Should advertisers stay clear of unpredictable, user-generated content?

Improveverywhere (IE), the informal flash mobbing group that stages ‘missions’ in public places (mass standstill on Grand Central Station, synchro swimming in Washington Square Park fountain etc.), has posted a video of their most recent event: a spontaneous musical by ’staff’ in the food court of a Los Angeles mall. It struck a chord with me because at high-school my clique of friends dreamed of a similar outburst in the class room or on the hockey pitch (but of course we never carried it out in those deferential, British, pre-Hairspray days). If you look at IE’s blog most comments are full of admiration for the food court video; but one or two see this mission as a departure from IE’s core of informal, inclusive activities. Typically, IE’s missions are organised via internet (their web site, social networking) and mobile phone. Participants (‘agents’) turn up on the day ready to do what’s necessary, and it works, more or less. The food court mission required a song to be written, a day’s rehearsal, negotiations with the mall authorities, and a team of actors who could sing and dance. Instead of IE’s typical compilations of unsteady video clips after the event, a professional-looking edit was posted. And the end result was less about the experience of the individuals involved (although it must have been a blast) than about the reactions of bystanders in the mall, as this erupted in front of them. But it was fun to watch and share, and most bloggers wished they had been there to experience it, so why carp?

Coincidentally Newsweek published an article last week, The Revenge of the Experts, claiming that web users now seek expert knowledge rather than peer commentary on the web. The article used Google’s Knol expert knowledge pilot and Mahalo (a start up Google rival, where search results are vetted by experts) as examples of responses to this need. Read a little further in the Newsweek article, though, and you find a comment from Jason Calaconis, Mahalo’s founder, ‘The more trusted an environment, the more you can charge [advertisers] for it.’ Ah, so that might be what’s going on. Could it be that users are being sent an ever-so-subtle message about peer group unreliability in order to drive them to more profitable sites? And will they be getting what they’re looking for even when they choose those authoritative-looking sites? According to Mindhacks, a set of apparently authoritative articles on sleep disorders have been published by the National Sleep Foundation, an organisation that receives funding from drug companies, which it spends on ‘public education’ i.e. advertising the existence of sleep disorders. Not an isolated example, I am sure, but just an indicator of the potential for messages with a specific bias from an apparently authoritative source.

It’s a bit of a stretch from Improveverywhere to the National Sleep Foundation but it’s worth it to make the point that much can be lost when basic user-generation is compromised. Heartwarming as the food court video is, it raises the bar for other IE missions. Will its high production values put them off? Will highly orchestrated mobs like this reduce the inclusivity of future missions (as far as I can tell many people join IE and turn up for missions without knowing anyone else who involved, and that’s where their social networking begins)? It will be interesting to see. It could go either way: the video could spawn many more adventurous mobs, or it could clip the wings of the project as a whole.

More generally the web is messy and full of mis-information, and production values are often low. But, nevertheless, good information will out. As the commercial story behind the Newsweek article unfolds, Andrew Keen, author of ‘The Cult of the Amateur’ is quoted as saying ‘no one wants to advertise next to crap’. But what’s his definition of crap? Slightly rough content, sometimes contradictory, sometimes superficial but which is, nevertheless, up-to-date and may just include some nuggets you couldn’t find anywhere else? User-generated content has its pitfalls, and web users need to be educated about them (and about the pitfalls (and strengths) of expert information too). But to lose peer commentary, to authorise and sanitise it would be to lose much of what drives people to the web in the first place. Olly Buxton, writing one of several critical Amazon reviews of Keen’s book, picks up on the issue of what can be gained from user-generated content. Citing the Britannica/Wikipedia dispute he writes
‘if the choice were blind faith in Encyclopaedia Britannica or a sceptical read of Wikipedia, I know which I’d have, and which I’d counsel for my children - especially since Wikipedia is automatically up-to-date, preternaturally following the zeitgeist, and replete with good know-how on things that Britannica would never have in a million years’.

So I would say to advertisers think twice before investing in the authority and expertise the internet ‘controllers’ want to bring about; there may be more to trust (and to invest in) in peer commentary, ‘crap’ notwithstanding.

Newsweek link via Putting People First

Entry Filed under: Advertising, Consumer Rant