Speech of ideas – faster, more exciting
Speed of thought – slower, more difficult

Facebook may need to think this through a bit more, I’ll still experiment with the system. I think they sold out when they abandoned their college roots and opened it up to old folks like me. On to a larger subject.

Situation:
increasingly cynical society
technology to share our thoughts and eliminate packaged messages of companies
companies need to sell stuff
consumers would rather listen to trusted friend of a friend than a company
break the chain of trust when incentives are introduced

Problem:

Financial, legal, and political, institutions are structured for predictability, blame, and division.
Socialness does not fit into these structures
Quarterly earnings reports as currently perceived will not allow for an intent driven economy
Control reigns supreme in boardrooms and advertising agencies
Facebooks of the world trying to bridge the gap between casual social conversations with controlled buying programs

Questions

If demand creation via advertising model is declining, and endorsement programs undermine trust, what can business turn to for predictable financial returns that will be accepted by Wall Street? Somebody is going to have to pay for all this stuff and it ain’t gonna be me.

Thanks for entertaining the open and fair discussions here, I hope to continue to see your points of view in my comments on your blog and on the web in general –all helpful and welcome.

Will get Toffler’s book (I was less than 3 feet tall when it was published in 1980s) and thanks for updating the text.

A good (online) friend of mine who is a strong advocate of the “prosumer” concept totally blew me away a couple years ago:

“One paradox of the emerging Small Is Good World is that David Suzuki’s words — It’s time to think local, act local — are made true, not because it’s time to turn away from global concerns and participation, but because local is no longer a term geographically place-bound.”

And this applies 200% to social networking: localization is TOPICAL, and not limited by TIME and/or SPACE.

What is the “topos” of facebook? It HAS none — or maybe it’s “Harvard” (if that is a “theme” or whatever).

Future social networks will thrive insofar as they are able to thematically focus, to localize the topic — maybe you could say in this context that “always on” would refer to “always on topic”, rather than “always online”….

Such topically oriented networks (in contrast to amorphous and/or “one size fits all” universal 2.0 kitsch) are still rather virgin territory — so there are indeed vast opportunities for growth here. Perhaps this growth will mean “stagnation” or perhaps even “decline” in the “old-fashioned” approach to community — time will tell.

nmw

I agree that “fan-sumers” isn’t a great word, and for me the words “fans”, “advocates”, and “evangelists” all would have worked for me…

… but snide remarks about “rip-offs from your betters” strike me as unhelpful.

If, as you believe, Jeremiah’s analysis is self-evidently wrong, why do you feel that ad hominem attacks are the way to go here?

For what it’s worth, I think that Jeremiah has an optimistic view of Facebook’s commercial chances, but that the general premise that 1: social networking sites will allow ludicrous micro-targetting for advertisers, 2: many of these advertisers will get it badly wrong, and 3: the good ones will concentrate on how SN sites can be used by having conversations WITH, rather than broadcasts TO their customers seems spot-on.

Regards,

Mark

Regarding Forrester, I’ve worked with them off and on for the last 10 years and I’ve found them to be a firm of integrity and innovation. They have been known to popularize certain buzzwords in the industry, mainly because they hire smart people and those people get quoted a lot in the media.

I understand your points, but there’s an upside that many are missing. I have a few friends, who I read their blogs on a daily basis, when they recommend products, I’m very likely to take a closer look. If the same concept is applied to Facebook pages and fans, how is this different?

Look beyond the buzzword, and let’s focus on the the opportunities. In the end, we’ll know what really works when brands start adopting this lateral marketing play.

To quote Dave Winer (roughly) “when advertising becomes so targeted, it’s no longer advertising, it’s information”