Generation Like

Last week we had a discussion about the importance of social media after enjoying some reading material and a frontline video that highlighted this importance in younger generations. There was nothing in the material that I found all that surprising, perhaps because I am a part of the generation in question, but some of the examples it did describe were very interesting nonetheless.

In social media, individuals are presented with various content, created by their friends, corporations, and everything in between, and are encouraged to display which pieces of this content are the most meaningful. From these displays, whether they be things a person has ‘liked’ on Facebook or ‘reblogged’ on tumblr, a lot can be learned about that person. One of the things examined in Generation Like, and that I found to be most interesting, was that there is an entire industry built upon collecting information on the interests people display through social media. Companies like TheAudience take advantage of this information, analyzing the related interests among select demographics and fanbases, in order to sell it back to the entities of which the selected groups are attached to. These entities can then use the analysis to provide fans with more engaging and meaningful content. Essentially, TheAudience capitalizes on allowing other entities to more easily capitalize through social media. As unsurprising as it is for this practice to emerge, some people might see it as an insincere way for these entities to resonate with their fans. Personally, I can hardly see any downsides to it. Rather than being shown content that is irrelevant to me, I now most often receive ads that are meaningful and have a much stronger capability to actually sell me something rather than waste everybody’s time.

I’ve also had a level of understanding that some entities actually plan out release schedules for the ads and other content they release through social media, but Generation Like actually presented this in astounding detail. I hadn’t entirely known to what degree this content is planned and calculated. Entire hours or days could be devoted to developing, reviewing, scheduling, and then deploying individual pieces of content. Even something so seemingly insignificant as a tweet could go through critical refinement to ensure that it includes the right phrasing and tagging and is published at just the right time to be the most appealing to followers. Followers, too, will engage in this content by retweeting or sharing it to other people, and the content creators know that they can take advantage of this. Sometimes they will offer incentives for content sharing, such as the “Sparks” in the frontline video, to make fans more inclined to perform. What might be more interesting, is that some fans will knowingly allow themselves to be taken advantage of in this way because they have a genuine and deep appreciation for the content, desire to see their favorite franchises continue to succeed, and would feel honoured, in a way, to help contribute towards that success. It’s just incredible how mutually reliant these systems of social media and content distribution can be. I don’t consider myself to be that kind of fan, but now when I see some tweets pop up from a famous entity, I’ll have a little bit more appreciation for the kind of work that was put into them instead of simply scrolling past them without any care.