Defining Social Nets Part II

Sunday, March 4. 2007

Defining Social Nets Part II

Some time ago we put some thoughts together on how to define social nets...well, another thought on how to think about axes:

- Closed vs Open - Ning vs a more open platform, Mydeo vs YouTube etc
- User Generated vs Producer generated content (and which is LonelyGirl?)
- Synchronous (chat rooms) vs Asynchronous (MySpace)
- Profile - high interactvity by others on profile (MySpace) vs Low (Profile as info sheet)
- Context created for SocNet (World of Warcraft) or by it (Bebo)

This should create some very interesting 2 x 2 thought experiments, for e.g take the first 2:

Closed vs Open, User Generated vs Producer Generated - gives 4 modes:

- Open, UGC - Anarchic model (YouTube is moving there as the commercial Producer Content gets delisted)
- Open, Producer Content - things like RocketBoom, Scobleshow are in this light - its Old Media but it is open to all to use and view. So is traditional Broadscasting.
- Closed, UGC - Private sites for users to create stuff - eg Mydeo
- Closed, Producer Content - standard Pay Per (View, Month, etc) model

"Web 1.0" is often Closed (user must sign in, may even have to pay) and Producer Generated (the publisher publishes, you consume)

Web 2.0 pushed both axes - open up the content within, and let the user loose to create. A pure play Open, User Generated content play example is an open Wiki.

What is most interesting are the Hybrids along the faultlines - this Blog is one. Blogging is pretty open. It's producer generated (us) but user comments and feed back is part of the User Generated Content.

Sites that are Open / Closed hybrids include those SocNets where you can choose the level of detail you give away in your profile, and those that have free and premium sections. Wikipedia is another - it is open, but there are barriers to entry that you must choose to navigate.

In theory there is a move from closed to open, and making the user the producer - but how does it make money? Advertising is not all the answer as (i) not everyone likes it and (ii) there is only a limited pot. You can't be open and erect subscriptions. Similarly, if the Producer wants to make a living, how will it work if all content is open?

A hint is in our earlier post re music yesterday ..the open part of the creation system is merely a pointer to parts that are less accessible - open song download takes you to the paid for concert, T shirt etc. At Broadstuff, the blog is open, but we hope you therefore think we are smart enough to engage our services - which are (usually) not free, and are often confidential.

Anyway, thats one 2x2 - more anon.

Posted by Alan Patrick in Social Networks at 11:32 | Comment (1) | Trackbacks (0)

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I'm not sure that all of the sites your are referring to make money at all, at least not in their current shape. It seems that many of the payments for the people that run the smaller personality blogs are in the form of increased efficacy and perhaps some professional work in other areas.

I also thing that many of the "twopointoh" experiments are sketches or prototypes that are eventually bought and rolled into a larger concern like google or yahoo.

I am reminded of the movie "Tucker", about the innovative inventor automaker who introduced, among other things headlights the turned with the steering wheel. I recently saw a luxery car commercial that touted this in their car as something new.

#1 David Bamford (Homepage) on 2007-03-06 14:10 (Reply)

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