26 Nov 09 Social Networks, Twitter

Shorting Toxic, er, Social Media

Over on the Twitter the other day, I wrote:

“Yes, that giant sucking sound you hear is me buying up CDSs against UGC-backed securities. #shorting_social_media”

Right now, the similarities between the overheated real estate market of a few years ago and the current chatter around the marketing potential of Twitter and Facebook are uncanny.

Turns out, I’m not alone in seeing the parallels.

“[Facebook] has consistently behaved in ethically questionable ways regarding all three of its customer sets: consumers, developers, and advertisers. Today, that behaviour seems have infected entire components of the media value chain. Entire networks are, it seems, brokering stuff of dubious quality. Sound familiar? It’s just like Wall St 2001-2008.” – Umair Haque

“What if the social internet as we know it is being built on sand, on ads that almost no one looks at now and fewer will look at in two years? ” – Ethan Zuckerman

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