With the proliferation over the last several years of social networks / social media sites / social networking utilities it has become increasingly easier for people to get their message, ideas, agendas out in front of a large audience with little effort. These tools have made it easy to amass a large following, whether they be FRIENDS / Friends or friends, and once you have put in the time to cultivate your following, getting your message out is easy. From friends on Facebook, to followers on Twitter to followers on Mixx, these tools are the platform to get your message out.

There is a fine line that we all must walk when it comes to “pimping” our stuff, if we “pimp” too much, the value of our content is lessened and perhaps our credibility is tarnished. With that being said, there are some that do not even recognize the line exists or do not care about it’s existence. Those are the ones that I feel are gaming the system(s). They have amassed a following and then either flood them with stuff or get them to vote (on social media sites) their stuff up simply because they follow that person and feel that whatever they vote up, the other will return the favor. This sort of scratch my back and I will scratch yours mentality has the potential to create an environment where sub par content is being popularized when in reality it is not worth the popularity it is garnering.

Whether it be a networking utility to socialize an URL of a blog post, or a social network where I am trying to leverage a friend to make a connection or submitting something to a social media site, I go out of my way to make sure that I am not taking advantage of my contacts and only try to share good content. At the end of the day, we all want to feel special in some little way that is why we join these social networks. For me, my reputation on all of these sites is important and I do not want to do anything to harm that, like perhaps game the system. People pick up on that quickly and before you know it, you become a friend’s list of one.