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Have you heard of Plurk? Well I hadn't, not until very early Sunday morning, when I first saw talk of the micro-blogging site being mentioned on Twitter. Over the course of the day, talk of Plurk spread like wildfire via Twitter, as users jumped over to see what the site was all about.
Many of us tried out Plurk, and came away with mixed results. That's not what impressed me. What impressed me was how quickly the "what is Plurk?" question traveled throughout the hyper-connected Twitter network.
Everyone wanted to check out Plurk, because everyone else was talking about it. And again, most people were tweeting that they didn't really understand what the deal was with Plurk, or what value it had. Didn't matter, as everyone was blabberin' on about Plurk, so everyone had to see what the deal was.
And it was a great example of how quickly ideas can spread, especially through well-connected networks. My guess is that if you weren't on Twitter on Sunday, you probably didn't hear much, if any, talk about Plurk. But if you were on Twitter, it seemed to be all anyone was talking about.
Then again, perhaps the most interesting aspect was that by day's end, many people were spreading an idea simply because everyone else was. Many people have lamented about the 'echo chamber' that exists in the blogosphere, and how we early adopters of social media sites/tools tend to over-hype any new sites or tools that pop up. It appears that was definitely a factor in driving everyone to Plurk.com.
Still, any business that wants to integrate social media into its business processes, needs to understand how easily ideas, and hype around those ideas, can spread in this space.
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Comments
The flip side, of course, is that if the plurk-of-the-day doesn't have an immediate and evident value proposition, it will just as quickly be publicly trashed. So - you better have the goods before you get talked about!
Posted by: Steve Woodruff | 06.02.08
How fast can we go, when we get microrobots in our bodies and start connecting directly through minds? Ain't the world for some people at the coast I know. :-)
Posted by: Dusan Vrban | 06.02.08
Steve I hear ya, but at the same time, we tend to over-hype sites like Plurk, Friendfeed, hell even Twitter. Aren't all these sites, including Twitter, still technically in beta?
But you're right, anyone wanting to launch a new social site,tool has to consider that they may face a massive load immediately. May not be fair to them, but again, we love to over-hype new social toys we find.
Posted by: mack collier | 06.02.08
Interesting article Mack... Thing is, while this example shows the potential for ideas to travel (quickly) through twitter, its not really a fair test. I'd imagine that a lot of the reason for the news travelling was the fact that plurk seems to be so similar to twitter and therefore is of interest to _all_ twitter users - close to 100%.
Very few other topics are going to attract such a high level of interest, and thus warrant so many tweets!
Posted by: Anne Rogers | 06.02.08
Anne I disagree. I've seen news items spread much quicker, such as Heath Ledger's death, which many noticed on Twitter before anywhere else.
Granted, the similarity between Twitter and Plurk no doubt got Twitter users talking about Plurk, but it was simply an example of how quickly ideas and stories can spread via Twitter.
Posted by: mack collier | 06.02.08
True enough that Heath Ledger's death -- or Ted Kennedy's brain surgery -- or whatever -- travels via Twitter at the speed of... well, Twitter.
But at the same time, Plurk's sudden rise to fame seems attributable to the fact that lots of folks on Twitter have that BSO gene. (Including me.. signed up Sunday.) ; )
Posted by: Ann Handley | 06.02.08
Nothing attracts a crowd, like a crowd. Funny cause I keep asking people on Twitter if ANYONE really likes Plurk, and no one has stepped up so far.
But it's still being chattered about endlessly. It's almost like we are all scared of being labeled as 'uncool' if we aren't trying out and talking about Plurk.
Posted by: mack collier | 06.02.08
There's a lot of pressure trying to stay at the bleeding edge... ! lol....
Posted by: Ann Handley | 06.02.08
Fellow Daily Fix contributor Karl Long is blogging that Plurk wants to be 'Twitter for teens':
http://experiencecurve.com/archives/plurk-twitter-for-teens
Funny because Gavin Heaton said on Plurk last night that the site looked like 'Twitter for kids' ;)
Posted by: mack collier | 06.02.08
I heard about Plurk on Twitter also, Mack. I was in the middle of some apps research and it was very apropos timing. Blog post http://www.livepath.blogspot.com
Posted by: Leigh Duncan-Durst | 06.03.08
Hey Mack ... thanks for the shout out! You know, I think it is more because Plurk has a game like feel. More kid like. Taps into our sense of fun too.
Posted by: Gavin Heaton | 06.07.08
Count me among the many who heard about Plurk -- and then signed up to try it out -- because of the buzz about it on Twitter last week.
I think Twitter's recent downtime and general unreliability also has many of us thinking, "What if we could find another service that did everything Twitter does ... except that it always worked?" There's usually that secret hope in any of these new shiny objects we're testing out, no?
Posted by: Bryan Person, BryanPerson.com | 06.08.08
Amazing how fast ideas can spread, it used to be the "Slashdot Effect" now I guess it's the "Twitter Effect" ?
Hope once our new concept hits beta we'll get the same type of quick exposure BUT with positive feedback, unlike plurk.
Nathan Lands
http://www.hiyaya.com
"Changing the face of e-commerce"
Posted by: Nathan | 06.09.08