EONS

1
EONS

• Myspace for the Baby Boomer generation

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What does Eon mean?

• According to Wikipedia, an eon (sometimes spelled
  aeon) is a period of time arbitrarily designated
  by humans.
• It appears that the name eons was chosen for
  this social network because of the age bracket
  that the company focuses on.

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About Eons

• Launched on July 13, 2006
• Currently has almost 90,000 registered users
• Is overseen by three chief officers and five
  department vice presidents
• Founded by Jeff Taylor, who is also the founder
  of Monster.com

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Who is Jeff Taylor?

• A few facts about Jeff
• 45 years old
• Internet Age icon
• College dropout, but finally received a degree at
  age 40
• Formerly a Boston nightclub deejay

BOOM,BOOM,BOOM!
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Structure of Eons

• Encourages membership for those over the age of
  50
• Allows lurkers, but with limitations
• Emphasizes participation with groups
• Provides an aggregated group blog and a members
  blog

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Short tour of Eons.com
Lets go
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Community or Not?

• There are many aspects that contribute to the
  essence of a community. According to McMillian
  and Chaviss, there are four specific
  characteristics that help form a community, and
  Eons appears to conform to these requirements.
• Lets see how

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Who can blog?

• Eons members have their own personal blog, as
  well as being able to participate in the
  community blog.
• Lurkers do not have this advantage.
• Lets take a look

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Sociability

• Jenny Preeces three components of sociability
  are implemented in Eons structure in the
  following ways
• Purpose
• About Eons
• People
• Member-to-Member Searching
• Groups Directory
• Policy
• Terms of Service
• Privacy Policy

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Commercial Advertisements

• All of the advertisements that are disbursed on
  the Eons website are targeted towards a very
  select audience. Since Eons members are 50 years
  of age or older, many of the advertisements carry
  topics such as medicine, cruises, and more
  specifically, the Electric Chair, which will
  hopefully encourage members to purchase those
  items. Eons

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Social Capital

• Eons encourages social capital within its
  structure.
• Members enjoy interacting with others and being
  able to support one another.
• Jeff Taylor refers to the impact that the use of
  the Internet and Eons has had on users lives in
  a recent press release.

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Strength of Ties

• To a certain degree, Eons extends weak and strong
  ties.
• The majority of the ties are weak.
• Some ties become stronger as members communicate
  regularly with other particular members.