–+ ROAM DIGITAL +–

The below is from The Cluetrain Manifesto … We are so far behind…

The connectedness of the Web is transforming what’s inside and outside your business — your market and your employees.

Through the Internet, the people in your markets are discovering and inventing new ways to converse. They’re talking about your business. They’re telling one another the truth, in very human voices.

Intranets are enabling your best people to hyperlink themselves together, outside the org chart. They’re incredibly productive and innovative. They’re telling one another the truth, in very human voices.

You have two choices. You can continue to lock yourself behind facile corporate words and happytalk brochures. Or you can join the conversation.

Found this post … Must explore network journalism further …

From http://www.newassignment.net/blog/david_cohn/sep2007/06/network_journali

These definitions are in large part inspired and playing off of Steve Outing’s Poynter post 11 Layers of Citizen Journalism.

Citizen Journalism: An umbrella term, without a doubt, citizen journalism is when a person who does not make their living as a journalist engages in an act of journalism. Simple enough right? Again, this is a broad definition, which means citizen journalism encompasses all the other acts of journalism that will be described below. But not all acts of citizen journalism are necessarily “network journalism” or “open source journalism.” These are unique types of citizen journalism. Another way to think of it: Citizen Journalism is the class and “network journalism” is a species. SAT Question: Mammal is to Human as Citizen Journalism is to Open Source Journalism.

(More After the Break)

“Stand-alone journalism”: Stand-alone journalism is one notch above citizen journalism because the individual isn’t reporting out of happenstance. Instead, the reporter, who might not be a “professional” has every intention of going out to report on a topic. It was a conscious choice to go out and investigate a topic, but the endeavor is done by a lone reporter. This term was coined by Chris Nolan at Spot-on, so really, I am not the one to define it — and I hope I’m doing justice to Albritton’s original conception. Either way, this is how I see “stand-alone journalism.”

“Participatory journalism”(Pro-Am Journalism): This is the most basic form of citizen journalism that news organizations engage in. It occurs through basic comments on an article — when those comments add extra information, examples, or new views that the original writer left out or didn’t know about. These comments can be an incredible source of value to a story and are very easy to invoke (just ask). It is what Jay Rosen used to help research his recent LA Times editorial: Rosen explained to the DailyKos community that he was looking for examples where blogging was used to do journalism and the community gave over 250 comments that we then combed through. It was participatory — all you had to do was comment. Because
it’s easy to invoke and easy for others to participate (commenting takes minutes) it happens all the time, it is just a part of the greater blogosphere culture.

This is also the basis of “Pro-Am Journalism” when professional and armature reporters work together. Pro-Am journalism continues into network and open source journalism, but this is where that relationship begins and I suspect it is where Pro-Am relationships are most common right now — regular commenters become trusted sources on topics that they are experts in.

“Network journalism”: Using “distributed reporting” (below) “network journalism” is when groups of people come together through the Internet to work on a single story. Like stand-alone journalism it is a conscious decision, but the work is not done by a lone reporter. Instead, it requires a group of people. Network journalism rests its fate on two principles: First — the “wisdom of the crowd,” the notion that a large network of people will have a collective intelligence that is greater than any single reporter. The second is “crowdsourcing” (crowdsourced journalism is below), in this case — crowdsourcing is the idea that a group of people will be able to tackle a large investigation in a more efficient manner than a single reporter. A recent example of network journalism that I was a part of was NewAssignment.Net’s OffTheBus project, where we gathered a group of 30-40 people to cover the CNN/YouTube Debates (The previous link describes that example of network journalism — and here is some media commentary on that just for fun).

Right now I don’t think “network journalism” has reached its full potential, but I am hopeful and ambitious.

“Open source journalism”: Okay, now we are getting into complicated territory, because open source is itself an umbrella term outside of journalism that is often misunderstood. First, open source journalism presupposes a network of people — multiple points (sources) of information. Like network journalism, open source projects are collaborative by nature. But open source journalism adds two more nuances to network journalism. Either (a: the re-release of stories or (b: sharing information among competitors (the second has amazing potential, but I don’t expect it to happen anytime soon).

At this moment, 61,199 members have joined the group – http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=219739857206&ref=mf

This group was formed to condemn the behaviour of a lone numbskull who has just dragged Nigeria’s already sodden image more into the mud. Folks, this is not a group to speak about religion…we are talking about someone who is either mad, or a moron….and has put a BIG QUESTION MARK on d sanity or sincerity of purpose of 150 million pple who are already sick of other name-callings. Period!

The lyrics of popular FELA ANIKULAPO KUTI hit: Sorrow Tears and Blood aptly sums up the real Nigerian’s Attitude to life:
”i no want die
i no want quench
mama dey for house
papa dey for house
i want enjoy….’

This song, done in Nigerian pidgin english sums up thus: Our people (regardless of religion, geography or culture) DO NOT WANT TO DIE, THEY WANT TO ENJOY.Even our petty miscreants run away from the crime scene and prefer to enjoy their loot in (at least) hideaways.

For 50 long years of independence, this action has been unheard of, unseen in Nigeria or even outside Nigeria by a TYPICAL NIGERIAN even if he/she was brought up outside its shores.

That VALUE FOR LIFE IS OUR TRADEMARK. Every parent instils it in their wards as can be seen by the REPORT MADE BY HIS VERY RESONSIBLE FATHER to the US Consulate in Nigeria.

This is not about a north, south,east or west thing. This is not about religion. It is about a long held traditional attribute of Nigerians: perseverance and love of life, broken by this unfortunate incident. We are chagrined by such misbehaviour DURING a long-sought RE-BRANDING PROCESS.

We therefore use this medium to let the world know: the REAL NIGERIAN LOVES LIFE!

I haven’t read much critiques of internet activism/protest – and here’s a good article to consider.

Yet even if the internet doesn’t always bring people out onto the streets, its adherents have another, subtler argument. For democracy to succeed, they say, you need civil movements to help make protests more intense, frequent and well-attended. A vibrant civil society can challenge those in power by documenting corruption or uncovering activities like the murder of political enemies. In democracies, this function is mostly performed by the media, NGOs or opposition parties. In authoritarian states—or so the story goes—it is largely up to lone individuals, who often get locked up as a result. Yet if citizens can form ad-hoc groups, gain access to unbiased information and connect with each other, challenges to the state become more likely. And social theorists like Robert Putnam argue that the emergence of such groups increases social capital and trust among citizens.

Also, worth keeping track of a story by Victoria Police sharing information with corporations about protestors.

I am not so sure. The dull blog format work because as users we are relatively dull – I reckon. Consistency helps find information, or evaluate whether we want to read past the first sentence.

Formatting a blog like a magazine, where potentially every post has a different look and feel is nice, and in some cases, appropriate – but I still think we are a lean-forward state when it comes to online experiencing. The content overrides the design – still… But yes – it may change soon. Definitely though, design acts as a differentiator – and maybe that’s where the blogazine model will succeed.

For more: http://www.smashingmagazine.com/the-death-of-the-blog-post/

Time for the macro post to shine
Longer blog posts with valuable content might not get the recognition they deserve, because the 140-character mindset turns people off of reading several pages of text. One way to combat this and make your content more appealing is by creatively altering the layout, using the blogazine technique.

After googling and searching facebook for about 5 minutes, I can’t seem to locate the actual facebook that is meant to have thousands of supporters… It’s interesting that none of the stories I have read on mainstream media’s websites references the actual facebook location.

See also: The Facebook Page (when I find it)

via The Age Online (AFP Story)

THOUSANDS have taken to the internet to castigate Saudi authorities in a rare burst of open outrage after floods killed more than 100 people in the Red Sea port of Jeddah.

The toll jumped to 103 from Wednesday’s floods after authorities discovered more bodies, al-Arabiya television reported at the weekend.

Human rights lawyer Walid Abu al-Khair said families of victims were supporting a lawsuit that he has launched against the city of Jeddah.

It will allege widespread mismanagement of city works construction by the Jeddah government as a principal cause for the flooding.

”They didn’t make the drainage work. They have told us for three years or more that it has been completed,” he said. ”Even people from the city government said there were mistakes.”

Mr Walid said he planned to file his lawsuit this week, when government offices and courts reopen after the two-week Eid holiday.

A huge rainstorm sparked the flash floods, with many victims caught in their cars and drowning in two metres or more of water.

With public protests banned in Saudi Arabia, Jeddah residents have taken to the internet to attack the government.

More than 11,000 people joined a Facebook page created three days ago to complain about the floods, saying that the municipal government and contractors were at fault for not building adequate infrastructure.

and via Hassna’a Mokhtar | Arab News

Saudi Facebook group vents anger over flood

JEDDAH: Following Wednesday’s devastating floods in Jeddah, which left a trail of death and destruction, there is growing anger among residents at the state of the city’s infrastructure. Some are even threatening to sue the municipality for damages, claiming the flash flooding was a direct result of municipal negligence. A group calling itself the “National Campaign to Save the City of Jeddah” has established an Arabic-language Facebook profile calling for action to ensure the city is never flooded again. Thousands have rushed to join the group since it was set up on Thursday. By 5 p.m. on Friday, 6,191 Facebook users had joined the group. Thirty minutes later, 153 more people had joined. “What we witnessed made it clear beyond any doubt that the city of Jeddah is in urgent need to be saved,” the group said on its page. They have called for a national emergency plan to protect it. The group published nearly 200 photos and numerous videos of the devastation. The group creators said that, contrary to belief, Jeddah residents do not enjoy it when it rains “because of all the damages that happen due to a poor drainage system and poor road planning and infrastructure.” According to a local e-newspaper, the campaign’s supervisor, Riyadh Al-Zahrani, said that the group was created to unite the efforts of people and organize volunteers to provide assistance and highlight the seriousness of the situation. “People want to write a petition and send it to the governor. They want to express their feelings about the municipality. It has been shown now that it has no integrity,” Al-Zahrani was quoted as saying. The King Abdullah Road underpass that was built less than four years ago was completely submerged. “Where is the drainage system? What was the vision of those who designed this project?” asked Al-Zahrani. Lawyer Waleed Abu Alkhair, one of the campaign’s participants, said that everyone who has been involved in this chaos must be sued. “We’ll do our best to take this to the Court of Grievances. We’ll ask for compensation to those who suffered losses and damages. That’s the least they should get,” said Alkhair. Mufleh Al-Qahtani, chairman of the National Society for Human Rights, was reported as saying that victims of the floods have every right to file cases in the Court of Grievances against government bodies.

NielsenWire’s A Pocket Guide to Social Media and Kids looks at how kids are using social media.

SUMMARY: When is a phone not a phone? In the hands of children and tweens, today’s cell phones are primarily used as text messaging devices, cameras, gaming consoles, video viewers, MP3 players, and incidentally, as mobile phones via the speaker capability so their friends can chime in on the call. Parents are getting dialed in to the social media phenomenon and beginning to understand—and limit—how children use new media.

Check out the full article.

Trendwatching predicts embedded generosity will be big in 2010…. Here’s what they say:

It was big in 2009, and it will be even bigger in 2010. In particular all things EMBEDDED GENEROSITY. It incorporates all giving initiatives that make giving and donating painless, if not automatic (after all, pragmatism is the religion .
On top of that, with collaboration being such an integral part of the zeitgeist, expect lots of innovative corporate giving schemes that involve customers by letting them co-donate and/or co-decide.

So check out these innovative, corporate EMBEDDED GENEROSITY examples that are worth copying or improving on in 2010:

• Australian Baby Teresa manufactures and sells a variety of 100% cotton onesies for babies, and, for each one purchased, donates another to a baby in need somewhere in the world.
• IKEA’s SUNNAN LED desk lamp is powered by solar cells. The product retails for USD 19.99, and for every unit sold in IKEA stores worldwide, another one will be donated to UNICEF to give to children without electricity in refugee camps and villages in remote areas.
• Still going strong, Procter & Gamble and UNICEF have joined forces for the fourth year running, in an effort to raise money for tetanus vaccines. Each time a pack of the Pampers or Fairy brands bearing a “1 Pack = 1 Life-Saving Vaccine” logo is purchased, P&G will donate the cost of one vaccine to UNICEF.
• TOMS Shoes donates a pair of shoes to a child in need for every pair they sell online. As of August 2009, TOMS has given over 150,000 pairs of shoes to children in need. TOMS shoes plans to give 1 million shoes by 2012.
• Sage Hospitality is encouraging consumers to complete 8 hours of volunteer service in exchange for 50% – 100% off published room rates in their 52 hotels. To take advantage of the ‘Give a Day, Get a Night’ scheme, customers must present a letter from the organization they worked for.
• Give a Day, Get a Disney Day aims to celebrate and inspire volunteerism. Disney is working with HandsOn Network to highlight a variety of volunteer opportunities with participating organizations across the United States, Puerto Rico and Canada. Starting in January 2010, those who contribute their time can have it verified by HandsOn and they’ll receive a voucher from Disney for one day admission to a Walt Disney World or Disneyland theme park.
• Servus, a Canadian credit union, began handing out CDN 200,000 in ten-dollar bills, giving 20,000 people the opportunity to create a Feel Good Ripple by spending the money on someone else. By pledging CDN 200,00 to the effort, the company hopes to start a ‘ kindness movement’ that will positively affect at least 20,000 people. Servus is distributing the bills through its branches throughout Alberta, and asking participants to write up stories of their kindness online.
• Campbell’s Help Grow Your Soup campaign aims to raise money to maintain farm buildings in need of refurbishment. The campaign asks consumers to vote for one of ten barns in need of work, and for every vote until January 2010, 1 USD will be donated, (up to USD 250,000) to restore the five barns which receive the most votes.
• In October 2009, Twitter’s owners announced that they will begin selling wine through their label, called Fledgling Wine. The wine will be bottled from August 2010 and USD 5 of every bottle sold will go to Room to Read, a charity that organizes literacy programs for children around the world.
• Chicago’s Hotel Burnham launched the charity based initiative ‘Casual Blue’ in 2009. A USD 10 room credit is given to patrons who leave a pair of (old) jeans, which are then donated to local charities.

Also, worth checking out the Generation G write up:

GENERATION G | “Captures the growing importance of ‘generosity’ as a leading societal and business mindset. As consumers are disgusted with greed and its current dire consequences for the economy—and while that same upheaval has them longing more than ever for institutions that care—the need for more generosity beautifully coincides with the ongoing (and pre-recession) emergence of an online-fueled culture of individuals who share, give, engage, create and collaborate in large numbers.

In fact, for many, sharing a passion and receiving recognition have replaced ‘taking’ as the new status symbol. Businesses should follow this societal/behavioral shift, however much it may oppose their decades-old devotion to me, myself and I.”

via CBSNEWS

New features include user-generated lists to follow tweets from many originators on a particular subject, and geographical location datelines to show where tweets are coming from. Twitter is working on several things which will help give the network more credibility as an information source.

Full Article – October 2nd:

(CBS) The co-founder of Twitter unveiled new innovations on the horizon for the popular social networking site, including user-generated lists to follow tweets from many originators on a particular subject, and geographical location datelines to show where tweets are coming from.

Evan Williams, a Silicon Valley entrepreneur who co-founded Twitter, also said Twitter is working on a reputation validating system to address isues of credibility for the site. Twitter became a major newsmaker this year when Iranians sent tweets about the brutal Iranian government crackdown on protesters.

Williams said the role Twitter played in showing the world what the Iranian government was doing was “clearly gratifying.”

But he said he understood the concerns of news media in how to handle such information, which is essentially unverified and reported by anonymous entities.

“It demonstratied a potential we thought was there … having worked on technologies that allow people to publish more information freely, I believe, is a good thing … but it also says to me ‘Wow,’ we have so much more to do.”

Williams said Twitter is working on several things which will help give the network more credibility as an information source. For example, tweets will soon have an option that shows the location from where they’re coming.

“If a tweet is coming out of Iran on a mobile phone, there are still ways to fake that,” he said, but noted that a geographical location would screen out a lot of fakers.

The network is also working on a reputation system, based on ratings from other users.

“We are working on reputation systems … You may not know someone is trustworthy, but other people who are trustworthy trust them.”

One of the challenges, he said, is the balance between anonymity — anyone can create a twitter account — and reliability. He noted that anonymity was key to the Iranians posting images and news of the government crackdown.

“Anonymity was a key thing for the people there … How do you have anonymmity and trust … that is a key thing,” he said.

Williams was the opening speaker Friday at the annual convention of the Online News Association. He waffled on the omnipresent question about how Twitter, which is financed by venture capitalists, intends to make money.

“We’re focused on building the value for awhile,” he said. “When it comes to prioritization, we value the things that best secure twitter and the things twitter does best.”

One new innovation to be unveiled in the short term is lists, a feature that will make it easier for Twitter users to group — and share with others — the people they are following. A user could have separate lists they’re following, personal friends, sports figures, celebrities, and share these groups with others.

Searchability and organization of tweets is a key goal in the short term, Williams said.

“It’s been one of the biggest issues of Twitter, you know stuff is going on in there, but where is it?”

Williams, who noted that he had worked on a half-dozen technology start-ups before Twitter, was asked for tips about entrepreneurship.

“One thing we try to keep in mind, is assume we don’t know what will happen and therefore not get too clever about what we’re doing … things don’t happen as you think they will on the Web.”

He also shared the origin of the name. Williams said he and his partners were first sending their tweets via cellphones that would vibrate, which made them think of twitch … and then twitter was right below that in the dictionary.

“Twitch didn’t have the most positive connotation. … Twitter had the connotation of birds talking. I don’t know who started calling them tweets. At first we thought that’s not right, but then we embraced it.”