(Ir)religiosity

After two weeks of interweb percolation, Kevin Watson has posted the results of the UM Social Media experiment.

There were 759 views of the YouTube video promoting Reclaiming the Wesleyan Tradition: John Wesley’s Sermons for Today There were 44 hits to the video when I discovered it and posted it on the Methodist blogosphere. At the end of the first week there were 619 views. This means that the momentum slowed down significantly after the first week as there were 140 views in the second week. (On the other hand, that is still more than three times as many views as the video had in its first six months of existence.)

About a week ago I posted a comment on Kevin’s update of the traffic.  Maybe it’s because I had really low expectations going in, but I was surprised at the results.  I still am to some extent, especially with the increase of views in the first week.  A mere twenty-five blogs generated almost 600 unique hits.  I think that is pretty good.

Others have expressed some disappointment with the results.  That’s understandable.  The video itself  has been criticized; both the production and what it was plugging were lifted up as possible reasons behind why more persons didn’t participate and why the traffic dropped off after about a week.  The production/content problem looks to be true and the traffic issue may have more to do with the dynamics of viral marketing than anything else (though, this was not at all a true viral phenomenon) I think. A small number of initial participants necessarily limits the spread, especially after the initial peak in traffic.

Which lead me to my main disappointment of the whole thing.  Only 25 bloggers participated.  Just glancing over the MethoBlog I can see more than 25 links.  So why such a small number?  Is the actual number of active Methobloggers much lower than what has been compiled at the MethoBlog?  Or did most Methobloggers think the vido simply wasn’t good enough to be promoted on their blog? Or, are Methobloggers simply not effectively networked with one another?

I’m not sure.  Of all those questions, I think the third is really worth reflecting upon.  Especially since connectionalism one of our tradition’s most heralded hallmarks.  How does that translate into the online, social media-oriented world?  Are we really capitalizing on those resources?

What are you thoughts?  How can Methobloggers be more effectively connected and networked with one another?