What’s happened to the marketing blogosphere? Our conversations in posts and on Twitter used to be so dynamic. Our corner of the blogosphere used to be a nice place to be, a collegial debate on the future media and communications. When we had spats, we made up.
Now it’s just downright snitty. The confluence of many new, inexperienced voices and folks pretending to be social media aficionados has created a much different kind of place. Now it’s about looking savvy at others expense, garnering the biggest follower count, and throwing back handed comments. Increasingly, I find myself walking away from the Twitter marketing conversation early in the work week, and completely avoiding it during the weekends.
Joseph Jaffe and I discussed this change at the Forrester Customer Experience Forum this morning:
What do you think?
Isn’t this the same pattern, and the same complaint, that has been repeated in all political spheres, which is to say, the spheres of all human social endeavors? Nihil sub sole novum.
It happened on Usenet, it happened on IRC, it happened on the blogs.
It happened when popular culture started to displace high culture.
And it happened when the common people were allowed to run their own government, taking it away from the so-called noble aristocratic elites.
It looks ugly, but it also looks beautiful, it can be be cruel, but it can also be nurturing, vicious and virtuous, base and noble.
It’s the very essence of a democratic participation. And is to expected in anything that calls itself a /social/ media.
Hey Geoff:
I’ve been feeling like this since last December–one of the reasons I stopped blogging as frequently.
Couple things have happened over the last year:
–You remember a couple of years ago when there was plenty of work and the clients were rolling in? We were like spiders during a fly epidemic: No bickering because we were all eating. Now that we are in a recession and many people are unemployed or freelancing,the competition has gotten tough again. Some might feel there is a fight over resources and therefor act aggressively
–The gates are open. Everyone’s on-board. Carpet baggers as far as the eye can see. These people copy, repeat and add to the noise. Instead of following someone because they respect them, they are following them because they are told to. It’s not the same. They don’t understand a key element in social media: It’s about community. With so many “discussions” around social media, they might not realize there is a community. I’m also willing to bet they weren’t here when there was. Its also harder to socialize thousands of people.
It’s not about losing power; it’s about losing intimacy.
The truth is, many people have yet to burst out of the social media bubble. They are intent on staying firmly planted within the sphere, going to the same conferences, listening to the same people talk about the same things. My frustration is that there is no real progress being made. Same conversation, different day.
I for one, am ready to start having those relevant conversations again – about the state of new media today, and where it`s going in the future. About emerging technologies and methods like Linked Data and the Semantic Web, and how it pertains to what we are doing now with social media.
The medium must move forward, or risk annihilating itself.
Geoff, I’m probably not the guy you want to hear from on this, but (despite my poor word choice) I’m actually a pretty optimistic, collaborative guy. I started a Facebook group called “How can I help you in 2009?”; and have a Tweet theme I call Smart People / Smart Ideas where I promote the work of others.
Yes, there are isolated cases of the sniping you describe and I’m guilty as charged there too, but on the whole I still see much more support and collaboration then negativity.
I think we can all try to strive for more and better.
Geoff,
I think Joe hit on something in terms of numbers. When we follow and are followed by thousands, aren’t we at least sometimes overwhelmed by the noise? To escape all the chatter, I use TweetDeck to set up a group that consists only of a few of those I follow and who follow me, and instead of searching for a nugget of an idea cast throughout the jungle, I look only around a few trees. That said, conversations occur very infrequently, and I spend only about 30 minutes a week on Twitter and have reduced my blog posts from 4 to 5 a week to 2 to 3.
@Chris You are missed. But I understand why you have moved on. Kyle Flaherty has done the same thing, and I, too, am fighting the impulse to go dark earlier and earlier every week.
Lewis: Tweetdeck helps, but it doesn’t stop people from conversing at you. At which point, I do feel obliged to pay attention to them.