Social Networking Sites Take Poops On Users And Don’t Wipe Their Asses
Why do some of web 2.0’s biggest and best social networks have the absolute worst customer service reputations?
It’s beyond counter-intuitive. These networks rise from nothingness due to their ability to effectively integrate users into a highly interactive community, and then, once the community has reached a pinnacle of interactivity, the creators foresake the community, essentially leave members to their own devices.
For my money, the two most egregious offenders - although I love them both to death- are Facebook and MySpace. Time and time again, I hear horror stories about frustrated users and their inability to discuss their frustrations, never mind solve them, through customer service channels.
Facebook, for one, makes regular practice of banning users’ accounts without warning or subsequent justification. As they continue to rake in the dough from advertising partnerships and attempt to become the “end all be all” uber website, their concern for the customer is only dwindling. Facebook dissatisfaction forums, like the one at www.getsatisfaction.com/facebook, are becoming more populous, along with reasons to be frustrated. A December 2008 research paper from HP Labs, for example, reports that 43% of all Facebook messages are now spam.
Fortunately, some social sites have elected to step up to the plate on the customer relations front. Even though Digg has taken much flack in recent weeks for their algorithm change, they have made a concerted effort to respond to their users, or at least their top users. This past Friday, moreover, Digg CEO Jay Adelson announced that he and Kevin Rose, Digg’s co-founder, were launching a series of “town hall” meetings to address users’ concerns. Of course, this initiative only comes after several of Digg’s power users raised hell and boycotted the site.
So what’s the lesson learned? Well, just like in high school, most of the big kids are assholes, and there’s nothing you can do about it. However, those assholes, at the end of the day, make us appreciate the nice kids a little bit more.
http://brianzafron.com/blog/?p=25
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