Has The Age Of Facebook Debates Come To A Close?

Trish Forant at Dayngr Zone Media recently posed an interesting and increasingly common question on Facebook, asking friends if they've pulled back from sharing opinions or engaging in debates on the popular social network. She is not alone. A few weeks earlier, Blog Bloke had asked a similar question, wondering what his friends posted besides kid pics, food porn, and celebrity sightings.

He had more or less asked where has the social imperative for social media gone.

It hasn't necessarily gone anywhere. But more and more people, it seems, feel that social networks are already too negative in between their servings of silly cat videos. After all, one person's social justice is another person's social poison. And unless you're up for some diatribe, it is best to be a sycophant or perhaps stay silent. Even constructive criticism is a skill set as plenty of people are easily offended.

Recently, one of my friends told me to "read the article" after I left a comment on an article she had shared. The article asked people to pick between two vices. I had said neither, which was later attributed to me thinking like a parent. I could have said I was thinking like a person and outlined my case, but why bother? It was already apparent after two invalidations that discussion wasn't welcome.

And therein lies the crux of the problem. Not all social networks really afford as much two-way communication as one might think. Facebook is especially weak in the dialogue department.

Facebook is a lousy platform for meaningful dialogue and intelligent debate. 

This isn't a network criticism. It's a recognition that the platform was designed to help people manage social connections and connect with those who have similar interests and not communication or social discourse. And while sometimes a discussion might lead someone to a revelation, such occurrences are rare. Most debates only make people feel bad at worst, awkward at best. Why?

• Facebook celebrates sycophants.  It isn't by accident that Facebook has a 'like' button. The system is meant to deliver positive reinforcement from friends. "Me too" and "good job" add happiness.

• Facebook invites dogma. The wall and comment section of Facebook is much less suited to dialogue than statement making. Most discussions consist of affirmative or negative sentiment.

• Facebook skews for affirmation. Much like more and more people watch news programs that reference their beliefs, they nurture friends in the same way and unfriend those who don't fit.

• Facebook favors majority. As people mass a majority of like-minded friends, they build an army of agreement to support whatever they happen to share and sometimes to shake down dissenters.   

• Facebook creates imbalance. Whereas blogs provide an open-ended forum with the potential for thoughtful discussion and Twitter forces dialogue with a 140-character limit, Facebook creates the impression that short comments feel like quips and long comments are akin to hijacking the post.

All in all, the social network is mostly designed to deliver healthy does of "good vibes" so you keep coming back for more. It mostly works that way too. Few people actually sign on to thrive as the one contrarian among friends, on their wall or someone else's spaces. Life is too short to be grumpy.

So most people sign on to share bits and pieces of their lives, with the unstated understanding that their friends will give them support or props as needed, and the unstated assumption that they do the same for their friends. And when you know that is the system by design, it doesn't make much sense to muck it up by floating out too many ideologies, issues, or opinions that people disagree with.

Sure, there are those like Trish Forant (and myself) who are generally more than happy to celebrate our diversity of friendships and willingness to agree to disagree. But nowadays, fewer people seem accustomed to the notion that most topics cannot be boiled down into black and white, red or blue.

Why would they be accustomed to anything else? Facebook is purposefully designed for someone to either "like" something or remain silent. Anything else carries the risk of negative reinforcement. Real discussion, on the other hand, requires a better format and, occasionally, a decent moderator.

The Best Time Fallacy For Social Sharing

You can read countless opinions about the best time to share content on social networks and come up with all sorts of conclusions. Some people have even published guides about sharing. And other people claim that there is a science behind sharing. Maybe it is science or maybe it's more random.

If it really was science, one would think big data could decipher it by now. Or who knows? Maybe it already did. If you spend a little time reading these articles, most pros are convinced by their metrics.

Some look for peaks in reach. Others avoid peaks in reach.  Some prefer off hours. Others prefer on hours. Some measure peaks in engagement. Others measure other stuff. Some say do what everyone else does. And others? Well, they say Friday.  Friday? Yes, Friday. 

Take your pick or subscribe to the most common of claims — 1-3 p.m. on Twitter, 1-4 p.m. on Facebook, 5-6 p.m. on Instagram, 8-11 p.m. on Pinterest, etc. — and you will eventually learn one thing. These assumptions are mostly wrong, at least wrong enough that they aren't always right.

Social sharing is largely shaped by three interdependent factors. 

The simple truth is that different social communities consume, engage, and share differently and different content (both in form or function) is consumed, engaged, and shared differently. The very best that anyone can hope for is to assess how their community receives and responds to content.

So where some self-proclaimed data analysts get it wrong is in not considering the entire picture. Ergo, the best time to share isn't necessarily dictated by big data patterns but by three interdependent influencers that established those data patterns. Specifically?

Community Demographics. Demographics do shape some online activity much like they shape broadcast channels, with the exception of increased accessibility at work. Sooner or later, marketers are likely to see age, gender, income level, race and ethnicity as influences (with occupations or interests being big tells too). This is doubly true for brands driving demographics to their accounts.

The point is that musicians and music lovers might be more active between 4 p.m. and 6 p.m., graphic designers between 7 p.m. and 9 p.m., authors and book lovers at around 11 a.m. and again at 5 p.m. This space, by the way, tends to perform better earlier in the day, especially between 6 a.m. and 8 a.m., which corresponds with marketers and communicators getting into work on the East Coast.

Social Media Management. And if you ever wondered why so many social media professionals can make seemingly contradictory claims about the best time, chalk it up to their own design. If a social media manager engages people between 6 a.m. and 8 a.m., 11 a.m. and 1 p.m., and 4 p.m. and 6 p.m. every day, then it's more than likely they will develop an audience around those times.

In fact, it might even make sense to pick times slightly off from some community demographics in an attempt to reach underserved prospects. Or, depending on resources and strategies, it might make sense to weight more activity during other timeframes. In the case of this space even, I'm partly responsible for that 6-8 a.m. timeframe mentioned earlier.

Content Type And Relevancy. Of course, engagement doesn't begin and end with participants. Not all content is created equal at the same time. For example, a social media manager might find that long-form content, studies, and white papers are best delivered when people are fresh while shorter content and timely information feels better late in the day and early morning.

Not all topics are created equal either. Some are predisposed to natural timeframes. People are more receptive to food porn before they eat rather than after they eat whereas recipes are easier to consume mid-morning and a few hours after dinner. And other special interests (such as programs or television shows) have unique timeframes too. Sometimes it can even be as simple as before and after (and sometimes during) the program.

In sum, the best time to share content has nothing to do with data patterns and much more to do with the factors that created those data patterns, with "do what seems to work" coming in a close second. Even the case of this space, all the external data suggests that I'm publishing at the worst time for a communication blog except the evidence that comes with publishing and sharing at other times.

Have Social Networks Become The Colosseum Of Our Times?

There are hundreds of news headlines that will break today. Some of them, such as extreme insurgents gaining ground on Baghdad, are important. Others, such as the giraffe gaffe made by Delta Airlines, are not. And yet, outrage over the latter easily outpaced the outrage over the former.

What did Delta do wrong? There isn't much of a story. In an attempt to bring visuals into its social media mix, Delta congratulated the United States for its win over Ghana with the Statue of Liberty representing the U.S. and a giraffe representing Ghana. The problem? Giraffes don't live in Ghana.

Immediately following the tweet, Twitter lit up with responses, ranging from those that aimed to poke fun at the company to those expressing true outrage and claims of racism. To compound its self-inflicted injury, Delta also followed the gaffe with a typo in the apology.

"We're sorry for our choice of photo in our precious tweet. Best of luck to all teams playing in the World Cup." — Delta

Delta meant to write "previous" tweet (which it eventually sent out as corrected), but that wasn't the only misfire. Identifying the "offensive" tweet as the "previous tweet" only makes sense if you leave it up. Delta Airlines had removed it.

The social media lesson isn't what you think. 

Some public relations professionals said the error is indicative of inexperienced communicators managing social network accounts for big companies. Others said it was an example of Americans being largely ignorant of Africa. And yet others pinned it to a lack of cultural sensitively training.

While any one of those speculations might be true, the better lesson slipped through the cracks. Sometimes a social media crisis is only what we make it. Delta chose to make it serious so it was.

Delta could have made fun of the company instead (which seems more appropriate given that the original mistake was one part ignorance and one part laziness) and followed it up with an image of something more representative of the country. Elephants, for example, do live in Ghana.

Then again, given how many people asked the airlines to avoid the stereotypical safari imagery, they could have chosen any number of other things to do in Ghana instead. They could have even encouraged people to find out what there is to do there with a one-time airfare reduction.

Why not? Delta already flies to the city of Accra, which is the capital of Ghana. There is nothing wrong with promoting a destination. It's what airlines do because every destination becomes their home.

Social media is sometimes akin to the Roman colosseum.

Almost two centuries ago, the Romans used chariot races, arena hunts, mock sea battles, and gladiator contests to entertain its population. The biggest of its arenas is the famed Flavian Amphitheatre, which is estimated to have held between 50,000 and 80,000 spectators.

The games were so successful that they were sometimes held to simply to distract the populace from other problems. It worked too. There was far too much to worry about — who sat where (social standing), what to wear (personal branding), and which gladiators were favored (professional prowess among those who weren't slaves) — to concern oneself with other political problems.

It remained a thriving industry in Rome for almost 300 years. Emperor Honorius had closed down the schools. The contests were finally banned outright when a monk leapt between two gladiators and the indignant crowd stoned him to death. Six years later, the city was sacked by the Visigoths.

Social media can have the same galvanizing effect, easily placing silly cat photos over social justice. There is nothing wrong with that. But then again, it's always smart to consider that social media is what we make it and, in some cases, maybe we're making too much of it like the colosseum as outrage is amplified and the participating crowd wants to extol a pound of flesh.

Sometimes that is a good thing. Sometimes that is not such a good thing. The best rules of thumb are to always check the facts, always consider the source (even friends are fallible), and never pile on the latest crisis just to score social media points for the quip. Save some energy for things that matter.

What do you think? Does social media provide more amplification or distraction in the world today?

Real Marketing Strategies Aren't Built On Search Or Social

The most common explanation for pushback related to changes to social and search platform changes is that people are resistant to change. Some companies have even mapped out classic reactions to it.

It follows a cycle. People deny the change will happen and then become upset when it actually occurs. This is sometimes followed by confusion, depression, and crisis. We're seeing it today.

Companies were laying people off after Google made changes to Panda. Companies used teams like reachpocalypse after Facebook became more like paid media. Both platform changes have been highly publicized as if they are unique, but it happens all the time — tweaks, adaptions, and deaths.

The Internet is in a constant state of change. Some people like to equate it to a world map, but it plays out much more like the chaos of a new cosmos. Every day, major players use their gravitational juice to expand, contract, and buy out other solar systems. It's a billion dollar game being played by titans who largely ignore the little people who worship or try to exploit them, except for the occasional swat.

"We're playing in their backyard but don't want to play by their rules - conundrum." — Shawn Elledge, Integrated Marketing Summit

My response? There are plenty of backyards. Problem solved. 

This isn't a new idea (and it doesn't mean that you abandon Google, Facebook, Twitter, etc. outright). All it means is that anybody who has been deep in the social space for any length of time has learned a lesson or two about playing in other people's backyards with other people's sand. Just not en masse.

Sure, social and search can work wonders for some companies. But it doesn't work that way for all companies. It largely depends on who they are, what they do, and the kind of customer they reach.

For example, it makes sense for search and social to play a prominent role in the outreach efforts of an Asian restaurant in Las Vegas that derived most of its business from hotel deliveries. While the restaurant has a loyal customer base, its primary revenue was derived from hotel staff referrals and visitors searching for Asian takeout. It made sense because there are two primary search drivers.

1. People search for things because they have no idea what exists.

2. People search for things because they know they exist somewhere.

Content marketing and social media were mostly built to help capture the first kind of searchers while simultaneously engaging a few of those people enough to make them second kind searchers or, better yet, direct referrers who bypass searching all together. Ergo, sharing is an expression of gratitude that sometimes creates second kind searchers — people who have heard of you, your product, your service, your idea, your company. For a restaurant, it might mean someone saying "make sure you eat at >place< when you are in >city<" or it could manifest on any number of review and travel sites.

Conversely, a speciality commercial contractor may have have a presence on social networks and earn reasonable placement on search engines, but search and social are not primary drivers. Generally speaking, this kind of business isn't driven by first kind searchers. They rely on second kind searchers and direct referrers. As a result, the social and search portion of a marketing plan differ.

Instead of popularity, the company needed to engage decision makers within their space — designers, architects, and general contractors who would have a specific need for the specialty provided. And the best way to accomplish that as a new company (but veteran owners) not to load up on search and social, but to create content that featured the designers, architects, and general contractors they were trying to reach and thereby giving their target audience an opportunity to become direct referrers.

In both cases, while the restaurant clearly has some reliance on search (which was still eclipsed by hotel staff recommendations), neither company was overtly reliant on fleeting tips and tricks to gain temporary boosts from a search or social networks that are all too often treated as marketing channels. There are better ways to invest a marketing budget than website traffic or social network likes alone.

Put the power of choice in the hands of customers not the platforms. 

The point is that all marketing plans ought to revolve around your own backyard, where it can be much more effectively managed. This is accomplished not by understanding platforms so much as understanding your customers, what they need, and when and how to deliver on that need.

The more you understand about your existing customer, the more likely you will be able to expand that base by delivering on the value proposition and/or other closely content they will value. And this approach makes much more sense than what many companies do to inflate the appearance of success.

1. Companies spend money to rank higher across accidental and unrelated search queries.

2. Companies spend money to send people to social networks instead of their backyard.

3. Companies spend money to interrupt consumers at the wrong time and place.

The most important takeaway for any organization is that all platforms change and they change so often that marketing professionals ought to be weary about any ticks and trips related to those three tactics because today's boost will be tomorrow's penalty and today's best investment will be tomorrow's waste of time. Stay focused on the constants of your company and customers first.

Pay It Forward With A Social Media Endowment Today!

Most of us understand that social media is not a fad. It's the biggest social shift the world has seen since the Industrial Revolution. About 96 percent of Millennials have already joined a social network.

They aren't alone. About 73 percent of every generation is active on social networks. One out of every three couples who married last year met via social media (and are less likely to split up). One out of every six higher education students are enrolled in an online curriculum. Eight in ten companies use LinkedIn as a resource tool to find employees (and 98 percent use some social media).

Social media has become so important and so dominant in our culture and around the world, that an ever-increasing number of social scoring sites quantify, measure, and rate how we perform online. These scores are so important that you cannot leave social media to chance and still come out on top.

Everyone needs professional online help but they often learn it too late.

There is only one problem. By the time someone really needs to boost their social media presence, it's already too late. So they don't get hired. They don't make the grade. They don't even stay married.

It's time to face facts. There isn't anything anybody can do help you improve your social media status.  You are not a celebrity. You are not a marketer. You have no social skills. And even if you did, you would probably blow it anyway. But even if you are a total loser, we have some pretty happy news.

Even if you are a loser at social media, your kids don't have to be losers too.

You can make sure your children aren't subjected to the same social shame you have to live with today by investing in a social media endowment policy for tomorrow. It is the very first cradle-to-grave service ever offered and we're proud to be on the cutting edge of this exciting new program.

What is a social media endowment? A social media endowment works like any other financial endowment, except the money you invest is earmarked to be invested in the social media development of your children from cradle to grave (and, technically, even longer than that). Most social media planning starts from conception and carries forward to the next generation with a post-mortem plan.

Why an endowment instead of a typical service retainer? Service retainers are great, but they can also deplete disposable income and we don't want to do that. An endowment works better because the investment holds its principal in perpetuity, paying out only a small portion for the services that are needed. When the program is complete (at death), some money can be paid out to a benefactor too.

How are allocations slated over the life of the endowment? While every social media endowment is different, we generally plan to allocate $100 per month times the age of the child, allowing it to cumulate when they need it most — applying for colleges and finding post-graduate employment. All other interest is reinvested until the principal reaches a peak operating balance. At that time, the service is capped at 50 percent of the monthly interest with allowance for events, circumstances and contingencies.

What special events do you plan for as part of the program? Obviously, there are times in everyone's life that deserve special attention— birth, first birthday, first day of school, etc. To ensure these magical moments receive fresh attention, we draw down additional funds to ensure their birth announcement (for example) trends on Pinterest or that the optional live birth video is a hit on YouTube, making your child an instant celebrity that people know they should be watching!

Can highlighting their biggest life moments really matter? Perhaps the best explanation is an example. As reported by CNN, some people already offer this service for weddings. But this concept is so much bigger because we will be in your child's corner from day one to make their dreams come true and trend at the same time. Best of all, as an endowment, it's already paid in full. As long as the endowment meets the minimum requirements, everything is covered. So, in sum, heck yeah it does!

How does a social media endowment really help? The only difference between your child and the kid who got his picture on the front page of the news for a science project is exposure. By sharing select posts, pictures, and videos early on, they create a legacy of achievement whether they were any good at something or not. The simple truth is that winning people over before your child is good at something will lead to an amateur following that will swear the child is good at it.

Are there money making opportunities for my child? As your child grows his or her social scores and fan base, the sky is the limit in terms of endorsement deals, sponsorships and spokesperson opportunities. Many children who are enrolled in the social media endowment program are already on track to become famous, giving their socially challenged parents a second chance at fame by becoming their child's manager. The perks alone will blow your mind!

The time to act is now! Imagine how great their lives will be if everything they do trends on the most popular social networks! Facebook. Streamed. Twitter. Chirped. Pinterest. Pinned. Google+. Added. The point is that as experts, we will migrate your child's success onto whatever social network is popular in the future. It's easily guaranteed because the program operating capital is guaranteed.

The bottom line. With a social media endowment, your child will be entitled to the best of everything online — from a trending birth announcement to the highest influencer scores in whatever interests they might have — long before their peers even have permission to open an account. They will be first, firmly entrenched, and positioned to make their dreams come true while receiving endorsements from companies that know exposure is everything just like the social stars you envy today.

For endowment options, please inquire after reading the disclaimer.* Based on historical averages, a $1 million endowment made today will cover $500,000 worth of social media exposure while growing the principal to $1.8 million in 10 years. Initial endowments of $50,000 or more are also manageable to reach your goals!

*For more great social media tips in the tradition of April Fools! please see The Mushup Strategy, Bronx Zoo Influencer, SME: 14.0, Clout Bellies, How To Write A Social Media Book, or almost anything labeled satire. Have a great day! And a special thanks to Benson Hendrix for inspiration!

Does Social Justice Fit Somewhere Between Silly Cat Videos?

Sometimes the hardest thing to reconcile about social networks is how serious they can be. You know what I mean. We've all seen friendships and family members splinter over political and social issues on platforms like Twitter and Facebook. People lose jobs. Companies get embarrassed. Bullies are outed.

Yes, social media can be serious. In fact, it was the seriousness of it that inspired one recent discussion about how labels can trap and condemn us if we aren't careful. They really do. Every day. 

In direct contrast, social networks don't always seem serious. It's the silliness and steady stream of absurdity that can prove bothersome. And this seems especially true when it detracts from social justice.

This is why Amy Tobin was inspired to write Social Justice: Have The Social Networks Failed Us, Or Have We Failed Them?, a column that captures how something silly like Ben Affleck as Batman can trump something serious like chemical weapons in Syria. The effect is always profound. Any time someone draws a contrast between soft news and hard news, someone else will feel petty for talking about superheroes while people die in the streets of Syria. It's us who fiddles while Rome burns.

If you want to change the world, don't blow against the wind. Fan the flame that's waiting.

I know how Amy feels. A few years ago, Tony Berkman, president of BlogCatalog, asked the same thing in a different way. He wanted to know what bloggers would talk about if they weren't talking about then headline stealers Paris Hilton and Britney Spears. So we all sat down and decided to find out. 

The question was especially relevant to me. A couple of years prior, celebrity was the cause for why one of our best practice short-term public relations campaigns became a best practice media kit. The kit was a winner but the campaign missed when we were scooped by celebrity.

Specifically, a celebrity trumped a media event that centered around education in Nevada. So there you go. When a "Who Wants To Marry A Millionaire?" contestant files for divorce, news stations don't stand by to cover the governor and a virtual who's who list in state education at the opening of a new private school. 

So naturally, when Berkman asked his question about bloggers, I was primed to participate as one of the founders of an initiative called BloggersUnite. It was the first series of social media awareness campaigns that coordinated bloggers (and later social network participants) to change the world by setting a conversational agenda online.

In the months and years that followed, I developed and executed campaigns for DonorsChoose.org, Amnesty International, AIDS.gov, Heifer International, and March Of Dimes (among others). All of my work was contributed as an in-kind effort to change the world. All of the campaigns were successful, with the most visitable delivering 1.2 million posts on one day, reaching 250 million. 

The volume of the campaign was so loud that it was covered by several dozen media outlets, including CNN. And despite some pushback from social media enthusiasts who prematurely concluded that it was all buzz and no bite, this early awareness campaign eventually changed American policy in Darfur. Right. We changed the world. And we didn't change it once. We changed it a few dozen times.

The prospect that people were willing step up was especially inspiring for Berkman. So he eventually spun the initiative into a standalone, do-it-yourself platform called BloggersUnite. It still exists, but as a silent giant.

Why? It's silent for the same reason I warned him against crowd-sourced solutions, hoping that social would be its own steward for good. Most people don't know how to plan campaigns and most people are too easily distracted to lead. At the same time, if there was ever a time I wanted to be wrong, it was about this observation. 

The spontaneity of social media and social networks is unpredictable at best and overrated at worst. In other words, it takes more than people to drive meaningful conversations like the campaigns we managed before the platform. It takes someone to give it shape and fan the flame once it gets started.

Even then, it takes considerable patience and planning to get anything off the ground, no matter how good the cause might be. You also have to be empathic, not only for the people you are trying to help, but also for those who offer up no sign of support. Why? Because you don't know them.

The hardest lesson in the world is finding empathy for those who laugh while we cry.

Developing these campaigns was hard work. But what is even harder was knowing when not to launch one. As Berkman eventually learned, you can only ask a community to promote worthwhile causes a few times year. Ask too much and you'll burn them out. Ask them to plan it too and most will pass.

And it's on this point that I want to come full circle. When we see society as opposed to people, we all tend to think that all these people — the person sitting across the table, reading our post, passing us on the street — is somehow isolated or inoculated or apathetic against the world. They're not.

Not only are most of them active with their own causes, but they also have their own private battles to fight too. This one just survived cancer. That one just lost their wife to it. This one isn't sure how they'll pay the rent next month. That one found out their spouse is having an affair. This one is wondering where their education took a wrong turn. That one is in need of the services someone else is promoting. And the list goes on. And on. And on.

So if any of those people want to laugh at the prospect of Ben Affleck being Batman, it's okay. They've earned it. Maybe tomorrow they can fret over the international crisis in Syria instead. Or maybe they won't.

As I mentioned to one of my friends while discussing this subject, something needs to be done in Syria but when you attempt to prioritize it against something like a cure for cancer, then there is no contest. But even without prioritizing an endless list of heartbreak in the world, we might remember that even Shakespeare saw a need to insert comedy into his tragedies. Life is heavy enough. It takes considerable effort to lighten it.

Applied to causes, the concept comes from the man who inspired the last BloggersUnite campaign that I was able to step up for and play a major role in developing as a last minute campaign. Patch Adams was among the first in the medical community to defy the dourness of cause marketing and shaping public opinion. He epitomizes the life lesson that angels have wings because they take themselves lightly.

At least that's the way I see it. What do you think? What does Tony Berkman, Simon Mainwaring, or Kate Olsen think? What does anything think? Are social networks too serious, too silly, or does that old rule apply — social is whatever you make of it?

The comments are yours. Feel free to fiddle with this subject or suggest something else. I would love nothing better than every topic to come from you. Let's talk for a change.

Blowing Up Instagram: Facebook

If you ever wanted to test against the fragility of a social network, Instagram is the photo sharing social network to watch. Facebook, which is well known for overreaching on some terms and privacy issues, has decided to claim ownership rights on everything members upload and share across Instagram.

Instagram, which was one of the few apps worthy of review in 2011 (pre-Facebook) on our alternative review site, received a respectful opening score before any of the other bells and whistles it has added since. We gave it 5.2 on our alternative scale, which would be right around 7 or 8 on a non-alternative 1-10 scale. It rated high because it revamps the artistic fun associated with Polaroid cameras for the modern age, using digital data instead of the integral film commonly associated with Polaroid photos.

So what changed? Instagram via Facebook is now asking for unspecified future commercial use of people's photos, which means (as the article states) a hotel in Hawaii can use your Instagram photos if they pay Facebook. The member won't receive any money. They won't receive any credit. They won't even receive notice.

What will the Instagram member get? A whole lot of headaches, advertisers too.

One has to wonder about the logic of such service changes, especially because it opens up a steady stream of problems even if members don't care. The worst of them, even for Facebook, is that this change of policy makes them a publisher and not a sharing service, culpable for the images people post.

But there are other problems too. The very idea that one day an Instagram member might see their photo in a commercial advertisement without compensation or notification is flawed. Given that most photographers would claim copyright infringement before realizing they signed away their rights on Instagram, I would advise any my clients to avoid purchasing pics via such a pariah policy.

In fact, Instagram makes it all especially risky because there are thousands of bands, authors, and artists that have turned to Instagram as their preferred photo sharing tool. Given their struggles with preserving copyrights in the digital age, it doesn't seem plausible they can afford to support a service that claims ownership of concert shots and album designs or artist proofs and dust covers. I just don't see it.

Amateurs will have plenty to worry about too. Their kids could become the poster children for anybody and everybody Facebook decides to the sell content to. In some cases, it puts kids even more at risk. In other cases, it will be even more creepy in the hands of some questionable advertisers buying the rights.

A speculative analysis of why Facebook made this logic leap. 

While Facebook/Instagram hadn't made a public statement about the policy changes, one could assume that the logic leap was made because Facebook makes similar claims on content shared to Facebook. Along with this precedent, people have largely ignored the problems with the Pinterest policy too.

What these two policies have taught social networks is that once people become attached to a service, they tend not to care and outright ignore any policy changes. They give up their privacy. They give up their rights. They give up everything (as long as they can use the service). They just don't care.

Except in this case, Facebook seems to have made a fatal flaw in assuming people would treat Instagram policy changes the same. First and foremost, unlike Facebook, there isn't a compelling reason to use Instagram given all of the other photo sharing networks in existence that don't claim ownership.

While Instagram is preferred, there are plenty of alternatives. Even the effects features have since been duplicated across a wide variety of apps. All anyone has to do is use them to achieve the same result.

This makes or an interesting case study in that unlike Facebook, which has achieved a must-have status in perception if not reality, Instagram still feels optional despite the $1 billion price that Facebook paid. It also makes an interesting case study because Facebook is being forced to continually prove its own stock price while illustrating why its publicly traded price continues to struggle. It might be worth something as the leading social network today, but it is still being managed in a rather immature fashion. Sooner or later, the front runner might implode like almost every other front running social network before it.

A final thought on rights and social networks in general.

Personally, I've always found myself operating in two different directions when it comes to ownership and the Internet. On one hand, publishers and distributors have to be open minded about Fair Use laws. Even when it comes to my content, here and sometimes other places, I've taken a lenient stance provided links and credit are given when links and credit are due. Social is all about sharing, much like TripAdvisor has realized in opening up its content to thousands of other sites.

On the other hand, I have practiced restraint and resistance to every social network I have ever worked with that has tried to claim ownership of other people's content. In one instance, I turned down an offer to help edit a book made up of member-generated content after learning that the content originators would be credited but not notified or compensated. I made my case strong enough that the network dropped the idea.

The bottom line is that there isn't any need (except greed) for social network startups or established behemoths to claim anything but enough rights to enable people to share their content. Anything beyond a post or picture as a one-time share is an overreach that people ought not to ignore.

They ought not to ignore it for two reasons. Social network members that ignore policy changes risk becoming little more than slaves to the social networks they support. And social network providers, even if they are more sensible in their own policies, need to police their industry against such abuse or all of them will risk future legislation and laws that reverse and regulate the immaturity of a few.

Immature really is the right word. Despite the best guesses of some, Facebook is ruining Instagram. I will hate to leave, but if Instagram doesn't self correct by Jan. 16, I'll be among the departed.

Update: In traditional Facebook fashion, Instagram responds to the pushback with an apology.

Retiring A Deck: Social For Strategic Communication

Since my first presentation on social media in 2005 (not counting blogs), I've always considered it a moving target. The average deck lasts six months (or a year with ongoing updates).

The deck I am retiring today served as the framework for two classes at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, and five presentations (each customized for a specific industry). The intent of the deck was to get students with diverse and varied backgrounds (some with social experience and some without) to rethink social media.

Rather than simply focus on tips, tricks, and tactics, the 3-hour class is meant to inspire students and working professionals to ask better questions before developing their programs. Personally, I don't think the future of social media lies in social software as much as it lies in understanding people, which ought to be the goal of any social media program attached to strategic communication. In other words, understand what people want you to communicate and then find the right tool to help you do it.

Integrating Social Into Strategic Communication

View more presentations from Rich Becker, Copywrite, Ink.

Anyone who has seen other social media presentations that I've made in the past will recognize a few items that never seem to change such as defining social media as an environment where people use social technologies to communicate. For me, that is what it has always been about.

Some people can make great cases that social media is about sales, impressions, influence, or whatever. But sooner or later the ones that have the greatest successes change their thinking. It doesn't make any sense to teach people how to adapt a social network without considering the organization's purpose or needs.

Instead, communicators and related professionals need to ask what do the people they serve really need as it relates to their product and then deliver it. While a restaurant might share some cooking tips or their latest culinary creation, a motorcycle dealer might feature customization tips, rider profiles, and area club events.

Or, as you will see at the end of the deck, a youth sports program might offer real-time score updates via text messaging and Twitter, team stories, coach tips, game photos, and any number content ideas across any number of social networks. All the while, everything needs to be developed with the organization's purpose in mind. And with that in mind, I hope you can find something useful in the deck too.

Measuring Facebook: Social Network Ads

The Wall Street Journal reports that 70 percent of Facebook campaigns return three to five times the spending; five times the cost for nearly half. The internal reporting, which was released by Facebook, comes after the "quiet period" after an initial public offering ended.

The study was completed by comScore and included tracking 60 campaigns. What is less understood is how those campaigns were chosen and whether they represent the larger share of ad purchases on the social network. Another interesting hiccup in the study is what is considered a return — mostly, the measurement was based on amplification, showing Facebook extends media exposure between 50 percent and 200 percent.

Why do many marketers still distrust Facebook and social media ad purchases?

The biggest challenge with social media marketing remains the same. Many critics attempt to apply rules to social media advertisements that aren't fair when compared to other reporting measures.

Specifically, they attempt to measure return on investment in a vacuum, as if impressions can be isolated and quantified without considering the "social" portion of the equation. Others fail to measure the right outcomes, thinking about "likes" as the outcome even though it's better to assign an outcome to anything but likes. (They just make you feel good and give you a readership base.)

If you want an analogy to better understand Facebook advertising, think of it in terms as an introduction to publication with "likes" being subscribers. But much like magazine subscribers, it's silly to expect that every subscriber is going to read every stitch of content from cover to cover and see every direct response ad. Results vary and the variance isn't decided by the publication alone. It could be anything, ranging from the content of your advertisement to what people see when they land on the page.

Besides, different advertising works differently on Facebook. While most marketers invest considerable time on prospect advertisements (filtering out people who already like a page), other advertisements could target people who already like the page — you know, people who already gave you a wink and a nod or perhaps a share.

That's part of the problem with social network advertising now. Marketers have become so accustomed to gaining numbers that they forget about the people who are already there, waiting around for something to happen even if it isn't ever going to happen. In many cases, underperforming Facebook ads/pages are often the result of not producing anything valuable (whether content or coupon) for the people there, leaving people with an empty feeling: "Okay, I 'liked' your page, now what?"

Facebook advertising works well enough for hyper-targeting efforts. 

After running Facebook ad campaigns for a number of companies, the only common ground is that there is no common ground. Each presence deserves its own objectives. For example, running a campaign to shore up locals to visit a restaurant is very different than attempting to target tourists.

It doesn't even matter what type of cuisine you are talking about (although there is a way to focus in on those folks too). To drive more locals, the ad needs to target proximities. To drive more out-of-town guests, you might need to target people who love visiting the town.

Conversely, most restaurants only target people who have an expressed interest in a specific kind of food. But the reality, in most cases, is people who have an expressed interest in a specific kind of cuisine are already entrenched with one, two, or three restaurants of that kind. If you want to penetrate that market and cause conversations, then you have to be prepared to offer them something more than their favorite restaurant.

At the same time, looking at outcomes, one also has to appreciate that if your goal is to drive more visitors to your restaurant then it stands to reason that the local targeting is a short-term investment and tourist marketing is a long-term investment, e.g., once-a-month visitors as opposed to once-a-year visitors.

Along with deep thinking, marketers need to appreciate that Facebook advertising works best as part of an add-on campaign element anyway. While there have been a few Facebook-only campaign successes, the majority of companies seeing returns are those that use social networks as an add on. Ergo, if you produce a television advertisement, post it on Facebook and ask for feedback. A percentage of people who have subscribed to the page will likely share it and some of their friends might share it too.

The lowbrow measurement is that if 1,000 of the 10,000 people who like a page see the ad and 100 of them share it, then that return is better for the few seconds it takes to upload the video than the return of not sharing it. If you can increase that outcome by running an advertisement to that video post, all the better.

Likewise, someone finding your Facebook page on a search is probably better than someone not finding your Facebook page on a search (unless your page sucks). And keeping people who do like your restaurant up to date on special events, menus, introductions, etc. is better than not doing it.

Certainly, Facebook is not the end all to a successful marketing campaign. But marketers need to step back a little bit more and consider the bigger picture. When comparing something to nothing, something is always better. The rest is dependent on what you want to do and how you prioritize it.

In other words, the jury might still be out on Facebook in terms of an investment, but it terms of whether their advertising can be a benefit is already decided. What isn't decided is whether or not companies have good enough teams to maximize a return on the effort.

Branding Failure: Your Brand Is Not You

Professionals aren't the only ones struggling with the lack of social networking etiquette and the impact of errant tweets on so-called "personal brands." It seems that online friends, extended family members, and spouses can be the source of most online friction.

Even if someone carefully manicures their online presence and pedigree, it only takes a single tweet, comment, or picture from someone closest to you to undo everything in a day. One button click on Facebook can undo a decade of being an ideal "power couple" when someone changes their status from 'married' to 'its complicated'.

These seemingly harmless, sometimes quirky online episodes under the existing rules of social networks can set off a flurry of phone calls among family members, make connected employers think twice about whose head is clear enough to lead that big project, or even scare away the usual friendly suspects who normally subscribe to everything you share. It doesn't even have to be so overt, either.

Anything can happen, really. A couple of years ago, I was working with a candidate who took a pretty tough stand on illegal immigration. One of his followers, who the candidate hadn't spoken to in years, took exception to what he had to say, enough so that she started rallying against him on Facebook thread.

The entire episode exploded into a half-day session of angst as his followers split into decidedly different camps on the issue. But the real kicker was when her barely coherent argument was punctuated by the fact that she was his cousin, talking about illegal immigrants who were in his extended family. Yikes. He didn't even know it (and it didn't change his position). But there were consequences.

Does 'personal branding' mean we need 'couples branding' and 'family branding' too?

This is one of many reasons that personal branding doesn't work. And it is the main reason that I am always perplexed when social media professionals argue that personal branding ought to be an ever-constent concern. Yes, the same people who advise organizations can't control their brands are sometimes the same people advising individuals that they ought to control their online brands. Are they kidding?

If you think it's difficult to manage a message within an organization that can set some semblance of guidelines, then you might as well lower your expectations for personal branding where no such guidelines exist. Well, except for those folks who ask their better halves (and friends) to seek approval.

Can you imagine doing the same with all your friends and family members? 

Years ago, I wrote a little post about Tom Cruise to illustrate the pitfalls of personal branding and the paradox of expected behavior, whether or not someone pursues personal branding as a means to an end. The point I was trying to make then — the fragile brand theory — is the further away someone drifts from the reality of who they are, the more damaging any deviation from that brand becomes.

It also explained why some public figures are expected to be saints with no room for error and others are expected to be sinners with reckless abandon. But what I didn't write about then was that the entire image is dependent upon those who claim to know you best. And that means any personal branding deck is stacked with wild cards that undo anything that isn't authentically you or, worse, the contradiction of anything you've said or done, whether it is true or not.

Brands are fragile. Character is not. And even that is going to take hits. 

Recently, I reviewed this brilliant little thriller called Defending Jacob that underscores the point. The story, about an assistant district attorney whose son is accused of murder, illustrates just how fragile a brand can be. At the onset, the character is one of the most respected people within his community.

But when his son is accused, all those years of reputation building come undone. To make matters worse, his wife becomes fixated on the fact that the protagonist comes from a long line of violent men, the most immediate of which is incarcerated for murder. Never mind that he hadn't seen his father since age 5 or that he didn't share this dubious fact because of the baggage (and labels) that come with it; his wife still obsesses over whether or not she had a right to know before they were married.

Sure, the book is fiction. But the concept is not. People make judgments about all sorts of unrelated things, ranging from who you associate with to your extended family. Brands can't be controlled.

Five years ago, when online personal branding became the topic du jour, it all seemed easier. But that was only because there were fewer people actively engaged in social media. Nowadays, even those obscure family members (like the second cousin who always seemed like he came from another planet) and those long lost friends (like the one you ditched school with and told all sorts of secrets), can snap any brand you've built since then in a second. But those folks are only the tip of the iceberg. The person  sitting next to you is just as likely, even if they have no intention to do you any harm.

You can't control any of it. So you might as well be comfortable with it. It's just part of life. Live it.

Branding: Why I Stopped Worrying About Being Batman

There has been plenty of buzz-up over Peter Shankman's declaration that people have one brand — not personal or professional (hat tip: Olivier Blanchard). And while this verdict has garnered some attention because Shankman is well followed, the epiphany isn't so special.

It has always been true, even if "brand" is the wrong word. He's talking about character.

"Every single day, someone directs me to their LinkedIn profile to learn more about them. You know what I do when they do that?" Shankman says. "I go right to Facebook and search on their name there. Why? Because I know they're on their best behavior on LinkedIn, but on Facebook, they're going to be 'real.' Guess what? I'm not the only person who thinks this way."

In his example, he's right. People share different things in different places.

So unless you are a superhero — Superman, Batman, Spiderman,  Iron Man, and the like — there is no division between your personal and professional lives. In fact, superheroes aren't so good at having two either. Even people who swap their public personas with secret identities by finding the closest phone booth or sliding down a bat pole, tend to struggle in attempting to juggle multiple personalities.

But that is not to say Shankman is right. He is presenting a conversation starter, not a conclusion.

People ought to give up on brands. People ought to give up on judgments. 

As a society, we set different behavioral boundaries in different places: Someone might behave differently in church than they would at the local pub. It's a mistake to think just because you are exposed to someone at only one location or the other somehow means they are pulling a fast one.

On the contrary, the fact that they exhibit appropriate behaviors in two different environments is admirable. It demonstrates how they can adapt to a variety of social settings. In fact, if people acted the same in church as they did in a pub, you might be more concerned about them.

The same can be said about social networks too. People act differently on Facebook and LinkedIn because each community has different behavioral expectations. And, for many people who work in communication-related fields, we probably have a lot more than merely two. Everyone does, really.

Given that, the opposite of what Shankman is getting at bears truth too. People who are able to encapsulate their entirety into a single "brand" that consists of readily available attributes would be remarkably 1-dimensional and probably boring. At minimum, they are most likely faking it.

Let's face it. If you can fit everything about yourself within the confines of an elevator speech that people can actually remember, then you have a bigger problem than figuring out what to write down on the cocktail napkin so you can commit it to memory. Well-rounded people are not organizations where a mission, vision, and voice encompasses an agreed upon direction for every facet of operations.

In fact, this chronic need to ferret out the "truth about people," as Shankman suggests, says more about those lurkers than it could ever say about the people they investigate. Short of discovering someone is ethically and morally dysfunctional or engaged in something illegal, why can't we learn to accept what people want to share with us?

How I learned to stop worrying about my brand like Batman.

When I was just beginning my career, long before social media, I was especially concerned about my professional brand. I would literally adopt a different demeanor, dress, and attitude to exhibit a certain sense of serious professionalism to offset my youthful age, a barrier for many overly judgmental prospects.

While it worked well enough, there was some consequence. Being overtly aware of everything you say, do, and share (as a by-product of what you project) can be stifling. It also creates the propensity for fear and doubt because purposely exhibiting certain qualities also means chronically keeping score.

Isn't that the fundamental reason most people are afraid to speak in public? They are too worried about what other people might think of them. Did they like what I said? Do they see me as an expert? Do they agree with my conclusions? And so on and so forth.

It was too maddening to maintain. So, I gave it up. Instead, I decided to adopt a basic principle. I care what people think, but I don't care what they might think of me. Why should I? I'm a complex person.

People are too complex for a single brand. Get over it.

I like Mozart as much as metal (as well as alternative, punk, country, rap, hip hop, folk, etc.). I am both fiscally conservative and socially committed. I have faith, but don't measure others against my beliefs. I enjoy clinical books that some people call boorish and contemporary books that others call controversial. I wear a suit when the occasion calls for one, and Doc Martens when it does not.

I could fill a million file cabinets with contradictory likes and another million with things that I haven't made up my mind about. And I certainly don't want to share them all with everyone or, in some cases, with anyone. So what?

If someone is going to imagine a "brand" about me, it will likely depend upon the setting where they meet me offline. So why ought it be any different online? When I eventually decided to make a public page beyond my personal account on Facebook a few weeks ago, it had nothing to do with branding or ego and everything to do with privacy and context.

In other words, while some subjects cross over, others do not. People who want to read about communication-related topics are a little less interested in commentaries about music, literature, and movies. People who want to contact me for a job don't really need to know that I went to a musical production a few nights ago. People whom I have a conversation on Twitter don't need to be part of the conversations I have with select friends and family (and don't really want to be, either).

Sure, Shankman is right that the boundaries between personal and professional sometimes blur, but the course correction doesn't need to be a burden to the individual so much. It needs to burden society.

Just because information exists doesn't mean we need to rifle through it all like an investigative reporter, looking for way to add up the labels and deliver a judgement. If we do need to do that, then it might say more about our own characters than anything we can uncover.

Making Lures: Oooo Pinterest Is So Pretty

Do you remember Dory being hypnotized by a pretty little light in the animated film Finding Nemo by Disney? Or maybe you remember how much fun she had bouncing a squishy little jellyfish. Or maybe you remember how much fun they had swimming with a shark until its addiction to white meat kicked in.

Pinterest is filled with those moments. But it's not Pinterest you have to worry about. 

There aren't so many lures on Pinterest as there are lures off Pinterest — enough tips, tactics, and strategies to game the buzzed up social sharing network to fill an ocean. Learn to say no to them.

There is no such thing as a Pinterest strategy, let alone eight of them. And pitching doesn't have much to do with repinning other people's pins just to attract attention to a wall of marketing fodder on a network. In fact, the entire reciprocal push of other people's stuff so they will push yours is becoming passé. People see through it, mostly.

There are always those legal considerations too. Plopping every photo from your company on Pinterest is paramount to giving up any copyrights (which isn't so bad unless you're a photographer or those pics have monetary value). And that doesn't even account for accidental repinning infringements, with your company being much more interesting to any infringed party than a lone network participant.

But I don't really want to get too wrapped up in making a win-lose column about Pinterest as much as I want to offer up some common sense. When your communication strategy begins to become so benign that you count pins, repins, likes, and comments as your objective, what you're really saying is that you have nothing to offer. Do something different with Pinterest if you are going to use it. It's simple.

The best "strategy" for Pinterest is to use it like participants do. Don't try to game it for glory. 

The best online communication comes from natural interests that are designed with the company's intent in mind, not a means to grab up flash-in-the-pan attention. If anything, all those tactics tend to backfire.

• Review your organization's mission, vision, and values.
• Elevate your plan to see if the network augments anything.
• Consider relevant content you can share at the right time.
• Become a participant without any agenda other than quality.
• Work at being a beneficial presence not someone who benefits.

That's my list of five, but it might not make sense for anyone who hasn't seen it through to execution. Personally, I enjoy Pinterest but it doesn't fit this marcom slant beyond the occasional educational and psychological threads. So I don't develop sneaky ways to force it.

The platform is much more in sync with Liquid [Hip], a music, film, fashion, and travel review site. But even with relevant content, we didn't make a marketing channel to push anything. Instead, I integrate what other under-the-radar creative people find with our own. And mostly, they pin it before we do.

The idea is to make like-minded quality content indistinguishable to the content we create — which is precisely how people use networks without agendas. Most people pin to express something. Maybe you can too.

For example, if you have a parks and recreation department, maybe you could host a beautiful park photography board (with photographer permissions). If you are a tech company, maybe you can share like-minded innovations. If you are a restaurant, maybe you can highlight recipes that you have tried to make at home (along with some from your establishment). If you are a general contractor, maybe you can have a board that celebrates architecture or designers. And the list goes on...

There isn't any mystery to using Pinterest. The only mystery is how you can avoid the temptation to use it for anything other than the intent of the network. It isn't really about ROI as much as market position.

Specifically, you have to ask if you are one of them or just trying to use them. If it's the latter, skip the pinning and mind the "teaching" lures that promise marketing. Some lights have ugliness attached.

Changing Social Networks: Five Big Changes In Progress

Sometimes social network developers feel like they're in a foot race. If they aren't moving forward and making big changes, the general thinking is that they are somehow falling behind. Sometimes they are. Sometimes they aren't.

But social networks are compelled to make changes whether they need them or not, and I've been told as much by people who own them. The only hold out among bigger networks is Reddit. It relishes its own roughness and the people love them for it.

Personally, I like change. It's why I do what I do. 

But not all change is good. So why is it almost every social network is undergoing change, with Linkedin and Google+ being the least obvious? They think they have to, with the latter network not as obvious because it's currently implementing changes around its network instead.

For example, not everyone noticed that Google+ gave Blogger users the option to replace their Blogger profile with a Google+ profile. I work with several platforms, including Blogger, so I noticed. I made the change too, which came with some unintended consequences like changing my Blogger post signature from Rich to Richard Becker. The cost is a certain casualness, but I can live with it.

The rest are undergoing more obvious changes. Some are good. Most aren't. Let's look at five.

The five most significant social network changes taking place right now.

1. Facebook. Facebook wants people to migrate to Timeline. On the surface, it's not a big deal. It's a new graphically-intensive look for the largest social network on the block. Under the hood, Timeline is not a small deal. It will change the way you think about Facebook.

Pros. For professionals, especially those in communication, the personal marketing potential is right on target. The branding opportunities are apparent; so much so that some people have changed their tone. There isn't much they can do about the past. That quip in 2009 is alive and well on the front page.

Cons. For most people, Timeline makes Facebook feel more formal. For the exact same reason personal marketers like Timeline, most people do not. They did not sign up for Facebook to tell their story. They signed up to connect and have fun. Timeline also places privacy in the forefront once again, but that is an entirely different conversation.

Outcome. Mostly neutral. The best thing about Timeline is the look and that it is optional, for now. Over time, Timeline is the direction Facebook wants to go. While this scrapbook concept is okay, it redefines the intent, which leads people to wonder if maybe they ought to share only their choicest moments in life, which means all our casual connections, shares, and banter are best left ... where?

Best use. Whether for business or pleasure, it's still the best network connector out there today. So let's hope they don't blow it for the sake of Timeline.

2. Twitter. Twitter, which was the only social network that initially refused to be called a social network and still does, has been rolling out changes in big broad strokes. While not everyone has the new interface, those who do are struggling to get used to it.

Pros. The aesthetic is more pleasing at a glance because it reopens more of the background image, giving marketers more room for branding and contact information.

Cons. The new interface is counterintuitive, including where you compose a new tweet. Instead of above the feed, it forces you to move up to the top of the page or sweep left. It also places things you don't need to see (who to follow) directly in your field of vision. And ironically, things you do what to see (like a website link and mini bio) on a completely different page.

Outcome. It sucks. Every day I sign in to Twitter, I dread the day my account will suddenly look like one of the ones I manage. If it wasn't so heavily adopted, this change would convince me to leave it. Thank goodness for third-party interfaces.

Best use: While its ability has been hindered with marketing messages and link sharing, it manages to retain its status as a real-time communication tool. But it might not if it imposes a new layout.

3. Digg. Digg hasn't really known what to do with itself since it cut off its mutual sharing services (Digg me and I'll Digg you pacts) nose to spite its mutually spammy community (no one else was left) face just before it turned commercial. Recently, Digg was hoping to revive itself by encouraging people to share their Diggs on Facebook.

Pros. Other than showing how many tweets and likes something has (which is surprisingly inaccurate), you tell me.

Cons. Noted changes to Facebook aside, I don't think I could ever bring myself to share a link from Digg, which would require people to pass through Digg to get to what I am sharing. Some people do, but I don't get it.

Outcome. I want to like Digg, but Digg makes it hard to like Digg. The core problem is that it killed its sense of community and hasn't done anything to get it back.

Best use: It's a remnant news aggregator without enough topic categories, mostly used by people who want to share tabloid news, tech, science, and politics. Well, sort of.

4. Delicious. The bookmarking service that Google wanted to kill before fans pushed back has undergone big changes since it was sold. The initial changes were designed to make it more graphically oriented and better organized, which was a good call.

Pros. It does look better and is better organized. Even the "stacks" was a solid concept, which allows you to group similar posts together, regardless of how they are tagged.

Cons. Unfortunately, the network tied its front page content to popularity as opposed to freshness. As soon as it did, the front page started looking static and participants discovered less new content, with the exception of those gaming the system.

Outcome. At the current drop-off rate, Delicious won't be saved. It might even be dead by the end of the year, and I don't think anyone will care unless it gets fixed.

Best use. If you want to collect content and you want to send people to it, Delicious is a fine place to do it. Unfortunately, discovery trumps bookmarks and networks without people are useless.

5. Chime.in. For the last few weeks, I've been reading posts about Chime.in written by people who claim to know social networks. They say that the bright and shiny object syndrome days are over because nobody is piling into the new Chime.in. They are wrong because Chime.in isn't really new. It's a completely re-imagined Mixx and it has a foothold (but not with marketers).

Pros. Mixx needed to be remixed, and Chime.in has done a great job at it. It's graphically smart, easy to navigate, and organized by a tagging system that allows you to follow tags or people. It also staffs visible human editors who share outstanding content.

Cons. It may never have mass appeal, preferring to serve a hard core notch. Sometimes that's better.

Outcome. There is definitely a renewed interest in Chime.in, especially in the arts, which is where I spend most of my time there. It is hands down the best change of the bunch because the developers were clearly thinking about people first. Even better, there is no incentive to be the biggest "chimer" on the block.

Best use. It's one of the better organized topical playgrounds and feels intuitive to discover new things within a topic or people who share the same interests.

I probably could have included SlideShare and StumbleUpon too (especially because it took a few days to find a direct submit link button on StumbleUpon), but I'm still walking through what's really new. I also could have included a few that recently shuttered. Suffice to say no one really noticed (which is why they were shuttered.) Only one really surprised me. It's only flaw was it wasn't being marketed.

There are really four lessons here, and you've heard them before. When you start trying to be all things to all people (e.g., Facebook, Google+), eventually you could become nothing to everyone.
When you forget to keep people in mind and simply expect people to like whatever is on your mind, they tend to wander (Digg, Delicious). When you embrace change for the sake of change, it's never a good idea (Twitter). But when change has a purpose for the people you serve, it's almost always great (Chime.in).

And, most importantly, never think for a second you've figured out a social network. The moment you do, the entire site will be remade. And when that happens, all of your so-called assets will be gone.