Don’t be intimidated by the complicated social media landscape. The path forward is clear.

Graphic showing the complexity of the social media landscape.

Infograph by Buddy Media via Business Insider.

A coworker sent me a link to this graphic, illustrating the complex web of social media tools available for marketers. It was created by Buddy Media at the unveiling of their suite of monitoring tools.

It’s an interesting graphic, but I think it misses the point for social media marketing. I see this as a warning to “me-too” companies who want a piece of user’s social time and attention (and it’s also effective to make a case for content monitoring).

Social media marketers only need to know a couple of things to get started:

    • Have a story that’s worth sharing;
    • Tell it consistently where people are, and;
    • Make sure it’s easy for people to share with others.

My take is the biggest reason content marketing fails to deliver for many is – if they’re honest with themselves – the story just isn’t compelling.

Pomegranate Center: transforming communities through collaboration

Fantastic ideas about moving large groups into collective effort to create shared space and community projects.


“I work with communities of place … just people who happen to live together in the same neighborhood, same city, same town, who come from different cultures, ideologies, religions, tastes and values. In my philosophy, those differences are the greatest untapped asset we have in our society.

Read more at: www.pbs.org

Journalism from a CS perspective: content engineering is king

More great evidence that journalism is about information collection and distribution, not necessarily storytelling.


What if journalism were invented today? How would a computer scientist go about building it, improving it, iterating it? He might start by mapping out some fundamental questions: What are the project’s values and goals? What consumer needs would it satisfy? How much should be automated, how much human-powered?

Read more at: www.niemanlab.org

“Why Community Is the Most Popular Show on the Internet”

Interesting analysis of shifting viewing habits and geek culture in the mainstream. Good stuff in the comments, too, about timeshifting and advertising.


Yesterday, Community, NBC’s sitcom about the odd and endearing relationship between a diverse group of community college students, was named TV Guide’s fan-favorite comedy, and its fan-favorite ensemble. Its time slot competitor Big Bang Theory, the CalTech-set CBS comedy about a pair of nerd genius roommates, didn’t win in any category.

Read more at: gawker.com

Jarvis on media’s real business: content or relationships?

“The problem is, the media is not built for relationships because our industry was born in a time of factories, not services.”

The Guardian launches its new Media Network my essay asking whether we in media are really in the content business. Here’s the first half (in the rest, I catalog the methods I think are worth exploring to rethink our role…. I’ll be expanding on that later).

Read more at: www.buzzmachine.com