symbiotic relationships and the “full-time intimate community”

In 2005, Mimi Ito and Misa Matsuda published Personal, portable, pedestrian: Mobile phones in Japanese life. This groundbreaking work contains a collection of essays by Japanese researchers about how the mobile phone (or keitai) is transformed from a business tool to a personal device for communication and play. Much of the scholarship centers around what Japanese youth do with the mobile phone. One of the essays in this book, Misa Matsuda’s “Mobile Communication and Selective Sociality,” focuses specifically on how youth have adopted the mobile phone to build and maintain a “full-time intimate community.” Rather than being reachable by just anyone, Matsuda finds that keitai allow youth to control the flow of communication, making themselves available to “intimate friends or selected others [with whom they] want contact.” While youth may have hundreds of numbers in their addressbook, the collection of people with whom they regularly maintain contact is far smaller. From the moment they wake up to the moment they go to sleep, youth text a small group of intimate friends, building a network through ongoing chatter. While the actual substance of a particular message may not have great meaning, the aggregate helps build and sustain bonds, bringing youth into each other’s social sphere even when they are physically apart. Physical spaces often require people to socially organize around who is present, regardless of desire. School environments, for example, create social situations where people socialize with others even if their bond is not strong. What is unique about the connections built and maintained through texting is that individuals choose to maintain these ties, creating a context out of the people instead of the environment. The “full-time intimate community” that youth build is critically important to them.

Social contexts like the one that Matsuda describes have social norms and rules of decorum. For example, reciprocity is a critical component in the process of building and maintaining connections. There are understood rituals for reaching out and for signing off. While texting may not be synchronous, an apology may be necessary for responding at an interval other than what is collectively expected. Because these social contexts are extremely local to each network of friends, there are no universal norms. Yet, as is true in any medium, participating in a particular community involves sussing out the social norms and learning how to behave properly.

Marketers and politicians are trying to become actors in these networks. Typically, they want to leverage the networks that people build to engage directly with consumers. Yet, all too often they come barreling in with their own norms and expectations like a bully or a narcissistic princess. By broadcasting instead of engaging, they demand attention. By pushing their agenda, they rupture the social context. To combat this, they are typically ignored or ostracized, treated like a pariah unless they volunteer to give something back. When having them in the network serves a functional purpose, they are tolerated, but not loved.

There are exceptions and those are intriguing case studies. Consider the symbiotic relationship between bands and fans that emerged on MySpace. Bands needed fans to friend them so that they would be validated for promotional purposes and they wanted a mechanism by which to disseminate information to fans. Fans loved bands and wanted a way to show their affiliation and get validated from those bands. The MySpace friendship between bands and fans initially supported both groups, especially when bands solidified the relationship through a comment that would enhance the individual’s identity in front of their friends. (It should be noted that the rise of “band spam” and the lecherous nature of the labels disturbed this dynamic.)

So herein lies an interesting question… What does it take for brand, politician, or institution to sit meaningfully at the table in the mobile world of the “full-time intimate community”? Blyk is betting that consumers will tolerate these groups’ presence in return for free connectivity. Is this mutually parasitic relationship the only tenable one or are other mutually beneficial relationships possible? If so, what might those look like?

Entry Filed under: Brand, Practices