Information Technology Reference
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obtaining the reward of feeling that there are thousands of people who silently
agree with him and that one day he will own the rights to a blockbuster movie.
This takes us back to the “me” idea and to the fact that the social web and
media empowers the individual to show that they are at the centre of web
interactions and that they have unprecedented importance online. Looking at
the well-known social websites like YouTube (watch me), Twitter (follow me),
The Sartorialist (see me), Facebook (hear me), A Small World (admire me),
Chic in Paris (love me) and Greek Tragedy (listen to me), it's apparent that the
focus on “me” is not just an idea but the reality of the social web.
With over 170 million blogs existing in cyberspace, the majority of which are
updated weekly, and the daily creation of more blogs and online communities at
a mind-boggling pace, the flow of personal information in online public forums
is unmatched by any other phenomenon that has taken place on the Internet or
offline. The social web today serves multiple purposes including finding and
connecting, conversing and influencing, participating and sharing, all for more
effective communications. In addition, the social web also enables consumers to
shop better, look better, learn better, complain better and generally feel better.
There is no more going back to the way things were before the social web.
The mind-set of consumers and the general society has changed forever and
this includes the group of wealthy people that make up the luxury consumer
market. And don't be falsely led to believe that wealthy people are not active
on the social web because that would be the first mis-step.
To begin with, recent research indicates that one in four affluent consum-
ers in North America belongs to a social networking website and nearly
40 percent of them log in daily to see what's happening with the people and
organizations on their list or in their network. Also, 38 percent of these peo-
ple belong to at least three social networking websites although, in general,
they have one or two in which they are active participants. Not surprisingly,
10 percent of them publish their own blogs - and these are individuals with
an annual net income of at least $300,000. For those that don't have the
time to log in, daily updates are sent to their email boxes in the form of
e-newsletters and activity updates from the social networks. And North
America is not even the world's first blogging region.
Another indication is from A Small World, the online social network for
the world's wealthy and successful “happy few”. The social network, whose
value is derived more from the quality rather than the quantity of member
profiles, has over 300,000 members with an average household income of
$330,000 from all the world's regions, with Europeans topping the list even
though the company is New York based. With profiles ranging from billion-
aire and millionaire businessmen, senior executives, entertainment moguls,
and sportsmen and women, A Small World has a strong focus on building
a community based on trust and monitors behavior through a strict code of
conduct and etiquette. This means that the community is for the serious-
minded who wish to connect on professional and personal levels. This unique
