Category: Social Media

  • Don’t Call Them “Consumers”

    What you call people matters.  It tells them what you really think about them. Here’s an example: years ago my friend Jules shared how her Mom would call for her Dad in a never-changing escalation of urgency and decline of affection: “Sweetheart!” she’d trill, followed by, “Honey?” and then ending with “Bill!!”  The equation worked…

  • The FOMO Myth

    In my last post I wrote about how Facebook’s business need to have more people doing more things on its platform more of the time is in tension with how human satisfaction works. In today’s post, I’m going to dig a little deeper into the satisfaction math (for those of you with a “Math, ewww”…

  • The Problem with More: Coca-Cola, Electric Cars, Email, Facebook and Satisfaction

    I Pac-Man chomp my way through many articles each week, digesting most with a tiny burp and leaving them to the brass-knuckled mercies of memory.  Yet two recent pieces have stuck with me: Matt Richtel’s October 10th piece in the New York Times, “In California, Electric Cars Outpace Plugs, and Sparks Fly” and Roberto A.…

  • I Want to be my own Big Brother: an App Daydream

    “I never travel without my diary. One should always have something sensational to read in the train.” (Gwendolyn Fairfax in Wilde’s “The Importance of Being Earnest”) I’m skeptical about how much corporations benefit from the data I generate.  If tracking my every movement worked, then Facebook would not keep trying to sell me the icky…

  • Short post about “My Facebook Movie” — from Charming to Cloying in 21 hours

    The first person I saw share “My Facebook Movie” was Terry Kawaja, 23 hours ago as I write this short post.  I clicked.  I smiled. I shared mine a few minutes later. Then I looked at those of two friends and stopped. This morning I saw that my wife had shared hers, so of COURSE…

  • Social Media Quote of the Year: Facebook is like a tattoo…

    Social Media Quote of the Year from our 16 y.o. babysitter Emily Wolfram: “Facebook is like a tattoo. Make it trashy and it will keep you from getting jobs in the future. Keep it classy and it will be something you have your whole life.” This is one smart kid. I’m continually impressed by her…

  • Netflix’s Big OOPS– didn’t these guys take Psych 101?

    Topline takeway for this post: Netflix has screwed up, turning unconsidered background choices into front-of-mind considerations. They don’t understand how pleasure and satisfaction work. I’m on vacation and somewhat unplugged, but I was still connected enought to receive a surprising email from Netflix yesterday saying that if I want to retain both unlimited streaming and…

  • Sat AM Quick Updates on Urban Outfitters

    Quick updates: Urban Outfitters finally spoke out both via Twitter and on the blog to which they link: Hey everyone, please read our statement regarding the I Heart Destination Necklace. http://urbout.co/kqdecK Why the company waited until the Saturday morning of a holiday weekend is beyond me. Note also that my friend Marshall Kirkpatrick of ReadWriteWeb found…

  • Urban Outfitters’ Massive Social Media FAIL

    Please check out my latest post over at iMedia Connection about how Urban Outfitters is following in the dubious footsteps of Domino’s Pizza back in 2009 in their failure to address a massively negative social media campaign. Domino’s learned this lesson the hard way — and is now doing social media right — so let’s…