Selection is a natural; so is categorizing; so is ranking; so is list-making.
We owe a lot of great things to the human tendency to rank & classify. We wouldn’t have science (and therefore we wouldn’t have a whole bunch of other things)… Think of biology and chemistry.
Unfortunately, it also means discriminating. A list isn’t so much about what’s on it as what (or who) is not on it.
So, wary of that, Chris Brogan has expressed some dissent from Twitter’s new lists feature.
Admitting it’s one thing to make a list of things, the game changes when it becomes personal:
In talking with friends about it on Twitter, people immediately started DM-ing me, telling me that they felt left out or even LESS important because they weren’t on any lists. Lists are exclusionary by nature. They’re static. There’s a lot of reasons why they might not be all that pleasant for people.
The same thing concerned me too.
I haven’t made any lists yet because, like Brogan, I didn’t want to exclude anybody.
Sorry, let me rephrase that: yes, I did want to exclude people; no, I do not want those people to feel bad about being excluded — nor do I want them to hate me.
Ironically, Brogan did hurt someone’s feelings: Robert Scoble’s.
Scoble seems to be riding a wave of euphoria over Twitter lists so it didn’t take long for him to come dashing in to defend the honour of his betrothed:
I can’t STAND this attitude that everyone should be included in everything.
I should NOT be on a list of golfing greats. Heck, I’ve never even played the game, but let’s say I played. Are you KIDDING ME by saying I should be mentioned in the same breath as Tiger Woods?
At first it seems very over-the-top — not really getting Brogan’s point either.
Of course Scoble doesn’t care if he’s not on a list of golfing greats, but he might care if someone left him off a list of tech bloggers, or smart people, or people worth debating.
Then again he might not, because he knows he’s influential and list-worthy. He’d make most people’s lists and a few anomalous exclusions would come out in the wash.
But imagine someone who works hard but doesn’t have a huge profile, they’ve corresponded with Brogan a little — maybe they were on the same panel at a conference once too. This person would expect to be on one of Brogan’s lists. If not, feelings might be hurt and relationships damaged — and I suspect there are a lot of people potentially in this position.
Given the nature of Chris Brogan’s brand, it doesn’t take much imagination to understand he wouldn’t be keen to pick favourites (and, in effect, non-favourites) from the follower list he has already invested so much in.
But there’s some insight in Scoble’s argument. [And I should say, God bless these guys. I'm a huge fan of both.]
Lists shouldn’t be so subjective, they shouldn’t simply be about pleasing people or playing favourites (unless that’s you’re thing, and if that’s really you’re thing than roll with it). They should have some kind of objective merit attached to them — something by which the rest of us can evaluate how well you selected.
On the other hand, we don’t all have to make all-inclusive inventories of “social media experts,” or of every startup founder and VC on Twitter.
Good lists are objectively accountable but also demonstrate a degree of selectivity.
Jay Rosen is creating a good balance. He has a list of “best mindcasters I know” and he explained how he defines that. He also has a list of “young smart newsies” and before doing that he openly made a call for young journalists who might qualify.
So if he overlooks somebody then he’s got something to fall back on, and if someone really thinks they belong there are opportunities to earn it — though ultimately if Rosen doesn’t think you make the cut, that’s his call… and I think the web is better for having people willing to make those kinds of discriminations.
Smaller, more specific, and more exclusive lists tend to be more meaningful — at least on a human level.
Discernment is more communicative than sheer volume. It doesn’t just represent the people on (or off) the list, it’s more a representation of the person who created it.
Look for great storytellers.
Stories don’t work if the storyteller tries to include every detail; the listener/reader quickly gets lost. Great stories focus on a few key facts supplemented by a handful of complementary details.
And there’s a saying in music that the true masters don’t just know what to play, they know what not to play.
An untrained ear might be impressed by flurries of noise, but pure technical proficiency without selectivity is a characteristic of youth. Lots of people can wail, far fewer manage to develop a discerned and expressive style.
Nuanced and carefully constructed patterns might seem arbitrary to outsiders but they’re a kind of secret sign of expertise to fellow masters who have learned the craft and understand reasons for things.
Before trying to invent an expensive and sophisticated system for real-time search (looking a little further into the future), maybe we should consider the solution might simply be to skillfully select and cultivate our networks: learn to identify others who do the same.
The rest follows.
Maintain only the most rich and vital connections and they’ll deliver everything you need — and nothing more.