Dee in her post “Is Content Being Dethroned By Social Media?” said:
“…A well-known Internet marketing slogan is “Content is king.” But is content being dethroned by social media?
Social media sites like Digg, Reddit, Netscape, Del.icio.us, and StumbleUpon are changing the online business game. These sites drive huge amounts of traffic. And all you need is good content and a lot of friends. Notice I did not say great content.
… This brings us to the key to social media marketing. Friends, the more, the merrier…”
Her point was that with popularity of social media (including bookmarking) sites it was relatively easier for online marketers to fetch eyeballs to their websites. Even relatively pedestrian content can be used to generate a ton of “eyeballs”. Obviously she mentioned this in the context of using social media as a marketing channel.
Guest Eyeballs
I agree. You can indeed get a lot of visitors to your site with interesting, or as Dee puts it good, content and a little help from social media sites – Digg, Reddit, Del.icio.us, StumbleUpon, etc. Your traffic sees a growth spike for a few days, maybe weeks. You will love all the attention your site (or more specifically, content - good, bad or ugly) gets.
And, then the audience begins to erode - as swiftly as it arrived. Your content looses its novelty and, more importantly, gets buried under new content (or links) at those social media sites. Thus, the marketing challenge does not end with attracting this “drive-by traffic”, or as I like to call it “guest eyeballs.”
Resident Eyeballs
You are left with the task of getting more eyeballs. The marketing task then truly boils down to not just fetching eyeballs, but also retaining eyeballs. That is, converting your “guest eyeballs” to “resident eyeballs.”
This can only happen if your site offers fresh content (presumably good) that compels your first-time visitors to return. The only way to accomplish this is by having a constant supply of interesting and compelling content to retain your “(guest) eyeball stream”. And, obviously, the rate at which you refresh content becomes crucial. If the rate of refresh is too slow, your site and its content become stale.
Consumption Keystrokes
Besides refreshing, engaging content, marketers use “registration” as another technique for retention. Registration – which entails the use of “keystrokes” – is commonly used as a pre-requisite for receiving additional value. This value can be in the form of additional valuable content delivered one-time (e.g., a white paper), or on a continuous basis (e.g., a newsletter subscription, or RSS). The value offer can even take the form of additional rights accorded to registered users (e.g., right to rate or comment).
The marketing goal here is to generate return traffic – repeatedly and frequently, or in other words, increase devotion to your site. The value for the user is “information consumption.” I refer to return traffic generated through registration (in its many forms) as “consumption keystrokes.” The prime motivation here again is “content” or, better still, “addiction to your site’s content.”
Contribution Keystrokes
The discussions above are predicated on the site supplying content to attract and retain traffic. This means, eventually the supply of quality content will become a bottleneck. So, website owners will progressively find it more difficult to maintain traffic growth.
So, the ultimate marketer’s challenge is to have a self-scaling and self-sustaining model for traffic growth. Is such a scenario possible? Yes, it is possible if your (existing) traffic – that is, user base – generates content that attracts more traffic. This indeed is the secret sauce behind the successful social media sites!
Sites like YouTube, Digg, MySpace, etc. have thrived as a result of user-generated content – or “contribution keystrokes”. User contributions can be in the form of a rating or review of content; or the creation (e.g., uploading a video) of content. That to me is the quintessence of ‘community’ in the online realm – or the ‘democratic web.’ Once again, ‘content’ is the driving force.
Commercial Keystrokes
The end goal of any website is obviously is to generate revenue. Advertising and online commerce remain as the primary revenues models. In either case this will happen only through keystrokes – “commercial keystrokes”.
From a marketing perspective how well you transition eyeballs to keystrokes will determine your success. The more traffic your site generates, the more successful you are likely to be in generating revenues.
And, of course, that hinges upon your site’s ability to scale and sustain the offer of great, engaging, refreshing and compelling content over time. Thus, as you can see, content is not just the king, but the “emperor” of the online world.
Showing posts with label media. Show all posts
Showing posts with label media. Show all posts
Thursday, August 02, 2007
Monday, July 16, 2007
Marketer's Interpretation of Forrester Research on Online Participation Habits
In a recent report from Forrester Research on "Social Technographics," authors Charlene Li and Josh Bernoff used the metaphor of a ladder to show user participation in social media. They estimate that 13% of adult online consumers are content creators; 19% are critics who comment on blogs and/or post ratings and reviews; 15% are collectors; 19% are joiners; 33% are spectators (often called lurkers); and 52% don't perform any of the previously mentioned activities (Refer figure below for details).
Based on this report, Business Week later published a graphical representation (see figure below) of online participation levels by age group.
What is the significance of these statistical insights on online user behavior to a consumer Internet marketer? Well here are some conclusions I have drawn about online marketing strategy on the basis of figures in these diagrams:
- Interestingly, in a previous study, Jacob Nielson had talked about the "90-9-1 rule" for online social behavior i.e., 90% lurkers (or inactives); 9% infrequent contributors; and, 1% frequent contributors. The findings of Charlene Li and Josh Bernoff seem to reinforce these numbers.
- It is remarkable that collectors are almost uniformly spread across all demographic segments. More remarkable is that fact that the ratio of collectors to creators is far lower for the youth (less than 26 years) than that for the (more) mature adult categories (greater than 26 years). Does this mean that the average user does not really care for syndication? Should RSS figure lower in product management and engineering priorities? Well, your guess is as good as mine.
- The high percentage of specatators and inactives really reinforces the belief that social media's potential is still untapped (despite the mushrooming of applications). It also perhaps implies that the average online user is reluctant to adopt / embrace social media. Is this an indication of 'online social shyness' or 'do-not-feel-the-need-to attitude'?
- Clearly the teens, youth and generation Y are the darlings of social media. It means the younger age groups feel a greater need for social expression and networking. Hence, it is also likely that these demographics spend more time online than their older-age counterparts (besides willing to be early adopters). Thus, marketers of social media applications need to necessarily focus on these segments for building vibrant and sustaining online communities. So, a social application that these age groups finds 'cool' (and useful) is more likely to spread faster virally than an application that is perceived to be not 'hip and trendy.'
- The big picture that emerges for marketers is that their market entry strategy is more likely to be successful if it targets the younger generations. The 'joiner' percentages in these segments are far higher than the 'creator' percentages (with almost a differential of 15-30%).
In summary, younger social media users are 'early adopters.' They exhibit greater propensity to participate. Marketers of social media and online communities should keep these online behavioral insights in mind while chalking out their online strategies.
Friday, July 13, 2007
KEEPING SOCIAL MEDIA SITES CLEAN
Recently social media sharing and publishing platforms have become ubiquitous. People use these sites to create and contribute content; or to critique and comment on content; or just to collect and consume content. Regardless of the use, people of all ages flock to sites that are in this realm (like YouTube, Digg, Flickr, etc.)
So, how do you keep these user-generated-content-sites clean for all ages and free of objectionable content? Do you remove all mature content? Do you display a warning before showing mature content? Or, do you filter content display depending on the age of the user? And, what processes do you provide for the community to flag mature content? These are some of the policy challenges that social media sites address regardless of media silos (of text, audio or video content).
Browser Preferences
As is well known mature material on the Internet is not just pornographic content. It also includes adult / obscene language, and violent or hateful material. Such content can be posted on social media sites as text, audio or video content.
Users do have ways and means of filtering such content on the Web using settings on their browsers. For instance, on Internet Explorer you can use The Recreational Software Advisory Council rating service (based on the work of Dr. Donald F. Roberts of Stanford University) to filter mature content. Some search engines also provide Safe Search preferences, which can be set to filter adult material.
These techniques basically place the onus on the user for setting viewing preferences. Suspect sites and / or offending content get entirely blocked.
Selective blocking
Social media sites feature content users generate. They do not provide editorial filters for approving content and hence have no control over the material that gets published.
So, while they would like to attract users belonging to all demographics, some controls are necessary to insure users do not accidentally view objectionable content on the site. Besides, they do have social responsibilities and moral obligations.
Best Practices
Social media sites need to have well-defined policies for flagging mature content. Getting users to declare mature content while publishing it is the first step. The media site needs to prominently flag all such mature content. A ‘mature icon’ may be displayed to warn users about the nature of the content and to prevent accidental viewing. Next, sites may have to incorporate date-of-birth based controls to prevent underage users viewing mature content.
A means for users (viewers of content) to report inappropriate content should also be provided. The media site should allocate resources and define processes for reviewing complaints and then taking appropriate steps including, but not limited to, expeditiously take down of the inappropriate content. Termination of the violating user’s account is also a step that can be pursued as an option.
Finally, social media site owners need to be vigilant about their site being used for publishing child pornographic material. Federal and state laws make it a crime to produce, possess, distribute, or sell pornographic materials that exploit or portray a minor. It has to be remembered that social media sites as service providers must report child pornography incidents to law enforcement authorities.
Recently social media sharing and publishing platforms have become ubiquitous. People use these sites to create and contribute content; or to critique and comment on content; or just to collect and consume content. Regardless of the use, people of all ages flock to sites that are in this realm (like YouTube, Digg, Flickr, etc.)
So, how do you keep these user-generated-content-sites clean for all ages and free of objectionable content? Do you remove all mature content? Do you display a warning before showing mature content? Or, do you filter content display depending on the age of the user? And, what processes do you provide for the community to flag mature content? These are some of the policy challenges that social media sites address regardless of media silos (of text, audio or video content).
Browser Preferences
As is well known mature material on the Internet is not just pornographic content. It also includes adult / obscene language, and violent or hateful material. Such content can be posted on social media sites as text, audio or video content.
Users do have ways and means of filtering such content on the Web using settings on their browsers. For instance, on Internet Explorer you can use The Recreational Software Advisory Council rating service (based on the work of Dr. Donald F. Roberts of Stanford University) to filter mature content. Some search engines also provide Safe Search preferences, which can be set to filter adult material.
These techniques basically place the onus on the user for setting viewing preferences. Suspect sites and / or offending content get entirely blocked.
Selective blocking
Social media sites feature content users generate. They do not provide editorial filters for approving content and hence have no control over the material that gets published.
So, while they would like to attract users belonging to all demographics, some controls are necessary to insure users do not accidentally view objectionable content on the site. Besides, they do have social responsibilities and moral obligations.
Best Practices
Social media sites need to have well-defined policies for flagging mature content. Getting users to declare mature content while publishing it is the first step. The media site needs to prominently flag all such mature content. A ‘mature icon’ may be displayed to warn users about the nature of the content and to prevent accidental viewing. Next, sites may have to incorporate date-of-birth based controls to prevent underage users viewing mature content.
A means for users (viewers of content) to report inappropriate content should also be provided. The media site should allocate resources and define processes for reviewing complaints and then taking appropriate steps including, but not limited to, expeditiously take down of the inappropriate content. Termination of the violating user’s account is also a step that can be pursued as an option.
Finally, social media site owners need to be vigilant about their site being used for publishing child pornographic material. Federal and state laws make it a crime to produce, possess, distribute, or sell pornographic materials that exploit or portray a minor. It has to be remembered that social media sites as service providers must report child pornography incidents to law enforcement authorities.
Saturday, June 30, 2007
How Many More Accounts & Passwords?
The blogosphere is replete with frustration over "centralized social networking sites" (e.g., Krishnan, jEN...). The reason is pretty simple and straightforward. The way the ‘social’ aspect of the Internet exists today, you have no choice but to open and manage accounts over several sites to network around "social media."
So when will this multi-account networking end? What will it take for us to network with people over the Web regardless of where they have their "virtual media homes" set up?
Personality Fragmentation
I believe "the social realm" in the virtual world has to eventually mirror in many ways the physical realm. In the physical world, when someone looks at me they see one persona. During interactions over a period of time, they may get to see different emotions, expressions and the ilk. But, all that behavior manifests eventually in one personality. So, over a period of time with continued interactions, they get to know my likes (& dislikes), interests, passions, friends, family, and so on. Those who get invited home even get insights into what I own, value and cherish – books, music, videos, etc. In other words, they get to build a 360-degree view of me over time.
In the virtual world, outside of the words that I use to talk about myself (profile) or about something and the few photos or videos (faked?) that I share about myself, there is no personality. Further, my profile & personality is split across sites depending on the use I am putting the site to. Thus people publish content (regardless of media), participate in threaded conversations, manage schedules, etc., on myriad sites.
Further, the lack of physical interactions is a big impediment in virtual communities. There is no sense of bonding, belonging or togetherness unless it is an essentially physical group with presence online to facilitate remote communication (e.g., Yahoogroups).
Unification
So, for a (truly) virtual community to become socially connected, and to congregate (albeit virtually), there is a need to provide each member with an opportunity to know as much about the other members in the community. In other words, it becomes important to consistently expose common profiles about members across social networks irrespective of the platform or site where the network congregates.
By the very nature of today’s fragmented social applications, this is impossible. For instance, it is not possible for me today to expose my Flickr photos and Wordpress posts to members of a YouTube amateur movie club that I am part of.
So, what next?
Thus, the need is to seamlessly network with social and professional circles without endlessly opening accounts, maintaining passwords, entering profile information, checking threaded conversations, viewing published content, etc. on various social platforms. Open identification seems to be a step in the right direction.
Maybe Digital Lifestyle Aggregation (DLA) is the way to get there. However, I kind of felt many of Marc Canter’s concepts of DLA have been around for some time. One question that pops up in my mind is: What if a service does not expose itself with an API?
So, YouTube, Facebook, MySpace, Blogger et al. are you listening?
The blogosphere is replete with frustration over "centralized social networking sites" (e.g., Krishnan, jEN...). The reason is pretty simple and straightforward. The way the ‘social’ aspect of the Internet exists today, you have no choice but to open and manage accounts over several sites to network around "social media."
So when will this multi-account networking end? What will it take for us to network with people over the Web regardless of where they have their "virtual media homes" set up?
Personality Fragmentation
I believe "the social realm" in the virtual world has to eventually mirror in many ways the physical realm. In the physical world, when someone looks at me they see one persona. During interactions over a period of time, they may get to see different emotions, expressions and the ilk. But, all that behavior manifests eventually in one personality. So, over a period of time with continued interactions, they get to know my likes (& dislikes), interests, passions, friends, family, and so on. Those who get invited home even get insights into what I own, value and cherish – books, music, videos, etc. In other words, they get to build a 360-degree view of me over time.
In the virtual world, outside of the words that I use to talk about myself (profile) or about something and the few photos or videos (faked?) that I share about myself, there is no personality. Further, my profile & personality is split across sites depending on the use I am putting the site to. Thus people publish content (regardless of media), participate in threaded conversations, manage schedules, etc., on myriad sites.
Further, the lack of physical interactions is a big impediment in virtual communities. There is no sense of bonding, belonging or togetherness unless it is an essentially physical group with presence online to facilitate remote communication (e.g., Yahoogroups).
Unification
So, for a (truly) virtual community to become socially connected, and to congregate (albeit virtually), there is a need to provide each member with an opportunity to know as much about the other members in the community. In other words, it becomes important to consistently expose common profiles about members across social networks irrespective of the platform or site where the network congregates.
By the very nature of today’s fragmented social applications, this is impossible. For instance, it is not possible for me today to expose my Flickr photos and Wordpress posts to members of a YouTube amateur movie club that I am part of.
So, what next?
Thus, the need is to seamlessly network with social and professional circles without endlessly opening accounts, maintaining passwords, entering profile information, checking threaded conversations, viewing published content, etc. on various social platforms. Open identification seems to be a step in the right direction.
Maybe Digital Lifestyle Aggregation (DLA) is the way to get there. However, I kind of felt many of Marc Canter’s concepts of DLA have been around for some time. One question that pops up in my mind is: What if a service does not expose itself with an API?
So, YouTube, Facebook, MySpace, Blogger et al. are you listening?
Wednesday, June 06, 2007
Media Convergence: Have we achieved it?
Ever since the Internet revolution began, industry pundits have waxed over the possibilities of using it to channel multimedia content. It was even predicted that this new media would eventually converge with old media on the Internet. With the Time Warner and News Corp. acquisitions of AOL and Myspace respectively, it finally seemed this “media union” was here for good. Other hardware and device-level innovations and developments have bucked this trend.
So, has the potential of the Internet been realized in the delivery of unified media? The answer is a big NO. The progress of this “new-old” wedlock has been anything but satisfactory. I believe the power of the Internet has been grossly under-utilized in the delivery of a convergent media. And, here’s why.
The Internet advantage lost
One of the great advantages of the Internet is the delivery of rich content over the same physical medium. Audio, video, text, image and other content can all be transmitted to the consumer over the same (communication) channel.
Yet, unfortunately what we see is the replication of old media techniques and approaches in the Internet realm. This is most evident in the “divvying” up of content-sharing and publishing sites along old-media-type lines. Blogging is the new-media equivalent of print publishing; video blogging for television broadcasting; podcasting for radio broadcasting and so on.
True power of the Internet
The true power of the Internet lies in the fact that it provides a common delivery backbone for a media mashup. In other words, the Internet can serve as a medium for dynamic delivery of video, audio and print content – all in the same channel.
How will such media convergence be useful? Imagine a single communication channel of democratic presidential candidate, Hillary Clinton, being used for publishing editorials on her views; broadcasting videos of her public addresses during the day; podcasting her radio interviews; publishing photos of her public engagements and so on.
This unique “mixed-media” publishing will prove to be the hallmark of Internet-based public communication. This media mashup would be the key differentiator between old media and “truly” new media (Internet) publishing.
Mixed-media for the masses
Sure enough, Hillary Clinton’s campaign can afford to invest substantially in infrastructure to set up a website to deliver (streamed or otherwise) such mixed media content. But, what about the average John or Jane Doe, or the average family in the American heartland wanting a channel to keep its extended family or community informed? That is indeed a challenge that the new-media technology companies need to address.
Disclosure: I am a co-founder of Cylive - a social application that empowers users to network in highly personalized ways.
Ever since the Internet revolution began, industry pundits have waxed over the possibilities of using it to channel multimedia content. It was even predicted that this new media would eventually converge with old media on the Internet. With the Time Warner and News Corp. acquisitions of AOL and Myspace respectively, it finally seemed this “media union” was here for good. Other hardware and device-level innovations and developments have bucked this trend.
So, has the potential of the Internet been realized in the delivery of unified media? The answer is a big NO. The progress of this “new-old” wedlock has been anything but satisfactory. I believe the power of the Internet has been grossly under-utilized in the delivery of a convergent media. And, here’s why.
The Internet advantage lost
One of the great advantages of the Internet is the delivery of rich content over the same physical medium. Audio, video, text, image and other content can all be transmitted to the consumer over the same (communication) channel.
Yet, unfortunately what we see is the replication of old media techniques and approaches in the Internet realm. This is most evident in the “divvying” up of content-sharing and publishing sites along old-media-type lines. Blogging is the new-media equivalent of print publishing; video blogging for television broadcasting; podcasting for radio broadcasting and so on.
True power of the Internet
The true power of the Internet lies in the fact that it provides a common delivery backbone for a media mashup. In other words, the Internet can serve as a medium for dynamic delivery of video, audio and print content – all in the same channel.
How will such media convergence be useful? Imagine a single communication channel of democratic presidential candidate, Hillary Clinton, being used for publishing editorials on her views; broadcasting videos of her public addresses during the day; podcasting her radio interviews; publishing photos of her public engagements and so on.
This unique “mixed-media” publishing will prove to be the hallmark of Internet-based public communication. This media mashup would be the key differentiator between old media and “truly” new media (Internet) publishing.
Mixed-media for the masses
Sure enough, Hillary Clinton’s campaign can afford to invest substantially in infrastructure to set up a website to deliver (streamed or otherwise) such mixed media content. But, what about the average John or Jane Doe, or the average family in the American heartland wanting a channel to keep its extended family or community informed? That is indeed a challenge that the new-media technology companies need to address.
Disclosure: I am a co-founder of Cylive - a social application that empowers users to network in highly personalized ways.
Wednesday, May 02, 2007
How is Cylive Useful?
Since the time we launched Cylive Beta a few days ago people have asked me what the site is all about. On hearing details of the application, most have tried pigeon-holing the application into an existing Web2.0 space. And, they have had difficulty doing so because the application is very unique and different from what exists out there!
So, here is a little 1-on-1 about what Cylive is about.
"One Roof" Concept
In the physical world, most of my belongings - books, CDs, DVDs, albums, magazines, files, etc. - are all at home under one roof. All items are pretty much stored, shared, displayed and showcased from the same location. The same principle pretty much applies to digital content on my personal computer.
So, why is it that in the virtual realm of the Internet, I have to upload my pictures into Flickr, videos into YouTube, bookmarks into Digg, blogs onto Blogger and so on, with each site requiring a separate ID / password? And, if I have to share my "digital assets" with friends and family, I have to either form groups on these sites, or resort to some good-old link-forwarding via e-mail. Not at all elegant!
We developed Cylive to function as a single destination on the Web for storing, sharing, publishing and distributing any digital stuff.
Publishing Freedom
Imagine watching "Planet Earth" on the Discovery Channel without getting an insight into the effort and the technology behind each clip. Wouldn't such a "commoditized" clip lack some of its appeal? Unfortunately, social media publishing sites - Picasa, YouTube, and the like - all adopt a one-size-fits-all approach. This means I am forced to publish, for instance, each of my photos with just a title, a brief description and some tags. A picture may be worth a 1000 words; regardless, a 1000 words may still be required to describe it.
And, what if I wish to share an album of my best photos along with a audio clip attached to each photo? Or, publish a recipe in my blog with a photo to go with each step? Isn't technology supposed to enable such "out-of-the-box" creativity?
So, we designed Cylive to support personalized media publishing. In other words, Cylive permits users to remix media-types - thus enabling "media mashups."
Content Diversity
Last year I tried publishing a table (of Web2.0 memetic attributes) in this blog. I realized there was no easy way of dong it. In fact, I discovered that "social applications" are all geared towards mainstream media types, i.e., audio, video, photos, etc. So, if I have to pubish and share my Oscar picks with my buddies I had to get my hands dirty in cumbersome HTML code. In other words, I had to become a HTML geek. Why?
Therefore, we architected Cylive in a way that makes it real easy for a layman like me to publish any information in a structured manner.
Shades of "Sharing" Gray
Just to make sure I had exposed the richness of Cylive in this blog entry, I wanted my colleague (and fellow Cylive co-founder) to preview it. So, I forwarded a copy of this text (via e-mail) for his critical review. Evidently, the "social" element of Blogger applies only to the 'sharing' of published content.
Most "social media applications" are deemed 'social' because they permit a two-way dialog between the producer and the consumer. But, what about collaborative content creation, i.e., simply co-creation? And, I am not just talking about blogging wikis (or blikis), but also rich media here.
Thus, we created Cylive to serve as a collaborative platform. Content owners can control "who gets to do what and when with content." For instance, all the invitees in my New Year Eve party can upload snaps (captured in their respective cameras) directly into a common photo album on Cylive.
Conclusion
In marketing and Web2.0 parlance Cylive is a "social publishing and content-management" platform. Forgetting the geek-speak, it really is the "site of the free" - it gives you the FREEDOM to express yourself in any way you deem fit. Come, take a test drive and find out how easy it is to become a "multimedia" Web publisher on Cylive!
Since the time we launched Cylive Beta a few days ago people have asked me what the site is all about. On hearing details of the application, most have tried pigeon-holing the application into an existing Web2.0 space. And, they have had difficulty doing so because the application is very unique and different from what exists out there!
So, here is a little 1-on-1 about what Cylive is about.
"One Roof" Concept
In the physical world, most of my belongings - books, CDs, DVDs, albums, magazines, files, etc. - are all at home under one roof. All items are pretty much stored, shared, displayed and showcased from the same location. The same principle pretty much applies to digital content on my personal computer.
So, why is it that in the virtual realm of the Internet, I have to upload my pictures into Flickr, videos into YouTube, bookmarks into Digg, blogs onto Blogger and so on, with each site requiring a separate ID / password? And, if I have to share my "digital assets" with friends and family, I have to either form groups on these sites, or resort to some good-old link-forwarding via e-mail. Not at all elegant!
We developed Cylive to function as a single destination on the Web for storing, sharing, publishing and distributing any digital stuff.
Publishing Freedom
Imagine watching "Planet Earth" on the Discovery Channel without getting an insight into the effort and the technology behind each clip. Wouldn't such a "commoditized" clip lack some of its appeal? Unfortunately, social media publishing sites - Picasa, YouTube, and the like - all adopt a one-size-fits-all approach. This means I am forced to publish, for instance, each of my photos with just a title, a brief description and some tags. A picture may be worth a 1000 words; regardless, a 1000 words may still be required to describe it.
And, what if I wish to share an album of my best photos along with a audio clip attached to each photo? Or, publish a recipe in my blog with a photo to go with each step? Isn't technology supposed to enable such "out-of-the-box" creativity?
So, we designed Cylive to support personalized media publishing. In other words, Cylive permits users to remix media-types - thus enabling "media mashups."
Content Diversity
Last year I tried publishing a table (of Web2.0 memetic attributes) in this blog. I realized there was no easy way of dong it. In fact, I discovered that "social applications" are all geared towards mainstream media types, i.e., audio, video, photos, etc. So, if I have to pubish and share my Oscar picks with my buddies I had to get my hands dirty in cumbersome HTML code. In other words, I had to become a HTML geek. Why?
Therefore, we architected Cylive in a way that makes it real easy for a layman like me to publish any information in a structured manner.
Shades of "Sharing" Gray
Just to make sure I had exposed the richness of Cylive in this blog entry, I wanted my colleague (and fellow Cylive co-founder) to preview it. So, I forwarded a copy of this text (via e-mail) for his critical review. Evidently, the "social" element of Blogger applies only to the 'sharing' of published content.
Most "social media applications" are deemed 'social' because they permit a two-way dialog between the producer and the consumer. But, what about collaborative content creation, i.e., simply co-creation? And, I am not just talking about blogging wikis (or blikis), but also rich media here.
Thus, we created Cylive to serve as a collaborative platform. Content owners can control "who gets to do what and when with content." For instance, all the invitees in my New Year Eve party can upload snaps (captured in their respective cameras) directly into a common photo album on Cylive.
Conclusion
In marketing and Web2.0 parlance Cylive is a "social publishing and content-management" platform. Forgetting the geek-speak, it really is the "site of the free" - it gives you the FREEDOM to express yourself in any way you deem fit. Come, take a test drive and find out how easy it is to become a "multimedia" Web publisher on Cylive!
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