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Month: September 2009

Be a social media star: a menu board of 5 competences

We are in social media because we really have fun

Most of us who get into social media because we love it.  We like computers and we are fairly sociable, though curiously, often introverted too.

We do what we love, and we do it happily all day long.

It’s only when we start to think about making money, that we start to think about monetizing. And then we start to think a lot about money. And we start to talk about it too.

Have you ever noticed that people in other industries don’t talk about money nearly as much as we do?

That’s because they have more than us.

Why other people make money

My ‘day job’, or at least my day-job in years gone by, was as a psychologist to commerce and industry. We put in systems – pay, performance appraisal, selection. Hell, even pensions.

Most social media firms are much too small to be bothered with such systems. That’s lucky. These systems tend to be rather dull.

The guiding principles behind the systems are another matter though.

Take competencies, for example.

We try to understand a job in terms of its essential skill base. What do we get done? What are the main clusters of tasks?

I’ve been edging toward a model for social media and this is what I’ve come up with.

Menu board of 5 competencies in social media

Competence 1: Customers

Who are our customers? If they used our service, what would they use it for? How do they satisfy that need without us?

Once we’ve introduced our service, how do they use it? What tweaks do they introduce?

This isn’t a customer-service role. It’s a strategic-role where our expertise is watching the people we serve.

Clay Shirky is the best example of a person who is expert in this role He works at the role of macro-strategy. What affects all of us?

We also need mavens working at the level of micro-strategy – our own industry, our own locality, our specific demographic. Anthropology and sociology are good foundations for this expertise.

Competence 2: Technology

Today, Seth Sternberg, founder of Meebo, posted his thoughts on managing startups over on Techcrunch.

He believes that the core team needs at least two technical people: the pixelator (design of the front end) and the person who makes the servers fly (backend).

That’s a useful framework to start with. Where is design and processing going? What is likely to break onto the scene in the next five years? What is flair and what is competence in the field?

In the social media world of south-east England, many of us rely on LoudMouthMan to give us an overview of what is happening.

I suspect many geeks are very specialized and are micro-micro, so to speak.  What are the slightly broader ‘chunks’ that match clusters or groups of apps who compete with each other?

Competence 3: Marketing

Now we get to looking after customers.  Marketers in the social media space are quite competent technically.  They use social media to find customers, respond to customers, and tweak the system to manage the % ROI.

This space is very noisy. But I perceive most people are chasing the business of big traditional companies who are perceived to be flush with cash.

I haven’t met too many social media marketers who will manage a startup.  The closest that I know of is Julius Solaris who is his own startup, so to speak.  He arrived in UK less than 18 months ago and has built an extensive network of entrepreneurs in London.

I’ve done a little work on the broad mega-picture of Facebook & Twitter and Linkedin users in UK

To work our own space – to go from zero customers to 1000’s of customers, we need to copy Julius.

Competence 4: Keeping it all together.

I have met some accountants at Julius’ meetups. Accountants who specialize in social media are as rare as hens’ teeth though.

Lawyers are a little more common, but not common at all. Omar Ha-Redeye, reading for his JD in Canada is the closest I know.

This post is my contribution to this competence ‘Keeping it all together’ by thinking ahead about our skill base.

Competence 5: Emergence

And lastly, who is Hannibal of the A team?

We sometimes bring ‘old world’ attitudes to social media. We want to be in-charge, largely because we don’t trust each other and we are terrified of losing control of the ‘rent’ – the unusual profits.

In reality, of course, we barely have any profit at all. This is part of the creative sector and few people get rich.

Hannibal doesn’t play this old fashioned role. Hannibal thinks up the game plan. Hannibal builds the missing trust and gets out some fair and cast iron contracts (that the lawyers, accountants and psychologists will make happen in their detail).

Hannibal coordinates. Hannibal sizes up the progress we make in our distinct arenas and passes information between us to help us stay together.

And second only to building trust, Hannibal senses the emergence of new understanding, clarity and more finely tuned goals. Hannibal represents the group to itself . . . represents the group to itself.

Hannibal must love the group, seriously love it.

We are Hannibal in our own lives. We think up our game plan. We help all the people who help us to trust each other. We pass information between them when they cannot do it themselves. We sense what we can do together and we represent this possibility so everyone can imagine a future that includes us . Universities have started to offer full semester courses to start students developing personal leadership.

Five competencies for managing a social media business

  • We need them all in part
  • It’s great when we find a maven who will keep us informed of broad changes
  • It seems to me that there are many opportunities to become experts at “industry” level (between niche and the broader picture).
  • “Keeping it all together” is calling for people with professional skills to specialize in social media.
  • We are all Hannibals in our own life.
  • Some people play the role of Hannibal in project teams and get very good at it.

Any use to you? Has this list helped you to check off your strengths and the strengths of your network?

Can you start a project team in the next month?  Who is missing from your team?

When you next go to a meetup, who are you hoping to find, probably standing somewhere quietly?

Any thoughts?

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Events Managers teaching us the central concept of management

I had an interesting exchange today with Events Impresario, Julius Solaris.  Well, I had two, but I will tell you about this one.

Julius tweetedd about the lack of creativity in events.

  • I asked whether lack of creativity mattered and whether we would rather have events where creativity happened.
  • Quick off the mark, Julius tweeted: “@jobucks but providing a creative environment is key to foster creativity IN the event”

Yes!  Which the boundary conditions does the Event Manager create, so that you and I can be creative when we meet at the party?

These days, people do Masters degrees in Event Management.  So, somebody must know.

How do students learn this double-layered approach to management?

Which conditions do we manage to raise the likelihood of creative activity by the guests?

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Exuberant Monday: What atmosphere would you like today?

“There  is no place on earth more exuberant than Venice on a breezy, hot, cloudless, day.  The boats rock and swell in the Lagoon as if launching themselves, crewless, on adventure;  the ornate facades brighten in the sunlight;  the water smells fresh, for once.  The whole city puffs up like a sail, a boat dancing unmoored, ready to float off.  The waves at the edge of the Piazza di San Marco became raucous in the wake of the speedboats, producing a festive but vulgar music like the dash of cymbals.  In Amsterdam, Venice of North, this jubilant weather would have made the city sparkle with renewed purpose.  Here, it ended by showing the cracks in the perfection – .  .  .”  The Historian, Elizabeth Kostova.

I do love exuberance.  What atmosphere do you like best?

I was delighted last year to stumble over the work of Kay Jamieson who researches exuberance – mainly in scientists.

This piece in The Historian led me to reflect how inarticulate we are at describing the atmosphere that we prefer.  We probably fumble toward what we like and when we have the chance, attempt to re-create what we enjoyed in the past.  We probably recognize quite easily the surface features of what we enjoy.  But do we understand the deep structure that allows these surface features to emerge?

Kay Jamieson studies exuberance in individuals.  Saying it is OK to be exuberant is probably one of part of deep structure we need.  What are others?  To recreate an exuberant atmosphere – or the atmosphere we prefer.

And your preference is .   .  .:

Kay Jamieson on exuberance

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BoXAK9qbRh4]

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8 must-haves for conferences in 2009

About once a year, I go to a formal conference, I am not sure why.   I prefer unconferences and most conferences these days are streamed. I could put my feet up and watch at home.

So for me, there is an increasingly “high ticket to entry”.

I think these 5 are what are called “table stakes” .  They are the minimum to be credible.

1.  I want the venue to be clean (it usually is in the UK).

2. I want parking (preferably free). Importantly, though I want details on how and where to park. That means the postal code and how I will pay and for what period. Should I have trekked off to bank to find pound coins in advance, etc. What do I do if the machine is broken, etc.

3.  I want the postal code of the venue. Google has maps and cars and phones have satnav. I don’t want a diagram or written instructions. I want a postal code so I can use the map of my choice. But peculiarities like the number of exits at the Tube, the one for me and direction I should turn when I hit fresh air would be good. London is notorious for not marking its streets.

4.  I want working WIFI and it should work the minute I switch on my device.

5.  I want to know where to get refreshments. In the UK, we usually travel a long way. When the hosts provide refreshments, they really do need to be healthy and match the diversity of UK.  Otherwise arrangements at a local eaterie might be preferable.  I don’t want to ruin my health for the sake of being cheap.

With Web 2.0, I think we get another list which allows us to prepare before we come to the meeting.

We don’t want to spend several days following people up afterward. Ideally, when we walk out the door, we’ve wrapped up our routine business and moved on to coordinating opportunities that arose out of the meeting.

1.  Registration on Amiando because they provide a community. Meetup is fine for non-conferences.

2.  Registration information that does not dwell on rank or institution. Life has changed. I don’t want to talk to you if you don’t want to talk to me! Tell me why you are there and what I can do for you.   In advance. Put up a link to your blog and give me your Twitter name.  I’ll scan the lists and connect up with you before the meeting.

3. A Twitter stream is good but so is a way to find each other.  We must have contact information in advance and our twitter names should be on the participants’ list.

I am looking forward to the wider use of ecards too. I don’t want to enter cards when I get home. I want to send an ecard directly to my contacts database. That’s for 2010.

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Surprise! US is not overborrowed. But does it have Growth Story?

If you have even the slightest interest in living in the manner to which you have become accustomed, can I recommend you find 5 hours to watch these three videos of 12 economists talking what is happening in the US financial system and its dealings with the rest of the world?

I am just a lowly psychologist so I try to boil down economics to actionable rules of thumbs that we can use.  When you are done, I’d be interested in your take of mine.

1.  Find your growth story . . . and stick to it!

Find an industry that you enjoy, find the bit that is growing, and grow with it, wherever it takes you.

2.  Help you kids find their growth story

Invest in the things they love to do and take them on holiday to parts of the world where growth is happening.

Think abut a good trip to Brazil, Russia, China or India once in three years, rather than a time-wasting, resource-frittering holiday every year.

And if they have any inclination for languages, help them by doing their homework with them.   It may help when you talk to you grand-children who might be living in another country!

And may be include Arabic on you list of possibles.  Bang on the door of the mosque in your neighbourhood and ask them to include your children in their after-school activities?

3.  Remember that money is losing value as much as houses are losing value

Unless you have a lot of it hanging around, this is a good news story for you. Investors will want to invest in your growth story.

Don’t be desperate for their money. You have something as rare as hens’ teeth.

Bring in investors who believe in your story as strongly as they believe in returns on their capital.

And then write a tight contract for them!  This is a borrower’s market, whatever the mass media tells you.

4.  Learn the numbers and ask your MP and business leaders hard questions

The more we show that we know the numbers, the quicker they will get down and dirty with them too.

Let them watch 5 hours of videos on economic more often than we do.  That’s their job, after all. Let’s get our money’s worth!

5.  Vote with your ballot and your feet for people and firms with growth stories

Question the panic about government borrowing.

It may be different here in the UK – I wish we had a forum like these 12 economists here.  Common sense tells us, though, that we will only get out of our mess with a plan – a plan for getting out and moving along with growth stories in Brazil Russia India and China.

We don’t have to eat and drink ourselves silly to keep up. But starving ourselves and living in sack cloth won’t make us any richer either.

Government borrowing is only a problem when don’t have a plan to make businesses better over the next 5, 10, 20 years.

We want a growth story!  Can we start a fashion?  What will happen if we ask everyone you meet, what is your growth story!

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RSS’d to make your dream come true?

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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Add these 2 places to your guidebook of the British internet

At the Oxford Social Media Convention, I met a young man from Nominet UK. Nominet UK registers all top level domains dot.uk.

Nominet UK is a not-for-profit company.  It took a while of clicking around their website to find that out!

That information should be in their footer, shouldn’t it?

This young man told me he was a Trustee and employed by ??? Nominet or a Trust run by Nominet?. Couldn’t find the Trust on the Nominet website so I googled.

There is a Nominet Trust and its institutional framework is clearer.   It is a charity and the information is on the front-page.  I must have been talking to James Kemp.

Here is its purpose

“We will consider funding UK-based and international Internet-related initiatives in the sectors of education, research and development, safety and inclusion.”

What odd wording “we will consider”.

The project must be capable of delivering what is promised.  Shouldn’t we take that for granted?

But this is a link you should remember if you are interested in inclusion and the internet.

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Future of social media from Social Media Convention

Blogging at 20? The future and potential of social media

Panelists:

Kara Swisher,Wall Street Journal

Dave Sifry, Technocrati

Richard Allan, Facebook

Nigel Shadbolt, University of Southampton

Chair: William Dutton, Oxford University

If social media are the defining advance of Web 2.0, whereby the network-as-platform enabled users not just to download content but to create it, tag it and share it, what will the next decade hold? Many of the social media businesses whose tools we rely on have yet to make a profit, whilst concerns about privacy, security and possibly even dignity suggest that our online habits may have to change. The technology press has for some time been heralding the oncoming arrival of Web 3.0, as an era where the web gets ’smart’, and research on the developing semantic web suggests that this is no idle prediction. But what will happen to social media in the interim? Will the next ten years see our fascination with blogging, wikis and social networks replaced by a re-focusing on the enhanced informational capacity of the Web or will we continue to Tweet?

Richard Allan. Increasing pressure to regulate. EU took broadcasting rules and applied to internet. When video hs TV like power – it will attract attn of regulators. We want to tak our identity with us – crunch area. Can we let ppl let us develop identities – regulation of identity is an attractive issue for governments. Increasing power of audience.

Daily reach Facebook in UK 9m by 0.5 hr.

Bill Dutton. In US, want anonymity.

Richard Allan. Germany, like pseudonyms. Some sites might want identity cards.

Nigel Shadbolt. Public data should public. Delighted Facebook is promoting portability. Somebody at Google -Data Liberator.

What can be predicted – space and place will be more exquisitely defined. Will be revealed by digital behaviour.

Social norms. Do we need regulation. Let’s have some very clear info about where our info is and we must held ppl accountable or misuisng it.

Question.

?? Strategy for governments. Need data. Lisbon – top-down.

Richard Allan. Next few years. What mashups could you build? Find a loo – Satlav. Get data out of local authorities. Make data freely data – at every local govt.

Kara . .. find Starbucks.

David. Urinary Liberation Front.

Nigel Shadbolt. Need to be able access data. Some inadevertently handed over. Rail timetables.

David. Legal proceedings.

Nigel Shadbolt. Each jurisdiction will have different view of what is a public good.

Question.

?? Who controls, for example, our language preferences. Who will control this in future?

Kara . .. Google.

Dave. .. easily fixable. Geo search. Area of enormous innovatin. Who tracks all that. Commonly available. Genie out of bottle.

Kara. .Google holds back results in China, by requiremetn.

Richard Allan. Geo location is covered by law in Eu.

Kara.. .. computer driven body parts.

Floor/Kara animals / kids – 2 blocks off.

Bill Dutton. Privacy and surveillance. Also issue of quality. Are social networks going to enhance quality or not in your area? Or sideshow.

Nigel Shadbolt. Purposive social networks. What can you keep private? Challenge to build networks with scientists. Interesting engineering to share data. Quality? Next year – most papers in chem.eng will be in Chinese. Data is published with paper.

Kara….. no downside. Scientists collaborative and competitive. Silos. New media is of quality and getting better – take quality and ethics and embrace speed. Do excellent work online and still of high quality.

Dave…. better and be worse. Think through consequences of speed.

Richard Allan. Comparing apples and pears. Comparing content and conversation. Framing doesn’t tell us about quality anymore. We can make wrong assumptions about what we are looking at.

Nigel Shadbolt. Internet . . didn’t persuade Americans to believe in natual selection.

Question

?? Business model scalable to univeral access. Richer, younger, better educated are on line. Will we increase real life differentials?

Kara . .. distribution of technology in States. Universal access. Facebook has turned profitable. Google more profitable than Oprah – did I get that right.

Bill Dutton. Social accountability for small groups of users.

Question

x hours of YouTube – people becoming illiterate. . ..

Kara . . think video, screens.

Touch it, move it.

Richard Allan. Video will distribute President Palin.

Nigel Shadbolt. Empowers illiterate.

Dave…. Had videos for years…. won’t replace multi-modal

Kara . . 4 year olds expect screens to be touch screens

Dave . . . What will be on top today, will not be on top then.

Nigel Shadbolt – silicon will be meat…. lifestyle data …. big

Richard Allan – serious movement of refuseniks

-end-

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

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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Scientists ARE using social media

Parallel Session II: Making science public: data-sharing, dissemination and public engagement with science

Panellists:

Ben Goldacre, Open blog

Cameron Neylon, Bad Science blog & Oxford University

Maxine Clarke, Nature

Chair: Felix Reed-Tsochas, Oxford University

Journals and peer-reviewed publications are still the most widely used channels through which research is disseminated within the scientific community and to a broader audience. However, social media are increasingly challenging the supremacy of editors, reviewers and science communicators. Blogging about science has become a new way of engaging ‘the public’ directly with researchers whilst researchers are increasingly using blogs within their own academic communities for peer-review purposes. Panellists will give their perspective on how social media have changed the nature of the scientific debate among scientists, and how they have impacted on engagement with the public understanding of science.

1. (Observation last night.) Two of the panelists list their blog as well as their academic affiliation. But are they academics too? Or borrowed for the occasion?

2. Missed opening remarks as struggled with weak internet connections here.

3. Now Cameron Neylon. Scientist – using social media as his lab notebook. No peer review. Ppl could steal data. But could [crowd-source] review. Then discovered other scientists using social media to “do science”. Maxine Clarke of Nature said few scientists use social media but it is a rapidly growing community.

Exp – publicize details – ask people to take mmts.

Describing typical 7 year cycle of a research project.

Who funded the prizes (journal subs) for students. Completed project in 6 mo with invited paper and publication. Much more efficient.

Questions

FRT: How much has interaction changed?

Ben Goldacre. Journos often get issues wrong and dumb down issues. Does journo science news inform people with science degrees who work in a variety of roles? Blogs can be niche (mindhacks on neuroscience and psychology). Imagine 2000 science blogs with 500 readers each talking to 1m people.

Royal Society Prizes for science books recently – 20K in prizes an more in admin – books selling 3000 copies only. Science Minister [google the spat] – committees have no new media experience.

Blogs encourage us to be clearer and sounder about what we write. Link culture. Journos don’t want you to know they’ve copied and pasted from a press release. Cited an example of not checking primary sources. We link to primary sources.

FTR: [Will blogs kill science journalism?]

BG: Old science journalism is dumbed down for us. We need a patchwork with better stuff for people who are informed.

FTR: Danger of sloppy journalism. But issue of quality and trust.

BG: Journos say internet is undistributed mush. Need to learn to use internet. Easy to tell when something is [rubbish]. Lots of dodgy stuff everywhere. Want more and let the street [filter].

Maxine Clarke: As editor, don’t equate blog in that way. But likes blogs and interaction. Nerdish quality – correct – find niche. Look for Open Lab.

BG: Disintermediation – 70% of science words on BBC Radio 4 are spoken by scientists themselves. Shepherded and coached to be clear – but speaking. Look at Radio 4 for examples.

Cameron Neylon. Abandon term public – don’t distinguish between public and scientists. Engage people with the scientists. Let people contribute to science – even be authors.

BG: Interdisciplinary communication. Semi-professional communication promotes . . . Need a place between newspapers and journals.

FTR: Will social media allow us to differentiate public?

Cameron Neylon: Arrogant and lazy toward non-scientists. Need not to be [snobbish]. Get support for funding.”public

Questions

Dussledorf: What keeps scientists from using Web2.0?

BG: Younger people use Web2.0? Get RAE to reward unmediated engagement with “public”. And pay or allow people to split jobs.

Maxine Clarke: Generational issues for journals like Nature. Friendfeed heated discussions about science.

Camero Neylon: Only just starting to explore social media for public and for science (see Friendfeed). New things are high risk strategies and they keep high risk behaviour for science. Won’t be taken seriously if you are out on a limb. People who are using Web2.0 are trying to get a tenured position. Some senior ppl involved. But 10 years in – more cautious.

BG. Use blogs as [scribble-pad] in lost cost threshold.

Question

❓ Time to read academic reports. Likes Nature for summary. Few Twitters using service. How are inst. like Nature making money out of it.

Maxine Clarke. Highlights from Nature very popular. Making money isn’t a serious concern for making money online – still experimental. Lack of time – Nature Network – some blogs to work out problems but also just about lab life. Social not about scientific work itself. Scientists are cerebral – therefore enjoy blogs.

OII: Fighting against moral panics? Rapidity of moral panics in journo. How does peer review play into process? Blogging about something published is out of step with production of work – time gap huge.

Cameron Neylon: 6.5bn spent on science. 80% of cost is peer review – count peer review ideas by 95%. Small proportion of important ideas – use traditional methods. Straight out of instrument and blogged if need for instrument.

Ben Goldcre. Peer review is best of bad lot. What is a scientific publication. Document of record. Methods and results to be published. Different types of publications. Need to recognise two types.

Maxine Clarke. Peer review increases quality. 95% of biological papers are rejected and some passed on to other journals. Cited a journal that publishes online with peer reports – need tagging system.

FTR – audience separating production and differentiation. [lost question]

Maxine Clarke. More journals publishing peer reviews and opening up articles for comment. People tagged by subject. People don’t comment. Scientists conservative – assessed by publications. Power issues inhibit comment.

FTR- can social media change scientific debates.

Maxine Clarke. Widgets in newspapers to follow conversations – find hard to follow. Nature also makes txt accessible in “accessble” format. Conversation too fragmented.

Cameron Neylon. Publicatation is too high risk to be the place to innovate. . . online material not indexed by medline. Conversations in different part of research cycle.

BG: Structural issues. Draw strands together about topic – can it be open. Wiki-professionals – micro-credits for helping on something.

Maxine Clarke: Micro-attribution is growing topic. Av no authors is 6. Some consortia iare 100 or so.

Can contributions be attributed to you – technical issue.

FTR: open source modes of science. Triggers of open source science.

CN: Science is the great open source endeavour. What can we do that is useful? If cannot be replicated and cannot check details, not science.

Bill Dutton: Peer review publications – wrong place to look. Other phases of research process – lot going on. Less collaboration less at publication, high status, older people.

Maxine Clarke. [Internet playing up]

Question: Radio 4. Book only sold 3000 copies. Wonderful to have well written science blogs. Few ppl capable to of writing good science blogs. Problem is not quality but problem of selling stuff to consumers.

Ben Goldacre. That’s why good

Lost a bit here – Said Business School’s internet connection is scribbled.

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