In another pathetic attempt to start making serious money, Facebook has come up with yet another dumb f**king idea. They are testing a new virtual gift product that allows users to give “credits” to other users. The idea is that you can give other users these credits in addition to or in lieu of commenting on or liking a message or expressing a status. So if for example I say “got completely arseholed last night,” other people can throw some credits my way.
Why they should want to do that unless they are a complete cretin, is beyond my imagination. It’s bad enough that complete strangers send me virtual teddy bears and martinis. Or that others with virtual STD’s want to hug me. I refuse to believe that all these douchenozzles are going to start sending me money.
Still, somehow or other, in spite of all the hoopla about it growing faster than “The Blob” in Steve McQueen’s unforgettable movie debut, Mark Zuckerberg has to start justifying the outrageous $15 billion valuation Microsoft gave them in 2007. And he’ll have to do it before his ex-college roommates, currently suing him for stealing their idea, win their case and inherit the company.
Couple that with the fact that Twitter has taken over as “Digerati Flavour du Jour,” and you might consider that the Economist put it best about a year ago, when they said that the founder of Facebook should sell out before his bubble burst. A year from now, I expect to be saying the same thing about Twitter.
George, surely you know that Twitter is dead... long live 'Flutter' - see link below
www.youtube.com/watch
hey George,
I wouldn't say Twitter is the “Digerati Flavour du Jour” -- more the Mainstream Media Flavour of the Month. They are only catching on to what the blogosphere embraced oh way back in 2007. That's internet eons. As for bubbles bursting, I couldn't predict who's will in the end. But don't you think too much obsessive waiting for Twitter to fail surely obscures the bigger picture of microblogging as a major trend.
Hi George,
The Greenback has a different philosophy to the Pound or the Euro. It's a 'show me the money culture' whereas Europeans tend to be more of a 'show me the goods and I'll bring the cash mentality'. I would suggest a duel based on two virtual hospital systems. One where the patient has a credit check before entering, and the other, a state-run system created entirely for the pleasure of the rest of Europe and international paying guests (as we have in the UK). I wonder which economy's workforce would survive longer?
I'd like to know what John Gallen's views are on this:
If Twitter, Flutter, Myspace, Facebook, and Linked-in, were all different hospitals, what would be the outcome?
PS. Thanks for your post. Much appreciated.
OK, here we go (at leat its not a soccer analogy - I didn't have a clue what Mr Trott was on about last week).
Twitter - French hospital and GP system. In and out, no fuss, job done and little or no cost.
Flutter - Well, it's a gag innit, so I guess I'll just put it down as 'Scrubs'... just good fun, with a few dead people and the odd song.
Myspace - not at all social, completely commercial - "now, where's your insurance". It's the USA.
facebook - got its doctorate credentials from spam; paid little or nothing to an unknown college called 'Dr Monkey' for its PhD; and now spends its time shuffling patients around on temporary beds trying somehow to drag money from them. That'd be the Irish hospital system.
Linked-in - I like linked-in. No fuss, doesn't need any hype and does its job professionally. It's the R&D department of The Mayo Clinic.
Oooh...
Lots of good stuff here.
Guys, you have to understand, I am not knocking social media. I am, in fact, a great admirer of social media and all it stands for. I just think the idea of making money from social media is an oxymoron... Because when you try and do that, you turn away the people you attracted in the first place. I may be wrong, but having lived through the dot.com implosion of the nineties, when we were all going to get stinking rich (Remember Boo.com?) I'm just keeping my powder dry... Good chat though. Keep it coming.
Cheers/George
George Parker
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