Firstly, congrats to the winner @colinnixon and thanks to @dekrazee1 @froosh @shanewilliamson @omniwolf & Kenny for bumping up the price!

Here’s my learnings:

• Auctioning stuff for charity is hard
• It takes a lot of time, correspondence, Q&A, photos etc to get people interested
• Guilting people to bid does not work
• Ebay doesn’t allow you to state that an auction is for charity unless you’re an official representative. So, I used Wordpress instead. People pledged in the comments field, and the highest bidder won!
• One downside of a Wordpress auction? Is wasn’t real time, and it was a little difficult to know what everyone was posting (kind of like shooting in the dark). *Curse that refresh button!*
• Probably obvious to most, but people only commit to bidding close to the end of the auction. So, when asked on twitter ‘what time does the auction close’ I stupidly said ‘Let’s say… midnight’ so we all had to wait around til bidding closed. I’m guessing I would have received more bids if it was earlier in the day.
• Whilst my midnight Wordpress auction wasn’t very practical, it was a lot more fun than Ebay! It definitely had a more personal feel & I would definitely do it all again!

Thanks again to #cccsyd for a great event… and watch out – I’m already planning for next year (You think I’m joking?).

Remember, it’s never too late to donate to RSPCA! (Just add “CUPCAKES” in the ‘position’ field).

The reciprocity diagram works for existing social interaction within society, but shifts when you apply it to social media. What we are willing to exchange with our ‘home’ is the same/similar to what we are willing to exchange with our ‘village’ and even the ‘inter-tribal’ sector.

How it used to be.

In traditional village societies, it was easier to decipher… there was generalised, balanced and negative reciprocity.

Generalised = sharing/giving when nothing is expected in return (reciprication here is an emotion – how you feel when you share or do a good deed), maximum trust and minimum social distance (typically within general societies, usually reserved for close friends and family), eg. Making chicken soup for a sick friend.

Negative = barter, where goods of equal value are traded, with minimum trust and maximum social distance, eg. I’ll swap you my cow for 3 sheep.

Balanced = someone gives something to someone else but expects they will be ‘compensated’ at a future date, with moderate trust and moderate social distance, eg. you give your neighbour a cup of sugar but you expect that you can then borrow their lawnmower.

The problem here is that this type of reciprocity does not fit with social networking (online). Think of youtube for instance. What do you expect to receive when you post a video? Is it solely satisfaction or an expectation that you will be ‘repaid’ in future with something of equal value? Reciprocity on all levels can be played out across all social circles, which changes the value of what we exchange.

To use family portraits as an example… in the 1800’s well to do families would have their portrait painted, and they would share it with anyone who entered their home. With the arrival of photography and the printing press, images could be ’snapped’ rather quickly and distributed to those in your community. Enter digital cameras and online social networks and your family snaps are available to everyone, everywhere. The perceived value of your images may (or may not) be of more value to your inner circle than your outer circle… but the exchange occurs simultaneously with your friends, family, your home, community…. and with the global community (should you decide to post your images on a public network).

How it is now.

So, what exactly does reciprocity mean for netizen and how would the circles of reciprocity be redrawn for social media? Would it look something like this….

Balanced and Generalised forms of reciprocity are compressed and altered. The exchange offers maximum trust (ie. that unkown users aren’t going to use the information/material in an untoward way), but also allows for maximum social distance through the global network. Youtube is a good example of this. Some users post videos expecting nothing in return, they do it because they know the community will appreciate it. Others share their videos, but expect that one day they will be ‘compensated’ ie. someone will post an equally valuable video at some stage in the future.

Negative is reserved primarily for ecommerce sites, be it Amazon or Ebay, and is largely unchanged.

Web2.0 technologies not only change the way we view exchanges within our community, but change the frequency, type and access to different forms of reciprocity.

Through social networking, we can exchange information with those in our outer circles, and in doing so, expand ourselves as we eliminiate the divisive social circles through online exchange.

What do you think?