Engaged Reading Time - Issue #36
Here's the latest batch of Audience Engagement links. Watch for some analysis tomorrow, and hopefully another batch of links on Thursday.
Future of the social internet
Can “Indie” Social Media Save Us?
Great New Yorker piece on the emerging "IndieWeb" - an attempt to retake the web from the big platforms that have caused so many problems. I'm a great fan of micro.blog, for example. I've yet to see any publishers experiment with any of this. Are we too hooked on the platforms?
The Dark Forest Theory of the Internet
A thoughtful Medium piece looking at trend of people withdrawing from the open internet, towards more protected online spaces. The consequences of this could be big.
Into the Personal-Website-Verse
A back-to-the-future-past piece looking at the technology falling into place to allow people — and publishers — to own their own spaces and communities again.
The gentrification of the internet
This is a great summary of why the existing state of affair is so problematic
Platform Updates
Using Surveys to Make News Feed More Personal
Facebook to explicitly ask people who and what they're most close to - and compare that data with what it sees in terms of engagement.
How to Spark Meaningful Conversations on LinkedIn
LinkedIn's own guidelines on creating engaging discussions within its platform. I'm always slightly sceptical of these — but worth checking out.
Instagram adds Stories to Explore tab. Here’s how to get on it
How to get found in a Like-less world…
Research
Clickbait Content May Not Be Click-worthy
We all sort of knew this, didn't we? Nice to see it proved, though.
Audit suggests Google favors a small number of major outlets
A word of caution on this: it's very much about the mainstream news, rather than anything more niche. I'm going to so a long piece on this in the near future for OM&HB, but what Google's doing is narrowing the range of information people are exposed to - and I'm not impressed.
What content does well on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and Google
A handy reference guide…
A good question…
Are You Worth Trolling?
A timely reminder: being worth trolling is a sign of success, not failure. But how you manage it matters.
See you next weekend for more links.
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