RECONSTRUCTION

This site is currently under reconstruction. New updates and location to follow soon...

#140Twitter York Project

Just to let you know that as of this week there starts my most recent project: The #140Twitter York Project.

The idea is to explore microblog ususage on a 'micro' (relatively) scale and analyse the properties of business networks in the city of York on Twitter.

Data collection has started and seems quite appropriate, in the same week that Coca-Cola and Unilever are shifting marketing focus away from 'traditional campaigna' and towards a 'digital' and 'push' marketing strategy across various community platforms: Facebook, YouTube etc. Indeed, as Will Cooper notes, 'social media begins to dictate their marketing activity in 2010'.

So rather than the analysis of already established brands (I'm sure that Coke has more than enough £'s to sustain their own departments and keep marketing/research chiefs more than occupied) my research explores how independents within a localised area can seek to target consumers, create networks, sustain consumer interest, seek out buyer/sellers and ultimately take advantage of 'community' structuring through Twitter.

In short, the business and commercialised reaction to being on the edge of the Information Age, as my new friend Shourjo at BBC Leeds put it. More from this project soon...

Purely for the purposes of the Give

As regular readers to this blog and other sites about 'social media', those of us with such mediated lives hold that people simply 'get' such communications. No explantion is required, especially in answer to the question 'why use Twitter?' Other's who 'get' this evolution of the web, of social platforms, of technology are well tuned to the Information Age - shaped by networks, links and our connections with others.

Such an Age presents new social opportunities...

Purely for the delight of the connection and to take advantage of one such social opportunity is provided by one AndyWhitlock. This week is taken as a Week of Favours (now in colour), where Andy is offering seven days of favours - 11th to the 15th of January. One favour per day and anyone can ‘apply’ for one.

Here are the favours,

1. #favour1 – He’ll make/find you an image
2. #favour2 – He’ll blog something for you
3. #favour3 – He’ll look up something for you
4. #favour4 – He’ll tweet something for you
5. #favour5 – He’ll write something for you
   

To apply you need only TWEET @andywhitlock or comment on his blog post.

In the same week that I have been commissioned to write reportage on consumer-to-consumer behaviour comes Andy's very apt recreation of community spirit and vigour. Interesting, because you need have no direct tie to Andy and because in the spirit of other aspects of Web 2.0 his favours are Free.

Cyberspace 1990s was based on an inherent individualism - where making a connection (whether to another person, or even dialling to get onto the internet) were experienced as risky situations. Technology had to be negotiated, choices made, communications initiated, contact slooooooow. Somewhere admidst the Web 1.0 read write early hay day some resources conveyed a sense of 'community' (see Howard Rheingold and Barry Wellman for more). More rencently identities offer a reconnect as an adjunct to 'real' world connections, rather than 'fantasy' or 'play'. Increasingly Web 2.0 in its 'friend/lier' guise has reframed community again, which has not gone unnoticed by various social commentators, including,
Anderson’s (2009) The Longer Long Tail: How Endless Choice is Creating Unlimited Demand;
Gladwell’s (2006) Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking;
Howe’s (2009) Crowdsourcing: How the Power of the Crowd is Driving the Future of Business;
Leadbeater’s (2009) We-Think: Mass innovation, not mass production 2nd Edition;
Shirky’s (2009) Here Comes Everybody: How Change Happens When People Come Together
Surowiecki’s (2004) Wisdom of Crowds. All which, if you haven't, you should read.

We can debate individualism another time, but one aspect of Andy's generous offer strikes me, it is imperative that we are seen to make the ‘correct’ choice as we are presented with ever-increasing choices. Add to this more pressure, when making the ‘incorrect’ choice could lead to unforeseen consequences (or just a bad friend on Facebook). On the web, the range of resources that are the most popular tap into this shared notion of choice by community - Twitter, Facebook, Flickr etc. all play on the notion of community of people sharing experiences, moments, recommendations and updates about cups of tea.

There's something rather comforting about these mediations, especially as we have the ability to take these with us through increasingly mobile devices and handheld technology. Obscurity is no match for the web, to be turly mobile it seems we must lead from the charge wave our hands in the air and polish up our community spirit.

The power of social media to Kill In The Name of...

After some rather lacklustre previous 'races of the Christmas Top Spot!' (Mr Blobby you belong in 1990s the-worst-of listings) it was nice to revel in the mounting workings of S.Cowell social media enterprise. XFactor: Slick in its production and promotion of 'that (nice) boy Joe' who sang about something to climb. Well he sang some other person's song about climbing. Everest this was not. Pulsing with Rage, 90s band Rage Against the Machine proved that with a little social media it's easy to be Killing In The Name - the name in this case being Mr Cowell, or so Christmas consumer's were led to believe.

Killing In The Name started life as the Facebook Group Rage Against the Machine for Christmas No.1 pushed by Jon Morter and Tracy Morter. The group SHOUTED! that we've had enough of a dull Christmas chart every year! Oh, yeah bring back the Spice Girls.

Impressive in numbers terms, the group has attracted more than 450,000 members (2 percent of the U.K. Facebook population) in the two weeks of its existence and it is UK's most trafficked and historic facebook group... Most Facebook Groups struggle to get past 5,ooo members.

Back to social media, Killing In The Name has become the first song to achieve the Christmas no.1 position through downloads only and has Achieved the biggest one-week download sales in UK chart history. Not bad for some quick fingered campaigning via Facebook.

BUT Cowell is not defeated. Killing In The Name could be a sneaky PR backfoot. Joe and the Rage are both held under Simon's Sony deal. So placed at no.1 and no.2 the man's making money. Ker-ching! It must be comforting that the man can hear this in Barbados.

So is this consumer POWER and from the people action, in action?!... Perhaps no. For Cowell this is win, win. For rest of us, proof that advertising works. As consumers we follow the leaders, whether they be the Joe's, or the Machine's of the world. As Coles points out for WalletPop, while there is much to be enjoyed about this victory - most notably the fact it raised £65,000 for housing charity Shelter - this is a far cry from consumer power in action.

To return briefly to the social media side of things, 'that (nice) boy Joe's' Official XFactor Facebook Fan Page has, as of this week, been taken down. This is well timed, as according to Henry, for the Huffington Post, McElderry was deluged with a slew of rub-it-in-your-face comments, "I've just read that British Airways are after cabin crew, Joe," mocks one 'fan', another recommends that, "the list of future employment options are.. Tescos, Burger King and now B.A."

Ouch. Wonder what Joe's Twitter feed says... 'I must not make crap Christmas songs'

Tweet2Eat.

Twitter is useful for many things. 'Watching' celebrities as they shun each other, throw an ego related tantrum and kiss n make up. Another Twitter use stems from my recent culinary captivation as led by the foodie's. One of my latest research projects is the tracking of everything to do with food and the cultivation of a 'modern' food culture in our age of social media.

Now with 'good' reason to recipe stalk Jamie Oliver et al., those I have found to be of more inspiration are the 'everyday' food bloggers who tweet and blog simply for the love of food. Where the celebrity chef culture can be exaggerated and overblown ('how to have the perfect Christmas' is only with @Delia and friends' *gag*), the food bloggers invite commentary from other cooks who, just like them, may not hold a professional position in the industry, but do, just like you, LOVE food.

Lacking what to cook/where to go tonight: A fail-safe technique is to follow @aforkful @FoodUrchin @thelarderlout @GingerGourmand @TheOrdinaryChef.

Also, FIND! @Twecipe - a service that allows you to tweet your ingredients and receive a recipe in return.

So whilst overeating is not recommended. One cannot indulge enough on the food talk of others. Good morning @porridgelady.

Time to rust. Freedom on the web.

Our freedoms as they (seemingly) are on the web: fluid, multi-dimensional, creative, and even (at times) considerate and assertive, have, I must warn you, only a limited lifespan. Justine Bateman states that we 'Need to put our foot down on net neutrality' - very much PRO the openness, this is under threat from the efforts of organisations such as ATT, Comcast, Time/Warner Cable, Verizon, Verizon Wireless, The NCTA who threaten to control all forms of media content. By control I mean for profit $/£s. Until when? Well 'when' the margins of profitability state that this isn't a good idea. So that'll be at the end of time.

Increasingly mediated, but always communicative what makes the web? NOT its version change to a '2.0', but its links, networks and openness - A veritable pool for innovation. The question is, should media commerciality innovate like the rest of us? OR is this freedom damaging the quality of information - social or otherwise?

Maybe there's room for both. Today in the UK, Johnston Press reveal a trial to charge for online content.

Other opportunities one could throw in to the mix include:

Maybe Fox's 24 could be 23hours long with a final 'paid for' hour.That bit we all skip forward to anyway and usually when Jack Bauer is either getting his vest top on or off for the upteenth time in 24hours.

The newspaper the Sun could publish with a free 'fully dressed' version. And then with an additional option of a 'less dressed' content version = less clothes more totty for £s.

email could work the same way. Free SPAM. But $/£s for the content that you really care about... That job interview reply etc.

Whatever the future, you can safely bet there will be a price tag for our freedoms.

Taking it all off. GPS my intimates

There is a preface to my remarks for this post. It is likely that you and I do not know each other very well and I would prefer we were face-to-face for the following - so I first knew your social particulars (gender/height/hair colour/relationship status and so on), and second, so I could better gauge your reaction to the following...

Dear reader, my passion and first love (and what will be my ever-enduring love) is technology. I am happy to inhabit a wonderfully (by my own estimations and 'creation') socially mediated world. I hold firm that technology is a creative and good thing. In the right ways it can be life changing. But lets not get too technologically deterministic here. What makes technology special is the how, why and when we choose to use it.

Which is why I am a bit abashed when it comes to the penetration of technological artifice into the bedroom. Today marks MEGA Monday! the busiest internet shopping day of the year. (hello Amazon & John Lewis you have my order/s). BUT, pause before you point and click as I build up to the BIG reveal...The Brazilian designer lingerie company LindeLucy lets its wearers be GPS tracked. Perfect for that spontaneous roll in the hay? Handy when your other half is stuck in traffic and wants to locate you? A chastity belt for our times? Watch and decide for yourself.

I wonder what the forrah would be if via uplink these smalls rated your intimate abilities too?...
Pick it up, ladies. Pick it up. All right. Ladies! That’s it. Let’s go. Live updating of your sexual exploits.