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A few weeks ago a friend of mine posted an image of this website on his facebook wall. If you follow the link (or read the title of this blog) you’ll quickly realize it’s a map of the internet. If you are at all like me, your first reaction might be “You can’t map the internet, silly! It has no geo-phyiscal presence!” But if, like me, you realize this is an overly simplistic interpretation of the concept of ‘map’, you’ll explore this website further and discover that it’s actually quite neat!

The map is a “bi-dimensional presentation of links between websites”. The more traffic a site has the larger the representation of that site is. Users switching between sites form links and the stronger the links, the closer the sites. The sites are also colour coded based on the country in which they are based.

Beyond being visually attractive and generally cool to look at, the Internet Map is also a useful tool for examining how people use the internet.

For instance, a closer examination of the second largest blob on the map reveals facebook as the second most trafficked site. (I guess I should note this map was created in2011 and, as far as I can tell is still based on those statistics). Ominously close, however, is the giant blob representing Google.

This blog by Mark Wilson, sheds some light on what this close spatial proximity means. Basically, the close proximity of these two blob monsters indicates that a large portion users are visiting both sites. This means that google and facebook are, in a sense, competing for the same customers. This is not really surprising news. I think most people would expect the two biggest websites to have many users in common.

What is surprising is the distance between facebook and other social media sites. While Youtube and Twitter are relatively close to the facebook blob, wikipedia is further away and popular blogging sites blogspot and wordpress are very distant (wordpress is in the virtual Oort cloud of this internet solar system). This seems suggest that users of these blogging sites tend not to use facebook, twitter and the like nearly as much as other internet users. Those who use wordpress appear to not use the rest of the internet at all.

I’m not sure I completely grasp everything offered by this map. Further exploration may reveal new insights. What is clear is that the internet is dominated by relatively few sitesand a good portion of these are social networking related. I would like to find a similar map from 5 and 10 years ago to see what the landscape looked like before facebook and the other giants really established themselves.

Searching for inspiration for a new blog post I decided to explore the lighter side of social media. Sure social media sites can connect us with our friends, help people collaborate in the workplace, streamline group projects etc…. but where’s the fun in that! I remember when I first signed up for facebook; it was exciting to log it and see what people I barely knew were up to. It served no practical purpose but it was fun! And I like fun!

I feel social media has lost its excitement factor. Maybe it’s because social media is a staple of my academic life but it all just seems far too…. useful. I want random, pointless entertainment!

To quench my thirst for senseless entertainment in the social media realm, I embarked on a quest to find the wackiest social media site I could find. It turns out there is a near endless supply of crazy social media sites (I guess I shouldn’t be surprised… it is the internet) and I thought I would share a couple of my favorites with all you fine people.

REMcloud

Definitely one of my favorites. REMcloud connects people through shared dream experiences. People can post brief descriptions of their dreams and see who has been dreaming about similar things. The site also shows trending dreams and celebrities in dreams. I was disappointed to find out the number one trending dream was about iPhones… When I dream it’s usually about fighting dinosaurs or fixing Winston Churchill’s car… but I guess that’s me…

Line for Heaven

Ever wanted to get into heaven by using a social media site? Well now you can! Line for Heaven allows you to “save your soul and reserve and place in Heaven.” Users earn karma points by interacting with the site and other users and those who earn the most points are “moved closer to God.” It’s unclear how official this site actually is, but it aims to promote religious tolerance and good deeds, which is a noble cause.

There are countless other bizarre social media sites out there, including a dating site for those passionate about mustaches and a site that allows people to donate money for breast implants. It seems as though there is a social networking site for every niche, trend and idea. It just shows how expansive social media has become; it verges on (or emphatically exceeds depending on your point of view) superfluity.

While many of these sites seem pointless, unnecessary or downright offensive, they still serve a purpose. People find enjoyment interacting on these sites. I feel this is the entire point of social networking and can sometimes get lost in all the practicality and usefulness social media tools offer us.

A month and a half ago the word ‘Pinterest’ was not in my vocabulary. The thought of ‘pinning’ something online had never passed through my head.

Then, all of a sudden, everything changed. First my girlfriend signed up. Then I discovered many of my friends had joined. And soon I was reading class wikis about how libraries can use Pinterest to promote events and resources. All of this in a little over a month. I admit I am usually a little behind on innovations in social media but I feel like Pinterest has exploded on to the scene quite quickly. (So fast that it still shows up on my spell check as a misspelled word.)

As I became more and more aware of what Pinterest was and how it worked, it became more and more apparent that it is a perfect platform for advertisement exploitation. As far as I could tell, however, advertisers weren’t exploiting it. How could this be!? While businesses are able to promote their products and services with Pinterest, there is no dedicated advertisement section on the website. Basically, businesses wishing to promote themselves on Pinterest are restricted to using it in, virtually, the same way as you or I.

Meg’s social media blog helped me understand why Pinterest isn’t a giant advertising board. I find it very refreshing that a website with such potential for commercialization is taking the high ground and not selling out to businesses. Instead, Pinterest is remaining loyal to their users and keeping their website as a place to share interests and connect people with similar tastes.

Reality Check

Well, maybe not… Nick Cicero’s blog on socialfresh explores how a new redesign of the Pinterest website could be paving the way for sponsored pins and advertisements. By increasing the size and content of each pin as well as adding a related pin widget, Pinterest could be opening the door for advertisers. Cicero points out that, in particular, the related pins aspect looks like a perfect place to start adding sponsored pins and boards.

So will Pinterest go the way of Facebook and start adding permanent advertisements? It’s hard to say. It is undeniable, however, that the potential for commercialization and profits on this website is huge.

The ‘Cool’ Cost of Advertising

So, if Pinterest (or any social media site for that matter) can make a bunch more money by allowing advertisers on to their site, why don’t they? While this is a topic that warrants in depth research (and perhaps a future blog post…) it seems like one central reason is the ‘cool’ factor of not becoming a slave to business. Much like how people abhor musical groups for ‘selling out’, user comments on Cicero’s blog indicate that people don’t like advertisements (surprise, surprise) and they don’t like when their favourite websites start catering to advertising companies. While I’m sure there are many angles to this story, maintaining integrity and a clean image is important for user-based social media sites. As quickly as social media sites can rise, they can also fall (ahem, MySpace). As tempting as profits are, the risk of alienating one’s user base cannot be ignored.

Further Reading

http://socialfresh.com/pinterest-users/ – Stats on Pinterest users

http://adage.com/article/digital/pinterest-launches-business-pages-cozy-brands/238295/ – signs that Pinterest is inching closer and closer to brands and businesses

I’ve never blogged before. I’ve read blogs. But I’ve never blogged personally. I’m unsure as to what to say and, more importantly, unsure of how to say it.

That’s what inspired me to read this lovely little post from the ironically named Anti-Social Media blog.

Considering I’ve never blogged before and, thus, nobody has read a blog of mine, I felt I needed to make my blogs more readable, which would inspire more people to read my blogs, which would inspire me to write a blog… if you follow my logic.

Lessons for a good blogger

Lame humor aside, this post was actually very helpful in getting my bearings as I take my first steps into the new world of blogs. Its main point is a well organized blog is a readable blog. The author of the above mentioned post, says that there are three strategies to constructing a well organized blog.

• use subheadings to grab attention
• use bullets to break down points quickly (that’s what I’m doing here!)
• use bold to draw the reader to the main point of a paragraph

These seem like useful tips. People aren’t stupid, they are perfectly capable of reading long paragraphs and complex sentences, but they do have limited amounts of time during a day. It’s unfair to expect them to read a long-winded, drawn out post without knowing whether or not it will be worth their time.

That’s where these tips come in. Structural tools like these let people easily skim a post and determine whether or not it’s worth their time.

How this relates to social media in a broad sense

To take this idea further, there are those who believe that social media sites and mobile technology have ruined people’s ability and desire to search deeper into topics and ideas. Twitter and facebook have created the false expectation that a complete, well-rounded opinion of a subject can be obtained or expressed in 140 characters. I admit I used to think this way as well. Not any more.

This manner of thinking underestimates the general intelligence of humanity. Call me an optimist but I think people are aware that, while social media is one way of obtaining information, it is not the most complete nor the only way. It is simply a quick way. Blogs, tweets and facebook posts may be brief and tailored for a quick read but they allow us to experience a ton of information in manageable portions. Social media allows us to skim a huge amount of information on a virtually limitless variety of topics and then make our own decisions as to what to investigate further. This seems like an incredibly useful affordance.

But, I digress. I started off talking about how to organize a blog and ended up talking about how social media allows us to experience information. I guess I still need improvement in the whole organization thing… oh well. Like I said, it’s my first time.

Further Reading

http://www.inc.com/ss/10-must-have-blog-techniques#9 – General tips on how to get your blog noticed

http://www.wpwebhost.com/30-techniques-to-create-an-effective-blog/ – Kind of a long list but the content is good

http://www.pcgdigitalmarketing.com/20120430-10-creative-blogging-techniques-to-smash-through-writers-block/ – A good site to help those of us searching for blogging ideas

Welcome to UBC Blogs. This is your first post. Edit or delete it, then start blogging!