If you’ve been following Tangyslice’s desperate quest for social media coolness, you know that he’s going on a social media bender, trying to join 100 social sites in 30 days. Back in art school, I worried about the people who seemed to be more interested in cameras and lenses than in the photos they produced. Content is king, I say. If you’ve got nothing to say, you’ve got nothing to tweet, nothing to blog, nothing to shout, and ultimately, nobody to friend. [I suppose it’s possible that in social media terms you can reverse that last bit to “if you’ve got no friends, it doesn’t matter what you have to say.” See my recent attempt to explain Twitter for more mulling on that.]
That said, I took up Tangy’s gauntlet and took stock of my social media memberships, and then joined a few more to see what’s what. After all, his misguided Spurlockian stunt comes in part from my declaration that I’ll join almost anything just to secure the limeduck name against poachers. (Yes, I flatter myself to imagine that they might exist. Allow me some self-indulgence here, it’s my blog after all.)
It turns out that I have accounts on at least 29 social media and networking sites: (and even as I type this, I realize there are a few more…)
Social networks I actually use. There is original and timely content or information here because I log in frequently and maintain information.
Marginal social networks. I log into these once in a while because they’re very specific or because I have a few important contacts unique to them.
Insurance social networks. I maintain membership here because I believe its important to have updated information there just in case, or because I know some people search there or have contacts there.
Vertical social networks. These are very specific, maybe too specific, but I joined them to check them out and they seem to have some useful effect in keeping connected with topics of interest.
Social bookmarking sites. I just don’t use them much except occasionally to try and promote my site or a friend’s site.
Repeater and aggergator sites. These are places where I have a profile that does nothing other than repeat or consolidate the RSS feed(s) from some of the sites I actually use and from limeduck.com. I’m here just in case one of these gets big and to protect the limeduck brand.
OK, I admit it, I have no idea what these sites are for. I just joined them to try and stay ahead of Tangyslice.
Do I feel 29 times better? Do I have 29 times more to say? Does this get me 29 times more traffic and search awareness? Hardly. Are there useful sites I haven’t discovered? Almost certainly. I’ll be disappointed if there are no comments alerting me to sites I’ve cruelly omitted.
Watch this space for updates. Or any of the other 29 spaces.
Yo, is it OK if I just call, text or email you? I’d feel 29 times more efficient.