Middle East Mayhem On Twitter?

Yesterday David Saranga, Consul for Media and Public Affairs at the Consulate General of Israel in New York, hosted a live press (well, really public) conference on Twitter to directly answer questions regarding the current situation in Israel and Gaza. From the press release:

"This is the first time that a government is holding such a conference on Twitter. "We are constantly getting questions from the public regarding the situation in Israel and Gaza," David Saranga, Consul for Media and Public Affairs, explains, "so we are answering the public's call and holding a Citizen Press Conference on the social networking site, Twitter, to answer these questions directly." Twitter users can take part in the Citizen "Press" Conference by going to http://www.twitter.com/IsraelConsulate and directing their messages to @israelconsulate and including the tag #AskIsrael. Questions will be answered on Twitter, with a link to IsraelPolitik if the answer exceeds Twitter's maximum length of 140 characters."

Hm, kind of heavy subject for Twitter--I mean, how can you adequately answer questions like "How do you justify the killing of children? How will that lead to peace?" or "When will you stop using the citizens of Sderot as human shields?"
in 140 characters?

You can check out a summary of all the questions and answers on Israelpolotik.org and decide for yourself if it makes you just a wee bit uncomfortable. I'm still not sure how I feel about it--on one hand, Saranga's rationale--summed up in this tweet exchange:

"shelisrael: Why have you chosen to come on Twitter. Is that not political in itself?"
We saw debate on Twitter and saw people who had unreliable information. We felt Twitter would be a good way to put an official voice out there.

--makes sense; then again, if you ask me, the whole "How do you justify killing children?" 140-character exchange is a little bone-chilling.

Autism Twitter Day

Yesterday I made two great discoveries in the blogosphere: this great post by Joe Boughner about the top 5 (well 4) SM trends that should die before 2009 and Autism Twitter Day. Yes, they are both related.

Joe's post talks about the way social media is becoming more about being one big popularity contest and less about the quality of the interactions social media makes possible. Amen. If the end result of social media is going to be the systematic rise of a few huge "experts" and millions of nobodies with great ideas yet few followers, I need to get off here. As Joe points out in his post, even the so-called experts are not experts. Nobody is, because social media is constantly changing and nobody, even if they're plugged in 24/7, can stay on top of it all. ESPECIALLY if they think that, because they're experts, they have nothing to learn from novices and don't bother seeking out the tiny, unknown guy or gal who is actually far more of an expert than many of the high-paid/high-profile consultants and gurus out there.

Which brings me to my second point: Twitter Autism Day. I forget how I stumbled upon the very few blog posts about Twitter Autism Day, but somehow I did and I'm awed by the whole thing. I won't bother to sum it up neatly here: basically a woman (Bonnie Sayers) who describes herself as a single parent to two boys who writes about autism spectrum disorders, orchestrated a Twitter event that generated over 5,000 tweets in 24 hours and made the top trending topic on Twitter twice that day.

It was certainly no coincidence that a second Twitter Autism Day, this time orchestrated by TannersDad as part of the Obama Biden Transition Project Community Discussions took place on December 23.

At any rate, each of these events seemed to be great successes and really demonstrated the power of social media tools. The two individuals who orchestrated the events? One has a few thousand followers and the other "just" 421--does that mean his event was any less significant or successful? Of course not.

My point? Social media isn't about ego or popularity; it's about enabling people with shared passions to connect, communicate and affect change.

My Social Media Prediction for 2009--Assocations Will Get it Wrong

'Tis the season for closing the door on the old year and looking forward to the new one. Rather than trying to cleverly and accurately sum up the state of social media in 2008, I'll just paraphrase CNET news' 2008 wrap-up post:

"...it was a terrific year for social networks. Mostly."

Now go read the whole post for a very comprehensive year-end review of social media.

Now on to 2009. Peter Kim, a former Forrester Research analyst,asked 14 social media heavy-hitters to blog about their thoughts of what 2009 might have in store with regard to social media.

The one that resonated with me the most?

"Although it is now cheaper to launch an initiative leveraging Web 2.0 technology - it requires qualified and passionate people to make them successful." - David Armano

Why did that one grab my attention? Because I totally agree with him...and I fear that many associations won't get it and it will prevent their social networking initiatives from succeeding.

Let me back it up to say that my prediction for 2009 is that associations will finally decide that yes, it is time to get on the social media bandwagon, if they haven't already. The buzz has been building all year--I won't even attempt to add up all the sessions, webinars, blog posts, articles, tweets about the importance of social media--and I'm pretty sure that by now, the majority of association folks who have resisted will decide that, yes, it's time to do this. So they'll either hire social media professionals or have existing staff absorb those responsibilities. Either way, I predict that many of them will get it all wrong.

Why? Because being social media savvy is largely about personal brand--and associations aren't about personal brand. They're about hierarchy--um, I mean teams--and doing things the way they've always been done. A qualified social media professional pretty much needs to eat, breathe and sleep the part. They need to blog, tweet, read blogs and generally be immersed in the online community--actually, many of them. There are plenty of people out there doing this; however, the thing with social media professionals is that, to a large extent, you need to be one to recognize one. And the association folks who will be in charge of selecting the right candidates aren't, in all likelihood, social media professionals themselves.

Here's what will happen. Being invested in ROI and traditional metrics as they are, associations will want to hire sure things: people with resumes boasting great credentials in communications or marketing or web. The guy or gal whose main claim to fame is being a social media rockstar? Not so much. So the hiring managers will select people with traditional communications or marketing backgrounds who can throw around a bunch of social media buzzwords but who have no real experience with social media.

The result? Well now, you'll have to wait for my 2010 predictions for that.

Twitter in Real Life

There's a good reason I'm a blogger and not a videographer: because I'm horrible at making videos. Actually, that's not technically true; I haven't ever tried to make a video. I don't know the first thing about directing, editing, animating--frankly, I don't even know the terms for the things I don't know. Suffice it to say I'll stick to blogging.

With one exception, that is. One of the funniest things I've ever seen on YouTube is the video about Facebook in real life. I was hoping there'd be a similar one for Twitter, because if the concept of Facebook in real life is hilarious, the concept of Twitter out loud in real life is even better.

Alas, there wasn't one (ok, there is one but it wasn't what I was thinking of). It did, however, introduce me to my new favorite thing: XtraNormal. XtraNormal lets you turn text into a movie. Naturally I was intrigued--text I can write.

So I tried it and, while I'll definitely be sticking to blogging, I personally was very amused by my video.

Without further ado, here's my Twitter in real life video. (If the F word offends you, you shouldn't watch.)(But now you're curious so just watch it anyway.)

Changing of the Media Guards

A few months ago I posed the question "Will citizen journalism replace traditional journalism?"

I recently came across an article that gives a great example of why the answer is "yes." Roland Legrand, a multimedia newsroom manager for Belgian publisher Mediafin, wrote a great piece for PBS.org's Mediashift, detailing a newspaper's role in bringing a community together. He pretty much sums up the reason why user-generated media is destined to replace traditional media:

"The people formerly known as the readers have now become readers/writers. In the 'good old days' of the print newspaper, we only got a few letters each day. Today, we get hundreds and sometimes thousands of comments on our news articles each day. With the click of a button, readers can easily and instantly post reactions to articles. Furthermore, the readers don't only react to our articles -- they react far more often to each others' comments. The article may start a discussion, but it does not necessarily remain the center of attention."

He likens his paper's new live blog application a soccer game: "One can watch it at home, alone, or experience the magic of being all together with fellow fans in the stadium." He maintains that readers don't want to just read news; they want to discuss it.

I thought about his article when I read my Sunday Washington Post the other day. Front page, above the fold was a story about DC's charter schools. A prominent call-out box to the right of the story pointed out additional features to the story on washingtonpost.com:

• "Interactive Charter Schools Map: Find out how each school measures up on test scores and other data.


• Multimedia: Narrated photo galleries of principals, faculty and students.


• Live Online: Reporters...host a discussion at noon tomorrow."

The thing is this: with newspapers folding like houses of cards lately due to plumeting sales and ad revenue, how long are they going to be able to pay people to generate the same content that's available online in spades online for free? Take this charter school article, for instance; The Post had to pay not only the two authors of the article, but the person/people who created the interactive map and narrated photo gallery--as well as an additional reporter for the live online chat. Not to mention the production and printing costs.

If you search "DC charter schools" on Google blogsearch, you get over 30,000 results--take your pick. Prefer multimedia? Right now, YouTube has almost 50 videos about DC charter schools. Online interaction? Try the DC Charter School Reform group on Yahoo or the "I Love my DC Charter School" group on Facebook.

All I know is this: if traditional media does fall, there's plenty of user-generated content poised and ready to take its place.

Happy Holidays--Social Media Style, Of Course

Looking for a way to create e-cards then share them online?

Smilebox lets you create cards--complete with photos, music and/or video--then post to your blog or your Facebook page. If only they had a Twitter application, it would be perfect.

You can create and share cards for free (preceeded by a short ad) or pay $2.99 to be ad-free. I would have done ad-free but my wallet is in the other room and the cat is sitting on my lap so I had to do the free one--so make sure to sit through the ad to view the card.

Here's hoping you and yours have a wonderful holiday season and a healthy, happy new year!

Make a Smilebox greeting

Association Social Media Roadshow Reflections Part 2: Facebook

*Disclaimer: I work for the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association (ASHA); however, this is my personal blog in which I express my own thoughts and opinions.*

A few weeks ago I blogged about my experience of being among 12,500 members at my association's annual convention, and their reactions to our budding social media activities.

I work in ASHA's web department, and we had a booth in the exhibit hall with a sign that said "Facebook isn't just for teenagers--learn what ASHA's social networks can do for you."

As I said in my previous post about Twitter, the vast majority of our (130,000) members are in the 34-55 year-old category. That said, we are closely affiliated with a student association--the members of which will ultimately become members of ASHA. When we first started toying with the idea of incorporating social media into our communications strategy, we figured there would be plenty of interest from the students but weren't sure how many of the older members would want to participate.

I am the first to admit that I originally dismissed the idea of a Facebook page--I didn't think there would be any value to members. Turns out I couldn't have been more wrong, as evidenced by the almost 5,500 fans we've attracted in about 2 months.

We built a very basic page on Facebook--just information about the association, links to our Twitter stream, our YouTube channel and our online store. Our tweets feed into the status updates for the page, and that's about as much content we add to the page on a regular basis--at this point it's basically there for members to use as they wish.

At any rate, back to the convention. It gave us a great opportunity to explain--in person--what social networking is and how it can enhance the value of their membership. There was a lot of interest and excitement from members, from students to a man who's been a member for 34 years. As a matter of fact, of all the people we met there, he was the most enthusiastic about social media--he'd even incorporated it into his presentation about academic leadership.

As for Facebook, here are some examples of how it's working for us:

• Proves that our members are, in fact, receptive to social media. Even before we'd added any information about Facebook to our website we attracted several thousand fans. The day we posted the link to the Facebook page on the homepage of our website, 1451 people visited the Facebook page; 413 of those became fans.


• Provides tangible metrics. While there is a lot to be said for new metrics like return on engagement, the fact remains that, to the people who are skeptical about the value of social media, nebulous terms like "engagement" aren't that persuasive. They want proof that social media is worth it. Facebook Insights provides that kind of data: page views (both overall and unique), fan demographics by age and gender, new fans per day, etc. You can view the data graphically, or export it to Excel.


• Lets us observe how members are using the page.
  

  "I am in private practice and would love to meet other SLPs that are private practice owners, as well."
  
  "I am interested in the topic on the outcome of late talkers who display no other disability......any pointers? "
  
  "I am also glad to be able to connect with other SLP's on here. What a great idea!"
  
  "Hello everyone! It is great to connect with all of you. I look forward to being a part of this like-minded community."

I could go on but I won't bore you. The bottom line is that there is no question that the level of interest in our page on Facebook has helped turn "someday" into "now" in terms of getting buy-in about the need for a social media strategy.

Why Every Stay-Home Mom Needs to Be On Facebook

A few weeks ago I went to a bingo night at school, arranged by the PTA. PTA isn’t really my thing, but any form of gambling is, so I went. After bingo (I didn’t win once in 21 games—go figure why I love gambling) I went out for drinks with a group of moms.

When we were leaving the restaurant, somehow the conversation turned to Facebook. I had recently made Facebook converts of a few of them and they were raving about it.

Then one woman said “My husband says if I have time to waste on Facebook I need to get a job.”

Ok, so Facebook might be a time toilet and of debatable merit in many ways—what with the poking, smile invitations, Lil’ Green Patch requests and all the rest of it. But the larger truth is that Facebook is a social media tool, and being familiar with social media tools is far from a waste of time--especially for women who have given up or postponed their careers to be home with kids.

I'll spare you the rant about how hard it is for women to re-enter the workforce after taking time off to raise kids; suffice it to say that clawing your way back up the career ladder is a LOT harder than climbing down. Chances are, while you're home raising kids, the world and the workforce are marching on, leaving a thick layer of dust on your resume.

Think about it, though: what if there was a career you could actually build from scratch, for free and in your spare time at home? Guess what? There is one.

While the title varies, the occupation I'm talking about is social media or community manager (for our purposes I'll call it social media manager). I was prepared to write a whole treatise about how social media careers are on the rise, but found this great post that sums it up better than I could.

Want to be a social media manager? Here's what you do:

• Start a blog. Not only will you familiarize yourself with blogging platforms, terminology and applications (widget, tags, comments, Digg, Technorati, etc, etc...) but you'll build a portfolio of writing samples.


• Get on Facebook and Twitter and every other social network you can. Granted, you'll probably only be able to (or want to) keep up with a few, but it's a good way to familiarize yourself with social networks--what they are, which ones are useful for what and what all the crazy little icons mean.


• Read. Read blogs, articles, books, magazines, newspapers--anything about social media. The beauty of social media as a career is that it's basically a brand new field; therefore the only things separating you from the "experts" are a few thousand blog posts. Everything you need to know about social media is out there; this is one area where grad school is not only not necessary but actually detrimental. The world of social media is evolving so rapidly that it requires constant, ongoing learning, not classwork. Think of it as a never ending learning experience--but in a good way.


• Network. Social media offers the unique opportunity to actively network without ever having to have so much as one face-to-face conversation with anyone. Not that there's anything wrong with actual personal interaction, but when it's not an option because of time constraints, social networks can help you connect with people who will be able to help you get a job when the time comes.

I could have included much more detail--told you which blogs to read, which people to follow on Twitter, which social networks to familiarize yourself with, but figuring out the answers to these questions is part of your social media self-education so I'll leave the details to you.

So next time your husband accuses you of wasting time on Facebook, tell him that you're actually laying the foundation for your social media career and to leave you alone.

Social Media, Circa 1997

Canadian blogger SuzeMuse had a great post today about social media not being new at all. As a social media veteran of over 11 years, I can assure you she's right. Her post inspired me to take a trip back to web 2.0, circa 1997.

Back then, I was a stay-home mom, desperate for social interaction but totally isolated from actual friends. The only thing I had to keep me company was a computer and a dial-up connection. What started as a Google search for an ovulation calendar led me to an “expecting club” of women who were also trying to conceive—and with that, my social media journey began.

Through the magic of one of my favorite web tools, the Wayback Machine, I was actually able to dig up the page that started it all for me. This is a snapshot of the page in 1997.

Guess the concept worked because here’s the 2008 version of the same site.

Ok—you say-—maybe there were online communities back then, but not web 2.0 stuff like reviews, blogs or videos. Actually, look again: granted, the 1997 version doesn’t have blogs, but it does have groups, reviews and videos (sorry, link to the videos is broken).

As SuzeMuse, well, muses, about Twitter one day just vanishing--imagine your most valued social network suddenly disappearing? It happened to my online mom community-—multiple times. But Suze is exactly right: somehow we were always able to pick up the pieces, rebuild and regroup. Somehow (can you say social networking?) we’d always manage to spread the word to one another and find the newly-created group. Imagine trying to find and contact all of your Twitter followers--but without Twitter. Good luck with that.

Oh, and forget luxuries like free social networks—our boards were either hosted and supported by one woman’s techie husband, or built on rickety, unreliable services that would go down at the drop of the hat and stay down for days, if not permanently. Imagine 100 women all waiting breathlessly to hear whether Sally’s pregnancy test was positive after watching her trying to conceive for 7 years and having the boards suddenly be gone for a week or more? Happened. Ditto for labor, births, and other cliff-hanger moments.

We have had some awesome meetups—10 or more of us at a time, some traveling from as far away as Australia and Norway. Flying from Australia to DC to meet up with a bunch of women you’ve never even laid eyes on and know only by virtue of an online social network? If that isn't a testament to the power of social media, I don’t know what is.

All I know is that anyone who says social media is just a fad hasn’t had the experiences I’ve had. Social media is here to stay, period.