socialmedian: 2 Free iPhones

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2 Free iPhones

Submitted by Jasongoldberg

Jul 15, 2008

Summary

Hey alpha-mates. We're going to try a little contest here on socialmedian.

The two individual on socialmedian who have the most followers (besides myself and any other socialmedian employee) by midnight eastern time this Friday, July 18, we're going to give a free iphone to. Just a little something to help folks start to discover some of the new features.

Comments (24)

Jasongoldberg,

Jul 15, 2008

Details: We'll send an iphone to anyone in the world who wins this little contest. You just need to pay for the service.

Detect,

Jul 16, 2008

woot.

Avemii,

Jul 16, 2008

sweet 8 gig or 16 :)

Weinberg81,

Jul 16, 2008

Fantastic! Thanks Jason.

Laconica007,

Jul 16, 2008

I want that damn iPhone.

Jasongoldberg,

Jul 16, 2008

8 gig this time around.

Eisokant,

Jul 16, 2008

Sweet! It got me flocking back to the site.

Nandop,

Jul 16, 2008

Give away 2 iphones? Cool.

For the one who has more followers? LAAAAAAAME!

That kind of promo encourages the growing of lame users who go out adding everybody, every unknown person, making fake networks and not adding anything to the service, but break it.

Sheuer,

Jul 16, 2008

I agree. Just adding people in order to win a prize doesn't increase the value of the overall network or the news circulating through it. But it certainly explains why I suddenly gained so "many" followers.

Jasongoldberg,

Jul 16, 2008

Hey all -- just a short little promo to gain some initial awareness of the feature. Over time, having a lot of followers wont matter if Newsmakers aren't actually keeping up with newsmaking for their followers.

We'll also be introducing mechanisms to ensure that Newsmakers who are truly providing value to their readers are recognized and highlighted vs. those who are now.

So, net net, I think this is a good way to kickstart the feature but also agree that it has to be more of an actual value add to be a Newsmaker over time.
-jason

Ragtag,

Jul 16, 2008

It'd be nice..

Randomnicole,

Jul 16, 2008

fun

Nandop,

Jul 16, 2008

I understand Jason, thanks for responding. But I have to disagree. Having a lot of followers should be useful, meaningful and fun, not meaningless. Social|median should avoid any reality where they "won't matter". It's alright, it's just a promo to call the attention to a new feature, but all actions you take mean something to us users, they give directions to the service and hint on what this is all about.

But if there's new iphones on the way, let them be! :) Hope I can participate in the next contest. Thx!

Sschablow,

Jul 16, 2008

Let's do it.

Jasongoldberg,

Jul 16, 2008

We appreciate the positive and negative comments. 72 hours of this contest shouldn't do any harm. I agree that in long term being a Newsmaker needs to be meaningful. I'm confident we will get there. We'll also be doing some outreach to the most active Newsmakers on socialmedian over the next couple of weeks to get your take on what features we could/should add to make being a Newsmaker more valuable for you. We got some good suggestions today for ways to expose which Newsmakers' followers actually read and comment on their stories.

Wozkol,

Jul 17, 2008

Great incentive Jason!

Margotmood,

Jul 17, 2008

Cool!

Catepol,

Jul 17, 2008

:-)

Jasongoldberg,

Jul 17, 2008

You can check the leader board here. http://www.socialmedian.com/users?s=popular

Thelewisshow,

Jul 17, 2008

This beats waiting in line.

Netzoo,

Jul 21, 2008

great idea to get me hooked on using Social|Median, Jason! I always have been skeptical of the iPhone, but can't truly judge it until I somehow end up w/ one in my hand. keep up the good work

Emanuel,

Jul 21, 2008

I agree with Nandop.
This contest will be like spam.
"XX XX is now following your updates on socialmedian" ...

Jasongoldberg,

Jul 21, 2008

It worked as a nice way to get people to know about the Newsmaker feature. Now, it's really up to the site working for itself and for the people using it.

Netzoo,

Jul 21, 2008

congrats to the winners. I'm back to stubbornly awaiting the u.s. launch of the Blackberry Bold (and then still possibly biting the bullet and going w/ iPhone)