OK, Now I Get MyBlogLog

Over the weekend, I wrote a post about MyBlogLog that described some of their experiments to create more value for their constituency. Eric, one of the founders of MyBlogLog (every member knows his mug), cordially showed up and commented on some of the new features.

Most everyone I know cannot grasp what MyBlogLog's real utility is (ok, try explaining it, I dare you...). It's very low maintenance, avatars pop up on the screen and invite you as contacts... since it's one click to accept them into your network, I would just accept and assume most would do so. It's low maintenance to the point that it seems to have very little value... no real content, superficial messages mostly amounting to "thanks for dropping by"...

Then I noticed SoloSeo had published a number of tools to massage MyBlogLog data. One of the best of the tools aggregates all the blogs networked by 20 or so chosen "contacts" (MBL members) and lists them in order of "linkage"... this is some utility, like search - one can choose a random set of bloggers within an industry and find the most popular (or at least the most networked) blogs by aggregation.

Then it hits me... MyBlogLog's utility is in the data on its unique constituency. Who'd have thought a social network could be developed principally from bloggers? It's a powerful subset due to their influence as active trafficked commentators... With this data, MyBlogLog could potentially leverage commercial opportunities as diverse as targeted media buying (blogs as advertisement vehicles) to developing new media networks.

By extension, MyBlogLog's micro-constituency shows me how social networks, now characterized by mass market plays like MySpace, will eventually micro-channel just like the media networks have done in moving from the big three TV networks of the 1950's to the splintered landscape of cable and internet programming today. And like ESPN, CNET and Animal Planet, the social networks based on fans of sports, tech and animals will prove their commercial viability with new strategies likely based on the old media network models - advertising and affinity marketing.

I then joined the most ephemeral, micro-social network MyBarackObama (what a name! kind of makes him cute...). The application itself is a technological thumbs up according to Techcrunch - with all the requisite features like a mulituser blog platform ( which I'll do, but still don't know what to blog about). The concept is simply Politics 2.0 - Obama's supporters actively advocate with their voices and network with each other... they are the opposite of the silent majority and it is refreshing.

Pat Kitano, Transparent Real Estate

Labels: Barack Obama, MyBlogLog, new media, social networking, web 2.0

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