Dear Lord, I have to throw out the Halloween candy. I get to this point every year where I realize that if I eat candy every day for a couple weeks I get really, really crazy. I don't think I could ever give sugar up but I have got to stop the binging or I am going to end up on the bathroom floor cutting myself like a teenager. "Fun size" my ass. But let's leave my ass out of this.
Ignore this next bit if you are not on Twitter. And you just may want to ignore it even if you are on Twitter. I have been thinking a lot about the new "lists" feature that's just been rolled out. Most of the reaction has been positive. There's been some (legitimate) griping about elitism and a-listing, but mostly people think it's a cool new feature. Which it is. But I wonder if it's more than just a new feature. I think it could end up being a major game-changer. For one, It suddenly turns Twitter economics upside-down. Now you don't have to be smart, witty, thoughtful or connected to be an influencer. Now you can just be really good at compiling lists to become powerful on the network. If someone is able to be really great at curating lists they suddenly have currency on the network, because people could potentially follow their lists instead of individuals. This then messes with the "follower" number for people because if someone is on a list or lists I follow I don't need to follow them in my timeline anymore. That could result in people getting fewer followers and thus less of what people now deem as the power indicator. So suddenly this new number, the "listed" number becomes very important. (Actually my favorite comment so far about the lists is from, not surprisingly, @CcSteff: "Loving the list feature. Really excited to have another number that measures my self-worth.") I have no doubt celebrities, who are so good at this game for obvious reasons, will pretty soon start coming up with clever ways to have people add them to their lists to up that number. Lastly, I can see some sticky intellectual property issues coming up. Let's say you compile a list that becomes followed like crazy. People are following the list because of the content that's in it but the lister could get "rich," first in just social media currency and then possibly in real currency depending on how Twitter ultimately starts monitizing content or if a list turns into some kind of media deal for the curator. Sort of like the brouhaha that surrounded Twitter Wit earlier this year. There was some passionate debate on those issues and some characterized @nick (Douglas) as making a buck off other people's lulz in an exploitative way while others thought it was totally kosher because all the tweeps who were quoted gave explicit permission. Lists raise a spectre of similar IP issues that could be a real headache. Something tells me there might be an updated TOS coming out pretty soon. But, this all might amount to nothing if the lists don't take off. Right now there is a flurry of activity but it seems like the subscribing to public lists is confusing to people and might not catch on in a big way. I haven't made any lists yet because I am feeling kind of funny about all this stuff, not to mention my usual fear of hurting someone's feelings that keeps me from participating in FollowFriday every week. But, I plan on making some because it's really nice feeling to be on people's lists so I'd like to spread that love as best I can. You know, after I finish my novel.
Just one more Milky Way. Then I stop. I swear.
