A Little More on Klout and My Magical Gift

The graphic above shows my Klout score as of today. Not only did my number jump dramatically, I also shifted from being an Explorer to being a Specialist. That corresponds to a two column jump in the Klout 4×4 graph of social influence. I don’t know how that is measured, though, so I can’t exactly tear that apart.

This graphic shows my Klout score as of yesterday. A balmy 49, or a 6 point jump from my 42 from one week ago. You’ll notice both graphics indicate a jump of 2 points in the last thirty days, though without clarification of whether that’s measured from my score on day 0, or my change from my last score. So I revisited my Score Analysis:

As you can see in this chart, the lowest point of my last thirty days is still above 50 (the tooltip in the image represents the point at the lowest part of the graph, coming in at 50.39). If you look at my score from yesterday, I was below 50, and yet according to this chart not only have I not been below 50 in thirty days, yesterday my score was 53.08. And to push this point again, precisely one week ago, my score was 42, as I proudly displayed in this image:

I have jumped 11 points in seven days. I have done it magically since it’s not even tracked on the chart. I have apparently developed magical powers over time, space, and social influence.

This demonstrates precisely why I am suspect of any social influence scoring model that is used by any organization to deliver any level of different service or benefit.

Related

• Klout. Nail. Coffin. Who cares?, November 25, 2010 by Martijn Linssen.
• Why your Klout score is meaningless, June 1, 2011 by Alex Braunstein.
• Why your Klout score is meaningless, June 6, 2011 by Andrew Gelman.
• Does Your Klout Score Mean Anything?, June 21, 2011 by me.
• Social Scoring As the New SEO, June 27, 2011 by me.

Update: May 10, 2018

Klout has announced today that it is closing shop on May 25. Just in time for European Union’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) to kick in (on May 25). I also forgot Klout existed, but at least my score made it up to 58 from a start of 42. Whatever any of that means.

To all of our fans: after careful consideration we have decided to shut down the Klout website & the Klout Score. This will happen on May 25, 2018. It has been a pleasure serving you, and thank you for your ongoing support over the years. Details here: community.lithium.com/t5/Lithium

I look forward to whatever Chinese start-up comes along to replace it that we can all ridicule.