Social networks are a central part in any design process today on the web and beyond. Often, however, the social part gets hyped too much, and that’s why I work with Gianandrea Giacoma trying to give some methods, tools and tips to get a good grounding. This posts is about a recent speech and workshop I did, summarizing some of the most important aspects of our Social Experience Design method.
How are Google+ early adopters using the new social network? This survey report shows usage patterns & best practices from other people’s experience. Even if there are many ways to organize your circles, Tribes in which you can identify seem the most effective way to do that, followed by the kind of relation you have and the topics you’re interested in.
Social network tools are surely a powerful tool to extend our social relationships, but even with all their good qualities they can’t help us to overcome what seems the limit of our cortex to process close relationships with more than 100~230 people. A recent research based on 4 years of tweets confirms that limit.
The social business can be conceived as two pyramids that needs to merge themselves, one from the bottom and one from the top: the balance of the two is able to create a thriving environment for both the company, its employees and its users.
The so-addressed social technologies are here, and here to stay. They are showing the world what you can do with a network and a bit of good social design. But with the growing success of those services, both in usage and in revenue, shouldn’t we stop a while and think about the ethics of them?
Social Usability is a quality attribute that assesses how easy social interactions are to make. The checklist is built to be both a simple rule of thumb and an important guideline in the hands of a social network designer.
