What’s next after social media…?
Goodbye friends; hello the stuff you are actually interested in
This morning like any other, I woke up, switched on the kettle and religiously scrolled through my Facebook news feed for 5 minutes.
Unsurprisingly I saw that one of my friends has entered a modelling competition and has the traditional “vote for me” post up; it’s “vodka time” for one of my school friends (we’ll leave out the fact that it’s only 8am), another’s oldest daughter is away to school for her induction day and finally there is a promoted post for the Google Squared Online course which I have already been part of and completed.
In fact, of the 30 or so posts I bother to look at the only one that catches my eye is this pretty damn impressive video of a life size Lego Tardis from Dr Who. (Check it out, it is pretty cool)
So what’s my point?
My point is that I’m checking Facebook purely because it’s a force of habit, not because there is anything particularly interesting on there. Although I love my friends, they don’t half post some rubbish, the vast majority of which is of little to no relevance to me and is just noise.
This relationship between individuals as friends, followers or fans has been the foundation of social media from day one. We befriend our family, work colleagues and school friends almost because we feel obligated to, not because we are interested in what they had for their lunch or that they have just completed level 42 in candy crush.
Ian C Rogers discusses this concept in his article Why I unfollowed you on Instagram in which he states that “the social network is yesterday and the interest feed is tomorrow”.
What Ian is looking for in his article is a feed of content that is relevant to him and his passions. Not what his friends want to publish.
The next revolution…
The last few years have seen, and for the short term will continue to see, little in the way of revolutionary change to social media or the way we spend our time online. However it is coming…
The next big step online will be beyond social media as we know it today. It will be in platforms that are tailored to our own passions, not the passions of others. They will deliver fresh content, where the quality and relevance will be more important than the individual that posted it.
Don’t believe me?
Why do you think platforms like Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Pinterest, and others have spent so much time and money on semantic search and artificial intelligence?
They are trying to make their platforms smarter, trying to filter out the noise and deliver content that you are interested in.
However this is just a sticky plaster on a gaping wound. These platforms are still fundamentally based on that connection between individuals that you already know.
The next big “social network” will not put relationships first.
phlow is part of this coming revolution
phlow isn’t based on this relationship between individuals. Although it has some social elements built in, phlow isn’t a social network as we know it today.
It delivers fresh, relevant content based on your interests. It’s like following a topic or a hashtag rather than a person — where the quality and relevance of the content is more important than the pedigree of the individual who posted it.
Content is presented as distraction-free, beautiful, “phlowing” streams of images allowing consumption of large quantities of information more quickly and efficiently than from a blog or news article.
phlow doesn’t use fancy computer algorithms or artificial intelligence to try and guess what you want to see. It uses the power of crowd behaviour to select what is relevant and trending in any given niche. We work on the basis that if it is relevant and resonates with people like you, that share your interests and passions; then there is a good chance it will be relevant to you also.
phlow is a big part of the coming revolution that is set to replace social media as we know it today, and we hope you will join us by requesting an invite for early access of the phlow app.
