Comments on: more thoughts on social objects

By: Drake

Drake — Thu, 08 Nov 2007 11:15:28 +0000

Great concept. To all who have joined the comment thread: how do you create social objects around luxury products– those where exclusive ownership and privacy are part of the buying and owning experience?

By: Betsy Aoki

Betsy Aoki — Tue, 30 Oct 2007 23:42:18 +0000

Loved this idea. I like also the conversion of the mundane product into the amazing one by “social gestures”. Rock on Hugh!
Betsy

By: Dwight

Dwight — Mon, 29 Oct 2007 07:36:22 +0000

Great stuff Hugh. At Handmeon we’re turning gifts into social objects. It’s much more fun.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Sat, 27 Oct 2007 14:09:48 +0000

Thought you when i read this in NY Times
Student’s Ad Gets a Remake, and Makes the Big Time
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/26/business/media/26appleweb.html?_r=1&ex=1351137600&en=63fd5eb855566342&ei=5088&partner=rssnyt&emc=rss&oref=slogin

By: Michelle

Michelle — Fri, 26 Oct 2007 22:48:09 +0000

I love this Social Object concept. It is not something that I’ve considered before but as soon as Istarted reading the blog it started to make sense and is something I will be looking to incorporate into my work.

By: Anon

Anon — Fri, 26 Oct 2007 16:45:22 +0000

How about social objects and trust… can you always trust the judgement of those who are using social objects to build network nodes. What happens when trust breaks down… does it damage the network or just the node? Are the objects of choice such as the personal invitations trust worthy… will they spam you.…
Going on from there you can get into an interesting discussion over social objects and privacy similar to conversations about facebook etc.
The way I see it social objects can be a double edged sword, they can be good or bad dependent on implementation, usage and ownership.

By: Josh C

Josh C — Fri, 26 Oct 2007 01:56:36 +0000

The social object idea is slowly coming together in my brain… I think I get it but can it be applied everywhere? What if you sell a boring but powerful and useful software? What if your customers are not known to be terribly social people? How do you take a good product with very low social mobility and make it SOCIAL?

By: Kim

Kim — Thu, 25 Oct 2007 23:55:41 +0000

Hi Hugh, I’ve been enjoying your cartoons for some time now. This idea of the Social Object is intriguing to me because I’m interested in how people interact, but even more so because I’m a painter. It gives me food for thought regarding art as a Social Object. I’ve thought about it from many angles but not in such a clear objective way as this. Thanks.

By: Kimber Chin

Kimber Chin — Thu, 25 Oct 2007 20:34:09 +0000

So true about the movement from search to share.
Consumers (myself included) are pretty darn lazy.
Why should we search, evaluate and choose when someone can do it for us?

By: Joe Andrieu

Joe Andrieu — Thu, 25 Oct 2007 19:36:21 +0000

Hugh,
I love the social object concept. I’m not sure yet how to apply it to what we do, but I do want to share this:
One of the most enduring and powerful social objects is sports fan apparel. I saw this in high gear at the bar with my buddy wearing a Sox baseball cap. At least half a dozen people came out of nowhere to share a live sports moment. Powerful stuff.

By: Eats Wombats

Eats Wombats — Thu, 25 Oct 2007 17:58:09 +0000

http://wombatdiet.net/2007/10/24/for-microsoft-the-ow-starts-now/ Used one of yr cartoons in this post FYI. Thanks for the laughs.

By: business

business — Thu, 25 Oct 2007 17:23:48 +0000

very nice!

By: James Cherkoff

James Cherkoff — Thu, 25 Oct 2007 16:52:22 +0000

Well said, and here is the greatest social object of all: http://tinyurl.com/2zxqo3

By: ninefish

ninefish — Thu, 25 Oct 2007 05:46:05 +0000

As usual Hugh, some critical ideas succinctly expressed. I’m not adding much to the conversation, other than to note a similarity in your concept of the geek and Seth Godin’s sneezer concept. They both seem to share a lot of the vitaal signs of the social object/shared object

By: eli edmundson

eli edmundson — Thu, 25 Oct 2007 05:04:07 +0000

Great explanation of a solid concept, I’m sold!