What is Klout abuse?
We’ve written quite a bit about Klout which measures social media influence and designates an ever-changing score to each user. One of the amazing features of Klout is that other users can indicate what topics other people are influential about, and users can give each other a “+K” in any topic.
Most people will not experience any abuse and will simply receive positive feedback on topics they are influential about, but with as many connections as I have personally, there is bound to be a prankster in the bunch. A lot of people like to poke fun, so I have a lot of +Ks for cats (which I tweet funny pictures of a lot, so that makes sense), but the following +Ks are funny for about 30 seconds until you realize that it is attached to a literal social score that some people use to decide the validity of another user for a speaking engagement, job, or whether their voice is legitimate:
Okay, very funny. Getting a +K in cats is harmless, but beer and teens? That is public, anyone can see that on my profile and it is not the impression I would ever seek to give my professional contacts. For those of you that know me, you know I have a sense of humor, and it might be surprising that I would care, but when friends’ pranks overlap with someone’s professional face, actions must be taken.
How to curb abuse
Klout allows you to block a user which means not only can you not see their profile and they cannot see yours, they are also blocked from giving you any +Ks or adding topics to your profile.
To block a user, go to their profile and at the bottom of the page, click the “Block User” link. That’s all.
If you made a mistake or made amends, you can unblock a user at any time by visiting “Settings” at the right-hand corner of your Klout screen next to your name and in the drop-down menu, click “Privacy Settings” and click “Unblock” under the user’s name.
Hopefully it will not happen to you, but if your friends are as relentlessly hilarious as mine, you may need to simply block them to put them in a time out.
Matthew Rathbun
January 16, 2012 at 7:03 pm
What if, contrary to how many people tell you otherwise, you just don't care about Klout? I know I'm wrong here but I don't care what your score is, if I've found quality in your engagement. I guess I'd rather just delete my account instad of worrying about negative aspects like this…
Lani Rosales
January 16, 2012 at 7:16 pm
Many people are deleting their account rather than monitoring it for the very reason you cited – the arbitrary nature of the score. There are a lot of alternatives coming out on the market, so I think some will seek those alternatives, but I'm still discovering the value(?) of Klout, so we will see what my ultimate decision is after I ignored it for so long.
Jace Deloney
January 16, 2012 at 7:39 pm
To me, the only fascinating thing about Klout is that it seeks to map the topology of social networks. By finding the influencers (hubs), you are able to maximize the probability that your ideas, tools and services will be adopted by others.