The rise of user-generated content

Why do people spend so much time creating and uploading content for the internet? In the view of MySpace guru Richard Rosenblatt, the answer is age-old: 'People like to express themselves, and they want to be famous. Those are two things we saw from the very beginning of MySpace. Five years ago MySpace didn't even exist; in 2008 it's going to do $800 million in revenue, and generate more page views than anything on the web.' Making the news As the vice president of research for Hitwise UK, Heather Hopkins is close to the statistics: 'Four of the most-visited sites in the UK are social media sites. Bebo, MySpace, YouTube and Facebook are all in the top 20. Given how new this category is, that's pretty remarkable.' Heather also sees user-generated sites making a major impact in the news arena: 'Earlier this year, we looked at three major news events: Saddam Hussein's hanging, Zinedine Zidane's head-butt during the World Cup, and the Israel-Lebanon conflict. When we looked at how people were searching for those events, and where they went after they'd searched, we found Google News, Wikipedia and YouTube figured more prominently than the sites of mainstream media news companies.'

Heather Hopkins

Not just teenagers in bedrooms Social networking and user-generated content were once the province of IT geeks and teenagers in bedrooms. Not any more. Richard Rosenblatt has seen a huge change: 'Over 50% of MySpace users are over 35, which is a statistic that nobody even believes. Social networks started as a way for teens to express themselves, but the tools have gotten so much better and the demographic has really expanded. That has profound effects, because you're now talking about people of 25- or 35-plus who are interested in producing content.' Richard's latest, 3i-backed venture Demand Media (see panel) plays to the internet's changing demographics. As users age, Richard foresees a fundamental change in their relationship with the internet, with less focus on general connections and more on shared interests: 'We think the next wave is social media in verticals - like golfing, hiking, gaming or airliners. If you go to our site http://www.airliners.net/, it's a community that generates 80 million page views a month just putting up pictures and talking about planes.'

Building B2B communities But if the wave of user-generation has well and truly taken hold in the consumer space, what about the vast B2B market? Peter de Monnink, head strategist at Reed Business (see panel) expects rapid growth: 'Currently, the user-generated content on most B2B websites is relatively small but it's gaining strong traction. Whenever we change the platform so users can interact, the traffic goes up. That's good, because once we have the reach, we can start to build engagement. And once we've built engagement, we can monetise the traffic. 'User-generated content is imperative for community building. If titles and brands in the B2B space don't interact with the communities that they serve, the brand gravity lacks a certain element and will be harder to monetise. 'It's also essential to develop a brand which has both an online and offline presence. Print publications with a strong, community-driven presence online are more valuable than B2B communities that aren't supported by print publications. A print publication shows that you have experts in the field, who are able to generate content.'

Peter de Monnink

Democratising expertise In the B2B market, the distinction between expert- and user-generated content may be vital. But in the wider world, it's a distinction that Richard Rosenblatt questions: 'I think the line between independent content creator and expert is starting to blur more and more. Clearly someone with a PhD in biophysics is an expert but who's really an expert in the best way to cook jambalaya? 'Our tools are getting better and better at letting users determine whether you're an expert. If you are, you'll get paid handsomely because people will click on your ads and read your articles more. The web is great at letting people decide for themselves what's quality content and what's not.'

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