One thing that has really intrigued me about network effects is that many network-websites have mediocre user interfaces. The forum I mentioned before is one example and I also consider the Twitter and Facebook platforms to be sub-par. They are all sustained by their extensive networks (and the network creates a natural barrier to new entrants.)

Obviously if the user experience gets bad enough people will jump ship. I guess that is one of the key drawbacks of any web 2.0 network – an active engaged community has more power than the company hosting the community.

Interesting discussion! I can’t wait to read your sci-fi novel!

Many thanks for the link – I’m amazed that it’s so traditional in form…and yet obviously works really well for its community!

Perhaps I imagined this but I think I read something about how the larger a non-transactional network becomes, the more chance there will be a schism among its contributors. This is because there will come a point where a large enough identifiable segment within that community ‘becomes sentient’ to the point that it recognises that the existing forum does not fulfill its needs.

Actually, that looks a bit like the precis of a sci-fi novel – but any view on it nevertheless?

Thanks for the note. Travelmuse is doing some exciting things. Keep up the good work!

Stephen -

Great comment. I’m a big fan of the Tracking Tourism Blog, so it’s good to see you here.

You make a great point about quality of product. If the product doesn’t offer a unique value to the consumer then no amount of promotion is really going to cause a network to take off.

Sorry my last link wasn’t working. It is the TGR ski forum – http://www.tetongravity.com/forums. It is an interesting community that originated on the Powder Magazine website. One of the Powder administrators did something to offend the community and all of the forum members agreed to find a new forum on another site. The forum will see 100K monthly visitors this winter and probably produces reasonable revenue for TGR. The story makes me wonder if a mass community movement on Facebook or Twitter could convince everyone to change to a more user-friendly platform.

Great article – I’m a bit annoyed that I hadn’t thought of this!

It strikes me that the tactics outlined above for securing early users are pretty much all promotional tactics and this is a legitimate approach.

But if we are assuming a transactional network, I would also stress that the product needs to be right and offer users something either new or better than the process they had previously used. Typically it should make the process easier and less painful but it could also be about trust.

in this context, I’m interested in your last point where you wrote about the site that got its start when a large crowd decided to abandon their existing forum (the link isn’t working for me so can’t check it out) – can you say a little more about why?

Fiona @travelmuse