Read the full post here.

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The ethics of UGC/web 2.0

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In 2006, TIME magazine proclaimed the year of ‘you’, the year of web 2.0. The year where ‘the many wrested power from the few and help one another for nothing.’

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That sounds very new age and hopeful, but looking back (and considering Gartner’s hype cycle), although things have changed, we didn’t get the ‘community creative utopia’ we were all promised.

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What happened?

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I wouldn’t describe myself as a Marxist, but Andrew McStay’s theory of UGC/web 2.0 as ‘surplus labour’ (Marx, 1867). Today we call ‘surplus labour’ unpaid work. UGC and web 2.0 is the work which creates value on the respective websites, drives traffic and earns revenue. Facebook users, Wikia authors, and YouTube gurus are ‘at work at the wheels of capitalism’ as much the Tesco checkout assistant.

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Q:  UGC is ‘working for the man’, why do people participate in web 2.0 at all. Why do people work for a for-profit company without pay?

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A: People do not know they are working for free, and they enjoy it.

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Where’s the unethical behaviour here then? I don’t believe it is unethical in and of itself  for users to submit UGC as ‘surplus labour’; users are getting a ‘free’ medium to discuss their content, and sites need to cover their running costs, and generate acceptable profit margins (the web is not, in large, a charity). If users don’t have a problem with working for free, who are we to tell them otherwise?

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For me the ethical problem lies with audiences (in general) not knowing that they are effectively working for free. If those audiences knew that it is their work that generates billions of dollars of revenue for web 2.0 sites across the world, they act differently online. Users should be told (in the nicest possible way) that they are being ‘used’.

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Some Marxists will take offense to how UGC creativity is assigned a market value with web 2.0, but I believe this is a bit of a straw man argument; if people value something, and are willing to give time or money to acquire or experience it, it has value whether you like it or not.

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Moving on… to Facebook

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Since my (and my friends) Facebook statuses (and other FB UGC) earn Facebook the majority of its revenue (through advertising), it would be fair to assume that Facebook would pay more respect to their ‘workers

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Despite Facebook’s disregard for privacy, it is still one of the most popular tools used by brands for CSR, and brand-consumer conversations.

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What does it say about the brands when they use a site like Facebook, to promote them being ethical and considerate to consumers? It’s like a vegetarian buying groceries ar a butcher’s; a complete contradiction. How are audiences expected to take CSR seriously, when the medium itself is ‘tainted’?

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Web 2.0, TIME: http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1569514,00.html

Gartner hype cycle: http://www.gartner.com/technology/research/methodologies/hype-cycle.jsp

Marx’s ‘surplus labour: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surplus_labour

Andy McStay: http://advertising-communications-culture.blogspot.com/

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Also, Shephard (2009) ‘participation on web not equal’, therefore UGC creation not equal either. Balance of creativity on the net damaged. The net is populated by ‘the loud kid in the class who would always shout out the answer’.

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Digital activism, is just like all other activism in it’s intent and purpose, to enact political or corporate change. It only differs from traditional activism in its accessibility and ‘instaneity’.

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Digital activism allows constant networked global communication, it promotes instant support and mobilisation (demonstrations etc), it also demonstrates traits of Chris Anderson’s ‘long tail’; it allows niche interest groups that would be fractured by geography or lack of awareness to unite for a mutual cause.

Digital activism movements tends to have no public leaders (though, there are always flag bearers and instigators), and therefore acts like a mutual movement in the eyes of the activists themselves, promoting ‘ownership’ and involvement. One lone person cannot enact a fantastic degree of change, but as the clichéd saying goes, ‘the whole is greater than the sum of its parts’.

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Don’t believe me? Look at Egypt, Tunisia, Syria, Libya, Iran, Thailand etc. Where were these protests 10 years ago? Social networks and digital may not have caused these uprisings, but they have certainly acted as a conduit, endowing the movements with staying power and legitimacy.

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Ok, that’s all well and good, but what’s the downside?

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I honestly think that the main reason for the popularity of digital activism (Facebook groups/trends), as opposed to other forms of activism, is the rise of what I call ‘Me too’ culture, a culture that revolves around shared experiences ‘hey I joined that group too!’, or ‘I don’t want to look selfish by not changing my profile picture for charity’.

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Does ‘me too’ culture promote insincerity in activism? Or does it let people feel like they have become a part of something, a piece of history. Also, like many things digital, participation is governed by the convenience to the user of that participation; if all it takes for a user to ‘enact change’ is to change their profile picture, change their status, ‘like’ a group, or write your email on a petition then many will gladly take part. These are not true activists.

Kavada (2010:108), argues that it is not only necessary for movements to be seen as mutual, leaderless, movements for audiences to be truly engaged with the movement (eg, proactive, communicative), but they must also feel like they are part of the decision making process (not very common in many forms of digital activism). A lack of power in the decision making process can lead to a lack of ownership and commitment to the relevant cause.

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What this means for advertising?

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If your brand does a ‘bad thing’, you can bet your ad spend someone will find out about it. You can also count on people drumming up support and awareness to your actions. If it serious enough, you may end up on the front page of the Guardian, or even worse, the Daily Mail. Some awareness campaigns create movements, this is ‘muchos mal’ if you are at the receiving end of the discontent, expensive to repair.

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Kavada: Joyce, M., ed., 2010. Digital Activism Decoded. New York: International Debate Association.  Available at: http://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/~sjm217/papers/digiact10all.pdf

AP: Social Networking’s role in Middle East protests. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7XgtxAg-TSk.

Chris Anderson’s http://www.longtail.com/

Egypt: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-12289475

Tunisia: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-12180738

Syria: http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/world/bodies-in-the-streets-as-syrian-tanks-storm-protest-town/story-e6frf7lf-1226044764669

Libya: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/africaandindianocean/libya/8344034/Libya-civil-war-breaks-out-as-Gaddafi-mounts-rearguard-fight.html

Iran: http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2011/02/201121412571299951.html Naughty Mahmoud

Thailand: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/asia-pacific/7584005.stm

Would you like to know more? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2010%E2%80%932011_Middle_East_and_North_Africa_protests

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Havard law man Charles Fried, defined privacy in volume 77 of the  Yale law journal (1968) as “control over knowledge about oneself”, or controlling access to your personal information. Unfortunately, due to the nature of the internet, this privacy is nowhere to be seen. The ease of access to your information, and the demand for ‘free’ online content has, in part, caused us to lose huge chunks of our online (and offline) privacy.

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Websites all across the net need a source of revenue to meet web design, management and hosting costs, and this revenue has to come from somewhere. If you are not going to pay for it, value will be stolen from you, often without your consent.

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Public awareness of the issues surrounding privacy, and the misuse of public information, have been bought up by literary works such as Orwell’s ’1984′ and Kafka’s ‘Zer process’, which have highlighted the importance of privacy in ‘modern’ times. Fried (19680 argues that privacy is a fundamental part of liberty, if we don’t have privacy online, how can we have true liberty.

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The scary thing is that most of us do not know that we are being ‘watched’, by business and digital miscreant alike.

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The main enemies of online privacy include:

Browser cookies: often just make the web more convenient to use, like storing site settings and usernames, but can be used to track site history and browsing habits.

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Flash cookies/LSO/super cookie: This reclusive menace is similar to browser cookies in what they do (convenience and tracking), but different in that most people are unaware of their existence, and are more difficult for the average user to remove.

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Google (http://www.theonion.com/articles/google-responds-to-privacy-concerns-with-unsettlin,16891/): basically one of the worst anti-privacy offenders in the world, including snooping on people’s homes, recording unsecured wireless connections and trespassing on private housing peabody estates to take pictures of the front of houses for local youths to eye up for theft. Thanks Google.

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BT Webwise: BT will soon be rolling out their new ‘service’, which uses ISP based deep packet processing, to record every bit of up and downstream data to analyse your (well, BT customer’s) browsing habits and interests. This information will be sold to advertisers to provide you with more personalised adverts. Interestingly, there is no true opt-out. Scarily I’m with BT, not only am I being ripped off, but soon to have my every online action recorded, analysed and categorized. Lovely jubbly.

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Social networks/Facebook: An interesting one, apologists would claim that social networking sites only make public what you allow, but Facebook have changed privacy permissions in the past. Also, Google and Facebook, make most of your information accessible by all by default. This would not normally be a problem but, even though I said in my last blog post that people are not stupid, most people are –digitally- stupid, and make assumptions about the service they are using, sometimes with incredibly embarrassing results. Then there are the countless Facebook apps just squirming for the chance to access you and your friend’s private information.

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Spyware: Given that many online users don’t really understand the risks of spyware and browser exploits, it is unsurprising how common spyware is on PC’s around the globe. Spyware is essentially a virus, but is different from viruses in that they very rarely make themselves known to the PC user, do no physical damage but steal information like keystrokes, bank account details etc, and are not detectable by most of the popular anti-virus programs.

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It has got to the point where, if the information is online, or on your PC, then it is publicly accessible by all.

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What does this mean to advertisers? The more the industry ‘takes the mickey’, the more public distrust and anger will be towards businesses. As privacy becomes more of a concern, users will be more difficult to engage with digitally. I believe that if privacy was better respected online, people would ‘lurk’ less and engage (2-way) more with online content.

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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_privacy

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2011/04/19/facebook_privacy_sucks/

http://www.adobe.com/products/flashplayer/articles/lso/ Straight from the horses mouth#

http://www.google.com/privacy/faq.html

https://www.privacyinternational.org/

http://www.liberty-human-rights.org.uk/index.php

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This week, I’ll be directing my ‘little grey cells’ towards Search Engine Marketing, it’s components, and using Blacks (link) as an example, show what I believe to be general best practice when it comes to an effective SEM campaign.

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By my definition, search engine marketing (SEM), features two main strategies; ‘paid’ and ‘organic’.

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‘Paid’ SEM refers to the practice of paying search engine companies in order to get higher rankings in search results. In practice this means Google AdWords; where businesses ‘bid’ for the right to pay for their site to be included on the first page of search results (typically the top 3) based upon search terms they have chosen. This is either paid for via CTR/PPC or CPM/Cost per K-impressions.

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Do this now, (or don’t, I can’t force you), type in ‘android phone’ into Google search. When I did this the top 3 search results were from UK mobile network operators trying to sell me phones. They have paid for the terms phone and android so that I see their websites before any others. This also allows brands to reach me without me actively searching for that particular brand directly. People only search for a brand they know, which means AdWords could save brands money on traditional message-based advertising.

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The second part of SEM, organic search, or search engine optimisation is a much more complicated ‘theory’. Once upon a time, it centred on ‘meta data’ and site word content, which was used to gauge relevance to the search topic (webmasters fine-tuned this information to get better page rankings), but due to abuse by unscrupulous site owners this technique is rarely used. Nowadays, most search engines measure the amount of links back to your site, which Google sees as ‘votes’ to a particular websites legitimacy and relevance, to certain search terms (though this is also vulnerable to abuse, see ‘spamdexing’).

This new ‘voting system’ has created an interesting scenario for brands and businesses; to get your brand high up on the organic (and trusted) page rankings, you must get people to link to you. But how do you get people to link to you (and talk about you online?).

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In my opinion, the key to truly effective SEM, is through ‘content creation’. People link to content that represents added value to them, and using AdWords to promote the content. This goes hand in hand with the ‘new’ wave of advertising theory; post 2010 is the age of permission marketing. We can’t tell people what to do or feel, we cannot interrupt their productive life; we must become part of that productive life. Consumer/audiences are not passive, they are not stupid, and we must get them to come to us.

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Take for example, Blacks, a hiking and camping retail store. Being a camping and hiking specialist means they could easily create how-to videos on various aspects of camping, like the best place to pitch a tent when it’s raining, or the best sleeping bag to use in certain conditions. They could also maintain a forum where ‘industry professionals’, ‘prosumers’ and enthusiasts could get advice and opinions from each other on all things outdoors. Blogs can’t hurt either, as long as they are sincere and interesting, serving the interests of consumers and not just ‘company/product updates’. Paid for Adwords would be best used to direct relevant traffic and audiences towards your online content.

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If you contribute to the (relevant) communities, those communities will link back to you in blogs and forum and, BOOM, up goes your page rank.

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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spamdexing http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_adwords http://www.blacks.co.uk/home.html http://econsultancy.com/uk/blog/925-why-online-pr-and-seo-go-hand-in-hand

So what, I’m linking to Wikipedia, get over it. They are not in alphabetical order either. Shocking.

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A common problematic situation, a situation with which I can help you my dear readers, with my handy guide:

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If you ask me, a brand is more than a trademark, a label or sign of reputation; it is rather everything that a consumer thinks and feels in connection with the that brand, like emotions, relationships, values, meaning, memories and shared experiences.

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Kapferer (2009) argues that ‘all [brand to consumer] communication builds up an image of the sender’, even if that message was not intended to be viewed by the brand’s target audiences: everything that a brand says and does, even if it does not ‘say’ it on purpose, changes the way audiences view the brand. This is why ‘seamless branding is SO important’.

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Seamless brands are, as implied by the name, seamless. When a brand is seamless, brand managers have taken every effort to make sure all communication and everything the brand acts upon and does reflects that brands values and meanings. It is a focus on the little things that makes brands come to life for consumers.

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From a digital perspective, this means making sure all aspects of your consumer accessible online presence correspond with the brands core values. Things like making sure the tone of voice of the art direction and text synergises with the brand, and how hyperlinks/menu design/javascript/flash can be used in the best way to allow users to navigate your online presence, as well as reflecting target audience web usage patterns.

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Brands commonly fall down in digital when it comes to things like website design.

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Take, for instance, the MacDonalds UK website. Think of what MacDonalds stands for; happiness, family, shared experiences and ‘democracy’?

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Q: What part of the website reflects these brand values, or the MacDonalds’ experience:

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A: Hardly any of it.

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Attention to detail is one of the most important things to get right, argues Rory Sutherland (IPA), and I argue that the focusing on the small things, in all aspects of the brand experience, make up a large part of the seamless brand.

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Take for example this custom 404 error message, from a Star Wars fan site (501st.com) that sells ‘StormTrooper’ costumes.

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That’s what I call attention to (esoteric and geeky) detail. Sutherland argues that this attention to detail is what most organisations look over, while concentrating on the large aspects of branding and website usability, ignoring what makes things special to people.

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Enrichment of the brand experience comes from stepping back and looking at what is really important to YOUR audience. What really makes a difference to them?
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You can start by observing how a few members of your use your site (or your brand in general), or do what Verganti (2009) argues; make it [cool] and they will come, experiment if that is what your brand is all about innovation. ‘Sweat the small stuff’: Custom 404′s, brand relevant tone of voice, content that reflects what your audience is after, and even modifying technical and legal jargon. Take this iTunes/QT installer.

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That’s a good place to start with with bloke at the bus stop asking awkward questions.

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Verganti, R., (2009) “Design driven innovation – an introduction”

Kapferer, J.M., (2009) “The new strategic brand management: creating and sustaining brand equity”

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This is a system where 10 million people just cannot be reached digitally. That’s one in six people. It’s a system where it seems every other under 30 stashes a smartphone in their pocket or handbag. And, of course, there is the majority with the ‘old school’ DNS connections at home.

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What does it mean to society to have a growing group of consumers that are ‘switched on’ 24/7, and another group of consumers that can’t be reached digitally at all?

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With the ‘virtual pint’ generation, the 4 million over 65’s who ‘don’t see the point in the internet’ generation and everything in-between. Sounds like a class system to me; at least a class system that is not based upon levels on education, but rather perspectives on emerging (well, maturing) digital communications technologies.

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Is this a problem, or a happy accident?

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[Geordie accent] “YOU decide.”

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So how is it a problem?

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For society, the digital divide means a whole class of people who will be left behind. In a world where digital communication is the main arena for our current culture and communication, and where even mundane activities like shopping and accessing government services become a chore without a connection to the web. It is also a system where those that a more connected are more likely to be more successful in the workplace; whether it is keeping up to date on the latest industry breakthroughs through blog posts, keeping up better social/work networks via Facebook or LinkedIn, or applying to the 7 million jobs posted online each year: connected people have an advantage.

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So how is it a benefit?

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If you are a media planner that thinks in demographics as opposed to psychographics, the digital divide has made your life so much easier. The facts are black and white. You just can’t reach over 60’s with digital (though that is slowly changing), so use ‘old media’ vehicles, and it is really worthwhile, as well as a whole lot easier, to ‘talk to’ or target under 30’s, so to get your ROI nice and juicy you need to focus on social and digital for the under 30’s demographic.

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WOULD YOU LIKE TO KNOW MORE?

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Independent: decoding Britain’s digital divide

Guardian: ML Fox and the digital divide

Exploring the digital divide: Stump et al 2008

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The essence of the ‘convergence culture’ and ‘transmedia storytelling’ theories are not new, and certainly did not originate with the dawn of digital communications. The famous German artist Wagner used the term ‘Total Artwork’ to describe the use of a combination of artistic forms to enrich the telling of a story or theme, in order to increase the emotive affects on the audience.

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How can we exploit ‘total artwork’ with the advent of pervasive digital communications and social marketing?
A leading example is that of UK Channel 4′s ‘Misfits’ (winner of the BIMA Multiplatform Award), where leading characters had their own real-time Facebook and twitter accounts, interacting with each other and their followers; building story, and inter character relationships and bonds, alongside interactive content like games, and behind the scenes content.

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For Misfits audiences that interact with the additional content, this means a much richer storytelling environment, with more powerful, enduring, substantial, compelling and accessible  (mobile social) characters. Indeed, Facebook fans were shocked when a character ‘hacked’ another character’s Facebook page.

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The total artwork concept also increases audience aspects like faithfulness to the broadcast and programme franchise in general (future series). Audience exposure and interactivity with on-line content between broadcasts can also increase the persistence of the story and Misfits as a brand in audience mind space (interactive users think about Misfits more between broadcasts).

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The combination of interactive and transmedia story telling leads to a more enriched and rewarding viewing experience; audiences get more emotionally involved.

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For content creators, providers and advertisers, the effective use of transmedia storytelling, generally means a more engrossed and loyal audience, who are more likely to pay attention to ads (brand connotations), are easier to reach on-line (social), and easier to reach with pervasive/ubiquitous communications (mobile), as well as an audience more sympathetic to brand communications (at least within the context of the interactive content).

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That’s all well and good, but the real question on my lips is “What does this mean for people who only consume TV based content?”. Will they be left behind, when broadcast TV refers to off-line content? Will they feel marginalised compared to the more switched on audiences? Will broadcasters lose audiences because of this?

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Transmedia storytelling: Blurring the lines between reality and fiction.

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E4: Misfits

Wikipedia article on Misfits TV

Clerkenwell films: Misfits producers

Misfits alternative media content creators: Six to start

Guardian article: “E4′s Misfits characters to post on Twitter”

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Interactive: http://www.facebook.com/simonmisfits http://twitter.com/nathanmisfits http://twitter.com/simonmisfits http://twitter.com/kellymisfits http://www.e4.com/misfits/ http://www.youtube.com/show?p=cDGYL0ICECU

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Picture this; you are walking through a busy shopping centre, and left and right you see ads that really engage you as a person. An electronic billboards shows custom tailored ads for baby milk and gym memberships, promotions for your favourite comedian’s latest gig , and gift ideas for your boyfriend, after all, it’s his birthday soon.

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Sound far-fetched?

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Think again.

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OK so Minority Report style holograms might not be exactly just round the corner, but hyper-targeted ads are here to stay, and our mass immersion into social media has made us oh so easy to segregate.

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We now live in an age where social media (Facebook, Twitter and the like) has become such a huge part of so many people’s lives (and growing), that it has become the primary place for people to define themselves in their communities, as well as talk to the people they love about they things they love and hate.

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It has become another tool or medium with which we use to define ourselves to other people. The days of the Prada handbag and Northface jacket, may not have ended, but the days of ‘Strange Women Lying in Ponds and Distributing Swords as a Government System’ and ‘‘I love crumpets!‘ have only just begun.

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Social media users are curiously immersed in their connections; a few seconds of downtime, a red traffic light, a commercial TV break, or even a trip to the loo and out comes the smartphone, ready to digest what is going on in that person’s cultural sphere.

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But what does this increasingly pervasive digital aspect of culture and self-expression mean for advertisers? Well for one, the huge wealth of information supplied through privacy lacking social mediums like Facebook has made it easier than ever for brands to track  trends, brand perceptions and user experiences. It has also made ‘hyper targeting’ possible.

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Before the internet advertisers segregated target audiences into demographics and psychographics, and selected media channels based upon these aspects. Google AdWords and other ‘site user-profile’ based banner advertising allowed advertisers to target users based on average estimated audience values, a step forward, but not the ‘giant step for mankind’ that advertisers were desperately looking for.

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Facebook allows brands and companies to target an individual’s own pages, based upon that individual user’s own real-life values and behaviour.

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“So, John Doe, you are a Bristol university student from Catford that ‘Likes’ ‘Ministry of Sound’, ‘Rinse FM’ and ‘Cider’, I bet you would be interested in a pair of these shiny new Nike trainers, how about some cheap coach tickets so you can go and visit your lonely mum back home. Oh look it’s your sister’s wedding anniversary next week, don’t forget to send her a Moonpig card.”

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This is the future, now.