I read an article yesterday that really struck a chord talking about web 2.0 / social media and different people's levels of knowledge and how they view others from this perspective. The essence of the article was, in the words of Joel Postman "Some social media “experts” and veterans look down on social media “noobs,” aka newbies, or newcomers. (The word “noob” comes from l33tspeak, an early hacker “language” now popular among some social networkers.)"
This is something that everyone who knows a little about social media has (I am sure) been guilty of but is absolutely against the principles of social media - after all the clue is in the name "social" - namely that no one knows everything about everything and the point of web 2.0 is about sharing, passing on and commenting on information.
I found this particularly pertinent on a personal level when I recently undertook a search for information on new Asics Kayano trainers and wanted to know if I should get the 14's or 15;s and all the info online proved very useful (the 14's are best btw) and I am currently looking at multi room wireless audio system that is less than 4 figures and social media is proving a hugely valuable resource- on a professional level we recently won a pitch for Racing UK and getting under the skin of the racegoer/ watcher was key to success - social media was invaluable in gaining this understanding (indeed part of the challenge is now setting up their own social community) and for another pitch for a large financial services firm where the challenge was to present how social media could be used to help sell their product in to a new target group understanding the social media profile of these targets was key to the response.