The Future of Reputations

Changing Everything?  Was catching up on some reading and ran across this gem of a publication called Edge where earlier this year they had published a series of answers to the question "What will change everything?" What bridges will be crossing that fundamentally really change everything about and around us.  There were articles about social networks, how text will give way to video everywhere, education, computer processing, planetary matters and what we know today or will tomorrow about the brain.  There is a lot there.

The Age of Reputation: The one I got thinking about was was "reputation" by Gloria Origgi, a philosopher and a researcher at the Centre Nationale de la Recherche Scientifique in Paris. Her areas of research are philosophy of mind, epistemology, and cognitive sciences applied to new technologies.

She begins by pointing out that the Internet is really what will change our future most but then raises the question of how it changes things the most. Rather than paraphrase, let me quote the premise:

"The Internet is a complex geography of information technology, networking, multimedia content and telecommunication. This powerful alliance of different technologies has provided not only a brand new way of producing, storing and retrieving information, but a giant network of ranking and rating systems in which information is valued as long as it has been already filtered by other people.

My prediction for the Big Change is that the Information Age is being replaced by a Reputation Age in which the reputation of an item — that is how others value and rate the item — will be the only way we have to extract information about it...The age of reputation will be a new age of knowledge gathering guided by new rules and principles. This is possible now thanks to the tremendous potential of the social web in aggregating individual preferences and choices to produce intelligent outcomes."

Anonymous Powerful Algorithms Give Way:  She notes that the anonymous mathematical algorithm for cataloguing and retrieving information will/is giving way to rankings by people...and in some respects "information" becomes irrelevant, or at least subservient, to rankings by people and then the aggregation of those rankings.  The "new generation of search engines whose ranking procedures are simply generated by the aggregation of individual preferences expressed on these pages: no big calculations, no secret weights...results of a query are organized just according to the « grades » each of these pages has received by the users "

The Human Web:  And so the human web really takes hold in what we often think about as a data driven world.  To quote Gloria Origgi again, "this softer Web, more controlled by human experiences than complex formulas, will change our interaction with the net, as well as our fears and hopes about it. The potential of social filtering of information is that of a new way of extracting information by relying on the previous judgments of others."

For many who have been working in, or thinking about, social media, the premise she raises are familiar.  The social web enables people to connect with other people and share perspectives in whole new and powerful ways. Her conclusions, taken beyond web pages to a reputation based and ranked world are most interesting, I thought.

For another good read, be sure to check out the New York Times article about Web Comments/commenters.....some interesting observations there. ...

And, if you think about the two articles together and put comments in the context of these  "reputation rankings".....well, I am not sure what to think :-) .

Interview with Shel Israel, Fast Company TV's Global Neighbourhoods

Shel Israel posted an video interview this past week. We chatted about Michael Dell's drive to take Dell's direct business model and extend it using social media and online tools to foster direct connections with customers and others with an interest in the company.

In this "connected era" we also chatted about the value of listening, some of the tools, measurement, and changes impacting communications and marketing.

Frankly, we chatted a lot about why I believe what we are working on at Dell is so important and how it changes the interaction and relationships between business and people....but, of course, only time will tell.

The Canard of Control

Canard, not as in duck, but as a "false or baseless, usually derogatory story, report or rumor."

Previously, I wrote about three of blogging's dirty little secrets. I continue to hear people say that businesses wanting to enter the social media and blogging space have to "give up control."

Of course, the social media evolution/blogging requires corporations to engage in very meaningful and human ways; to listen, to learn and to converse. This is a fundamental change from the mass media era.

Indeed, this new era may in fact be revolutionary for creating amazing new ways and opportunities to further realize what Michael Dell recently talked about: "joining the conversation and speak directly and candidly with our customers. The more we engage, the more we learn and the better we can do for our customers."

When has that not been the case for business and the basis of relationships with customers?

This issue of control continues to be a red herring. It creates false fears and false assumptions. Companies didn't have control to start with. To suggest that business entering this space must give up something (especially the alleged concept of control) when they did not have it to start with puts a false sense of security into maintaining the status quo, while also scaring people (read businesses) into complacency and maintaining a false condition of security that does not exist anyway.

And, much as "practices" by business might have been used to give some illusory sense of control, the fact is a brand cannot be controlled. What business had the control to move its brand from X to A, from Pink to Yellow or from ugly to pretty.

In a similar vein, corporate reputations are not controlled either. Again quoting Michael Dell in his recent interview with Shel Israel "We don't own our reputation we just own our actions. That's something our customers give to us in return for us exceeding their expectations."

Check these definitions out...as further demonstration that philosophically "control" does not exist. This issue of control is a false security, predicated on leaving something behind that did not exist. People or businesses need not leave behind "control" in order to enter the field of social media. They need simply to want to more actively engae with their customers.

Look at what Wikipedia says about "free markets":

"A free market is a market in which prices of goods and services are arranged completely by the mutual consent of sellers and buyers. By definition, in a free market environment buyers and sellers do not coerce or mislead each other nor are they coerced by a third party.[1] In the aggregate, the effect of these decisions en masse is described by the natural law of supply and demand. Free markets contrast sharply with controlled markets, in which governments directly or indirectly regulate prices or supplies, distorting market signals.[2] In the marketplace the price of a good or service helps to quantify its value to consumers and thus balance it against other goods and services. In a free market, this relationship between price and value is more clear than in a controlled market. Through competition between vendors for the provision of products and services, prices tend to decrease, and quality tends to increase."

Or check this out. Wikipedia says this about brands and how the customers were are are in charge:

"By the 1940s, Mildred Pierce manufacturers recognized how customers were
developing relationships with their brands in the social, psychological, and anthropological senses. From that, manufacturers quickly learned to associate other kinds of brand values, such as youthfulness, fun, and luxury, with their products. Thus began the practice of 'branding', wherein the customer buys the brand rather than the product. This trend arose in the 1980s 'brand equity mania'.[8] In 1988, Phillip Morris bought Kraft for six times its paper worth. It is believed the purchase was made because the Phillip Morris company actually wanted the Kraft brand rather than the company and its products."

My suggestion? Control and issues of power are canards. Lets move the dialogue on.

Lets talk about participation and engagement; listening and learning together. It is here where the dialogue is fruitful, productive, hopeful. It is here that it is real and it matters.

Third Tuesday, Come snow or snow or snow in Ottawa and Toronto

Thrilled to be back home for a visit to Canada. Had wonderful dinners with friends, old and new, saw some great art at the national gallery, including the re-positioning of art from native and european peoples, interwoven in a distinctly Canadian way. BEAUTIFUL!

Not to mention special and FRESH photography from Africa. Congratulations to the International Center for Photography in New York, an old and favorite haunt, for the exhibit and National Gallery of Canada, for picking it up. Thanks to my dear friend and artistic mentor Jennifer Dickson for the treat

Now its time to join folks in Ottawa tonight, Toronto tomorrow and Wednesday at the Canadian Institute Social Media Conference. The Third Tuesdays (on 1st Monday in Ottawa and 1st Tuesday in Toronto) should make for some exciting discussions about social media and business.

Im going to focus on "listening companies" and corporate reputations, as well as on listening, understanding and acting...like the posts referenced below.

These folks have had some pretty special and senior speakers in the field. I am very honoured (note that "u")to be their guest, share what I can but also listen and learn and understand from those attending.

Just to prove I still have some Canadian blood, pop on over to Flickr or see video below. Thanks to my host Joe Thornley

PR at Its Best: Dennis Spring's New Webcast

Had a great conversation with Dennis Spring, Spring Associates, to launch his new program "PR at its Best." We talk about building a career with a breadth of experience, the changes impacting communicators and communications, the inter-relationship of social and mainstream media, "mind flips", tools, Dell and ultimately humanizing corporations, trust and corporate reputations. Its 36 minutes and the link is here (if it doesnt post itself from the site):

ScribeMedia.Org » PR At Its Best: Richard Binhammer, Director of Corporate Communications, Dell



Hope you enjoy.