Stardust Global Ventures

Before I go too far, let me just say this is an opinion piece. I’m not a statistician so my theories and ideas are my own. They are not proven and for every opinion I put out here, there will be at least 10 opposing ideas so I’m not going to worry about that. As I said, this is all just my opinion about what has taken place. No need to kill the messenger. The messenger isn’t bringing a fact but rather a consideration.

The past year has brought a lot of new technologies, a lot of new admissions into the world and a whole lot about social media. This has become the new catch phrase blanketing everything around the technologies we use and the relationships surrounding them. In the telco industry, most people thought the catch phrase would be unified-communications. Social media ran right past that and became an entity with a life of it’s own. Social media is people.

Let’s start with Robert Scoble. I knew who he was before I knew Ken. I had engaged with him and in fact when CBS did a piece on Robert Scoble and twitter, they showed Robert’s twitter feed on the news. My name showed as they scrolled his feed. Yeah…that would be me in early 2007, back when I was still sheryl4321. That was 07 and in 08 I met Robert in person.

Today I think Robert Scoble is who he is because of timing. He doesn’t bring anything really unique to the tech world. He’s an ex microsoft guy who got into blogging and made news over a couple of things he did, and more, the people he engaged with. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying there’s anything wrong with Robert, but today what he does really well and CAN do because of his massive following is instigate. Case in point a conversation on twitter just yesterday. Robert made a comment and Ken responded. Robert came back with something to Ken and Ken again responded. Robert said not one word more but many of his followers started talking to Ken and in fact immediately following that one little interaction of two 140 character exchanges, Ken was followed by a dozen new people. Something that doesn’t happen for either of us in those numbers. We may get 5-10 new followers over the course of a day but in a 5 minute span, it was clear what caused it.

Ok, so what am I really trying to say with all this? I believe we’re on the edge of something really big. A change is taking place and we’re all part of it. From how we do business, to how we engage socially with friends. Our lives have truly become part of a global structure and traditional boundaries will soon be removed, not unlike the Berlin wall.

Friends with companies have moved on to start different companies, other connections have moved on to different countries, change is taking place. Social media will quickly be called something else because it has been so over used and we are saturated by people calling themselves social media experts, I have heard time and again the comment, “I am the only person on twitter who is NOT a social media expert”. It’s true. Almost everyone on twitter has in their bio something about social media.

Marketing is trying everything they can to get some benefit out of twitter but they will probably ultimately be the reason twitter fails, if not this year, certainly very soon. In the last month alone I have blocked over 100 new ‘connections’ because when I look at their link it goes to a smooth sales pitch page that annoys the hell out of me.

We’re seeing old media trying to find a way to mesh into new media, and in fact one of my twitter pals, newmediajim, aka Jim Long, NBC cameraman in D.C. has taken to twittering in abundance about his escapades along 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. et al.

I’ve met authors, interviewed some, spoken to MANY, all using Facebook as a way to connect with readers. Some using twitter as well. I’ve watched PR people throw together Facebook profiles for actors they represent with little engagement and no thought to why it might matter.

I’ll tell you why it matters. I’ll tell you what I believe the ‘regular’ people get and the media mavens and social media hounds don’t understand at all. This new world we’re living in requires something of us all. It requires engagement. The benefits are huge because we now have a big database of people and connections we had no knowledge of before. Engagement is necessary for the marketers to gain anything at all from the use of twitter. People are too used to shutting out what they don’t get anything from. Without engagement you may as well not go to the trouble of pretending you want to.

Last year I started using facebook pokes as a tool to touch base with people. I lost some followers because of it. Lost some others for reasons known only to them. I gained a whole lot more than I lost and I did that because I put myself and my belief system on the line in full view and let people make the choice over whether or not I bring anything of value to their world.

I don’t wish to debate the idea of following 15000 people. To me that seems ludicrous. I have always believed quality is more important than quantity and yet I see value in having large numbers to draw from. Chris Brogan is someone I think does a good job of that because he gets a lot of information by having a lot of people to glean from.

So what’s next in 2009? It’s going to be wild. I hope a new term replaces social media, though what that might be I couldn’t say for sure. I do think as social media gains a bigger foot hold we are going to see business embrace it more freely and in truth, businesses who fail to accept it will quickly find themselves without an employee base. Maybe they’ll have to support the senior citizens of the world because any kid in high school today, you know the kids who have grown up with technology as part of their daily lives, well, they’re not going to search out a job that doesn’t allow them to engage in their world the way they always have. They’re looking to have the ability to use im on the job and receive sms on their smart phones. They fought and found ways to have cell phones in school even when just a decade ago the school systems were not allowing them to have them at all. Our kids are more resourceful than we ever gave them credit for.

Times they are a changin’, to quote Bob Dylan. Isn’t it exciting?

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