The stages of corporate social media

Corporate social media essentially goes through three stages.

The first is new, free and wonderful, lots of functionality, user friendly and free, or at least pretending to be free. It’s purpose is to build a customer/product base (as the customer is the product).

The second stage is monetization. The purpose is to make money so once the free loss leader period is over measures to create revenue are introduced. These are usually things the users can live with and are introduced along with measures to make the customer dependent on the product.

Once that is achieved we move into stage three, equivalent to the final stage of capitalism. We move from earning a fair profit to profit maximization with no regard for the user, the assumption being that by this time the user is convinced their very existence is dependent on the product, also known as the Facebook effect.

With the introduction of Brand X, EvilElon is clearly telling us he is moving Twitter into Stage Three as capitalism moves into it’s final stage.

SocialCoin – The Socially Responsible Alternative to Bitcoin

 I am placing this concept in the public domain for anyone with the necessary technical skills to create the structures and necessary algorithms to implement it.

Wikipedia provides an extensive section on Bitcoin and in particular Bitcoin mining.

Essentially Bitcoin is created by an energy wasting computer process they call mining. The value (profit) is based on “proof of work” provided by the computer process and not by any product mined, as no product is produced in so-called Bitcoin mining. A computer algorithm determines the amount of value (profit) that accrues to the Bitcoin “miners:

So how does SocialCoin work. Mining SocialCoin involves utilizing energy, resources and labour to create social housing, But based on the Bitcoin model the value (profit) is not produced by the product created, so the housing created can be given freely to public or non-profit housing agencies, housing co-ops or directly to those needing housing. Like Bitcoin, the product created is irrelevant to the creation of SocialCoin. Like Bitcoin the value (profit) derived from mining SocialCoin is based on the work done and derived by a computer algorithm and accrues to the SocialCoin “miners”.

I challenge any economist to demonstrate that this concept is not as feasible as Bitcoin.