Posted 3. April 2009, 12:02 by Rich Terry comments (2)
Category : Home   Industry developments

During 2006, speculation regarding the ownership of Facebook intensified. Despite the social network reporting a loss of $3.63 million during 2005, the prospect of owning a significant share presented Google with a very appealing opportunity as they looked to expand their advertising revenue. Their failure to seal the acquisition may soon create an uncharacteristic chink in the armour of the web’s leading search engine, but it won’t necessarily be from the squandered advertising opportunity. This article examines how the mass, rapid accumulation of information within social networks and our behaviour towards it may be giving Google cause for concern.

Fast-forward to 2009 and Twitter-mania sweeps the web. From politicians to sweet manufacturers, the craze has spread from the web’s typical early adopters to casual social users and engagement-craving marketers with rapid speed. Micro-blogging offers the framework to provide friends, family, fans and customers with condensed updates, and its usage has seen Twitter thrust into the mainstream media spotlight. The platform’s immediacy and accessibility provided an essential tool for both reporters and civilians during crises such as the November 2008 terror attacks on Mumbai and the Hudson plane crash of January 2009.

Twitter has emerged as one of the web’s leading platforms for an activity that Google must sit up and take notice of – sharing. No longer are websites and blogs at the forefront of news reporting and discussion. Be it opinions, images, news or speculation, internet users are turning to Twitter to both seek and disseminate information that is unique from that of Google search listings in very distinctive ways. Our behaviour within these social environments may start to impact upon our approach to the web as a whole.

Information is published in real-time

Reports and opinions are posted to and searchable within the “Twittersphere� immediately. Within seconds of a news story breaking, the Twitter universe is rife with opinion and reporting. In particular, micro-blogging has provided an accessible stage for the practice of citizen journalism, “the act of a citizen, or group of citizens, playing an active role in the process of collecting, reporting, analyzing and disseminating news and information� (Bowman and Willis 2003). Furthermore, reputable media outlets update their streams and subsequently direct users to their dedicated coverage. All of this information is immediately accessible using Twitter’s inbuilt search functionality. These features and uses contrast considerably with Google’s offering, but whether it breeds an environment which could be considered an invaluable topical resource is questionable.

One step ahead of static search

During the 1990s, Google swiftly cemented its position as the web’s leading search engine. If it had been published to the web, the chances were that Google would recover it with ease, accurately achieving relevancy thanks to its innovative search algorithms and link analysis. As its usage grew, so did the technological capability, with Google’s spiders crawling the web several times daily and updating search rankings accordingly. Despite this, the service offered is static, as the information must first be published and then indexed.

The term “Google� is now as much a verb as it is a noun, testament to its search dominance. However, as Twitter grows in usage, so might the web user’s desires and expectations evolve. Users providing information in real-time will crave reciprocation. It will no longer be enough to know what has been said, users, be them researchers, journalists, marketers or casual browsers, will want to know what is being said. Whilst the bulk of this conversation exists on Twitter, accessible instantaneously through its feeds and search facility, Google will lag behind. It may only be a case of hours before Google listings are populated with new information, but contrast this to Twitter’s immediacy and a potential inferiority in the Google offering is clearly identifiable.

Immediacy or credibility?

Twitter provides a level playing field for information dissemination. Anybody can create an account and publish a Tweet. It doesn’t matter whether the Tweet was published by a reputable journalist or a mischievous schoolchild – they will possess identical prominence within the Twittersphere and will be ranked purely chronologically when the universe is queried. This raises issues regarding source credibility. Credibility amongst Twitter users could be determined through analysing the amount of Followers that they have or the number of times that their content receives a “Retweet�, the act of reposting a Tweet within a user’s own feed. These reputable users will accumulate a following based on factors such of these, but Twitter’s search engine does not rank results based on credibility as its purpose is to display what is being discussed within the Twittersphere at that moment in time.

Because of this, real-time search may be littered with inaccurate, speculative information. For example, at the time of writing the media were playing close attention to the health of actress Natasha Richardson, victim of a skiing accident. By querying the Twittersphere, users were presented with conflicting reports. Within hours of the news breaking, the following Tweets were posted from a number of different users:

The specific details regarding the tragedy varied, and anybody following the story on Twitter was left unsure as to the exact severity of actresses’ condition. Although Twitter users possess the ability to, in the developer’s words, “see what’s happening – right now�, the accuracy of the image projected is dubious.

Over the next 24 hours, Google’s spiders encountered stories relating to Natasha Richardson’s accident and they began to appear high up within search listings. Google’s previously mentioned algorithms and link analysis meant that stories ranking highly were likely to be accurate and from more credible sources. As well as factors such as keyword density, Google heavily favours those web pages with a high number of inbound links, especially from other websites that it deems credible. This meant that if a number of other web pages or blogs linked to The Daily Mail’s coverage of Natasha Richardson’s accident, this page would be propelled high within Google’s listing.

Google results for “Natasha Richardson accident� a day after the story emerged, displaying less speculative information than Twitter and listing recognisable sources:

The true value of immediacy

In the case of the Hudson airplane crash, a Twitter user in New York may have observed the passenger jet ditching from their office window. Within seconds, a Tweet would inform their following of what has just been witnessed. Over the course of the next several hours, subsequent Tweets from the user’s vantage point would provide up-to-the-minute information to their followers as well as anybody who is searching a keyword contained within the Tweet. This information is published with greater immediacy than many news agencies could manage.

This functionality could be utilised by journalists seeking new information regarding the event and could prove useful in so many other circumstances, such as when a brand manager needs to assess the immediate impact of a negative press report. However for every user with a valuable, accurate message to contribute to the Twittersphere, there will be hundreds more speculating and the credible sources will be engulfed by the wider conversation.

Twitter joins websites such as Wikipedia as a user generated source of information that must be approached with a degree of scepticism. However, whether the content is factually trustworthy or not is irrelevant to Twitter’s true value. The content returned from a real-time query highlights what people are discussing and what they believe to be true. This information alone provides a valuable signpost for further exploration and a gauge of public opinion that Google is unable to capture.

Despite the identification of the many limitations accompanying Twitter’s search functionality, it must be stressed that the service does exactly what it claims to do. Future developments may incorporate the ability to filter out less credible sources from search listings. However, for the time being Twitter offers the tool to portray what no traditional search engine can – what’s on the minds of web users at that precise point in time.

Information is conversational

When it comes to factual data, the depth of sources discoverable through Google search is second to none. Twitter’s representation of qualitative data, however, provides an interesting alternative to the typical reviews and blogs to be returned by a traditional search engine. This is because Twitter is conversational.

Conversation or dictation?

When a user Tweets regarding a product or service this is more often an appraisal to be shared with a valued network of followers than a pre-meditated critique. Take a restaurant, for example. An internet user logging on after a meal out may share the experience with an online community, such as Restaurant-Guide.com. This is often because they deemed the visit memorable. They may have been particularly impressed by an attentive, entertaining member of staff or decidedly annoyed at the lengthy wait for their food, and subsequently felt the need to share the experience through a dedicated channel. This is a purposeful act, and these are often prompted by extraordinary experiences. A customer who has received the level of service that they expected beforehand is going to be less inclined to log on and confirm this occurrence within an environment more suited to an informative analysis, with Bolen (1994) writing that “good, normal, or adequate service or experiences will solicit little or no “word-of-mouth� statements�. If a list of reviews is populated almost entirely by the small percentage of customers who have an extraordinary experience, the overall accuracy of these resources becomes questionable. A study by Wiener and Mowen (1986) found that “sources perceived to have external reasons for making a persuasive argument will be discounted�. Add to that the risk of competitor sabotage and users may begin to approach such sites sceptically.

Contrast this environment with Twitter and you realise the potential to gauge opinion from a potentially more reliable, accurate source. Many social networkers use status updates to provide a commentary to their day. Some messages may express an extreme emotion or discovery, but many simply provide a short reflection on an experience. If a Twitterer broadcasts their concise opinion of a restaurant then they are doing so to inform followers of their experience. The opinion retrieved through Google listings may be fuelled more by extraordinary experiences and the motivation to persuade readers that this is what can be expected of the service.

The conversational nature of Twitter makes its search functionality all the more useful as a qualitative source of information, particularly concise reflections. To instantly gather opinion regarding the release of a new film, a Twitter search returns an array of succinct judgements:

Google remains an essential tool for in-depth reviews. However, as web users become increasingly familiar and comfortable with short snippets of information, the desire to consume them more often will reinforce Twitter’s position as a valuable tool for swiftly discovering emerging trends.

Conclusion

When Google abandoned its efforts to acquire Facebook it was discarding the opportunity to add an ever expanding wealth of data to its arsenal. More importantly, Google were underestimating the value of the kind of data that Facebook and other social networks accommodate. A simple status update may only be several words in length, but it creates an imprint upon the web of the user’s thoughts. In conjunction with the millions of other statements and conversations being recorded daily, social networks host a gauge of both public opinion and emerging information.

The identification of this simple yet invaluable resource has helped elevate Twitter to the mainstream. Not only is Twitter a fun, efficient tool for communication, but its immediate, concise nature possesses the potential to seriously impact upon how web users publish and desire information. Google failed to appreciate how these behaviours and expectations may evolve over the next several years due to interaction within social networks. Google’s static environment, although still undeniably valuable, can no longer be considered the web’s comprehensive information offering when it fails to capture the web’s constant buzz of social activity.

References

Bolen, W. 1994. The Role of Word-of-Mouth ‘Advertising’ in Retailing. American Business Review. Vol. 12 Issue 2, p11-15.

Bowman, S., Willis, C. 2003. We Media. Hypergene. Available from: http://www.hypergene.net/wemedia/download/we_media.pdf [Accessed: 11/3/2009].

Wiener, J., Mowen, J. 1986. Source credibility: On the independent effects of trust and expertise. Advances in Consumer Research. Vol. 13, No. 1. p306–10.