Posts Tagged ‘Social Web’

Defendability of a Social App

Posted by: Manas in Social Web on January 5th, 2009

While talking to Atul today afternoon over lunch, the issue of defendability of social apps came up. His comment was that in the web 2.0 paradigm, the biggest challenge is the defendability. Someone else can pick up your idea and execute and you can’t do anything about it. There are three main things here - a) Everything is pretty much open so there are mostly no trade secrets, b) There is no rocket science involved in the technology, so, it’s very easy to replicate it, c) Most of the stuff is built on top of open source code, so, anyone can mimic your functionality in no-time.

So, how do you defend the leadership of your social application? What barriers-to-entry can you create for others?

While thinking more about it, I realized that the real defendability of social applications is not to be found in technology but in something that’s at the core of social applications - i.e. social. Yes. What’s there in the name of technology for Wikipedia? In fact, most of the other wiki softwares are better than MediaWiki. Yet, can we have another Wikipedia? What’s there in Facebook? What’s there in LinkedIn? In any of the popular social applications on the web today, technology is neither a barrier, nor an advantage. It’s all social.

Earlier, if you were to build a product, you’ll build some fancy technology. Building that technology will be the real challenge and also the real asset later on. That technology will put the barrier to entry of other players.

However, in the social application world (or the web 2.0 world), the real challenge when building the application is social, and when that challenge is solved, the real asset is also social.

For Wikipedia, Facebook, MySpace and others like them, the challenge was not to develop any fancy technology. It was rather to develop a social system in which their users could do something useful and also mobilising those potential users around their concept. Once it was done, their success cannot be replicated by anyone else.

So, when we think social apps, we have to think really social. For challenges that we solve and for the competitive advantages that we build.

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Social System Design Goal - Avoid Gaming

Posted by: Manas in Social Web on December 12th, 2008

Every social system must have provisions such that users cannot game it. It is a fundamental goal of the system design.

At a very high level, we can take two approaches to achieve this -

1. Make it extremely difficult for someone to game the system. Example - Google. Google spends tremendous amount of energy on ensuring that people do not game the system.

2. Reduce the incentive of gaming to zero. Example - Wikipedia. If you put some spam on Wikipedia, chances are that the very next person who visits the spammed page will revert your changes. End effect, only one person saw what you had put.

We know now that the first method is not fail-proof. Wherever money is involved, people are able to spoil Google results and the search results are more like advertisements. Even though you may see that these are not good results, you cannot do anything about it and those bad results will stay on the first page for a long time.

So, with Google, it’s hard to game the system but once you have gamed the system, the incentive is very high.

That’s not the case with Wikipedia. There, gaming the system is extremely easy. As easy as it can get. Just edit the page and put an advertisement for yourself. But there is virtually no incentive in doing so. That’s why Wikipedia has very little spam compared to Google.

So, what do you want to do for the system you intend to design? Make it hard to game it or remove the incentive of gaming it?

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Pottery and User Generated Content

Posted by: Manas in Social Web on December 8th, 2008

As I mentioned earlier, building a website based on user generated content is somewhat like a potter making an earthen pot. Since there are so many websites coming up that rely on the user generated content, it is imperative to understand the process that can make these websites successful or an utter failure.

The pot is made by the momentum of the wheel. And what does the Potter do? Gives shape to the clay of lump so that an earthen pot comes out of it.

First he applies hard force so that something starts rising from the clay lump. And then slowly and gently, control the upward and sideways movement of the clay as it rises further and further up.

Similarly, for the website, first ensure that the wheel is spinning i.e. there is willingness in people to contribute to the cause you are standing up for. Put in some hard work (may be hire some people) to create a critical mass of information. This will set the momentum in the right direction. And then slowly and gently, keep things in order while people dump more and more info to your site.

Of course, things are not so simplistic but there is certainly a pattern.

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Carpentry and Pottery {OR} Mahalo and Wikipedia

Posted by: Manas in Development, Social Web, Web on December 7th, 2008

What’s the difference between a Carpenter and a Potter? That’s roughly the difference between Mahalo and Wikipedia. Not precisely, but roughly.

Carpenter works with tools. Potter works with hands. Carpenter cuts the wood in pieces, gives them shape by applying a lot of force, then puts these pieces in some order back again. Potter spins a wheel which is the main supplier of further force and then just sits and gives shape. The wheel keeps spinning and the potter keeps giving shape.

Carpenter exercises explicit control over the entire process while Potter exercises very subtle control.

Building Mahalo is Carpentry where it is decided which articles to write, the format in which to write, assign people to write them, review them, put them up, keep people on job for updating them.

Building Wikipedia is Pottery where the core Wikipedia team primarily works towards keeping things in shape and maintaining some quality. Rest is all done by the spinning wheel (i.e. a movement towards building a free encyclopedia).

Both are art and both have their own pluses and minuses. They both can give good results. You need to decide which approach will work for your site and then stick to that.

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