Trend-setting in a virtual society

Recently, I have observed, especially on Facebook, that people start to follow several trends of answering notes, tag friends in similar comic pictures, and answer trivial quizzes. Before I started to wonder why people follow these trends, I found myself answering one of the quizzes on Facebook, “How old are you on the inside?”. Suddenly, I think about one power of networking community: trend-setting. In a virtual society, when one person posted a picture, a note, or changing his/ her status, it is very likely that his/ her friends will be interested in and copy that item and publicize it in their profiles. Think about how many people in your friendlist will do that, and subsequently friends of them will do just the same.

Many people think that having their friends to follow their actions is an example of common interest, which made them friends in the first place. On the other hand, people may feel that being “tagged” in notes or photos on Facebook, or “invited” to applications is a way to maintain relationships (which is why in one of the previous entries, I mention internet as a relationship maintenance tool). By saying this, I mean that Facebook users desire of ways of using Facebook to remind friends of their existence (You may not talk to a friend for a long time, but suddenly she tagged you in her note, wouldn’t you be happy even a little?), as well as ways to make friends know better about each other. What may be the other reason for such trend-following? It may simply because that they have time for such activities, or they do not want to be missed out in the domino game.

But let’s think about trend-setters and followers in another view: it is a way that one expresses uniqueness and creativity. If you more and more people are following your actions, more frequently they visit your profile, would you think about setting a more “meaningful” trend? If you say yes, you are not the only one. Facebook users have invented so many ways to use their profile pictures, notes, status, and photos to convey certain messages. These messages may regard political or environmental campaigns, soliciting votes, fundraising, or even news broadcasting. I have seen my Nepali friend uses his Facebook as a way to express his political view of freedom for Tibet: using his status, profile pictures, quotations, wall posts, and groups. It cannot be denied that by such use of a networking community like Facebook, he was successful in raising awareness of his international friends about Tibet issue. And, if his Nepali friends follow such use into a trend, it will be a very effective way to achieve their goals.

Furthermore, if people can set trends and have followers, I think it is about time to think about a way that users can shape a new way they use Facebook: combining a networking community with a virtual marketplace, or in the other word: Facebook as an enterprise platform. By saying this, I am introducing a terminology: social-shaping, which roughly means that our society influences design and use of technology and vice versa. Users will start to use Facebook as a tool for them to do things such as marketing and revenue-creating. With Facebook, people can turn their profile completely into personal websites with existing Facebook platform, and introduce people in their friendlist about new products, news through using wall posting, photos, video-uploading. An on-going example is that singers can use their Facebook as means to communicate with fans, introducing new released albums, updating location of new tours, etc. Want more than that? Singers can probably sell their songs by using hyperlink of commercial music video to online music providers, such as iTunes. Asides from marketing, virtual networking platform can be a potential place for technology-savvy users to start earning their money by working as professional Facebook application writers and earn subscription fees from their work. With just as small as $1 for each individual to be able to subscribe for unlimited download of virtual gifts, of songs, or unlimited plays for online game, it may turn Facebook to a wonderful source of earning. How about payment method for these businesses? PayPal is a good candidate. However, with such new uses of Facebook, we may expect new technical issues regarding security and privacy: wall-scamming bugs, Deny of Service attacks, phishing, fee soliciting frauds, etc.

To conclude this entry, I want to quote my favorite saying about successful entrepreneurship: “ Wherever there are more than 2 people, there is a chance for establishing a market and earning profit.”. It seems to be true in both physical world and virtual world.