Comments on: Musing about Social Objects: Molluscs that Matter

By: How to design a social networking site using social objects | Kyle Mathews :: Dreams With In

Fri, 27 Feb 2009 18:21:34 +0000

[...] Rangaswami created, what I think, is a brilliant metaphor for understanding how social objects grow through conversations. He compared the growth in value of a social object to the gradual adding of new layers to a pearl [...]

By: Go Big Always - Don’t dump on me: The 4 behaviors of the social web

Go Big Always - Don’t dump on me: The 4 behaviors of the social web — Tue, 13 May 2008 09:08:11 +0000

[...] follow up thoughts. For example, in this post I’m polishing ideas I read from JP Rangaswami (Pearls) who was polishing something he read Hugh McCloud (social objects). Polishers dimensionalize ideas [...]

By: Robin Raven

Robin Raven — Fri, 22 Feb 2008 23:45:37 +0000

I agree with much of what you say – especially the connection between the social objects and conversations.
Iim interested in the idea of “good” social objects. Good in what sense? True, just, correct, interesting, successful?
Cultivating (pun intended!) the pearl analogy; are “good” social objects above all valuable -i.e. the market will pay a premium in some sense for them, or to be associated with them, over inferior ones?

By: Treat concepts imported from the external web with caution « sandyblair

Treat concepts imported from the external web with caution « sandyblair — Wed, 20 Feb 2008 11:41:43 +0000

[...] just too wasteful if the contributor resource is limited. This seems to tie in nicely with JPs pearl analogy. Sure, natural pearls are better than cultured ones, but cultured ones are better than fake pearls [...]

By: Laurent Blondeau (Evidences)

Laurent Blondeau (Evidences) — Tue, 19 Feb 2008 11:39:07 +0000

Hi JP,
more about to come, but see things came like TV history channels in some ways (I wrote here : http://tinyurl.com/2fm7yc on this subject).
UGC makes social objects to the bulk, that’s the change in web2.0 state ; it provides one shot and all day long, improvement of our knowledge, senses, feelings and points of view. Maybe we can be only viewers without conversations, it’s a difference we can’t avoid totally, don’t you think ?

By: Frymaster

Frymaster — Mon, 18 Feb 2008 14:12:35 +0000

And, like actual pearls, a discerning buyer knows the difference between natural (authentic) and cultured (spun) examples. A less informed buyer may not.

By: alexis

alexis — Sun, 17 Feb 2008 13:08:58 +0000

Hmmm.

Some questions may arise here..

Why can’t a conversation itself be a ’social object’? Can one social object be inside another? How do social objects evolve over time, and are rules involved – if so then are those rules, themselves, social objects? If there is an object, must there be a subject? If one subject points out a social object to a second subject, then is there any token by which the second subject can refer to, or even describe, this object unambigously?

An alternative view would be to talk instead about Social Processes (pace Luhmann et al.). These have no fixed granularity — in the examples on Hugh’s blog, each cases evidences sevcral layers of social process. Social processes can be games in which meaning is established over time, in a normative fashion.

For example there is a game we play, called Confused of Calcutta. In this game a process calling itself “JP” creates “Blog posts”. Other players in the game choose their own names and create “Blog comments” in which reference is made to “Your blog” and “Hugh’s blog”.

JP, this is your blog.

Which is the social object?

By: Niall Larkin

Niall Larkin — Sat, 16 Feb 2008 23:55:44 +0000

Nicely put. Pearls of wisdom emerge from natural conversations. Like in the adda you talked about before. Which selects and polishes. Also, which manages to embrace and muffle the loudmouth and the egos that come in and use them in turn as irritants to seed the next conversation, which may then give rise to another pearl in time.

By: LazyRiver

LazyRiver — Sat, 16 Feb 2008 20:32:01 +0000

Can I be very practical and ask questions:
I can’t see the connection between markets and marketing and social objects. Can you explain that one more… as you have explained a social object is seems to me that your blog is a “social object” around which a community has formed.. what then is the relationship with markets and marketing… if this blog is a social object, are you then’marketing’ your ideas. I think that does a disservice to exchange and creativity of the conversation… but perhaps I too am confused.

By: John Dodds

John Dodds — Sat, 16 Feb 2008 18:57:14 +0000

The critical point is that “good social objects are rare” – too many people think you can designate something a social object and all sorts of magic will follow.

My perspective has always been that the activity around which a “community” forms has to exist first and the social object follows and might cause the community to coalesce and grow. Unlike cultured pearls, you can’t force communities into existence.