As you know, I follow the universe of social media,
monitoring the popularity of various venues in order to encourage my readers to
use these appropriately. I’m an avid
Facebooker, occasional Tweeter, YouTuber and LinkedIn member. What’s happening in the Israel right now
reveals some strange new truths about social media.
The military's live
spin about the strike, and Hamas' response on a separate Twitter feed, have
been called an unprecedented use of social media. BuzzFeed wrote that it
"may well be the most meaningful change in our consumption of war in over
20 years." It's raising questions about the ethics and implications of
live-tweeting a violent conflict. And it's calling into question the democratic,
everyone-has-a-voice nature of Twitter, which is known more for giving a voice
to protesters and civilians than military spokespeople.
The full CNN
article comments on Facebook and Twitter usage as “giving a voice to
protesters and civilians”. Maybe the
lesson is that we should be using these social media venues as one of the
masses. Maybe we should be rallying our
readers in common causes related to our markets and our industry. Rather than instructing and promoting we
might need to comment and voice concerns.
That’s likely why LinkedIn sucks (in my humble
opinion.) You can’t get a group of
business-people to engage in meaningful dialogue when most seem hardwired for
self-promotion. LinkedIn users might
feel they’re above the masses so that rather than fighting against “the man”
they believe they are “the man” (pardon the gender bias of this ‘60s hippy-reference.)
If there is resentment to military captains and captians of
industry using social media for propaganda and promotion, then maybe we should
avoid it too. We could start thinking
like our market, and take a good hard look at our industry. Social justice, environmental impact, fair
trade, ethical business practices. Who’s
with me?
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