You’ve heard every single social media/web 2.0 expert/pundit/blabbermouth/evangelist repeat it ad naseum:
Companies in this new world must be honest and transparent with their publics or face the wrath of their consumers.
In this case though, the “wrath” might just be mere annoyance.
Apple said that the reason they were pulling out of MacWorld is because they were scaling back on conferences. The direct quote from their initial release is: “Apple has been steadily scaling back on trade shows in recent years, including NAB, Macworld New York, Macworld Tokyo and Apple Expo in Paris.”
Speculation about the ‘real reason’ Apple had pulled out was because of the rumours swirling around CEO Steve Job’s health, and yet today, Jobs sent out an open letter to the Apple Community.
Dear Apple Community,
For the first time in a decade, I’m getting to spend the holiday season with my family, rather than intensely preparing for a Macworld keynote.
Unfortunately, my decision to have Phil deliver the Macworld keynote set off another flurry of rumors about my health, with some even publishing stories of me on my deathbed. [source]
Apple now claims that it was a political decision not to have Jobs to deliver the keynote. All of which means that yet again, Apple isn’t being completely honest and upfront about Jobs’ health.
What’s up with Steve, how he’s feeling, or why that even matters is of no consequence to me. Apple will be fine, with or without Jobs at the helm.
What’s bugging me about this is that the company couldn’t, or didn’t anticipate their community’s response to the other guy giving the MacWorld Keynote, when it’s always been up to Jobs, and then they pulled out of MacWorld all together after this year? And they didn’t anticipate that this would cause any kerfuffle at all? That the tech reporters, Apple reporters and pundits and the entire fanatical Apple community wouldn’t put all of this together and wonder what was really up?
Apple has built a large, loyal fanbase. They’ve created their own little cult, and have had years and years to get to know this group, to understand how they internalize information and repeat it, and yet, they’re still stumbling, the way they always have, over some pretty basic tenets.
It’s been all over Twitter today - the “Koobface” phishing worm has hit Twitter. If you’re one of the thousands hit, you’ll receive a direct message saying “Hey - check out this funny blog about you!”, and then there was a second one which said “You are funny in this video!” with a link to a blogspot blog, which redirected to “twitter.access-logins”.
If you’ve entered your user name and password into this site - which looks like twitter unless you look closely at the address bar - your information would have been phished. The scary part of this is that most people use the same user name and password for everything from online banking and other services.
Craig Schmugar, a threat researcher for McAfee Avert Labs said that, in general, Koobface strikes only social-networking sites - like Facebook and Twitter.
Twitter has posted a brief warning on the status blog, and there’s a warning at the top of your stream if you’re on the Twitter site (but not if you’re using a 3rd party application like Thwirl).
Twitter said:
If you receive an email notice saying you’ve received a Direct Message with a link that redirects to what seems like Twitter.com, be careful about entering your Twitter credentials. Instead, look closely at the URL to see if it’s not really Twitter but a sketchy phishing site like http://twitter.access-logins.com. If this has you feeling a bit weirded out, feel free to change your Twitter password.
If you have been affected by the Koobface virus, Facebook has posted removal instructions here.
Schmugar said this attack is similar to e-mail attacks 10 years ago in that Koobface is using infected friends lists, reminiscent of early mass-mailing worms. Just like back then, don’t open an attachment you’re not expecting, even from people you know, and be very concious of where you’re inputting your user name and password.
The moral of the story? Make sure you don’t use the same password for each of your accounts, especially for your banking and other important identity/financial sites. If you’re looking for an easy way to create unique passwords, read this.
UPDATE: There’s another phrase coming through the Phishing scam: “hey. i won an iphone! come see how here http://helloiphones“. Basically, just make sure you don’t click on any links you don’t trust, and anything that seems to good to be true, likely is.
Recently, I wrote about who owned your online identity, and today, I came across an article about Google et al, and the amount of information they gather as we trip through the internet.
According to Fortune Magazine, “Google & Co. gather a lot of information about you as you surf, including the date and time for your search, your search terms, and your IP address, which is an 11-digit number that identifies your computer and, more important as far as advertisers are concerned, your location.” [source]
At first, I didn’t think much of this. Yeah, ok, so Google (or Yahoo, or whomever) keeps track of my searches - they know that tonight I searched to find out what Singapore-style Fried Vermicelli is and if I thought I might like it. (Turns out, I do!) By the time stamp on my search, they also probably know that I was deciding on dinner options. Does that even matter?
But then I read about when AOL accidentally released the search information of 650,000 members. AOL Stalker reported the most popular search is User# 672368. In the course of two months, this user searched “curb morning sickness,” “you’re pregnant he doesn’t want the baby,” “baby names,” “abortion clinics charlotte nc,” and “engagement rings” - in that order. Is this relevent? Maybe… maybe not. How many people know each other’s AOL user numbers (or, heck - maybe everyone does, like we used to with ICQ… I’ve never used AOL so I don’t know how it works….). What if, instead of user numbers, that had been an email address? Lots of people know my email address(es), and I wouldn’t really want them to know if I was searching for information about a pregnancy.
Now, granted, this information is only kept for a few months (Yahoo keeps information for 90 days, Google for 9 months (down from 18) and Microsoft, 18 months), but still. It all feels very ‘big brother’ to me, and that’s just kinda uncomfortable.
I suppose all of this isn’t particularly surprising given that we’re in the “Facebook era”. Many people are avid users of a social network or four, where they freely offer their favourite movies, bands, relationship status, location and contact information. Marketers point out this fact when arguing that people actually want to see advertising tailored specifically for them, and hey, maybe they do. Or, maybe this is just advertising’s way of trying to convince us the industry isn’t fading into obscurity?
Not only is it a sad day at JPG Magazine and 8020 Media, it’s a sad day for the rest of us too, and the news is burning up my Twitter stream.
JPG Magazine is closing their doors, after spending months trying to make the buisness sustain itself. In these economic times, people simply aren’t spending the money they used to on anything that’s not food, shelter, and necessary clothing. It sucks, because Jpg Magazine did some amazing things for professional and amateur photographers both, but perhaps we’re not strong enough to sustain something like JPG Magazine.
Laura Brunow Miner, one of the founders of JPG Magazine said, in a statement released on their blog, “We wish we could have found a way to leave the site running for the benefit of the amazing folks who have made JPG what it is, and we have spent sleepless nights trying to figure something out, all to no avail.”
I’m thinking, personally, that the saddest part of this is that 1) a major creative force in our community is closing it’s doors, and 2) that this is a sign of many many more closures of amazing properties to come, and that makes me sad.
The Flickr site will live on, but for me, it’s just not the same.
There’s a tonof postsout there that talk about how social media will change in the upcoming year, what will happen with our communications and predictions for the year to come and looks-back at the year that was.
Me? Sure, I did the ranty (although, perhaps it was a little too ranty!) post the other day about the things that I hoped would just go away in 2009, and I’ve been looking aroung at the posts that try to predict 2009.
Twitter gained a major following this year and started to go mainstream, big time. Growth is off the hook, (I can’t believe I just wrote that in all seriousness. What the hell does that even *mean* anyways?) and I can only imagine that will continue in 2009.
Newspapers and magazines folded, went entirely online and started to get the whole social media thing just a little more. I think that’s only going to continue in 2009. I will be stunned if by this time next year, more mainstream media has adopted some serious social media interaction and tools. If there’s an industry that seems like it should be picking this kind of interaction with readers up quickly, it’s the mainstream media, however they’re one of the industries that seem the most reluctant.
Companies and Brands are starting to get involved in social media… some of them are going it really well and others are …well, not. Here’s to brands and companies getting it more.
Advertising has taken a huge hit for 2009, and I anticipate that will continue… I think that the people are seriously tired of the spin and marketing messages that come with sales and want to know the honest truth about the product or service they’re looking at.
PR is the same as advertising at this point. It’s changing dramatically and people don’t believe the marketing hype of stories like they used to.
Even the way we communicate is changing. More and more I find I pull away from email, towards SMS (text) messages and twitter, but even more so, if I need more than 140 or 160 characters, I pick up the phone. It’s faster, easier and accomplishes the same thing in minutes rather than hours. Partly, I think we’re moving away from the technology and going back to our “roots” so to speak, and partly I think people want to do things the most efficient way possible.
What do you think is going to come to the forefront for 2009? Are we going to get more simplified or are we going to move towards more and more social media tools and communications?
2008 has been a hell of a year, hasn’t it? The economy went to shit, the automakers asked for a bail out and the States got one hell of a new President. For me, 2008 started out very promising, and then quickly went sideways, and kinda stayed that way for the rest of the year. Kinda rollercoastery.
There were a couple of events and phrases that popped up through the year, that I am hoping were a 2008 phenomenon and will get buried under the passage of time, like the rest of the year, including:
“Rockstar” “Guru” and people just starting out in social media calling themselves “experts”. Maybe this was happening in late 2007 too, and lord knows I was one of those who called myself a rockstar at first and then a guru for a while after that.
Here’s the thing:
If you don’t get up on an arena stage, sing or play your guts out, every night, are a household name, have groupies and can’t walk down the street to go grocery shopping without paparazzi following you and selling your picture to every celebrity rag in the USA, you are not a rockstar. Let me say it once more, so it sinks in: YOU ARE NOT A ROCKSTAR.
If you are not a spiritual teacher who has the power and wisdom to erase others spiritual ignorance and help them practice a certain religion as a discipline; if you do not have a following, an ashram, and people do not seek out your assistance to help them find their spiritual path, you are not a Guru. Let me say it once more, so it sinks in: YOU ARE NOT A GURU.
If you have a facebook page and you twitter, but have just started dabbling in the social media scene or even if you’ve been here for a while; if you cannot think strategically enough to get yourself to your destination with maximum efficiency or cannot demonstrate enough ‘thinking-it-through-edness’ to develop and implement an effective plan to increase brand visibility (or if you know what all those words mean, but you can’t explain their true essence to me), you are not a social media expert. Let me say it once more, so it sinks in: YOU ARE NOT A SOCIAL MEDIA EXPERT.
The sheer volume of “new media experts” “web 2.0 experts” and “social media consultants” that have cropped up all over the place, hanging their shingles out, hoping to cash in on the wave of social media is staggering. Every 1 in 3 people who follow me on Twitter these days are “social media consultants” but, they have nothing to back it up. Where’s the honesty and transparency folks? Where’s the truth? Do they even know that’s a tenent? If they do, can they tell you why? If the person you are talking to about your upcoming social media strategy can’t answer that simple question, along with “how long have you been working in the social media scene?” then run. Do not walk. Do not hire them. RUN. And quickly.
This wasn’t any more obvious to me than the other day, when Chris Brogan tweeted that if he didn’t have your twitter name top of mind, you might be missing out on work and fifty-eleven billion people all tweeted @ChrisBrogan here’s mine! Here I am!. Great, you know how to Twitter, but can you produce a strategy?
Now, yes, I term myself as a social media strategist, and here’s why: I have more than 8 years of traditional public relations experience - which has taught me a huge amount about how to create effective strategies, how to reach the people, and what the public responds to. I have spent the past two years working with real social media clients, helping them to develop communities, speaking on the topic of social media, and analyzing every single new tool, service, and goofy “measurement” schtick out there. I know the ins and outs of those services and I know why it is that certain brands work better on certain platforms, and best of all, I can tell you why. So yes, I’ve got the phrase “Writer. Social Media Strategist. Loudmouth.” on my business cards. And I am all of those things. I’ve earned the right to call myself that after 8+ years.
Along with the terms that I would banish for 2009 are “Web 2.0″, “blogosphere” and “weblog”. They’re outdated, outmoded and they suck. They are no longer representative of what we do.
Web 2.0 is very 2006/2007, back when it just began. Maybe just 2007. Either way, it’s no longer the next thing. It’s the now thing. You want to differentiate? Fine, use “traditional” or “conventional”. That means that the way we’re doing things now is new. Is different than the traditional.
Blogosphere. Oh, the Blogosphere. A rip-off of “atmosphere” and, sure, I get it, but it’s very 1998. Much like “weblog”. Let it go. It’s not a “sphere”. I have…. (counting)… seven blogs at the moment. Four of which I get paid to write. Plus two of my own and one that is connected to the book I am writing. I’m about to launch an eighth on travel etc. Due to the volume, does that mean that I have my own ‘blogoniverse”? No. It means I have blogs. I write for several blogs. And we’re done, mmk? Thanks.
The other thing that I was very aware of in 2008 that I think should just go away and stoppit entirely, is the public drama/cat fights/bullshit. As one of my local Twitter connections recently put it brilliantly:
Holy Brilliant, and Amen sister!! Thank you for saying what the rest of us are thinking.
There were several public blow outs - both online and face to face, but still in the community that I was either dragged into, a part of, or witnessed, and damn am I tired of them. The social media community is a small one, and any words that are said, shouted or written, can and will be repeated. I am guilty of this myself - as well as guilty of participating in said dramas. I regret it, but 2008 was a year of personal drama for me that spilled out into my public life, what can I say, except “I apologize”?
For my part, I’m taking a break from the world and focusing on my own life for at least January - and that means few social commitments, little online interaction and more introspection and work. It means letting go of several of the people to whom I threw drama at, who dragged me into drama, and whom I dragged, unwittingly into drama. It means letting go of the drama, of the people who cause it, and concentrating on my own development.
To those who were involved in drama I witnessed or took part in and to those whose dramas I didn’t see, just let it go. Please. It’s dumb. It’s not worth it, and it mars your reputation and brand.
Either way, whether you take my advice or not, I’m out. I don’t want to play anymore, and to that end, I will not rise to the bait, I will not lash out at those who have wronged me, whether real or imagined.
The moral of this post? Drop the drama. Be honest. Do unto others. Most of all, stop the bullshit. I’m over it, and I know others are as well.
Let. It. All. Go.
(image sources: Sam Roberts at the Commodore, by me, on Flickr; Shallomj Screenshot from Twitter)
CyberAlert, Inc, is an online media monitoring company, with several different products to keep an eye on your brand. The two which are of particular importance to social media: Netpinions, consumer discussion, word-of-mouth, buzz monitoring service which monitors 100,000+ online message boards, forums, and Usenet news groups and BlogSquirrel — a blog monitoring service — which monitors 5+ million new postings each day in 25+ million blogs worldwide.
2009 marks the sixth year that CyberAlert will grant a minimum of 15 monitoring packages to not-for-profit organizations. Each grant consists of one full year of free news monitoring / press clipping services, ranging in value from $2,700 to $3,900. Last year, CyberAlert awarded 29 grants in 2008, with a aggregated value of over $275,000 to organizations like the NAACP, the Canadian Breast Cancer Network and America’s Second Harvest. For a complete list, click here.
All not-for-profit, educational and charitable organizations in the United States and Canada are eligible to apply for the grants, except previous grant recipients. CyberAlert is accepting grant applications until December 31 and will announce the grant recipients in January. More information and a simple and secure grant application is available online.
On December 20th, a Continental flight slid off the runway mid-take off. There were some minor injuries, and of course, the whole thing made the news.
What’s different about this crash however, was the fact that Mike Wilson live-tweeted the whole thing.
Wilson has since been interviewed on several mainstream media stations including NBC, Fox News, and more. A Google search for “denver plane crash + Twitter” yielded more than 22,000 results.
It looks to me like 2008 was the year that Twitter started to go mainstream. It’s becomming the go-to for many for breaking news - the Denver crash was reported on Twitter before it hit mainstream news. Same goes for that F18 that crashed into a San Diego backyard a while back.
Personally, I find this fascinating. It used to be that we learned about the actual news from television news or the newspaper the next morning. Now we can get a play-by-play of events as they unfold. Usually, by the time mainstream news gets ahold of the stories, most of Twitter has already heard about it.
I’m wondering how this will change mainstream news reporting in the upcoming year. Thoughts?
Facebook Connect. Myspace Data Portability. Google Friend Connect. All of these individual services are supposed to be there to help you manage the fire hose of information that comes to you through your social graphs, but who owns that information?
The idea behind Facebook Connect and all of the other connect services, is to make all of the social media sites easier to use. Basically, the thought is that users will be able to log onto other websites using their Facebook ID, and see their friends’ activities on other sites as well. They’re also giving members the chance to broadcast their actions on the partner sites to their friends on Facebook, kinda like Beacon did.
The thing that struck me most about these services was the fact of who owns the information you’re putting online, and from there, how these services will use that information. Knowing who you are, who your friends are and what you’re doing online and where, is one of the cornerstones to a fully-targeted advertising campaign. All that freely flowing data to all the other social networks is a boon for any advertiser because it offers up a full personal profile.
So, the question, for me at least, becomes, just how much information do you allow a potential advertiser to know? Is it a good thing that, for example, an advertiser knows your favorite color is red and you are a die hard Canucks fan, and so their ad servers show you a limited-edition, red-shirted Johnny Canuck? Is that really going to make you want to click through that ad and purchase that limited edition?
I just don’t know how comfortable I am with all of this targeted-advertising thing. It feels slightly… smarmy somehow, in the way that fortune tellers or snake oil salesmen told you exactly what you wanted to hear after reading the clues you give off. Are we not just giving even more clues - and this time, blatant and direct instructions on exactly what advertisers should sell us and when? Oh, and what to send all our friends too.
After all, depending on who owns all that information you’re putting out there, you could be doing just that. it certainly isn’t personal information anymore, that’s for sure. And, how can you be sure in the Terms of Use somewhere, deep down in there, there’s not a clause that allows Myspace to sell all that info you’re putting out there? Do you really believe these sites are just trying to keep you in touch with your friends more easily. *scoff*
Good one. You almost had me there. Say, I’ve got this great bridge overlooking Manhattan I wanted to speak with you about. I’ll give ya a great deal!!
MemeLabs, the online video contest gurus, have a new contest, and one that sounds pretty cool. Chip Wilson, the Lululemon founder, apparently isn’t dead yet, and to commemorate that, he’s holding a walk/run/parade/party …thing.
This is the 2nd year for the “Chip’s Not Dead Yet!” one mile, uphill race where all proceeds support BC Children’s Hospital. This race is different; you have the choice to run, walk, or parade in one of the various ‘waves’ that go up the hill. If you want to run in your underwear, so be it. If you want to run in a bridesmaid dress, go for it.
On Friday, June 20th, 2009, a busy street in the Vancouver neighborhood known as Kitsilano will be completely closed to traffic and the event starts. You run in “waves” of themes - all the superheroes together, all the animals, the gladiators… well, you get it.
The fastest one up the hill will win $20,000, but, you’ve got a chance to win $1,000 right now! Memelabs wants to know what your ideal themed wave would look like. Dress up as your favourite superhero or even run in your underpants! Tell us what you think would make for the best wave and you will have a chance to win $1000 in cash and one of our monthly prize packs! Enter here!
For a quick sneak peek of the race, check out the video.
Steve Job’s health, and yet today, Jobs sent out an open letter to the Apple Community.
Here’s the thing:
Recent Comments