Comments on: Ties that bind

Plaxo CEO Ben Golub examines whether social networking will become a victim of its own success.

weak ties == the internet

This weak ties notion is very perceptive, indeed.

This is the phenomenon of not bothering to know your next door neighbor but spending plenty of time running around town. The key is diversity of contacts; and diverse sources of information; and a variety of ways to make money and spend money.

We all live it each day, but what we needed was for someone to stand up and say, "We don't need close friends as much as we think we do."

weak ties == the internet

This weak ties notion is very perceptive, indeed.

This is the phenomenon of not bothering to know your next door neighbor but spending plenty of time running around town. The key is diversity of contacts; and diverse sources of information; and a variety of ways to make money and spend money.

We all live it each day, but what we needed was for someone to stand up and say, "We don't need close friends as much as we think we do."

Six degrees of separation... or less?

It is clear that that the degrees of separartion are decreasing with the likes of Plaxo, LinkedIn and OpenBC. Peter Cochrane has previously talked about this in his Uncommon Sense column (but referred to the super-linked people as "nodes").

What I find interesting is that the most connected people can can exert influence through their contacts. This is not the first time in history this has happened though. Until the early twentieth century these people were typically found amongst the clergy. In an increasingly secular society, they are now lawyers and headhunters.

Six degrees of separation... or less?

It is clear that that the degrees of separartion are decreasing with the likes of Plaxo, LinkedIn and OpenBC. Peter Cochrane has previously talked about this in his Uncommon Sense column (but referred to the super-linked people as "nodes").

What I find interesting is that the most connected people can can exert influence through their contacts. This is not the first time in history this has happened though. Until the early twentieth century these people were typically found amongst the clergy. In an increasingly secular society, they are now lawyers and headhunters.

Power Nodes: The Densely Connected

They are people who think well, write well, and tend to be generous with their time and ideas. They also read a lot, listen carefully, and are highly self-aware regards their own interests.

Trust is believing the air flowing over the top the wing really does have to move faster. Otherwise, the amount of white-pigging that goes on in these networks will cause nodes to opt-out and return to hoarding for better connections. Elitism and favor trading are strong and successful strategies.

BTW: current social theorists on these topics are too often pundits and CEOs selling software. The two topics they don't like to explain are 1) It is also possible for stupid people to collect in large groups and use their social network to retard progress. 2) Defection is a successful strategy.

Power Nodes: The Densely Connected

They are people who think well, write well, and tend to be generous with their time and ideas. They also read a lot, listen carefully, and are highly self-aware regards their own interests.

Trust is believing the air flowing over the top the wing really does have to move faster. Otherwise, the amount of white-pigging that goes on in these networks will cause nodes to opt-out and return to hoarding for better connections. Elitism and favor trading are strong and successful strategies.

BTW: current social theorists on these topics are too often pundits and CEOs selling software. The two topics they don't like to explain are 1) It is also possible for stupid people to collect in large groups and use their social network to retard progress. 2) Defection is a successful strategy.

[zerdos]

Getting Plaxoed? :-)

OK, that may be a tacky title... I actually agree with what Ben says, and experience LinkedIn spam myself. Yet I find it a bit ironic that Ben talks about this issue .. when Plaxo, which is a great service has similar problems.

They make it too easy to generate mass-emails, update requests that many recipients consider spam. This should be an option turned off by deafult.

I love Plaxo, but the decent, spam-free yet efficient way to use it IMHO is to sign up, d'load it to Outlook, but kill the email-generating feature. You WILL still get the auto-update of those who are already Plaxo members, without annoying hundreds of others.

I've posted more on this here: http://zoliblog.com/2005/06/getting-plaxoed_06.html

[zerdos]

Getting Plaxoed? :-)

OK, that may be a tacky title... I actually agree with what Ben says, and experience LinkedIn spam myself. Yet I find it a bit ironic that Ben talks about this issue .. when Plaxo, which is a great service has similar problems.

They make it too easy to generate mass-emails, update requests that many recipients consider spam. This should be an option turned off by deafult.

I love Plaxo, but the decent, spam-free yet efficient way to use it IMHO is to sign up, d'load it to Outlook, but kill the email-generating feature. You WILL still get the auto-update of those who are already Plaxo members, without annoying hundreds of others.

I've posted more on this here: http://zoliblog.com/2005/06/getting-plaxoed_06.html