I believe we’re beginning to see an emergance of this. Others, such as Jay Jamison — who articulates the idea of “interest-based networks” beautifully in this article — seem to think so too.

People are seemingly shocked by the rapid acceleration of Pinterest. They shouldn’t be.

Look at Pinterest’s mantra: “Organize and share things you love.” Compare this with Facebook’s: “Facebook is a social utility that connects people with friends and others who work, study and live around them.”

See the distinction? FB is about organizing around people; Pinterest is about organizing around things.

We’ve naturally conceived of social networks as being “for” helping us connect with other people (that’s what FB, Twitter, Tumblr, etc. do). The problem with this is that for most of us there is a relatively finite number of people with whom we’ll connect (cf. Gladwell’s idea in The Tipping Point that the max number of authentic social connections anyone can have is 150).

Not so with things.

We’re constantly discovering new things about which we might want to learn more (in an era where everyone is a content creator, this ain’t slowing down).

The unintended consequence of organizing around things, of course, is that it leads to the possibility of breaking through the glass ceiling of acquaintances. In other words, we have a far better chance of making new social acquaintances via organizing around things than we do connecting with people. This is why Pinterest is growing so quickly.

When we organize around a thing, we’re breaking through barriers of geography and demographics and, instead, uniting around a shared psychographic interest. I can, for instance, tweet a link to an article about some great bbq that I’m looking forward to trying in Austin during sxsw, and I know that some percentage of my followers on Twitter and FB will appreciate this article. However, I’m unlikely to expand my social circle via this gesture.

Conversely, if I go organize myself around the interest/object of bbq, and then look to see others who have done the same, there is a chance that my social circle can expand (i.e. meet new people).

To be clear, I’m not for a minute saying that FB is going away/going to fail (the cost of abandonment is just too high for most people; though there have been some studies of late showing a large degree of unused FB accounts).

Rather, I’m saying that there is tremendous opportunity to rethink how we should be concieving of networks moving forward. As I’ve argued forever, look to objects of interest (in some respects, the more specific the better) that people are passionate about, and give them the tools to better organize. Doing so will lead to far more durable, rewarding, and expansive connections than organizing around existing social connections.

Of course, the real winner will be the person/company who combines object-orientated organization with acquaintance-orientated organization (you can bet FB is working on this). The chart below attempts to exemplify the trends, and the potential outcome.

The main thrust of my journal article is that social media has failed to live up to its promise. Essentially, the guttering candle flame that looked as if it might ignite an entire “markets are conversations” moment, has been extinguished, and in its place…

Well, there’s the rub.

It seems most can agree to feeling, at best, frustrated by social media in its varied incarnations. I don’t believe a day goes by for me where I don’t hear someone talk about how they’re tired of Facebook, etc. However, people are loath to abandon it (the cost of quitting – moving/losing all those photos – is too high). Related, no alternative has emerged.

I’m not sure, however, that it’s just fatigue that is making people dissatisfied. Rather, I think it’s an unfulfilled promise. For a moment, FB (etc.) seemed to offer authentic connection, and, thus, hope with respect to our greatest collective fear: loneliness.

As those connections — once co-opted — became increasingly less authentic, the value of these social networks fell. The promise of not-lonely disappeared.

There are moments of authentic connection out there, however. It takes some looking. It takes following the bread crumbs (often originating on FB).

One such example that works for me is the newly-introduced live stream sessions on Daytrotter. And, yes, full-disclosure, I’ve been working with Daytrotter for ~4 years now.

Why these work for me is their authenticity. You hear the artists creating in real time…warts and all.

“Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic,” and this to me is magic. The tech disappears. The intimacy re-appears. For the time that the artists put themselves out there, there is a bond between listener and artist. For this time, we’re not alone, and we’re not lonely.

Nothing worth doing is completed in our lifetime; therefore we must be saved by hope.

Nothing we do, however virtuous, can be accomplished alone; therefore, we are saved by love.

These are both exciting and stressful times for many people. Share your excitement; comfort those who are stressed.

Blend the following:

handful of blueberries
one small avocado
some coconut milk or coconut water
some ice

The world has been a happier, clearer, more manageable place since I’ve been drinking these.

I just bought some bee pollen, and plan to chuck some of that action in too.

We experience “buyer’s remorse” when we realize we’ve been used as a means to an end.

We aspire to buy things when we feel the material object (“social object”?) we buy will externally amplify our internal values.

The external amplification of our values manifests in two things:

1. I’m wearing this Lady Antebellum t-shirt because I’m hoping that others who also like Lady Antebellum will see my t-shirt and we will be able to connect around this thing that we both value.

2. I’m wearing this Lady Antebellum t-shirt because I’m hoping that others who don’t know about this thing that I value (Lady Antebellum) will be curious enough to ask me about them, and give me the opportunity to do what I’m hard-wired to do: share information about this thing I value.

(NB: when we were a t-shirt, it’s physically uncomfortable (absent a mirror) for us to see what we’re wearing; we wear it so others might see it. This, of course, also explains why there are mirrors in guitar stores.)

So, the cognitive dissonance — which explains our hatred for marketers and advertisers — occurs when we have been persuaded/coerced by an advertiser/marketer to purchase something that does not align with our values, and therefore amplifies a falsity with respect to our values.

At that point, we are being used as a means to an end for the advertiser/marketer.

That’s why we hate marketers:

On the other hand, when we amplify things we value, and it provides us the opportunity to connect/share, the marketing disappears.

Lots of change.

The old inspirations… not so inspiring.

The old ideas… not so inspiring.

The old voices… not so inspiring.

I’ve been trying to really listen.

Talk less.

To whom do you listen?

As is often the case when Alan talks, he says things without recognizing their effortless brilliance.

When he said the words “social, fun, and competitive” I literally stopped him (only partly because as glad as I am that he’s digging cross training or whatever, I could only feign interest in exercise talk for so long).

I really stopped him because “social, fun, and competitive” sums up what you must aspire towards if you hope to have a successful web presence.

If your site/web presence lacks any of these elements you will fail. You will lose to any other site that does feature these elements.

Social (LNKD bubble aside – and, remember, the late-90s Internet stock rise was also a bubble, but – like this social media bubble – when it popped the world was forever changed) and Fun should be apparent.

However obvious it should be to make your web presence social and fun, it’s certainly not simple. How many sites do you know that are fun? I promise you, they’re the ones you spend the most time on …. however you define “fun.”

And, of course, people screw up social all the time. Most frequently, they use “social” tools as a way to share “PR” information about what they’re up to…wrong (the correct ratio of authentic communication (i.e. non PR) to PR is 80/20, by the way).

No, it’s competitive that I think bears a bit of discussion. This doesn’t mean competitive in the Western sense so much as it means incorporating moments of satisfaction based upon some achieved threshold, and cognizance that others are also attempting similar threshold moments.

It can be something as simple (and seemingly non-competitive) as the completion bar on a LinedIn profile, or the civic sharing involved in star ratings on Amzn, to the more overt game mechanics seen on Zynga’s apps.

Have a look at the sites you frequent, and note the number that combine “social, fun, and competitive,” and then look at your web presence. How do you stack up?

Ken Shane and I got in a bit of back and forth about – generally – what constitutes success in this music business model.

In attempting to address Mr. Shane’s point I suggested that for virtually every other artistic endeavor aside from music there is little-to-no expectation that most people will make their living engaging solely in this activity.

For example, few people think, “I’m a fine art photographer, and I should be able to just take fine art photos.” The vast majority of fine art photographers I know subsidize their gig by doing non-fine-art work (weddings, photo-journalism) and/or work completely unrelated to photography (stock brokering, etc.).

Same is true, of course, for writers, actors, painters…mimes, et al.

None of these people (particularly mimes) feel that they are somehow deserved of the right to mime and mime only — they have some other non-mime gig to subsidize their mime-itude.

Musicians, for some odd reason (and, arguably, actors too) tend to feel doing non-music work is somehow beneath them/hinders their ability to create great art. They often seem taken aback when it’s suggested that perhaps they have to do some other job in addition to creating their art. (Yes, I’m generalizing, but, in my experience, only a little bit.)

In reality, of course, it’s not just a bifurcated life that artists must live — having multiple jobs.

Who doesn’t have several jobs? My wife is a full-time mom who also does educational consultation and teaches bellydance. Don’t even get me started on my crazy-ass schizophrenic activity. Frankly, most everyone I know is juggling several “jobs.”

And yet musicians want one job: musician.

In any case, the message here isn’t that musicians are solipsistic, but rather what I tried to convey in my response to Mr. Shane’s comment to my TuneCore post: that we all must have jobs that allow us the time/money/freedom to pursue the work that makes our life meaningful (our art).

In other words, we have to have: The gig (lowercase) that helps sustain the Gig (uppercase) that sustains the Spirit.

Of course, the old adage of “do what you love, and never work another day” isn’t necessarily wrong, it’s just reductive.

No one is so monochromatic as to have a single thing they love; we all have a variety of interests, and, thus, we all do many things.

Some things we do because they align with our values and purpose, and some things we do in a purely mercenary manner so we can do more of our purpose-driven things.

Such is life. Thank goodness.