Social Media is Not Free

October 27th, 2009 by barbarabates

If I see one more quote claiming that all companies should jump into social media because its free…I’m going to poke my eyes out.  So when I read this morning’s post on the Future Changes blog I couldn’t help but share the insight.  The quote below…and the heart of the post succinctly depicts the issue with why people think social media is free…and why it is not.  A distribution channel or channel for engagement is only as good as the content being distributed or shared.  Yes the channels are free…the content…especially the most valuable kind is most likely not.  Thank you Stewart Brand.

Information Wants To Be Free. Information also wants to be expensive. Information wants to be free because it has become so cheap to distribute, copy, and recombine—too cheap to meter. It wants to be expensive because it can be immeasurably valuable to the recipient. That tension will not go away. It leads to endless wrenching debate about price, copyright, ‘intellectual property’, the moral rightness of casual distribution, because each round of new devices makes the tension worse, not better.

Posted in Blogging, Influence, Social Media |

2 Responses

  1. Twitter Trackbacks for Eastwick Communications » Blog Archive » Social Media is Not Free [eastwick.com] on Topsy.com Says:

    [...] Eastwick Communications » Blog Archive » Social Media is Not Free blogs.eastwick.com/blog/2009/10/27/social-media-is-not-free – view page – cached If I see one more quote claiming that all companies should jump into social media because its free…I’m going to poke my eyes out. So when I read this morning’s post on the Future Changes blog… (Read more)If I see one more quote claiming that all companies should jump into social media because its free…I’m going to poke my eyes out. So when I read this morning’s post on the Future Changes blog I couldn’t help but share the insight. The quote below…and the heart of the post succinctly depicts the issue with why people think social media is free…and why it is not. A distribution channel or channel for engagement is only as good as the content being distributed or shared. Yes the channels are free…the content…especially the most valuable kind is most likely not. Thank you Stewart Brand. (Read less) — From the page [...]

  2. uberVU - social comments Says:

    Social comments and analytics for this post…

    This post was mentioned on Twitter by eastwickcom: Social Media is Not Free http://bit.ly/LH4SN...

Leave a Comment

Please note: Comment moderation is enabled and may delay your comment. There is no need to resubmit your comment.