Reputation, Then and Now
Social Media Reputational Sites
To address the problem, at few websites have recently been created to allow members to give a rating for types of knowledge. One of the most popular and well known is Klout. This site allows twitter users to give “Klout” about various different topics including social media. The site’s goal is to give a score based on all these different metrics and measures the reach of your network, the amount of influence you have over your network and the amount of influence of your network. In addition to it actively measuring your network through your mentions, tweets, network structure and retweets, Klout gives users the ability to directly “give” Klout to followers on twitter when they present some insightful information on a topic. Klout also has the ability to connect Facebook, LinkedIn and numerous other social media sites.
Source: adrianchira on flickr.com
However, Klout is not without its issues. First of all, it calculates Klout regardless if you actively own an account, once you create an account it suggest that you forward Klout to Twitter followers and tells you that users Klout score. Secondly, Klout recently changed the method used to calculate a user’s Klout dropping scores significantly angering many of it’s users. Fortunately, for social media lovers, there are other competing services to Klout, although Klout may soon go public.
Does Klout matter though? I think this greatly depends on how you view social media. If social media is seen as an end until itself then Klout and services like Klout will have a major impact. If social media is simply for fun or part of a tool set then I think its significant is much smaller. A lot of people will like to see their single number score as high as possible, however, many people simply won’t care. For social media experts that give advice on how to better use social media for companies, Klout is extremely important. It provides a number for them to point to for themselves and their client. Increasing the size and reach of the network is a key goal of any social media expert.
I think that the more social media invades our lives the more likely it is we will all use services like Klout. If not actively, our “Klout” will be measured and used for topics we are experts in. It is likely, social media experts will push reputational systems like Klout on the average user. I think this change will occur over time and won’t have serious impacts outside of the social media expert circle for several years.
I'm curious as to what the new currency for reputation will become; now that it's mainstream to be social online. Numbers (of followers, likes, upvotes, etc.) still have the instant credibility attached to them but, in a world with 'celebrities' who are famous for nothing except being well known, not for having any social value, this is clearly a flawed approach. I very much hope a framework similar to the core structure of Quora's comes to fruition, in order to provide some solid ground to stand on. Having a mixture of social proof from traditional sources as well as the audience one is able to create is the next step in providing reputable real time data on...well...reputation.
I was going to read this article but then I saw the "Next Page" button and couldn't be bothered. Moral of the story? Single page articles get read more that split ones.
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