What went wrong with Multiply?
I'm doing some historical work on social network sites using the Wayback Machine and I've come across a site called Multiply. Today Multiply is much more about shopping than it is a full-blown SNS, but it's fascinating to look at what it was offering in 2004 - it's About page is basically a description of what we do on Facebook today. Most interestingly, though, is the level of granularity it offered in terms of who could see our posts (not dissimilar to Google+'s circles, which everyone is so excited about in that it solves a problem in Facebook). For each post you can specify who can see it at quite a remarkable degree of granularity (everyone; your network, your contacts, or a custom list). It also, in 2004, promises alerts when someone in your network does something (i.e., a news feed). Was anyone here on that site in those days? Does anyone know what happened to it given that they really seemed to have online social networking fairly sussed seven years ago. I'd be very interested to find out... Thanks Nicholas _______________ Dr. Nicholas John sociothink.com @nicholasajohn
Yes... and I still get their notices. Note that Multiply was always oriented toward consumers, when i joined it already had a whole functionality for recipes and 'what i bought' lately. as for the functionality of circles. The technology for that has been around for ages, even back to early bbs's I'm thinking.
Multiply was launched in the States but quickly became popular in the Philippines (and other South Asian / Pac Island countries) pretty quickly; it competed with Friendster pretty heavily for a while and then it got bought by some other company and became stale (keep in mind: all social network sites that had to go through a sales transition lost serious ground in the process). They tried to differentiate themselves from competitors by basically throwing in every social feature known to man. This overload worked for some, but also made it unappealing for others. Classic story of SNS competition at the time. And Jeremy's right - it was always about consumerism and the features that it had were nothing new (just like G+'s features are nothing new). What folks never seem to remember in this space is that it's *NEVER* about the features. It's about the cultural dynamics. danah On Jul 21, 2011, at 10:55 AM, Nicholas John wrote:
I'm doing some historical work on social network sites using the Wayback Machine and I've come across a site called Multiply. Today Multiply is much more about shopping than it is a full-blown SNS, but it's fascinating to look at what it was offering in 2004 - it's About page is basically a description of what we do on Facebook today. Most interestingly, though, is the level of granularity it offered in terms of who could see our posts (not dissimilar to Google+'s circles, which everyone is so excited about in that it solves a problem in Facebook). For each post you can specify who can see it at quite a remarkable degree of granularity (everyone; your network, your contacts, or a custom list). It also, in 2004, promises alerts when someone in your network does something (i.e., a news feed). Was anyone here on that site in those days? Does anyone know what happened to it given that they really seemed to have online social networking fairly sussed seven years ago. I'd be very interested to find out... Thanks Nicholas _______________ Dr. Nicholas John sociothink.com @nicholasajohn _______________________________________________ The Air-L@listserv.aoir.org mailing list is provided by the Association of Internet Researchers http://aoir.org Subscribe, change options or unsubscribe at: http://listserv.aoir.org/listinfo.cgi/air-l-aoir.org
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------ "taken out of context, i must seem so strange" -- ani http://www.zephoria.org/thoughts/ http://www.danah.org/ @zephoria
On Thu, Jul 21, 2011 at 4:24 PM, danah boyd <aoir.z3z@danah.org> wrote:
What folks never seem to remember in this space is that it's *NEVER* about the features. It's about the cultural dynamics.
I would amend that point by saying that the features are a part of the cultural dynamics, rather than separate from them. One question to ask is what is the "it" that we are talking about. Dan ------------------------------------ Dan Perkel PhD Candidate School of Information, Berkeley Center for New Media UC Berkeley http://people.ischool.berkeley.edu/~dperkel
danah
On Jul 21, 2011, at 10:55 AM, Nicholas John wrote:
I'm doing some historical work on social network sites using the Wayback Machine and I've come across a site called Multiply. Today Multiply is much more about shopping than it is a full-blown SNS, but it's fascinating to look at what it was offering in 2004 - it's About page is basically a description of what we do on Facebook today. Most interestingly, though, is the level of granularity it offered in terms of who could see our posts (not dissimilar to Google+'s circles, which everyone is so excited about in that it solves a problem in Facebook). For each post you can specify who can see it at quite a remarkable degree of granularity (everyone; your network, your contacts, or a custom list). It also, in 2004, promises alerts when someone in your network does something (i.e., a news feed). Was anyone here on that site in those days? Does anyone know what happened to it given that they really seemed to have online social networking fairly sussed seven years ago. I'd be very interested to find out... Thanks Nicholas _______________ Dr. Nicholas John sociothink.com @nicholasajohn _______________________________________________ The Air-L@listserv.aoir.org mailing list is provided by the Association of Internet Researchers http://aoir.org Subscribe, change options or unsubscribe at: http://listserv.aoir.org/listinfo.cgi/air-l-aoir.org
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------
"taken out of context, i must seem so strange" -- ani http://www.zephoria.org/thoughts/ http://www.danah.org/ @zephoria
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This is one instance of how Multiply (or social network sites in general) always follows where its consumers are: http://www.thejakartaglobe.com/business/social-shopping-site-multiply-to-ope... Izul On Thu, Jul 21, 2011 at 7:29 PM, Dan Perkel <dperkel@ischool.berkeley.edu>wrote:
On Thu, Jul 21, 2011 at 4:24 PM, danah boyd <aoir.z3z@danah.org> wrote:
What folks never seem to remember in this space is that it's *NEVER*
about
the features. It's about the cultural dynamics.
I would amend that point by saying that the features are a part of the cultural dynamics, rather than separate from them. One question to ask is what is the "it" that we are talking about.
Dan
------------------------------------ Dan Perkel PhD Candidate School of Information, Berkeley Center for New Media UC Berkeley http://people.ischool.berkeley.edu/~dperkel
danah
On Jul 21, 2011, at 10:55 AM, Nicholas John wrote:
I'm doing some historical work on social network sites using the
Wayback
Machine and I've come across a site called Multiply. Today Multiply is much more about shopping than it is a full-blown SNS, but it's fascinating to look at what it was offering in 2004 - it's About page is basically a description of what we do on Facebook today. Most interestingly, though, is the level of granularity it offered in terms of who could see our posts (not dissimilar to Google+'s circles, which everyone is so excited about in that it solves a problem in Facebook). For each post you can specify who can see it at quite a remarkable degree of granularity (everyone; your network, your contacts, or a custom list). It also, in 2004, promises alerts when someone in your network does something (i.e., a news feed). Was anyone here on that site in those days? Does anyone know what happened to it given that they really seemed to have online social networking fairly sussed seven years ago. I'd be very interested to find out... Thanks Nicholas _______________ Dr. Nicholas John sociothink.com @nicholasajohn _______________________________________________ The Air-L@listserv.aoir.org mailing list is provided by the Association of Internet Researchers http://aoir.org Subscribe, change options or unsubscribe at: http://listserv.aoir.org/listinfo.cgi/air-l-aoir.org
Join the Association of Internet Researchers: http://www.aoir.org/
------
"taken out of context, i must seem so strange" -- ani http://www.zephoria.org/thoughts/ http://www.danah.org/ @zephoria
_______________________________________________ The Air-L@listserv.aoir.org mailing list is provided by the Association of Internet Researchers http://aoir.org Subscribe, change options or unsubscribe at: http://listserv.aoir.org/listinfo.cgi/air-l-aoir.org
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-- Iskandar Zulkarnain HASTAC Scholars 2010 Website: http://www.hastac.org/hastac-scholars<http://www.hastac.org/scholars> Rochester Intermedia Studies Group Ph.D. Student Visual and Cultural Studies 424 Morey Hall University of Rochester Rochester, NY 14627
I would offer that in addition to the dynamics that danah mentioned, I personally believe it is the way in which those dynamics are presented to the user. Part HCI, part social construct ("dynamics"). A friend of mine once told me that a solutions often lay in how you view the problem - similarly, interactions often lay in how we view the environment. Not exactly prophetic, but almost too simplistic. As an example, I personally enjoy G+ as a SNS environment much more than Facebook. And this is likely bleeding over to different subject but the ability to segregate social circles is, in my opinion, what limits social interaction on Facebook - flexible privacy permissions is simply duct tape on a much more complex issue. In fact I would go so far as to say the problem isnt privacy of your information from people you know, so much as it is the stratified strength and magnitude of social circles, some which are not intended to overlap - think facebook vs linkedin as an exaggerated example. Im done rambling now :P Thomas Jones @othertomjones http://theothertomjones.com One should guard against preaching to young people success in the customary form as the main aim in life. The most important motive for work in school and in life is pleasure in work, pleasure in its result, and the knowledge of the value of the result to the community. -- Albert Einstein, On Education -- On Jul 21, 2011, at 7:29 PM, Dan Perkel wrote:
On Thu, Jul 21, 2011 at 4:24 PM, danah boyd <aoir.z3z@danah.org> wrote:
What folks never seem to remember in this space is that it's *NEVER* about the features. It's about the cultural dynamics.
I would amend that point by saying that the features are a part of the cultural dynamics, rather than separate from them. One question to ask is what is the "it" that we are talking about.
Dan
------------------------------------ Dan Perkel PhD Candidate School of Information, Berkeley Center for New Media UC Berkeley http://people.ischool.berkeley.edu/~dperkel
danah
On Jul 21, 2011, at 10:55 AM, Nicholas John wrote:
I'm doing some historical work on social network sites using the Wayback Machine and I've come across a site called Multiply. Today Multiply is much more about shopping than it is a full-blown SNS, but it's fascinating to look at what it was offering in 2004 - it's About page is basically a description of what we do on Facebook today. Most interestingly, though, is the level of granularity it offered in terms of who could see our posts (not dissimilar to Google+'s circles, which everyone is so excited about in that it solves a problem in Facebook). For each post you can specify who can see it at quite a remarkable degree of granularity (everyone; your network, your contacts, or a custom list). It also, in 2004, promises alerts when someone in your network does something (i.e., a news feed). Was anyone here on that site in those days? Does anyone know what happened to it given that they really seemed to have online social networking fairly sussed seven years ago. I'd be very interested to find out... Thanks Nicholas _______________ Dr. Nicholas John sociothink.com @nicholasajohn _______________________________________________ The Air-L@listserv.aoir.org mailing list is provided by the Association of Internet Researchers http://aoir.org Subscribe, change options or unsubscribe at: http://listserv.aoir.org/listinfo.cgi/air-l-aoir.org
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------
"taken out of context, i must seem so strange" -- ani http://www.zephoria.org/thoughts/ http://www.danah.org/ @zephoria
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For what its worth Multiply was quite significant within the ethnography of Filipino transnational mother-child media communications that Mirca Madianou and myself carried out. At that time it was probably the second most important social networking site after Friendster. In a way Filipino usage was prefiguring the idea of separating out groups within the networks as people often had multiple social networks dedicated to different groups such as friends as against family, or gay as against straight relationships. For whatever reason Multiply had become particularly associated with the posting of photographs rather than any textual engagement and so had become complementary to other social networks both as genre as well as by audience. On 22 July 2011 01:08, Thomas Jones <thomasallenjones@gmail.com> wrote:
I would offer that in addition to the dynamics that danah mentioned, I personally believe it is the way in which those dynamics are presented to the user. Part HCI, part social construct ("dynamics"). A friend of mine once told me that a solutions often lay in how you view the problem - similarly, interactions often lay in how we view the environment. Not exactly prophetic, but almost too simplistic.
As an example, I personally enjoy G+ as a SNS environment much more than Facebook. And this is likely bleeding over to different subject but the ability to segregate social circles is, in my opinion, what limits social interaction on Facebook - flexible privacy permissions is simply duct tape on a much more complex issue. In fact I would go so far as to say the problem isnt privacy of your information from people you know, so much as it is the stratified strength and magnitude of social circles, some which are not intended to overlap - think facebook vs linkedin as an exaggerated example.
Im done rambling now :P
Thomas Jones @othertomjones http://theothertomjones.com
One should guard against preaching to young people success in the customary form as the main aim in life. The most important motive for work in school and in life is pleasure in work, pleasure in its result, and the knowledge of the value of the result to the community. -- Albert Einstein, On Education --
On Jul 21, 2011, at 7:29 PM, Dan Perkel wrote:
On Thu, Jul 21, 2011 at 4:24 PM, danah boyd <aoir.z3z@danah.org> wrote:
What folks never seem to remember in this space is that it's *NEVER*
about
the features. It's about the cultural dynamics.
I would amend that point by saying that the features are a part of the cultural dynamics, rather than separate from them. One question to ask is what is the "it" that we are talking about.
Dan
------------------------------------ Dan Perkel PhD Candidate School of Information, Berkeley Center for New Media UC Berkeley http://people.ischool.berkeley.edu/~dperkel
danah
On Jul 21, 2011, at 10:55 AM, Nicholas John wrote:
I'm doing some historical work on social network sites using the
Wayback
Machine and I've come across a site called Multiply. Today Multiply is much more about shopping than it is a full-blown SNS, but it's fascinating to look at what it was offering in 2004 - it's About page is basically a description of what we do on Facebook today. Most interestingly, though, is the level of granularity it offered in terms of who could see our posts (not dissimilar to Google+'s circles, which everyone is so excited about in that it solves a problem in Facebook). For each post you can specify who can see it at quite a remarkable degree of granularity (everyone; your network, your contacts, or a custom list). It also, in 2004, promises alerts when someone in your network does something (i.e., a news feed). Was anyone here on that site in those days? Does anyone know what happened to it given that they really seemed to have online social networking fairly sussed seven years ago. I'd be very interested to find out... Thanks Nicholas _______________ Dr. Nicholas John sociothink.com @nicholasajohn _______________________________________________ The Air-L@listserv.aoir.org mailing list is provided by the Association of Internet Researchers http://aoir.org Subscribe, change options or unsubscribe at: http://listserv.aoir.org/listinfo.cgi/air-l-aoir.org
Join the Association of Internet Researchers: http://www.aoir.org/
------
"taken out of context, i must seem so strange" -- ani http://www.zephoria.org/thoughts/ http://www.danah.org/ @zephoria
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The "economics of superstars" might be relevant here. Rosen (1981) provides a model explaining how differences in success (measured by income) in the arts and sport can be far greater than the differences in talent. Adler (1985) presents a model where large differences in earnings can exist with no differences in talent. Adler argues that stardom is not due to the stars' superior talent but rather due to the need of consumers for a common culture i.e. to consume the same art that other consumers do. So if we think of social networking site features as "talent", this could help explain why some SNSs became superstars despite not being better than the others. Actually the network effect inherent in SNSs makes superstar dynamics even stronger. Rosen, S. (1981). The economics of superstars. American Economic Review, 71(5):845-858. Adler, M. (1985). Stardom and talent. American Economic Review, 75(1):208-212. Rob ------------------------------------- Dr Robert Ackland Fellow and Masters Coordinator, Australian Demographic and Social Research Institute, The Australian National University e-mail: robert.ackland@anu.edu.au <mailto:robert.ackland@anu.edu.au> homepage: http://adsri.anu.edu.au/people/robert.php project: http://voson.anu.edu.au Information about the Master of Social Research (Social Science of the Internet specialisation): http://adsri.anu.edu.au/study/msr.php ------------------------------------- On Thu, 2011-07-21 at 16:29 -0700, Dan Perkel wrote:
On Thu, Jul 21, 2011 at 4:24 PM, danah boyd <aoir.z3z@danah.org <mailto:aoir.z3z@danah.org>> wrote:
What folks never seem to remember in this space is that it's *NEVER* about the features. It's about the cultural dynamics.
I would amend that point by saying that the features are a part of the cultural dynamics, rather than separate from them. One question to ask is what is the "it" that we are talking about.
Dan
------------------------------------ Dan Perkel PhD Candidate School of Information, Berkeley Center for New Media UC Berkeley http://people.ischool.berkeley.edu/~dperkel <http://people.ischool.berkeley.edu/%7Edperkel>
danah
On Jul 21, 2011, at 10:55 AM, Nicholas John wrote:
I'm doing some historical work on social network sites using the Wayback Machine and I've come across a site called Multiply. Today Multiply is much more about shopping than it is a full-blown SNS, but it's fascinating to look at what it was offering in 2004 - it's About page is basically a description of what we do on Facebook today. Most interestingly, though, is the level of granularity it offered in terms of who could see our posts (not dissimilar to Google+'s circles, which everyone is so excited about in that it solves a problem in Facebook). For each post you can specify who can see it at quite a remarkable degree of granularity (everyone; your network, your contacts, or a custom list). It also, in 2004, promises alerts when someone in your network does something (i.e., a news feed). Was anyone here on that site in those days? Does anyone know what happened to it given that they really seemed to have online social networking fairly sussed seven years ago. I'd be very interested to find out... Thanks Nicholas _______________ Dr. Nicholas John sociothink.com @nicholasajohn _______________________________________________ The Air-L@listserv.aoir.org <mailto:Air-L@listserv.aoir.org> mailing list is provided by the Association of Internet Researchers http://aoir.org Subscribe, change options or unsubscribe at: http://listserv.aoir.org/listinfo.cgi/air-l-aoir.org
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------
"taken out of context, i must seem so strange" -- ani http://www.zephoria.org/thoughts/ http://www.danah.org/ @zephoria
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Very good point, but what creates the cultural dynamics? How are these formulated? On Fri, Jul 22, 2011 at 2:24 AM, danah boyd <aoir.z3z@danah.org> wrote:
Multiply was launched in the States but quickly became popular in the Philippines (and other South Asian / Pac Island countries) pretty quickly; it competed with Friendster pretty heavily for a while and then it got bought by some other company and became stale (keep in mind: all social network sites that had to go through a sales transition lost serious ground in the process). They tried to differentiate themselves from competitors by basically throwing in every social feature known to man. This overload worked for some, but also made it unappealing for others. Classic story of SNS competition at the time.
And Jeremy's right - it was always about consumerism and the features that it had were nothing new (just like G+'s features are nothing new).
What folks never seem to remember in this space is that it's *NEVER* about the features. It's about the cultural dynamics.
danah
On Jul 21, 2011, at 10:55 AM, Nicholas John wrote:
I'm doing some historical work on social network sites using the Wayback Machine and I've come across a site called Multiply. Today Multiply is much more about shopping than it is a full-blown SNS, but it's fascinating to look at what it was offering in 2004 - it's About page is basically a description of what we do on Facebook today. Most interestingly, though, is the level of granularity it offered in terms of who could see our posts (not dissimilar to Google+'s circles, which everyone is so excited about in that it solves a problem in Facebook). For each post you can specify who can see it at quite a remarkable degree of granularity (everyone; your network, your contacts, or a custom list). It also, in 2004, promises alerts when someone in your network does something (i.e., a news feed). Was anyone here on that site in those days? Does anyone know what happened to it given that they really seemed to have online social networking fairly sussed seven years ago. I'd be very interested to find out... Thanks Nicholas _______________ Dr. Nicholas John sociothink.com @nicholasajohn _______________________________________________ The Air-L@listserv.aoir.org mailing list is provided by the Association of Internet Researchers http://aoir.org Subscribe, change options or unsubscribe at: http://listserv.aoir.org/listinfo.cgi/air-l-aoir.org
Join the Association of Internet Researchers: http://www.aoir.org/
------
"taken out of context, i must seem so strange" -- ani http://www.zephoria.org/thoughts/ http://www.danah.org/ @zephoria
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-- Rasha A. Abdulla, Ph.D. Associate Professor Journalism and Mass Communication The American University in Cairo www.rashaabdulla.com http://twitter.com/RashaAbdulla <http://twitter.com/rashaabdulla>
participants (9)
-
Dan Perkel -
danah boyd -
Daniel Miller -
Dr. Rasha Abdulla -
iskandar zulkarnain -
Jeremy hunsinger -
Nicholas John -
Robert Ackland -
Thomas Jones