Yesterday, I [somewhat] objectively made a set of 10 predictions I expect to see over 2009′s course. However, what I expect and what I’d like to see are two very different things, so I thought I’d complement yesterday’s list with a wishlist of my own. Here are five things I think would contribute to social media’s value for myself and others.
#1: More automation.
We’re getting there with devices like the Eye-Fi card and the upcoming Fitbit, but we can do even better: I want to see services and technology that limit the time I’m required to actively spend uploading, sharing, and tagging content. I don’t ever want to see a Flickr upload screen again, choose tags for my online video, manually share my location on Brightkite, and so forth. If it can be digitally “outsourced,” I want that option. That’s why services like Tagcow appealed to me so greatly when they first emerged– I want to be able to spend more time creating and discussing great content than preparing and labeling it for the Web.
#2: Fewer options.
In a way, I’m fortunate that the tech economy is forcing companies to rethink their strategies and limiting the number of new startups because, as far as I’m concerned, there are much too many similar services in the same space. Take a look at FriendFeed’s supported import list, for instance– most web users probably only know a quarter of the items on that list. I don’t like this because the more spread out users are over different sites, the more effort I need to go to to engage with those users. If you wanted to visit all of your old college friends, for instance, you’d have to spend weeks traveling across the corners of the globe to meet up with all of them. The way users are scattered all over the net mirrors this difficulty, it doesn’t solve it, and it’s time for this to change.
#3: Ubiquitous location awareness.
With the improvements in Web-ready mobile phones, this might be what I’m most eager for: every social media service we know and love to be deeply integrated with physical location and GPS. I want to be able to walk into a restaurant, drycleaner, or bar, and instantly know (without having to search, etc.) what my friends and contacts think about that location, how many times they’ve been there, and if they’re on the premises as I check. Assuming they opt in, of course, I want to know where my good buddies are on campus so that we can make plans to meet up if we discover we’re near each other. I think location is the next frontier of the social web, and I am dying to see it evolve.
#4: More behavioral research within social media companies.
As a social scientist in training, this one’s personal: I want to see some scientific research and careful survey analysis driving development and tuning of social media technologies. It’s unfortunate that the once-generous venture capital used to back many of these companies goes only to programmers, engineers, and designers– with such a significant human component to many of these services, it’s surprising to me that no one explores the human aspects of these sites in development. What our intuitions tell us users would prefer is not always reality, and this should be reflected by a growing adoption of more serious scientific rigor.
#5: Improved accessibility, ease of use, and marketing.
To the early adopter set, Twitter is old news. Trying to get my friends and family on such a service, though, is often like pulling teeth. No one in my community that I interact with on a regular basis has read up on Twitter as much as I have, so if anyone could talk people into joining these services, it should be me, right? It’s unfortunately quite rare that I meet success in getting new users to join. I would like to see an increased effort by social media companies to market their products to all users, not just those that go on to blog or Tweet or FriendFeed about them (which means, of course, that these messages fall on the ears of the proverbial choir, not the congregation). Help me get you more users, social media companies, please! It’ll help you in the long run.
To wrap this up, I just want to point out a common theme among these items here: simplification. As I wrote at the beginning of the month, there’s just too much clutter and noise out there today. I want a new set of tools that help me deal with this big mess. Will 2009 bring these tools, or will it bring additional complications? I’ve turned into quite the social media cynic over the last few weeks– New Year, please, reverse this trend!
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Tagged as:
automation,
brightkite,
eye-fi,
fitbit,
flickr,
friendfeed,
gps,
location,
marketing,
research,
tagcow,
wishlist
Five things I want to see in social media in 2009
by Andy DeSoto on January 2, 2009
Yesterday, I [somewhat] objectively made a set of 10 predictions I expect to see over 2009′s course. However, what I expect and what I’d like to see are two very different things, so I thought I’d complement yesterday’s list with a wishlist of my own. Here are five things I think would contribute to social media’s value for myself and others.
#1: More automation.
We’re getting there with devices like the Eye-Fi card and the upcoming Fitbit, but we can do even better: I want to see services and technology that limit the time I’m required to actively spend uploading, sharing, and tagging content. I don’t ever want to see a Flickr upload screen again, choose tags for my online video, manually share my location on Brightkite, and so forth. If it can be digitally “outsourced,” I want that option. That’s why services like Tagcow appealed to me so greatly when they first emerged– I want to be able to spend more time creating and discussing great content than preparing and labeling it for the Web.
#2: Fewer options.
In a way, I’m fortunate that the tech economy is forcing companies to rethink their strategies and limiting the number of new startups because, as far as I’m concerned, there are much too many similar services in the same space. Take a look at FriendFeed’s supported import list, for instance– most web users probably only know a quarter of the items on that list. I don’t like this because the more spread out users are over different sites, the more effort I need to go to to engage with those users. If you wanted to visit all of your old college friends, for instance, you’d have to spend weeks traveling across the corners of the globe to meet up with all of them. The way users are scattered all over the net mirrors this difficulty, it doesn’t solve it, and it’s time for this to change.
#3: Ubiquitous location awareness.
With the improvements in Web-ready mobile phones, this might be what I’m most eager for: every social media service we know and love to be deeply integrated with physical location and GPS. I want to be able to walk into a restaurant, drycleaner, or bar, and instantly know (without having to search, etc.) what my friends and contacts think about that location, how many times they’ve been there, and if they’re on the premises as I check. Assuming they opt in, of course, I want to know where my good buddies are on campus so that we can make plans to meet up if we discover we’re near each other. I think location is the next frontier of the social web, and I am dying to see it evolve.
#4: More behavioral research within social media companies.
As a social scientist in training, this one’s personal: I want to see some scientific research and careful survey analysis driving development and tuning of social media technologies. It’s unfortunate that the once-generous venture capital used to back many of these companies goes only to programmers, engineers, and designers– with such a significant human component to many of these services, it’s surprising to me that no one explores the human aspects of these sites in development. What our intuitions tell us users would prefer is not always reality, and this should be reflected by a growing adoption of more serious scientific rigor.
#5: Improved accessibility, ease of use, and marketing.
To the early adopter set, Twitter is old news. Trying to get my friends and family on such a service, though, is often like pulling teeth. No one in my community that I interact with on a regular basis has read up on Twitter as much as I have, so if anyone could talk people into joining these services, it should be me, right? It’s unfortunately quite rare that I meet success in getting new users to join. I would like to see an increased effort by social media companies to market their products to all users, not just those that go on to blog or Tweet or FriendFeed about them (which means, of course, that these messages fall on the ears of the proverbial choir, not the congregation). Help me get you more users, social media companies, please! It’ll help you in the long run.
To wrap this up, I just want to point out a common theme among these items here: simplification. As I wrote at the beginning of the month, there’s just too much clutter and noise out there today. I want a new set of tools that help me deal with this big mess. Will 2009 bring these tools, or will it bring additional complications? I’ve turned into quite the social media cynic over the last few weeks– New Year, please, reverse this trend!
Tagged as: automation, brightkite, eye-fi, fitbit, flickr, friendfeed, gps, location, marketing, research, tagcow, wishlist