Wotta lotta Twotter
Still fresh from an early dice with marketing world faddishness in 07, Twitter seems to be recovering nicely and growing fast. There is a squillion addons, plugins and general widgety bits. And its traffic just overtook Digg. [smile]
I'm benmason. C u there.
[image from niceparking]
Posted by: Ben at hometime on Tuesday, 27th January 2009
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Blogging is dead, says Wired
Wired, usually a source of wonderment, has published this piece of piffle announcing the death of blogging. The article assumes that a bloggers aim is 'skyrocketing to the top of Google's search results' and chasing attention, fame and cash. But the majority are still doing what bloggers do best: participating in open conversations around subjects that interest them.
Blogging isn't journalism. It is a publishing format which very much suits the current stage of web development and use. It's great for launching small companies, tracking community projects, keeping in touch with family and myriad other situations where freeform, open conversations are beneficial. Blogging is the digital front porch.
If social media just allows us to manage relationships with more acquaintenances than we could before it,then blogging seems the most suited to the web of all. It's open, it links information, it's accessible to all and it's a modular technology.
I'm willing to bet that blogging will be around a lot longer than Wired. And the jounalist claims to be 'onto the [Twitter]'s real appeal'. But he's only tweeted once.
image from thp365
Posted by: Ben at [sigh] o'clock on Monday, 24th November 2008
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Seeding plan
Plants have had it tough for years. Talked at, relied upon to look nice, to feed us and to create an atmosphere sustaining 6 billion people. But now they can vent their feelings: the first blogging plant is here.
Created by Satoshi Kuribayashi, a researcher at the presitigious Keio University, ‘Midori-San’ is a pot plant with embedded sensors. These measure the plants reactions to sunlight, weather and temperature, then convert them into simple blog posts, e.g.: “today was a sunny day and I was able to sunbathe a lot... I had quite a bit of fun today.”
Kuribayashi homes to embed more sensors, allowing Midori-San to publish ever more complex messages. Let’s hope this happens in time for us to pick up “I am feeling Triffid today”.
Go here if you can read Japanese (or Plant), or read more at the New Scientist.
Posted by: Tom at luncheon on Monday, 27th October 2008
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Marketing: socially objectable or still socially objectionable?
Lots of people are discussing the concept of the social object (see a simple explanation or a complex presentation).
Social objects are the things people cluster around like a football team, a blog or a political party. The concept illustrates the idea that social networks are mistakenly illustrated as connections directly between people but better illustrated as connecting via shared interests.
This matters more because the internet lowered the cost of information distribution and therefore the cost of managing social relationships. We now have more than (Dunbar’s) 150 friends. So social objects suddenly became more valuable.
So will marcomms departments rush to create quickie social objects like (ugh) ‘viral videos’?
Or will they help tweak or create products to make them better social objects like beta-testing does?
Or will they align themselves with existing social objects like sponsorship always has?
The verdict: the social object idea is a nice way of illustrating why it’s more important than ever that marketers concentrate on what their practice was created for: to listen to what people want and then satisfy their needs.
[image by Dipanker Dutt]
Posted by: Ben at mung-beaning on Monday, 27th October 2008
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