The Intersection of Online and Offline

Like many other people who are my peeps, I start my day off with some online news, peruse a couple of blogs, check Twitter (my tweeps), and sometimes even jump over to Facebook.

But I think that I am going to opt out of social media for the next month or so.  For me, it’s pretty simple.

I am hatin’ the hatin’.

Believe me, I am a First Amendment guy.  Most of the free world does not enjoy the freedoms that we do (read: China) when it comes to expressing individual opinion, especially via a vehicle that is targeted for mass distribution, like blogs, Twitter or Facebook.  But for me, it’s depressing as hell to open up social media tools and see so much venom spewed regarding the upcoming elections.  Again, see above — I am a First Amendment guy — but I am so tired of reading what are supposed to be either pithy or downright mean-spirited comments from both sides of the political aisle.  It’s a depressing way to start the day.

For example?

• “If I was [sic] John McCain, I would have insisted that the debates not be shot in HD.”
• “All of the McCain-Palin signs have gone missing from my neighborhood. And I thought Obama transcended politics.”
• “My neighbor got a new McCain-Palin sign. In fact, now he has two. Take that Obama sign stealers.”
• “Example #4980 why Congress is broken: The bailout vote was technically on the “Paul Wellstone Mental Health & Addiction Equity Act of 2007.”
• “Is the economy fixed yet?”
• “Is there anything about McC that you find NOT hypocritical lately?”

All of these represent Tweets or status updates that I have seen in the last week - hence, my decision to try to Opt Out of Ugliness.  You see, I have lived and worked in the nation’s capital since 1987 and have never — ever– seen such venom on both sides of the political aisle.  I am pretty sure that it was always there, it is just that the social-media-Hyde-Park-Speaker’s-Corner-Soap-Boxes did not yet exist.

So for all of you out there who are exercising your constitutionally-given right to express your political views, have at it.

But I can’t believe that I would EVER quote him — but of all of people, Howard Stern often said “if you don’t like what you are hearing, turn the radio dial.”  So for a while, I am out of the ugliness.

Mark

I have been offline for ten days or so because I had a little owie in my arm that turned out to be some pretty major surgery.  While I was recuperating and emerged from a percocet-induced haze, it occurred to me that I was really lacking an outlet for ideas, expressed in social media.

I use this blog, Media Bullseye and Boston Hardball to express what happens to me on my mind that particular day or in that particular moment.  Being robbed, temporarily, of the use of my right arm made me think how important user generated content (the user being ME) had become to me.  I had a lot to say, and the only one to hear it was my new dog, Prince.  And he just cocks his head and walks off.

So while I can’t type for long, this avoiding a typical diabtribe, it’s nice to be back in the swing with the ability to express myself using social media.  I missed it.

Mark

I have gained semi-notoriety this week because of my online-based apology tour, having said stupid things, apologized and my idiocy was well-documented and forgiven on CareerDiva.net, the New York Times, and I even did an interview yesterday with the Washington Business Journal (no link yet because it will be a couple of weeks, but you can count on my self-promotional side to pimp that too).

I have a semi-foul mouth, which has been curbed only through my parenthood, but for those of you who have read this blog, you’ll note that when I become particularly exasperated by something that I think is inane, my usual response is:

“Jesus.”

Well, now I have either an outlet for that, or an e-portal which may just ensure my eternal damnation.  Tech Crunch reported recently on the launch of Gospelr,

…a microblogging platform for people who want to share thoughts, ideas, words of encouragement, prayer requests, daily scripture readings, and oh so much more.”

I am honestly not here to praise or condemn this, but one of the questions that I get asked frequently and was asked yesterday during the interview was “What is the next BIG THING?”  Some people B.S. (there’s that foul mouth again), their way through this, but my answer was simple:  Anyone who tells you what the NEXT BIG THING is is lying.

An example of this is the fact that Gospelr is based upon the Twitter platform and represents a segmentation of the Twitter audience.  A year ago, who predicted that Twitter would launch, crash (literally), an then crawl back into our waiting arms?  And what about that stupid whale?

I think that Gospelr represents the fact that microblogging has now become so intertwined with our lives, we’ll begin to see more and more platforms that are targeted towards a particular segment of the of the  population who share common interests.  Now THAT’S interesting.

I’ll avoid all other commentary as to minimize the flaming comments that are undoubtedly headed my way.

Mark

I am so fortunate in this life to get know know smart and talented people who connect me to other smart and talented people.

I won’t divulge her name because she has not given me the ok, but one of my amazing students from last semester (who while studying at Georgetown and another institution of higher learning trained for and completed the Boston Marathon) has virtually introduced me to Jim Long.  Jim, on his “about page,” says:

We stand at a tipping point in the media world. Existing media models, weighted on the side of big corporations, big finance, big hits, and big stars are crumbling around us. The pendulum has swung. Now, trend spotters, micro-celebrities, and the new influencers are using the power of social networking, syndication, and online distribution to aggregate audience and leverage their value.”

True ‘dat.

And as usual, other folks find smart statistics, that I, um, “appropriate.”  The one below is from Jim’ post “Trendspotting-Finding Opportunity in Career Uncertainty.”  I urge you all to visit Jim’s blog, but he succinctly makes the point in the chart and subsequent paragraph:

See that blue line on the graph? That represents jobs data for the TV news industry according to Simply Hired. For those of you who don’t know me, I’m a network news cameraman by trade, still clinging on to rapidly diminishing fortunes. The more appealing green line represents job data results for “Social Network”. So as that downward job trend continues across legacy media, I still believe there is tremendous opportunity in social media.”

Looking forward to meeting you, Jim.  And thanks, person-in-this-space-who-will-go-unnamed…

Mark

In a moment that was likely based on blogger hubris and too much caffeine, a few weeks ago, I blogged about an MSNBC piece on social media overload and called it “sloppy journalism.”

The point that I was attempting to make in the post is that there are enough tools and aggregators out there to eliminate social media overload.  FriendFeed and other tools can put it all in one place.  Almost as soon as I wrote it, some regular readers chimed in and politely took me to task;  the article was note written for propeller-heads such as myself, but for people for whom social media may indeed create overload.

Among the initial comments were:

• Jonathan Trenn said: You’re an online strategist, a PR pro, a social media practitioner. Being networked on all these sites is in your professional blood. In addition, you likely feel somewhat required to take part in all of these networks because it’s tied into what you do for a living.  She’s likely writing that piece for a lot of the working professionals who are getting all sorts of information on this network, on that service, etc.
• Jenn Zingsheim said: I agree that this seems to be sensationalist journalism, but Jonathan has a really great point. I find that when I’m talking about what I do to friends & family, they get quickly lost when I’m describing all the different networks. They like to package things neatly into boxes (”…ok, so Flickr does photos, LinkedIn is professional, Facebook is college…what? It’s not just college? and you have professional connections there too?…I thought that’s what LinkedIn was for…” etc.)

And then, yesterday, the author of the original article, Eve Tahmincioglu wrote a polite and measured response to my posting which was critical of her piece (which I am listing in its entirety):

• Hey Mark,

  I don’t enjoy being called sloppy but I’m open to any criticism if I can learn from it and get better at what I do. I’m not sure your criticism here really helped me out but I’d be interested in hearing more.

  It’s great to hear you’re able to keep up with so many social networking sites, but alas, not everyone can, aggregators or not.

  I have gotten tons of emails from people who believe they need to have hundreds of friends on every site out there and the thought of it is driving them crazy. The bottom line is they don’t.

  Because of what we do we have to luxury to play around with all these new great sites, but there are many professionals out there scrambling to keep their jobs or find new ones that don’t.

  If I had time, I would definitely attend the Blog Expo, being I’m a blogger myself. I would have stopped by to say hello.

  And by the way, my name is pronounced, tach-min-gio-lou.

  Best,
  Eve

Just like the old saying goes, if one man calls you a jackass, pay no attention.  If three people call you a jackass, buy a saddle.  So I am going saddle shopping later today.

I’ll say publicly what I posted in the comment thread and what I emailed:  my post was a cheap shot and Eve responded politely and without rancor.  And the fact is that Eve, Jonathan and Jenn were right:  it’s easy for me to dismiss social media overload because I live in a different world.  Given time to think about it, my response is akin to my accountant saying to me, “There’s no such thing as difficulties in doing your taxes because Microsoft Excel is so easy to use.”

I was wrong, period, and am eating a big crow sandwich.  After I researched Eve a little, I discovered that she has her own blog, has published a book, and is well-thought of enough to have column on MSNBC and is clearly somewhat of an expert in the career field.

And to top it all off, when subject of a pithy post, Eve is unfailingly polite.

So where I come from, when you’re wrong, you apologize. Sorry, Eve.

Mark