Why my stance on Twitter changed

A couple months ago, I gave Twitter something few web companies ever get - a second try. I was originally a Twitter hater, now I'm a big fan (with a few complaints).

Here's why I now use Twitter:

It finally started to work.

First try
Twitter was riddled with constant downtimes (down for 5 days in a row once!), lots of malfunctions, a non-functional AIM client, and overall service that was slowww. I was sure that the tech problems were going to turn people away to a competitor. Somehow people stuck with it (I didn't, but came back months later).

Second try
Fairly smooth service (at least their outages are scheduled).


The conversation evolved and I found a community

First try
In Twitter's early days people were in experimentation mode, so most posts were about mundane, personal activities (see below). For me, this was intolerable since the people I followed weren't personal friends. I could really care less what kind of coffee some guy I never met was drinking.


Second try
I now use Twitter the same way I use the blogosphere - as a new media information source. I follow a small group of people that post interesting links and thoughts (see below). If their posts become too personal and mundane, I stop following them. Once again, the actual people within any online social tool is what determines success. A tool can be incredibly cool and useful, but if you can't get your friends to join or at least find people you care about, you'll drop the service. I've experienced this personally with great services like Iminlikewithyou.com and Me.dium.


Alternative viewing tools are now available.

First try
Visiting Twitter.com was out of my way and phone notifications were just too invasive.

Second try
Although it's not perfect, Flock's Twitter integration has really made it easy to check out Tweets.








Why I'm still a little disappointed.

Where's the innovation in the last 8 months?? Yes, some cool things have come as result of the API, but all in all, I expected more from Twitter. At the very least give me a better way to find friends or organize Tweets.

Should Brands join or build Social Networks?

Here's the post I put up within Jeremiah Owyang's thread on Facebook.

Wow, a lot has been said so I'll try not to repeat anything.

Brands should definitely join and only build if they actually have some solid benefits to offer.

Although building a lifestyle network sounds great, it must be executed PERFECTLY to have a chance. Because the second consumers get the slightest whiff of a brand's ownership/influence on a "lifestyle" soc network, they often run for the hills.


Unless you're dealing with an affinity brand, you need to take some time out for a reality check before building a network. The likely situation is that A) People don't care that much about your brand and B) People think your marketing efforts are evil and untrustworthy.

Now, combat A and B with real consumer benefits and honest communication delivered to the right niche, and your network might have a chance.

One last thing, when a brand does have multiple social networking executions, I'm always astonished to see how isolated each effort is. A Facebook page and branded social network can be deeply integrated. How about building a place for alpha-fans, and also joining a large network to talk to your prospects. Now, build in functionality that deeply integrates the two, and you can have your brand advocates influence potential consumers.

I think building can be an amazing thing, but needs to be more than just launching www.My[insert brand name].com

Blogged with Flock

Blogosphere doesn't hate beacon, they hate Zuckerberg

I find the whole Beacon fiasco disheartening. I see the Beacon effort as a strong step forward in bringing innovation to the advertising industry. What a giant overreaction over one single error in implementation. Here are my stances -

1. The blogosphere doesn't hate beacon, they hate mark zuckerberg. After his pompous speech about reinventing advertising, rabid dot com bust survivors couldn't wait to find a reason to hate Facebook.
2. Um, hello, nobody under 25 could care less about this story. Face it, younger people don't mind sharing everything about their online habits. This is a trend that will continue. When you're 13 years old and you're equipped with multiple SNS pages, twitter, blog, camera phone, digital camera, and umpteen other devices/services, do you really think they'll hate the fact that their friends will know which movie they rented from blockbuster?
   
3. Facebook will tweak, tweak and tweak until they nail this execution. Most of the people mad haven't been on FB long enough to realize how amazing this company is at refining their product.
4. At its heart, Beacon is about making advertising better. Most of online advertising is as useless as its traditional counterparts. Banners, interstitials, video spots and most sponsorships are all about yelling at the consumer with a message they don't care about. Beacon is trying to provide users with a benefit by telling them what things their friends are doing online. Great advertising gives consumers a benefit (see Google sponsored links), beacon does that. More on this later.
   

I admit that not having a true opt-out is really bad and they didn't handle this well from a PR standpoint. However, it shouldn't make us look past what is really great about Beacon - it makes advertising useful and beneficial.

The first post...

Here's the deal -

I work in new media (i.e. digital, interactive, or whatever you want to call it)

I actually really like the industry I work in, so I spend a good amount of my free time forming strong opinions and making predictions. I also spend a good amount of time reading new media blogs, and trust me, the world doesn't need another boring one that recycles the same old stories.

So here is what my blog is going to be about (so far) -

1. My opinions, stances and predictions on the latest industry developments
2. Quick digestible links that I think you'll enjoy

I'll keep a log of my stances and predictions over on the right. If this blog suddenly goes away, you can assume that I was wrong one too many times.