FanLib: FAIL

[stewardess]

December 28, 2007 — The Christian Science Monitor holds forth on the good and bad in the "digital race" of 2007. In their annual summing up, FanLib is the "bad" object lesson for "Web 2.0"Digital race? WTF, dudes! It isn't a race, it's a freaking big bang spreading outwards in every direction

Comments

[liresius]

Oh, Fanlib were "THE BAD"! LOL! Thanks for the link!

[stewardess]

It is certainly satisfying they have become the "don't do this!" object lesson.

[liresius]

Oh yes! *g*

[kurenai_tenka]

...proving that we can get our message across just as well as they can and without a budget? XD;

[tejas]

*Better* than they can.

Morons.

[stewardess]

No budget, and we forgot to have meetings. :)

[kurenai_tenka]

Assuming they remembered them, of course. XD

[angiepen]

I think it's a step in the right direction that they even recognized that FanLib fucked up; they could easily have tsk-tsked the selfish, whiny fans or something. The whole point of the article was the relationship between big business and the "new" internet, so it's not at all surprising that they took the POV what companies can do online for their own benefit.

Angie

[stewardess]

I'm probably expecting too much of them. CSM is a big business, and reflects those values. Still, this really irked me:

Companies need to understand what motivates audiences before creating business models around them.

Calling fanfiction writers and readers an "audience" is missing the point spectacularly. It's like calling a major league baseball player a "sports fan."

[stewardess]

By the way, I just had a personal reminder about the intense greed currently surrounding "social networking."

An old friend is developing a product that will be sold online and at events. It's not fandom related, but it's similar in its narrow appeal and need for word of mouth. A marketing guru told him he needed "affinity marketing," and thought they should build a social networking site just to sell the product.

Totally bats? Yes, indeed. It would be like setting up one to promote... reproductions of tin flour canisters from the 1950s. Really a small niche, and not profitable enough to justify the labor and expense.

I told my friend social networking would happen around the product with or without him. :p

Perhaps one day corporate America will understand social networking is not something they can buy or build, but people, millions of them. Right now, though, they believe it is a magical, inexhaustible gold mine. It will be the next bubble to burst.

[lttledvl]

Perhaps one day corporate America will understand social networking is not something they can buy or build, but people, millions of them. Right now, though, they believe it is a magical, inexhaustible gold mine. It will be the next bubble to burst.

I don't see that happeninng until companies (US or otherwise) realize that not everything in the world is sellable. Though admittly, they are pushing that route too.