I notice that there are people who others believe they have to follow and respond to. Chris Brogan, for example. If you are a wannabe in the new space not only to you follow Chris, you RT everything he says and comment on his posts. I’m a fan of Chris, so not criticizing him, but rather some of the lemmings who are hanging on his every word. Then there are some really really smart people who have a fraction of the followers, get a sliver of comments, but are actually saying really smart things. Guess I’m actually moving off topic here. Sorry.

Anyway, back to the original thought. I gave a talk that had stories, points, examples and predictions. In the hour during and afterward there were maybe 800 posts on Twitter. A glance at what got repeated or quoted vs what didn’t offered at least some sense of what resonated. If we live in an age of soundbites (sad, but true) then it’s somewhat important that we get good at them. Twitter comments can help. Yes?

Ironically much of social media’s appeal is its *lack* of feedback. We can write what we want on Twitter and think 2,000 people are listening, when really most aren’t tuned in. We can post whatever we want on blogs with no censor. We can upload videos and hope they go viral, while most won’t.

The very liberation that drives user generation of content is a result of the removal of normal feedback filters: bosses or editors can’t say your work isn’t good enough. We no longer risk failure, so we produce more. We take greater chances because no one can now stop us.

So maybe instant feedback isn’t always such a good thing. By all means, tweet about my speech, but I’m not certain I want to read the results.
.-= Ben Kunz´s last blog ..Sometimes it makes sense to ignore your customers =-.

I am thinking of the days when news journalists RAN out of a press conference to call in the latest scoop. Also thinking about how women were given credit for their multi-tasking skills when going back to work while also continuing to take on most of the responsibilities for caring for a family. A bright thought…maybe these new devices have trained men to be as agile as women and family life can be balanced (as we see it becoming more and more) between women and men.

The quest to be the “first one” to post what has just been seen or heard is exhausting…I can see that there will be those who are the first in line at the gate/tweeting and those who will sit back and look forward to creating a reflection/website or blog on what has been tweeted.

Such an interesting time to be at the elder end of the game.

melinda

Re your pt about instant feedback, I agree that there is value in getting it.

However, the thing about instant reaction is that it is just that. I can remember seeing speakers and disliking or disagreeing with what they said at the time they said it. Subsequently however, with time to reflect my impressions changed. Time provides perspective.

For this reason it is important to take real-time/instant reaction with a grain of salt.
.-= Jackson Wightman´s last blog ..Spreading bad ideas =-.