Are you rude in person? Do you ignore people who speak to you when in public, or only speak to those who can somehow benefit you? Do you post signs in people's yards without their permission, or take their work and pass it off as your own?
If you're rude in real life (meatspace, as it's known), then you'll probably never be successful in social media. That's a given, with the exception of the flaming trainwrecks and gossip hounds we follow in moments of weakness (yes, Wonkette, I'm talking to you). And their success is the success of Tila Tequila. Fleeting and somewhat sad.
I expect to find the clueless and the a**holes in social media. They're everywhere else, and the strategies for ignoring and punishing them are the same. What baffles me is how kind, otherwise normal people can go online, and turn into rapacious trolls, content thiefs, and SEO comment spammers without a hint of personal remorse.
Much of it has to stem from ignorance. They don't value social media, and thus they have no concerns about peeing in the social network pool and littering on the Information SuperHighway.
We can put up all the signs we want, but the truth is that the internet, once locked away into private portals with closed memberships, is now open to the general public. If our networks are getting fogged up with the foul stench of mouthbreathing newbs, it's our own fault. In our desire to prove that cutting edge really is cool, we accepted a bunch of people into the fold that we never would have brought home for Christmas dinner. One jerk in a room full of cool people is worth going to a party with. Once the jerks reach critical mass, the party isn't worth going to.
So why do I bring this up? We're doing a poor job of policing our communities. We're a poor job of laying down groundrules. Social media sites are so desperate for eyeballs, they look the other way as long as the traffic keeps growing. And so the job falls to the new community managers.
Companies who will be successful in social media have to learn how to hire community managers who are respected and obeyed. This is as true in networks companies don't control as it is in the internal network. There's no winning in a network like Twitter if your antagonists aren't interested in coming to an agreement. The real test lies in understanding which networks can be approached, and which should just be monitored and never joined.
We like to talk about self-regulating communities, but I'm starting to see a lot of bad marketing practices seep into social media circles. I'm pretty sure that social media is here to stay, but that doesn't mean it will be for the better. It's important that we stand up for best practices, and support companies who stand strong when they are right.
The rules of social media are the rules of common sense and etiquette. It's up to each of us to make sure the pools we swim don't end up like the YMCA after a swimming lesson for first graders.
