When you do technology in ministry like I do, trust is a big thing. Over the last week, I’ve noticed feelings in myself that make me want to change the way I do things. These issues are huge, but these three companies seem clueless.
I don’t trust any of the big three in social media: FaceBook, Google, and Twitter.
Each of them has a cultural problem that they need to overcome in order to regain trust.
FaceBook is the big offender here. I feel like that as a FaceBook user they’re trying to trick me into clicking on advertisements. They’re getting less and less obvious (as ads). They’re also making it look like people I know are recommending things they’re not. I feel like they care about users as revenue, not as people.
As someone who has FaceBook pages, I feel like they’re hiding my pages and then telling me people will see them if I pay. So, while this may or may not be true, it feels like they’ve lured me onto their platform and now are trying to trick me into spending money.
FaceBook needs to quit announcing more and more money-making schemes and they need to make sure that they’re not tricky ways to do it.
Google has a different problem. They’re killing so many things that I’m hesitant to use anything other than search, Google plus, and YouTube. Here’s the deal, I use Apps, Adsense, Adwords, and Google Voice, but I’m worried that they’re going to die. That’s a problem, Google. I don’t want to use your stuff because you’re killing stuff I’ve fallen in love with. The only way to fix this is to stop killing stuff and tell us you’ve stopped.
I love Twitter, but they’ve got a problem too. I wrote the book on Twitter for churches, but I get the feeling that they’re going to kill all the tools I need to take advantage of their platform. How long before Tweepi, ManageFlitter, HootSuite, and other tools quit working because of some new API restriction? I’ve got 12,600+ followers, but I’ll abandon the platform if it becomes unusable.
These problems are all opportunities for other services. Who will take advantage of them? Maybe you will.
Paul
We are not the customers. We are the product. The advertisers are the customers.
And haven’t you seen the announcements about Googel+ going away?
Nevermind about my Google+ comment. I was thinking of iGoogle, which is going away in November.
I get that we’re the product, but we have a choice and if they do enough to make us want to leave, we will and then their real customers won’t have anything to buy.
It’s kind of like running a pet store where all the doors are open. You don’t treat the dogs poorly and then act surprised when you can’t sell them because they’ve left.
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