As social networking continues to find its niche and importance as a collaborative enabler, some folks (myself included) believe that person-centric designs (while helpful in some situations) may fall short for business cases.

Imagine if you were to build a social interaction map based on the creation and utilization of information objects. Mapping the social fabric based on who knows whom is but one axis. What if you mapped it based on who invited whom to read ‘x’, and then based on which invitees accepted and which ones didn’t? Capturing information transactions appear to provide new axis with which to measure and understand the social fabric.

“Could the next generation of online communications strengthen civil society by better connecting people to others with whom they share affinities, so they can more effectively exchange information and self-organize?” — The Augmented Social Network (First Monday)

In some cases, this question can be answered ‘yes’, but in other cases, the cart is in front of the horse. Isn’t it possible that the opposite is true? The exchange of information provides a map that ultimately supercharges the social fabric of an organization causing the members to leverage their connections. Instead of mapping people to each other solely on interests, consider mapping them based on information exchange and let them use the map to connect more.

To effectively use social networks to increase the capacity of information workers to act wisely (e.g., a working definition of KM), they need to know who appreciates their information output, not necessarily who they know that you don’t.