The conundrum of the Social Media Revolution

One of the SMS screencasts is on the history of social aspect of communication and the current revolutionary aspect of social media communications. An interesting point raised is that while we tend to think of social media as something very new and contemporary, the truth is that communications among humans have always had a social element to it. In this regard, history repeats itself in the social aspect of the communication, it is just the medium that has changed.

I do agree with this statement. Now let's assume that this statement is a universal truth. If that is the case, then following the rules of Symbolic Logic, one can concur that sum of all assumptions comprising the statement have to be also true in order to make the full statement a universal truth. If any one assumption is declared to be false then it is reasonable to concur that either the universal truth of the statement is no longer valid or that particular assumption does not belong in the statement. Sounds confusing? I will explain with the following conundrum.

There is evidence to suggest that communication, particularly mass communication through whatever medium was always controlled by certain agencies who stood to benefit the most in controlling such information. As onerous as this sounds, it is something very much present today in almost every aspect of our lives. For instance company communications are always checked and clear by senior staff, generally involving someone from media/public relations and legal. Governments engage in controlled dissemination of information so as to not create chaos among the public. Major news corporations are controlled by even larger conglomerates that are again controlled by a few elite individuals who tend to characterise the news coverage based on their personal beliefs and opinions. For instance it is commonly known that Fox, a major US television network whose major shareholders are prominent members of the Republican Party, has a strong conservative bent and appeals to the right wing faction of society. Alternatively, the O network, presumably controlled by the eponymous Oprah Winfrey, tends to have a more liberal bent and appeals to the Democrat Party voter base or the left wing faction.

A more ominous aspect of controlled information is that of governments propaganda such as those done during Nazi occupied Germany, and communist controlled North Korea and China. Another instance of this is the commonly held belief that modern history, as taught in most schools, was written in the context and for benefit of the early imperialist nations since they were the ones who developed and then controlled the printing mediums of that age.

Now getting back to the topic of Social Media revolution, one of the key benefits cited is the democratisation of the information. Since creation and sharing of information is no longer restricted to a few individuals, and is in the hands of the public, the information shared is better for society. However, if we assume the universal truth of the preceding statement that there is nothing new in social media and that it is simply history repeating itself through a different medium, and if it has been historically true that communication has been controlled to benefit the elite, then it stands to reason that eventually, social media will begin to be controlled by the elite and benefit those to whom it stands to benefit. 

If one cannot accept the reasoning for accepting the latter conclusion then one has to discard the former hypothesis behind it as well. 

However, there are early signs to suggest that after the initial euphoria of mass involvement in communication, there seems to be a convergence of control of media through certain elite channels. For instance, the text reading for this module "Social Media Marketing: A strategic Approach" had one case study on the emergence and massive growth of Digg, an online portal of news information. While Digg's model may be based on mass participation behaviour, what is ignored in the case study is the fact that the popularity of an aggregator news site like Digg, means the dissemination of information is being controlled by that one agency notwithstanding the appearance of democratic process in how the information is ranked. Examples abound in other aggregator sites like Mashable, TechCrunch, Vine, Stumbleupon and so many others. These are million dollar (if not billion dollar) valued companies. It can be reasoned that information (or at least how it is gathered and read) is once again being controlled by the elite. Even Google's search bot, notorious for creating the specialised skill of Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) of all content published online, is developed by engineers and a very very secret algorithm in how information is found and ranked. So a large organisation with the ability to write SEO content is likely to have it's information found and read more easily than some local blogger sitting in a remote town and dispensing jewels of wisdom.

Indeed, the best term to describe this trend is from another screencast video of this module reading, titled "The Social Media Minefield". A minefield it is! So tread with caution.

-Abi

The folly of Social Media (SMSscreencast week 1)

For this week's posts I figured a fun way to write the reflective journal is to re-read all the screencasts of this module (organised by week) as posted on Google communities and then write this reflective journal based on my understanding of the specific content in relation to the overall content of this module.

The first intriguing item of interest was the Conversation Prism as originally designed by Brian Solis and Jess3. I had never seen one of those and what was shocking to me was the discovery of the numerous social media platforms out there (probably increased since the date of publication to this writing date). 

This dial is incredibly informative but it is also the perfect reflection of my state of mind with social media in general - OVERWHELMING!

Let's "dial" back in my timeline a bit to clarify this statement. I was slow to adopt social media when it first evolved. I did not grow up with Social Media. In fact, the Internet came at the time I graduated high school. So like most others in the bandwagon, I assumed social media to be another passing fad in the likes of MySpace, Facebook and Friendster. I did finally venture on to Facebook but not until 2008. I dabbled in it for a while, connected with some old school friends, posted some pics and then I got bored. I didn't get it. I figured it was something that the Millennial generation did. Over the next few years I heard about Twitter but again it was something I just did not get. I reminded me of the heydays of Instant Messaging but now to the entire world. I did use Linkedin regularly but the motivation was primarily for career enhancement and not for it's social aspect.

Finally in 2012, I took a stab at Twitter and for some reason I was hooked from day 1. Soon after I followed up with writing short blog posts (again something I didn't understand previously). Blogging and tweeting became a routine; at times almost like an addiction. Now although I was focused on just a few social media platforms by 2013, there were several new ones popping up everyday at that time. I started to open up accounts on as many other platforms as I could and dabbled in each for a while. As of last count, I was on 52 social media platforms. Sometime in late 2013, I finally became mentally exhausted by social media involvement. This is when fatigue set in just by wanting to "check in" online.

My resulting action was to purge myself of social media platforms and restrict use to the most relevant ones for my semi-professional blogging activities. I also made it a point to not spend more than 2 hours per day on the Internet (whether access through computer, TV or smartphone did not matter).

Coming back to the topic of the Conversation Prism, one can see how the mere sight of the dial with the numerous platforms in small fonts and images can remind me of the overwhelming aspect of social media. From a strategic business aspect, what that means is one cannot devote limited resources (no matter how deep the pocket is) for communicating through every channel available in social media universe. Strategic selection is the key. It does not matter if a person is the user (as platform content generator) or the reader (recipient of the content). There comes a point where our minds cannot fathom constant barrage of information and needs to shut off. This is what I mean by the "Folly" of social media. When too much of something becomes bad for you, it is time to realise that the decline and popularity of a tool will inevitably follow. 

Another example of how social media becomes overwhelming is also evidenced in the SMS module hangout group. Each week the amount of readings (and sub-readings as others commented and posted other information) was strenuous at best. It is easy to share and post content nowadays but what one does not think about is the amount of virtual "junk" that is left behind in the Internet as a result of constant sharing and posting. 

This aspect was covered in one of the screencast videos titled "Always-On Society". Indeed, our habits have evolved to remain always on to face the barrage of constant information input. However, if the previous generation was able to create a successful world prior to the advent of social media, and if human generations tend to follow cyclical patterns in behaviour, it can be reasonable to assume that at some point in the future (perhaps one or two generations later), people will start to revert back to less information and less use of social media and start become "sometimes-on" society. 

I will get back to this subject again in a future post and discuss what effects the constant barrage of information can have on the human mind.

-Abi

Group Dynamics of collaborative participation

For those  regular readers who have been following this blog since inception, you will recall I mentioned the reason for starting this blog was for requirement of the individual assignment in the Social Media Strategy module. I should mention now that we also have a group assignment to complete. The task requires collaborative effort among the distance MBA students assigned to group of six members who will analyse the social media strategies of one company and develop a short video presentation with the findings and post it on Google Hangouts. 

While the analysis component by itself is relatively simple to complete, the challenge lies in the collaborative part. While collaborative effort among candidates is commonly applied in assignment completion in full time MBA programs and other professional designations, what makes this task challenging within the SMS module is the distance factor involved. For instance, our group has six members who are located in different countries and time zones and most of us have never met the rest in person. So some in the group are participating and engaging through social media platforms regularly, while others have been absent (to date).

My intention behind mentioning the above situation is not to complain about the non-participants. Rather, it is to highlight three interesting facets of collaborative tasks done remotely. 

1. Such a task would be virtually impossible to do before the advent of the Internet no doubt, but even during the early days of Internet adoption and before the existence of VOIP telephony and other social chatting platforms, such tasks were onerous even in the best case scenario. Programs like Google Hangouts and Google Docs allow for instant face-to-face chat time with cohorts and a live working document that is edited and reviewed by all involved instantly.
2. Group dynamics, whether in real-time or virtually, however, remain the same. For instance every group will demonstrate the emergence of a leader, moderator, critic, doer, and slacker. The last one is of particular importance to me, cause quite frankly, I was just that during my undergrad studies! It requires the moderator to effectively facilitate collaboration in order to get the task complete.
3. Effectiveness of group collaboration is further dependent on positive reinforcements (recognition, personal gratification, salary increase, promotion) and punitive reinforcements. Both reinforcements may exist implicitly. Thus in company setting, there are obvious direct benefits and damages that comes with group dynamics of collaborative tasks. In full-time MBA programs, such benefits/damages may be more implicit. Nevertheless, the group cohesion exists. However, in distance learning environment, there is reduction of both direct and implicit benefits/damages. This may suggest that the hype of telecommuting may be just that - hype! The most notable instance of declaration of war on telecommuting was the banning of flexible remote work benefits of Yahoo employees by its newly appointed CEO, Marissa Mayer. The event occurred in early 2013, and it caused a huge uproar on social media and regular media. The debate raged on for a while on pros and cons of flexible working environments and telecommuting. The biggest reason cited by the CEO was requirement of having "face-time" to increase productivity. Back then, Yahoo was in dire need for improving it's productivity. Incidentally, Yahoo stock was at $20/share prior to the ban. As of my writing date, Yahoo stock is at $35/share. Could this increase be attributed to some extent on the ban? 

Social Media is dynamically changing the working habits of the contemporary worker. As with any new invention, there will be benefits and there will be pitfalls. The successful longevity of any invention then lies in the net benefits achieved. What this means for the various social media platforms in existence today, is something that is being written but unknown. Scarily enough, it is happening remotely!

-Abi

A different direction on blogging for the module

The module individual assessment element requires every student to write regular blog posts as a learning journal to provide reflective thoughts and feedback on the learning.

One of the recommendations made by the module instructor was to post throughout the learning period and not leave it as a last minute task, the latter being the typical outcome for most assignments at any higher learning institution. I was initially set to post regularly throughout the learning sessions since my memory would be fresh from the readings.

However, on further introspection I chose to commence writing upon completion of the entire learning sessions offered through Google + community and additional reading materials. The reasons for this are simple and two-fold. Since a learning journal is intended to be reflective thoughts on ones learning, it made sense to write after completing the sessions (and digesting all the material). Additionally, my experience from blogging and interaction on social media is that most people don't reflect much on anything but rather act as conduits for relaying messages that comprise partial bits and pieces of information that are perhaps not fact checked.

In the case of the SMS learning sessions, I started to realise that while my impressions and understanding of a particular session was developed upon completing that session, it did not stay static or remain in a linear fashion. Rather it kept evolving as the next learning session was completed and certain assumptions or opinions on a prior learnt paradigm was changed.

Ill demonstrate what I mean with an example. Assume one is taking a course on Corporate Finance. The course materials and reading is set forth in a linear fashion. One has to grasp the subject on a preceding chapter or session before moving to the subsequent one. Essentially skipping is not possible. It's like building a conventional wood-framed house from the bottom up. Furthermore, assumptions and beliefs on concepts from prior chapters remain static. The understanding of Cournot Oligopoly will remain the same no matter what subsequent theories are learnt. Contrary to this conventional method, social media learning is dynamic. I may have learnt about Linkedin in prior session and understand it to be the MOST effective professional networking platform out there and then totally discard that notion when I later learn that Twitter offers an incredibly fast way to connect with professional cohorts. Thus my earlier paradigm was disrupted. This is the essence of social media. Dynamic, disruptive, and evolving. It is like building a modular house with bits and pieces manufactured in various parts. 

Thus my rationale to complete the learning sessions and then be able to reflect back on the impressions developed at this time. And trust me, what I write in my posts for this module will probably be disrupted by new learning by the time the element is evaluated!

-Abi

Introductory Message

This is my first blog post for the Durham MBA SMS module individual assessment element.

As a quick background review, I should mention that I have been an active and avid blogger since 2012. I run a Travel and Money Savings blog called Larkycanuck's Blog which has been rated as one of the Top 40 blogs in my city. I have also been very active on major social media platforms, with a particular strength in Twitter.

I have to be honest about one thing. I registered for the SMS module initially because there was no other module for me to register during the semester for Distance Learning. My view on learning and education, particularly with a MBA program, is that my money spent should be for high level learning that I probably would not learn on my own or would be difficult to grasp by oneself. In this regard, my prior elective modules were all the ones focused on strategy and finance and marketing. At the time of registering for SMS, I felt it was money about to be wasted on a course on Social Media, which essentially by it's nature, is something one "socially" develops and if one had to learn anything on it, there are gazillion materials freely available on the web. Furthermore, since I was quite active on social media already, I asked myself the question - 

"Why exactly am I paying this much money to learn how to Tweet, Like and Post?"

I am sure that the module Director/s had asked the same question. The resulting answer of course is different because the question itself is wrong. What I was surprised (and delighted) to see was that the module was not just about how to use Twitter or Facebook or other SM platforms (although there were some elements of this aspect) but rather about strategy implementation of a social media marketing effort for business purposes.

This was a fresh take on my learning of social media since I never saw it (SM) to be anything much more beyond another means of communication between friends and family. This was even after the fact that as a result of the success of my blog, I was getting paid (not huge sums) to write!

I believe now that the module outline covers a wide spectrum of social media platforms while also engaging the participant in understanding the strategic implementation component of it.

Now that is useful to learn indeed!

-Abi