Broadcasting Brain

As a bit of a follow-up from my guest post at LouisGray.com, where I talk about ways to enlarge the social media audience size, I have a simple thought for today.

Sometimes another social media user says something really dumb, ignorant, or otherwise embarrassing. These statements can make that other person an easy target. You can use their moment of weakness to attempt to show that you are better, stronger, faster, or otherwise superior to them by cutting them down.

The next time you see that happen, take a minute to think of a constructive response, then try contacting that person privately and let them know what you think. Show them the error that they’ve made, but don’t rub their noses in it either.

Don’t use a moment of weakness to promote yourself by leaving your footprints on the perpetrator’s back. Who knows? That act of kindness may turn out to be a beautiful thing.

And, if they reject you, just let it drop. Live and let live. Move onto something more constructive.

I don’t believe that any of my readers would engage in this kind of behavior. However, if you know someone who could get some value from this lesson, why not pass this thought onto them?

Mass media marketing thrives on controversy and chaos to get ratings. What century is this again?

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Today I’m just going to give a quick update on recent and upcoming activities:

Last night I attended the Third Tuesday Social Media Meetup in Fredericton, NB at the offices of Radian6. I had a chance to socialize with some local social media enthusiasts and learn a few new things. I dragged a co-worker along and he seemed to enjoy himself, too, so that’s all cool. I learned a bit more about LinkedIn, which I’m sure will be useful in the long run.

Two guest Brain appearances this week:

Blogging: Bored With Your Feeds - Try Toluu - guest post at Geeks Are Sexy (mentally sexy, anyway) where I give a quick overview of the up and coming Web application Toluu.

Podcasting:  I was a guest on the most recent Social Blend podcast on Friday, July 18 - the podcast should be up and available later this week. It was a lot of fun! I’ll link to that as well when it’s available.  My podcasting debut!

Note: I did Q&A sessions with SilentJay74, Bdog2g2, Nomadelle, and CGT2099 at this blog a week or so ago.

Have a good day, explore the world, and doing something special.

Image credit: Christina Snyder.

I think it’s the sloganeers that win most of my respect and admiration. In the advertising world, that is. Perhaps it’s the act of writing sales or ad copy that can really show what you’re made of. Finding that magic blend of brevity, wit, and power is yet another of those tempting grapes that I keep leaping for, yet it seems to keep eluding me.

Every now and then I see something and a little phrase pops to mind. Normally it’s a pun or wordplay that lands softly on my tongue and leaps out at the first opportunity. I want to be first to introduce the latest and greatest neologism to grace the minds and hearts of my peers and neighbors in social media. (I’m incredibly jealous of James Chartrand for inventing “niebu”. Well, he didn’t really invent it; his fat fingers did. But I digress as the envy express loads up for the next ride.) Or anywhere, really. As long as it’s clever and (here it comes) I get some credit for originating the pithy phrase, I’ll take what I can get.

This is turning into a more serious condition for me, though. I think I have coinage envy (see, I can’t stop trying!) Or punitus. Here are some (overlooked) examples of mine that I saved in Twitter:

• Q: What song do pirates sing when they’re outnumbered/outgunned by other pirates? A: “You’ve got to fight, for your right, to parlay!”
• If Saturday night’s all right for fighting, is Monday morning all right for moaning?
• There is only one thing worse than not being talked about and that is not being Twittered about - apologies to O. Wilde
• I saw the phrase “shrinkage enhancement” in a doc. at work today and thought, hm… oxymoron?
• Air conditioning - the miracle that ultimately made Web 2.0 possible.

And then there’s the attempts at pseudo-technical terminology!

• Idea injection method
• Rookiememe
• Chattercrack
• Humpday Linkage (an actual weblog that I used to post on Wednesdays)

But of course, other smart minds are out there grabbing the terms like “Twebinar”, “Plurkcast”, “Plurker”, “Clowd”, and Facebook and Twitter and… Google… and…

[deep breath]

OK, what to do? Should I abandon this pointless quest for sentence success? Or should I keep trying for something shining that “sticks”? (more on this later)

EDIT:  and, most importantly, should I get a life?  

A couple of months later than planned, I finally have sent out my first issue of my E-Mail newsletter to my mailing list.  It’s a very simple format, no graphics, etc. newsletter talking about past, present and future of my content creation work.

The newsletter is called Thought Radiation and it will probably come out once per month.  You’ll get to hear about things before they’ll happen on blog or otherwise.

If you had already signed up for my mailing list, then don’t worry, a copy of the newsletter is on the way.

If you’d like to be included on the mailing list, just drop me a line at contact@broadcasting-brain.com and I’ll gladly include you on this list so you can receive the first issue plus all upcoming newsletters and stuff.

Cheers!

I’ve been thinking a lot about the topics of yesterday’s blog post, where I fretted about actions and reactions, and a whole bunch of other dichotemies. In the end, however, the thing that bothered me the most was from one of tech blogger Corvida’s recent posts:

Disappointments

To the people who agree with this bulls*** that [Loren Feldman's] doing, I feel sorry for you. However, I feel even worse for those that won’t take a stand against him. I’m disappointed with some parts of the tech community that have let him get this far [by publishing potentially offensive videos] let alone this popular without saying something intelligent to this moron to stop his progress thus far. It’s making me feel some sort of way about the tech community that sits in silence rather than speaking out because of fear. It’s saddening and disappointing on so many levels.

The thing I don’t like about this paragraph is that it creates a dichotomy (or trichotomy, I suppose):

1. The people who chose to speak out against things that they find offensive
2. The people who don’t find these things offensive, whether or not they chose to speak up
3. The people who find these things offensive but are afraid to speak up.

Are these the only scenarios? Or is there a fourth:

4. The people who find these things offensive, but are practical or pragmatic enough to realize that best way to quiet some people is to ignore them.

Is group 4 brave? Afraid? Insensitive? Pragmatic? Callous? Smart? Ignorant? I guess that’s open to interpretation. Maybe 3 and 4 can coexist.

But here’s another thought to consider: where does it end? Are we now obligated to call out every person who makes objectionable material? Do we just focus on those people who criticize our own religion, ethnic groups, orientation, economic class, gender, or nationality? Do we take on the battles for those groups who are disadvantaged but that we don’t belong to? Do we take on some or all?

Personally, I’m just not geared up for that. I would not know where to draw the lines.

I will settle for trying to be civil and respectful towards the people that I encounter. Even that can be a challenge on some days. But it’s something within my power and sphere of influence. Otherwise, I can only handle those situations of which I have a good, detailed knowledge of the facts on all sides. It’s just too easy to make a mistake.

Sorry, readers, but that’s the way I see it. I mean no offense to anyone, especially Corvida, who followed her heart and logic and did what she thought was right in a given situation. But, again, where do we draw the lines?

EDIT:  post title changed to make more sense….

I’ve been reading some stuff during the past day that, while disturbing me, is provoking some thought.

I’m thinking a lot about poles, extremes, dichotomies, and dilemmas.

Things like:

• Digital (yes/no, 0/1, on/off) vs. analog
• Freedom of speech vs. communication within defined boundaries
• Prejudice vs. respect
• Anger vs. empathy
• Talking vs. listening
• Humor/satire vs. cruelty
• Love vs. hate
• Principles vs. situations
• Groups vs. individuals
• Trolls vs. patriots
• Laws vs. mores
• Inclusion vs. exclusion
• Logic vs. emotion
• Reality vs. illusion
• Surface vs. inside
• Taste vs. bluntness
• And, somewhere, common sense vs. human nature

Do all of the big questions only have two answers? Or are there other solutions?

There is one world and one main public Web that binds it. We all live, work, and play here.

Is there one right, appropriate solution when people publish content that other people find offensive?

I don’t know. But if we judge people solely by what we see, then some might think that I really do have blue skin and a green glowing, exposed brain. My avatar does, I don’t. But that’s what most people see.

I’m not the most community oriented person, but I worry when strong feelings work to separate its members.

Note: these are the writings that have prompted these thoughts:

Adding Fuel To The Fire of Racism

A FriendFeed thread related to the above

Loren Feldman, The New Yorker, and Social Media Evil

FriendFeed thread related to the above

Thinking About The Negatives

Another FriendFeed thread about learning about real life society

Rob Diana has been picking up the blog ranking riff at Regular Geek in this post.  He’s got some very good points, you should check out his post.

BTW, in case you didn’t notice in yesterday’s blog comments, there is now a website called Rookiememe.com (I notice that someone bought and registered the domain name yesterday so… you’re welcome.)

There’s a team of people who were working on something similar to what I described in my semi-satirical post about a fictional Rookiememe, so they’re on to something and more power to them.

I tell ya, is this Broadcasting Brain blog full of good ideas or what?

Anyway, I think this discussion about how we discover the blogs of the “long tail” of blogging is worthwhile.  What do you think?

In an attempt to lower a potential barrier to communication, I’ve done away with the Contact form on my Contact page.

If you ever want to get in touch with me by E-Mail, just drop me a line at contact@broadcasting-brain.com.

As well, I frequently check out my Twitter account.

It’s the 21st century, why not make it a bit easier to get in touch?

I think we’ve all been looking in the wrong places for the best and coolest new web app or web service.

Those of us who fear the lingering influence of the Techmeme, RSSMeme, Google Sharing, Digg, Techcrunch, etc. effects are looking for new ideas, fresh content, and wanting to discover the best new content out there.

In the interest of smashing the walls of the virtual echo chamber, I think it’s time for a brand new app. It’s time to throw out the old standards and really, really try something new.

Enter: Rookiememe

Rookiememe will be a simple but effective Web app that is focused on finding new, fresh ideas by looking for… new and fresh blogs.

Rookiememe will have the following general characteristics:

In order to qualify for a spot on Rookiememe, you:

1. Must have a domain less than two months old, preferably buried in the Google “sandbox” (the one that’s not supposed to exist)
2. Must never have been linked to
3. As per the above, it must have a Technorati rating of zero.
4. It must not link out to anything that’s been on Techmeme within the past month
5. It must be written in proper English and not obviously be culled together to sell GoogleAds or other online advertising
6. In fact, it can’t be allowed to have any advertising on it at all

And that’s just the start. Just imagine how new and different this content will be!

OH, and it would not have a leaderboard, because anything that becomes popular will immediately be removed from Rookiememe.

What do you think? Is this a potential goldmine or what?

Is it all smoke and mirrors or is there any substance to it after all? Or are there just a bunch of hucksters out there trying to make a few bucks off naive people who want to get ahead in life? Is social media just next iteration in hucksterism and pyramid style marketing scams? Or is it something more?

Greg Davies, aka CGT2099 of social news fame, wrote a heated, yet insightful post critiquing the use of the phrase “social media”. As you may recall in last week’s Q&A post, Greg basically said that it’s just the Internet; social media is just a buzzword.

Greg aims pretty clearly at a key constituency who he blames for the hype behind social media:

The individuals I am talking about are those who claim they are knowledgeable about Social Media. It is the biggest con of the 21st century, folks: they create a buzz word, convince you that it exists, persuade you that you and/or your business needs it, and then convinces every person that they are so competent in the area that you can afford to pay them lots of cash to be your “Social Media Consultant”.

You know, he’s got a good point, although I do think he’s generalizing a bit. Greg’s not bashing the medium as a whole, though. He acknowledges that there are some people using the new tools smartly and effectively. However, he does spew a fair amount of bile towards people in the “make money online” and blog monetization segments of the world.

Whether or not you agree with his article, I think Greg brings up some excellent points and serves to put a bit of a reality check in place. If you’re new to social media and you have dreams of becoming rich and famous, or you know someone who is, I’d recommend that they read Greg’s article just to get some perspective. You don’t have to agree with him, but you should at least consider what he’s saying.