Today, I was asked to take part in a panel discussion for the 2011 Clemson Summit…the topic was Creativity and Passion. As a part of the panel discussion, the moderator sent us ten potential questions to be asked in the during the panel discussion.
What a humbling experience to take part in a discussion with such thought leaders. Over the next ten weeks, I am going to post the answers to each question. All of these questions explore the idea of Creativity and Passion…enjoy!
(“In My Own Words”) Creativity & Passion mean _________. My Response: To be able to fully understand “Creativity” one must be able to get into the “Zone.” That thin space that connects logic and ethics, with the ability to grasp the full extent of our senses. Think of a time when you were fully connected with your senses, where an idea presented itself and the euphoric side of your brain took complete control. An example might be when an idea is fully presented when a certain selection of music plays or during an epiphany. The passion comes to play when you exercise the ability to act on that euphoric moment, converting creativity into tangible results. Taking complete control of that idea and having the willingness to lead others to bring that idea to fruition.
One of my favorite videos I share with my students and my clients is from Steven Johnson called “Where Great Ideas Come From”…which is a presentation put to animation by RSA Animate. This concept of connecting people with passionate ideas emphasizes the opportunity we have to use our passion to inspire others with creative leadership.
On Wednesday,as I was surfing around on Google+, I noticed an update by a Sarah Hill, a broadcast News Anchor at KOMU-TV. She was soliciting a “Hangout” topic for her Thursday afternoon “Hangout”. The topic…ABC News has paid Casey Anthony and a close friend $215,000 for some photographs and a “scoop” in the story.
She posted an article from the Poynter Institure outlining the payments being made from ABC News to Casey Anthony as a license fee for photos of her and her little girl. Here is the article…CLICK HERE.
In the article…Jerry Schneider, senior vp of ABC NEWS, states, “the license fees are a miniscule part of a hundreds of millions of dollars news budget, and to describe our work in terms of those licenses is to miss the entire forest for a tree… It’s getting the exclusive interview with Commander [Mark] Kelly after the congresswoman [Gabrielle Giffords] is shot; It’s getting in to see President Mubarak on an absolutely historic day. It is the team coverage in Japan with the only anchor who goes there.”
First of all…I have been thinking through this idea of news outlets paying for content, whether it is video from a stringer of the latest wreck or a high profile story that the nation is watching/reading about.
So here are my questions I am thinking through. Why do media organizations feel the need to pay for content? Why do media organizations feel the need to compensate people for “information” or “content” in order to gain some exclusive rights to this content…thus creating leverage so they can attract an audience.
News organizations are driven by numbers which are ultimately what lead to dollars. This is beside the point, because I see both sides of the argument for paying for content. YET, I do believe they should disclose.
If you look down further in this Poynter article, you will see a comment from Mike Goldstein of Portland, OR with his online name as “dicmikeg” and he states:
“This morning, while the President was speaking to the Nation about the economy, Libya, Afghanistan and what Congress might do to put Americans back to work, the “news teams” from the major networks were absorbed with the latest in the Casey Anthony trial. CNN was kind enough to carry the press conference which, interestingly enough, was attended by reporters from the same networks that would not broadcast the event live (as there were much more pressing priorities, what with Casey’s dad not co-operating with the defense team)…Truly a sad commentary on why the American public is so unaware of what’s truly important to them and their lives.”
This part of the whole ethical spectrum has me thinking. Once again, why do organizations pay for content? Why…why do they feel the need to shell out hundreds of thousands of dollars to obtain content, to get an interview, provide team coverage in Japan during a crisis.
Here is are some of my thoughts why.
1) News organizations are international influencers, crossing the digital and geographic borders. They create culture. That is the reason why the news media can shift the thinking of the American (if not international public) by the mere decision of their daily coverage. In one fail swoop, they shifted from economy back to Casey Anthony. Because of that imperialistic power of the journalistic pen, they feel the burden to pay for content. Why, because they are creating daily cultural discourse.
2) They carry a huge burden to deliver everyday. Each day, executive producers, reporters, writers, editors, are making decisions of coverage based on the prediction of audience: what will tune them in to watch and read. They are investing in futures. $215,000 is just a small investment on a potential huge return on rating points, clicks, adword campaigns, social media conversation.
3) Proliferation of so many media(s). They are competing not only against themselves and across the street competitors, they are competiting now with consumer created content. They know those pictures that Casey Anthony has in her possession are just as valuable on the open, social market as it is in the hands of mainstream media outlets. Media organizations must pay to have leverage over all the other media outlets, including the the social outlets driven by consumers.
This slippery slope is no longer a slope…it is a line that is continually being pushed again and again and again. Why, because news outlets still must maintain leverage with audiences in order to compete. That is why they bought those images (or bought the license for those images) back in 2008 and 2009. They were investing in futures…and it sounds like they got their monies’ worth.
Do I blame them? No! Should they disclose? It is up to the ethical standards of journalists in that particular discipline. Will someone smack their hand and send them to the corner if they don’t disclose? Not really. Who is the oversight on this issue…well, their colleagues. Those guys/gals across the street are doing it just as much…they want to compete as well.
So ask yourself…why do you think news agencies feel the need to buy? Why do you think they feel the need to invest?
So I just finished up a fun project with my friend Melanie Lux and the South Carolina Bar Association…and it is was a blast. My friend Melanie Lux brought me in to help with this video project, profiling different attorneys across South Carolina. The whole goal was to tell stories of different attorneys and share them in a social space for others to share.
So many stories, so many perspectives, so many different legal backgrounds.
I have been working with my friend Andy Arnold for over a year and a half, and I was glad he was chosen as one of the attorneys to be included in this campaign. His background and passionate approach to the legal profession provided a rich perspective for this campaign. He has a powerful story to tell, as you can see in his video above.
The goal was to meet with twelve different attorneys, capture, and tell their story. Then we used YouTube as the hub of the campaign, leveraging the rich SEO opportunities from the largest search engine. This “mothership” provided the homebase to distribute these stories through other social communities, social outlets, and digital distribution points.
Each attorney shares with their friends, posts them to their Facebook profiles, embeds in their websites…creating a rich social web for this legal message. I love it…telling stories and leveraging the social web to share a message that a community can connect.
Working with Melanie Lux provided a polished approach to these messages and allowed us to integrate some traditional marketing as a part of this campaign. You can read her interview in MidlandsBiz.com.
If you want to look at the rest of the stories from South Carolina attorneys, go to YouTube.com/SouthCarolinaBar.
In a note this afternoon, Pete Chasmore, founder at Mashable, explained a conversation he and his team at Mashable had with the Google Plus team. Bottom line, Mashable is not going to have a branded presence on Plus until Google releases the business accounts soon. Here is his note below:
There are many groups that have gone ahead and created branded accounts for their organizations. I know I created one for Greenville Hospital System. We have been trained to claim our “domain,” not knowing what the future holds in each social outlet/space. We do not want anyone speaking on behalf or our brand’s behalf.
Look at the latest statement from MSNBC, they had their Google Plus account taken down by Google. So, one of their editors is now posting on their behalf, using a personalized account.
So what do we do? Well, I have a few thoughts…my opinions:
1) If you have created a branded account for your organization/hospital/company/brand…hold on to it as long as you can. Keep on engaging in conversation and testing the waters with your strategy. Keep the conversation alive and ask the Circles what they are wanting from this experience.
2) Be prepared to transfer this account. We do not know how Google plans to release the new branded/business accounts, but be prepared to transfer the current Google Plus account to the new platform. This may involve sharing with your Circles that you will be transferring, but communicate with them your intentions.
3) If you have not created a branded account for your organization/hospital/company/brand…maybe consider holding off for a while. Create a personal account and get acclimated with Google Plus. This is the time to play, research, and figure out what this new outlet is all about.
4) Starting formulating some strategy for the usage of these accounts. If you have to transfer or if you are waiting to create a branded/business account, and you want to create one, starting putting together a plan on how to use and/or transfer your existing account.
5) Communicate with your Circles and let your community guide you. Let your Circles share with you and your brand how they want to engage with you on Google Plus. This will help you determine your strategy and your process when Google releases the branded/business accounts.
“Here is a quick update on Google+ and businesses:
A few weeks ago we mentioned we would be doing a test of business profiles and asked people interested to apply. Believe it or not we actually had tens of thousands of businesses, charities, and other organizations apply to take part from all over the world. Many of you have reached out to me personally through Google+, e-mail, chat, and even other Googlers. Thank you. Your response has been humbling.
With so many qualified candidates expressing intense interest in business profiles, we’ve been thinking hard about how to handle this process. Your enthusiasm obligates us to do more to get businesses involved in Google+ in the right way, and we have to do it faster. As a result, we have refocused a few priorities and we expect to have an initial version of businesses profiles up and running for EVERYONE in the next few months. There may be a tiny handful business profiles that will remain in the meantime solely for the purpose of testing how businesses interact with consumers.
In the meantime, we ask you not to create a business profile using regular profiles on Google+. The platform at the moment is not built for the business use case, and we want to help you build long-term relationships with your customers. Doing it right is worth the wait. We will continue to disable business profiles using regular profiles. We recommend you find a real person who is willing to represent your organization on Google+ using a real profile as him-or-herself.
All of us on the Google+ effort are delighted by your engagement with this project – thank you all for taking the time to apply and offer such incredibly useful feedback. Keep it coming!”
On Monday, I had a great opportunity to try out a Google Plus “Hangout” with Reed Smith and Ed Bennett. Our goal was to try it for the first time and maybe talk a bit about Google Plus in healthcare. Great conversation and great time to sit back and learn a but from smart healthcare, digital leaders. The video is above from our Hangout. Also, Reed’s friend Bryan Person joined us…great to meet a new person on Plus.
Here is the biggest take away, three things that have me thinking about Google Plus and healthcare:
1) Google Plus is so new, we have no idea how it is going to shape or integrate into our social structure. People are still learning how to use Google’s technology and the user base is still in it’s infancy. Reed Smith brought up a good point, we do not know if this iteration is the 1.0 or even 0.5 version. So many changes are coming, more users will be joining…so Ed Bennett thinks it will be a few months to really see the major impacts in the social space.
2) Integrating Google Plus into a large healthcare/hospital system. Ed Bennett shared some knowledge…he is creating “Circles” based on service lines and departments with the University of Maryland Medical Center (UMMC) Google Plus account. As people are adding the hospital to their circles, Ed is sending them a personal note asking what type of information that would like to receive on Google Plus from the UMMC. Based on their response, Ed is putting that person into a specific Circle based on the relevant service line or department. This allows the person to receive the information they are seeking. Also, if the person asks about an area of the hospital that does not have a Circle, then you can decide to create a Circle based on that feedback.
3) We are still not sure what to expect from a business class account with Google Plus. We do know that the business accounts are right around the corner, so we are sitting back waiting to see how/if to convert our hospital business accounts when Google Plus releases this business option. We know it is right around the corner, especially given this Mashable Story about verified and business account. For this article, CLICK HERE.
Also…one side note, Apple released their Google Plus application in iTunes for the iPhone today. For many people, it is not showing up when they are doing a search in iTunes on their iPhones. If you read this post on your iPhone, CLICK HERE and it will take you to the Google Plus application in iTunes.
If you want to connect with me on Google Plus, CLICK HERE for my profile.
Google+ is starting to shape up as more of a B2B place for me…not a place to engage “consumers.” Now I am sure others are finding situations that are different. Let me clarify a bit, a place to engage in professional communication between colleagues and other businesses. Very few of my family members are on Plus…I am sure that will evolve.
I know many individuals are using Plus right now in the same work flow, if not similar, to other social outlets. It is a distribution point of content.
I am also thinking through how we will use this outlet in healthcare? Since this is a fluid environment, a place to engage in broader conversation…it will be interesting to see the healthcare applications. There are already so many channels to reach patients…will this be another place? Or will this be a place for medical practitioners and leadership to engage in professional communication.
Using Circles to engage in private conversations, it is a platform for creation and sharing of knowledge. I am already having physicians asking me how they should use Plus. I know one is specifically using it to stay in touch with family across the country, utilizing Hangouts for group video chats…a means to keep families connected.
It is so fun to sit back and watch the evolutions of technology grow, change, and shape culture. Twitter, Facebook, and so many others have shaped the current culture we live today. But, is our attention span so short that we will forget yesterday’s social outlet as we learn the next. What will happen to Plus after the honeymoon period is over and the pendulum swings back closer to center? What is the center?
The more and more I write, the more and more I wish all of my clients were on plus. This would be a great place to engage and share ideas. A great place to chat online or jump into a Hangout if we need human interaction beyond the typeface.
I have a theory though…Plus is going to alter our current cultural experience online. It will break us away from short chats and into longer form discussions online. It will make us question whether we should have a blog on WordPress or Tumblr, yet write fluidly in this space for a broad or finite group of people in a “Circle”. I see academics leveraging the interactivity of Plus to engage in scholarship in a whole new manner. Even teach completely through plus, using Circles as class roles.
I am 37, and I sit here getting ready to have my first child…Rose Frances. The velocity of technology and social media(s) have made me wonder what she will experience? What will Rose be using is elementary school and so on…to communicate and share information. Will outlets like Twitter, Facebook, Plus, Gowalla, Ping, Pinterest, etc. still be around?
Ok…back to the original question: how are we really going to use Plus? Are we going to use it like all the other outlets or will we change the way we communicate based on the new opportunities Plus has offered us…to participate in mutual, technological discourse? Plus is just a technology…that is it.
The other day, I was having a long creative session with a new client and the topic of ethics was the basis of our discussion. Yes, how can we tell stories without morally compromising an organization. Let’s dive into this a bit.
First, how can we tell stories of those who have benefited from the organization’s mission and are not compromised as leverage for public awareness. What do I mean? Imagine an organization wanting to tell their story, and as their mission they help people during tough times. But in order to explain their mission for the public at large to understand, they ask people to explain how the organization has helped them.
This brings up two ethical dilemmas:
1) privacy of those being served by the organization
2) the ethical barometer of the organization
We are all very passionate about a cause, we are all very passionate about sharing the story of our cause. But are we passionate enough to share the stories of those we serve, even though privacy is an issue, as a means to promote with an aim for helping the greater good? What is the greater good? Who is to benefit from the stories to be told? The people who have suffered and now have chosen to share to benefit the brand, the people who could learn from this experience, or the people who could learn that an organization exists and go seek help?
Let’s take a few scenarios:
First, think about Joplin, MO and the tornados that have ravaged this small town. In the age of social media and digital awareness, many flocked to help these people. Many people felt the need to give, donate time, or just go see with their own eyes. But there are many digital media enthusiasts who jumped at the opportunity to go capture the story, the many horrifying stories for personal benefit. Specifically, going to Joplin to capture stories to put on their blog, put on YouTube, shoot a documentary, raise awareness in a fashion that benefitted them personally, leveraging this horrible time for their personal gain. So many organizations wanted to be the first to report, grab the SEO, share it on Facebook….all for personal gain.
For you naysayers, I understand the public awareness this coverage brings for this international story. I understand that these digital media stories brought tremendous awareness, thus influenced tremendous giving, donations, and public outreach for those who suffered this horrible event.
But this leads me to my next scenario…Hurricane Katrina. I was on the ground the day after the storm hit. It was my job to go to the outlying areas surrounding New Orleans and capture stories, those explaining what had happened in their area. We journalists were the only means to communicate what had happened in the outlying areas…because all the communication channels were destroyed.
So many times, I would drive up to a house, town, area and someone was outside looking at the area and they were emotionally charged. At what moment do we begin to capture those stories when those individuals are in a state of panic and cannot make the conscious decision that what they’re sharing emotionally could be shown around the nation. This is and has been a huge ethical debate in the journalistic world. Who is winning here, who is benefitting from this story…especially if the journalist is recording with the camera because he/she knows this will win them some huge awards.
So, let’s implement this into telling stories inside businesses, non-profits, and organizations. Where does your ethical barometer lie when considering telling a story from inside your organization? Do you have the best interest of the person in mind, or do you have on your digital marketing cap, seeing the potential viral reach of a story? Are you leveraging this person’s story for personal gain? Are we conscious of the potential outcome from this story?
I see both sides of the issue…the one that sees the public gain from hearing a story and the desire to protect one’s story from the digital community. I do not think each of us can say exactly where we stand on this issue. Each person cannot say they have a hard line they can draw because each story is contextual and is affected by our own daily, personal biases. We as digital communicators need to be conscious of our decisions when we plan a storytelling strategy. We have to create a thoughtful plan that includes implications of telling stories that might ride the ethical line. But whose ethical line are we riding?
These questions lead me to my final thought…the velocity of the digital world and need to share as a derivative is blurring the ethical lines of storytelling. The need to share online, to collect information, has become competitive in nature. This capitalist idea has created the need to share the same content faster than the next, to generate SEO back to our blogs, websites, and other portals. Digital communicators are competing online for a stake in the SEO game…to gain a piece of the digital pie. This digital velocity accelerates during times of big digital news.
So where does this leave us? It leaves us in a place to seek and understand where we hang out in this ethical continuum of digital storytelling? Are we seeking to leverage stories for our personal gain or for the best interest of the great good. Are we raising awareness or just creating more noise in the digital spectrum?
Last week, I wrote a post detailing the effects of creating Google Plus Profile and how it directly impacts your rankings in Google. If you look at the image below…you can see what I was detailing in my previous post, showing where my Google Plus Profile is located in a simple Google Search of my name.
But a friend of mine (Mandy Vavrinak) commented on the blog post raising a question about a Bing.com search.
So let’s take a look at what will happen with a Bing.com search of Bobby Rettew:
Notice what is the top item in this search, my Facebook Profile…interesting. Well Duh, this makes since especially given this article from CNN.com back in October 2010, the Bing/Facebook search deal. Bing.com is influenced by the number of “Likes” in a Bing.com search, as detailed in this blog post. BTW, my Google Plus account was way back in page fifteen of Bing.com with this search.
So, what are we learning from this little discovery, a Facebook Profile is to Bing.com as is Google Profile is to Google.com, when it comes to SEO. Thus the “Plus One” concept in a Google search result will influence rankings in a Google search similar to the influence of a “Like” in a Bing.com search.
So Google is looking at our impressions within a search result with the Plus One similar to the “Like” in Facebook. By clicking +1 beside a search result, it gives you stamp of approval. These +1’s will show up in search results if your are logged into your Google account, and allow you to click it you have a Google Plus account.
Three weeks ago, I noticed something new in my WordPress blog. I have the “1-Click/Retweet/Like” plugin by LinksAlpha installed. It let me know it was time to update this plugin. When I updated, it added the +1 for Google Plus as one of the options to share. Now I have it placed at the bottom of each post.
This allows people to give a post a +1 as a sign of sharing in Google Plus. Each plus one helps a blog post, a website, a brand in Google’s rankings. The same as clicking the “Like” for Bing.com’s rankings. Ultimately, it is a way to show approval and help your favorite pieces of content show up in search rankings.
So here it is…if you have a Google Plus account and a Facebook account, you need to “+1” just as much as you “Like” to help your favorite pieces of content in search rankings. This will ultimately share with your friends in both outlets the things that your like the most. This influencing our social networks and social rankings of content.
Oh…by the way, there is a change in my Google Profile ranking in Google. Last week (July 6, 2011), my Google Plus Profile was listed number four in a search for my name, now it is number one:
We still have to stay grounded my friends…we have to stay grounded. As I was thinking through the hype of another social outlet to be added to the users’ menu, a song came to mind. Do you remember the song “Another One Bites The Dust” by Queen? This tune keeps on popping up in my mind, thinking through the lyrics. Now, I am not singing the same lyrics to the tune…I have changed to “Another One Called Plus”. Yes…I think Queen would probably baulk at singing these lyrics. There is an irony in the changing the lyris, I think.
Yes…there is another one at the playing table, and within a week Google Plus has the buzz of a major player in the user arena(s). The more and more I read in the social sphere…people are comparing Google Plus to other outlets. We are seeing more user reviews making comparisons to other social outlets, because that is all they know. But…it is just another platform to connect.
We as communication professionals have to be careful not to fall back into a paradigm as technicians. Not only jump on the bandwagon and focus on the technology and the excitement of the technology, but instead trying to learn how users might interact with this new platform. Now granted it is being reported the Google Plus has experienced close to 5 to 9 million users in the first two weeks of this beta release. This is all about how your interpret the numbers, like in this article from eWeek.com.
“Google+ has more than 5 million users in the United States alone during its first two weeks of existence, according to a couple of creative calculations by early users of the fledgling social network.
Open June 28 to limited field-testing, Google+ is Google’s (NASDAQ:GOOG) major bid to bite into the massive growth and influence of Facebook, which has more than 750 million users and poses a threat to Google’s display ad business.”
BUT…there are still communities still interacting in all the other platforms and digital media outlets. As this new platform emerges, we have to stay vigilant in our roles as communication practitioners. Each platform is going to apply to different communities of users and how they communicate. We have to sit back, educate ourselves with these new platforms, let the honeymoon dust settle, then see how/if we can apply this to what we are doing.
I do not think there is going to be a mass exodus from Facebook, Twitter, Blogs, and other social/digital mediums. I think people will will use the medium that best serves their abilities to communicate with the people they want connect with regularly. But, we must educate ourselves with these new technologies and see how/if we can apply our communication knowledge to this platform as practitioners. Whether we use online video to communicate our message, write a blog, create a Facebook campaign, do a media buy, or even implement a digital media strategy…we need to assess this platform and see how it might play into how we communicate our message.
I think one of the big things many of us in the this social space have been feeling for a while is the explosion of noise in the social space. More and more outlets, channels, places to shout our information.
Twitter was so fun two years ago, not many people were using this outlet…so it was a smaller community base of people interacting. Now it has exploded.
More and more people are wanting to lock down and limit their friends in this “social space”, protecting against the mass markets. Yes we can “Like” pages, but there are restrictions. The one thing that Facebook has going for it, the ability to have community conversations.
I would take part in Twitter chats and notice many of those same people would jump over to Facebook to have more private, engaged conversations…away from the mass 140 character updates. The hardest thing about Facebook is the restrictions on some of the interactive flexibility to share different types of media. The other concept that helped Facebook, is the idea of being a “Friend”, which is a two way decision.
Twitter has a great concept, but the idea of “Followers” is a bit egotistical fundamentally. People would, and still do, focus on how many “Followers” they do or do not have. That name created a culture of competition, a race that fulfilled most American egos…I want more. This notion turned Twitter into a mass communication piece…just people buying into a culture of amplification.
This idea of “Circles” is intriguing. It takes the real time update concept of Twitter, combining with the ability to attach media with updates from Facebook, and combines the discussion idea of Wave…into Circles. I am actually wondering why they did not call Google Plus….Google Circles.
You have the ability to create a private room, a private place for a group of friends to interact and share. I have read so many people saying that they are going to go back to less numbers of people and move to a more intimate group of friends they know using Circles.
We want to be close to our friends. We want to share and be heard. Mass digital media has created so much noise that we are searching for a place to have conversations with friends we know in person and people we have met online. We want to have a closer relationship and feel open to speak freely, away from the public scrutiny of bad Tweets. The many politicians and public figures have shown us that Twitter’s amplification can hurt our credibility, especially when we share the wrong picture, say the wrong thing, or mis-represent the wrong brand.
We just want a place to be ourselves and share with our friends. It looks like Plus might provide that refuge…Circles is a place to be ourselves again and feel open and honest to share. So we do not have to change our handles to names that no-one knows and put avatars up to hide behind.
I am not sure how Plus will evolve, especially when they open it up to business accounts later this year. What are you doing when you go into Plus for the first time? Are you honestly re-thinking who you will let in, or are you just transferring the same online friendships and tendencies you had in other social outlets. Or, are you looking for a richer experience online with a tight nit group of friends. I know I am, I have a circle just for my Frat Brothers and one for my close friends.
Oh yes…I have been completely impressed by the Circles concept in Google Plus. But my only reference point here is my Facebook account settings and Twitter Lists…but this is completely different.
So may times I have wanted to only interact with a group of people in a discussion, but has the interactivity of Facebook. I have found a link, an idea, a video, a picture, or an opinion…and only share quickly with a specific group of friends. This can be done by just creating a Circle of connections (people) then updating your status for these to see.
This to me is where I am beginning to see some value, and where I see where Google Wave has some influence. I can quickly create a “Circle” where I add friends/people/connections, then I can interact with them and only them. No more worrying about trying to separate a status update from those who you feel do not need to see this information. So many times on Facebook, I wanted to share a video with just a group of friends…but was worried about either upsetting someone on my public timeline or marginalizing someone based on the content of this update.
If you look below…you can see how an update will go only to a group of people are just in my “Friends” Circle.
Now…only my friends are interacting with this content. Just the friends I have dragged to this circle below:
So what does this mean…I can do more collaborative discussion online. I can create a “Circle” for a discussion and interact with them on the fly, separating that discussion from others I have connected with on Google Plus. This opens up a new paradigm for a person like me. I can create a “Circle” for a class I am teaching, creating discussions between the class members. I can create a “Circle” for a client, using this as an opportunity to have discussions, share media, share links, etc…all on the fly.
The other thing I like, is that you can extend this conversation beyond a circle. You can click to add more people and select to add a “Circle” of people to include in this update. You can also select “Extended Circles” as an option where this update is extended to that “Circle’s” group of friends. So you have grown you network of influence of an update by selecting the option for an additional degree of people to take part in that discussion.
You can add other “Circles” or even make the update public. Very cool…you can decide on the fly who you will interact with in one drop down menu. This is under the assumption you have set-up all your Circles of contacts. Pretty Cool Stuff!
So…while trying to set-up my profile in Google Plus…I am trying to work through securing my profile name just like on Twitter and Facebook. Basically securing my own Google Plus URL with BobbyRettew. In the process of researching, I felt like my account had gone through all the initial set-up steps…so I thought I would Google myself to see if/how this new social network would appear in the search results.
This is what appeared above. It was the 4th item listed in the Google search results. Wow, below was my LinkedIn, Facebook, then Twitter account profiles (in respective order). So recap this, this is the order of what appeared in a Google search for “bobby rettew” after having a Google Plus account for 30 minutes:
BobbyRettew.com (My Website) – Established in 2008
rettewcreative.com (My Business Blog) – Establish in 2009
BobbyRettew.com/about (The About Page on my Website) – Established in 2008
Google Profile (Which is my Google Plus Account) – Google Profile established in 2008 and Google Plus in 2011
LinkedIn (My LinkedIn Profile) – Established in 2007
Facebook Account (My Personal Facebook Page/Profile) – Established 2007
Twitter Account (My Twitter Profile) – Established in 2008
Notice the difference in dates of set-up and between Google Plus and the rest of the Social Networks, and how fast it generated a top search result. Look what information was presented for my Google Profile/Plus account: It you notice, immediately people can see a few things:
My Google Plus/Profile Picture
Where I am located
Where I am working
My Tag Line
Link to my Personal Blog
Link to my Twitter Profile
Link to my Website
All of this was immediately established based on the creation of Google Plus account. So…this immediately provides an immediate portal for people searching my name to the places to connect with me! Now, look at the order from left to right of the links below my tagline. They correspond to the order I created my links in my Google Plus account.
Ok…so now I get it. This is showing a direct relationships between my Google Profile/Plus account and how I can be found via a simple Google search. This has me thinking…thinking through the ROI for me of having an account. Now, have to figure out what the ROI might encompass from investing time in this new Social Network.
Tomorrow…I will release a post about Circles in Google Plus. It is pretty cool what you can do with these things!
So I just received an invite and I working through Google Plus and checking it out. As I login, I have noticed a few things:
It is just another social network, another place to interact with people online.
As I am creating my profile, it is pulling a lot of my information from my Google Profile. So if you have an up-to-date Google Profile, it is going to populate your Google Plus profile based on this information.
It is basing your network of connections from contacts in your Google Account. Google Plus uses the term “Circles” as a name for your networks, and can be based on how you set-up your Google Contacts.
It has a stream similar to Facebook, allowing you to make an update and include a picture, video, link, or location.
Reminds a bit like Google Wave as far as the interface design and fluid interactivity.
I am thinking through the business application for enterprise level usage such as Facebook Pages.
Wondering how and when I am going to use this social network and if it makes sense for me? I am active on Twitter for both personal and business, Facebook for both personal and business, LinkedIn for business…so wondering where this makes sense for me? If at all?
The digital media interaction looks fluid, specifically people are posting animations and other interactive media with ease.
Google Plus looks like another extension of my personal Google Account. Yes…it is pulling information from my Gmail, Contacts, YouTube, Picasa, and Profile Accounts from one single Google login.
Since you have to have a Google profile to have a Google Plus account, a Google Business account cannot accept an invitation currently. Yes, BobbyRettew.com is self hosted and also uses Google products such as Mail from Google. So when I log into my BobbyRettew.com Google Account…I cannot create a Google Profile. Thus, the Google Plus invitation sent to my Bobby@BobbyRettew.com email account would allow me to accept the Google Plus invitation. My Google Plus account is via my BobbyRettew@gmail.com email/Google login.
So here ya go…my initial thoughts after playing with it for about 15 minutes. This is purely a surface level overview…nothing strategic yet. Still thinking through and wondering the if, how, and when about this social network. Bottomline…everyone is raving, but do I really give a dang about investing time in another place to interact with the same group of connections. Or…maybe this social network will open a whole new place for new relationships and new interactive experiences.
Bottomline…I think it is still another place for Google to try to make a play on Social Networking; leveraging all the other technologies that are already in place for an individual’s Google Account.
Take away for me (since I am a tech geek)…it is going to be fun for a while. But eventually it will have to bring value beyond the honeymoon for me to engage along with all the other social outlets.
Video over the web has transformed and made us re-think how we use this visual medium. As you know…I am big on the rhetorical triangle and how we as communicators use this daily to engage in common discourse. I have spent lots of time talking about audience…but one of the areas of the rhetorical triangle that really intrigues me is distribution. How are we distributing our message to our audiences. My thesis has always been that audience, purpose, and distribution are working in parallel and dependent upon the other to create the context of our communication. But, distribution is one of the major tenants of this triangle.
So let’s define distribution. Based on my interpretation and application, I view it as the vehicle by which we touch our audience with our message. It is a channel through which the audience receives and interprets the message for consumption. So if we look at online video, it can be a primary or even a secondary distribution mechanism for our message(s).
Think for a second, before online video…video was television. Our message was created and distributed via television stations and their trafficking of advertising campaigns. We would also use video to reach our audiences via trade show presentations, internal communication avenues, or where ever their was a television. The broadcast tube was the distribution mechanism and it was primary.
As the ability to distribute video over the internet grew, the screen on a computer was not the only way to distribute this visual message. Video messages have to rest on some URL, some individual domain for us to find and watch the information. But this is only a small portion of the distribution for video. With television, you could put it on a VHS tape, DVD, or pay for advertising space. The vehicle here for distribution was merely finding the right channel.
With online video…the primary points of distribution became “infinite” with huge different channels of URL’s…making it hard for audiences to find this content. This is how the social media space began to explode…beginning with email. Email to me is a social media outlet. It is social and just as asynchronous as Facebook or Twitter. You can send an email and have to wait for a period of time for someone to read or respond. It also created personal, social dialogue. So using video via email became a natural fit. Why…because we could send a message to our address book and they would watch. Obviously we know where this went, email addresses became wide spread and more groups were creating and purchasing books of email lists to send messages.
Now audience analysis has become more important when creating online video messages. It is no longer spending money just to create the message, you have to begin to figure out how to distribute this message to the target audiences. Organizations that are spending large dollars on great video production now can track viewership, and the ROI is more about the tension between the message and how the message is distributed.
So online video production houses are having to move from just content creation but to content distributors as well. In order to keep business rolling, they have to act more as communication practitioners combined with their video production skills. These plans include looking at social outlets beyond traditional outlets as touch points to audiences. We now have to leverage keywords, SEO, YouTube, bloggings platforms, permalinks, and other distribution parameters to find their audiences.
If you want to create a video campaign and realize the value of using Twitter or Facebook to connect and distribute a message, the community building effort must start long before the video message is created. This is why community building is huge in the minds of digital media content creators. If you are a small company and want to get your video message in front of the right people, you have to define…where does the community exist and how do they communicate?
Social outlets are not always the answer. I finished a huge project for Western North Carolina Conference of the United Methodist Church. They wanted to capture and tell stories of rural churches in North Carolina. These stories would be showcased at the annual conference, in-front of 2000 pastors, staff, and other support staff. The distribution was simple, burn to a DVD for everyone to watch at one time…then we would put on YouTube for them to find, and share afterwards. The community was in one physical room. Then, once the community was exposed to the message…they could use technology like YouTube to share with their friends.
The point here…is we have to think about distribution and how it relates to the audience. If we want to create a year long social media campaign for a community to watch, there has to be a community. You just cannot set-up a Facebook page or a Twitter account, then start tweeting about the video. If you are trying to hit a large audience of people and you only have two people in the community…then something is not working. A community of people have to engage with a common interest online before you can start sharing a message.
Example, a few years ago…I worked with Clemson on a project. They wanted to create a video invitation to send to all of their students via email. They wanted to invite the students to an event called Legacy Day. This was a day where students, faculty, staff, could come together to meet those who had left money to Clemson in their will. They were also going to be having a book signing for the new Clemson history book.
After talking with Clemson, we came to the conclusion that email blasting a video to the students would have as much effect as going out in the center of campus, during spring break and holding a sign up to come to Legacy Day. No one would open, read, click the video link, watch, then attend. So, instead…we knew that Clemson students are highly active on Facebook. So, we engaged with a group of students to help us with the project. We found some students, got them to help us with the video production, they create a Facebook event and shared with their friends, and we posted small video vignettes once a week leading up to the event.
So what is the point, we realized that Facebook is the distribution mechanism, BUT we needed to engage the individuals in the student community of Facebook to invite their friends to join. Then they could share the video with their friends. We nearly double the expected attendance projections…and we used video to tell the story of Clemson Legacy. We were leveraging the online community of students.
Distribution is a powerful tool…a powerful consideration…a powerful part of the Rhetorical Triangle.
As I took part in #BlogChat Sunday night…I was so pleased to see the conversation move away from technology, which blog platform to choose, and other topics sometimes I browse through. Finding passion in your blogging and writing has always been my position. Regardless of you blog for advocacy, business development, or even to generate income…you have to have some passion behind your message.
Above is what I think…”Passion is food for the soul…if you can blend that passion into your writing…it can become infectous!” So tell me, what blogs do you connect with…that touch you daily. Is a photo blog, video blog, a business blog, one of advocacy, what is it?
As I was thinking through this topic, the one thing that always finds a way to make it’s way from my subconscience to the forefront of my thinking, how can we convert passionate writing into revenue and a business development tool. I even wrote a blog post about this very topic: Does Passionate Writing (Blogs) Generate Revenue? These is a method to the passion, writing content that passionately connects…thus the SEO argument.
Regardless…this has made me look back at my work and do an assessment, an assessment of my writing and my direction. So the best way I know how to do a simple assessment, create a word cloud from all my writing in my blog.
Here is a word cloud from this blog, my business blog:
Here is a word cloud from my personal blog (https://rettewcreative.com/personal-blog):
I chose not to do a word cloud from my tags, because that is just measuring frequency of the words that I deem searchable for each blog post. This is a subjective viewpoint of my writing, looking through a lens completely focused on SEO. Instead, I used Wordle.net to pull all the words from all my posts to assess frequency of the actual content I am actually writing. I am focusing solely on the content in this simple assessment.
So begs the question…are the largest words in the word cloud (which shows the largest frequency of usage my my blogs) match the purpose and mission behind my passion for both my business and personal blogs. My business is based on video, media, blogs, people and those are the largest words in the business blog word cloud. But…based on this simple assessment, I can see words that are apparent that I might want to focus more in my writing. I also see areas in my personal blog that I might want to re-focus a bit…I am wondering if I am talking too much about business in my personal blog?
With the announcement of the new Final Cut Pro X and other Non-Linear Editors (NLE) like Avid Media Composer moving more consumers into the pro-sumer market…the question begs an answer: is tape media dead? Outside of more consumers using non-video tape recording cameras, more and more pro-sumers and professionals are moving from tape media to SD media.
In a recent review by USA Today of the new Sony NX5U along with the emergence of using Digital SLRS to acquire video images…the claim is that video tape is dead. It is in the first line of this article: “Review: Sony NX5U video camera”. Jefferson Graham states, “The big takeaway from this week’s overhaul of Apple’s Final Cut Pro video editing software is that tape-based media is dead.”
Well here are my thoughts?
Storage costs money! Yes! Higher Definition images need more space to store these images! It all comes down to work flow…what do I mean, well we will address that in a second.
Traditional image acquisition in the video production world use video tape to record the image captured by the lens and processed by the camera. Once recorded on the tape, it would take equal amount of time to play and “ingest” into a computer’s non-linear editing suite (like Final Cut Pro, Avid Media Composer & Adrenaline, Adobe Premiere, etc.). Basically, if you recorded an hour’s worth of video, it would take an hour to put it into the computer.
With solid state media, video cameras are able to record the image as a file. The better the image, the better the camera, the larger the files sizes. Instead of just playing the video back for the computer editing suite during “ingest”, you could just transfer the file, the same process typically as copying any other file from a thumb drive to your computer. This cuts down time in the production process, huge amounts of time. BUT!!! Once you transfer the files to the computer, you can erase the media in the camera and reuse for the next production.
When you use video tape, many production shops do not erase the original tape and save just in-case the original video information needs to be accessed. More video tape means more money. Thus, the transition to cameras that do not use video tape, it appears to cut down on cost.
BUT…here is the thing that keeps me still acquiring on video tape and recordable media like SD cards simultaneously. Once you put the video from a camera that records it without video tape into the computer, you have to save the original media somewhere. It requires hard drives to store this original media…because you erased it from the camera and it is not on an original video tape.
So…for the production house and the consumer, you have to find a place to store this original video media. For a production house…this turns into Terabytes and Terabytes of storage of this original footage. Now this storage costs can be passed off to the client…but it takes space. Bigger and bigger storage servers…and if you are storing on servers that use hard drives with moving parts, they can fail. Yes, you can RAID these drives…but I have met more and more and more major universities, production houses, etc. where the RAID’s fail and the original media is GONE!
Yes…I was at a major university that lost a whole season of football footage to a failed RAID system. Those hard drives are moving parts. Yes…there is solid state storage but it so damn expensive, it is hard to justify the costs with the new technology.
Avid’s NLE’s allow you to erase media that is unused in the editing process, but keep the parts of video production used in the final product. BUT…what if you want to re-access that un-used media for another project?
Here is what I do…my current solution.
1. I use a camera that can record on video tape and solid state storage simultaneously. The video tape is there just in-case the solid state media fails. It has happened before during my ingest. I have lost a whole day of shooting on an SD Card, but had the tape as a back-up. If not, it would have cost me time and money.
2. I ingest into the computer using Final Cut Pro with the solid state media card. Why, because it converts to a Quicktime (.MOV) that is widely excepted by most major NLE’s. I can also ingest 83 minutes of HDV in 7 minutes compared to the 87 minutes it would take for me to play that tape into the computer. Then…if I want to edit in Final Cut Pro or Avid…I have the original raw media digitally. (Avid has to convert the files to their proprietary codec)
3. I save the original HDV video tape as a back-up…properly labeled. So, if I loose the raw media on the hard drive, I can open the project and use the tapes to re-ingest the media.
4. I save the project files from both Final Cut Pro and Avid Media Composer in two other spots outside of the edit suite: a back-up storage drive and my online back-up space in the cloud. So, if I loose everything digitally, I have the original project files in two places and I can pull the tapes out to re-ingest the media.
5. I back-up my raw media files of the current years’ productions at a un-disclosed storage facility on consistent basis. This allows me to save time if my systems go down…just go get the media and transfer the files.
Why do I do this…because I do not trust moving parts in hard drives. I have had more NLE systems and their hard drives fail with media. I have watched major broadcasting units not be able to put on a show because files got corrupted with lost media. Tape is a physical media that provides a great back-up solution for original media.
Now, this is not always going to be a great solution long-term…but I am researching and working with partners on solutions that will provide me and my clients a great solution.
Today, I was asked to take part in a panel discussion for the 2011 Clemson Summit…the topic was Creativity and Passion. As a part of the panel discussion, the moderator sent us ten potential questions to be asked in the during the panel discussion.
