Me, My Site, My Ad Here
EmailJohn C. Dvorak, an often-provocative writer who comments on computer and Internet technology, has a piece at PC Magazine’s site this week titled, "Why Social Networks Stink." Dvorak complains that social networking–all that sharing of your personal life on MySpace or Facebook, making yourself Time’s Person of the Year (remember the mirror on their cover?)–is really a terrific way, in a time when advertising is being shaken to its core, of selling things. Full disclosure: ABC News this week announced an arrangement with Facebook to share political news and discussions. More HERE if you didn’t see it. "What has been overlooked in the entire social-networking scheme is that at its core, it’s not social networking but marketing," writes Dvorak. "In fact, the entire MySpace scene is devoted mostly to selling music and keeping people up-to-date with their fav indie band." In other words, he says, you become the advertising agency, if you use Facebook or a MySpace–or any of a zillion other sites on which you post your preferences. If you post a picture on Flickr, for instance, there’s data embedded in the image that reports what model camera you used. Go to this LINK on Flickr’s home page, and–well, you can see which camera manufacturers will be most pleased. One form of this has already backfired. Facebook said–after getting 50,000 protest signatures on an online petition–that it would dial back its "Beacon" feature, which tells your online friends if you’ve made a purchase through such sites as Blockbuster.com, Fandango.com or Overstock.com. More HERE. Dvorak published his piece before that happened, but it fits right in with his theme of trendsetting as a form of marketing. "I’m interested in watching how far this goes with the core target audience: the 16-to-24-year-old demographic," he wrote. "For some reason, that group considers itself immune to advertising pitches. But they’re probably the worst trend mavens since the hippies in the 1960s. Let me assure you, fashion and other fad/trends are not organic. Someone somewhere is pulling some strings."
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This Facebook business is one of the most chilling things I’ve read about recently. I can just imagine what the Patriot Act can do with this, or any government agency.
Posted by: Andy | November 30, 2007, 2:32 pm 2:32 pm
55 million facebook users, 55 million clueless idiots. And there continues to be a sucker born every minute.
Well doh. If you supply a company, ANY company with information of a personal nature, or usage statistics, they WILL use it: if not now, then in the future. What, do you think some ‘privacy policy’, or even the law is going to protect you? Of course it won’t. Companies merge, policies get changed, laws get thrown out and rewritten.. yet your data will ALWAYS be stored in that database, and can be used against you 10, even 50 years down the road. In the information age, your identity is linked to your behavior, and allowing the two to meet will doom you to a life of profiles and explanations, a ball-and-chain of permanent data that will follow you to the end of your days: one that you can never rid yourself of.
“Post your picture online! Tell the world of your life! We’ll store your information!” Indeed, facebook and other social-networking users will ultimately reap what they sow. Your identity is the golden goose of information today, so protect it accordingly.
Posted by: Robert | December 2, 2007, 1:58 am 1:58 am
Very well said Robert.
Posted by: BTL musings | December 2, 2007, 4:24 pm 4:24 pm
The lack privacy on these sites is only a small part oof the problem. The larger issue is that these “communities” are completely artificial and in no way represent true society. While people waste their time on them, reality slips into oblivion. We’re bbreeding a generation that cannot function without a mouse and a keyboard. And no, they aren’t more saavy, just more disconnected by technology that isn’t very useful.
Posted by: Will | December 3, 2007, 7:00 am 7:00 am
Will has a point. It’s often been something I’ve wondered about. Will the advent of the internet cause us, as individuals, to become so insular that we contact each other electronically, and not physically? I read a science fiction story a long time ago, which postulated that nudity on a monitor screen is not the same as nudity in person. After all, you’re viewing an image, not the real person. I can’t wait to see where it all ends.
Posted by: Andy | December 3, 2007, 8:26 am 8:26 am
This article is correct in stating that the marketing companies just want to sell and could care less how they sell it to us. The marketers for years have been using people as sandwich boards with all the Logos/Icons on our clothing. The next generation of advertizements will be messing with nature. Plants and animals through generic engineering will be manupilated with Companies Logos. If you disagree just think 30 years ago no one would of paid for a Tee Shirt with a huge Company Advertizement on it and now its common place. Anything for you to pull open your wallet.
Posted by: Funny Guy | December 3, 2007, 4:17 pm 4:17 pm
Hey, Funny Guy, just wait until all those cereal boxes in the grocery stores start yelling at you as you walk down the aisle. I’ll bet the suicide rate doubles.
Posted by: Andy | December 3, 2007, 5:45 pm 5:45 pm
HAHA!! Thats a good one Andy. I remember a few years ago I read a story about a company that wanted to put a billboard in orbit. But it would be large as the apperent size of the full moon. And just as bright. Needless to say, it was shot down. I do agree, that our information is for sale online. But by going online, and to sites like these, you pretty much give them permission to do so. So it’s us, the consumers fault, not the companies.
Posted by: Lawrence | December 4, 2007, 5:22 pm 5:22 pm
Quoting the article:
“Let me assure you, fashion and other fad/trends are not organic. Someone somewhere is pulling some strings.”
Unfortunately, it’s not just fads and trends. This is the way the entire world works and has worked since some primitive people learned how to take advantage of some other primitive people by developing political, economic and religious hierarchies.
Get smart everyone. Stop being sheople.
Posted by: Tim | December 5, 2007, 4:59 pm 4:59 pm