Social Media—An Exercise In Ego
by Miki SaxonI read a great description of politics in You Run, a short story by Sarah Shankman, “politics is one long power plan; an exercise in ego”. That seems to be a good description of what leadership is to many people.
It certainly describes the MAP so prevalent in the business scandals of the last two decades, as well as that of the titans of Wall Street who contributed so heavily to the current economic mess.
It’s also a major characteristic of the more mundane populace in general, as witnessed on social media platforms.
- The foremost cyber-goal is to be on the first page of Google search results based on designated criteria.
- The more friends you have on Facebook the more desirable you appear.
- Garner enough followers on Twitter and you are suddenly a leader.
- Technorati assigns authority levels to bloggers.
Every social media rates its members and people work mightily to improve their ratings.
For those who aren’t celebrities of one kind or another or are verifiable in the real world, this is done based on the ancient principle of “I’ll scratch your back if you’ll scratch mine.” (As you might guess, this isn’t my forte.)
That means the ratings can be manipulated—and they are.
There are dozens of classes, webinars, coaches and businesses, along with hundreds of books, all focused on ‘managing your online persona’. They teach all the tricks to raising your authority level, acquiring more friends and followers, and the achieving first page status on Google.
But there are no classes, webinars, coaches or books that explain how to tell the wheat from the chaff, i.e., sort through these impressive exercises in ego to find real value.
What do you do? Please share your approach to finding and validating the authenticity and value of your cyber-connections.
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August 14th, 2009 at 9:27 am
Anytime you put in place a metric, people who are measured by it will try to game it. It happens for university rankings, company innovation rankings and social network websites.
However social networks are nothing new. If you are connected to people who are not reliable in life, you don’t rely on them. Why would you rely more on them because they rank high on some web site ? As far as usefulness, to me linked-in was a great response for the manipulated search results of monster.com. As far as information goes, it all boils down to your appreciation of the reliability of the source. When the source is not reliable you do not trust it and you cross check with other sources.
Twitter, facebook and company, just like email are only tools. They do not change the laws of nature.
August 14th, 2009 at 10:02 am
Hi Denis, I agree totally. The problem is that many people have no idea how easily the system is gamed. It amazes me, but so many seem to think that cyberspace is different—that email always gets through, unlike snailmail; that news in blogs has the same objectivity as news in newspapers.
You ask, “Why would you rely more on them because they rank high on some web site?” The problem is that people do rely on those rankings and most don’t have the knowledge to understand how they can be gamed or they just don’t think about it and accept it all on face value.
As usual, you’ve added considerable to the conversation; I’ve missed you:)
August 18th, 2009 at 8:47 am
Well thank you :)
Unfortunately Miki a lot of people rely on FOX News for their information. Tools can be gamed but as of 2009 they don’t lie :)
August 18th, 2009 at 9:29 am