Journal
NEW MEDIA & SOCIETY
Volume 15, Issue 8, Pages 1348-1365Publisher
SAGE PUBLICATIONS LTD
DOI: 10.1177/1461444812472322
Keywords
Digital methods; fabric of the web; Facebook; Like economy; medium-specificity; platform studies; social buttons; social web; software studies; web analytics
Categories
Ask authors/readers for more resources
The paper examines Facebook's ambition to extend into the entire web by focusing on social buttons and developing a medium-specific platform critique. It contextualises the rise of buttons and counters as metrics for user engagement and links them to different web economies. Facebook's Like buttons enable multiple data flows between various actors, contributing to a simultaneous de- and re-centralisation of the web. They allow the instant transformation of user engagement into numbers on button counters, which can be traded and multiplied but also function as tracking devices. The increasing presence of buttons and associated social plugins on the web creates new forms of connectivity between websites, introducing an alternative fabric of the web. Contrary to Facebook's claim to promote a more social experience of the web, this paper explores the implementation and technical infrastructure of such buttons to conceptualise them as part of a so-called Like economy'.
Authors
I am an author on this paper
Click your name to claim this paper and add it to your profile.
Reviews
Recommended
No Data Available