Are "reputation" scores a waste of time ? #digitalfootprint

The principle of a digital footprint is that someone can take your *public* data and create some value from it.  There are a growing number of tools that try to rank/ rate your influence and implied reputation.

Klout is another one that takes your public (web) data and provides an interpretation.  The question is "what is the utility of these services"    Sure it confirms that celebrities have clout and the rest of us are minnows or if you are looking for people to follow, this is another filter to help you decide; but do these comparative scores really help anyone as they are not normalised to my peer group and sphere of influence.  Also missing TV viewing and mobile data means that they only see a tiny percentage of my life.

The downside of these tools and the scores is that you will focus on the score and not the content, focus on managing the algorithm (get to the top) and not the value.  Like Google Page Rank, someone will change the algorithm and pop goes your score.  Worst still you will be the only one who notices.

Back to basics,  digital footprints have value,  Klout and PeerIndex should be selling the data from their analysis to focussed marketing companies and sharing that revenue with me, but before that, get some rounded data from my mobile and TV as well.