Social media value propositions of Twitter, Reddit, Facebook, Instagram, TikTok

I found it interesting to observe how each platform’s unique features invite different types of content.

The recent popularity of Clubhouse is a reminder that likely there are many feature combinations unexplored that may potentially be more optimal for new and existing types of content.

Twitter
(1) forced concision
(2) public audience & assymetric (non-mutual follow) by default
(2→3) follow people smarter than you in their area of expertise
(1,2,3→4) broad overview of the juiciest happenings in different fields
(4→5) good for intellectually curious people with no time to spend on in-depth analysis

Reddit
(1) tyranny of the majority / lowest common denominator
(2) controversial ideas buried by default
(1,2→3) wisdom of the crowd
(3) no word limit; more patience for long form, in-depth discussion
(3→4) good for narrow-interest groups
(5) anonymous by default
(1,2,5→6) also good for silly memes pandering to baser instincts

Facebook
(1) private audience & symmetric (mutual follow) by default
(1→2) sharing personal issues that only close friends will care about
(1->3) Narrow-interest groups with content too unsavoury / controversial to be public (otherwise it’d be on Reddit)

Instagram
(1) pictures by default; short videos
(1→2) peacocking, narcissism
(1→3) photography
(1→4) dogstagram

TikTok
(1) short videos only
(1→2) antics set to music
(3) algorithm decides what you watch next
(2,3→4) indulge baser instincts (targeted by algorithm)

(Also experimenting with a concise way of presenting relationships between ideas.)