Business in the social Internet: is it possible to grasp the immensity?

And, really, can the social Internet be equally interesting and / or useful for all its users: from a “pig-tailed girl” to a serious businessman? Leave the girls with pigtails alone, like no pigtails either. Statistics say that in Web 2.0, their generation feel very good. Let's talk more about professionals and businessmen.



This note is a shortened version of a note posted on my iTech Bridge blog . There, “under one roof,” I placed my comments made on three different cases: one discussion, one vote and one question asked to me. This theme largely overlaps with that considered in a number of my notes on the problems of the intelligent web. It concerns the issues of evaluation, ranking (sorting) and filtering information. However, here these questions are projected onto the business application of the social web.



As a matter of fact, three autonomous, connected with one topic with a general conclusion, are summarized in one rather long note. Therefore, I immediately warn you that if there is no time, it is better not to go there. So as not to write angry comments :). Well, below everything is very brief and without lyrical digressions (almost in the telegraphic style of the FAQ) ...



Question (of one habraograzhdanina) : Is it possible to build an intelligent network on a non-intelligent social resource?

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Answer: People everywhere and always remain people, with all their strengths and weaknesses. For any virtual community, this also applies fully. A social web, or rather a web resource, by itself cannot be either intelligent or non-intelligent. But the owners, if they want, of course, are quite capable of making this resource more or less focused on one or another community. To do this, they come up with various "rules of the game" (ratings, karma, and the like).



Question (arising from the previous one): Does a business need, in general, a social web?



Answer: Yes, I do. Indeed, in the social Internet there is a place for resources not only for mass, but also for corporate (Enterprise 2.0) use, today no one doubts. In any case, in the West.



Question (and again following): Is it possible to combine in one resource two incompatible, at first glance, directions: the traditional (mass) and the corporate (business)?



Answer: But with this question the situation is more complicated. Unfortunately, the market is responding to it rather negatively than positively. In any case, as we have seen, for resources oriented towards a more or less mass user. It should be noted that those who are now developing social resources for a corporate application still answer this question in the negative. They do not want to unite. Otherwise, there is no way to explain the fact that not only resources intended for work on the Intranet (behind a firewall), but also those who allow network-wide use, almost flatly refuse any rating of users and ranking of information. There is no need, they say, this business people. Although in this case, an enormous amount of knowledge is lost, scattered across the massive social resources. And the “mullet strategy” about which I have already spoken is only one of the ways to resolve this contradiction. I will tell about the friend below.



Question (to the result of one discussion): Is it possible to love or not to love information?



Answer: No, it is impossible. Information can only agree or disagree. But the concepts of “like - dislike”, or, which is the same “love - not love”, are quite intimate, whether it is a woman, Microsoft, or a note by your colleague. Not recognizing this, any social resource knowingly condemns itself to the loss of a significant audience of professionals and business people.

Question (to the result of one vote): Well, why did you bury him?



Explanation: They buried, or rather, decisively filled out one of the most innocuous polls. Neither you seditious thoughts, nor assumptions that hurt anyone, nothing even close to you. Just asking for advice on how to rename some collective blog.



And now the answer is: Since the proposed poll from the first minute hit the otkhabrennye ’and from there it was never able to get out, they didn’t see it, and certainly not see it, many of those for whom it was intended. After all, only a masochist or a strawberry lover will donate his time to dig into the waste of human activity, even informational. Real experts and people of the case, as a rule, do not belong to the specified categories ...



Question (put in conclusion of the note): What is the collective mind in social resources capable of?



Answer: The collective mind is capable of much, if it is properly managed. To do this, it suffices to lay in the social Internet more advanced criteria for ranking, sorting and filtering information. It is these criteria, together with the corresponding algorithms, that will take on the role of managing the collective mind. In other words, they will become “miners” of the necessary for specialists “grams of radium from tons of (informational) ore”. In this regard, it seems to me that if the term “managed democracy” has the right to life, it is, above all, in virtual communities ...



Well, now, if you're interested, you can go to the main note, containing all the necessary explanations and links. At the same time I want to warn you that to illustrate some of my assumptions and conclusions, I referred to some features of Habrahabr. Therefore, in order to avoid the repetition of my sad story with news2, I beg you of the respected Habrahgazans to take this calmly. I hope that everyone, including the owners of Habrahabr, if they read my note, will correctly understand that I was guided only by good intentions :) to expand the areas of using the social Runet. This is what we are doing now in our community “For the New Social Web”. I would be glad if my considerations were ever useful to anyone else ...