We Are Organized Chaos

$1 Billion For Twitter? Is It 1999 Again?

 

So, as you may have heard, the word on the street is that there is allegedly a bidding war over Oprah’s favorite micro-blogging website, Twitter. Google and Microsoft are being thrown around as two of the suitors. Now, Twitter’s founders, for their part, have stoked the flames by going on the record saying that they wouldn’t sell for $1 Billion dollars. You read that right. They would not sell it.

So, I gotta ask: what is going on around here? Seriously? Is it 1999 again? Aren’t we in a freaking global economic f*ckstorm? Why are people even entertaining the thought of paying this sort of money for “eyeballs” still? Why are they not worried about things like revenue and profitability?

Most of my favorite sites in the world right now are social media sites, but this is just ridiculous. Google is going to lose $470 million on YouTube, this year alone (according to Slate Magazine). They paid $1.65 billion for the site back in 2006. Recently, Facebook was valued at $15 billion dollars (after Microsoft dumped $150 million into them). Now though, it’s looking like Facebook is being valued at closer to $4 billion (which has them none to pleased). These numbers are all huge, and I don’t get where they are coming from. Where are the revenue streams that will one-day support these businesses? How are they going to make more than they spend? And (let’s make that leap of faith and assume that they will make money one day) once they are making money, how are they going to stay relevant, and profitable, long enough to make up all the money they’ve already lost building the business? Why are we doing exactly what we did in the ‘90s? What’s different?

I have to admit though; I’m shocked that Twitter won’t sell for $1 Billion. If I’m running Twitter, and someone offers me $100 million and a meatball sandwich, that site is sold. Enjoy. Here are the keys, I’ll be on some beach somewhere. But a billion? I’d be looking for Ashton Kutcher and the “Punk’d” cameras. $1 Billion. I’d probably be able to go and buy the Dallas Mavericks then…

Does anyone remember AOL? Friendster? WebVan? Pets.com? Excite@Home? MySpace (whose traffic is down over 11% this year)? This list could go on, I’m just getting warmed up… Just because you have eyeballs now, it doesn’t mean you will in one year, or two. Your “eyeballs” move in a herd… they follow the other people, not the technology or the application. They are not loyal to Facebook or Twitter. Call Chris DeWolfe (MySpace’s CEO) and ask him. If everyone on Facebook started leaving in droves for GiveJackABillionDollars.com tomorrow, they would be gone. For example, do any of you still check your Friendster accounts? They’re called “social” networks for a reason.  It’s all about where the people are… 

$1 Billion dollars and Twitter would say “no”. Wow. How can you not hear a Homer Simpson-esque “Yoink” as you grab that check and run out the door giggling? That kind of money shouldn’t be offered in the first place, but once it is… how do you leave it on the table? Anyone want www.freetwitterdesigner.com? Not huge traffic numbers, but it got .0036% of the traffic of Twitter in February. If my math is right, that values us at at least $3.6 million. We’d definitely sell it for that. You have my word.

What do you guys think? Am I just not seeing the “bigger picture” here?

$1 Billion? Sheeeeeeeeeeeyit.

What’s New In Interactive – 4/17/09

What’s New In Interactive is our weekly round-up of links we pass around to each other.

Here’s the latest list of links that caught our eye…

• 84% of Americans say online consumer product reviews have influenced their purchase decision
• The average American visited 111 internet domains and surfed 2,554 web pages in March
• The best thing at CTIA this year – the new Kyocera folding phone concept
• How Guitar Hero helped kick off Social Gaming
• 3D Virtual Trip into how a tumor grows
• One of our favorite community platforms, Ning, is now hosting over 1 million communities
• iPhone Prototype makes excellent use of RFID
• SocialYell Lets USers Raise Their Voices about the Good Companies Out there
• Is social the future of display ads?
• A site we’d never have if it weren’t for tumblr: “look at this fucking hipster”
• Google will lose $470 million on YouTube this year
• We’re big believers in video, and definitely loved the cinematography on this Phillips site. A little more interactivity would have been nice, but it’s definitely beautiful.

Troll Control

A common concern among clients who want to engage their customers via communities is the need for moderation. There is a balance that need to be struck between freedom of expression and the need to tame excessively inflammatory posts. Clive Thompson of Wired recently described several interesting techniques to rain in trolls without having to resort too heavily on expensive moderation. Instead, here are some tricks to let your community do the policing:

1. Crowdsourcing. Let a randomly picked group of readers describe posts for a limited period of time. These descriptions are then converted to a rating. Users can then filter out low rated posts, making them less apparent.

2. Selective Invisibility. Again, based on reader ratings. If a comment gets too many negative ratings it gets removed. The trick is that it becomes invisible to everyone except to the one who posted it. This way the troll thinks everybody is ignoring him and hopefully goes away.

3. Disemvoweling. Using this technique, a post that crosses the line gets all its vowels removed making the message still understandable (and thereby not really censored) yet still clearly flagged as inappropriate.
Of course, the best way may be to simply ignore the trolls. NPR, for instance, has a rule not to “feed” the trolls. They remove both the original inflammatory post as well as replies to curb the practice. In addition, requiring registration or some form of identifier in order to post will help create a barrier to entry for the random hatemonger.

Further reading:
http://eatsleeppublish.com/how-to-beat-comment-trolls/
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/03/magazine/03trolls-t.html?_r=3&hp=&oref=login&pagewanted=all

The Future of Branding on Social Networks?

So, fairly frequently a client asks me “What’s cool?” (Anyone who knew me in high school would be highly amused to learn that I’m never asked that question) Admittedly, my gut instinct is to ask them if they’d seen “Dexter” or “The Wire” yet. I then realize it’s a work-related conversation, so I deduce (by thinking) that what they’re really after is actually, “What’s next in the digital space?”

So, what exactly is cool? Now, admittedly I’m no Ashton Kutcher, but for the immediate future, one of my answers is SocialVibe. And here’s why: their model just may revolutionize the way brands show up on social networks; the way consumers interact with brands; and, the way social networks make revenue (I know this last point may seem like blasphemy to some of you purists who think “eyeballs” are as good as money, but the VC well will run dry at some point and companies are going to need to make more than they spend).

First, for those of you that haven’t heard of them, here’s a little SocialVibe “about us”. And, seeing as how I’m incredibly lazy, here’s how paidcontent.org describes them: “SocialVibe lets users choose a cause to support and then a brand to “sponsor” them, from biggies like Coca-Cola, to indies like apparel-maker Sub Urban Riot. They post a branded badge to their social media profile and the sponsor donates to the cause according to the number of views it gets. Users can choose multiple causes and sponsors, and the badges work across nets like Facebook, MySpace; with integration into WordPress and IM clients like AIM coming down the pike.”

Nothing complex, but incredibly brilliant none the less. And, the reason I think so can be summed up by this: everybody plays, everybody wins. It’s a win-win-win-win (for those of you keeping track at home, that’s four more wins than the Detroit Lions put up this season). Here’s how:

• Individuals “win” because they get to control what brands they are associated with while getting the warm fuzzy feeling that comes with helping out a good cause. It’s no surprise that this site is gaining traction with teenagers, as it’s been well documented that teens “value the environment, and buy from socially responsible companies” (http://www.mediapost.com/publications/index.cfm?fa=Articles.showArticle&art_aid=57341).
• Brand’s “win” because they not only get to be associated with an individual’s favorite cause (in that individual’s mind), but they get in invite into the social media party/conversation. It’s as if the individual is saying, not only do “I support this cause”, but I also “support this brand”. How powerful is that for the brand’s credibility and their relationship with their consumers? Beats the crap outta some banner on the right hand nav. I guarantee it. I mean, it’s as if the brand got their Evite to the “social media party”, they showed up on time with a bottle of wine or a case of beer, they were charming, and now the host and guests are loving that they’re there.
• Charities “win” because they… well… because they get some much needed cash.
• SocialVibe “wins” because it’s only fair that they should take a nominal piece of the cash pie for facilitating this program (this piece is evidently coming soon, as I believe all the money currently goes directly to the charity). To be honest though, I am left with one nagging question: what happens when Facebook (or Myspace) replicates this offering and uses the power of their 280 billion users (and their countless brand relationships) to make SocialVibe obsolete. Hopefully that doesn’t happen, but in that case, Facebook finally has a revenue stream so they then get the “win”.

Well, that’s all I’ve got for now. I’d love to hear your thoughts @jack2point0