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Tag: Matthew Hindman

RSS’d to make your dream come true?

Published September 20, 2009 by Jo Jordan

RSS’d?

If you aren’t, it probably won’t!  As a work psychologist, that was a subterranean text that I was hearing at the Oxford Social Media Convention on Friday.

Matthew Hindman, for example, a political scientist from Arizona, tracks how the internet is used in politics in the US.  While we are raving about my.barackobama.com, Matthew is noting details that pass us by.

For example, Obama won Ohio through marginal gains in Republican states which, in turn, were made on the back of careful statistical analysis of voting patterns.  I live in a small town in rural England, and RSS’ed or not, putting my hands on his book, The Myth of Digital Democracy, over the weekend is not a possibility.

[If anyone knows how to efficiently read 200 page pdf files on a screen, please doooooo tell me the secret]

Internet politics is not for the faint-hearted

What I gathered of the overall message is this.

The internet is a powerful tool in the hands of people who understand statistics, who understand politics, and who are motivated to get out there and do the work.

What can political scientists (who watch the way we use the internet) teach those of us in business?

Without benefit of the book and not knowing how to read long pdf documents efficiently on screen, I’ve been thinking about what I heard against what I already know.

  • When the barriers to entry are low, as they are on the internet, “every man and his dog” is able to enter the space.
  • Because so many people are in the space, competition is fierce, and profits are low.
  • Because profits are low, consolidation and scale is important.
  • And people who have already invested hugely (think TESCO’s for example) will protect their investment and are going to play hardball with we ‘noobes’.

Porter’s 5 factor model and my internet business

I like messing around with numbers and seeing what they can tell us about what we are doing and where we are going.  So I look forward to seeing the data Matthew has put together and seeing what analyzes we could do here in UK in both the political and business arenas.

The progress that I’ve made so far, is that I am hearing the principles of Porter’s 5 factor model of business conditions.

  • The internet is an unattractive industry precisely because it is easy to get into. [Barriers to entry are low]
  • When we work in the internet, we have to organize our work to “take care of the pennies”. [Cost leadership]
  • We also have to get quite big to have enough volume to make a profit.

Can I conclude from this train of thought that in the internet world, organizing and organizational skills are critical?  Have we even thought about the challenges of “taking care of the pennies”? [Not a lot! Time to begin!]

And am I RSS’d to do the work involved?

Which of my ventures can I be RSS’d to do ALL the work it takes to win?

[I am trying to remember who made the RSS joke. Iain Dale! Politicians do not know their RSS from their elbows!]

Parallels with running a psychological practice

This isn’t a new problem for me.  I am a psychologist by trade and I’ve spent countless hours over the years talking about exactly the same issues in our businesses. . . oops!. . .professional practices.

We have exactly the same ‘problem’.   Anyone can dispense psychological advice – and they do.  My profession tries various tricks like protecting the name and putting up artificial licenses to stop other people using various procedures.

We do all that to escape the the hard reality that we need both organization and professional knowledge to run a profitable practice.  The amateur sees our interaction with our clients.  They copy that.  They pinch our materials and copy what they see us do.   What they don’t see and don’t copy is the back end.

That infuriates us because the back end is expensive.

When we get over being annoyed, we can turn this relationship around. Our back end is worth what we pay for it because it allows us to answer three questions consistently and better than the amateur who trying to copy us without sufficient investment in the ‘going concern’.

  • Do we understand our clients deeply in ways that they care about?
  • Are we there for them when they need us?
  • Does our analysis of their issues and concerns help them act and act effectively in the mess, rough and tumble of their own lives?

It feels so ‘wrong’ to have to compete with amateurs. And ‘noobes’ deeply resent the cost of the the organization structure to deliver a competitive service and the time it takes to put it together.  Oh, the conversations I’ve had and the time I’ve spent getting my head around this.

But that’s business when barriers to entry are low.  It is part of our professionalism to know that.  Porter’s Five Forces does explain that – in every first year business text.   We should know that we need a professional organization to give our message efficiency, effectiveness and edge.  Sadly, the internet is not easy pickings in politics or business.

Our RSS’d about boxes

So we’d better know what we are RSS’d about!  And hang out with people who are RSS’d about it too.

Maybe we can have two boxes?

Hobby – enjoy it, but can’t be RSS’d to win.

Profession – sooo committed that being RSS’d to do the details comes easy.

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Academics begin by dismissing the democratic potential of social media and end there?

Published September 18, 2009 by Jo Jordan

Social media, so what? Assessing the impact of blogs and social media

Panelists:

Stefan Niggemeier, BILDblog

Evgeny Morozov, Georgetown University

Matthew Hindman, Arizona State University

Richard Allan, Facebook

Chair: Sandra Gonzalez-Bailon, Oxford University

Theorists such as Yochai Benkler have suggested that the accessibility and inherently social nature of Web 2.0 tools such as blogs, social networking and wikis mean that we might expect them to enhance our democratic freedoms through the opening of new channels for debate and collaboration. Academic research suggests that such new opportunities have not been equally taken up, and that in many areas, new social media are simply being used by old ‘elites’. At the same time, blogs and social media are having significant effect in enhancing accountability and transparency, particularly in repressive regimes like Burma and China. This session will ask whether we should be so quick to dismiss the socially egalitarian and politically democratic potential of social media or whether there might equally be more mundane but significant social impacts which have so far been ignored.

Missed beginning with internet problems.  People kicking the benches.  Photographers blinding us with flashes.  No work getting done here.

Evgeny Morozov:  From Belarus – some countries getting more democratic.  Some activists and NCG’s becoming more effective.

Impact of internet – what about people who are not activists.  All political forces are using it.  Can find connections of dissidents online.  Access doesn’t make people aspire for democracy.  [Why should it?  Technological determinism?]  Says refrain from technological determinism?  [Straw man?]

Richard Allan:  Potential vs reality.  Political practitioner.  Audience had left the building.  Political class optimistic.  Cyberutopia just that.

Apps that allow ppl to have ongoing deeper relationships beyond challenge-response of a blog.   Afffordancies from a political view.

Early social media : pubs (bars) online.  Bars develop a specific character. Talking to the same people.  People could come in but don’t.

Now: Festival.  Arrive with like-minded people but reach out and meet new people and discover new ideas.  At a Festival, we spend time in the music tents not the side shows.  But side shows can arrive and develop novel connections.  Entertainment also still trumps politics.  Can we use social media to expand our networks in novel ways.

Matthew Hindman: Access, openess, public sphere – most people say there are low barriers to entry.  Monopolies -high fixed costs, low variable costs.  Economics on internet are far less forgiving.   What has Google spent on intrastrucutre on R&D.  By end of 2010, Google will have cost more than the Manhattan project. Web has many new niches but saturate quickly.    What is cost of Amazon?  In any established niche, fixed cost are very high.    Choke points.

Who uses the technologies – may onto existing . . .

Democratization – messy business – no technology can make all the values better at once. American public sphere currently very exclusionary – gatekeepers different but disproportionately male, white, highly educated.    Internet does not reach people who take their lunch pail to work.

Marketplace of ideas is more ferocious than ever – imperfect ways of addressing.

Deliberation vs coordination.

View of BO campaign -networks ran centrally rather than distributed.  Disintermediating politicians.

BO won Ohio with much more effective statistical targetting & political history – won in Republican areas of state.  Done by elites.

SGB:

Unintended consequences.  Most important unintended consequences.

Stefan Niggemeier:  Use tools to own end.  Use for spam or evil things.   Don’t think in UiC.  To start internet company can be difficult, but so much easier to be heard.    Know it doesn’t happen all the time.

Matthew Hindman:  Traditional media you will be heard.  Publish on internet you may not be heard.  You do not have to ask permission -you need to catch the attention of a big blogger.    Many possible patrons but still need one.   Some groups are not on line – trade unions and conservative religious not on  line.

Production more open but filtering is not more open.  [push pull issues here??]

Evgeny Morozov. Social media helps repressive media – selective about response.

[Some give and take by panel as I am distracted by media problems again]

Matthew Hindman.  Example.

Question

??  Take focus away from minority -technologies exacerbate divide.  96% of Africa no way of expressing themselves.

MT: Mobile phones in Africa.  Half of Africa can be reached by cell phone.

Richard Allen.  Less interesting in library and more in conversation.  Advantages of being part of conversation (yes or no)?

BBC: Blogs, crimes and national security.

Evgeny Morozov.  Sharing information on cyberattacks.   Need discussion of cyberviolence.   Govt is going pursuing national security agenda – most done by individuals for non-criminal reasons.

Question.

?? Synthesis – social mediators –  what I can do on line?  Seeing emergence of new intermediation.  What do people do with what we do online?

Question.

??  Unintended consequences.   What do panel think about real time public scrutiny has affected public debate?

Answers: ? Citizen expectations that we would move toward direct representation – Richard Allan prefers representational politics.  EM – healthcare debate – 70% discuss myths and then media comes in.   [ confused – Palin talked about death panels to win not to be accurate].

MH clearest result of real time scrutiny has bee higher polarization.  Opinion transformation has been transformed.

Would you improve debate by seeing Twitter stream?  Stefan yes.

Question.

??  Politics is tired in UK.  Polis on line has been  failure.  Is discussing social media a smoke-screen?  Is overestimating social media undermining social media?

MH.  Cable news – most people started consuming less news, some more news, distribution changed.  Lower voter participation [cause and EM: effect?].  Inequality about what people know about politics.  Politics is small part what we do online .25% [demographic s?]

EM: Slacktavism.

Richard Allan.  Is what you are saying on line immediate and significant when they engage?  Electorate are smart.  Voters ignore politics when it is not relevant.  Not tools and issue.

Closing . . .

Very ragged.  Restless meeting struggling with intermittent internet.

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