By Ben Haber
We discovered two great infographics this week, one that looks at the history of social media, and another that compares Facebook and Twitter. Enjoy!
(click on the graphic for a larger view)
11 comments January 25th, 2011
By Ben Haber
Last night’s episode of Criminal Minds was about a killer that found his victims through social networking sites. The episode specifically calls out Facebook and Twitter, but also references geo-location social networks like FourSquare. While the details of the episode are fiction, the episode brings up valid points about the information that we share online, and feels real enough to make you check your privacy settings following the show.
For the purpose of analyzing three types of social networks, I’m going to focus on Facebook, Twitter and FourSquare.
Facebook: Facebook is unique because it allows you to have a lot of flexibility with your privacy setting. While Mark Zuckerberg would urge you to keep an open profile with low privacy setting, that is not the smart move. First, make sure you’re only “friends’ with people that you know and can trust. You don’t have to accept friend requests from everyone, especially if you don’t know them or don’t like them. Then, you can limit the amount of information that is available to people. Don’t post where you are at all times, don’t give out your home address or phone number, and don’t put up pictures that share too much about yourself.
Twitter: Twitter has two privacy settings – share everything or create a protected account, meaning that you need to approve everyone that has access to your Twitter feed. If you have a standard account it means that anyone can see what you write, regardless of if they are following you or even have a Twitter account. Think about this again, ANYONE can see what you post. If you’re giving out details about your current location, announcing when you’re home alone or on vacation, anyone can see that. Twitter is much safer as a communication tool that does not offer an excess of information on your whereabouts or personal life.
FourSquare: FourSquare might be the most dangerous social network of them all since its primary goal is to broadcast where you go, and how often. Users check in to locations that they visit, ranging from the office, movies, restaurants, parks, and even their homes. While this builds an online network of people that you can get tips from, it’s really risky. Anyone can see where you are and learn about your daily and weekly patterns. It’s a lot of personal information to provide strangers with, and is a social network that I won’t go near for personal use, no matter how many discounted Frappucinos Starbucks will try and bribe me with.
11 comments May 20th, 2010
By Molly Galler
Yesterday afternoon, Ryan Seacrest, the host of FOX’s reality television singing competition American Idol announced via his blog that FOX would allow the recently cast Top 24 contestants to use Facebook, Twitter and MySpace during the competition.
He wrote, “In a testament to the undeniable influence of social media in today’s day in age, American Idol producers and network executives, after nine seasons have finally agreed to allow contestants to maintain social networking profiles on Twitter, Facebook and Myspace. In previous seasons, all social networking was banned, and any pre-existing profiles were deleted prior to the start of live shows. While we’re still unaware of the exact ‘rules of engagement’ for these profiles, considering they were all custom-made by FOX, we can imagine producers have established ground rules for what’s kosher to be discussed on Twitter and elsewhere.”
RaceTalk has previously reported the NBA and the NFL putting restrictions on athletes using social media close to game time, and it seems FOX will follow their lead with this new crop of contestants.
While it is unclear what exactly the ground rules are, FOX has created each contestant’s social media profile themselves, taking control before the contestants even begin pushing out information into the social media universe.
While I respect FOX’s attempt to keep up with the demand for a social media presence, creating profiles for the contestants and providing guidelines for what they can discuss seems to defeat the purpose of following their personal accounts. Why not just have a general American Idol profile and push out general, non-spoiler updates?
When the phone lines are open, I’d like to cast a vote for authenticity, please.
5 comments February 19th, 2010
By Kyle Austin
Jon Miller of News Corp. Speaks with Jessi Hempel of Fortune about MySpace last year
Last year at Fortune’s Brainstorm: Tech I watched News Corp. digital czar Jon Miller talk almost glowing of the new talent News Corp. was bringing into MySpace. It was just two months after the hiring of Facebook’s Owen Van Natta as CEO and without mentioning him by name, Miller appeared to lay out the case for why Van Natta was the man to lead MySpace forward:
“You can’t do everything and you can’t do it all yourself. You have to look outside in addition to within. You must be focused. We are focused on music, games and video. You can’t play catch-up. It requires a top-to-bottom (culture) shift. Part of the idea of bringing in the new team was to make this shift. We’re going to make a culture that is product focused, entrepreneurial and dedicated to continued innovation.”
However, maybe it was telling that Miller refereed to “them” as a team and not Van Natta as the lone savior. Because now, only 6 months later, Van Natta is out of a job and MySpace COO, Mike Jones, and chief product officer, Jason Hirschhorn (both handpicked for the “team” by Miller) appear to be at the helm of a still-teetering ship.
Kara Swisher of All Things Digital (a News Corp owned publication) reports that contrary to public statements, Miller fired Van Natta after all day meetings on Wednesday. In his internal memo to staffers, first picked-up by PaidCotent (in-full below), Miller noted that Van Natta was “stepping down,” while praising the efforts of Jones and Hirschhorn.
He did however, give some credit to Van Natta for a slight revival for MySpace, noting “We added over 1.5 million users and grew significantly in time spent last month – as a result of many of his efforts.”
So why the abrupt exit if they were headed in the right direction? One obvious reason is that Rupert Murdoch is still not happy where MySpace is. He publicly noted in a recent earnings call that “It’s (MySpace) not where we want it.” During that same call, the company highlighted that its digital media group dropped $32 million from a year earlier – largely due to marketers moving away from MySpace and into Facebook. But what can they do with it at this point?
The new team’s vision appeared to be focused on music and gaming. MySpace still has the in into Hollywood and New York. But with shrinking traffic, can they build subscription services into the mix? There have been rumors about a music subscription service but nothing has been announced publicly. Without that, the site appears to be a niche site that won’t be a revenue maker for the company. Could they on-load it? Maybe a Russian investor like Digital Sky Technologies (investor in Facebook) would be interested speculate media insiders, but I’m not sure what other appetite is out there for MySpace in its current state.
But perhaps the bigger question is where will Van Natta end up? Perhaps, Twitter?
Today we announced that Owen Van Natta is stepping down as MySpace’s CEO. Mike Jones and Jason Hirschhorn, who have each done a great job from both an operational and product perspective, are being elevated to co-Presidents and will assume Owen’s responsibilities. While this may be a surprising turn of events for some of you, I am absolutely confident that this change is best for all parties involved and – most importantly – the MySpace business. Owen took on an incredible challenge in assuming leadership of MySpace during a difficult period. He has worked to refocus and revitalize the company, and I believe MySpace is pointed in the right direction and gaining valuable momentum – we added over 1.5 million users and grew significantly in time spent last month – as a result of many of his efforts. However, in discussing with Owen his priorities for the future both personally and professionally, we both agreed that it was best that he step down at this time. I am grateful to Owen for his hard work, and I ask that you join me in wishing him well in the future. His departure is effective immediately, as are the appointments of both Mike and Jason.
I will leave it to Mike and Jason to communicate to all of you their excitement about the future and their priorities for the business going forward, but I would like to express my confidence in their ability to lead MySpace into this new and promising chapter. Since joining in April, their efforts on both the operational and product development fronts have been vital to our recent progress.
Thank you all for your continued hard work, and please join me in congratulating Mike and Jason on their new roles, and in wishing Owen all the best in the future.
Best,
Jon
Office of Jonathan Miller
Chairman & CEO, News Corp. Digital Media Group
Chief Digital Officer, News Corporation
2 comments February 11th, 2010
