Tech

The future of social networks

Back in February Esther Dyson wrote in the Wall Street Journal about the changing advertising landscape. She suggested that even new highly personalised advertising technologies are only a temporary fad, and that social networks are the future for promotion.

So it's interesting to read that a user account in a social network is up for sale. The account holder has a set of "followers" who will automatically receive any message he sends. And therein lies the value.

Is this the future for social networks? A world of fake (but compelling) accounts which are then sold to the highest bidder for whatever use they like? If it was email we'd call it spam.