Frontline did a program ed tech types should make certain they view and share. The program features Douglas Rushkopf (Program or Be Programmed) and his analysis of the “social currency” of social media. He proposes that teens are competing for “Likes”. My first thought as a bloggers was that this is not limited to teens because I do pay some attention to the hits my blogs generate.
What does it take to generate “likes”? Association with popular “pop culture” is a way to generate “likes”? I see it as the opposite of using famous people in your ads. Instead of the image of famous people rubbing off on a product, you have the popularity of a product rubbing off on unknown people. It works out will for all parties – free advertising and a way to attract attention.
The process of generating attention has lessons you can see played out elsewhere. Check out the process by which “liked” individuals begin to collaborate in order to magnify their popularity. You see a similar phenomenon with what I like describe as the “I used to be a teacher, administrator, librarian” types who now move from ed conference to conference as paid presenters. Check them on Twitter or whatever social platform you choose and note the frequency with which they mention each other. There seems to be no content value in these mentions (kind of like a “like”) in that there is no information to be considered, but such mentions give followers clues as to who the cool people think are cool.
