Beyond Search to Cybersocialization
May 23, 2009
Ad Age is not my first choice in morning reading. I scanned the article “The Coming End of YouTube, Twitter and Facebook Socialism” by Simon Dumenco here because these services are going like great guns in World War One. In fact, one of my history profs asserted that World War One was a precursor to World War Two, and that, ladies and gentlemen, ushered in much of our current brave new world.
Mr. Dumenco asserted:
It’s sweet, really, that venture capitalists have ponied up millions so that we can all keep tweeting. It’s also more than a bit scary. Because more and more of us are increasingly addicted not only to Twitter, but to other services that lack workable business models. What happens if the “dealers” who feed our habits disappear? (It’s been known to happen. Last week, for instance, Yahoo announced it was shutting down last century’s hot social-networking-esque service, GeoCities, for which it paid $3.5 billion in 1999.)
After reminding me that money may not be “smart” when it comes to Ad Age’s view of business, Mr. Dumenco concluded:
Seriously. I love YouTube, I’ve made some interesting connections through Facebook, and I enjoy Twittering. (Last week, for instance, I tweeted about an astonishing bit of information I came across in Britain’s Daily Telegraph: YouTube “reportedly uses as much bandwidth as the entire internet took up in 2000.”)
Two thoughts this gloomy day in Cleveland, once home to the burning river:
One. The notion of socialism is interesting, but I don’t think the argument was developed, nor presented in a way that squeezed the milk from this metaphor. The referenced services are superficially similar if one views them from the with it, Mad Ave vantage point. But I don’t see the three as having much similarity with socialism let alone to coinage “cybersocialization”. Balkanization and middle school friendship groups seem to be more on point to me along with the prospect of skills no longer in demand in today’s job market. The lack of cohesion within the services and their interesting swarming behavior seems to be a new type of social integration. The old and familiar “isms” don’t provide much in the way of handholds in my opinion.
Two. The ad perspective is commissionable monetization. None of these three services has figured out a business model for themselves that generates sufficient cash to keep the Odwalla flowing for the employees and contractors. More problematic is the reality that Mad Ave types have to sit on the sidelines, Twittering and updating Facebook pages, without an opportunity for billing. The market available to Facebook owners, for example, seems to be a challenge to squeeze into the old, familiar business models. As a result, Facebook is experimenting and while Facebook tries to figure out its financial future, the Mad Ave types are being driven wacky because they can’t figure out how to cash in on the service. The squirming reminds me of a class of third graders denied recess.
Bottomline for me: traditional and familiar advertising models have to be custom fit to these new markets. Venture firms have nothing to do with this problem, nor can money solve the problem. When I watched a jeweler in Istanbul fit a stone into a cheap sterling silver setting, I was surprised at how long it took. The value of the finished piece was insufficient to compensate the worker for the labor. But the jeweler managed. Ad execs may not have the degrees of freedom the jeweler enjoyed. With each passing day, the old Mad Ave skills may be eroding.
Like the publishing and financial sectors, the issue is not socialization. It is life on the dole or a McJob. I don’t think the end of YouTube, Facebook, or Twitter is impossible. I think that more disruption will take place before these outfits bite the dust. Traditional advertising is likely to face a greater challenge in the short term. Tweet that.
Stephen Arnold, May 23, 2009
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