WEBVTT - TechStuff Classic: TechStuff has Klout 0:00:04.240 --> 0:00:07.240 Welcome to tex Stuff, a production of I Heart Radios, 0:00:07.320 --> 0:00:13.920 How Stuff Works. Hey there, and welcome to tex Stuff. 0:00:13.960 --> 0:00:17.119 I'm your host, Jonathan Strickland. I'm an executive producer with 0:00:17.120 --> 0:00:18.880 How Stuff Works and I Heart Radio and I love 0:00:18.920 --> 0:00:22.720 all things tech and today we're having another classic episode 0:00:22.720 --> 0:00:26.239 of tech Stuff. This episode originally published on October twenty four, 0:00:26.480 --> 0:00:29.920 two thousand and twelve. It's called tech Stuff has Clout 0:00:30.320 --> 0:00:34.440 and spoiler alert, cloud is no longer a thing, but 0:00:34.479 --> 0:00:38.080 when we recorded this episode, it was a thing. Clout, 0:00:38.360 --> 0:00:42.479 as you will learn, was all about social media influence 0:00:42.600 --> 0:00:46.159 and reach, and depending on your point of view, it 0:00:46.280 --> 0:00:49.440 was either an incredibly useful tool, a tool to turn 0:00:49.520 --> 0:00:53.960 people into narcissists, or something even more sinister than that. 0:00:55.080 --> 0:00:57.360 But spoiler alert again, it's all moot now because it's 0:00:57.360 --> 0:01:01.160 no longer a thing. Anyway, enjoy this lastic episode as 0:01:01.200 --> 0:01:04.760 Chris and I tout our cloud. So today we wanted 0:01:04.800 --> 0:01:08.400 to talk about clout and whether whether or not you 0:01:08.440 --> 0:01:12.160 have any uh and maybe you personally. You know that 0:01:12.240 --> 0:01:14.840 guy over there, he's got no cloud. Apparently I apparently 0:01:14.840 --> 0:01:19.640 I have some. Um the it's a not insignificant amount, 0:01:19.760 --> 0:01:22.520 though not nearly as much. As you know, like Justin Bieber. 0:01:23.080 --> 0:01:26.520 Uh so, what is Cloud? So? Cloud is this company 0:01:26.640 --> 0:01:30.120 out of San Francisco that was founded by Joe Fernandez 0:01:30.959 --> 0:01:33.320 back in two thousand and eight. He started to build 0:01:33.319 --> 0:01:37.160 it when he couldn't talk. Did you know about that? 0:01:38.640 --> 0:01:41.280 There's an article and Wired and I actually revisited it. 0:01:41.280 --> 0:01:43.880 It's it's called what Your Cloud Score Really Means. It's 0:01:43.920 --> 0:01:46.959 from Seth Stevenson. Actually read it in the print edition, 0:01:46.959 --> 0:01:48.720 but I went back and revisited it so I could 0:01:48.720 --> 0:01:53.920 throw in my electronic notes. Yeah. He uh, this is 0:01:53.960 --> 0:01:57.960 really really funny. He um had had had to have 0:01:58.040 --> 0:02:01.160 his jaw wired shut. That that's not funny. I don't 0:02:01.200 --> 0:02:06.440 think that's funny. But because he couldn't talk, he started, Uh, 0:02:06.560 --> 0:02:09.960 he started tweeting and using Facebook to communicate with people 0:02:10.000 --> 0:02:12.160 because it was driving him nuts that he couldn't talk 0:02:12.200 --> 0:02:14.799 to people, he said, And in fact he said he 0:02:14.840 --> 0:02:20.280 couldn't his mom didn't even understand what he was Yeah. Really, 0:02:21.080 --> 0:02:24.680 uh so, I mean, thankfully he's apparently all better now. 0:02:24.720 --> 0:02:26.720 But I've seen I've seen interviews with him where he 0:02:26.760 --> 0:02:29.720 was not wired shut and he was talking. Yes, so 0:02:29.760 --> 0:02:34.040 he actually started uh, he actually started talking about or tweeting, 0:02:34.120 --> 0:02:38.040 tweeting about this, all sorts of different things about um 0:02:38.440 --> 0:02:42.000 restaurants that he had been to and making recommendations, and 0:02:42.040 --> 0:02:44.560 you know, again kind of iron as they point out 0:02:44.560 --> 0:02:47.520 the art kind of ironic. He couldn't open his mouth 0:02:47.560 --> 0:02:51.880 and go eat there, but basically product recommendations. He started thinking, 0:02:51.880 --> 0:02:54.600 because he had had some experience with with statistics, and 0:02:54.639 --> 0:02:58.000 started thinking, you know, how many people am I talking to? 0:02:58.120 --> 0:03:01.359 And and to who are they talking and how much 0:03:01.400 --> 0:03:05.840 influence do they have over people who buy stuff or 0:03:06.160 --> 0:03:09.919 go shopping or go out to eat with these different people. 0:03:10.120 --> 0:03:14.119 And that's when he started. He started making some rudimentary calculations, 0:03:14.200 --> 0:03:18.480 rudimentary by the terms of clouds algorithms today, and started 0:03:18.520 --> 0:03:21.720 putting together this idea of you know, how much influence 0:03:22.000 --> 0:03:27.400 do people have in the social media? So that's this 0:03:27.480 --> 0:03:31.880 is really an interesting concept to me because some people 0:03:31.880 --> 0:03:36.560 would have you believe that influence can be measured solely 0:03:36.600 --> 0:03:39.440 by things like the number of followers you happen to 0:03:39.520 --> 0:03:43.960 have on social networks. But Fernandez's point is that's not 0:03:44.080 --> 0:03:48.040 necessarily the case. You could have lots of people following you, 0:03:48.120 --> 0:03:50.000 but if no one's really paying attention to what you 0:03:50.080 --> 0:03:53.280 have to say, and they're following you anyway, then your 0:03:53.320 --> 0:03:56.000 influence isn't that great. You know, there's a lot of 0:03:56.040 --> 0:03:58.360 people who could potentially hear you, but no one's really 0:03:58.400 --> 0:04:01.200 listening to you, and that's a problem problem. So you 0:04:01.200 --> 0:04:05.800 could you could conversely have relatively few followers compared to 0:04:05.840 --> 0:04:08.680 someone who has millions, like you know, Justin Bieber's got 0:04:08.960 --> 0:04:11.840 millions of followers on Twitter. Now he happens to be 0:04:11.960 --> 0:04:15.360 very influential on Twitter. So that's I've heard that. It's 0:04:15.400 --> 0:04:17.200 kind of a bad example. But let's say let's say 0:04:17.200 --> 0:04:19.520 you've got someone who's got over example. Let's say the 0:04:19.560 --> 0:04:21.640 same You've got someone who's got over a million followers, 0:04:21.800 --> 0:04:24.039 but for some reason, their cloud score is not that high. 0:04:24.360 --> 0:04:26.600 The reason for that might be that perhaps a lot 0:04:26.600 --> 0:04:29.679 of those followers aren't real people. They might be boughts, 0:04:30.279 --> 0:04:35.120 So that could be one factor. But what Fernandez wanted 0:04:35.120 --> 0:04:38.960 to do was measure how much impact a person has 0:04:39.040 --> 0:04:43.040 on their various social circles and on the web in general. Uh, 0:04:43.200 --> 0:04:45.839 not just how many people are following them and those 0:04:45.839 --> 0:04:49.120 are those are two different things. So he built this, 0:04:49.320 --> 0:04:54.039 uh this company and this algorithm helped to Yeah, the 0:04:54.400 --> 0:04:57.680 His side, of course, is called cloud with a k UM, 0:04:57.920 --> 0:05:02.440 and since its inception there have been other imitators. I 0:05:02.480 --> 0:05:04.960 don't know some of them were actually out beforehand. And 0:05:05.000 --> 0:05:09.279 Twitter itself is working on its own implementation of a 0:05:09.320 --> 0:05:12.120 similar software that would allow you to see, like when 0:05:12.160 --> 0:05:14.640 you tweet, how how much of your audience are you 0:05:14.720 --> 0:05:17.440 actually reaching when you send out a Twitter message. And 0:05:17.520 --> 0:05:19.840 this really applies to people who have lots and lots 0:05:19.839 --> 0:05:23.120 of followers. So for example, if you take me, I 0:05:23.160 --> 0:05:26.920 don't have you know, thousands and thousands of I've got 0:05:26.960 --> 0:05:29.560 like four thousand followers, which that's that's a that's a 0:05:29.600 --> 0:05:31.720 lot for me because I'm like, well, I'm just a guy, 0:05:31.839 --> 0:05:34.320 you know, I'm a guy that four thousand people follow 0:05:34.400 --> 0:05:37.400 I hope that I'm interesting enough to justify that. But 0:05:37.440 --> 0:05:40.120 there are other people out there who have millions of followers, 0:05:40.160 --> 0:05:42.760 but they don't know necessarily how many of those people 0:05:42.760 --> 0:05:45.240 they're reaching when they send out a message. Yeah, just 0:05:45.240 --> 0:05:48.280 just for independent confirmation, I am sitting here directly across 0:05:48.279 --> 0:05:53.600 from from Jonathan and he is in fact just a guy. Yes, um, 0:05:53.640 --> 0:05:55.480 I'm just a guy with a sixty five cloud score 0:05:55.520 --> 0:05:58.400 though that's true. And then and part of the reason 0:05:58.480 --> 0:06:00.960 that that Jonathan does have a five Cloud score, and 0:06:00.960 --> 0:06:03.760 that's of the day we're recording this. These things do change. 0:06:03.800 --> 0:06:05.480 It could be, it could be it could be in 0:06:05.480 --> 0:06:07.599 the low forties. By the fame of this Podcas goes out, 0:06:08.200 --> 0:06:11.400 part of the reason that that Jonathan has a cloud 0:06:11.440 --> 0:06:13.880 score of sixty five is because there are a lot 0:06:13.880 --> 0:06:17.400 of people following him. But he's also well networked with 0:06:17.520 --> 0:06:20.599 people also in the tech world. So there are people 0:06:20.640 --> 0:06:25.359 who share his tweets with other people. That's part of 0:06:25.360 --> 0:06:28.040 the score. There there are people who who talk back 0:06:28.080 --> 0:06:30.640 to him who also, boy do they talk back to me? 0:06:31.640 --> 0:06:35.080 Shut up? You? Uh see what I did there? Yes? 0:06:35.160 --> 0:06:37.720 I do. Who There are people who have conversations with 0:06:37.800 --> 0:06:40.360 him on Twitter, let's go with that, who are also 0:06:40.440 --> 0:06:45.920 influential in the Twitter sphere and on cloud and therefore, uh, 0:06:46.120 --> 0:06:51.600 that boosts his reputation um and his his ability to 0:06:51.839 --> 0:06:54.600 to network with other people, and so therefore he has 0:06:54.839 --> 0:06:57.400 a higher score than than maybe some other people with 0:06:57.440 --> 0:06:59.960 more followers. This might sound really familiar to you, especially 0:07:00.000 --> 0:07:03.320 if you are familiar with like Google's page rank algorithms 0:07:03.480 --> 0:07:05.719 what used to be called page rank. Anyway, Uh, the 0:07:05.800 --> 0:07:09.960 idea that Google would use this complex formula to determine 0:07:10.280 --> 0:07:15.000 how well various sites would rank and search for any 0:07:15.040 --> 0:07:19.400 particular term that you're searching for. So when you're searching for, 0:07:20.200 --> 0:07:24.480 I don't know, uh, cool tech gifts for the holidays, 0:07:24.880 --> 0:07:28.280 then Google would look through its use its algorithm and 0:07:28.360 --> 0:07:31.200 rank all these pages that relate to those search terms 0:07:31.520 --> 0:07:34.560 and give you the highest ranked ones. And that ranking 0:07:34.640 --> 0:07:37.160 is based on lots of different factors, including how many 0:07:37.160 --> 0:07:42.560 websites link into it, and how old that particular website 0:07:42.560 --> 0:07:45.120 that you're looking at is, and and other factors as well. 0:07:45.160 --> 0:07:47.360 There's a lot of stuff that goes into it. This 0:07:47.440 --> 0:07:50.280 is the same idea except for people instead of pages. 0:07:50.320 --> 0:07:53.360 It's it's how well a person ranks, partly due to 0:07:53.400 --> 0:07:56.760 their behavior online, partly due to their network that's around them, 0:07:56.800 --> 0:07:59.080 partly due to how many people are following them. There 0:07:59.120 --> 0:08:01.559 are a lot of different actors at play. There's actually 0:08:01.600 --> 0:08:04.440 a web page on cloud site that goes into the 0:08:04.480 --> 0:08:07.160 different factors that that they will admit to. Now, they 0:08:07.160 --> 0:08:11.120 don't give you the nuts and bolts. It's a secret 0:08:11.160 --> 0:08:13.520 sauce if you will. Clearly, you wouldn't want to be 0:08:13.600 --> 0:08:16.400 able to give out all the information, because then people 0:08:16.440 --> 0:08:18.800 would game the system like crazy just to get their 0:08:18.840 --> 0:08:21.480 cloud score up, which is not the purpose of the 0:08:21.760 --> 0:08:24.080 of the site at all, or to to start a 0:08:24.080 --> 0:08:28.240 competitor to another good point. Um, yeah, let's let's talk. 0:08:28.640 --> 0:08:32.160 I'll mention a little bit more about what what they say, Uh, 0:08:32.280 --> 0:08:37.360 competitors are critics, I should say, actually criticize cloud because 0:08:37.400 --> 0:08:41.040 it's usually the comparison I've seen is to a credit score, 0:08:41.679 --> 0:08:47.440 because the credit reporting agencies don't tell consumers what's actually 0:08:47.480 --> 0:08:50.920 going into your score. Um. And in the in the 0:08:50.960 --> 0:08:53.120 case of credit, it has to do with you know 0:08:53.440 --> 0:08:57.719 how much you spend, how quickly you pay it back? Um, 0:08:57.800 --> 0:08:59.800 you know how many cards credit cards you have? Are 0:09:00.000 --> 0:09:03.480 it accounts, lines of credit that you have opened, and 0:09:03.600 --> 0:09:06.200 lots of different little proprietary things, and each of them 0:09:06.240 --> 0:09:09.120 has a little different mix. Well, the cloud is sort 0:09:09.120 --> 0:09:11.480 of the same way. They tell you roughly what goes 0:09:11.520 --> 0:09:13.319 into it, but they don't tell you exactly how much 0:09:13.320 --> 0:09:16.640 weight each one carries. Um. It's based primarily on on 0:09:16.679 --> 0:09:19.480 Twitter and Facebook. Um, this is not really much of 0:09:19.480 --> 0:09:25.400 a secret. Things like mentions of your name and Facebook posts. Um. 0:09:25.600 --> 0:09:30.000 People who who are engaged with a lot of brands 0:09:30.120 --> 0:09:32.280 on there, the likes that you have, the TV shows 0:09:32.280 --> 0:09:36.120 you like, UM, the the UH stores that you like 0:09:36.320 --> 0:09:39.960 on Facebook, UM, the number of comments you have, people 0:09:39.960 --> 0:09:43.960 who subscribe to you, uh, the number of friends. Obviously 0:09:44.000 --> 0:09:46.120 that's a metric and obvious metric. You know, how many 0:09:46.160 --> 0:09:48.160 people follow you on Twitter, how many people follow you 0:09:48.200 --> 0:09:51.439 on Facebook, people who mention you on on Twitter, or 0:09:51.480 --> 0:09:55.280 people who um people you reply to and people who 0:09:55.320 --> 0:09:59.080 reply to you shows your engagement with that network. They've 0:09:59.120 --> 0:10:05.600 also extended it you to Google Plus, LinkedIn, four Square, Wikipedia, UM, 0:10:05.640 --> 0:10:09.920 things on on LinkedIn. UM they go by your reported title. 0:10:10.160 --> 0:10:12.440 So if you say you're CEO of the World then 0:10:12.480 --> 0:10:15.160 and guess that that would probably help your cloud score. Yeah. So, 0:10:15.400 --> 0:10:18.360 although I think that's probably hard to verify. These are 0:10:18.400 --> 0:10:22.920 relatively new in the in the cloud world. These these 0:10:23.000 --> 0:10:26.400 UM these items, because before what it was really looking 0:10:26.440 --> 0:10:29.040 at was Twitter and Facebook mainly, First it was Twitter, 0:10:29.080 --> 0:10:31.280 and then it was there in Facebook then and it 0:10:31.400 --> 0:10:35.480 also linked You could choose to link stuff to your 0:10:35.640 --> 0:10:38.760 your cloud. If you create a cloud account, you could 0:10:38.840 --> 0:10:42.440 choose to link things like Google Plus, Facebook, Twitter and 0:10:42.480 --> 0:10:45.280 other platforms as well. Now it looks at these other 0:10:45.440 --> 0:10:48.360 elements like Wikipedia, or if you are mentioned in something 0:10:48.400 --> 0:10:51.960 like the New York Times, so that it can determine 0:10:52.160 --> 0:10:56.800 all right, well, um, you know you're getting press, people 0:10:56.800 --> 0:10:59.319 are writing about you, so then that means you are 0:10:59.360 --> 0:11:01.760 more in Floyd Childen someone who is not getting pressed, 0:11:01.800 --> 0:11:04.959 So that would impact your score as well. Yeah, if 0:11:04.960 --> 0:11:08.000 you want to sign up for Cloud, you would sign 0:11:08.080 --> 0:11:11.520 up using your Twitter or Facebook information. Basically, once you're 0:11:11.520 --> 0:11:14.360 logged in, you can you can uh sign up for 0:11:14.400 --> 0:11:17.319 Cloud and it will access your account um and it 0:11:17.360 --> 0:11:20.520 will say, okay, do you want to add your other accounts? 0:11:20.520 --> 0:11:21.880 Do you want to add these other accounts? And they're 0:11:21.880 --> 0:11:24.280 even more than they're mentioned here, things like Flicker and 0:11:24.640 --> 0:11:27.680 other accounts and things um and so yeah, what what 0:11:27.760 --> 0:11:31.239 Jonathan said is is true. They're also measuring this information 0:11:31.400 --> 0:11:34.280 whether or not you sign up for Cloud. Yeah, because 0:11:34.320 --> 0:11:37.040 you're you're if you have a Twitter account and it's 0:11:37.080 --> 0:11:41.160 public and you are sending out messages, that's public record. 0:11:41.320 --> 0:11:44.360 That's stuff that anyone can access. So what Cloud does 0:11:44.480 --> 0:11:48.000 is it will automatically start to index you and look 0:11:48.080 --> 0:11:51.320 at how other people are responding to you. So whether 0:11:51.400 --> 0:11:54.000 you have signed up for Cloud or not, you may 0:11:54.040 --> 0:11:58.400 have a Cloud score and uh, you know the we 0:11:58.840 --> 0:12:01.880 have we mentioned what the range of scores is. It's 0:12:01.960 --> 0:12:05.720 between one and one hundred. So the higher your cloud score, 0:12:05.800 --> 0:12:08.040 the more the more cloud you have, and the more 0:12:08.120 --> 0:12:13.520 influence you would theoretically have over the web based upon uh, 0:12:13.720 --> 0:12:19.080 you know, the algorithms assessment of you. Most people are 0:12:19.200 --> 0:12:21.520 not like you would think the average would be fifty, 0:12:21.520 --> 0:12:24.600 but the average is really closer to the twenties range. 0:12:24.960 --> 0:12:28.600 And it's that the people who are fifty or higher 0:12:28.640 --> 0:12:34.480 are are assumed to be more influential in whatever fields 0:12:34.520 --> 0:12:38.520 they've been identified as being experts in. Yeah, I mean, 0:12:38.840 --> 0:12:41.679 I'm sorry. I was gonna say, if you sign up, 0:12:41.720 --> 0:12:43.840 you'll find out that they ask you, hey, what are 0:12:43.880 --> 0:12:46.040 you influential in? Yeah, And it turns out like if 0:12:46.040 --> 0:12:47.920 I log into my cloud and I'd look to see 0:12:47.960 --> 0:12:50.319 what I'm influential in. There's some things you would expect, 0:12:50.320 --> 0:12:53.200 you know, like technology is up there, which that that 0:12:53.280 --> 0:12:56.400 makes sense. I do a tech podcast, I write tech 0:12:56.520 --> 0:12:59.760 articles for a website. Uh, that makes sense. There are 0:12:59.760 --> 0:13:03.400 other things like Atlanta restaurants. Huh, I didn't know that 0:13:03.440 --> 0:13:06.480 I was that influential with Atlanta restaurants. I should get 0:13:06.480 --> 0:13:09.920 better tables darn it. Um. But yeah, there there are 0:13:09.960 --> 0:13:12.000 other things that I look at on that people have 0:13:12.080 --> 0:13:15.520 identified me as being influential, and some of them maybe jokes, 0:13:17.320 --> 0:13:19.800 but that's that's kind of interesting to me. Yeah, And 0:13:19.840 --> 0:13:22.640 I think I think here is a good point to 0:13:22.760 --> 0:13:25.680 point out. And then there are critics and their proponents 0:13:25.679 --> 0:13:28.840 of cloud, just like anything else. But um, I think 0:13:28.920 --> 0:13:30.800 it's a good point to go right down the middle 0:13:30.840 --> 0:13:34.400 and say, look, this is what one person and his 0:13:34.520 --> 0:13:37.560 company have done, you know, as as as Joe built 0:13:37.600 --> 0:13:41.040 this company up, this is how they chose to measure people. 0:13:41.480 --> 0:13:45.400 And it's not it's it's based on one system, so 0:13:45.440 --> 0:13:47.920 it's not really I think, Uh, it was a couple 0:13:47.920 --> 0:13:49.520 of years ago, or was a couple of years ago 0:13:49.720 --> 0:13:53.080 last year where they where they rejiggered the algorithm, and 0:13:53.440 --> 0:13:55.679 was this year? It was this year. It was late 0:13:56.920 --> 0:14:01.160 some earlier this year when they changed it because my score, 0:14:01.600 --> 0:14:08.280 my score skyrocketed. I had been around sixty two and uh, 0:14:08.600 --> 0:14:11.240 and then I jumped all the way up to sixty nine. 0:14:11.360 --> 0:14:14.079 I was almost seventy. It was very close to seventy, 0:14:14.080 --> 0:14:17.480 and I was thinking, whoa, how did that happen? Holy cow? 0:14:17.520 --> 0:14:20.040 I'm more and I started comparing myself because it cars. 0:14:20.120 --> 0:14:23.880 You know, I'm a bit of an egomaniac, you know, 0:14:24.040 --> 0:14:26.120 I admit this, and so I was like, let me 0:14:26.160 --> 0:14:28.960 see what my good friend I as actar of this 0:14:29.000 --> 0:14:31.400 weekend tech Let me on tech news today. Let me 0:14:31.400 --> 0:14:35.400 see what how he ranks. Oh, he's he's at sixty five. 0:14:35.520 --> 0:14:38.960 He's lower than I am. Gosh I as and of 0:14:38.960 --> 0:14:41.960 course now I think he I think he ranks rightfully 0:14:42.040 --> 0:14:45.960 so above me, because these things, do you know? It 0:14:46.040 --> 0:14:48.400 was it was like an initial shock because people's scores 0:14:48.480 --> 0:14:50.880 changed pretty dramatically. Some went up quite a bit, some 0:14:50.920 --> 0:14:56.200 went down, and then it's been slowly kind of readjusting 0:14:56.240 --> 0:14:58.120 to where it needs to be based on all this 0:14:58.200 --> 0:15:01.760 new information. Um, and you know this, this could be 0:15:01.760 --> 0:15:04.360 really challenging because you're building an algorithm that needs to 0:15:04.400 --> 0:15:07.800 identify people, and it needs to be able to make 0:15:07.800 --> 0:15:09.880 sure it links to the right person, because, as it 0:15:09.880 --> 0:15:13.320 turns out, there's some folks out there who share the 0:15:13.360 --> 0:15:16.560 same name as other people, and so you have a 0:15:16.600 --> 0:15:18.840 lot of false positives. For instance, if you were to 0:15:18.880 --> 0:15:22.160 search Jonathan Strickland in the metro Atlanta area, Uh, some 0:15:22.240 --> 0:15:24.160 mug shots to be popping up and none of them 0:15:24.200 --> 0:15:29.040 are me today today. Okay, but let's be fair. Today, 0:15:29.080 --> 0:15:31.320 here's the recording of this podcast of those mug shots 0:15:31.320 --> 0:15:35.680 would be me. Who knows what tomorrow may brain. But 0:15:35.680 --> 0:15:37.200 but that's the thing is that I could end up 0:15:37.240 --> 0:15:39.120 identifying this stuff like, oh, John, this is being written 0:15:39.120 --> 0:15:43.720 about in criminal newsletters. That's odd. But I guess that 0:15:43.800 --> 0:15:46.480 ad just his cloud score, Like, no, that's not me. 0:15:46.680 --> 0:15:50.040 That's another Jonathan Strickland and the same spelling and everything. 0:15:50.120 --> 0:15:52.400 But you know, so the algorithm has to take that 0:15:52.400 --> 0:15:55.440 stuff into account. The other thing that's kind of a 0:15:55.480 --> 0:15:59.840 controversy with clout is how companies are using clout in 0:16:00.040 --> 0:16:04.200 various ways. Guys, it's Jonathan from two thousand nineteena interrupting 0:16:04.200 --> 0:16:07.760 this classical episode because I don't yet have quite enough 0:16:07.800 --> 0:16:10.640 clout to get away with this without taking a break 0:16:10.760 --> 0:16:21.920 to thank our sponsor. So what is cloud other than 0:16:21.920 --> 0:16:25.480 other than influence? A measure of influence in the social 0:16:25.520 --> 0:16:28.960 media world. An idea of of that, what does cloud 0:16:29.040 --> 0:16:33.240 get you? Very little or or al or a lot, 0:16:33.640 --> 0:16:37.600 depending on how high your cloud already is. Um, yeah, 0:16:37.720 --> 0:16:40.960 it's cloud is a weird thing. In some cases, all 0:16:41.000 --> 0:16:43.240 it might get you is bragging rights in the sense 0:16:43.280 --> 0:16:46.200 of you know you, you measure your cloud against your buddy, 0:16:46.280 --> 0:16:49.640 like your buddy i azactar of this weekend tech news today, 0:16:50.000 --> 0:16:52.440 and then you say, hey, look at that, or you 0:16:52.520 --> 0:16:55.600 may say cloud scores going up because you mentioned in 0:16:56.040 --> 0:16:59.240 very well and deservedly. So the man does good work. 0:17:00.240 --> 0:17:02.760 As much as I joke. He he is an actual 0:17:02.800 --> 0:17:06.040 friend of mine. Uh so, maybe not after this podcast, 0:17:06.359 --> 0:17:10.919 but he. You know, the these these numbers for a 0:17:11.000 --> 0:17:13.280 large part of the population may not mean much, although 0:17:13.320 --> 0:17:17.840 it can tell you how effective you are online. So 0:17:17.880 --> 0:17:20.520 in a in a sense, it's doing what it's supposed 0:17:20.520 --> 0:17:22.359 to do. It's telling you what your impact is. And 0:17:22.400 --> 0:17:25.520 if your impact is low, you might say, you know what, 0:17:26.280 --> 0:17:27.960 you might be cool with it. You might be saying, oh, 0:17:28.040 --> 0:17:30.000 you know, I just use this for fun, to stay 0:17:30.000 --> 0:17:31.639 in touch with my friends. That's all I use it 0:17:31.680 --> 0:17:34.040 for that. I don't care. But if you're trying to 0:17:34.040 --> 0:17:37.120 get a message out there, then what it's telling you 0:17:37.240 --> 0:17:40.720 is your message is not being heard. It's not it's 0:17:40.720 --> 0:17:44.640 not punishing you. This number is related back to that algorithm, 0:17:44.920 --> 0:17:46.680 and if you want to make sure your message is 0:17:46.720 --> 0:17:49.320 heard by more people, you need to look into ways 0:17:49.600 --> 0:17:52.480 of delivering that message in in a in a way 0:17:52.480 --> 0:17:55.359 that that interests people, that gets other people talking, that 0:17:55.880 --> 0:17:59.040 goes beyond just your immediate circle of followers. And if 0:17:59.080 --> 0:18:01.280 you're able to crack that code. And by the way, 0:18:01.400 --> 0:18:04.000 I do not have the secret sauce for that. There 0:18:04.000 --> 0:18:06.600 are some messages I send out there that go bonkers 0:18:06.880 --> 0:18:09.000 and I think, Wow, that's amazing, and then I and 0:18:09.040 --> 0:18:11.320 then I'll sit there and I'll craft what I think 0:18:11.359 --> 0:18:16.480 is the most brilliant, funny, uh timely tweet of all time, 0:18:16.480 --> 0:18:18.840 and I send it out and no one replies, no 0:18:18.880 --> 0:18:22.280 one favorites, no one retweets. So I mean, I don't 0:18:22.280 --> 0:18:24.320 have that secret sauce. Definitely you need to ask people 0:18:24.359 --> 0:18:26.120 who have a much higher cloth score than I do. 0:18:26.440 --> 0:18:28.600 But if your score is low, that could be an 0:18:28.600 --> 0:18:31.000 indicator that, hey, you need to change things so that 0:18:31.080 --> 0:18:33.440 you can make sure that whatever message you're sending out 0:18:33.440 --> 0:18:35.960 there is being heard by the right people. Yeah, yeah, 0:18:36.000 --> 0:18:39.359 and so and and for somebody like um, you know, 0:18:39.480 --> 0:18:43.479 for politicians for example, yeah, um, this is incredibly important. 0:18:43.720 --> 0:18:47.040 Or entrepreneurs want who get their name out. And then 0:18:47.080 --> 0:18:50.680 there's the the other group of people who are are 0:18:51.119 --> 0:18:53.800 short of in between there there, they're doing this shorter 0:18:53.800 --> 0:18:56.200 because they want to, and then they might be getting 0:18:56.920 --> 0:19:02.520 perks are cloud perks. So if you are an influential person, 0:19:03.200 --> 0:19:07.160 then you are an attractive person for certain brands. If 0:19:07.240 --> 0:19:11.080 you are influential in a particular field. Let's say with me, 0:19:11.160 --> 0:19:15.840 I'm apparently I'm influential one technology and Atlanta restaurants. Then 0:19:15.920 --> 0:19:18.640 let's say an Atlanta restaurant opens up and they are 0:19:19.200 --> 0:19:24.040 cloud savvy, they understand how cloud works. They and they know, Hey, 0:19:24.240 --> 0:19:27.719 if we convinced this guy to come into our restaurant 0:19:28.359 --> 0:19:31.159 and eat our food, and we really pull out all 0:19:31.160 --> 0:19:33.359 the stops, he's gonna go out and he's going to 0:19:33.440 --> 0:19:36.960 talk about this incredible experience he had. And because his 0:19:37.080 --> 0:19:40.160 influence is high in this area, that means we could 0:19:40.200 --> 0:19:43.920 see a return on that investment. We could see people 0:19:44.000 --> 0:19:47.920 come in because we tapped the right person to talk 0:19:47.960 --> 0:19:51.320 about this, and that can go across all sorts of industries. 0:19:51.359 --> 0:19:52.919 So that being said, I'll come out and say it 0:19:53.040 --> 0:19:55.919 right now. I have not received any cloud perks. I 0:19:55.960 --> 0:19:58.679 am not I don't use cloud to get cloud perks. 0:19:58.720 --> 0:20:02.120 I'm not saying that I would ever use one. If 0:20:02.160 --> 0:20:05.800 one came along that was just unbelievable, and I'm like, hey, 0:20:05.840 --> 0:20:08.199 this is exactly why I need and exactly how I 0:20:08.240 --> 0:20:10.680 need it. I would probably do it, but I've never 0:20:10.760 --> 0:20:13.800 had that. I've never had that happen. Yeah. The companies, 0:20:13.920 --> 0:20:17.120 the companies involved in cloud perks are generally people who 0:20:17.200 --> 0:20:21.720 want to do some promotion. That's it's pretty simple. Um. 0:20:21.800 --> 0:20:25.119 And so once you get your cloud score up to 0:20:25.200 --> 0:20:27.719 a certain level, and it could it depends on what 0:20:27.760 --> 0:20:29.919 it is. Yeah, it depends on the company. Like some 0:20:29.960 --> 0:20:33.600 companies will say, Okay, anyone who's below a seventy five, 0:20:33.800 --> 0:20:36.440 we're not interested in because that's not that's not worth 0:20:36.520 --> 0:20:38.960 the time it would take to do this. Yeah, but 0:20:39.000 --> 0:20:42.720 you might, um, you might pass let's say thirty, and 0:20:42.760 --> 0:20:46.560 they'll say, hey, people with cloud score of thirty, we'll 0:20:46.560 --> 0:20:49.480 give you a coupon for a free UM six pack 0:20:49.520 --> 0:20:52.960 of our new soda flavor. Go ahead and redeem it 0:20:52.960 --> 0:20:54.840 at your local store, you know, tell us where to 0:20:54.880 --> 0:20:57.520 mail the coupon. So they mail the coupon and you 0:20:57.560 --> 0:20:59.120 get the beverage and you try and you go, hey, 0:20:59.119 --> 0:21:01.800 this stuff is pretty good what they're hoping. But there 0:21:01.840 --> 0:21:04.400 is no requirement to do what they're hoping is you're 0:21:04.440 --> 0:21:07.119 going to share that experience with their friends. Hey, I 0:21:07.200 --> 0:21:09.480 was Uncloud. They sent me a coupon. I tried this stuff. 0:21:09.640 --> 0:21:12.200 It tastes like a combination of mangoes and feet, But 0:21:12.240 --> 0:21:14.080 I happen to like the taste of mangoes and feet. 0:21:14.480 --> 0:21:17.520 So I'm gonna, you know, tweet this on Facebook and 0:21:17.560 --> 0:21:20.200 Twitter and put it on my Google Plus account and 0:21:20.480 --> 0:21:23.720 mentioned it on LinkedIn. That you just did exactly what 0:21:23.760 --> 0:21:28.080 the promoters were what apparently my choice of mangoes and 0:21:28.119 --> 0:21:31.800 feet was not just having I just want to do 0:21:31.960 --> 0:21:34.680 something so trying not to think about that taste right now. 0:21:35.760 --> 0:21:38.199 I just wanted to say something silly. I don't like 0:21:38.320 --> 0:21:42.119 mangoes and I really don't like feet. But yeah, okay, 0:21:42.160 --> 0:21:45.480 so um so that's essentially what they're hoping that that 0:21:45.600 --> 0:21:50.159 will say that clout for it for its uh, you know, 0:21:50.280 --> 0:21:53.440 just to to promote its own credibility here. And I 0:21:53.480 --> 0:21:55.680 feel like it's fair to mention this Cloud says there's 0:21:55.720 --> 0:22:01.200 absolutely no obligation on your part as a cloud participant. 0:22:01.720 --> 0:22:03.960 If you get a perk to promote it in any 0:22:03.960 --> 0:22:06.280 way at all, you can take them up on the perk. 0:22:06.320 --> 0:22:09.240 You can decline the perk. You can tweet about it 0:22:09.359 --> 0:22:13.040 or not. Um and uh, and you know it's up 0:22:13.040 --> 0:22:15.399 to you whether you you could say, hey, this stuff 0:22:15.440 --> 0:22:17.640