I Million Friends

A line in an article in The Sydney Morning Herald caught my attention. In a harassment court case a Mr Hurst, accused of hounding a woman by sending her a friend invitation in Facebook, suggested Facebook friends are not that same as real world friends.

""[Popular British radio DJ Chris Moyles] has 1 million Facebook friends. Do you think he knows them all intimately?" Mr Hurst said.

Hurst was later cleared of any crime involving Facebook, but advised to leave the woman alone.

The case left a couple of questions unanswered. Does Moyles really have a million Facebook friends? If so, is his Facebook page more important than his Web site?

The first question is easy to answer. BBC 1's Chris Moyles Show page in Facebook currently has 334,860 fans. I imagine the number of unique visitors that cross Moyles' BBC pages each month is higher than that.

But looking at the pages both on Facebook and the BBC's site, it's interesting to note that there's something missing there that I'm sure is critical to the radio show: Chris Moyles.

Both the Facebook and BBC pages have discussion boards for users. But Moyle's personality doesn't shine through the pages. What's he thinking today? Where are his tweets? Where are his posts in the discussions? Did I miss something?

As a radio show I've no doubt that Moyles and the crew are focused on radio. But I can't help thinking 334,860 fans merit a little attention too. They're not just listening to the radio. They want to be seen to be associated with the Moyles show. And they are creating conversation around the show. In addition to the fans' posts on the Moyles Show page, Facebookies have created another 365 Chris Moyles groups.

Radio shows might do well to think about Facebook as a new antenna.