Twitter CEO Dick Costollo has firmly planted his feet in the nym friendly camp according to a post at Wired’s Epicenter, which you can read here. Mr Costollo is quoted as saying:
“Other services may be declaring that you have to use your real name because they think they will be able to monetize that better and think they will be able to get more information about you that will help them monetize better.”
“We are more interested in serving our users first, and we think by serving that by serving our users first, we will have a better platform for marketers and advertisers.”
Hooray for that but not only is Mr Costollo absolutely right in his thinking, he shows Google + how wrong they are with their real name policy because in terms of advertisers, whom people follow and what their interests are, will likely produce better targetted marketing than what their name is and Google should know this because so much of their advertising service is based not on your real name, but what you’re looking for or at.
Facebook is a different beast in many ways because it grew from being a service for people who knew each other in real life, although I disagree with their real name policy, I can understand why it’s there. Google + started later in life and yet, decided to ignore nyms and cause itself a whole lot of hassle. I’ve heard a lot of arguments from those who support real name policies but they are horrendously flawed, for a start, if you don’t know the nym in real life, then don’t interact with them, real life social networks are aimed at people whom you know in real life, a nym shouldn’t be a barrier to interactions if you know the person and if you don’t, ignore them.
Better behaviour is another, yet there is bullying on Facebook and there are flame wars, but better behaviour can be attained via real name policies, however at what cost? There are people who won’t comment not because they are ashamed of their quote, but because they don’t want to get into trouble via their employer’s social networking policy, many of which give warnings about conduct in your real name if you can be traced to your place of work, it stifles freedom of expression, then there are those who want to talk but the subject is sensitive, give them a nym and they will happily talk and then we come back to Oscar Wilde’s quote of “Man is least himself when he talks in his own person. Give him a mask, and he will tell you the truth.”
There are also issues on Google + with people who do use their real names having trouble being allowed to use the service, as Hugh Messenger points out on Google +, whilst using a nym, you can read that here. Hugh even offers to get his Mom to phone up and vouch for him.
None of these issues really arise on Twitter and it’s good to see the case being made for people using a social network how they best see fit, of course Twitter want to make money but letting users decide how they best use the network, is the best way, of course there need to be rules and regulations but Twitter works so well because people can be whom they want to be and if Twitter can cash in on that, then great.
The people who post on social networks, are the social network, they make it happen and a social network that encourages people to use it how they best see fit are providing their users with a great platform. However what irks me in this is the real life social networking, if you have 100,000 followers you don’t know those people in real life, there is absoultely no need to be using real names and the person with 100,000 followers doesn’t really want to know those real names, a name to interact with is more than suffice.
However, Bradley Horrowitz of Google recently posted on Twitter that they were looking at a suggested user service and that people with 100K followers on Twitter should direct message him, this is not real life social networking, this is an online network of people whom you do not know in real life. I don’t have a problem with someone having 100K followers, nor do I have a problem with a suggested user service, but this is not aimed at real life social networking, Google should get real about this.
As is stands, Twitter still offers the best options for me, it’s not without its faults and lack of functionality but it allows me to social network with people online, in real life I social network at work, down the pub, down The Villa, round people’s houses, at the shops yadda yadda yadda, for online purposes Twitter serves me best.