Online social networks are a way of accumulating social capital. However the real values of that capital in terms of exchangeable currency are not known. This is important if the social capitalist is to know that their social exchanges are paying off.
This is an idea for an app or official site software modification. Basically the dollar value of a given network is generated based on the accumulation of individual users and their relations. How the final figures are generated will not be outlined here, but some considerations follow.
Users willfully provide personal financial information regarding income and assets. This alone isn't an important factor however. Users rate how valuable another user is in terms dollar value. Most obviously, if someone has secured you employment as an employer or as a job connection you assign them a value equal to your earnings. Least obviously, and most revealing of the sinister nature of social exchange, harmonized dollar values are placed on all exchanges from sex to helping you move. Negative values are also possible for people who cost you money in various ways.
On a quarterly basis a social capitalist can count their gains and losses. Have their sexual escapades paid off, are the contacts you have amassed largely worthless, are you Facebook(tm) bourgeoisie, or lumpenproletariat?-- rcarty, Sep 29 2011 Your Network Worth Your_20Network_20Worth [theircompetitor, Oct 07 2012] I'm sorry, I thought this was the bathroom...-- Alterother, Sep 29 2011 //willfully// willingly?-- MaxwellBuchanan, Sep 29 2011 No someone made me do it.
But no not willingly because capitalism coerces the worker to sell herself as commodity.-- rcarty, Sep 29 2011 I still say you're flushing your money away.-- Alterother, Sep 29 2011 Sounds like a splendid idea to me.-- DrBob, Sep 30 2011 No one's going to like this, but the for the negligible revenue the large sites make by invading your privacy, serving up ads, etc., you might just as well pay small, outright subscription fees, provided they wouldn't keep using their ad-trackers anyway.-- 4and20, Oct 07 2012 The idea is about having your social self alienated and using it for social exchange. It was something I was thinking about when I was dissonant about giving away so much of myself for nothing only to widen disparity potentially creating a new extreme for my social status.-- rcarty, Oct 07 2012 It's possible that consciousness itself commodifies, since the limited scope of your conscious self inevitably reduces totality or openness in some way.-- 4and20, Oct 08 2012 If we both understand commodifies means 'evaluates' or produces a relative value for something then certain consciousnesses that have achieved some totality or are open in some particular way could be of some value.-- rcarty, Oct 09 2012 random, halfbakery