Perils of Popularity

The perils of popularity (or how to create hits) Rashmi Sinha www.slideshare.net

5 observations about today’s web 3 models of popularity 10 principles for design

5 observations

1. Second generation social networks
Sharing in large networks, versus own site
Human crawlers
Urban sociality

First generation Social Networks (Friendster, LinkedIn…)
How it works
People connect to each other
Six degrees of separation
“ Are you my friend” awkwardness
1) I am linked to -> -> to you --->You are linked to her -> -> to her…

Hi I found you while I was searching my network at LinkedIn. Let's connect directly, so we can help each other with referrals. If we connect, both of our networks will grow… X

Object mediated social networks
“… sociality along lines that include objects in the concept of social relations.”
Katrin-Knorr Cetina
Coffee Tomatoes

Model a: Watercooler conversations (around objects e.g., Flickr, Yahoo answers) 1) I share my pics -> -> with you ---> -->You share your pics -> ---> with him
How it works
People share objects | watch others
Connections through objects
Social info streams: emergence of popular, interesting items

Model b: Viral sharing (passing on interesting stuff, e.g., YouTube videos)
How it works
Individual to individual to individual
Popularity based navigation track “viral” items
1) I send video I like -> -> to you. You pass on --> --> to her, who sends on to her, who passes on…

Model c: Tag-based social sharing (linked by concepts. e.g., del.icio.us) 1) I tag my bookmarks -> you see my tags -->You share your tags ->
How it works
Saving & tagging your stuff (creating bookmarks).
Tags mediate social connections
Formation of social/conceptual information streams. Emergence of popular, interesting items
politics lebanon Global voices politics technology Global voices web JAVA CNN networks blogs science science science brain

Model d: Social news creation (rating news stories, e.g., digg, Newsvine) 1) I find interesting story -> you rate story -->Others rate stories
How it works
Finding and rating stories
Popular stories rise to top
5 4

Urban sociality
Crowds in MMORPGS
Alone together
Passive presence of others
Playing for the audience, but not interacting
(Ducheneaut et al. CHI 2006)
Social facilitation
passive presence can influence
Observed in cockroaches!
(Zajonc, 1960)

2. Sharing is relevant to search
Conversations around objects: community meets catalog

Popularity is popular on sharing sites
No multi-level menus!
Navigation = Top100 lists, tag clouds

Did Paul Ford speak too soon?

The sharing imperative

is starting to influence search

Sharing compared to search
shared by creator
smaller reach
higher quality
centralized repositories
relatively homogenous
social activity inside indicates relevancy, popularity

3. conformity effects in social decisions
sequential decisions
even 3 is enough

How Influence Works The individual Conversion (private acceptance) Independence Counterconformity Information Influence Normative Influence Interpersonal Influence Compliance Social Influence

Social influence in web-based systems
Cognitive Diversity
Independence
Decentralization
Easy Aggregation

3. rich get richer effects at network level

Duncan Watts experiments
Two worlds
Individual
Social Influence – 8 separate worlds
Theory of cumulative advantage

4. Era of hits is not over

Long tail hypothesis
democratized production > more inventory
democratized distribution > more consumption lowered search costs > reach niches

N Sync vs. lonely girl

System designer as studio boss
People want a shared reality
Mechanisms emerge to create trends

Creating trends
Everything starts as equal
People can connect locally
Highlight alternative viewpoints
System should be flexible

3 models of sociality
Google
Digg
YouTube

Google - Blind sociality
less social engagement
sequential conformity reduced

No way to navigate social network

Digg as a laser beam
Focused
in time
on tech topics
young male users

encourages mobs
Quick, engaging, transparent metric
Sequential decisions

Youtube - promiscuous popularity
Many metrics
Different strokes for different folks

Popularity on SlideShare Keep it on your desktop Download Remember stuff, tell someone you like their stuff Favorite & tag Share with your friends Email Share on your blog Embed Watch it View Interact with others Comment Goal Metric

Most viewed
shown on front page
content it surfaces

Most favorited & tagged
balance individual and social
reflect back tags in social stream
main social gesture

10 principles to design for sharing

Forget the ipod!

Give up control This is messy!

1. Make system personally useful
memorable personal snippets (e.g., Del.icio.us & Flickr)
Self-expression (e.g., Newsvine)
Social status: Digg
Don’t count on altruism
thrive on people’s selfishness

2. Symbiotic relationship between personal & social
Small individual contributions
can be collected and mashed-up
Simple, guessable URLs for everything
Personal snippets > Social stream
Pictures > by Events
Music > by Playlists

3. Porous boundary between public & private
Personal desktop software vs. social websites
People will share for the right returns
defaults to public, can change to private
user has control individual pieces & sets
Privacy settings on Flickr

4. levels of participation
Everyone does not need to create!
Implicit creation (creating by consuming)
Remixing—adding value to others’ content
Source: Bradley Horowitz’s weblog, Elatable, Feb. 17, 2006, “Creators, Synthesizers, and Consumers”

5. Let people feel presence of others
Sense that others are out there
what paths are worn
real time updating

6. and yet, moments of Independence…
Choreography: when alone, when part of group
prevent mobs
not too easy to mimic others
incentives for originality
allow for alternative viewpoints

7. Add in serendipity
navigation not just about popularity
access to some popular stuff (keep this fast moving)
make “long tail” accessible
popularity as a jump off point to other ways of exploring
personalization & recommendations
ad-hoc groups?

8. Complete circle of sharing I share You use it ?

9. Add in a dash of experts
contest on SlideShare: both judges & popular votes

10. Most of all, allow for play

Finally
your slides at
http://www.slideshare.net/tag/yrb
find me at
http://www.slideshare.net/rashmi

Perils of Popularity

by Rashmi Sinha on May 25, 2007

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Perils of Popularity — Presentation Transcript