Shark Dogs Are People Too: A Faux Online Social Movement
For my writing for the web class at UGA, I started a project studying social movements online.
When I began this project, my goal was to explore how someone would start a social movement online. I’ve been interested in the practice since the Iranian elections this summer, which had a huge following on Twitter, as non-Iranians attempted to help Twitter users in Iran by changing their location to Tehran.
I knew that this faux movement would include Twitter and Facebook. I quickly realized that I would also need a main web page, to help the cause look realistic, and a master email where all information could be gathered. This email was helpful for both establishing the accounts on these sites, and also for making my movement look realistic.
My first major mistake in all this was the movement I chose. In my mind, I pictured a humorous movement getting more attention quickly, to become something of a small Internet meme. I chose “Shark Dogs Are People Too,” based on a Halloween costume I bought for my dog. I assumed something cute and funny with an obviously fake background played like it was real would catch on, similar to something like Bonzai cats.
I was hoping to take advantage of this completely new “information,” since Boyd’s “Tweet, Tweet and Retweet article points out a successful Twitter user “in order to be able to spread information to new people, the individual must be connected to those to whom the source of the information is not connected already.”
Boyd seconds this, noting Twitter users are “most successful when the retweeter has a large network and occupies structural holes, or gaps in network connectivity between different communities.” Sharkdogs had trouble getting followers simply because it was an obvious joke, and not a famous one yet.
But, like any movement, it was begun by a single person and then spread to my friends. It took straight out suggesting for people to follow, share and retweet us, basically begging for fans. Same goes on Facebook. After creating the fan page, it came down to asking people to follow. This would be the same for any group, only they would more likely have a built in fan base they could notify of the addition.
Other than that hurdle, the project was an overall success. The main things I have learned about social movements online are:
1) I realized the importance of creating a unified look, both with the email account and similar images. That unified image, the authority of having email, a website and then social networking sites, was the bulk of the work. Making this into something believable (as a movement, not a topic) is where the hard part sat.
2) Stretching that image across multiple social networking sites. I realized the importance of You Tube and other sites too late, but did eventually realize that I needed to expand the brand into every site I could. It would also be smart to have used Digg, Reddit or other collection agencies like that to promote my own page. This would be important to any movement to establish more views, and become noticeable in a web that’s too large to find everything.
Spreading over many sites is where the actual social movement becomes involved. Once something gets into the realm of Twitter and Facebook, other people can take it on for themselves. Traffic to a website would be dead, but views for a Tweet or Facebook page are where the social movement has its legs.
Length of time became a huge issue. Jensen points to length of time active on the scene as an important factor in authority, something I could not fake. Social movements don’t happen overnight, unless it is a huge news topic like Balloon Boy. It was hard to establish any background since I only had a few weeks for the project, and building followers for this sort of thing went slowly. Using keywords did get me some good followers on Twitter, like the Greyhound Network and some Vet associations. This is how the social movements would build, slowing getting followers from their Tweets and networking through the followers the do get.
Facebook is a bit slower, since fan pages are less follow-me style. They do allow for more interaction, so Facebook fans were more involved, commenting and adding to the story. Jensen mentions that Facebook authority relies sole on those who follow you, in amount and quality, so building this was a crucial step that never developed as well as I had hoped.
What the project has taught me is that any social movement or new organization wanting to move through social networks needs to clearly identify their purpose. Then they need to present themselves to those with similar ideas. Follow them, comment on their stuff or even send suggestions. Being proactive is key here. Not waiting for followers, but searching out similar organizations. I painted myself into a corner trying to do a joke movement. Had I chosen an actual purpose, it may have been easier to get this going.
Still, social movements online are a good way to find new listeners and more varied participants. To steal a phrase from Lanham in his “Economics of Attention,” social media has “created new ways to pay attn to the world.” Of the followers I did get, some were from areas like Florida, or national organizations. Certainly this would be a larger number if I had a real cause. So while I followed and responded to the ASPCA and had few followers, a childhood cancer group at a university would have a pretty good response following Susan G Koman foundation and other organizations.
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