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Topic: My theatre has a facebook page???

Marcel Birgelen
Film God

Posts: 3357
From: Maastricht, Limburg, Netherlands
Registered: Feb 2012

posted 11-21-2017 05:57 PM

quote: Mike Blakesley
Heck there was a time when checking Film-Tech was the most important part of my day, multiple times a day. Since projection isn't as interesting these days, I don't check it quite as often but I still pop in here at least a couple times a day. I've probably written more words on this site than I have any other single place, digital or not. But am I "addicted" to Film-Tech? I would call it more a habit than anything. There are days I don't get a chance to check in, and I don't find myself crawling up the walls because of it.

Your interests are most likely, more profound, in depth and canalized than that of the average Facebook user. That's probably why you commit much time to a community you take a big interest in and see no much use spending the same amount of time and efforts on Facebook.

At the same time, this whole "social networking" thing has been proven to be addictive. And like it or not, a forum like this one is practically an implementation of a "social network", alas a more rudimentary version of it.

One of the reasons why it is so addictive is pretty simple to explain. If you post something on such a forum or "social network site" and somebody else reacts to it, it will give you a little adrenaline kick. The "size" of this kick depends in large parts on the type of reply you got. If it was, for example, a more negative reply, this little rush will motivate you to write up a reply. Those who it was directed too, will also receive their little dose and are likely to react.

It's this basic little, incentive driven system that drives a lot of the social networks out there. In many cases it's not that we really need it, but it's just like cigarettes, caffeine and alcohol, once you've become addicted to it, you want it, because your brain thinks it needs it.

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Frank Angel
Film God

Posts: 5305
From: Brooklyn NY USA
Registered: Dec 1999

posted 11-21-2017 07:02 PM

I don't think evil is quite the right word, but certainly an entity that is using people and manipulating their proclivities -- there's certainly something sinister about that. The FB machine is not in place as a non-profit, charitable organization; it is there like any other big, multi-billion dollar business to do one thing: make money. That's not necessarily evil, but much of how they make their money is hidden and opaque to the billion people they are making the money off of. Nothing about FB is transparent indeed it is presented as something neutral and only there for the benefit of the public. Fact is, they keep those billion people online by spending millions devising "hooks" based on very sophisticated physiological manipulation. That said, isn't that what advertising has always done?

I'd say the difference is, everyone knows when something is an advertisement; in print it is always identified as such and in broadcasting and even on the web, ads are clearly marked as such. We are conditioned to react to them differently than other content; we question ads differently and ascertain exactly what the ad is doing even when it is quite subtle. Facebook, on the other hand uses a myriad of little routines like quizzes and games and surveys and such to keep the user "involve." Much of it is purely deceptive.

The one time my nephew coaxed me into taking a "Personality Profile Test" on FB that purported to tell the participant what were their personality components. He played it and sent me the results and begged me to take it; I played it and noticed an interesting thing -- the questions were strongly skewed - "Choose one from the following" and then gave choices like: "1) would you enjoy brushing your dog or cat's hair" 2) You think its funny seeing a dog or cat tumble down a flight of stairs." Gee, I wonder what people will choose. The the results my nephew's and my tests were suspiciously very positive for both of us. The test's final "evaluation" spit out long and detailed personality info; we both evidently had glowing personalities -- we were quit attractive, fun, all-around great chaps. So of course that prompts you to go, test results in hand, sending that glowing personality profile of to everyone under the FB sun, coaxing THEM to take that fun test as well, all in the guise of it being "just for fun," while if you were honest, it is just a crass form of self-promotion. To convince my nephew that it was nothing more than a scam, I took it again, answering all the negative questions with the answers that were obviously planted to NOT be picked, and surprise, suprise, the resulting profile STILL found great things to say about me. Funny how it didn't pick up that I procrastinate way too much, that I am a notorious grouch in the mornings and the morning can last well into the afternoon. This great psychological test didn't catch any of those or my other fairly serious flaws. Point is, FB isn't telling anyone that this is a bogus test and designed solely to get you to stay there longer and then to to propagate this thing to each of the other billion so all stay hooked so they can be exposed to the other hooks planted on the pages that are displayed along the way. It is underhanded and deceptive. Evil? Close enough.

Problem for businesses is, if you DON'T have a FB presence, more and more that will be seen as that somehow you are not a "real" business. This has happened with websites. What do people assume if they search for your business on the web and you don't have a site? "How come?" is the question. "They must not exist" could be a conclusion you don't want the public to make. It would be akin to 30 years ago if you didn't have an ad, or at least your number listed in the yellow pages. And not only do you need a website for your business to be thought of as legitimate, it needs to be an impressive site as well (hence why designers can charge BIG BIG bucks).

Unfortunately, if you don't play this social effin media game, you are cutting your nose off to spite your face. As much as it smacks of cyber totalitarianism, there doesn't seem to be an easy way around it.

For awhile Google didn't allow you to take pictures down from your Google Business page that the public added. The business could only manage pictures that they themselves posted to their own page. I found this to be absurd. People where posting terrible pictures -- out of focus, underlit, and of stuff that was totally irrelevant to our business. The only solution was to post as many pictures as we could so as to push the pictures the public posted, so far down the page that they became irrelevant, but, problem is, they were still there. One restaurateur said someone posted a picture of a rat on a plate and he couldn't get it removed for a week. Google will take off something that you can flag as patently offensive, but only if you write to them, but that can take time, all the while people seeing these offensive images connected to your business -- SERIOUS damage. Happily I can report that just recently they change the business picture page so that the owner of the page can finally delete the images you don't want, but you better keep on top of it because anyone who wants can post any picture they want, relevant or not, flattering or even potentially seriously harmful to your business or not.

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