Frictionless Web 2.0

“I´m about to complete this paper with the precise help of some guys I don’t even know”. That was my general feeling after receiving excellent answers to my last question on LinkedIn which gave me plenty of new perspective. Of course I would never knew these people if it wasn´t by LinkedIn; in spite of that I was given very precise and polite remarks.

With this peaceful state of mind I selected a third of the responders to email them, saying hello and thank you, and eventually asking for some further details. A bit later I received two discouraging answers, sort of “Would you consider tagging my answer as a 'best answer' on LinkedIn?”

Paradoxically the answer was focused in web 2.0 trends that would affect Telco developents. So I remained pondering about this: sometimes the driver is not honest collaboration but the sheer reward. In this cases the concept of prestige in Web 2.0 is rather tricky (number of connections, number of good answers, etc). For some reason individuals may be looking around for some Web 2.0 cheap prestige in forums, and I can´t blame them. It has to do with your education: now it´s a “best answer” label, but some decades ago may have been nice stickers given in kinder gardens, just for behaving and sitting well.

Thus I must be failing in understanding the exact value of users in web 2.0 sites, and that reminds me with the Orbital Concept stated hereafter:

1. Every user of a website has a unique mass, measurable by their gravity (how many other users they attract towards themselves).
2. The larger a user’s mass, the stronger their personal gravity.
3. Users with larger mass pull users with smaller mass into their orbit.
4. Once in a site’s orbit, a user is now a measurable part of the website. His mass is a measurable part of a self-contained system.
5. The more often a user returns to a site (the more loyal they are), the tighter and faster their orbit is.

What I think: you get no gravity for demanding “Best Answer” rewards. And if you want to know the end of the little story, I answered nothing to both "best answers" solicitors. I´ll wait instead.