I created my latest contribution to For Immediate Release using AudioBoo.  Fun experiment.

It’s below – about Web 2.0 and Gov 2.0 – and even includes a British to American translation.

Mark

Although many of opined on this topic, every person has their own thinking on the most annoying – nay, downright maddening – behaviors in the world of social media that well, merit the social media death penalty.

By “death penalty,” I’ll leave it up to you to decide (adding a disclaimer that I am NOT endorsing you grabbing a gun and using it).  It could mean calling someone out on Twitter, Facebook or a blog post.  Worse yet, your egregious infractions could land you in the print media doghouse – like I did to me a year or so ago when I was an idiot.

So here’s my list of the Top Things that Merit the Social Media Death Penalty:

1. Twitter trouble: I try to keep up on followers on Twitter.  If you are nice enough to follow me (and are not a spam bot which probably DOES merit the death penalty), I try to follow you back.  But sending me a DM right after that goes something like “Thanks for following me.  To get more eyeballs on your web site, get my advice HERE!  http://jerkoff.com/123abc. ”
   Suggested punishment: Lifetime Twitter ban.
2. Calling yourself a “guru.” If you call yourself a “guru,” there is 100% chance that you are an idiot.  In my experience, people who lavish praise on themselves are rarely deserving of it.  Plus, there are a bazillion gurus out there who are clogging the social media space and confusing people who actually need good social media counsel.
   Suggested punishment: Public humiliation. Note: When I was at Fleishman-Hillard, I remember getting ripped to shreds in a client meeting by a consultant that the client had brought in to manage us.  A “guru.”  With our alpha Web site on the screen, she tore into us.  Revenge?  I said “Ok, can you please show us an example of your work?” I kept pressing and finally we pulled up a Web site that looked like it was designed in 1990 by blind monkeys.  Touche.
3. Facebook follies. If you “like” yourself on Facebook, you are a most likely and egocentric moron.  If you “like” your own blog post that you cross-post on Facebook, you are a double idiot.  Let others praise you (but if you are the one doing this, don’t hold your breath).
   Suggested punishment: One year ban from Facebook (accompanied by 40,000 volts of electricity delivered via your keyboard if you load the page).  Hell, the way that Facebook is going prying into people’s lives, this can’t be more than a couple of weeks away.
4. Temper tantrums. For those of you who think this is a tantrum, feel free to publicly flog me.  But for this one, I am thinking of people of a particular prestige who engage in petty pissing matches with others.  And get personal.  And the winner and undisputed champion of this one is Jack O’Dwyer.  Last year, he got into a public flaming match with respected Waggener Edstrom over their refusal to pay for a listing on his compilation of top PR agencies by revenue.  And recently, he took on public relations measurement Queen Katie Payne.  Get over yourself, Jack.  Really.
   Suggested punishment:  Mass unsubscription of his service.
5. Blogger hubris. There are plenty of bloggers out there whose egos far outstrip their accomplishments.  Their keyboards write checks that their online following cannot cash.  Hell, look at this blog and this post.  And me.
   Suggested punishment:  Be Mark Story for a day.

Bonus offenses:

1. Using the term “hits,” as in Web site.  I think that it was my friend Shel Holtz who termed this “How Idiots Track Success.”  Same for “hotlinks.”
2. Using AVE, or Advertising Value Equivalent.  Ads are not consumed and processed the way that earned media is.  And earned media is not paid media.  See #5 above.
3. “;-).”  It creeps me out when people use this emoticon.  Especially when guys use it. If you don’t wink at me in real life, please don’t wink at me online.  For me, this is the social media equivalent of the wet fish handshake.  <shudder>.
4. Bonus bonus:  Doing the “double gun” when you see someone.

What’s on your list of offenses that merit the social media death penalty?

For those of you about to flame, we salute you.  This is satire, people.

Mark

Image credit:  Sydney Morning Herald.

If you are one of the three people who read this blog regularly, then you know that I have not written a damn word in nearly three months.

Three months.  That’s a long time for a windbag like me.

I stopped writing because I found out a couple of things.  First, I was lacking meaningful things to say and I have always tried to keep my content interesting, funny and informative.  Second, I was suffering from a pretty severe case of social media burnout.  Keeping up with Twitter, blogging, Facebook and other tools was a little overwhelming balanced with my other duties in life.  I think that the first reason is closely related to the second.

Bottom line?  The media blackout is going to end shortly.  I am going to get off my ass and start blogging, start writing again for SmartBrief on Social Media and Media Bullseye as well a contributing to “For Immediate Release.”

Most people use the summer as a vacation;  I plan to use mine to get my voice back.

Thanks for reading.

Mark

I have had the good fortune of having outlets for my desire to write, and there is a new chapter in the Story Book.

Today, Smart Blog Social Media is the latest place where I will hang my writer’s thinking cap.  I penned (deliberate “old school” reference) a piece on how Nestle pretty much blew it on Facebook: “Dear Nestlé: Social media is a double-edged sword.”

For me, this is pretty cool.  And thanks, Jesse and Elena.

Mark

You would have to be living in a cave over the last couple of months not to be aware of the battle between Google and China.  Back in January, Google announced that they may pull out of the world’s largest Internet market — and that they would “stop censoring” search results, as is required by Chinese law.

Things got interesting yesterday when Google announced that they would no longer censor these search results.  According to the Wall Street Journal, yesterday:

“..the company shut down its censored mainland Chinese search engine, google.cn, and began redirecting Chinese-language search traffic to the uncensored google.com.hk.”

Let’s not start lauding Google as a good corporate citizen just yet.  Sure, they have the right to pull out of China just like the Chinese believe that they have the right to censor what their netizens see.  But if you take a closer look, you’ll see that Google badly trails the Chinese search engine, Baidu, plus in China, that the cash cow of Google, Ad Words, accounts for only four percent of their total revenue.

Pulling out may be a good decision for free speech, but when lauding the company’s stance, let’s remember that they are giving up only four cents on the dollar, and looking at an increasingly protectionist government creating and environment in which it will be harder for Google to grow.

As a point of comparison, I don’t see other companies pulling of out of China over human rights issues, for example.  General Motors needs China Right now.  So do most American car manufacturers.  I am pretty sure that they will keep their heads down when the larger debate of human rights comes up when U.S. and Chinese officials plan to meet in May.

Is Google doing the “right thing?”  Probably.  But let’s not forget that they initially agreed to submit to censorship when their entered the Chinese market.  It appears that the tipping point came when cyber attacks, originating in China, hacked into Google server, presumably attempting to access Gmail accounts of Chinese human rights activists.  Google had the “smoking gun” and/or excuse to threaten to stop censoring search results.

Enough was enough.

Does Google stand to lose a lot in a market that has disappointed them?  Not so much.  All of this reminds me of the scene in “Pulp Fiction” when Harvey Keitel tells John Travolta and Samuel L. Jackson (after cleaning up Marvin’s brains all over the back of the Chevy Nova), “Gentlemen, let’s not start [blanking] each others’ [blanks] just yet.”

So before we go awarding to the Nobel Prize to Eric Schmidt, let’s look at the fact that a) Google has been censoring all along, and b) they stand to lose little when the pull out and get blocked by the Internet “Great Wall of China.”

Interesting CNN report below – from the Chinese perspective.

Mark