Recently, Ecademy a UK based site did just that as they tightened the noose in an apparent attempt to bring in more paid memberships.For a couple of months I've engaged myself into learning more about social networking sites and try to come to some sense of use and purpose for how to effectively use these sites for business and personal purposes. I'll admit, I'm a bit perplexed by this site.
The Ecademy site prior to the recent change allowed free members--that are referred to by other members as Greystars--to post and reply to Blogs authored by paid subscribers. Evidently, the traffic cops noticed too many interactions coming from the "gray" community and decided to change the policies on the site.
In previous polls other members asked, "Should Greystars be able to send email on Ecademy?" While some members stated, "Why I should I pay for free members" many more thought the restriction counterproductive. My question to Ecademy remains unanswered: "Please define Social Networking."
What's coming down are massive postings, tweets, and re-tweets against Ecademy's new policy restricting further interactions from free memberships or the Greys-Greystars. In effect, one person that is unhappy has already told ten other people by clicking on the "Like" icon of the post describing why he/she is unhappy with the policy. Then, to make matters worse, by liking a post about not liking Ecademy's policy change that Ecademy didn't inform their members about--the exponential message is sent out to others across the web. Social Madness! For corporate users there's a simple lesson to learn here about the failure to communicate. Unfortunately for Ecademy, they haven't realized the consequences of their actions and are defending their rationalization to bring about more revenue.
