I can't help but wonder if social media can have a tempering effect on business and social practices. Your social circle wields a lot of influence. Apply social media and you have an even greater reach and frequency. Those of us who look at Social Media as a business tool embrace it to inform, influence and, in the best cases, generate new products and profit for our companies. In a very real sense, smart companies are letting themselves be influenced by their customers to great mutual benefit.
Can wider adoption of social media empower the public to be the non-governmental regulators? Can't an active and vocal customer and public constituency also create a dampening effect on poor policies and practices? I'm no financial pundit by any means (ask my wife), however it seems like now there are all sorts of experts who have come forward to deride the kind of financial derivatives that have contributed to the current financial meltdown. Where were these guys while these "bets on bets of bets" were being created? There must have been a lot of folks watching, talking, playing, predicting within the financial industry. If these industry people were blogging, tweeting, discussing the pros and cons, would it have effected the direction of the market or the creation of these products?
Hobbes (yeah, remember your college Political Science?) held that the government needed to exist to help keep the "leviathan" of man's true nature in line. I wonder if a more connected, social society would be an effective way to temper man's true nature, one component of which is greed.
Look at it this way. Most people try to be reasonable about cause and effect. We recycle, reuse, reduce for good reason. And we do so because it's easy, but, and let's be honest, right now there is a significant social component to recycling. What would you think of someone who completely shunned recycling?
Well, would we feel the same about unfettered, more public, greed?
Would widespread adoption of social media create a similar effect on greed and the creation of financial instruments that are so esoteric as to really only be understood by and benefit the few?
If the voice and reason of the many were expressed, would the same financial products have been created, or would the consumer constituents have informed a better product line for these companies?
I just wonder.
Can wider adoption of social media empower the public to be the non-governmental regulators? Can't an active and vocal customer and public constituency also create a dampening effect on poor policies and practices? I'm no financial pundit by any means (ask my wife), however it seems like now there are all sorts of experts who have come forward to deride the kind of financial derivatives that have contributed to the current financial meltdown. Where were these guys while these "bets on bets of bets" were being created? There must have been a lot of folks watching, talking, playing, predicting within the financial industry. If these industry people were blogging, tweeting, discussing the pros and cons, would it have effected the direction of the market or the creation of these products?
Hobbes (yeah, remember your college Political Science?) held that the government needed to exist to help keep the "leviathan" of man's true nature in line. I wonder if a more connected, social society would be an effective way to temper man's true nature, one component of which is greed.
Look at it this way. Most people try to be reasonable about cause and effect. We recycle, reuse, reduce for good reason. And we do so because it's easy, but, and let's be honest, right now there is a significant social component to recycling. What would you think of someone who completely shunned recycling?
Well, would we feel the same about unfettered, more public, greed?
Would widespread adoption of social media create a similar effect on greed and the creation of financial instruments that are so esoteric as to really only be understood by and benefit the few?
If the voice and reason of the many were expressed, would the same financial products have been created, or would the consumer constituents have informed a better product line for these companies?
I just wonder.
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