The Social Frame
September 29, 2008 in Work "Welcome to the social" ... Everyone remember that doozy? The social frame of the web seems to be close to running its course. The pour well intentioned social-media movement has become the butt end of jokes... How to Know if You Should Fire Your Social Media Consultant and Misreading The Cluetrain Manifesto. Change is a foot in the way we talk about the old information superhighway. This weekend I noticed a lot of people writing about ways to reframe where we are at with the web and what we (should) do/focus on now.
Jeremiah Owyang - What’s after the Social Web?
When I first started this blog, I titled it the “Web Strategy Blog” not the “Social Media blog” as I know there will always be new technologies and new trends, there’s something else coming beyond the social web
(An excellent choice!)
Chris Saad - My Vision for Social Media, Personal Reality
Personal Media is about recognizing that people are social and private. They are interested in personal experiences.
(Hmm, I enjoy personal experiences as well!)
Joshua Porter - Activity-Centered Design
"most popular web applications can easily be described in terms of the primary activity they support"
(Yes, I do use google for search, amazon/mp3 for buying music and dopplr for sharing trips!)
Edit: I realized I am stretching Josh's post a bit out of context here. Check his comment out.
Okay so the web is changing, people have social AND private lives, and web apps generally serve a primary activity.... and the sky is often blue!? There is obviously some context to those quotes and Im not trying to be a jerk, I swear. I respect those writers and love reading their stuff. But I feel like collectively we, the web geeks, are pawing at something that doesn't need to be pawed at. Now that "social" as a way to frame the web is nearing its end we are going to see a lot of people trying to push the next big frame that we can look at things through. Trying to define whats next or what is after "social" leads us down a road to, well, the next big thing. Ungh. As much as we all LOVE the next big thing, thats not at ALL what we need right now.
The way I like to think about this transition from the hype laden era of the social-web is that technology is fundamentally about communication. "Social," the concept, was really nothing new on the web, and creating new ways for people to communicate is always going to be a constant. The different contexts for communication, the objects to communicate around, and the new vehicles for communication are where the action is. At least for me. When I think back to my involvement with technology and the web it has always been heavily social, it has always been about communicating. What has changed is the amount of people using technology to communicate. A whole grip of people have pointed this out in some awesome books you may have read. So as the social web and social media fade away from the headlines I hope we don't rush for the next buzzing label and really spend some time making things that enable something new or unique (Oh, You Wanted the Douchy Web?)
I beat up on them a bit in the beginning of this post, but another way to look at Chris, Josh, and Jeremiah's ponitfications that seemingly state the obvious is that they are nice reminders of some constants.
- The web is always changing - so don't get hung up on what to label the next big thing.
- The web has always been rich with social value and personal value - its not either or.
- Good web experiences often revolve around a single activity - so focus on those social objects!
- The web has been and will continue to be about people communicating.
Reader Comments (3)
Social design is, to me, the idea that we design specifically for the communication between two or more people. In practice this means recommendation systems, commenting features, digg ratings, profiles, privacy settings, testimonials, etc.
Activity-centered design has more to do with design effort...it means that the primary object in our design efforts is the activity, not the person (UCD) or information (IA). I'm still working this out...but there is a tremendous amount of research on "activity theory" that we have to work with.
In other words, I don't see them as a progression...but rather two frames that have become increasingly important. I think the web will be social forever...my guess is that by saying it's all about communication that you do too...and that activity-centered design might just be a good way to align design efforts.
Thanks for the pushback!
I think activity centered design, social design, and user centered design will always be important ways to frame design for the web.
I should also say that Social-Design and the "social web era" are two different things in my mind. The intended sentiment of my post was.. now the buzz and hype is starting to die down its time to focus on putting into practice the techniques in books like yours and not chase after whatever the next "social" is, or web x.0 for that matter. Time to make stuff. Hopefully "make stuff" will become the next big thing as more and more tools on the web allow non engineers to create web apps.
My role as a consultant and designer is twofold...on the one hand I have to figure out how to make stuff, but on the other I have to help communicate the primary topics of the day...so I'm always toeing the line between buzzwords and practicality. This will probably always be an issue, but it's always good to read practical posts like this one to remind us all to slow down a bit.