Across the Twittersphere this afternoon, I came across a Tweet from Mike Volpe (@mvolpe) regarding a reply to a posting from Michael Arrington (@techcrunch) regarding HubSpot’s Facebook Grader. Have you seen/heard about this debate yet? Well if you haven’t, do some searches, you might find some ReTweets, Replies, or whatever else out there.
Any ways, Arrington published a post at www.TechCrunch.com yesterday reviewing HubSpot’s latest online grading application, Facebook.Grader.com What does it do? It “Measures the Power of a Profile” says the website. Alright this is all well and good… I’ve seen Twitter.Grader.com as well as PressRelease.Grader.com, and they all pretty much do the same thing. Gives you a score depending on numbers of followers, following, groups, and whatever else they want to look at. The tools are cool, and I’m sure are widely used, but why is Arrington coming out and blasting the FB Grader? He says that “…it’s beyond useless” Is it?
Maybe, but to start off, I think it is important to take a step back and really define where SOCIAL really comes from. People have started doing this lately, and some people haven’t. Although there are mixed ideas about what IT really is, there are a few terms you should NOT overlook.
SOCIAL: (One source says:) relating to human society and its members; “social institutions”; “societal evolution”; “societal forces”; “social legislation”
CAPITAL: (One source says:) assets available for use in the production of further assets
Now hold on a minute. If I’m trying to measure the “power of a profile” does that entail that every profile is not equal? Does that mean that if my profile is more powerful then yours, I should be regarded as having more capital than the average producer… universally? Is there a form of universal capital at all in Social Media? Does that even make sense? If that’s the case, you’re sort of limiting yourself on who you are trying to relate to. A common good is always nice, but nobody can tell one person or another what or who they think they should be listening to/preaching at.
While HubSpot has it’s grading tools, and pretty cool grading tools at that, use of these tools should be understood that depending on where you are looking/who you’re looking at/who you want to hear you/and so on, you shouldn’t put all your eggs in one basket. Thinking smart about your own personal social efforts is the best way to be, in essence, SOCIAL. Sure there are leaders in the world, but sooner or later, the underlings rise up and elect new leaders. Change happens. But everyone knows that right? 
(Congrats Obama)
Peace
P.S. Don’t abuse your position. It’s about the people, whether they like you or not.
P.P.S. Theres some good link juice in here guys, so don’t blast me.
