As soon as a site gets popular, it seems to fade away and is shunned as old news. Do we have such a short attention span, as a society, that we can’t stick to anything new? The trend seems to be a new site gains momentum and does one of three things:
- Runs out of steam before it hits its peak – Twitter, Jaiku, Facebook
- Hits its peak but the peak is much lower than expected – LinkedIn
- Blows way beyond its peak and the site’s popularity overwhelms it’s functionality and bogs it down – MySpace, YouTube
- (Bonus) So many sites trying to be like the popular sites that any chance at popularity is diluted – kyte.tv, zooomr
If you peruse any of these sites, both the ones I have listed and many others, they all claim to be the best at what they are doing. It’s kind of like buying a car, based on the television and newspaper ads, there are a lot of great car lots out there that will get you in that car today, but that’s not the reality.
I generally don’t fully commit to any of these sites, nothing out there is unique enough to capture my attention and keep it, so I’m just going to drive by. I have accounts at many of these sites and regularly add new contacts but it generally goes no further. I have learned to not just add anybody. For instance, on Twitter, if you add me and I go to your profile and it’s not in English or there’s no value for me there, I won’t add you. It’s not personal, I just don’t have the time. MySpace is the biggest potential waste of my time, I’m honestly about 20 years too late and I think I have only added 1 friend that seemed legitimate. If your name is Kaneisha or Roxy or Jenny or anything like that, I’m not adding you and that’s who all but one of you has been.
By the way, I still think there is some kind of value for a church or ministry to be at MySpace because there are a lot of hurting people out there, but it’s not for everyone. I think the church should have a definite plan of attack and try to be pro-active instead of passive.
Another example of the potential rise and fall of a site is FaceBook. Literally, last week, it’s all I heard, FaceBook this, FaceBook that, gotta get to FaceBook, if you’re not on FaceBook, you’re a loser, on and on and on. This week, there is no positive chatter about FaceBook. The hype last week got me to sign up at FaceBook, I got in there and wasn’t impressed. Maybe I’m missing something, make the sale to me if there’s something there.
While web 2.0 is cool, I wonder what’s going to stick. What are the sites that are going to capture my attention and keep it? There is some value in some of these sites but I don’t have time to bounce around to the next big site each week, recreating my contacts and my presence in that environment.
Cynthia Ware has an interesting perspective on whether LinkedIn or FaceBook is better and Rich has some thoughts on social networking, as well.
Hey, thanks for the link-love!
Rich
BlogRodent
ISTM that Facebook has utility as an extension of a community or group that already exists. I have two accounts on there (shhhhh… I am probably violating their TOS with that admission.) One is for myself as pastor of our local church. That one isn’t really doing much since there are so few of our church people who are online. I’m sticking with that account because I hope to meet-up with people I went to school with or with people from prior churches I have pastored. No success in that thus far.
The other Facebook that I only recently signed up for is related to my blogging activity. I still attempt to blog semi-anonymously, even though some folks have met me IRL. That second account has seen more activity because it has become an extension of my blogging community. The “friends” that I have with that account are friends who I’ve meet through blogging. (I’ll be looking for you now, Jim!)
So, with less than a month’s experience, that is my story so far. I’m not ready to abandon Facebook just yet. I’m going to stick with it for a time. Once you get several friends in your list, it is cool to see what they are up to. Also, some of the apps are really good, while others are quite lame. If you can get your friends using the good apps, that can be a nice way to interact also. (I’m thinking now, as an example of a good app, about the one that lists the books you are reading and have read. I can’t recall the name just now.)
In my opinion, this Web 2.0 is still new. It’s going to take some time and evolutions before the best parts of it rise to the surface. Meanwhile, it can be worthwhile playing around with what’s out there. A better topic might be how will Web 2.0 and social networking impact the church? Or how can the church leverage these tools?
Hey, I found you on Facebook!
It wasn’t easy since there are over 100 “Jim Walton”s
You might get more friends if you placed a link to your Facebook profile on this blog.