Social Intelligence Stories that Caught Our Attention: Volume Seven

Here’s the stories that caught our attention across the web the week of 27^th May. This week we have propaganda, the decline of Facebook engagement, influencers not being influential and Foursquare making headlines.

The Human Consequences of Computational Propaganda

New research released from the Institute of the Future reveals how social and issue-focused groups are paratactically susceptible to disinformation campaigns and were targeted with propaganda during the 2018 mid-term elections.  It also shows why the targeting of these groups will continue, and potentially worsen.  The paper also provides recommendations for fighting back.

The Decline of Facebook Engagement

If measurement is your thing, this new report from eMarketer might paint a very poor picture of things to come for Facebook.  Time spent on the platform is decreasing at a rapid rate and the report questions what “meaningful” interactions are? While the downward decline appears to be negative, taking another look at what meaningful interactions are could benefit us all.

And moving swiftly on, here’s another area of measurement that needs to be reconsidered.

What is Influence?

You’ve probably seen this one as it was a trending news story around the world, but we think we need to discuss this more broadly too.  An influencer with 2.6M Instagram followers failed to sell 36 t-shirts and had to cancel her new clothing line.

The influencer bubble is bursting. This young lady has well over 2 million followers and couldn’t sell 36 shirts. Focus on genuine engagement and not followers cuz they ain’t gonna buy a thing. pic.twitter.com/uOSVxc2k4D

— Flawless and Brown (@kissmyelite) May 27, 2019

It’s a rather embarrassing situation, and the influencers response isn't the best. But the story illustrates the story on the fluffiness around influencer measurement. For The Social Intelligence Lab, we also see our theories about influence being too literal and the need to explore secondary influence coming into play.  What do you think?

Foursquare buys Placed from Snap Inc.

When was the last time you used Foursquare? For us, it’s running into years. But Foursquare just made its first acquisition when they acquired Placed from snap Inc this week.  Placed is the biggest competitor to Foursquare’s Attribution product, which allows brands to track the physical impact of a digital campaign or ad.

The new product will be called Placed powered by Foursquare. TechCrunch reports that the acquisition means that Placed powered by Foursquare will have more than 450 measurable media partners, including Twitter, Snap and Waze – and more than 50% of the Fortune 100 are partnered with Placed or Foursquare.

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