The Narcissistic Side of Twitter

In thinking about Twitter, and the reason it lives on despite its core functionality being replicated by services like Facebook and Google Plus, two things occurred to me. First, Twitter achieved its initial rise due to an influx of celebrities. Second, Twitter allows ordinary people to follow, or even be followed by, celebrities, to engage in what seems like a conversation, and perhaps even to experience the excitement of having a celebrity respond to or re-tweet something that they have said. Second, it is the faux relationships that continue to drive Twitter. The sense that somebody you have seen on television "knows" you, cares about what you say, or is even reading and writing her own tweets. Yes, some celebrities manage their own feeds. Others have publicists or staff members who handle that for them, yet even when they're known to use proxies other Twitter members still seem to feel the thrill of contact.

Twitter serves celebrities, in that much of celebrity is built upon a false sense of communality or camaraderie, and now you can have "proof" that a celebrity likes you and cares what you have to say. It's an automation of the historically slow process of receiving fan mail, perhaps responding to it, perhaps dropping in a head shot. It's like being a member of a celebrity fan club, but where the celebrity actually "knows you you are" and "shows up". Twitter may be the virtual equivalent of the butler at the door or, for those who tweet through proxies, the virtual equivalent of the intercom between the butler at the door and you outside the locked exterior gate. But if you can't see all of that distancing, is it really there?

What brought this to mind today? A smart person who probably should know better than to care about Paris Hilton in the first place:

Paris Hilton is tweeting up a storm about how much she loves Bali. It's her first visit. She tweeted a few hours ago, "Make a wish. 11.1l.11"

Since I've stood up for Paris on TalkLeft so many times during her various legal difficulties, I thought I'd ask her a favor. I tweeted her in reply:

@ParisHilton I wish you'd visit Aussie Schapelle Corby, doing 20 years for pot in Kerobokan Prison in bli, Pls Google her name.

"I've blogged favorably about her," meets, "She's on Twitter", and somehow that seems to become, "She may listen to me and perhaps even share my outrage at Bali's legal system". Even if we assume Paris manages her own feed, and doesn't pass that task off to a publicist or intern, what about Paris would make you think that her trip to Bali and her raving about the wonders of the country is being driven by her amazement? Would it not be a safer bet that she has been comped or compensated to promote the nation or certain of its attractions, and won't be saying anything negative? (Call me cynical, but I believe Paris's raving is a thinly disguised sales pitch from a somewhat over-the-hill celebrity spokesmodel. Bali isn't under FTC jurisdiction.)

If a celebrity "friends" you on Facebook or, if we're to that point, adds you to a Google Plus circle, you can see (or search for) your face among the tens of thousands of others. Yes, if you want to browse the members somebody claims to follow or his list of followers, your account will be every bit as difficult to find. But Twitter puts the feed, not the faces, front and center. And due to occasional celebrity retweets or responses, people do get reinforced that their tweets are being heard.

I heard a celebrity being interviewed recently (it may have been Louis C.K.) and he mentioned both that he didn't like Twitter and that people got angry at him because he didn't follow anybody. (Solution: Hire an intern?) To me, this highlights the extent to which Twitter flourishes upon the false sense of "He likes me too". Even if you never look at the feed, you'll have a happier population of followers, and probably a much larger one, if you make them think you care what they say. Twitter makes that easy.

I don't mean to diminish Twitter's value as a communication tool. There are people who like it for following news, politics, business tips, etc. I just happen to be coming to the conclusion that the thing that allows Twitter to continue is the false sense of community it creates between its high profile members and their followers and that, absent that, it would be a shadow of its present self. A mere year ago, Justin Bieber was responsible for a full 3% of Twitter's traffic. What does that tell you?

LinkedIn Using Your Name and Face for Advertising?

At Marketing Pilgrim, Frank Reed discusses LinkedIn's plan to use members' names and photographs to boost ad performance:

When LinkedIn members recommend people and services, follow companies, or take other actions, their name/photo may show up in related ads shown to you.

Reed provides instructions on how to opt out - and you have to opt out as by default you're opted in. Reed comments,

Honestly, I am disappointed in LinkedIn doing this. I get what they are trying to do but to stoop to Facebook’s privacy practices level is not cool.

I think LinkedIn presently has more of an incentive than Facebook to play fast and loose with your privacy, or to try to imply your endorsement of advertiser products and services. In both cases it's about boosting revenue so that the companies can justify their absurd valuations. But Facebook can still withhold a lot of information, while LinkedIn is now publicly traded and must file annual reports and answer to shareholders.  LinkedIn got a huge boost from the publicity associated with its going public, but... have you used LinkedIn? Do you do so on a regular basis?

I've been signed up for years, but by far the most significant use I get of my membership is seeing a more detailed profile than is available to me without logging in. Most of the profiles I see haven't been updated for years. I expect that in some industries the networking opportunities offered by LinkedIn, and the ability to avoid having family and social content spill over into your professional profile, makes it more valuable. But if you're not in one of those industries, why bother? I heard from a guy who, prior to the announcement of LinkedIn's IPO, had forgotten that he had signed up and thought the periodic emails he received from LinkedIn were spam. Pay for additional features? You must be joking, right?

Since the IPO, LinkedIn seems a lot more like Facebook, across the board. The new layout seems more like Facebook. The proliferation of ads, leo more like Facebook. And using your profile information to try to advertise products to your network? Unquestionably like Facebook. Whether you consider the Facebook / LinkedIn "cool" or not depends, I suppose, on how much stock you own, but the fact remains that these companies have to do something to justify their absurd valuations - either that or face what I think is the inevitable realization that those valuations are unsustainable.

If I were a LinkedIn insider I would be thinking about how I could sell as much of my stock as possible without causing other investors to recognize what I was doing, just as some Facebook insiders attempted to sell significant amounts of their stock through the failed private investor program that valued the company at $50 billion. If I were with either company I would look at Google Plus and worry - not that it's going to become quickly dominant, but that Google can use Google Plus as a loss leader and won't have to engage in the tricks, gimmicks, avalanche of ads and disrespect of privacy that appear to be a significant part of the business model for stand-alone social networks. People only have so much attention to spread around, and we can already see a litany of dead and dying social networks displaced by Facebook.

<strong>Update</strong>: LinkedIn has modified its policies in the face of the negative publicity, <a href="http://www.marketingpilgrim.com/2011/08/caught-with-hand-in-privacy-cookie-jar-linkedin-makes-change.html">but to Reed</a> there's no reason to trust them in the future.

The Next Wave?

Through Google Wave, Google has unveiled a set of collaborative tools that both tie into and could potentially eclipse current social networking tools (including the oldest one, email). If you watch the keynote, announcing Wave to developers, you can get a sense of the incredible potential of this tool.

That's not to say "things can't go wrong". They can, most notably if it's too difficult or too cumbersome to incorporate Wave into third party sites (Google's open sourced most of the code to facilitate tool production and integration, but still...) or if people conclude that its use puts too much of their control of their data (or too much power) into Google's hands.

But it's pretty easy to see how Wave could transform most of the social communication tools we use today, from instant messaging to blogging, to forums, to social networks, as well as offering a broad set of collaborative tools that appear to significantly improve upon those currently available through Google Docs or similar services.

For now, though, we'll have to wait and see what happens. Some developers are getting an inside look, so they can start developing tools before the release to the general public, but for you and me... we don't get to try it out until "later this year".

"We're Almost Full"

I enjoyed this observation by Seth Godin, in relation to the overwhelming amount of data that's not just available to us, but is directed to us each and every day: "The internet isn't full, but we are."

You can't keep up with the status of your friends on the social networks. No way. You can't read every important blog... you can't even read all the blogs that tell you what the important blogs are saying.

That reminds me of advice I see directed at law firms - that they start blogs ("blawgs") and that they can generate clients and referrals through social networking. But that's simplistic.

The blogging advice typically goes along the lines of, "Pick a niche subject, start a blog, post regularly, and make yourself an expert." Blawg of dreams. I'm reminded of Orin Kerr's brief departure from the Volokh Conspiracy to start his own blog. He did all of that, and what? Went back to the much more eclectic, much less scholarly atmosphere of the group blog because it had the traffic. That was two years ago, and the marketplace is now far more crowded. Sure legal blogs can generate business or make people think of you as an authority, but so can a other approaches such as posting online articles, traditional networking, teaching CLE courses, or writing for traditional publications. You may find that, when costs and time are considered, those other approaches offer a far greater return on your investment.

It's amusing to me to read a typical article about the glories of legal blogging, as there seems to be remarkable overlap between the bloggers who are interviewed about their experiences, and they almost always also rely heavily on quotes from people who design and support legal weblogs. You may not get rich mining for gold, but that doesn't mean you can't get rich selling pickaxes to the miners.

Meanwhile, if you look at the ABA's top 100 blogs, how many of them are actually focused on client generation for practicing lawyers? I suspect that if you looked at the blogs that are the most successful at generating business from the public at large, I doubt you would conclude that many of the authors were leading experts in their fields (although they may say that they are on their blogs), and I doubt that you would add many (perhaps not any) to your blogroll. Creating a blog that establishes your expertise to other lawyers such that they refer you cases? That's a lot harder, as you have to get them to notice your blog. And follow it. And, as much as possible, to link to it.

That brings us to social networking. An article I read recently described a lawyer who was active on multiple social networks, and that his combined efforts on his networks generated about $100,000.00 in business for his firm over the prior year. The article conceded that he's an outlier. But it's more than that. It's safe to say he's a younger lawyer, and that his network primarily revolves around younger lawyers. Telling an older lawyer (and no, I don't mean "old" - just old enough to find social networking bit alien) "Find a social network, create a profile, connect to your peers, and learn to use it", will often not be a good use of that lawyer's time, as many of his peers won't be participating in the network, and of those who are many will be passively participating - they will have created a profile that they may or may not check on occasion, and that they may or may not update on occasion, but they're not actively using the network or the service's features.

As for a younger lawyer who is active in five or more social networks, keeps his profile up to date, responds to his friends, and generates referrals, let's not miss this: The emphasis is still on social. I doubt you'll find a person who is that active in social networks who joined and participates primarily for business purposes; but you'll find a lot who participate for social purposes, with a business element growing out of that social involvement. The importance of social networking is likely to rise, as more and more younger lawyers emerge from a generation that is heavily invested in social networks. But unless you're going to be an active social networker, it's unlikely to become a significant source of clients and revenue.

A big part of the problem is the information overload. There are too many blogs (and "blawgs"), and too many social networks. There will be an increasing tendency toward monopoly - just as there used to be many search engines and now there are really only three that matter, one of which is dominant, eventually there will be similar consolidation among social networks. Because even people who can afford to spend hours each day maintaining their profiles on five networks, few of whom work for law firms, will exhaust at six, or seven, or twenty. People who aren't into social networking don't want to be advised to pick between five or more options and hope that their participation leads to more business. They want to be told, "Use this one," and not have to worry about the others. Many would probably perfer a simple, specialized tool - e.g., an enhanced ABA membership that provides simple tools for members to connect to their peers, track practice areas, perhaps follow legal news and weblogs, and refer cases.