Why Twitter’s IPO is looking ridiculous as well as sad

Posted on October 5, 2013 by Nigel Cameron

Twitter 6×6 (Photo credit: Steve Woolf)

It’s hardly news that women don’t dominate technology companies, or indeed most companies, or governments (though the news that Rwanda‘s parliament now has 64% women members is fascinating; I wonder who will be the next president . . .). Point is: While denizens of the C Suite and Board members need to have a really smart grasp of the business, to use the old not-many-women-are-engineers defense against women high-level appointments is becoming absurd. Here, the New York Times points out that now Twitter is in process of going public, the public knows it is yet another men’s group. The board is entirely male (and, ahem, white). One woman, a new hire, Vijaya Gadde, is to be found in the executive office (she’s General Counsel).

This is ridiculous to my mind not become it isn’t “fair” (I have consistently argued that the equity case for appointing women to top jobs is both unreasonable and dumb), but because value will not be realized in this fast, fast-shifting economy without widely diverse expert perspectives at both C-Suite and director level. This is not simply an argument for women or other “diverse” groups. It’s a value-driven case for diverse thinking, including the seriously contrarian.

We have already noted that the IPO is also sad. Sad, because at some point a major social company will wake up to the fact that the logic is for social companies to be social in their governance. We need smart thinking on governance as well as technology, and smart mechanisms that will reward founders and other early risk-takers without locking up the results of their efforts with Big Oil governance. (See Facebook‘s share system, which together with its board membership and the role of its founder locates it clearly on the Carnegie/Murdoch side of history; and Twitter’s plan for a classified board. Sigh.)

We’re waiting for the tedious old-economy governance and financing approaches of these smart, C21 companies to find alignment. It has yet to happen.

http://nigelcameron.wordpress.com/2012/04/15/we-need-to-talk-about-twitter-reciprocal-knowledge-engine-plus/

https://futureofbiz.org/2012/12/11/please-may-we-have-a-social-social-network/

Curtain Is Rising on a Tech Premiere With as Usual a Mostly Male Cast – NYTimes.com.

Unsocial Networks

Posted on November 21, 2012 by Nigel Cameron

Mark Zuckerberg, founder and CEO of Facebook

Mark Zuckerberg (Wikipedia)

Facebook’s decision to draw back from one of the few evidences in the governance of social networks that they understand that social is actually coming to mean for the future of the corporate effort is perhaps no great surprise. For a company whose governance is designed top-down like that of a 19th century steel magnate (or, to be fairer, well, 21st century News Corp), the anomaly of leaving users free to make actual decisions, always open to being “exploited” (aka used) by users actually interested in said decisions, could not long endure.

But the question is raised, yet again: when will it be that companies in the ever-broader “social” space will evolve governance (and financing) models that are actually suited to social?

None of the major players has given that thought much thought, so far. The Facebook voting thing being nixed was a vestigial organ from an earlier, pre-IPO, day when the visionary aspects of the company had more logic than they do now (though, for my part, I have no reason to believe that MZ believes them any less). Something much bigger, and strategic, is needed for these companies to align their social mission with their social identity as vast networks of users. The future will not lie with playing cat-and-mouse on privacy and imposing corporate policies from (in Fb’s case) unbelievably non-diverse boards. And for future read profit.

I billion and rising. Well, we shall see. Think Kodak and RIM and HP and (ouch, ouch) Apple for curves whose rise is halted.

My take? MS soldiers on; Apple crests very soon in all respects; Fb is close to its zenith. MZ, like SJ and BG, has earned his place on Mount Rushmore. What interests me is what, and who, come nest; and how they manage to align their corporate efforts with their users. Hint: it may involve actually engaging this thing we call “social.”

Oh, and Twitter? As a company, it is in the balance, for just this same reason. Its daily users include some of the very smartest minds on the planet – from @rupertmurdoch down. The interest of the Twitter high command in what they/we think is somewhere around zero.

Facebook to users: Please vote to abolish your right to vote | Internet & Media – CNET News.

Unsocial Media: The Uselessness Of Facebook And Google+ (warrenellis.com)
Facebook to share data with Instagram, loosen email rules (reuters.com)

Facebook Crashes. My 5 Questions.

Posted on August 7, 2012 by Nigel Cameron

(Photo credit: Wikipedia)

As Facebook settles to just over $20 and all kinds of problems emerge for the company as a result (chronicled here at length, including lock-up releases, tax issues, cash issues:�http://www.businessinsider.com/facebook-lockup-release-2012-8#ixzz22mj8cB6e) we keep coming back to the basics.

My 5 Questions, following up my earlier post Is #Facebook Doomed?

1. How do we value such an effort in terms that synch with Wall Street when all digital companies are fragile if wonderful things? (Answer: Dunno)

2. How do we project value into the future when (as I keep saying, over and over) interoperability looms in the social space, and with it the end of economic profit? (Answer: Modestly)

3. How can it be that our definitely “social” company shows less interest in social engagement (and diversity!) than almost any other on the planet, when it is probably the company most in need? (Answer: A Dreadful Mystery)

4. Why did Mark Zuckerberg and his buds, who claim serious social purposes for their enterprise (which I have no reason to doubt are genuinely held), not explore innovative financing and governance techniques instead of chanting IPO and setting up a governance structure that a C19th steel baron would admire? (Answer: A Curious Lack of Imagination?)

5. When will a major “social” effort decide to fund itself, in part at least, through subscriptions from its user base – with commensurate accountability – in place of the vortex of ads/analytics/privacy into which our premier social network is being sucked? (Answer: None too soon)

Facebook Crashes To End The Day – Business Insider.

Is #Facebook Doomed? (futureofbiz.org)
Facebook’s market meltdown is far from over (blogs.reuters.com)

Facebook user satisfaction plummets- MSN Money

Aside

Mark Zuckerber (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Nuff said.

But if I may add: The cause is attributed to three factors: Privacy issues; the constantly changing interface; and what HuffPo describes as “in-your-face advertising.”

Which takes me back to a theme I keep harping on: Our leading “social” company is among the least engaged on its own behalf in social media; despite being uniquely well-placed, it has chosen to disconnect itself from its user/customers and take continual decisions without consultation.

The context here is fascinating, since it is not simply that Facebook, “the social network,” does less well than G+ and Twitter; as a whole social companies score far worse than traditional (and traditionally unpopular) companies such as airlines and utilities.

Hard to make this up. And truly remarkable that these companies seem to be among the least able to grasp the impact on business/consumer relationships of the technologies they have mastered.

It’s also dire news for Facebook investors.

Facebook user satisfaction plummets- MSN Money.

[News] Facebook User Satisfaction Plummets, Google+ Shines, Says Survey (pcworld.in)

We Need to Talk – about #Twitter: Reciprocal Knowledge Engine PLUS

Posted on April 15, 2012 by Nigel Cameron

Some time back I wrote and then revised a piece on both my Twitter use and the power of Twitter as a machine for building knowledge through mutual or reciprocal curation – what perhaps we can designate a “reciprocal knowledge engine. ” Google just told me that it could not find the phrase, so it looks like it’s mine. Here’s the piece: http://nigelcameron.wordpress.com/future/why-twitter-matters/

I don’t really have a lot to add on that score; seems to me this medium/platform is pregnant with capacities to enable the building of cross-disciplinary, convergent knowledge, in a world defined by the data explosion of the exaclasm and the exponential need and opportunity for understanding – as a prelude, one would hope, to wisdom in decision-making in the face of global risk.

Point about Twitter, though, is that it is also many other things, and yesterday’s post discussing the proposal that our @ addresses serve as our personal universal locators is not without merit. Then again, it’s a source for every crowd one could wish, from flashmobs during demos to the nuclear flashmob that was unleashed on SOPA. And market research. And (another recent theme in this blog) C-Suite engagement with stakeholders. Of yes, and if you must, the Lady Gaga fan club and the PR people from our favorite pols. And on and on.

Which suggests: Twitter as a corporation or a brand may or may not have immortality. In general, businesses in this space are ageing fast (not good news for current valuations). A rival could pick it up, mess it up, close it down. Or, more likely, a nimbler, smarter, son-of-Twitter will emerge in 20 months’ time and we will all feel how MySpacey Twitter used to be.

But in all the social media melange, in Twitter we have lighted on something far more valuable than the other platforms, useful for particular purposes though they may be. It’s why many of the smartest people on the planet are spending serious time here every day of their lives. And (back to reciprocal knowledge) they are my research assistants. And I am one of theirs.