The movie The Social Network, a story about the founding and establishment of Facebook, gives a behind the scenes view of the social networking site that has grown into a worldwide phenomenon. And it all started with Mark Zuckerberg’s Facemash, a short-lived college version of HOT or NOT®, in which female students at Harvard University were ranked based on attractiveness.
CubeDuel is the next generation of this type of online rating program, but it’s not about rating the attractiveness of others. Rather, it adds an element of professionalism (if you can call it that) by evaluating and choosing which coworker you would rather work with if given the choice. CubeDuel relies on the information from LinkedIn connections to present you with duel match ups of coworkers. Although your choices remain anonymous, I can’t help but question, are the affects of this site harmful to those dueling or is it all in good fun? It even got me thinking, that if you beat out a coworker in a landslide, is that an accomplishment you’d include on your resume?
There is of course the argument that CubeDuel is unprofessional and it is ironic that it is associated with the professional networking site, LinkedIn. LinkedIn must have also had some concerns with their involvement in such a website as they temporarily removed their connection with CubeDuel. However, CubeDuel affiliates released a statement saying that LinkedIn did not purposely shut down their operation but believed that CubeDuel hit a limit in registered members that caused the system to crash (sounds familiar to what happened with Facemash as it crashed the Harvard server when the site received an overwhelming amount of hits). The truth of the event with CubeDuel has yet to be confirmed.
On the other hand, this could all be in fun and games as those who work in offices are usually looking for some comic relief throughout the day and maybe CubeDuel is not meant to cause harm to members of the LinkedIn community. After all, those who allow CubeDuel access to their LinkedIn account and willingly battle their coworkers do so at their own risk.
Just like most social networking games, it is addicting and its popularity has soared in the short time it’s been live, but in the end, it all comes down to your willingness to expose yourself to see how your coworkers really feel when they stop “being polite and start getting real”. This game is for the brave, so if this isn’t quite your cup of tea, stick to Farmville on Facebook where the only risk involved is if you play during business hours.
Special thanks to our intern, Ariel Several for contributing to this article.
