a quiz that’s going to tell me which alcoholic beverage I am. The U.S Government should seriously consider restricting the internet access of individuals identified to be Gamer/Quiz douches. There should be some type of monetary reward given to citizens who turn Gamer/Quiz douchebags into the proper authorities. Have you ever noticed that the Gamer/Quiz type of douchebag is usually one of the biggest degenerates on your friend’s list? I’ve observed that Gamer/Quiz douchebags tend to love to play World of Warcraft for hours on end, listen to the industrial metal band 45 Rammstein at high decibel levels, and eat lots of cheap pizza. They often like to do all three of these rad activities at the same time. 4. The Character Assassin Voyeur The Character Assassin Voyeur is the shady chap who prowls around the party looking to take compromising and embarrassing photos of people to post on Facebook for the world to see. Nothing brings this guy more pleasure than taking a risqué picture, posting it to Facebook and tagging you in it. This dude never forgets to tag. After he tags you in his money shot he sits back and thinks “Damn it I’m awesome. TMZ ain’t got nothing on me.” You now that random hot girl you kissed last night that wasn’t your girlfriend? He’s got 4 pictures of you guys making out he’s going to upload. You sure as hell won’t be a cheating Casanova when the Character Assassin Voyeur is around. You know that bong hit you took before the band started playing? Yep, he’s got that one too. Mom sure is going to love that one isn’t she? You know when you started dancing shirtless on top of that table when you heard Taio Cruz’s “Dynamite” start playing? Yep, he’s uploading that gem to YouTube tomorrow and posting that immediately to Facebook for the world to see. You know that random drunk rant you orated after you downed a couple too many Jägerbombs Saturday night? If you don’t remember it that’s fine, because it was all caught on video and it’ll be uploaded for all of earth’s inhabitants tomorrow morning. Get ready to look like a complete ass! 5. The Constant Bragger I have no problem if people have something awesome happen to them and they want to let people know about it on Facebook. If some type of sensationally sweet serendipity saunters your way, I suggest you share the story soon after he it happens. That being said, there is a big difference between sharing a story about something cool that happened to you and being a perpetually arrogant and boastful douchebag. 46 There are some people who view Facebook as the premier platform to let you know how much more awesome their life is than yours. For example, I know one person that consistently post messages like this: “I’m skiing on a Tuesday morning and I have the entire mountain to myself while most of u people are at school or work. I bet you biatches wish u were me huh? Suck it!” or “I have two tickets behind home plate for the Red Sox game tonight! Have fun watching me on your television suckas!!!!!!” You would think this type of boorish behavior would only come from young people but I’ve seen people in their late thirties post things like “It’s 7:00 AM and I’ve already worked out for 90 minutes, read the entire newspaper, conducted a conference call, and answered 15 emails. I bet you feel pretty damn lazy after reading that huh? Most of you pansies are probably just getting out of bed now. You gotta work hard to play hard folks, I’m making a habit of doing both. Let’s make it happen today people! {Insert random cliché motivational quote here]” Every dog has his day, when your day comes I hope you let people know about it; just don’t be a total bragging douchetastic idiot and insult people in the process of sharing your story. 6. The “I Lost My Phone” or “I Got A New Phone” So Please Join My Lame Group and Give Me Your Number Douchebag Seriously folks, is it really that damn hard to keep track of your phone? Pardon me if I don’t want to post my phone number in your public group because I don’t want a bunch of stalkers and perverts to get my phone number off this page. If a group is “public” anyone can come in and start cherry-picking numbers. I had a friend who posted their phone number to one of those idiotic “lost my phone and need numbers” groups and they started getting weird phone calls afterwards. A person would call my friend’s cellphone really late at night and then not say a word. This went on for close to four months. They weren’t calling and hanging up; they would call and just sit silently on the other end as my friend repeated “Hello.” There was no laughter or anything on the other end, just deafening silence. Typing that sentence sends creepy 47 shivers down my spinal column; I can only imagine how bizarre this situation must have been for my friend. 7. The Hashtag User FACEBOOK IS NOT TWITTER! Come on man, get it together. No one wants to see you rocking a Hashtag on Facebook. 8. The Hype Man Everyone is quite familiar with the hype man. His crappy band has a gig in some old dilapidated dive bar this weekend and he really wants you to be there to hear him and his boys jam out. His band does a real mean cover of Lynyrd Skynyrd’s “Free Bird” and a “face-melting cover of Steve Miller Band’s track “The Joker.” He says the ladies love it when he and the fellas bust out “The Joker.” He is probably going to send you an invite to some group for the gig, he’s going to post about it constantly in his status, he might even send out a giant private message telling you how much he needs you to come to the gig and how much you’ll love hearing his band play some Sublime-inspired tunes. The cover charge is only $5! There are of course other types of hype men, there’s the dude who post links to his blog CONSTANTLY because he thinks he’s a genius and the world needs to read every thought that has ever appeared in his brain. This guy thinks he’s doing you a favor by sharing his blog constantly. He’s basically a leprechaun that gives you a pot of literary gold; unlike most leprechauns he doesn’t make you look for gold, he brings it right to you. It’s hilarious when the Hype Man begs you to “Like” his page. It’s almost like the Hype Man thinks he’ll automatically become as rich as Donald Trump if he reaches a certain number of “Likes.” 48 9. The Amateur Photographer The Amateur Photographer is the person that has between 3,000 to 4,000 photos of themselves on their page. This doucher thinks that their life is so astonishingly awesome that it would be a disservice to humanity if they didn’t try to document every second of their existence with a photograph. It’s almost as if this person doesn’t think something really happened unless they capture a picture of it. I’ve seen people at concerts and sporting events that were more focused on taking pictures of themselves hugging their friends or posing with beers than they were the event taking place. Rather than always trying to immortalize things into pictures people should just completely surrender themselves to the majesty of the moment. Amateur Photographers are also prone to take random photos of themselves standing in hallways with their friends, or peculiar photos of themselves standing in a kitchen or in a bathroom. Is it necessary for you to upload 15 pictures of you and your girls standing in the middle of a kitchen? Do you think there are any guys looking at your profile thinking “Damn I love to see a women standing in front of her kitchen sink. Forget about bikini pics, I wanna see a girl pose in front of her microwave. That’s the kind of thing that gets me going.” Does your profile really need 15 Mobile Uploads pics of you standing in front of your mirror before you go out for a night on the town? The Amateur Self-Photographers that really freak me out are the ones that take a picture of themselves in front of their mirror where you can see them holding a cellphone or a camera. Why would anyone ever do this? It’s like filming a movie and letting the audience see the camera men or setting up the concert stage so that the dude operating the soundboard is right next to the front man and the lead guitarist on the stage. Do these people really think these self-taken pictures are attractive? 49 10. The Random Friend Request Creep The Random Friend Request Creep is the person that sends you a friend request who you have never met before in your entire life and who you have no mutual friends with. It’s the 300 pound dude who looks like Big Black from Rob & Big, who has 7 friends, zero pictures uploaded, and almost no information filled out in their info section. It’s the person that created the “Santa Claus” Facebook profile. Mall Santas are pretty sketchy but they’re not near as odd as the person who takes the time to create a Santa profile and then invite 300+ strangers to be their “friend.” Trust me, Brad Pitt does not have a Facebook account ladies. If you add one of the “Brad Pitt” accounts to your friend list you’ve probably just added some 40 year old unemployed pervert who still lives in his parents’ basement and watches 8 hours of porn per day. 50 Chapter 5: The Appeal Twitter “Twenty years ago, Milan Kundera pointed to ‘Rewriting as the spirit of the times.’ Now, it’s re-tweeting as the spirit of the times. A story gets shaved and shortened until it can fit into 140 characters or less” – Rob Tannenbaum, The Los Angeles Times Twitter is a social networking site that allows individuals to compose 140 character micro blogs that are popularly referred to as “Tweets.” (Note: The previous sentence is precisely 140 characters, thus it would make a perfect Tweet.) Many individuals use Twitter to Tweet out information about themselves, post links to various news stories or videos, build a personal brand, and interact with others. Many businesses and organizations use Twitter for promotional purposes and to interact with customers. Many celebrities and public figures use Twitter for brand augmentation and as a means of interacting directly with their fanbase. Twitter was founded by Jack Dorsey, Noah Glass, Evan Williams, and Biz Stone in 2005 127 . Since its inception Twitter has experienced significant growth and is now one of the most popular sites on the internet. In 2010 the site was posting 65 million Tweets per day, as of August 2011 the site is producing over 200 million Tweets per day 128 . Every five days the site post a billion tweets! As of March 2011, Twitter had 175 million registered users 129 . Unlike Facebook, Twitter doesn’t release information about how many of their users visit the site on a daily basis. The size of Twitter’s user base isn’t necessarily a keen indicator of the amount of activity that takes place on the site. According to a report done by Business Insider there are 119 million Twitter 127 Carlson, Nicholas. "How Twitter Was Founded." Business Insider. N.p., n.d. Web. 29 Sept. 2011. <http://www.businessinsider.com/how-twitter-was-founded-2011-4>. 128 Twitter Blog: Your world, more connected." Twitter Blog. N.p., n.d. Web. 29 Sept. 2011. <http://blog.twitter.com/2011/08/your-world-more-connected.html>. 129 Carlson, Nicholas. "CHART OF THE DAY: How Many Users Does Twitter REALLY Have?." Business Insider. N.p., n.d. Web. 29 Sept. 2011. <http://www.businessinsider.com/chart-of-the-day-how-many-users-does-twitter-really- have-2011-3>. 51 accounts following one or more other accounts 130 . The same study found that there are 85 million Twitter accounts with one or more followers 131 and there are 56 million Twitter accounts following zero other accounts, and 90 million Twitter accounts with zero followers 132 . There are only 56 million accounts on Twitter following 8 or more accounts. There are only 38 million following 16, and just 12 million following 64. There are only 1.5 million accounts on Twitter following 512 or more accounts 133 . This figure illustrates how much activity and engagement really goes on in the “Twitterverse.” There may be 175 million accounts on Twitter but that doesn’t mean that 175 million people are actively using the site. Twitter users often use “hashtags” when posting tweets. A hashtag is using “the # symbol to mark keywords or topics in a Tweet. It was created organically by Twitter users as a way to categorize messages.” 134 For example a user might tweet something like “Rhinoceroses are extremely stupendously awesome #rhinotalk.” The hashtag “#rhinotalk” would catalog the tweet; if another user runs a search for rhinos on twitter it is likely that they will see this tweet and if they wish to talk about the merits of the odd-toed ungulates known as rhinoceroses they could compose a tweet and include the hashtag “#rhinotalk.” This simple hashtag could possibly spawn a major worldwide discussion about the Rhinocerotidae family. If this were to occur the hashtag might evolve into #RhinoRevolution. The most popular hashtags for a particular day are organized by Twitter under “trending topics.” This allows people 130 Carlson, Nicholas. CHART OF THE DAY: How Many Users Does Twitter REALLY Have?." Business Insider. N.p., n.d. Web. 29 Sept. 2011. <http://www.businessinsider.com/chart-of-the-day-how-many-users-does-twitter-really- have-2011-3>. 131 Carlson, Nicholas. CHART OF THE DAY: How Many Users Does Twitter REALLY Have?." Business Insider. N.p., n.d. Web. 29 Sept. 2011. <http://www.businessinsider.com/chart-of-the-day-how-many-users-does-twitter-really- have-2011-3>. 132 Carlson, Nicholas. CHART OF THE DAY: How Many Users Does Twitter REALLY Have?." Business Insider. N.p., n.d. Web. 29 Sept. 2011. <http://www.businessinsider.com/chart-of-the-day-how-many-users-does-twitter-really- have-2011-3>. 133 Carlson, Nicholas. CHART OF THE DAY: How Many Users Does Twitter REALLY Have?." Business Insider. N.p., n.d. Web. 29 Sept. 2011. <http://www.businessinsider.com/chart-of-the-day-how-many-users-does-twitter-really- have-2011-3>. 134 Twitter Help Center. What Are Hashtags ("#" Symbols)?. N.p., n.d. Web. 11 Feb. 2012. <The # symbol, called a hashtag, is used to mark keywords or topics in a Tweet. It was created organically by Twitter users as a way to categorize messages>. 52 to jump in on the most popular conversations of the day. Trending topics on Twitter are often completely unrelated to trending mainstream news topics. The Appeal Of Twitter for Companies and Individuals Recognize that the very molecules that make up your body, the atoms that construct the molecules, are traceable to the crucibles that were once the centers of high mass stars that exploded their chemically rich guts into the galaxy, enriching pristine gas clouds with the chemistry of life. So that we are all connected to each other biologically, to the earth chemically and to the rest of the universe atomically. We are in the universe and the universe is in us - Neil deGrasse Tyson Individuals are drawn to Twitter primarily because it is a great site for breaking news. Stories can spread and go viral at an exponential rate on Twitter through re-tweets (when a person shares a tweet posted by someone else.) Matthew Le Veque, a veteran public relations practitioner and adjunct instructor at the USC Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism, notes that Twitter is looked at by many as more of a newsfeed site than it is a social media site for building and sustaining relationships. Robert Hernandez, a professor in the USC Annenberg School of Communication and Journalism, and a veteran web journalist, thinks that Twitter has played a major role in helping us become a “headline society” and has significantly changed the way we consume news. Hernandez notes that many people are becoming drive-by consumers of news and that “Tweets” are the natural evolution of the sound byte. He also thinks that the best Twitter headlines will possess clarity and have the ability to really make one engage in critical thought. The best Twitter headlines will ingeniously skate the line between razor sharp wit and relative straightforwardness. Matthew Le Veque echoes Robert Hernandez’s assertion that Twitter is making us drive by consumers of media. Le Veque muses that “We’re developing into this ADD society. Where it’s we need it now, go, go, go, click, click, click, nobody wants to sit, or very few people, are reading these lengthy 53 articles; they want to get this bam, bam, bam, of information and Twitter can be ideal for that.” Le Veque notes that one of Twitter’s primary appeals is seen in how it perfectly speaks to a modern technological zeitgeist where people want information as quickly and as succinctly as possible. Twitter also is a simpler interface than Facebook. It doesn’t require one to upload a bunch of pictures of one’s self, or to fill out surveys about one’s personal information, nor is “following” people as tedious a task. On Facebook you have to wait for people to approve your “friend request” before you can start interacting with them. On Twitter there is no waiting period. You can start propelling tweets to anyone in the world (except for people who have their accounts set to private) as soon as your Twitter account is set up. Matthew Le Veque believes that Twitter’s greatest beauty might be the simplicity of its interface. It’s noteworthy that over 90% of Twitter users make their updates public 135 . Twitter also offers more anonymity than its social networking peers. This anonymity leads to some people feeling safer on Twitter than they would on Facebook. Twitter allows people to send messages to celebrities who they would most likely never have the chance to interact with in any other way and to interact with major organizations. Consider this: every team in the NFL is on Twitter and more than 50% of NFL players are on Twitter, 75% of NBA players are on Twitter, 82% of the US Congress and 85% of US Senators are on Twitter, 87% of the Billboard Top 100 Musicians of 2010 are on Twitter, 93% of Food Network chefs are on Twitter, and 100% of the top 50 Nielsen-rated TV shows can also interacted with on Twitter 136 . If you’re looking for celebrity engagement Twitter definitely seems like the place to go. Twitter is a valuable asset to companies because it allows them to interact directly with their audiences and it’s a good tool for gaging public opinion. Companies need only search their name on Twitter to gauge what people are currently saying about them. Mike Hudack, CEO of Blip.tv, a New 135 Graham, Jefferson. "Twitter took off from simple to 'tweet' success - USATODAY.com." News, Travel, Weather, Entertainment, Sports, Technology, U.S. & World - USATODAY.com. N.p., n.d. Web. 3 Oct. 2011. <http://www.usatoday.com/tech/products/2008-07-20-twitter-tweet-social-network_N.htm>. 136 Sullivan, Danny . "Twitter CEO Dick Costolo's "State Of The Union" Address." Search Engine Land: Must Read News About Search Marketing & Search Engines. N.p., n.d. Web. 30 Sept. 2011. <http://searchengineland.com/live-blog-twitter-ceo-dick-costolos-informal-business-address-92207>. 54 York-based video website remarks that “Now we use Twitter to get the fastest, most honest research any company ever heard — the good, bad and ugly — and it doesn't cost a cent.” 137 Twitter allows companies to tweet ideas and then receive instant feedback; Twitter allows organizations to conduct massive free focus group-like activities that can better inform their initiatives. Some organizations, such as Comcast, have individuals whose sole responsibility is to address questions and issue raised directed towards Comcast on Twitter. 138 Twitter can also help add a personality to organization’s upper management. Tony Heish, the CEO for shoemaker Zappos, has a Twitter account to make himself available to the public and to pet a personality to his picture and biography, Heish receives 200 tweets a day 139 . Studies have shown that whites are less likely to use Twitter than Hispanics or African Americans. A study conducted by Princeton Survey Research Associates International found that 25% of African American and 19% of Hispanic internet users say they use Twitter compared to just 9% of White internet users 140 . This study notes that African Americans and Hispanics “as a cohort in comparison to whites are younger, and the use of Twitter decreases when you get older.” One should also note that Aaron Smith, a senior research specialist at Pew, says people who are less economically well off may be more likely to use mobile devices to get Internet access and that may lead to a greater use of Twitter. 137 Graham, Jefferson. "Twitter took off from simple to 'tweet' success - USATODAY.com." News, Travel, Weather, Entertainment, Sports, Technology, U.S. & World - USATODAY.com. N.p., n.d. Web. 3 Oct. 2011. 138 Graham, Jefferson. "Twitter took off from simple to 'tweet' success - USATODAY.com." News, Travel, Weather, Entertainment, Sports, Technology, U.S. & World - USATODAY.com. N.p., n.d. Web. 3 Oct. 2011. 139 Graham, Jefferson. "Twitter took off from simple to 'tweet' success - USATODAY.com." News, Travel, Weather, Entertainment, Sports, Technology, U.S. & World - USATODAY.com. N.p., n.d. Web. 3 Oct. 2011. 140 Dixon, Julie. "Social Media Plays Greater Role in Cause Engagement for African Americans and Hispanics." Georgetown University Center For Social Impact Communication . N.p., n.d. Web. 10 Sept. 2011. <csic.georgetown.edu/OPR_SM_GT_Ethn 55 Twitter and Mobile Devices “Everyday people use Britney’s existence as currency; they talk about her public failures and her lack of talent as a way to fill the emptiness of their own normalcy. She—along with Lindsay Lohan and Paris Hilton and those androids from The Hills—are the unifying entities within this meta era. In a splintered social, they are the means through which people devoid of creativity communicate with each other. They allow Americans to understand who they are and who they are not; they allow Americans to unilaterally agree on something they never need to consciously consider”- Chuck Klosterman, “Eating the Dinosaur” The ease by which someone can use Twitter on a mobile device has been a major catalyst for its surge in popularity. In 2011, 43% of Twitter’s user base accessed Twitter through their mobile phone 141 , only around 35% of Facebook users access Facebook through a mobile device 142 . Robert Hernandez and Matthew Le Veque both note that the ease by which one can take a picture and then Tweet it with a mobile device is definitely part of Twitter’s allure. Twitter’s mobile integration makes it an excellent medium to watch and spread content quickly. 141 Miller, Melissa . "43% of Twitter Users Access Twitter From a Mobile Phone [Data]." Internet Marketing Blog | HubSpot. N.p., n.d. Web. 21 Jan. 2012. <http://blog.hubspot.com/blog/tabid/6307/bid/25026/43-of-Twitter-Users- Access-Twitter-From-a-Mobile-Phone-Data.aspx>. 142 Facebook Statistics. Facebook.com. N.p., n.d. Web. 18 July 2011. <http://www.facebook.com/press/info.php?statistics>. 56 Chapter 6: The Dangers of Twitter “My stupid mouth Has got me in trouble I said too much again - John Mayer, “My Stupid Mouth” One of the most obvious examples of Twitter’s dangers is seen in how one misguided tweet and go viral and irrevocably damage one’s reputation. The most glaring example of this can be seen in what happened to Congressman Anthony Weiner when obscene pictures of him surfaced on Twitter. The main danger of Twitter though is less obvious. One of Twitter’s primary hazards for individuals and organizations is the medium’s propensity to strip away context from statements. In order to fit information into a 140 character tweet people have to significantly shorten information, which often leads to a loss of important peripheral and contextual variables. The best way to illustrate the way Twitter takes away context from information is through an anecdote involving singer-songwriter John Mayer. In 2010 Mayer became a stark victim of social networking’s irreverent approach to context. Mayer did an interview for Playboy magazine in 2010 that was absolutely riveting. He talked candidly and in-depth about the music industry, race relations in the United States, his relationship with his 82—year—old father, the nature of fame, the difficulties of finding love when one is a celebrity, the difficulties of his own love life, the ways that the entertainment industry and culture are intertwined, and countless other interesting subjects. I walked away from the interview extremely impressed with Mayer’s cognitive complexity; I’ve read many interviews with Mayer over the years and I honestly think he’s one of the most articulate celebrities in the entertainment industry. In the interview Mayer used a racial epithet, not in a hateful or racist manner, to illustrate a point he was making about race relations in the United States. He also told the reporter that he had never had a black girlfriend and wasn’t typically attracted to African American women (although he did offer the names of several African American women who he finds attractive.) A few days after Mayer’s interview came out 57 he started to be passionately persecuted in the media. Mayer was called a racist, a bigot, and some people started calling for people to protest his concerts. I attribute a lot of Mayer’s media crucifixion to social media since social media has no respect for context. Social media, especially Twitter, is all about getting information out quickly and succinctly. Rather than contextualizing Mayer’s comments, many people tweeted sensationalized tweets like “John Mayer hates black people” or “If you’re a black girl and you want to date John Mayer he isn’t interested.” Mayer’s interview was a multifaceted 6,870 word piece that many people might have viewed as a long and intimidating read. Rather than trying to read the interview, so they could understand the context of Mayer’s comments, many people just took the 140 character summations they saw on Twitter to be a perfect summary of the nearly 7,000 word piece. Twitter slices and dices quotes and stories down to where oftentimes the heart of a piece is lost in Twitter translation. Rob Tannenbaum, the writer of the Mayer article, told the Los Angeles Times “Twenty years ago, Milan Kundera pointed to ‘Rewriting as the spirit of the times.’ Now, it’s re-tweeting as the spirit of the times. A story gets shaved and shortened until it can fit into 140 characters or less.” Tannenbaum also stated “The Web is a series of filters. Each filter narrowed the story more & more, until, in some sectors, it turned into, ‘John Mayer is racist.’ The dominant version of this story is the reductive one being passed on Twitter, which focuses on about five of the story’s 6,870 words.” 143 Ann Powers, a columnist for the Los Angeles Times, when considering Mayer’s interview mused “Now, in light of what's happened, I wonder if the Internet has transformed the interview, making it something that can't be self-contained, that will inevitably explode into sound bytes that will be misinterpreted, re-spun and played out to the torment of those interview subjects. No wonder publicists limit access!” 144 Soon will reporters need to read Miranda rights to celebrities before they interview them 143 Powers, Ann . "John Mayer: The writer behind the controversial Playboy interview speaks out." Los Angeles Times 12 Feb. 2010, sec. The LA Times Music Blog : Online. Print. 144 Powers, Ann . "John Mayer: The writer behind the controversial Playboy interview speaks out." Los Angeles Times 12 Feb. 2010, sec. The LA Times Music Blog : Online. Print. 58 Mayer’s media evisceration in 2010 shows that social media has cultivated a world where anything you say can, and will be used against you. Hashtag Hijacking Look at me! Look at me! Look at me NOW! It is fun to have fun But you have to know how Dr. Seuss, “The Cat in the Hat” One of the primary dangers of Twitter, as well as any social networking site, is the ability for you to totally lose control over your message. You might send out a clever message and have it completely turned inside out and used against you. For example, during January 2012 McDonald’s introduced two new hashtags: “#McDStories and “MeetTheFarmers.” McDonald’s thought that these hashtags would encourage people to share stories about how much they adore McDonalds and discuss how astounding McDonald’s farmers are. This isn’t quite what happened. People instead decide to use these hashtags to talk about how much they abhorred McDonalds. Animals rights groups used the farmers hashtag to share unsavory pictures of McDonald’s farm animals and food. 145 145 Sebastian, Michael. "Was McDonald's Twitter problem really a 'McFail'? | Articles." PR Daily News: Public Relations news and marketing in the age of social media | Main. N.p., n.d. Web. 11 Feb. 2012. <http://www.prdaily.com/Main/Articles/Was_McDonalds_Twitter_problem_really 59 Blackberry also was a victim of hashtag hijacking this year. In January Blackberry started a Twitter campaign that asked its followers to use the hashtag #BeBold, to tell the world how they planned to #BeBold in 2012. 146 The following Tweets soon appeared: 1. #BeBold Get an iPhone 2. I decided to #BeBold and trade in my BlackBerry for an iPhone this month. So far it has been a great switch. Sorry, RIM 3. #bebold, use an android Needless to say this isn’t what Blackberry thought would happen when they introduced the “#Bebold” hashtag. The problem with these campaigns is they offered no value to consumers. What incentive is Blackberry offering users to post why they’re going to “#BeBold” in 2012? Le Veque notes that organizations using social media have to offer some form of value to people. You can’t just ask people to “like” you on Facebook or “follow” you on Twitter without giving them some incentive. For example, Le Veque knows a small pizza restaurant in Manhattan Beach that’s been able to cultivate a strong social media following by offering deals like “We’ll give a free pizza to the 20 th person who follows us today” or “We’ll give a $10 discount to the 100 th person who likes us on Facebook.” A heck of a lot of “likes” and “follows” are based on people wanting to win a trip to Hawaii or get a new car, etc. You need to give people a reason to follow you. Casual fans aren’t going to take much interest in your social media pages unless you give these audiences a strong motive to follow you. The main brands that acquire a large degree of followers, without offering any type of incentives, are what Le Veque calls “aspirational lifestyle brands.” A brand such as Tiffany & Co has large 146 Allen, Kevin. "Research in Motion’s Twitter campaign hijacked | Articles." PR Daily News: Public Relations news and marketing in the age of social media ." prdaily.com. N.p., 1 Feb. 2012. Web. 2 Feb. 2012. <www.prdaily.com/Main/Articles/10713>. 60 following, not because they offer incentives but because people want to be associated with a luxury brand. The same goes for cars; Lamborghini has 24,704 followers on Twitter; do you really think that 24,704 people on the planet own Lamborghinis? Certain brands can cultivate a following solely due to the aura that orbits around their brand; most brands though are going to have to find creative, incentive laden ways to engage their audiences. 61 Chapter 7: Twitter Best Practices "Let a fool hold his tongue and he will pass for a sage”- Publilius Syrus, First Century BC, Maxim 914 The author routinely hears people ask questions like: How do we craft our messages properly on Twitter to engage our audiences? The real question they should be asking is: How are we going to put ourselves in a position where we can adequately respond to our consumers to ensure them a great customer service experience and to guarantee that they feel as though they are appreciated and their opinions are valued? The best thing you can do to win affective capital on Twitter is to respond to your followers and show that you actually do care what they have to say. Robert Hernandez, during his time working for The Seattle Times, noticed that people absolutely loved it when reporters would call them back or respond to the comments they made online. A brand needs genuine human interaction if they want to stay relevant on Twitter. Matthew Le Veque notes that “Ignoring a Facebook message or a Tweet posting is like ignoring your phone while it rings off the hook” and that you simply can’t snub people on social networking sites if you wish to maintain a high degree of affective capital with the public in the modern technological zeitgeist. Robert notes that “Listening and engaging is the recipe for good customer service.” You can’t just be using your Twitter handle as an extension of your brand’s website and be spewing information left and right at people. You have to use Twitter as a means of assessing your brand’s pulse and addressing customer service complaints. One time Robert was staying in a hotel and he tweeted his displeasure that the hotel didn’t have a certain channel that was showing a particular soccer match he really wanted to watch. A friend re-tweeted this information, with more details, and Robert actually got a call from the hotel’s manager and they gave him a free voucher for the hotel’s bar, a place that did have access to the soccer channel Robert wanted to watch so he could come down to the hotel bar and watch the soccer match. This is an awesome example of an organization using Twitter the right way. 62 Matthew Le Veque cites Old Spice has a company that adroitly understands the “Twitterverse.” In 2010 Old Spice had their infamous “Old Spice Man” make personalized video responses to Twitter comments and blog posts that were directed at Old Spice 147 . He responded to questions and comments posed by celebrities like Ellen Degeneres, companies like Starbucks, anonymous Twitter trolls and websites like The Huffington Post. The Old Spice man gave relationship advice to random people who asked for it on Facebook, he sent videos to people who had made videos about him on YouTube, etc. 148 This videos went viral and brought an enormous amount of attention to Old Spice. This campaign generated tons of free advertising and publicity for Old Spice and created an array of brand advocates and most likely brand loyalist. This type of campaign is something that’s so easy to do yet so rarely done. The videos didn’t feature expensive production, nor where they hard to create. They just had some half naked dude in a bath robe record a bunch of 2-3 minutes messages for people. Starting a viral video campaign isn’t near as hard as a lot of people think it is. Organizations need to remember that they wouldn’t exist if it wasn’t for their customers and followers. Robert notes “The LA Times exist, not because the LA Times is a badass, it’s because of the city of Los Angeles.” By genuinely engaging and responded to your followers you show that you appreciate them and recognize their value. Robert says that sometimes your responses and comments will end up outweighing your original post if you initiate a good dialogue. It sounds simple, but just realizing that social media is made for two-way communication and proactively responding and engaging with your followers goes a very long way in the world of social media. This is simple advice that proves powerful. Simplicity is the most underrated thing in our modern world. 147 The Huffington Post. "Old Spice Guy Makes Hilarious Personalized Videos For Fans." Breaking News and Opinion on The Huffington Post. N.p., n.d. Web. 11 Feb. 2012. <http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/07/13/old-spice- guy-makes-hilar_n_644608.html#s113824&title=Tha 148 Ehrlich, Brenna . "The Old Spice Guy Now Making Custom Videos for Fans via Social Media." Social Media News and Web Tips – Mashable – The Social Media Guide. N.p., n.d. Web. 11 Feb. 2012. <http://mashable.com/2010/07/13/old-spice-gu/>. 63 Chapter 8: The Future of Twitter There's an ice cream place in Vancouver that has 200 flavors, if you can believe that. But the people who go there end up less satisfied with their purchase than the people who buy their ice cream at a place with only 20 flavors. Yet people are lined up out the door at the place with 200 flavors because it seems like you're more likely to get exactly what you want.”- Barry Schwartz, The Paradox of Choices “The culture of abundance robs us of satisfaction” -Barry Schwartz, The Paradox of Choice The author honestly thinks that Twitter has reached its ceiling when it comes to innovation. The author can’t see Twitter undergoing any major metamorphosis or evolution in the forthcoming years. Twitter has its primary goal, spreading information quickly and succinctly, and they execute this goal just about damn near perfect. One doesn’t think on their current interface that Twitter can really pursue any other challenges or endeavors. The author thinks of Twitter like he does radios; they both have a purpose they perform adroitly and neither one has much room to grow, nor do their users really want them to change that much. Robert Hernandez believes that Twitter has reached its peak, when it comes to product innovation, and that in the future they should concentrate on fine-tuning and improving what they already have; he also believes that when Twitter tries to innovate and change they usually end up doing more harm than good. Hernandez thinks that Twitter will look at finding ways to improve its search function and meta data in the forthcoming years; Hernandez would like to see them refine their search function so that individuals can locate the genesis and origins of where a story or trend started on Twitter. Matthew Le Veque suspects that Twitter will aim at creating better means of analytic analysis for brand and marketers in the forthcoming years but he, like Hernandez, doesn’t foresee Twitter undergoing any major changes or introducing any significant innovations in the near future. Le Veque believes that Twitter’s brass realizes that Twitter’s simplicity is a one of its greatest selling points and that they aren’t 64 going to do anything that will jeopardize the simplicity of the interface. For example, Le Veque doesn’t think Twitter will ever change the character length limits it currently imposes on users. The author thinks that Twitter is going to stick around for a long time but that it won’t evolve very much from its current incarnation anytime soon. 65 Chapter 9: Social Networking and Mobile Devices “Technology is legitimately alienating; the rise of computers has certainly made life easier, but they’ve also accelerated depression. Case in point: if this were 1904, you would not be reading this essay, you would be chopping wood or churning butter or watching one of your children perish from crib death. Your life would be horrible but it would have purpose. It would have clarity. Machines allow humans the privilege of existential existence. Machines provide us with extra time to worry about the status of our careers, and/or the context of our sexual relationships, and or what it means to be alive. Unconsciously, we hate technology. We hate the way it replaces visceral experience with self-absorption-Chuck Klosterman, IV Social Networking use through mobile devises is set to experience significant growth in the near future. According to ABI Research, the number of people who access social networks on smartphones and other mobile devises is set to surpass 1.7 billion worldwide by the end of 2016 which is more than triple the 550 million expected to access social networking sites through mobile devise in 2011 149 . Twitter is currently being built into Apple’s iOS 5 and Google+ is being integrated with Android phones, Facebook as of now does not have a mobile partnerships or deals in the works. Dan Shey, a director at ABI Research, notes that “The interesting aspect in Apple’s and Twitter’s partnership is how it can provide iPhone users with a verifiable social identity for websites and apps. That gives developers a lot of scope to innovate in areas such as authentication, personalization, and advertising. It’s a hint of things to come” 150 . Interestingly a Nielsen study suggests that internet users over the age of 50 are currently playing a major role in pushing the growth of social networking use on mobile devices 151 . 149 Reuters. "Over 1.7 Billion Mobile Social Networking Users in 2016 Means Facebook Needs Its Own Operating System, Says ABI Research| Reuters." Business & Financial News, Breaking US & International News | Reuters.com. N.p., n.d. Web. 21 Jan. 2012. <http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/09/21/idUS219002+21-Sep- 2011+BW20110921>. 150 Reuters. "Over 1.7 Billion Mobile Social Networking Users in 2016 Means Facebook Needs Its Own Operating System, Says ABI Research| Reuters." Business & Financial News, Breaking US & International News | Reuters.com. 66 Facebook’s lack of a mobile partnership isn’t hurting the site’s mobile traffic one bit. According to the Los Angeles Times, market-research firm comScore conducted researching on people using mobile devices to access social networks and found that Facebook and Twitter enjoyed the most traffic from mobile phones 152 . comScore’s research showed that mobile access to Facebook grew by 112% during 2010 and a jaw dropping 25 million people checked their Facebook profile from a mobile browser in January 2010 153 . The same study noted that 4 million people accessed their Twitter pages during January 2010. MySpace has been losing mobile users over the past three years; this is no surprise since MySpace’s user base has been shrinking significantly in recent years. MySpace’s user base peaked at 100 million in 2006, and has been declining since 154 . I’m not going to address MySpace in this thesis since I don’t feel like acting as a social networking coroner. MySpace is dying a slow and painful death. In July 2011, Facebook released an app called “Facebook for Every Phone” that made it easy to access Facebook from more than 2,500 different types of phones. The app was offered for free for its first 90 days to get people to test it out 155 . Bret Taylor, Facebook’s Chief Technology Officer, has declared that mobile users are twice as active on Facebook as people who are logging on via personal computers N.p., n.d. Web. 21 Jan. 2012. <http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/09/21/idUS219002+21-Sep- 2011+BW20110921>. 151 Miller, Melissa . "43% of Twitter Users Access Twitter From a Mobile Phone [Data]." Internet Marketing Blog | HubSpot. N.p., n.d. Web. 21 Jan. 2012. <http://blog.hubspot.com/blog/tabid/6307/bid/25026/43-of-Twitter-Users- Access-Twitter-From-a-Mobile-Phone-Data.aspx>. 152 Reisinger , Don . "Access to social networks from mobile phones soars - latimes.com." Top of the Ticket - politics, national, California, Washington, Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, John McCain, Republican, Democrat, president, election - latimes.com. N.p., n.d. Web. 30 Sept. 2011. <http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/technology/2010/03/comscore-mobile-social-networking.html>. 153 Reisinger , Don . "Access to social networks from mobile phones soars - latimes.com." Top of the Ticket - politics, national, California, Washington, Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, John McCain, Republican, Democrat, president, election - latimes.com. N.p., n.d. Web. 30 Sept. 2011. <http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/technology/2010/03/comscore-mobile-social-networking.html>. 154 Lewis , Luke . " The sad shrinking of Myspace into the digital void | Luke Lewis | Comment is free | guardian.co.uk ." Latest US and world news, sport and comment from the Guardian | guardiannews.com | US Network front | The Guardian . N.p., n.d. Web. 30 Sept. 2011. <http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/jan/14/myspace-facebook-gaudy-user-pages>. 155 Guynn, Jessica . "Facebook launches free mobile app for more than 2,500 phones." Los Angeles Times 12 July 2011, sec. Technology: Online. Print. 67 and that so far 250 million Facebook users are connecting to the site through mobile devices. Taylor believes that eventually mobile use will surpass desktop use. Robert Hernandez also thinks mobile use will overtake desktop use in the future. This is very important prediction to consider when one thinks about the future of social networking. 68 Chapter 10: YouTube The truth, of course, is that we are the slaves; the machines became our masters through a bloodless coup that began during the Industrial Revolution By now, I think most Americans are aware of that reality; I think any smarter-than-average person already concedes that (a) we’ve lost control of technology, and (b) there’s nothing we can do about it-Chuck Klosterman, IV YouTube is a video sharing site, founded by Chad Hurley, Steve Chen and Jawed Karim, that was first introduced in 2005 156 . The site was purchased by Google in 2006 for $1.65 billion in stock 157 . At the time, this was the most expensive acquisition in the history of Google 158 and some pundits viewed it as a risky investment 159 . The pundits were definitely dead wrong on this one; the purchase of YouTube would prove to be one of the most astute decisions Google ever made. The author believes that YouTube might be the most important social networking site there is moving into the future. Individuals can use YouTube to upload video clips completely free of charge. YouTube features a vast array of video content. One can find major movie clips, professional and amateur music videos, video blogs (Cool hipsters call these “Vlogs.” The author doesn’t know if he’s hip and cool enough to invoke a term like Vlog so he’ll be using the descriptor “video blog” for the remaining duration of this thesis), news clips, informative videos, videos of cats dancing, videos of people fighting, game show clips, audio from famous radio shows, really shaky videos from Taylor Swift or Red Hot Chili Peppers 156 Hopkins, Jim. "Surprise! There's a third YouTube co-founder - USATODAY.com." News, Travel, Weather, Entertainment, Sports, Technology, U.S. & World - USATODAY.com. N.p., n.d. Web. 14 Jan. 2012. <http://www.usatoday.com/tech/news/2006-10-11-youtube-karim_x.htm>. 157 Associated Press. "Google buys YouTube for $1.65 billion - Business - US business - msnbc.com." msnbc.com - Breaking news, science and tech news, world news, US news, local news- msnbc.com. N.p., n.d. Web. 14 Jan. 2012. <http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/15196982/ns/business-us_business/t/google-buys-youtube-billion/>. 158 Associated Press. "Google buys YouTube for $1.65 billion - Business - US business - msnbc.com." msnbc.com - Breaking news, science and tech news, world news, US news, local news- msnbc.com. N.p., n.d. Web. 14 Jan. 2012. <http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/15196982/ns/business-us_business/t/google-buys-youtube-billion/>. 159 Stone, Brad. "YouTube, Now 5, Shows Signs of Growing Up - NYTimes.com." The New York Times - Breaking News, World News & Multimedia. N.p., n.d. Web. 14 Jan. 2012. <http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/17/technology/17youtube.html>. 69 concerts, videos of people prank calling the police, how to instructional videos, amateur comedic skits, etc. It’s not an exaggeration to say that you can find literally a video about just about anything on YouTube. A source at Google confirmed to Teach Crunch that, as of 2009, YouTube was streaming above 1.2 billion videos per day worldwide 160 . This number is absolutely flabbergasting. According to Comscore data, in 2009 it was estimated that 1.5 billion people were on the internet 161 , this means that, on average, every internet user in the world in 2009 was watching one YouTube video per day. One should note that Google hasn’t provided exact analytics or figures for the number of videos that there are on YouTube, or exact traffic numbers for the site. They’ve merely confirmed that YouTube streams “above” 1.2 billion videos per day. In 2009, Comscore estimated that YouTube/Google streamed just under 7 billion videos per month in the United States 162 . In the same year Nielson estimated that YouTube/Google streamed 5.5 billion videos per month 163 . While one can’t say exactly how many videos there are on YouTube, one can say with certainty that the site is growing exponentially and its meteoric growth has no end in sight; as your eyes are reading this sentence there are probably a few hundred videos being uploaded to YouTube. There’s a good chance that they might feature babies doing something cute and humorous, dogs or cats riding a skateboard or people doing something egregiously obnoxious. In December of 2011 YouTube announced that it logged 1 trillion hits for the year 2011! 164 This number really helps illuminate the notion that YouTube is one of the most important and powerful social 160 Arrington, Michael. "YouTube Video Streams Top 1.2 Billion/Day | TechCrunch." TechCrunch. N.p., n.d. Web. 14 Jan. 2012. <http://techcrunch.com/2009/06/09/youtube-video-streams-top-1-billionday/>. 161 Schonfeld , Erick. "ComScore: Internet Population Passes One Billion; Top 15 Countries | TechCrunch." TechCrunch. N.p., n.d. Web. 14 Jan. 2012. <http://techcrunch.com/2009/01/23/comscore-internet-population- passes-one-billion-top-15-countries/>. 162 Arrington, Michael. "YouTube Video Streams Top 1.2 Billion/Day | TechCrunch." TechCrunch. N.p., n.d. Web. 14 Jan. 2012. <http://techcrunch.com/2009/06/09/youtube-video-streams-top-1-billionday/>. 163 Arrington, Michael. "YouTube Video Streams Top 1.2 Billion/Day | TechCrunch." TechCrunch. N.p., n.d. Web. 14 Jan. 2012. <http://techcrunch.com/2009/06/09/youtube-video-streams-top-1-billionday/>. 164 Tsukayama, Hayley . "YouTube: The future of entertainment is on the Web - The Washington Post." Washington Post: Breaking News, World, US, DC News & Analysis. N.p., n.d. Web. 15 Jan. 2012. 70 media mediums currently in the world. It is estimated that YouTube has close to 800 million users worldwide 165 . YouTube has also surpassed Yahoo to become the second most popular search engine on the internet YouTube currently has agreements with CBS and MGM which allow them to upload films, televisions serials and ads for the networks. They also have partnerships with the Universal Music Group and Sony BMG Music Entertainment that allows users to use music from these conglomerates for their videos 166 and a deal with Disney Interactive to produce content specifically tailored for Disney’s audience 167 .YouTube is currently in discussions to renew its agreements with the Universal Music Group, Sony Music Entertainment, and EMI music 168 . Robert Kyncl, a top YouTube executive, when talking about YouTube’s astonding success, predicts that in Internet video content will soon account for 90% of the traffic on the Internet 169 . Kyncl also prophesizes that specialized internet shows will soon surpass traditional television programming and by the year 2020 that 75% of all new television channels will be introduced through online means 170 . <http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/technology/youtube-the-future-of-entertainment-is-on-the- web/2012/01/12/gIQADpdBuP_story.html?tid=pm_bu 165 Associated Press. "YouTube, Disney join in Web video partnership - CBS News." Breaking News Headlines: Business, Entertainment & World News - CBS News. N.p., n.d. Web. 14 Jan. 2012. <http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-501366_162-57319558/youtube-disney-join-in-web-video-partnership/>. 166 Lombardi, Candace. "YouTube cuts three content deals - CNET News." Technology News - CNET News. N.p., n.d. Web. 14 Jan. 2012. <http://news.cnet.com/YouTube-cuts-three-content-deals/2100-1030_3-6123914.html>. 167 Associated Press. "YouTube, Disney join in Web video partnership - CBS News." Breaking News Headlines: Business, Entertainment & World News - CBS News. N.p., n.d. Web. 14 Jan. 2012. 168 Langshaw, Mark. "YouTube in talks with record labels to renew licences? - Tech News - Digital Spy." TV news, TV shows, celebrity news and gossip - Digital Spy. N.p., n.d. Web. 14 Jan. 2012. <http://www.digitalspy.com/tech/news/a360066/youtube-in-talks-with-record-labels-to-renew-licences.html>. 169 Chmielewski, Dawn. "YouTube's Robert Kyncl charts Internet video's meteoric rise - latimes.com." Blogs - latimes.com. N.p., n.d. Web. 15 Jan. 2012. <http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/entertainmentnewsbuzz/2012/01/youtube-robert-kyncl-internet-videos.html>. 170 Tsukayama, H. (n.d.). YouTube: The future of entertainment is on the Web - The Washington Post. Washington Post: Breaking News, World, US, DC News & Analysis. Retrieved January 15, 2012, from http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/technology/youtube-the-future-of-entertainment-is-on-the- web/2012/01/12/gIQADpdBuP_story.html?tid=pm_bu 71 YouTube’s conviction in Kyncl’s predictions can be seen in how the company recently invested $100 million into original content development and production 171 . YouTube surmises that online specialized programming is the way of the future, and that online television could kill cable TV. Video killed the radio star; will its next victim be the television star? All predators if they live long enough eventually see themselves become the prey. Precedent suggests that the potential for online specialized programs to succeed is tremendous. Michelle Phan, a “YouTube celebrity” who specializes in making instructional makeup videos and fashion videos, currently attracts twice the number of viewers that beauty shows on the Style cable network do 172 ; Phan also has mainstream advertising support. A YouTube video game channel called “Machinima” receives 1 billion views every month from 116 million different people from around the world 173 . Comedian Ray William Johnson has three YouTube channels that currently have over 1 billion views 174 . 171 Tsukayama, Hayley . "YouTube: The future of entertainment is on the Web - The Washington Post." Washington Post: Breaking News, World, US, DC News & Analysis. N.p., n.d. Web. 15 Jan. 2012. <http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/technology/youtube-the-future-of-entertainment-is-on-the- web/2012/01/12/gIQADpdBuP_story.html?tid=pm_b 172 Chmielewski, Dawn. "YouTube's Robert Kyncl charts Internet video's meteoric rise - latimes.com." Blogs - latimes.com. N.p., n.d. Web. 15 Jan. 2012. <http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/entertainmentnewsbuzz/2012/01/youtube-robert-kyncl-internet-videos.html>. 173 Chmielewski, Dawn. "YouTube's Robert Kyncl charts Internet video's meteoric rise - latimes.com." Blogs - latimes.com. N.p., n.d. Web. 15 Jan. 2012. <http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/entertainmentnewsbuzz/2012/01/youtube-robert-kyncl-internet-videos.html>. 174 Tsukayama, Hayley . "YouTube: The future of entertainment is on the Web - The Washington Post." Washington Post: Breaking News, World, US, DC News & Analysis. N.p., n.d. Web. 15 Jan. 2012. <http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/technology/youtube-the-future-of-entertainment-is-on-the- web/2012/01/12/gIQADpdBuP_story.html?tid=pm_b 72 Chapter 11: Can YouTube Programming Supersede Traditional Television? My candle burns at both ends; It will not last the night; But ah, my foes, and oh, my friends— It gives lovely light -Edina St. Vincent Millay, The First Fig, 1920 The author does not believe that YouTube will render traditional cable television obsolete anytime soon. A group of people gathering around a television to watch a program or a movie is a tradition and ritual that won’t die anytime soon. The main reason the author doesn’t think that online television will ever surpass cable television is due to the fact that online programs can’t be monetized to the extinct that cable shows can. Advertisements during cable shows are much more effective than online ads which are seen as white noise and basically ignored by most internet users. Many people have programmed their minds to view all online ads as nothing more than spam and garbage not worthy of note; the author believes that online ads are basically invisible to a large majority of the current internet using population. Robert Hernandez also believes that internet advertising, in its current form, is extremely gauche. Hernandez notes that there has been little no innovation in the realm of internet advertising. He muses that many advertisers are just deciding to make ads that are “Bigger, more obnoxious, that do everything to trick people to click on them. And that’s why advertising sucks. Whack a monkey so you can win an iPad; you know, it’s spam! We look at those as scams.” Hernandez believes the only way that internet advertising can succeed is if it becomes less obtrusive, less obnoxious, more relevant, more useful, and is treated more like content; he feels that ads need to serve the community rather than annoy the community. The author agrees with Robert 100%; the current way advertising is utilized online is atrocious. The author doesn’t think that online programming will be able to be as commercially viable as traditional television for quite some time, thus it won’t supersede traditional television viewing in the near 73 future. The author also doesn’t think that online programming can attract the same level of talent that major studios can right now. YouTube has currently attracted: CSI creator Anthony Zuiker, actor Rainn Wilson, and Felicia Day to help it develop exclusive YouTube programming 175 . All three of these people are basically anonymous to the average Joe walking the street; these people aren’t going to draw in larger crowds like stars on major broadcast networks will.. In 2010 Business Insider estimated that the most popular independent YouTube program creators were making around $100,000 to $150,000 a year 176 ; the two most popular YouTube content providers in 2009-2010 were “The Annoying Orange” and Shane Dawson who made $288,000 and $315,000 respectively 177 . The author doesn’t believe that someone working on a salary of $100,000 is going to be able to produce the same quality content as a major studio that’s working with a multi-million dollar budget. YouTube content providers can find a strong and passionate niche audience but it will be very hard for them to break into the mainstream due to financial limitations. Is some kid making $100,000 year, who has his own entertainment show, going to be able to compete with Ryan Seacrest and E! News or CNN’s Showbiz Tonight? Do you really think that George Clooney’s publicist is going to send George to Des Moines, Iowa to do an interview in some dude’s basement? Do you really think a major company is going to pour tons of advertising money into a basically anonymous YouTube sports show or are they going to use their money to get a good spot on an ESPN Monday Night Football broadcast? This opinion is vehemently contested by some experts. Bob Garfield, an advertising critic for Ad Age, and the cohost of NPR’s program On The Media, thinks that traditional television advertising is essentially doomed. Garfield notes that America’s population has grown by 30 million people during the 175 Chmielewski, Dawn. "YouTube's Robert Kyncl charts Internet video's meteoric rise - latimes.com." Blogs - latimes.com. N.p., n.d. Web. 15 Jan. 2012. <http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/entertainmentnewsbuzz/2012/01/youtube-robert-kyncl-internet-videos.html>. 176 Wei, William. "Rich YouTube Stars." Business Insider. N.p., n.d. Web. 15 Jan. 2012. <http://www.businessinsider.com/meet-the-richest-independent-youtube-stars-2010-8>. 177 Wei, William. "Rich YouTube Stars." Business Insider. N.p., n.d. Web. 15 Jan. 2012. <http://www.businessinsider.com/meet-the-richest-independent-youtube-stars-2010-8>. 74 previous decade but network television’s audience has managed to decrease by 2% during this time span 178 ; he also points out the fact that a growing number of Americans now use DVR devices so that they don’t have to watch any commercials at all. Garfield also points out that the sheer abundance of channels currently available to someone makes advertising a lot less effective since many people simply change their channel when an ad comes on. It isn’t like the old days anymore where people had 4 channels and they basically were forced to watch ads due to a lack of alternative programming. Garfield asserts that television’s stagnant audience, and the proliferation of large cable packages, with more and more channels, will eventually lead to advertisers turning to the internet to reach their consumers. Garfield thinks it’s only a matter of time before advertises surmise that they aren’t reaching people through television and they when they aren’t able to find an alternative means of advertising that a form of media chaos will develop 179 . While the potency of traditional television advertising is dwindling the internet isn’t yet an adequate replacement medium. Content providers could adopt a pay-per-view scenario for online programming but that’s just going to make people start pirating content at a higher rate than they already do. People don’t pay for music, why would we expect them to pay for television? If YouTube specialized programming were to become the norm advertisers and PR professionals could try to utilize product placement and incorporate their clients into the narrative of a story but this is likely to alienate viewers. People really don’t like seeing blatant attempts at product placement. Garfield muses, “People hate it when they recognize product placement. It’s strange: Americans will willingly give up huge elements of their civil liberties, but they won’t stand for the corruption of their Hollywood- produced crap.” 180 Matthew Le Veque also thinks that it will be hard for online programming to dethrone traditional television due to the importance that small communities place on local newscasts. Le Veque asserts 178 Klosterman, Chuck. Chuck Klosterman IV. London: Faber, 2007. Print. 179 Klosterman, Chuck. Chuck Klosterman IV. London: Faber, 2007. Print. 180 Klosterman, Chuck. Chuck Klosterman IV. London: Faber, 2007. Print. 75 “Local news broadcast are still really important sources of information for local communities. I don’t see those going away.” Le Veque is correct in his avowal that local news broadcast play an important part in many people’s lives when it comes to learning about their communities; the author doesn’t think local broadcasts will be upended by independent startups anytime soon. Le Veque believes that a possible answer to the internet/traditional advertising quandary might be to synthesize traditional television and internet through the use of “Smart TVs.” A smart TV would be a device like a smart phone in regards to how it would be a place of multi-media amalgamation. Le Veque envisions smart TVs being hooked up to the internet and allowing people to surf the net while they watch cable programming. These TVs would also allow people to share a particular news story through their social networks immediately after watching it on TV. For example, Le Veque thinks one day he will be able to watch a 3 minute story on NBC’s Nightline and then press a couple of buttons on his remote that will allow him to email the story to his students. Smart TVs would also allow you to look up links about subject matter on your television while you watch a program about it. For example, while a man is watching Piers Morgan interview a presidential candidate a smart TV would let him run a search about the candidate, in a search engine on the right side of his screen, while the left side of his screen would continue showing Morgan’s interview. 76 Chapter 12: The Medium Will Soon Transcend the Message Modern Life changes no longer century by century, but year by year, ten times faster than it ever has before –populations doubling, civilizations unified more close with other civilizations, economic interdependence, racial questions, and –we’re dawdling along. My idea is that we’ve got to go very much faster-F. Scott Fitzgerald, This Side of Paradise, 1920 While YouTube will probably never be able to overtake traditional television anytime soon it could be the most important tool for PR professionals moving into the next decade. We are becoming an obsessively visual culture of people who have extremely short attention spans and increasing ephemeral tastes. It’s fascinating that the quote that introduces this section was written in 1920; Fitzgerald is definitely a prophet. Time is accelerating at an unprecedented pace and it is becoming more and more difficult to stand out. Many people might feel as though their screams always ache out as whispers with the information oversaturation and media overload that we now find ourselves in. Some of the fundamental questions of modern PR are: How do I elevate myself above the noise? How can one stand out in the modern world where literally millions of people and entities are always fiercely competing for people’s attention? How do I get noticed amongst the assortment of people and media fighting for people’s time? One of the best ways to stand out from the rest is to make unique a YouTube video of you doing some type of stunt. The media absolutely adores it when people do stunts such as: creating the world’s largest pepperoni pizza, creating a flash mob in a unique locale, building some huge object in Times Square, creating some parody song about your product, etc. The author believes that videos have a far greater chance of going viral than a blog post. Most blogging websites won’t release exact figures about how many views individual post receive 181 but I suspect that it’s quite rare for an outstanding blog post to receive anywhere close to the number of views that a popular YouTube video can. A really noteworthy YouTube video can receive millions of views; I 181 Silver, Nate . "The Economics of Blogging and The Huffington Post - NYTimes.com." Election Forecasts - FiveThirtyEight Blog - NYTimes.com. N.p., n.d. Web. 15 Jan. 2012. <http://fivethirtyeight.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/02/12/the-economics-of-blogging-and-the-huffington-post/>. 77 doubt that even the most popular blog posts of all time can break 5 figures. Sadly, a lot of people are willing to dedicate three minutes to watching a YouTube video but they won’t dedicate 15 minutes to reading a really thought provoking blog post or news article. Chad Kultgen’s book The Average American Male provides a perfect example of the power of YouTube in helping one bypass traditional media to get attention. The Average American Male is a novel that features an extremely sexist, arguably misogynistic, protagonist who swears constantly and is obsessed with sex. When the Average American Male first came out its publisher, Harper Perennial, couldn’t get anyone to write about the book. 182 To gain attention for the book Harper Perennial made a series of ingenious YouTube videos designed to basically suggest that men and women are typically operating on different wavelengths when it comes to a relationship. The videos would show a man and women interacting and through third party commentary it would suggest that men are more often than not thinking about sex when women are thinking about everlasting love and marriage. The campaign caught fire; the clips started garnering a ton of views and started appearing on a vast array of websites that would reach the book’s target demographic: young, liberal males. The videos significantly increased the sales of The Average American Male, the book went back to press three times during the first two weeks of its viral campaign 183 and its campaign was featured on CNBC. This anecdote perfectly illustrates how YouTube can be used for PR to bypass traditional media gatekeepers to reach and engage your targeted audience segmentations. Robert Hernandez believes that visuals will increase in the future but he thinks that text will remain the dominant communicative form since text is the easiest thing to produce. To make a video you have to have a video camera, filming literacy and editing skills; Robert believes that these things will limit the average person’s ability to create visuals. The author thinks that these skills will become essential in the coming years and that people who refuse to learn how to film and edit clips will be left 182 "The Average American Male on CNBC - YouTube ." YouTube - Broadcast Yourself. . N.p., n.d. Web. 16 Jan. 2012. <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zBd4VQJIwYE>. 183 "The Average American Male on CNBC - YouTube ." YouTube - Broadcast Yourself. . N.p., n.d. Web. 16 Jan. 2012. <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zBd4VQJIwYE>. 78 behind. When the internet first came out a lot of people didn’t know how to use it; this didn’t inhibit it from changing the communicational landscape of the world. People simply adapted and learned how to harness the internet’s potential. Something similar could happen with visuals; Robert is correct that right now there aren’t many people who have the skills to produce top notch visual content but that doesn’t mean there won’t be mass scale learning in the near future. Matthew Leveque agrees with the opinion that we are going to become even more of a visual society in the future and that video production skills will be essential if you want to work in PR, journalism or any type of communications vocation. Leveque notes that in the future “You aren’t going to be creating video content and multi-media content to rise above the noise; you’re going to have to create it to be in the noise.” Le Veque thinks that all PR professionals and communications professionals will soon be required to be multi-media content creators if they want to be successful in the modern era. Leveque also points to the growing popularity of photo sharing site Pinterest as an example of how potent visuals are becoming in our current internet landscape. Some research suggests that Pinterest currently drives more referral traffic than Google+, YouTube and Linkedln 184 . Cisco predicts that by 2015, internet traffic will be substantially more mobile based, and it will be mostly made up of video content 185 . By 2015, video traffic will account for two-thirds of Internet traffic 186 . It’s clear that visuals and videos are the way of the future. The Huffington Post has also recognized that video is the way of the future and has proclaimed that this year they will introduce more “Interactive Video Journalism.” This new form of journalism will have reporters upload videos of stories and then directly have a dialogue with individuals or groups 184 Solis, Brian. "Pinterest Rivals Twitter in Referral Traffic #pinteresting." Social Media Today. N.p., 2 Feb. 2012. Web. 9 Feb. 2012. <socialmediatoday.com/briansolis/438550/pinterest-rivals-twitter-referral-traffic-pinteresting>. 185 Goldman, David. "The Internet in 2015: Mind-blowing Video and mobile traffic - Jun. 1, 2011." CNNMoney - Business, financial and personal finance news. N.p., n.d. Web. 9 Feb. 2012. <http://money.cnn.com/2011/06/01/technology/cisco_visual_networking_index/index.htm>. 186 Goldman, David. "The Internet in 2015: Mind-blowing Video and mobile traffic - Jun. 1, 2011." CNNMoney - Business, financial and personal finance news. N.p., n.d. Web. 9 Feb. 2012. <http://money.cnn.com/2011/06/01/technology/cisco_visual_networking_index/index.htm>. 79 through a video chat system, such as Skype, 187 about the content they uploaded. This will be interactive journalism in its purest form. The “HuffPost Streaming Network” will launch this coming summer and feature close to 12 hours of live and interactive content. 188 187 Plesser, Andy. "Beet.TV: Arianna Huffington's Vision of Interactive Video Journalism." Beet.TV: CBS Interactive Readies Three-Day Grammy Build-up, Lands GM & Target as Sponsors. N.p., n.d. Web. 9 Feb. 2012. <http://www.beet.tv/2012/02/arianna.html>. 188 Plesser, Andy. "Beet.TV: Arianna Huffington's Vision of Interactive Video Journalism." Beet.TV: CBS Interactive Readies Three-Day Grammy Build-up, Lands GM & Target as Sponsors. N.p., n.d. Web. 9 Feb. 2012. <http://www.beet.tv/2012/02/arianna.html>. 80 Chapter 13: PLUS, there’s Google + Having sex with the same woman a thousand times is way more interesting than having a thousand one night stands with a thousand different women, because those one night stands are all the same-Steven Tyler Google+ is a social networking site that was launched on June 28, 2011 in a testing phase 189 . During its testing phase the service was only available to a few selected “early adopters” and some selected journalist 190 . Google+ allows people to organize their social networking connections into groups called “circles” which act as a means of classifying one’s relationship with a person. For example, you can create a circle entitled “Co-workers” for your coworkers and another circle entitled “Family” for family members. This allows you to send messages and share information with specific groups of people instead of everyone you make a connection with on the social networking site, although sharing with everyone is possible. Bradley Horowitz, the man who oversees Google's communications products and social applications, says “We've created a system that's based on the concept of circles, so that I can take my college friends and drag them into a circle called 'college buddies,' and I can take my work colleagues and drag them into a circle that's called 'work friends.' And I can share selectively the parts of myself with those circles that I choose to.” 191 Facebook has responded by introducing a “smart list” feature that allows users to organize their friends in a similar manner 192 . 189 Kaste, Martin . "Facebook's Newest Challenger: Google Plus : NPR." NPR : National Public Radio : News & Analysis, World, US, Music & Arts : NPR. N.p., n.d. Web. 4 Oct. 2011. <http://www.npr.org/2011/06/29/137507567/facebooks-newest-challenger-google-plus>. 190 Kaste, Martin . "Facebook's Newest Challenger: Google Plus : NPR." NPR : National Public Radio : News & Analysis, World, US, Music & Arts : NPR. N.p., n.d. Web. 4 Oct. 2011. <http://www.npr.org/2011/06/29/137507567/facebooks-newest-challenger-google-plus>. 191 Kaste, Martin . "Facebook's Newest Challenger: Google Plus : NPR." NPR : National Public Radio : News & Analysis, World, US, Music & Arts : NPR. N.p., n.d. Web. 4 Oct. 2011. <http://www.npr.org/2011/06/29/137507567/facebooks-newest-challenger-google-plus>. 192 Ross, Blake . "Improved Friends List." Facebook Blog. N.p., n.d. Web. 4 Oct. 2011. http://www.facebook.com/blog.php?post=10150278932602131 81 On September 18 th , 2011 Google+ registration was opened to anyone over the age of 18 193 . Google+ has an interface that is extremely similar to Facebook’s current layout. It has a stream where one can view the information that is currently being shared by others in one’s stream and a space where one can easily type information or post a link to share with others; users have the right to choose which “circles” they share information with. G+ also lets users conduct “Hangouts” which are group video chats in which up to 10 people can see and talk to one another. Hangouts are very similar to Skype chats. Since it was opened up to the public G+ has experienced a tremendous surge of new members. In less than one month G+ has attracted 25 million users 194 . Google+ is the fastest social network to reach 10 million users at 16 days. Facebook took 852 days to reach that mark and Twitter did it in 780 days 195 . Early figures suggest that G+ isn’t radiating with women as strongly as it is men. Currently G+’s membership is 63% male and 37% female. 196 After just six months, Ancestry.com founder Paul Allen claims that Google+ now has more than 62 million users and is steadily adding close to 625,000 users per day 197 . G+ has consistently evolved 193 Boutin, Paul. "Google+ for Everyone: What You Need to Know - NYTimes.com." Electronics and Gadgets - Gadgetwise Blog - NYTimes.com. N.p., n.d. Web. 4 Oct. 2011. <http://gadgetwise.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/09/20/google-for-everyone-what-you-need-to-know/>. 194 Bulas , Jeff. "Google+ Hits 25 Million Users in Less than One Month | Jeffbullas's Blog." Social Media Marketing and Blogging. N.p., 3 Oct. 2011. Web. 4 Oct. 2011. <http://www.jeffbullas.com/2011/08/04/google-hits-25-million- users-in-less-then-one-month/#SMM>. 195 Bulas , Jeff. "Google+ Hits 25 Million Users in Less than One Month | Jeffbullas's Blog." Social Media Marketing and Blogging. N.p., 3 Oct. 2011. Web. 4 Oct. 2011. <http://www.jeffbullas.com/2011/08/04/google-hits-25-million- users-in-less-then-one-month/#SMM>. 196 Bulas , Jeff. "Google+ Hits 25 Million Users in Less than One Month | Jeffbullas's Blog." Social Media Marketing and Blogging. N.p., 3 Oct. 2011. Web. 4 Oct. 2011. <http://www.jeffbullas.com/2011/08/04/google-hits-25-million- users-in-less-then-one-month/#SMM>. 197 Parr, Ben. "Six Months of Google+: Where Does Google’s Social Network Stand?." Ben Parr's Entrepreneurial Musings. N.p., n.d. Web. 13 Jan. 2012. <http://benparr.com/2011/12/google-plus-six-months/>. 82 since its inception, over the past 6 months Google has launched more than 150 new G+ features such as G+ games, improved Hangout chats, etc 198 . Data that appeared in the Los Angeles Times suggests that Google+ is struggling to attract and retain a user base. According to data given to the Times by “Hitwise” U.S. traffic to G+ has fallen in 11 of the 21 weeks since its launch, regularly falling between 10% and 20% from one week to the next 199 . G+ experienced some minor gains in traffic and increases in its user base after the site started to allow companies to create their own G+ pages, and opened up the site to businesses and education organizations that use its Google Apps 200 . Overall though, Google+ has been fighting sharp declines during its 5 month existence 201 . The author believes that Google+ is going to be a massive failure since it brings nothing new to the table that would make someone want to leave Facebook and become a hardcore G+ user. Let’s look at G+ in literary terms. Do you remember how after Harry Potter become popular how a bunch of deadbeat losers started writing their own young adult books about magic? Or didn’t you notice how a bunch of teenage vampire novels started appearing on the shelves at Barnes & Noble after Twilight caught fire? Consider G+ in the same way as a wannabe Harry Potter book or wannabe Twilight book; it’s a clear attempt at trying to make some bank off of someone’s else’s super successful idea. Google is trying to ride Facebook’s coattails. If Google wanted its social network to have any chance at being successful it needed to bring some innovation to the table, instead of merely producing an imitative facsimile that proves to be nothing but a junior varsity version of Facebook. 198 Parr, Ben. "Six Months of Google+: Where Does Google’s Social Network Stand?." Ben Parr's Entrepreneurial Musings. N.p., n.d. Web. 13 Jan. 2012. <http://benparr.com/2011/12/google-plus-six-months/>. 199 Sarno, David. "Google+ continues battle with fading user interest, data say - latimes.com." Blogs - latimes.com. N.p., n.d. Web. 13 Jan. 2012. <http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/technology/2011/11/google-plus-traffic.html>. 200 Sarno, David. "Google+ continues battle with fading user interest, data say - latimes.com." Blogs - latimes.com. N.p., n.d. Web. 13 Jan. 2012. <http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/technology/2011/11/google-plus-traffic.html>. 201 Sarno, David. "Google+ continues battle with fading user interest, data say - latimes.com." Blogs - latimes.com. N.p., n.d. Web. 13 Jan. 2012. <http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/technology/2011/11/google-plus-traffic.html>. 83 G+ is basically just like Facebook, except the interface is duller and there are a lot less people on the site. G+’s small user base is the primary reason it will never ascend to the apex of success that Facebook has. If someone has 1,5000 friends on Facebook, why would they bother going to another social networking site where they’ll have to tediously search and add all of their friends all over again and receive no significant benefits that they can’t already get on Facebook? Matthew Le Veque points to G+’s Hangouts has a place of major differentiation from Facebook and thinks that Hangouts could prove to be a valuable commodity for G+ in its fight against Facebook. The author strongly disagrees with Le Veque. Most people have the free service Skype, so they see no super pressing reason to use Google’s Hangout service. Google Hangouts are an unnecessary luxury. Skype and Google Hangouts both only allow for 10 people to chat at one time 202203 . Facebook is a Mercedes Benz; Google+ is like those imitative Benzes you can buy on the black market in China; it’s close to the original but it will forever be inferior. Robert Hernandez feels that G+ had potential but that it’s been severely mishandled. Hernandez points to G+’s lack of an efficient mobile program has a major factor to the site not gaining popularity. Hernandez, like me, also points to the lack of people and content on the site has a major reason why G+ is struggling. The site doesn’t have the novelty and diversity of content that Facebook does and it doesn’t have the energy that Twitter or Facebook possess. Hernandez also thinks that the G+ circle system is deficient due to the fact that you don’t know what circles someone else might have you in. Think about it, someone could have you in a circle called “People I hate” or “The biggest assholes I’ve ever met in my entire life” and you wouldn’t know it. 202 "Invite people to a hangout - Google+ Help." Google Help. N.p., n.d. Web. 10 Feb. 2012. <http://support.google.com/plus/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=1215839>. 203 "Skype - The Big Blog - Make group video calls with up to 10 people with the new beta version of Skype for Windows." Skype: Skype Blogs. N.p., n.d. Web. 10 Feb. 2012. <http://blogs.skype.com/en/2010/09/10_way_video_calling.html>. 84 Chapter 14: The Crux of Google+’s Failure: A Lack of Human Capital The masses are in reality their own leaders, dialectically creating their own development process-Rosa Luxemburg The masses are the decisive element, they are the rock on which the final victory of the revolution will be built-Rosa Luxemburg The author suspects that companies aren’t going to focus much on G+ because they want to reach as many people as possible to maximum their opportunities to make monetary capital. Facebook had 800 million users 204 , while some estimates put G+’s user base at 62 million. If you’re an organization it makes literally zero sense why you would target 60 million instead of 300 million. Another aspect of Facebook that makes it much more appealing to advertisers than G+ is the fact that Facebook allows for more specific segmented advertising. On a Facebook page users are able to list their favorite activities, favorite types of music, favorite movies, favorite television shows, etc. Facebook is an advertiser’s heaven. Matthew Leveque thinks that it’s a little bit too soon to act as a digital coroner and classify G+ as a dying site with no potential for resurrection. Leveque notes that G+ is “Not something we should take lightly because Google is not a small company that doesn’t have strong goals or resources.” Leveque does concede though that, despite Google’s strong reservoir of resources and innovative spirit, they’ve vehemently pushed several platforms that have failed in the not so distant past. Remember Google Wave? Google has shown that it has no qualms about shutting down a platform if it fails to live up to expectations. If G+ doesn’t experience substantial growth in the next two years the author suspect it will follow in the footsteps of the brontosaurus and become extinct. 204 Facebook Statistics. Facebook.com. N.p., n.d. Web. 18 July 2011. <http://www.facebook.com/press/info.php?statistics>. 85 Chapter 15: Can Facebook Be Dethroned? We want the past to persist, because the past gives us permanence. It tells us who we are and where we belong. But what if your most cherished recollections are also the most ephemeral thing in your head?— Jonah Lehrer, “The Forgetting Pill Erases Painful Memories Forever” All empires rise and fall; one day Facebook will fall from the peak of the social networking mountain. Robert Hernandez notes that one day “The average person is going to realize that they’re being ripped off, to a certain extent, and the proposal of ‘if you’re not paying for the produce you are the product’ is going to be too expensive. The proposal of my personal information at some point may make my uncomfortable. Someone else is going to come along perhaps with less junk, more focused stuff, that says ‘Hey this is where the cool kids are.’ If you want to look at it; a hipster thing.” One should remember that hipster values possibly played a role in MySpace imploding. When Facebook first launched it was only available to college students, this exclusivity could have factored into some people’s decision to leave MySpace. Hernandez thinks that right now not many people have the digital literacy to understand how Facebook is using their personal information and that many people might become weary of the site if some case about Facebook abusing personal information were to get injected into the mainstream and if the government were to get involved with some type of Facebook privacy case. He does concede though that it’s going “to be pretty damn difficult to replace Facebook” and that Facebook “has misplayed their hand several times but people still stick around” and that there are still a lot more people coming than going from Facebook. Matthews Le Veque questions the notion that Facebook will still exists as a social networking superpower in 10 years. Le Veque believes that MySpace and AOL have a set a precedent for how quickly a social networking site can evaporate and become irrelevant. Think about it; is there anyone who still uses AIM (AOL’s Instant Messenger) anymore? 86 Le Veque also believes that Facebook is not near as ingrained into our day to day lives as much as other communicational mediums such as telephones which makes it more susceptible to losing popularity; he cautions us to remember that social networking has barely been around for a decade and doesn’t have the proven track record of success that other communicational mediums do. Le Veque believes that privacy could be the one thing that could bring Facebook to its knees. Le Veque predicts that government regulation is going to eventually become a major factor for Facebook; he notes “When is government regulation going to get involved? When is the department of justice going to do an investigation; and what comes out of that?” The author agrees that a major privacy controversy could kill Facebook; the case would have to be huge in scope though 87 Chapter 16: MySpace Wasn’t Murdered; It Committed Suicide You can't connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backward-Steve Jobs Matthew Le Veque believes that people would have boisterously laughed in your face if you had told them in 2003/2004 that Myspace would be dead in 5 years. He thinks that MySpace’s failure indicates that the social networking success is hard to sustain and that Facebook could easily follow in MySpace’s footsteps and become irrelevant in the next five to six years. The author sees the point that Le Veque is trying to make in his MySpace analogy but feels as though the correlation between MySpace at its peak in 2004 and modern day Facebook is weak at best. MySpace in 2004, while popular, was a poorly executed site of advertising hokum and spam that had a reputation of being a place where sexual predators prowled. MySpace was known as a filthy internet cesspool for angst filled teenagers, annoying spammers, basement dwelling porn enthusiasts, sex predators and really lame indie bands. The MySpace platform was beyond sloppy; it wasn’t uncommon for someone to have to wait for up to five minutes for a MySpace page to load since most pages were filled with ads, music, spam, high resolution images, pop ups, friend’s pictures etc. Looking at a MySpace page in 2003 was like starring into the sun; your retina could burn out if it gazed for too long. This alienated a lot of people; a lot of people honestly felt like MySpace was nothing more than just another place for corporate conglomerates to shove advertising down your trachea. MySpace never felt like a social network; it basically felt like a giant nasty stripper pole with billboard sized ads attached to it. A lot of MySpace’s ads were sexual in nature which made a lot of parents think that the site wasn’t a safe place for kids. MySpace’s executives never seemed to realize that allowing a bunch of obnoxious ads that were inappropriate for kids, who were Myspace’s primary users, to proliferate on their site probably wasn’t a really astute idea. MySpace’s employees also didn’t do an ample job deleting spammer profiles. It was not uncommon for profiles dedicated to porn sites, prostitutes or porn actresses to go on “friending rampages” and try to add thousands of people to advertise themselves including young children. There also were a bunch of cases involving sexual predators engaging with teens on MySpace 88 and then eventually meeting with them and raping them. This lead to a bunch of news stories warning people to stir clear of MySpace 205206 . A New York Times story notes that law enforcement officials repeatedly accused MySpace of discovering sex offenders using its site and not acting on this information 207 . In 2009 it was reported that 90,000 sex offenders had to be removed from MySpace 208 . It’s still stunning that MySpace didn’t do more to combat sexual predators during its peak in popularity. MySpace had a reputation of being a pedophile’s lair. One of Facebook’s most ingenious moves was only allowing college students, who had a university email address, to join its site initially; this allowed them to position themselves as a much safer alternative to MySpace. This allowed them to brand themselves early on as an “anti-sexual predator” social networking site and as a place of refuge for those seeking a cleaner and safer social network. Allowing users to create their own MySpace page designs also hurt the site’s integrity since a lot of people designed really appalling looking pages. Consistency and uniformity creates comfort and makes for an easier to digest and use interface; MySpace never seemed to understand this notion. They probably thought they were empowering people by allowing them to create their own pages when in reality they were shredding up their brand. People like consistency and relative simplicity when it comes to webpages. Look at Google; Google has been one of the most successful search engines during the past 205 Williams, Pete. "MySpace, Facebook attract online predators - Nightly News - msnbc.com." msnbc.com - Breaking news, science and tech news, world news, US news, local news- msnbc.com. N.p., n.d. Web. 10 Feb. 2012. <http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/11165576/ns/nightly_news/t/myspace-facebook-attract-online-predators/>. 206 Kreiser , John . "MySpace: Your Kids' Danger? - CBS News." Breaking News Headlines: Business, Entertainment & World News - CBS News. N.p., n.d. Web. 10 Feb. 2012. <http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2006/02/06/eveningnews/main1286130.shtml>. 207 Stone, Brad. "States Fault MySpace on Predator Issues - New York Times." The New York Times - Breaking News, World News & Multimedia. N.p., n.d. Web. 10 Feb. 2012. <http://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/15/technology/15myspace.html>. 208 Walker, Marlon. "MySpace: 90,000 sex offenders removed from site | 6abc.com." ABC Owned Television Stations. N.p., n.d. Web. 10 Feb. 2012. <http://abclocal.go.com/wpvi/story?section=news/technology&id=6639968>. 89 decade and they have barely changed their page layout at all over the years. Simplicity and familiarity, when they copulate, often breed comfort. Unlike Facebook, MySpace never had clear goals. Was it primarily a place for up and coming emo bands to promote their screamo music? Was it a bedazzled dating site for people looking for sexual liaisons? Was it a place for teenagers to exclusively hang out? Was it a place for perverts to converse? It’s tough to manage your site when you have no idea what you want to be. MySpace’s brass honestly didn’t think giving the site a clear definition was necessary. This laissez faire orientation gave MySpace no direction, without clear goals and well defined directions companies often end up lost. Shakespeare said that “Modest doubt is called the beacon of the wise” not “complete and utter ignorant doubt.” It’s almost as if MySpace adopted a “let the people dictate MySpace’s meaning and mold the site to fit their needs” philosophy. MySpace tried to be everything, which meant it ended up being nothing. The author has never understood the whole “MySpace was popular and it eventually died so there’s a good chance Facebook will follow in its footsteps” argument. The reason MySpace failed was because it became known as the ghetto of the internet. It was a place where prostitutes, porn stars, pedophiles and freaks congregated. MySpace didn’t fall from grace because of some mass hipster movement where people decided to turn their back on the site solely because something new and exciting came along; MySpace pushed their users away through their ambivalence to child safety, their lack of goals, their appalling interface and their bombastic and infuriating advertising. MySpace’s leaders orchestrated their own demise through gross incompetence. If MySpace’s leadership had played their cards right they wouldn’t have seen a mass exodus and MySpace would still be a social networking titan. MySpace wasn’t murdered by Facebook; it committed a slow and painful suicide. MySpace’s failure is completely uncorrelated to a possible Facebook failure. Do you really think that people behind Facebook are going to introduce larger than life ads and pop ups, often relating to porn, in the near future? Do you think that Facebook’s leaders are going to basically decide to let spammers take over the site? Do you think that the people running Facebook, like the people who ran MySpace in 2003, don’t care at all about illicit content being promoted on their site and they will turn a 90 blind eye if sexual predators start becoming a major problem on Facebook? Do you think that Mark Zuckerburg, a complete control freak, is going to start allowing users to create their own obnoxious and obscene Facebook profile pages anytime soon? Do you think that Facebook’s leaders’ actions in the past few years indicate that the site has no clear goals or objectives? Facebook won’t be the next MySpace; it’s positioned itself to be very successful in the coming years. Le Veque questions if Facebook’s impending IPO, which will increase the pressure for profits, will lead to Facebook evolving into more of a marketing site than a platform for free form communication. Could Facebook’s impending IPO turn Facebook into a place primarily for brand pages and ad space? The author doubts it. The author suspects that Facebook’s executives have done their homework and realize what venom poisoned MySpace and are going to be very cautious in how they incorporate advertising and marketing into their site moving forward. 91 Chapter 17: The Blogosphere Reputation is an idle and most false imposition, oft got without merit and lost without deserving- Shakespeare, “Othello” The author believes the blogosphere is literally endless. In the following section the author reviews one of the most fascinating aspects of social networking to develop in recent years; the blog. The traditional barriers to publication have a collapsed and now anyone can publish his or her work in a few mere minutes through a blog. If you have a bad experience at Taco Bell, and you really want the world to know about your maltreatment, you can start sharing a blog post and if the blog catches fire you could elicit an apology from Taco Bell. Never before has the individual become so empowered. If you’re a great writer you don’t have to wait to get signed to some type of publishing deal to get people interested in your work. You just have to have really stellar content and know how to promote it. Robert Hernandez notes that average people can become well respected authorities in the blogosphere if they consistently post credible, genuine, and informative content over time on their blog. Good, credible, content will bring people back, regardless of your personal features. Robert Hernandez cites Jonathan Geller, the man behind the “Boy Genius” blog, as an example of how credible blogs can transcend individuals’ characteristics to obtain success. When Geller started his tech blog he was only a teenager 209 , this didn’t inhibit him from becoming a blogosphere superstar. Geller got a job at 16 that allowed him to make some deep connections in the mobile phone industry (Geller won’t explicate on exactly what job he got). He then used these connections to post credible information about unreleased cellphones. Geller’s inside info helped his blog erupt and he started getting around 1.5 million readers per month 210 . Los Angeles Times reporter Mark Milian notes that Geller had built “an online media empire 209 Milian, Mark. "Inside the mind of Boy Genius, whose blog sold for millions - latimes.com." Blogs - latimes.com. N.p., n.d. Web. 23 Jan. 2012. <http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/technology/2010/04/boy-genius-report.html>. 210 Milian, Mark. "Inside the mind of Boy Genius, whose blog sold for millions - latimes.com." Blogs - latimes.com. N.p., n.d. Web. 23 Jan. 2012. <http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/technology/2010/04/boy-genius-report.html>. 92 worth millions before being old enough to rent a car at some places” 211 . Geller is a prime example of how content transcends personal characteristics in the blogosphere. Matthew Le Veque stresses that great blog content also needs to be accompanied by great visuals to obtain sustained success. La Veque believes that an innovative design and lots of visuals will help a blog stand out and will be essential as the internet morphs into a more and more visual medium. Le Veque also highlights content diversity as a critical component in helping a blog stay fresh; you need to feature traditional blogs, vlogs, infographics and lots of multimedia to keep readers on their toes and engaged. Hernandez and Le Veque both note that a consistent flow of content is vital for blogs. If blogging had a list of cardinal sins the act of turpitude that would sit atop the list’s hierarchy of sordid behavior would be not updating your blog on a consistent basis. Nothing makes you look worse in the blogosphere than if your blog hasn’t been updated in months. Not updating your blog for months at time is like walking into a Grateful Dead convention wearing an Armani suit or proclaiming that the 2008 Detroit Lions are the greatest football team in the history of the NFL; it’s something you can’t do if you want to be taken seriously. Some cynical individuals may venture forth the notion that the internet landscape is congested with so much garbage that it’s near impossible to stand out; the author disagrees starkly with this notion. Our world is oversaturated with media and the modern zeitgeist is defined by increasingly ephemeral taste but truly terrific content is going to get noticed. Technorati, an internet search engine for blogs labeled by some as the “bible of blogs” 212 , once a year surveys preeminent bloggers to discover what influences their content and to get an idea about what trends are emerging in the world of blogging. In 2011, this survey found that the type of blogging content that produces the most positive feedback among hobbyists and professionals, working with brands, are 211 Milian, Mark. "Inside the mind of Boy Genius, whose blog sold for millions - latimes.com." Blogs - latimes.com. N.p., n.d. Web. 23 Jan. 2012. <http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/technology/2010/04/boy-genius-report.html>. 212 Bulas , Jeff. "18 Key Observations about the State of Blogging in 2011 | Jeffbullas's Blog." Social Media Marketing and Blogging. N.p., n.d. Web. 17 Jan. 2012. <http://www.jeffbullas.com/2012/01/16/18-key- observations-about-the-state-of-blogging-in-2011/>. 93 product reviews while advice and consulting content was the most popular type of blogging content among corporate and entrepreneur bloggers What gets a blog attention? Here are some tips: 1. Clear Target Audience You need to have a clear target audience for you content. It will be hard to cultivate a large following for your blog if people don’t know what type of content you will be consistently providing for them. 2. Timing Is Key A blog has to be timely to be puissant. The blogosphere moves extremely rapid, you have to post material immediately after an event happens or your content will seem outdated and irrelevant. 3. Length Is Crucial Blog posts are not thesis; say what you need to say as succinctly and clearly as possible. 4. Remember Your Content is More Important Than You A lot of people seem to not realize that content, not people (unless you’re a celebrity), is what sells a blog. To get noticed you have to create clear content that is going to resonate deeply with a specific passionate audience. When you make it about “you” and not the “content” you are doomed for failure unless you’re someone that a ton of people are vehemently curious about (i.e. if you’re a A-list actor, a Super-Bowl winning MVP Quarterback, etc.) Content supersedes all in the blogging community 94 5. Make Sure You Consider the Consequences of Everything You Post If you put a certain company’s name in a Hashtag on Twitter you better be ready to answer to that company for the things you write about them if you write something controversial. Make sure you’re ok with owning your work. 95 Bibliography Acohido,, Byron. "How many Facebook users are there? - USATODAY.com." 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Asset Metadata

Creator Kjoss, Victor., III (author)

Core Title Social networking in the modern zeitgeist: an examination of why we're obsessed and how social media will define our future

School Annenberg School for Communication

Degree Master of Arts

Degree Program Strategic Public Relations

Publication Date 05/09/2012

Defense Date 04/11/2012

Publisher University of Southern California (original), University of Southern California. Libraries (digital)

Tag blogging,blogs,facebook,g,gmail,Google,google plus,hipster,myspace,OAI-PMH Harvest,Psychology,SMS,social media,social networking,Sociology,Twitter,YouTube

Language English

Contributor Electronically uploaded by the author (provenance)

Advisor Floto, Jennifer D. (committee chair), Hernandez, Robert (committee member), Wang, Jay (committee member)

Creator Email kjoss@usc.edu,vic.kjoss@gmail.com

Permanent Link (DOI) https://doi.org/10.25549/usctheses-c3-38084

Unique identifier UC11288340

Identifier usctheses-c3-38084 (legacy record id)

Legacy Identifier etd-KjossVicto-833.pdf

Dmrecord 38084

Document Type Thesis

Rights Kjoss, Victor., III

Type texts

Source University of Southern California (contributing entity), University of Southern California Dissertations and Theses (collection)

Access Conditions The author retains rights to his/her dissertation, thesis or other graduate work according to U.S. copyright law. Electronic access is being provided by the USC Libraries in agreement with the a...

Repository Name University of Southern California Digital Library

Repository Location USC Digital Library, University of Southern California, University Park Campus MC 2810, 3434 South Grand Avenue, 2nd Floor, Los Angeles, California 90089-2810, USA