Our lives have become mediated to an extent never before encountered. A concert? A kids’ play? A birthday party? Everyone’s got some sort of technology recording every moment. So much so, they’re only ever living the moment through a lens – from the moment it’s recorded to every revisiting of it, the same view and memory will be had.

We carry the tools of media with us everywhere, every day. Our cell phones are our constantly ‘on’ media connection to the public world. As soon as we encounter something remarkable, we immediately reach to record and share it.

I wonder if this is true: Sharing is becoming more important than experiencing. Social capital has overtaken personally-held value. If I can’t share it, it’s not worth doing.

Last Saturday was the perfect winter day for an extended hike. Elisabeth, Shari and I took the dogs on what we originally had thought was our regular (loved) Saturday morning hike in the foothills. We started out, and somewhat Forrest Gump-like, just kept going. From Shanahan Ridge (what I call Shari’s trail), down to Mesa Trail and Bluestem Trails (part of my usual trail), and then Shari said we could do Shadow Canyon trail, which she knew from a wrong turn she’d taken a few weeks back. Off we went.

The elevation was pretty serious. We worked pretty hard. The only people up this trail were the hard core runners and one pair of one-off sight-seers. And as is usual with trails that are that much effort to get to, it was honestly spectacular. I had somehow forgotten that a really good climb rewards you with a view when you finally slow down and look behind you. We were so focused on chatting and going up the never-ending slope covered in snow and ice, I didn’t even think of what could be behind us. The landscape of trees, icicles, boulders and snow all around us were breathtaking enough. But then for some reason we stopped for a second, and looked down. It felt like we were on top of all Colorado. I could nearly reach out and touch Devils Thumb, we were that high (slight exaggeration, but really, we were very high). I was looking at the tops of pine trees from the trail.

Magnificent.

And not one of us had a way of recording it. For some strange reason, we had left our tools of media at home. (Elisabeth had her phone, which was out of battery.)

We talked a little about maybe it was better this way, anyway. In a lot of ways, I think it is. I shared that experience, that hike, with two very special people in my life, and our dogs. Nobody else. And it will always be that way. Even when we go back, equipped with our cameras this time (as we have assured ourselves we will), it will be different to the first time.

That one time, this last Saturday, will always be special for me. We ate snow when we got thirsty. We talked about so many different things. We looked at the view, and appreciated nature’s spectacular beauty which never ever ceases to stun you. I felt in awe, connected, healthy, strong, challenged and loved. I didn’t mediate a second. I shared it only with two people. Two special friends who I am blessed to share experiences with (and who can talk for three hours straight, it seems ).

Perhaps we should all mediate those special occasions a little less sometimes, live in the moment and focus on the way you feel instead of purely the way it looked. Perhaps focusing on how you feel will give us better connection to our sense of self than hitting a share button.

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Tonight QANTAS decided it was time to turn things around. The world’s leading safety airline (we’ve never crashed, mum!) is moving onward to try and get Aussies back on board, trusting the airline to be as true blue as ever. The company decided to launch a little twitter comp, with the requirement being to tweet what would make your inflight experience the most luxurious ever, with #QANTASluxury in the tweet.

Floodgates. Open.

What fun was had with that prompt. While some tried to identify ulterior, sinister motives, others just had freaking fun with the competition invitation. After all, the prize was a pair of pyjamas and an inflight pack. Big freaking deal, even if it is from first class and only worth $30. Who cares? The prize was totally not the point. QANTAS got that. Kudos.

The fact is, the competition got a massive number of people tweeting humorous messages taking the piss out of Qantas – exactly what they wanted.

Yeah, I said it. The company wanted you to take the piss out of them. To release your steam. To really, freaking vent.

Instead of being irate at them, people were starting to laugh at the Qantas stupidity – thinking at first it was a total social media fail, and extending it to the Alan Joyce stuff. The grounding of the fleet. The fights with the union. Suddenly it becomes a laughing stock instead of the serious issue it actually is.

Nicely played, QANTAS.

People now are beginning to feel sorry for you. Seriously. I saw it with my own eyes. I contributed to it. Nicely freaking played, you corporate maniac. My marketing roots respect you. However, I still don’t.

PS: I still don’t trust you to get me to my family. You really stuffed up. Even if their seats, food and entertainment is not as good as yours, I still will now buy on best deal and just suck it up for the bloody 16 hour long haul flight both ways I make. I used to have arguments with people in order to fly you in the past, over your competition, if your price was just a little higher. I won’t slug it out any more. You’ve lost my loyalty. And no social media ‘good time’ crapola will change it. The fact is, QANTAS, I can’t trust you. You will screw me over in order to screw over your workers and you don’t care how much I paid for a ticket, or how important my trip is. I’m sorry you didn’t value our relationship as much as I did.

From a marketer’s perspective, while many will have their anger turned to pity over your ‘fail’ and will have their animosity towards your brand lessened to the point of actually listening to your next message – I still think you suck.

 Featured pic credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/joits/

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This week, men are being sent to their deaths. Yep, there was more than one, but most people are talking about just one man. Troy Davis.

This man, convicted of killing an off-duty police officer, has had multiple stays of execution. But today he was supposed to go to his death – as the jury and courts decided he should.

Now, I’ve said it before, so I’ll simply reiterate – I’m pro-life. I don’t believe anyone should take the life of another person, and my view on abortion is the same as my view on killing any person, guilty or innocent – doubt or no doubt. So my response to this is obvious. Whether he’s guilty as hell or innocent, there is no time to take a life.

It’s been interesting to watch others’ reactions, though. And thanks to Twitter, I’m able to see a full range of conversation with lots of thinking (and non-thinking) people who want to be a part of the conversation. Some believe filling in a petition will work and if they just get another 1000 names, they can stop it. That’s like saying we’ll get a petition to get the court to stop DUI fines. It’s not going to work, but the sentiment is appreciated, no doubt and perhaps it will raise a flag to politicians as a platform for the next election – but I doubt Troy will be saved that way.

There are people who do not believe in the death penalty at all. So they have it easy for once (like me). But most of the reaction appears to be hinging on the fact that they believe there is doubt in the guilty verdict delivered on the man, and in fact they believe he is innocent – something that they’ve decided themselves, with the basis being that people who testified have recounted. (Of course, the fact the man is going to die might have something to do with it? It’s tough to clear a conscience of sending a man to death even if your testimony was factual, I’d suppose.)

One person even said that even if he was guilty, the fact he only killed one person is enough to not send him to death. It should only be for serial killers.

I’m dumbfounded. It would seem that for many people there are levels of guilt. There are times when someone should die, and times when they should not. And the states of the USA which implement the death penalty have judicial systems which recognise the call of the people. That’s called democracy.

Yet these people who are rallying for Troy Davis, who were not in the courtroom – have not (I would guess) read all the court documentation, let alone understood it – are ready and willing to stand up and second guess the very judiciary they themselves have implemented and the one that they said should deliver these verdicts? The judiciary that supports the basic rights, freedoms and decisions the democracy of their country stands for?

And what of the victim?

According to the courts, Troy Davis killed Mark MacPhail. (By the way, the fact that the Sydney Morning Herald describes Davis’s sister’s breast cancer battle and wheelchair is inappropriate). The police officer’s wife and children were left behind, and believe Troy Davis should serve his fate. His wife was in the courtroom during the trial. They know as well as anyone – and better than most – the real story. They’ve lived it for so very long.

If you believe there is a time to die for anyone, in any circumstances, you must also believe there is a system which can implement that time. Pulling the rug out from under it in individual cases shows that you don’t really believe in it.

And should you ever put anyone to death if you ever have doubt in any case?

I think not.

May all involved rest in peace.

Pic: Image by Amnesty International

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The difference between a natural hazard and a disaster comes from the effect it has on people. More and more everyday people are turning to social media to find out what is going on within their area and community of friends as well as their traditional information sources such as mainstream media. Through the work we’re doing at Project EPIC at the University of Colorado at Boulder, we are focused on using social media to help collect and organise information in a way which will allow people to find out what is happening during a time of crisis.

Of course, one fantastic aspect of social media is the social part – it means you can ask specific things in it and get a response, and it doesn’t matter what kind of social standing you have. It also means people can come together to put little bits of information in, and create a really reliable, up to date repository of information that others can search on. Social media makes ‘crowdsourcing’ possible, relevant and, particularly in crisis events, timely.

At our lab, we are working with volunteers, official agencies and everyday citizens to create easy-to-use tools that everyone can contribute to. Whether they are willing to pitch in for a few minutes, or a few days, everyone’s help means we can organise the information in social media more quickly – ultimately if you take a few minutes to volunteer to use the tools you already know how to use, then you could actually save lives – or at the very least, take some panic out of the event for the people involved.

Twitter

Our current tool is a format most people are familiar with, even if they don’t use it themselves very often. Twitter has a massive number of users, all around the world. However with hundreds of thousands of tweets being put out every minute, gathering information from them about a hazard event, and then showing it in an easy way to citizens and authorities is a difficult problem.

We use a system called Tweak the Tweet (TtT). Using TtT is easy – start by opening your twitter account, and then do a search on the hazard event (for example, for hurricane Irene, enter the word Irene.) All the tweets dealing with the hurricane will come up. Choose one of the tweets, and then go to your ‘What are you doing’ window, and rewrite the tweet in the format that our TtT computer will pick up when it scans the tweets coming through.

First, write the event hashtag #Irene

Then, identify what the main part of the tweet is dealing with, from the selection of general topics we use. These are: shelter, power, location, road, need, offer, damage, evacuation and so on. Please note that sometimes a tweet will need to be separated into more than one TtT tweet, so that it contains just a specific piece of information. Sometimes general tweets coming through the stream contain more than one thing (eg: “The shelter at 20 Riley street in New York has space for 200 people and pets” could be more than one TtT tweet when it’s rewritten.) Use that word (shelter, power or whichever you choose) as the second hashtag. Consider it to be like a heading. Then straight after the hashtag, write in the information related to that heading. Then you might have a secondary hashtag, which offers a little more detailed information. This tends to be a location, or contact details (we use the heading hashtags of #loc and #con to save space). So, you might have a tweet that is looking like this:

#Irene #Shelter Shelter now accepting up to 200 arrivals, including pets #loc 20 Riley Street, NYC

And then push send. That’s it! Our computers will be able to ‘read’ your tweet, whereas it couldn’t ‘read’ the original one. The computer uses the hashtags to organise the information into cells in a spreadsheet that is updated in realtime as these tweets come through. Then the information in the spreadsheet is translated and mapped, so that the general public can access information local to where they are heading or where they are – or where they know others are. The ‘back end’ of our spreadsheet (all the coding stuff) is shared with agencies and other volunteer organisations such as Ushahidi and Crisis Commons, and they work with us in combining the twitter data we’re collecting with other efforts they have.

Finally, we are also able to include images in these maps. If you’re using your own cell phone, turn on the geo location and just take the pictures and upload them to twitter with the #Irene #photo hashtag, and they’ll be added too. Alternatively, you can use the #location tag and put in where you’ve taken the image from.

The magic is that you don’t have to sign up – there’s no formal boundary to entry, and the learning is super easy. Don’t be worried about ‘getting it wrong’ – we all do – but we have people who are watching the tweets come in and are cleaning them up as they get added to the spreadsheets. It also doesn’t matter if you’re putting through information that might already have been entered – if it’s a double up, we remove the second one, depending upon whether time has passed etc. and the information might be new. Even if you can help out with TtT for a few minutes a day, or a longer commitment, the help makes a huge difference, both to people directly involved in the event and also those who love them but are far away.

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Privacy and anonymity are two hot button subjects. But for all the moral panic associated with it, very few people are making use of the privacy options available to them. On top of that, at the end of the day, privacy is not something you control anyway. It’s something contained within your network.

Facebook Privacy
The social network all of us are on (except for my friend Meg, whose graduate research includes online privacy. That’s telling.) Did you know that Facebook has over 140 privacy settings? Have you EVER looked into them? I mean really gone through and decided on some options?

Cartoon by @gapingvoid

Most haven’t. I can count on one hand the number of people I’m connected with on Facebook who have locked anything down. Yet most people freak out about what’s accessible about them online, and usually it’s pointing at Facebook as some evil source. Well, guess what? Facebook isn’t doing anything that’s completely new. Take, for example, the current outrage over photograph tagging.

Facebook’s new tool (well, it’s been around a while, it’s only just getting some press) suggests friends tag each other in uploaded images, based on facial recognition technology. This is not new. Facial recognition has been around for a long time. The quality of it is kind of dodgy – much like a cousin of voice-recognition software, but it’s not some new evil thing that Facebook dreamed up.

My issue is that yes, you should definitely be ensuring other people in your network are not tagging you in pictures, especially if they are unflattering or unfair – or even if they are not you! But you need to do more than that, and you should already have been doing it. You should look through the privacy settings. You should also make pictures you’re tagged in available only to friends on Facebook – and that’s if you only friend people you really know. Why? Most pictures uploaded to Facebook appear to be taken at parties and larger social gatherings. If you are not enthusiastic about every image of you coming up in a Google search being one where you have a beer/wine in your hand, blotchy cheeks, or worse – dancing on a table, then you should probably avoid them being taken, or at least avoid them being openly and easily Google-able.

On top of that, you need to be responsible as part of the social network too.

Stop tagging people
Yes, stop tagging other people in pictures. Just because you can, doesn’t mean you should. If you would like to be tagged, do it yourself, and give others the courtesy of tagging themselves too. Everyone has a different level of comfort with the amount of information out there in cyberspace about them. Don’t step on people’s toes by assuming they would like to be tagged. Unless the picture is of them with Brad Pitt. Then that’s totally fine.

Don’t out people’s locations
It’s pretty easy to work out where people are from the content of their tweets or posts. If it’s March and I’m saying I’m loving choosing my showbags, or complaining about the price of rides, you could guess that I’m at the Easter Show. But check-ins are not okay for anyone other than yourself. Brag about where you are, and that you’re with friends, sure. But if one of your friends has an AVO out against someone, they might not appreciate you saying exactly who you’re with and where you are. I’m guessing. (That’s another Facebook privacy setting, actually. You might want to look into that.)

Ultimately, your privacy online is about as reliable as keeping a private journal and leaving it in a library, hoping nobody reads it. Luckily for most of us, people could care less most of the time. We’re all so fixated on ourselves we don’t have time to stalk other people. But it helps both you and others in your social network to ensure you lock down some parts of your online presence a little – it might give you the extra five minutes, or a few google page views down, that could mean getting the job you wanted, or stopping that freaky stalker from coming within five feet of you. And that’s got to be a good thing.

Privacy Settings: to stop people from tagging your image and location in Facebook
1. Go to your front page, and click on Account which is on the top right hand corner.
2. From the drop-down menu, click Privacy Settings.
3. At the bottom of the table, click Customize Settings.
4. Scroll down to Things Others Share, and change “Suggest photos of me to friends” and “Friends can check me into places” to a setting you’re comfortable with.
5. Explore other areas of Facebook’s privacy settings, and make other changes you feel necessary.

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There are stacks of flaws in proposed business models for traditional journalism as it attempts to move into a new sphere. All of them are cloaked with a decent dose of assumptions – that people prefer traditional media, that people will pay for content, that they are the only entities producing good ‘quality’ journalism. So on and so forth. None of the models offer any kind of real innovation. A new approach.

But while I definitely hold this view, it’s interesting to look at how other areas of media are using innovation (or not).

It’s fantastic to see an extension of television shows beyond the traditional scope of merchandising. When stars and plot lines move into other media and other shows, it adds a layer of creativity that makes the show a little more punchy for the audience. These move beyond the unbelievable movements of characters between soap operas, and instead create unexpected and fun ties between shows you might watch and media you are involved with. Some examples:

Cougar Town and Community

A recent Community plotline featured Abed’s fascination with Cougar Town. The story was that he’d been taken out to be an extra on the show (nobody had seemed to notice his absence for a few days, which is not unusual). Well, a few weeks later, an episode of Cougar Town featured a scene with Abed in the background! (I’ve added it here…. but keep reading below for more)

Supernatural meets Twitter

On the episode of Supernatural which saw the Winchesters and Castiel appear in a tv show called Supernatural (confusing, I know, if you don’t follow the show), Castiel likes to tweet – and Misha Collins’ twitter stream that night included the tweets from the show! Talk about effective crossing over. Misha’s tweet stream then returned to normal.

Dr Kutner from House’s death on Facebook

When character Dr Lawrence Kutner from the popular House tv show killed himself, the show’s staff created a Facebook memorial page for him. Included on the page are farewell notes from the main characters in the show, and even a selection of informal photographs of the deceased – all in character.

Each of these actions by tv writers shows an innovation that is sadly lacking in most media – including the blogosphere. I’d love to see creative people behind media production of all types do more risky, inventive things which cross boundaries, and cross media.

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I’m pretty tired of the women in tech ‘debate’. Why? Because I think we fail to appreciate how women are demonstrating their tech involvement in a space they are creating themselves. Women are in tech, in huge numbers – they’re just not seen unless they are in traditional tech roles that involve a cubicle and 9-5 work day, and that shows how limited the debate really is. Let me explain.

I’m proudly a woman in tech. I am a researcher, a PhD student in the ATLAS Institute at CU. I hold an RA appointment in the Dept of Computer Science’s Project EPIC (Empowering People in Crisis), which looks at how social media tools can empower all stakeholders in crises such as natural disasters. I am absolutely behind every woman in a tech field, we need all of them.

I’m also a mum blogger. I own and respect the tag. And that makes me a woman in tech in another sense.

Telling stories is something women are fantastic at. And it’s in the telling stories space where you’re going to find some incredibly tech-savvy women, all demonstrating their expertise. In fact, that’s where a massive number of the women are in tech.

You might look down your nose on ‘moms who blog’. Many, many people do (including some – many – moms who blog). But let me tell you, over the last few months, even though I’m engaged with mom bloggers every day, I’ve been humbled by the number of moms who have extremely good technical, real computing know-how, building not only the technologies but also the brands and relationships of their media enterprises. An enterprise that might begin with a blog, but expands to video and podcast content as well. They are learning what makes great businesses in the tech domain while they have the rubber to the road and are doing it all themselves. These are women with training in some technical areas, either professional training or self-taught. They are networked and engaged. They are entrepreneurial – it takes real guts to create content, put a brand on it and push it out there. And they are accomplished. (Yeah, they are.)

Recently, I was invited and became a member of a local group of social-media-savvy moms. Not all are bloggers, but all are switched on, professional, creative and so darned impressively tech knowledgeable, I’m learning every day from them. (Yes I am. I have so much to learn.)

Most people choose to forget that moms who blog usually had some kind of professional or paid position before becoming mothers. And they were great at that job. So why is it so hard to believe that just because a woman has children she loses her professionalism? Sure, many women become bloggers as a hobby, but most look for something more pretty quickly. They’re surrounded by other successful women who are making something of their blogs, or who would love it if that opportunity arose (it’s there, you just have to embrace it). Nobody will retire on the money they make, but many find a continued realisation of their professional value and worth through their blog.

Yes, dear friend, mom bloggers are women in tech. They might not be in the spaces you speak of, nor do they fit your picture of a power woman in a cubicle blending in with the guys in a technical space that somehow, for some limited reason, you think is valuable. But there are a stack of accomplished women building brilliant companies, brands, dare I call them – startups (yep, I said it). They have networks, and collective intelligence like nothing I’ve ever seen before.

They’re teaching each other. They understand what they’re doing. And if you’re not watching, they’ll use it to take you on.

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Erika Doss’s work on memorialisation is an interesting foray into how western societies consider death. We are used to seeing memorials offline, from crosses at the sides of roads through to war memorials, and everything in between. We even see memorialisation happening online. But do we carry the human values of our offline existence online? Do our values look the same online as they do offline? And can we solve some of our society’s problems in dealing with death through the integration of memorials in technological spaces?

Pic: Flickr, Bennylin0724.

If we are, as Doss says, a “death-denying society” – one in which we’ve managed to ensure people die in locations we are ready to accept it occurs (66% of people die in hospitals, hospices or the like), then our obsession with social media might give us an opportunity to forge a better relationship with the topic of death.

Some cultures celebrate death as any other rite of passage. But in our Western culture, we ‘other’ death. It’s a taboo subject.

At CHI2011, a whole session was dedicated to the topic of death and bereavement and a few researchers are making headway into this interesting topic. However, I am left thinking that our work needs to look at opportunities in considering societal issues with taboo subjects using the social media spaces our society is already embracing rather than creating new sites and tools that people are ready to ‘other’ (distance themselves, or create a distinction between themselves and that place or those people) just as they do nursing homes and hospices.

Facebook allows you to memorialise the dead, but it doesn't suit everyone

So while Facebook continues to have problems with managing the fact that its user base will die – really die – we all have to address what we want to have happen with our social media accounts when we fall off the twig. The first place to consider how we want to have our social media lives finish up or continue, is to recognise how we feel about the people in our current friends lists on social media sites still being there when they physically pass on. Most people I know have at least one deceased person in their Facebook friends list. Nobody unfriends them. They just sit there. Living alongside all the other vibrant people in your stream, yet not. Typically, if it makes you uncomfortable to see faces of people you know are no longer physically operating their own account, then you’re unlikely to want that to happen to you. But at the same time, it seems harsh to unfriend or even just silence that person’s stream.

Do you have people in your Facebook stream you know are now deceased, and how do you manage it?

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It’s time to stop acting like life is always cute and cuddly. Some bloggers are walking advertisements for Stepford, but the best bloggers – the ones who you feel most connected to and passionate about – are the pre-robotic ones.

These are women who blog about topics they decide, because they want to – FOR THEM. They’re not out to impress you. They don’t want to make your day light and fluffy. They generally are thinking things through, or sharing an emotion or experience or frustration. They hit post quicker than you do. They get a little tipsy on twitter. They behave ‘badly’. They are diamonds with flaws, making them far more personal, and someone you can really feel for.

They’re not looking for your approval, but they appreciate your support.

If every woman began blogging like they lived in Stepford (and many already do!), then we become nothing more than a fabricated image that nobody believes or respects instead of a voice of authentic storytelling. I’m not sure where the line between responsibility and authenticity lies – and I’m certain I am far more conservative than I’d often like to be – but sometimes you just need to let it all hang out (or at least some of it), and be damned if readers see your flaws as you dangle them in front of their eyes. We need to accept and even embrace every part of ourselves, and understand that most people ‘get’ that you have less than perfect moments, thoughts, actions.

I fear that I’m often too cautious. I know I regularly think about what I ‘should’ do, say, talk about. The stuff I keep private even though I dearly want to share the pain and emotion of my indecisiveness.

Time to wear Charlie Sheen’s big boy undies for a bit.

No need to disclose because of not being paid - yet. But this twitpic could have been his first attempt to show potential advertisers how much reach he has.

Be damned if you use language the precious reader can’t deal with.

Be damned if you admit to ‘bad behavior’.

Be damned if you offend one or two people, out of the hundreds who exist on the internet (oh maybe there’s more than that?). Think you have no readers to worry about? Well, guess what? Two weeks ago, neither did Charlie.

Believe you’re amazing (Tiger blood!). Don’t regret the past (Those parties were AWESOME). Just write it and let the chips fall. Stop being so concerned about how your reader will accept it… who knows, you could end up like Charlie – the strange guy that everyone is talking about – EVERYONE – a living, breathing (albeit unemployed) meme. A guy who was famous and who rocked harder than Ashton Kutcher at a full-blown marketing strategy that was implemented fast and furiously – and took no prisoners.

You’ll note I’m definitely not going to jump on any ‘he’s obviously mentally ill’ bandwagons. Just because your rules, restrictions, behaviours are not accepting of the Sheen doesn’t mean its automatically in need of ‘treatment.’ In fact, I think what he’s doing is creative genius. The greatest part perhaps is that when his people and lawyers told him to stop talking to the press, he has now decided to just go directly to UStream this evening, and do his own show. Technically, he’s not going to the press. He’s BEING the press. Somehow I don’t think his lawyers will be impressed – but I am.

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My dissertation topic is coming together. What a fun little journey (also known as screwing with my mind) this is.

I research social media. I’ve written a paper on the best way to construct a tweet. I watch how people use their streams. I’m interested in how they construct their online lives, communities and identities. The stories (lies) people tell; the release people feel in ‘oversharing’; the flirting; the stupidity; the bravery. How people create, condition, and curate their intertwingled on- and offline lives. I’m the Penn and Teller of social media. (Probably the Penn. Because the other one doesn’t speak. That’s totally not me.

I’m not sure how I fell into the death realm. I’ve decided, though, that this will be my area of adventure for the dissertation. It’s fascinating. While we all know the ‘proper’ behaviours and practices when you physically die (the ulitmate form of identity management), today we need to get our heads around what will happen to your social media representations when you pass away. We haven’t prepared ourselves for this – people have online lives, and these don’t stop when you do.

Facebook initiated a Facebook Memorial Page where loved ones of the deceased can opt to have the page effectively closed, but still visible. It’s getting a heap of flack on that – mainly because it’s difficult to ensure the person moderating the page is who they say they are. Some people think they want their page closed down, others want them to remain. It’s not easy.

I’m considering three areas of death in social media:

1. The appropriation of your social media profile to become akin to a memorial upon your passing. How the community, friends, etc engage with each other, and with the ongoing digital representation of the deceased.

2. People who commit what has become known as ‘virtual suicide’. The closing down of all social media profiles (and commonly, reopening them). This is a great way of controlling identity both on and offline. Check out the suicide machine for a little more of this.

3. Finally, the people who use social media as a part of their offline suicide toolkit. Posting status updates as they say goodbye and end their lives, or live broadcasting it in social media.

Right now I’m engaging with the 1st one. I’ve developed a research proposal to examine Facebook’s Memorial Pages. I’ve got a list of reading as long as my arm – including areas as diverse as post mortem photography and roadside memorials as well as the scant work done in HCI so far in this area - thanatosensitive design, which is what I’m seeking to write in.

Interestingly, one paper says that it’s not trying to say we should design for the dead. I laughed out loud at that. But two weeks later, while walking the dog this morning, I realised that is exactly what we do need to do. We need to design for the dead as well as for the living. (Have I weirded you out yet?) My thinking is that if identity continues in social media after death (even if it’s managed by a loved one, which is common) then there is also agency that continues. We need to create design, spaces and opportunities for the dead to engage. And suddenly dead gets inverted commas around it. ‘Dead’. Because when you die, you don’t really. Jed says this makes me a “freaky weird kind of person.” I’m cool with that.

Yeah, I think you want to invite me to dinner parties. Meanwhile, ponder this – there are over 3 million dead people with Facebook pages. What do you want to have happen to yours when you pass away, and how will you prepare for it?

Related posts:

1. Why your small business needs a social media plan
2. Should some brands stay out of social media?
3. How to avoid people using location-based social media

Like many of us, I get tired of some (many, no… most) lists of “best”, “Top” or “most influential” bloggers, which are always seemingly pulled together from a very limited bunch, with no substantial formula behind them, and always featuring the same people. Yes, we know those bloggers are awesome, but heck with literally thousands and thousands of bloggers around the world, surely there are others we should be getting access to as well.

If it's wintery outside, best you check out some great posts instead.

So I decided to do something different. I’m offering a dynamically updated list of what YOU consider to be the best posts over the last year, and collecting links to them here so you can all click through and enjoy a digest version. This is not my version, it’s yours.

I’d love to include your recommendations. It’s simple:

a. Please tweet me or comment with *your own* most popular or favourite post from 2010, including a link. OR

b. Please tweet me or comment with the post from *another blogger* you most enjoyed in 2010.

I’ll keep adding to it daily as your links come in. I’d recommend adding these bloggers to your feed readers if they’re not there already, particularly as they are internationally represented! I’m listing them with the link to the post separated, in case you want to collect them yourself. Here’s to more fantastic blogging in 2011!

1. On Colorado Moms, the recipe for Carolina Pulled Pork BBQ got the most clicks http://coloradomoms.com/blog/2010/06/carolina-pulled-pork-bbq-mommy-crack/

2. Her Bad Mother reminded us that parenting choices are luxuries – what an incredible experience Catherine had. http://herbadmother.com/2010/09/freedom-choose/

3. Fiona provided an Australian view of Halloween, with great pics and new traditions http://www.fifikins.net/index.php/2010/10/31/why-should-the-devil-have-all-the-good-holidays-sorry-luther/

4. Laura did a fantastic job of sharing how she got out of her Australian Vodafone contract, complete with step by step details of the experience. http://rainbowtatt.com/misc/opinionated/cancel-vodafone-contract-iphone

5. Karen’s look at Australian politics as if it were a reality cooking show (Masterchef) is hilarious! http://bit.ly/aIUXeu

6. The wonderful Jo Townsend’s most popular post considered not falling into the Christmas over-spending trap. http://tinyurl.com/24f5ptv

7. Hartley Steiner shared her really funny 30 ways you know you have an SPD kid. http://www.hartleysboys.com/2009/01/30-ways-to-know-you-have-spd-kiddo.html

8. Suzan, along with others, was writing on the Reverb10 project when she responded to the Letting Go prompt, from the heart. http://suzanbond.com/blog/reverb-10-let-go/

9. I guess I should include one of my own – my most visited post continues to be the top 10 classic movies you should watch with your kids. http://www.mediamum.net/2010/01/26/10-classic-movies-your-kids-should-see/

10. The irreverent Nick Hodge explains social media in his fave post: http://www.nickhodge.com/blog/archives/3210

11. Annie at phdinparenting provided some great discussion foundation with her post about her decision to attend BlogHer even though Nestle came in as a sponsor http://www.phdinparenting.com/2010/06/01/my-blogher-accountability-post/

Related posts:

1. Why Aussie mum bloggers shouldn’t ‘win’ payment for K-Mart posts
2. We’re in training for the 2010 World Speed Stacking Championships
3. 2010, the year of the Active Voice Blog

Recently a guy claiming to be the author of myriad types of scholarly pieces which are being paid for by students received some decent amount of attention. He claims he writes stacks of work, faking his way through credentials for both himself and the students he writes for. Right through to thesis work, he claims he writes it all.

Well, of course, he does. He writes lots of work. I’ve seen paid-for work. And it’s garbage.

The paid-for work may or may not have been done by this guy (but there are plenty of others like him, just do a search for sites using the keywords: term papers), will barely get a passing grade – especially if the TAs who grade them are remotely interested in locating losers in the classroom, and believe me most TAs are pretty bitter about being poverty stricken students and can’t wait to grab a little power.

For another thing, the guy says he writes at all levels, including PhD dissertations. Let me tell you, that would be surprising to get away with at any university worth paying to go to. We have committees of academics. The rigor is not purely borne in the final written work, and everything written is quizzed at length. Besides that, no graduate student is getting a job in academe after they graduate unless they also are publishing in journals/books and presenting at conferences – there is too much competition. Basically, at the really important end, the discussion isn’t worth having.

So what is worth talking about?

But… there is a duty that all educators have. It’s to do due diligence on the content submitted by students, as well as put a committed amount of energy and time into teaching and assessing students in an adequate manner. This teaching and assessing must reflect the quality of student they wish to have come through their institutions. More than that, these institutions need to realise that the type of student they deliver to the world has a direct effect on society.

Ryan Esgus is up for reappointment, and you can stop him

It’s been brought to my attention that the University of Centerford is the first to recognise that the public should have a voice. They are inviting everyone to express their opinion on whether or not to re-appoint an instructor. This particular instructor,
Ryan Esgus, is known, it seems, for the type of educating that anyone paying a fortune (or on a scholarship equivalent to that fortune) would shudder at. Students are saying he gives them easy As. There are no comments on the papers he returns. He is typically unavailable for office hours. And he just reads directly from the textbook in lectures.

I hear complaints about 19th century styles of educating, but this type of education is even more backward than that.

The reason I’m writing about this is because everyone actually gets a voice here. The University is inviting comment and voting on this guy’s reappointment at the University in their interests of being more open to public opinion.

So I’m asking you to vote (just click this link to go to the survey). No matter where you live, or what your history. Vote, and let’s weed out some of the sick fish.

Related posts:

1. Using social media in education
2. The one where I’m crowdsourcing stalkers at SXSW
3. The future of print journalism is social

Yesterday I received an email through the Aussie Mum Bloggers network, inviting me (and every other Aussie mum blogger) to write a post here on Mediamum.net about how to get the best value out of $20 at K-Mart. If I did it, and sent the link in, I would be in the running to be one of 20 people to win… a $20 K-mart giftcard!

K-mart's offering a carrot. You deserve better.

Now, I know that blogger relations in Australia is a bit of an unknown quantity. Many Aussie women probably feel a little flattered that an offer is being made at all. It’s tempting to jump at it without considering it too much.

But, much like when you were a teenager dancing at Sweethearts at Cabramatta and some guy with a mullet and a Holden said “let me drive you home,” take a minute to think.

Think about what you’re worth.

And if you have a hard time with that one (after all, some of us let that guy with the mullet take us home. Ahem.)… then think what your readers are worth. Even if your readers are less than 10 a day – heck, 10 a month. What are they worth?

And if your blog and its readers are worth more to you than $20 a post – and that’s if you ‘win’, then give it a miss. Truly, if you say you’re only doing it this time, then what’s to make any company think you’re worth more in the future?

You’re building audience, readership, and value. You want people to return to you every time you post, and read what you say. You want to engage with people – build relationships and resonance. I don’t see how morphing those goals into some convoluted contest where you win payment for space allocated to a company that should be paying you for it in the first place actually fits in here.

K-Mart, this space is worth far, far more than $20. In fact, if you like, I’ll sell you some advertising space – after all, that’s what you basically want here. I’m insulted that you think $400 is all you need to pay for a minumum of 20 advertorials on blogs. My brand is worth just as much to me as yours is to you. Some respect is justified. You need to begin treating mum bloggers and their communities with some real respect.

Related posts:

1. How much is the Aussie brand worth?
2. My thesis, mom bloggers and understanding brand relationships
3. Are Mommy Bloggers (Mummy Bloggers) dumb?

Is it possible that your online communities (Facebook, Twitter, etc) are more important to you, and that you share more with them than the offline communities you are part of?

Research has shown that we feel more strongly about people online than we do offline. Sometimes, I suppose those feelings are based on very little detailed information. Nevertheless, the (somewhat disputed) assertion that today, two out of every 10 marriages in the US evolve from an online dating site (I’d guess it’s actually higher than that but not recorded because I think many people meet online first, just not on dating sites) means that all of us connect real, tangible feelings to our online communities – whether or not we went there to find attachments of the heart.

Photo: Flickr by lovelypetal under Creative Commons License 2.0

Plenty of people have real emotional connections with those they’ve never physically met. Some feel so connected with their online communities, they feel compelled to share their most heart-wrenching, private thoughts and experiences. When, for example, a mother shares the incredibly difficult experience of losing her spouse with the online world, this is not because she’s defective or lacking in offline relationships. It’s because she feels a real, personal, connection to the people in her online community. She knows them as a group. She gives out loving connection in the form of her painful honesty, and hopes for the same in return. She seeks more than just sympathy. She seeks resonance.

This is not a technological construct. It’s actually human centered computing at it’s most obvious. It’s very, very real.

Arguably, this connection of the mind and heart is more ‘real’ than the connections we have offline. Far more real than the connections with neighbours we say hi to each day, but little else.

More real are these connections, than the ones many say we ‘should’ be having.

But the fact is, we have been disengaged with offline communities for a long time. Neighbourhoods are largely dead. I am interested in doing a research paper on how many times newspapers report quotes from people who live in the vicinity of victims of domestic violence, who use the phrases, “they kept to themselves” or “they were a quiet family.”

Why do we connect with the heart online?

Other research, by Dan Ariely, talks about the IKEA effect. This theory says we attribute a greater sense of emotional attachment to things we build ourselves, and hold onto them even though the product is well, not entirely the best produced item ever. He calls it the IKEA effect. While I totally agree that it makes sense that we would feel greater attachment to things we build ourselves, I’m not convinced it’s that simple. In his study, he built an IKEA toy box for his son. That’s the connection. Our relationships, not things, are the reason we have bigger connections. They ‘why’ you’re building it matters more so than simply building it.

Or is it?

When instant cake mixes were introduced to the market in the 1950′s, they did not do well. Housewives (the market) felt that the mixes didn’t make their efforts easier, but that they undermined their effort and commitment to their families (the people they were making the cakes for). Adjustments were made to the mixes so they required the addition of an egg. And sales increased. That was the thing – make it easier for us, but don’t take away our involvement completely – it’s for our families – after all, that’s our identity.

I still know women who have ridiculous work and family schedules, and insist on cooking personally for bake sales, family events, and so on – even if it means staying up until 3am when a store-bought cake would have been perfectly acceptable.

Your online community

So what does all this mean for your online community? You build it, like an IKEA product. But you’re building it for you. Is it possible that the community you’re creating is a reflection of how much you value yourself? Do you want to just buy in to pre-made communities like Ning groups, or do we value the ones we spend our own time on more, like your personal groups on Twitter and Facebook? And where does your blogging community come in?

Related posts:

1. Do online communities pretend to care?
2. NestleFamily, breastfeeding and social media
3. The latent sphere of the network society

I was delighted to have presented at the Colorado Learning and Teaching with Technology conference at the University of Colorado yesterday. This was my second year at this conference, and it was incredibly well attended. As usual, some of the best moments came in the smaller discussions and conversations had over the lunch break.

In Australia, the curriculum in K-12 includes aspects of Media Literacy. In the US, each state has a different set of required things to be taught, and many don’t include media literacy at all. That’s just plain scary.

Today’s media is pervasive. It’s no longer identifiable as something separately held within the bounds of a newspaper or tv set, that you access to inform yourself as you go about your day. Instead today media is everywhere. It’s in your pocket. It’s part of who we are, our culture and identity.

On top of that, we are no longer just receivers of media. Today we create it. Critical analysis is not enough. We must equip ourselves and students, and our own children, with the tools and savvy they must have in order to be responsible creators, receivers and engagers with media in all its forms. As the Daily Camera quoted me from my presentation today on its front page, banning media forms doesn’t make people media literate. In fact, I believe it does the opposite.

I thoroughly enjoyed the session and the response was eager. If you’re an educator or a parent – or a college student – this is a presentation I hope you get some value out of too, so I’ve decided to add it here on my blog as well as on the conference wiki. Please feel free to use it as if it were under a creative commons license (ie just give me credit when you feel it’s due). And of course, your comments, responses and input are worth their weight in chocolate.

Related posts:

1. Islam and the media – without media.
2. NestleFamily, breastfeeding and social media
3. Ignite Boulder fun with breastfeeding and media

News flash: I’m not your average mom blogger.

I do research in social media and post that along with my posts about my family, my work, my life and beliefs. Like most women I wear many hats, and I blog a little about them all. Sometimes it’s academic (like this one could be if I hadn’t just had 3 hours sleep), other times it’s more focused on how many things people throw away that are perfectly good. My blog is three dimensional – it’s a pretty transparent view of me in all my roles.

Many people and companies know I do humanities focused research in social  media. Some are really interested – it sounds so fun to work on that stuff! But I’m  kind of sucking the fun out of social media. I am very interested in how little details  like word choice and sentence structure contribute to identity work (how we see  people, and how we construct what we want others to see us as being). I find I need  to speak about stuff in very much a short elevator pitch style rather than give full  answers to those who ask about my research – because you know what? They really  don’t care about the structure of a tweet the way I do. They want to connect and get  stuff. I want to know why. While these overlap, they’re not exactly the same. To use  an academic term, we have different lenses.

Luckily, my friends/colleagues are typically one of the following:

a. Too polite to say how truly boring they find it, or how I’m destroying the ‘fun aspects’ of social media for them by analyzing everything they do/post.

b. Care more about me as a person than my work.

c. Actually like talking about the research and how it fits with what they’re interested in (these people tend to be other academics, people in industry concerned with social media, or startup people.)

d. Someone I used in my research data collection.

e. On drugs/alcohol.

Or a little of some of all of the above.

In any case, whatever area you fit in – I’m posting my full Masters Thesis here. Because it’s my blog and I can. And also because I spent a heck of a lot of time researching and writing it. The realm of the mom blogger is a crazy and at times convoluted one. Not all of us get along – in fact I’m waiting for a “Real Housewives” version of mom bloggers. (If you giggled/smiled at that, you know what I mean.) And that friction is because we are all passionate, opinionated and sassy. Even though I disagree with some of the things people do, I respect them for making their own way.

So enjoy my thesis for what it is. For those who are not seasoned academics and want to actually find out what it was all about, probably the best thing for you to do is just read the intro and then skip to the conclusion – and trust that I did all the data work in between – that will stop boredom setting in.

I am moving on with my work, and have entered the realm of crisis informatics – looking at how people use new tools of technology to communicate during emergencies and disasters. I am very lucky to be working in the EPIC lab at the University of Colorado. I continue to be interested in digital marketing, social media and as a mom blogger (self identified as well as identified by others), I look forward to seeing how and if brands and women finally work out how to work together.

FINAL MASTERS THESIS

Related posts:

1. NestleFamily, breastfeeding and social media
2. How much is the Aussie brand worth?
3. Who owns a Twitter hashtag?

Boycotting a company is like being committed to something in a big way. It’s like getting married.

Like marriage, you are making a declaration that’s public. A formal representation of something you’re standing for. It’s no longer just a private aggravation. Deciding to actively, publicly boycott a company is a big deal. When you take that stand, and have a public presence that is noted by others, it’s even more of a challenge.

Just like marriage, everyone has an opinion on how you should do it. Whether they’re boycotting as well, or not.

Like marriage, there’s challenges. Some days you wonder why the heck you got into this. Why was it so necessary to you to take such a public stand? Couldn’t you have just quietly avoided those products? The challenges come from all over. There’s the ones that come from within, as you stand in the supermarket with a whining kid who really wants a chocolate bar and Nestle brands are what they’re reaching for.

When others who are not boycotting question you about your position, with a judgmental attitude, sometimes you wish you’d kept it to yourself.

This satirical plate from 1775 depicts Edenton North Carolina women's tea boycott. That's a cause I could never get behind.

When others who are also boycotting question you over things you say and do, it’s also something that makes you wish you’d kept it to yourself. Sometimes it seems too hard. It sometimes must feel there is very little solidarity in a boycott. You’re on your own path.

However, just like a marriage, when it goes well, it’s amazing. Someone thanks you for opening their eyes. People ask honest questions, trying to find out why you are boycotting and you feel heard. You sleep better at night knowing that you’re being true to something you hold dear. Some people respect you for your beliefs. The wise ones also respect your view even when they don’t share it.

The irony is, of course, that boycotting a company should feel more like a divorce than a marriage.

Oh please, not Nestle again…

Only for a second, okay?: Right now I feel very strongly for every woman who is trying to find her feet with their dislike of Nestle. While I don’t personally boycott the company, I, like many others, try to purchase alternatives. If you read my blog regularly, you’ll know the various battles Nestle has had over the last 30-plus years due to shoddy business practises. But boycotts have been in operation for many years – and whether it’s Proctor and Gamble, Segregation, or whatever other company or practice – boycotts gain a focus on the boycotters as well as whatever it is they’re boycotting.

So where do you stand?

There are other issues which are incredibly important to many, and are socially worthy, but which I just don’t pick up a placard for. Lots of good causes and social ills that need attention. Food, mosquito nets, pedophilia, gay rights, pollution…. it’s all too much.

So we each pick something. We must. If we don’t get irritated and active about something, then we get the world we deserve.

Boycotting KFC - made more difficult or easier when Susan Komen's cancer charity benefits when you buy a bucket?

Today I realised that we need all kinds of people. We need everyone to be aware of things that some feel important enough to be labelled as ‘activist’ about. Even if the cause is not one you personally agree with, having respect for those who do, and finding out why they hold such strong beliefs is key – it’s all about tolerance, understanding and respect.

If we all shared the same level of commitment, on the same exact causes, then many would go without attention. It’s not necessary for everyone to believe everything to the same level – but it IS necessary for everyone to try and understand, and appreciate other people’s positions and beliefs. Take out the judgment, and just get to know the other position. Only then can a conversation happen.

The harder facts: What your alignments say

Beyond Nestle, the greater lesson is that in 2010, the year of the Active Voice Blogger, the people who take a public stand on a cause have far greater social capital and value than any blogger with 50 or more brand associations on a seemingly endless telemarketing stream. The fact is, it’s easy to be popular. It’s easy to sell out. That’s not real social capital. When something really matters, nobody will take you seriously when you’re spouting about the wonders of bagels, cheese, Disney, baby wipes, orange juice… all before lunchtime. Bloggers are not the print Womens Weekly, with 20 pages of ads before you get to real content. Bloggers operate on credibility gained through authenticity. That’s a key difference to traditional media. More irony: bloggers can’t afford to be seen as similar to traditional media. That stream of freebies and short-term gains is drying up.

The alignments an organisation makes also reflects on its credibility. Perhaps BlogHer, in its 80 sponsor relationships, needs Nestle on board to run the conference it wants to hold. Perhaps it doesn’t.

I love knowing women who make a stand. Especially when it’s obvious that they’ll put their beliefs first, knowing they’re cutting off any future potential relationship with (ie income from) a company. Because when those people turn around and say something’s great, I’m more likely to believe them. I could not be more proud of the fact that my roomie for BlogHer 2010 is none other than @phdinparenting, who is the most authentic, giving and gracious boycotter who is typical of many I meet – her actions are fully considered and from the heart. I am sure we’ll be having long night conversations. And I simply can’t wait. Annie is smart, switched on, committed and continually self-examining – yet, not afraid to lead the charge and stand up for what she believes in.

That’s unusual.

Irony number three: It could be there is no greater brand ambassador than a boycotter – and these are the hardest people to convince to spout your messages.

Related posts:

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I’ve been asked why mom bloggers seem to have a fascination with laundry?

(What is the most polite way I can say this?)

Because it’s a pain in the arse. (There ya go. Actually, that was easier than I thought it would be.)

Just because we tweet/blog or otherwise about different detergents doesn’t mean we love laundry. (Exceptions are the psycho pretenders who say they love laundry because they’re getting a kick back, a la #gno. It’s not independent evaluation – and WE ALL KNOW IT. No woman is dancing in the laundry unless they’ve got a screw loose. Ha. I said screw.)

40kg of laundry at my place in Australia (5 loads). Yes, it gets sorted into smaller baskets for family members as it comes off the line.

We all have lives. Busy lives. And laundry gets in the way. It’s yet another ball we have to juggle because there’s nothing more annoying than a kid/husband complaining about the state of their clothes (no undies, ‘swamp rat smell’, odd socks missing, etc) while you’re racing around trying to make everything just work at the same time as dressing so your butt looks a bit smaller and that brown stuff on the wall is totally Nutella and not anything else.

I don’t have time to wash things twice. In fact, I don’t have time to check whether the detergent worked. I just expect it to. And damn it, when a detergent seems to not do a job and in fact just sets a stain instead of getting rid of it, it pisses me off. A lot. It drives me crazy, because I find out about it when I’m putting the clothing on again, after folding it and putting it away.

I don’t have time for this crap. (See? Three references to time in a row. This is a big deal.) Finding out there’s dirt marks still on clothing when I thought it was washed, drives me nuts. So I tell people. And so do all of us. It so happens my main method of communication with all my mom/mum pals is social media. And in social media, I’m loud.

We’re not fascinated with laundry, dear advertisers. We hate it. And we just want your stuff to work. That’s all.

Your Free Focus Group

The impetus for this post?

Bloody hell, Sun. I thought I was going up a notch in buying your ‘All’ 3x concentrated laundry liquid. I think the damn stuff put MORE marks on the clothing than they had going in. They don’t even smell that good either. I hate you. I got a better wash out of the $2.50 cheapo Sun bleach powder stuff I got at Dollar Tree. I keep getting coupons for Tide (which is pricey even with a $1.50 off coupon), so maybe I’ll try that. I think I got a one-try sachet of Tide once and used it, but here’s a note – one time is not enough to really evaluate a laundry soap. I need at least three or four goes at it. So while I used it for one load, it wasn’t memorable enough for me to actually buy it, especially when the price point is so high. Do some freaking research. When we find a good laundry soap we stick with it. But it needs to freaking work. You might want to think about that. Or bite me. Your choice. I hate laundry. I just don’t have the TIME.

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The ongoing antics of Nestle as it continually trips itself up in all forms of social media (Facebook, viral Greenpeace videos) have led me to ask if some companies should just stay out altogether.

Even Satan or Lex Luthor would have a better time on social media than Nestle. There are legions of people wanting to embrace evil.

Nestle Killer-Asesino Facebook page, one of many opened in response to Nestle's social media attempts

But Nestle doesn’t even have them on side. People are not saying that they’re willing to accept a company that has substantial long-term crappy business practises – because Nestle doesn’t admit to them. And that’s saying something.

For a company that is top ten worldwide in almost everything – size, employees, number of countries it operates in, number of brands it holds… no other consumer goods company has as much worldwide impact as Nestle…. and no company can boast as much obvious distrust from vocal consumers who have long-held issues with the company, and now have a means to share them with a new generation, and in new regions.

What doesn’t Nestle get?

The problem for Nestle is not just at the ‘I don’t like the company/product’ level. The issues are not just opinion. If it were, then they could be dismissed by many as trivial, personal or simply without foundation.

Instead, social media offers more than just opinion sharing. It gives every person with a web connection access to hard factual information, statistics and documented history including legal processes. The information is as deep as the user wants to go, and it’s all just a click away. Companies can’t hide it. That’s the nature of the web.

Getting it right

Chiat/Day’s Pepsi Refresh Project understood that there is something that resonates between a brand and the consumer, and that connection reaches far beyond the product.

Instead of using social media to focus on products, use it to focus on global issues – issues you and other multi-nationals contribute to, profit from, and can make a difference in. Involve the social web in gaining insights into how to fix these problems. Work with people, not against them. People want you to succeed when you demonstrate a commitment to things that affect their lives, their world.

If you spend part of your exhorbitant ad spend on social media that demonstrates real involvement with the community rather than talking about your products, you’ll begin to build some social capital where you have none.

Frame the conversations – it gives you some control. But ensure you’re framing them in spaces you’re willing to go, and that people will support you in.

Related posts:

1. NestleFamily, breastfeeding and social media
2. The three steps to being influential in social media
3. Why your small business needs a social media plan

Mass media (and some mom bloggers) would like to lump all mom bloggers into the same shoebox. As a result, it’s hard for marketers to navigate these waters without recognizing the differences between bloggers in the space.

Just as there are different types of magazines and newspapers, so there are different types of mom blogs. I’ve been researching the sphere of mom blogs for more than six months, and can generally classify them by three distinct types. I’ll describe them, along with providing some foothold references to traditional media, in the hopes of dispelling some questions. Comments from you are (of course) more than welcome!

1. Pitch Me – The marketing-focused mom blog

This is the blogger who says, “think of me as an extension of your marketing department.” The blog front page usually includes a “PR Friendly” button. This blog typically features lots of competitions, and wants to promote as much stuff as possible. Much like an advertorial-focused trade publication, there can be much value in the blog content, it can be very professionally done, and have a wide distribution.

Pitch Me blogs are keen to work with companies. (Pic credit: Flickr army.arch)

The blog owner may have ideas which extend to a complete campaign – they are like independent specialist creative agencies, but with a blog. Sometimes they will even want to negotiate a fee for their work with a brand and product (reflecting their role as being focused on marketing with your brand rather than an independent publisher). This is not new – there are older traditional publications that have done this type of thing – charging a company to have an article included.

The negative side of this is that while popular, the audience of these blogs recognizes that most of the content on the blogs comes from a marketing alignment (just as happens with traditional advertorial-focused magazines) and their purpose in visiting the site is to win stuff. Any kind of stuff. It is this type of blog that MSM (mistakenly) classify all mom blogs as.

For brands, it may appear easier to work with these bloggers – they are eager to develop a relationship with most PR representatives that have taken time to craft their pitch and do a little research on the blog and their style. This is not unlike pitching any kind of magazine, including the marketing-oriented advertorial ones. However, you should be ready to be asked for compensation for the inclusion of your material, whether you write and develop it or they do. These relationships are probably best suited to FMCG (fast moving consumer goods) products. The relationship is fast, and shallow – any belief that long-term resonance with the community will be achieved in this high noise space is fools gold, unless you run continuing promotions across a wide number of them (keeping it at high level is important here because your brand will be tarnished by a relationship with a Pitch Me blog that is low quality).

Prediction: These are the sites that are fast growing in number. There will remain a few high level blogs in the category, and these will develop to possibly being the best looking sites on the web – a necessity from sheer competition within the category. Sheer traffic numbers, however, do not demonstrate the readership’s commitment to the blog but rather to the range of competitions and giveaways. Because they tend to use passive voice, unless the blogger is in the top tier of these blogs, they are only of passing interest to the large readership and are not in themselves memorable brands to associate yours with. For deeper resonance on higher priced items, best find another outlet.

2. My Magazine – Multi-niche magazine-style blogs

These blogs reflect far less of a marketing approach and more of an individual, active voice. The blog will cover a variety of areas, generally reflecting special personal interests of the blogger (who may actually be a specialist or expert in one of these areas). These bloggers are open to receiving information about products/services/companies/brands across the realm of interests they cover, but nothing beyond that. In fact you’ll annoy them if you try – sort of like pitching a wedding venue to divorce magazine. Not only is it a waste of everyone’s time, it’s actually unprofessional and demonstrates a lack of understanding and/or basic research. And these bloggers are likely to call you out on exactly that.

The premise of providing compensation of some form to these bloggers depends upon the type of product, campaign and information you have. If you are looking for particular amount or style of coverage to be guaranteed, then it’s advertising and you need to pay whether you provide all the content, or if the blogger develops it themselves. Depending upon the blog (and its hosting location in the world), disclosures of these arrangements will be necessary. If you are willing to offer a product/information and hope that you’ve got enough nouse (and the blogger is interested enough) to hope to get something written, then you don’t pay. Of course, you’re familiar with this – it’s the same as a traditional general interest magazine and the writing ethics are reflective of a traditional journalist (even if the writing style itself is different). They have a more active voice and agency on their blogs, and do not focus primarily on competitions or marketing. They reflect more of the traditional journalistic standards in their writing, and will develop distinct areas of advertising and editorial to ensure adequate compensation and understanding is achieved for all parties, including their readers. They will sometimes actually feature boycotts and dissention rather than promotion (something you will not find in a Pitch Me blog). You will have a better idea of the readership of this type of blog, allowing better segmentation for more specialized products, or more specialized market segments – great for brand extensions or highly targeted mass consumer campaigns in the blogger’s interest category.

Prediction: These bloggers will align themselves with a few brands and have some short-term campaigns that will be highly effective for all concerned. Some of these bloggers will become more and more celebrated within their segments, through MSM outlets. While there are fewer of them, their range is wide and a somewhat varied audience of people find them to be ‘sticky’ sites that they will regularly return to.

3. Niche specialized blogs

These bloggers are becoming the new version of traditional specialized (or event trade) magazines. Focusing on a single general area such as health or politics, these bloggers have detailed knowledge and understanding in their field, and have enough passion and/or specialised expertise to blog authoratively about it. While they are moms/mums, they do not focus on product reviews, competitions and giveaways – however they might run them occasionally if it complements their niche. These blogs have far lower readership numbers overall, but the readers are influencers in the category, and are very loyal to the blogs in the space. These blogs are very sticky to those who are influential in the subject matter. The readership also has deep respect for the blogger’s expertise and looks to them for specific recommendations.

Niche mom blogs have one particular area of expertise. Pic credit: Flickr Mike Licht, NotionsCapital.com

These bloggers are also the ones least likely to enter into a variety of advertorial-style campaign deals. They will want to work with specific brands only, and develop a ‘brand ambassador’ relationship that is more akin to a spokesperson role. Through that relationship, some form of compensation would be negotiated, that would not necessarily guarantee coverage on the blog. These blogs are better suited to high-end, or specialized products with a defined niche target audience.

Prediction: This area will be growing in breadth and depth over the next year as more women with specialised interests and expertise decide to blog, and as some early entries to the competition-focused FMCG field move on and develop a loyal base focused on competitions in one category.

Summing up

Over time, the tiers of influence to be found in each of these areas will prove themselves. In much the same way as you already use your media monitoring forces to discover influencers in traditional media, you should utilize the same strategies for blogs and bloggers. Just like journalists, they have their brand passions – and their brand dislikes. More and more often, they have their story needs and deadlines that will see you gain the most favourable treatment when you can help them at the most appropriate time (just as you do with journalists). Some already have editorial calendars – you should ask for them, and use them. The only difference is that the internet works on dog years – the field changes seven times a year, not once. It’s a challenge to keep up, but everyone should at least try.

Finally, it would be a mistake to trash any of these three types of mom blogs. Each of them have a place – and there are great and not-so-great iterations of all three types. Depending on the brand, the best relationships will be had by aligning with the best blog (and blogger) for the objective – and these decisions need to be made with consideration of more than traffic numbers, google rankings or other shallow metrics in mind.

Related posts:

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3. Why Aussie mum bloggers shouldn’t ‘win’ payment for K-Mart posts

The hot thing at SXSW is location-based anything. (I’m so cool, I don’t even need to be there to know this.) But I’ll bet every single geek pushing a location-based app at SXSW is missing the point. You should sign up for location-based social media. So cool people can avoid you.

Here’s the deal – there are some people I’d rather not see. (Oh come on, don’t get all judgy. Like you’re happy to see every single person, every time you see them? Yeah, right). Some people always ask you for money. Maybe they repeat the word “dude” too often (that’s really annoying). Or they’re smelly. Or don’t wear shoes (I have this thing with shoes. Blame flylady.). Perhaps there was a drunken evening in a toilet stall you’d rather not be reminded of (don’t look at me, but if you’re blushing right now, well there you go).

These are people who you cross the street to avoid.

If an axe murderer checks in at Starbucks, best you go elsewhere for your mocha. (Pic credit: Flickr Creative Commons Jin.Thai).

Social media today gives everyone the ability to only ever run into people you like, and avoid all the weirdos. Yes, even if you’re at (Woodstock for geeks*) SXSW.

Location-based social media is the gift that rewards everyone. You can see where the people who will negatively effect your groove are at all times, and avoid them. And people who actually like those dodgy losers can find them.

It’s a win-win.

Real-world example right here

Over a year ago, I requested all mountain lions around the Boulder area get on Brightkite. It was a reasonable request. I just wanted to know where they were so they wouldn’t eat my kids, Brightkite is a local startup (ie, the mountain lions need to support local industry), and it would allow us all to avoid an awkward confrontation.

The old-school way of keeping track of mountain lions. Social media would be far more effective. (Pic credit: Flickr Creative Commons pst)

Well, none of the mountain lions took me up on it. Maybe they don’t follow me on Twitter. Anyway, I found it very disappointing. It was all about mutual respect. Live and let live. You lions do your thing and we’ll do ours, and if you let us know by checking in at North Boulder, maybe even with a cute pic of you with your cubs, then we’ll be aware you’re about to eat our terriers. Or kids.

But no, they didn’t do it. And so we had a spring and summer where little dogs were chewed, and the owners had no idea. That’s just disrespectful when Brightkite was right there, all free and stuff.

So the big takeaway is to get into location-based social media. It means I can avoid seeing you. Then everyone’s happy.

*This (apt) description of SXSW was originally coined by @nsquared but I pushed him for it. He’s a nice guy. Don’t go hatin’.

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Dear SXSW attendees:

I know you’re all excited. You’re going to spend a whole heap of time being all geeky and fun, and drinking and stuff. Talking about startups, design, innovation, music… ooh I’ll bet you’re all tingly.

My husband is one of you. He’s kid-at-Christmas excited. He loves Texas and had a ball there last year. As a startup geek guy, he can’t wait for a whole week of indulgence.

Good on him. I hope he has a great time.

But now to the point of this post – apart from his blue eyes and salt-and-pepper hair, my husband has an Australian accent.

I have seen the way females respond to a male with this shrimp-on-the-barby quality. It’s a little over the top. During SXSW women go a little nuts for startup guys – add the accent, and it’s all downhill for the startup widow wife.

Unlike some other (better known) startup guys who think it’s okay to flirt and carry on while away from home, as long as they “don’t go home with anyone at the end of the night,” (I’m not naming names, but you freaking well know who you are – and people do talk about you, by the way), it’s not going to cut it with me.

Stop whining, woman. What’s the point?

I’m not going to SXSW (someone has to stay here and look after the kids and write a thesis), so… I’m running a Where’s Waldo-style competition on my husband for attendees of SXSW. Let’s call it my little contribution to citizen journalism.

Ooh, a competition from a mom blogger? (Who’d have thought, right?) But how do I WIN?

This is Jed. Print it out. Keep it handy. (Note the wedding ring.) Some call it stalking, I call it love.

All you have to do is find my husband, Jed (gorgeous guy – see the pic – with accent). Take pictures of him, and post them on whatever social network you use (Brightkite, Twitpic, Flickr, whatever). Tag them ‘Jed’. You can then tweet me the link (@Mediamum), or post them in the comments for this post. Each entry will get a number, and I’ll draw a winner using the Random Generator tool. The winner will get a $25 gift card from the place of their choice. The more pics you take, the more opportunities you have to win.

I love my husband. If I squint a bit, he looks like Mark Harmon, and that’s something too good to lose.  I’m sure you understand.

Thanks, and I hope you rock the world at SXSW. (Don’t make me come down there.)

*Jed has given his blessing for this competition to happen. He thinks it’s funny. That will be the case unless everyone there starts taking his picture. Then I’ll be the one laughing.

**Do not chew me out for being a loser wife. I love mah man and no biaitch is gettin’ in mah way (hair flick). That said, he has my blessing to drink and talk and stuff. Just as long as his hands are in plain view at all times.

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An American woman named Angie Jackson has decided it was a good idea to share her experience of aborting her pregnancy with the world, via YouTube and Twitter.

A mother of a four-year-old who goes to the trouble of outlining the reasons why she decided on an abortion with RU486, Angie says her social media posts are her attempt to “demistify” the process, and let everyone know that for her, the whole abortion thing “isn’t such a big deal.”

Here’s the video of her saying she is “having an abortion  (insert dramatic pause) right now.” (Don’t worry, there are no gunky parts, which is not what the Sydney Morning Herald would have you believe in its reporting of the story, with the warning the paper placed at the beginning of the video.)

She also twittered the entire process. You can see the community response by searching the hashtag #livetweetingabortion. And there is even a twibbon. Yes, just when you thought all the really terrible twibbon ideas were had, this one leaves nothing to the imagination.

This is a story with so many news hooks in it, a news editor would begin planning a long lunch. Front page … done. Abortion, methods of abortion, social media, social media plus abortion. Oh, and atheism. Check the mainstream media stories on this, and you’ll see it all – surface level crapola about all the obvious news angles, lots of sensationalist eye rolling and no depth.

Look at the blogosphere reactions and you see some insightful commentary. Feministe, for example, reminds us how many women go to get abortions all the time, and how veiled our usual discussions of the subject are.

Deep breath.

Now, I personally switch between being pro-life and pro-choice (knowing that my choice will always be pro-life, no matter what, for me, but recognizing others may not feel that way. I actually have trouble with this whole stance – if I feel so strongly about it, then why am I not ready to instill my thoughts on others? I do it with breastfeeding, don’t I? And for some this means I can’t be a feminist. Feminists are not Sarah Palin. Feminists are not pro-life. People look at me and don’t think feminist. Oh really raised eyebrow? But I digress.) This is not something I throw around a lot, because as Feministe correctly states, it’s a heated debate that I don’t choose to enter. However, I have my views and I respect other people their rights to theirs. I am kind of okay with that, but I don’t know if I always will be. But for now, it’ll do. Until you judge me and be really nasty and call me names, and say horrible things about the size of my arse. Then you’ll push me over the edge and I won’t share my Aussie accent with you any more. And we all know who loses in that equation.

While I disagree with Angie’s views on the subject, I think her decision to speak about it in a very open conversation is a great one. (It’s okay. I’ll wait while you pick yourself up off the floor from shock.) I believe everyone should endeavour to hear every side of a conversation, especially views that don’t mesh with their own. Especially when you have a passionate belief on one side.

In fact, to take it even further – I wanted to hear what she had to say, even though I knew her decision would not have been mine. And I think other people should be brave enough to do that without a knee-jerk reaction (‘jerk’ being the operative word).

So instead of looking at the mainstream media stories reporting the incredulity of using social media to talk about such a politically incorrect subject, I think we can all learn more from reading and seeing personal stories about the subject, from all sides. Only then can we be truly educated and tolerant – if not understanding – of each other. Each to their own.

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Company A says, “Let’s create an event, sponsor some bloggers, and they’ll create a hashtag around it and we’ll give out some prizes. It will be great, Twitter will be buzzing with our company’s name.”

Or a group of bloggers might come up with:

“Every week we’ll be ‘meeting’ on twitter, using this hashtag.”

Sound like good ideas? Sure. And for many it’s been working. But what works right now, or yesterday, won’t always work. And that’s something you need to be aware of, whether you are a direct representative of a brand – or one of the moms who decides to use a hashtag, even as part of a simple discussion.

Just because you begin a hashtag, doesn’t mean you control the hashtag and what happens within the conversation it starts. It’s out there for everyone to engage in. The etiquette is still evolving. What is seen by some as polite is to allow people to push products or messages using hashtags. What is seen as others as polite, is to not fill their twitter streams with obviously sponsored messages with little real value. We’re all still working out the middle ground.

No company or individual is too big in social media... to fail. Pic credit: Flickr C.C. goldberg.

If your followers allow you to bleat positive company messages without interfering, it’s because they’re respecting your space and you’re not stepping on their toes enough to aggravate them. If, however, you flood their streams with inane garbage that really doesn’t invite balanced conversation, then you will most likely get what you deserve.

Everything you’re connected to in social media, both messages and people, says something about who you are.

The use of hashtags have some calling back to traditional methods of advertising messages. Social media is not controlled media. This is not your space. It doesn’t matter if you’re a company or an individual, you can’t control the use of a hashtag. You can pretend to control the conversation by making a hashtag a metaphor for a flag of membership to a particular perspective or even a particular conversation point – but if the general population decides to discuss something else, or bring other things into the equation under that hashtag, then that’s what social media is all about.

Ironically, the things you can control are the words you use, the images you use, and the connections you make. These three-dimensional aspects of your brand are far more telling about you than simple two-dimensional things like a single targeted message in a broadcast campaign. People expect you to have a variety of connections. I’m proud of mine – from .. ahem adult entertainers, through to famous musicians and academics. I’m known for my mulitplicity (do not call me Sybil). But inauthenticity is not.

If you want a fully controlled message, use traditional advertising in a mass media you’re familiar with – where you have the opportunity to blast one-way, two-dimensional controlled messages to the public. It gives you all the control, and if done really well, can create a semblance of a personality for your brand.

If you are ready to really engage with your target audience, then social media provides you with an opportunity to demonstrate a complete, three-dimensional personality for your brand that consumers can really connect and find resonance with. When done well, it will result in brand loyalty and brand ambassadors that you don’t have to buy off.

On Twitter the use of a hashtag organizes conversation around particular things. But it doesn’t organize the thoughts of those in the conversation, unless they’re willing to have it that way.

Don’t forget you’re dealing with conversations in an even playing field now. The old rules do not apply.

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Word of Mouth has always been a double-edged sword for small business. I remember the saying  a local fish and chip shop had on their wall. “If you like our food, tell your friends. If you don’t like it, tell us!”

Once upon a time, the worst that could happen would be a letter to the editor of the local paper. With a 24 hour news cycle, the bad news would pass and your business could weather the storm.

In today’s social media world, it’s different.

Up to now, it’s been easy for small businesses to say social media was something they’d like to dabble in, but it wasn’t necessary to really put too much time into. It was a fun thing, or a sideline to their other communication tools.

Today businesses of all sizes need to be examining their online presence. Think of your customers. How many of them do you think have Facebook accounts? All it takes is one status update that says negative things about your business, and suddenly you’re suffering. How about this status update, posted by someone with 30 friends who lives in a rural area with a tiny population:

“Ugh. Feeling very sick after greasy fish and chips from Big Joe’s.”

Picture credit: Flickr Creative Commons http://bit.ly/dg3sD2 http://bit.ly/9NHDJC

How many of that person’s 30 friends do you think live in that same rural area? The same rural area that Big Joe’s counts on customers for? And how much weight do you think those 30 friends put on the opinion of the person who posted the status update?

A lot.

Word of Mouth (or WOM) carries the most powerful advertising impact of all the different forms of promotion you could use. And it spreads like wildfire.

“Sorry to hear about Big Joe’s big grease up.” “Get well soon, buddy.” “Won’t be going there again.”

Imagine now, that you are the proprietor of Big Joe’s, and you are one of the friends of this status poster. Not only would you know the negative post existed, but you’d also have an opportunity to find out more about why they were feeling ill, and possibly begin a conversation that made people think you were interested in doing good business, instead of thinking you’re a shop dealing in food poisoning.

Today, everyone is on social media. And everyone has influence. Time to claim yours.

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While many people align technology adoption and use with age, the facts show it’s not all that easy to stereotype the creators of content in the online media.

Today’s Pew Report on Teens and Social Media amplifies a very real issue in the US. Our teens and young adults are engaging in “new” media, but on a very limited level.

The majority of them are not creating new content.

In fact, the number of them who blog themselves (just 14%) or even who comment on blogs, is dropping.

Many of us celebrate the new democracy offered by the Web. However, when so few of our young people are engaging beyond watching viral YouTube videos or speaking within a small realm of personal IRL friends (or believing that’s who they’re talking to) on the small stage of their individual Facebook accounts, we have a problem. Democracy isn’t served unless people use their voices.

Picture Credit: Creative Commons cartoon by @gapingvoid.

Access is one thing. Content creation intended for a public audience is entirely another.

I’m around a lot of students every day. When they’re asked who has a blog, from a room of 150-200 students, only a handful of hands go up. In a Journalism class.

What are they waiting for?

We need courses that teach young people (and everyone else) that they don’t need a university degree to have a voice. And that every voice deserves to be heard. We need to show young people how to use the simplest of tools – the mobile phones and cameras they all hold – as citizen journalists, not just for sexting (they figured that one out all on their own). We need to show them how easy it is to set up a blog, and just as importantly, how to get people to read it.

Our young people need to be encouraged to be brave, honest, and opinionated – in a public forum. We need to respect their right to speak, and engage with them when they are used.

Until then, democracy is not being served.

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