Community Migration: Natural Evolution?
Wednesday, June 18th, 2008Daphne plurked today about leaving Plurk to concentrate on ping.sg as well as Twitter and because things were just getting too overwhelming for her to keep up with everything at once.
It got me thinking about whether this is a natural progression of sorts. People join an online community until the benefits of another (uptime for Plurk) far outweigh the previous benefits of another (Twitter), or the conversations on Plurk are more intense/genuine than those on the shoutbox on ping.sg. What do we do when that happens?
I know Pat Law has mentioned a very good point that people move on to better value propositions. That’s why we’re not on Friendster or ICQ anymore. If the community shifts to a new “tool”, should it matter? After all it’s people-centric rather than platform-centric isn’t it?
Of course, I’m not saying either ping.sg or Twitter are inferior, unworthy platforms. I think ping is still great for getting the latest buzz in the local blogosphere and log on at least thrice a day to check out the newest posts, Twitter runs in the background on Twhirl for stuff to pop up once in awhile. But when faced with a new, potentially better tool, what happens?
One reason also why the ping.sg shoutbox is less “vibrant” now is because many of the pingsters are on Plurk as well. This suggests that people see more value there, or are joining it because everyone is as well, or a combination of both, but that results in ping.sg being less lively. Natural evolution of online platforms? Innovate and keep your communities or die?
I pretty much understand where Daphne is coming from, so I ask the local community because I’m curious: If you’ve shifted to Plurk, do you feel like you should stick with your previous platforms just ‘cos? Or does the higher value proposition outweigh all? Very curious to know the various views behind this.
Tags: daphnemaia, facebook, friendster, icq, msn, patlaw, ping.sg, ping.sg shoutbox, Plurk, plurk vs twitter, singaporean blogosphere
