The baby conspiracyOn online communities, social media, social networks and the difference between the threeClo Willaerts, 17 Nov 2008Guest Lecture @ KHLim, Maastricht

Sanoma Magazines Belgium

Sanoma Magazines Belgium

Bnox

1895: Repertoire Bibliographique Universel• Paul Otlet & Henri La Fontaine

• “Everything in the universe, and everything of man, would be registered at a distance as it was produced. In this way a moving image of the world will be established, a true mirror of his memory. From a distance, everyone will be able to read text, enlarged and limited to the desired subject, projected on an individual screen. In this way, everyone from his armchair will be able to contemplate creation, as a whole or in certain of its parts.”

1962: “Galactic Network”

•J.C.R. Licklider of MIT discusses his “Galactic Network” concept in a series of memos

•a globally interconnected set of computers through which everyone could quickly access data and programs from any site.

•The first recorded description of the social interactions that could be enabled through networking

•Licklider later teamed up with ARPA

1985: “The Well”

1982: Cyberspace

“A consensual hallucination experienced daily by billions of legitimate operators, in every nation, by children being taught mathematical concepts... A graphic representation of data abstracted from banks of every computer in the human system. Unthinkable complexity. Lines of light ranged in the nonspace of the mind, clusters and constellations of data. “

William Gibson

1990: Godwin’s Law

"As an online discussion grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving Nazis or Hitler approaches one."

Mike Godwin, http://catb.org/esr/jargon/html/G/Godwins-Law.html

1992: World Wide Web

1992: “virtual communities”

“virtual communities are cultural aggregations that

emerge when enough people bump into each other often enough in

cyberspace.”

(Howard Rheingold: A Slice of Life in My Virtual Community)

Definition: online community

An online community is a group of people with a common interest along with an online infrastructure that allows its members to create value for themselves and the group as a whole.

Examples: the wikipedia community, Limewire, groups/fan pages on Facebook, Quakenet, Runescape, Slashdot, Digg, Fark, Deviantart

Strong communities

Map of online communities

1993: On the internet, nobody knows you’re a dog

1997: Slashdot•News for nerds, stuff that matters

•a collaborative peer-to-peer publishing of "open source news” -> community-generated content

•Reputation management systems: Slashdot's karma; , cfr. Ebay's colored stars

•“the slashdot effect”•http://www.slashdot.org

User generated content: the one percent rule (1/2)

"if you get a group of 100 people online then one will create content, 10 will “interact” with it (commenting or offering improvements) and the other 89 will just view it."

User participation: The 1% rule (Ben Mc Connell, http://customerevangelists.typepad.com/blog/2006/07/understanding_t.html

Community roles

User generated content: the one percent rule (2/2)

Videogeneration(uploading)

Videodistribution

10%

61%

85%Videoconsumption

1999: Cluetrain Manifesto•http://www.cluetrain.com/ •Markets are conversations and the Internet is a facilitator of one of the grandest, most global of those conversations.

• “Their members communicate in language that is natural, open, honest, direct, funny and often shocking. Whether explaining or complaining, joking or serious, the human voice is unmistakably genuine. It can't be faked.”

2002: Small world project

•The Small World Project is an online experiment to test the idea that two people in the world can be connected via “six degrees of separation”

•http://smallworld.columbia.edu/description.html

Six degrees of separation

2003: Social currency

• “In an interactive space, content is not king. Contact is.“Douglas Rushkoff: Social Currency @ thefeature.com

• http://www.thefeaturearchives.com/100068.html

2003-2004: YASNS

•http://www.friendster.com •http://www.orkut.com•http://www.myspace.com•http://www.tribe.net

•Clay Shirky: YASNS

Definition: social networking services

Social networking services give users the tools to connect with each other and communicate.

Examples: Bebo, Facebook, Friendster, Habbo, Hyves, Last.fm, Linkedin, MySpace, Netlog, Orkut, Skyrock, tribe.net

Definition: social media

Social media are the online technologies and practices that people use to share opinions, insights, experiences, and perspectives with each other.

Examples: blogs, Flickr, twitter, Facebook, Youtube

Social media starfish

2004: the wisdom of the crowds

James Surowiecki :

“the aggregation of information in groups, resulting in decisions that, he argues, are often better than could have been made by any single member of the group.”

2005: Blogging

2006: Time magazine

Zappybaby.be: like Facebook, but about babies

www.zappybaby.be

“life stage” community:

pregnancy,

birth,

babies,

toddlers.

Life stage: getting pregnant

Life stage: pregnancy

Life stage: giving birth

Life stage: babies

http://www.zappybaby.be/zappy/blogs/CloW/34248/De_lachende_vierling.html

Life stage: toddlers

http://www.zappybaby.be/zappy/blogs/CloW/32478/De_Beatles-baby_uit_Korea.html

The baby conspiracy (1/4)

The baby conspiracy (2/4)

http://www.zappybaby.be/zappy/blogs/CloW/34243/Baby-gooien_populair_in_India.html

The baby conspiracy (3/4)

The baby conspiracy (4/4)

Enter Zappybaby.be

ZappyBaby is an online community for young parents. It capitalizes social media tools (e.g. blogs, photo sharing, video sharing) to help young parents,

create their own content,

communicate & share information

connect with each other on a local level

The Zappybaby profile pages and groups allow users to grow their own, powerful social network.

a) zappybaby is an online community

An online community is a group of people with a common interest along with an online infrastructure that allows its members to create value for themselves and the group as a whole.

What connects the Zappybaby users is a particular phase in life: pregnancy, childbirth and raising small children up until their first day at school.

b) zappybaby is a social medium

c) zappybaby is a social network service (1/2)

Social networking services give users the tools to connect with each other and communicate.

Registered users are able to create a profile page, containing a.o. their zip code. The profile will use zip code to link profiles together who live in the same area, thus helping in bringing people together in real life as well

c) zappybaby is a social network service (2/2)

Thank you

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