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Tuesday, 29 December 2009

2009 Social Media Year in Review YouTube

Great cartoon summary of some of 2009's social media headlines.

Thursday, 03 December 2009

Week 10 - Question of the Week

The question of the week is to talk about what we learned in this weeks presentation. This week's presentation was on mobile technology and presented by our resident mobile guru, Nick.

The key points from Nicks slides and the reading were:

1) Mobile technology is a democratizing technology due to the low costs and ease of adoption.

This fact wasn't much of a surprise to me. I had actually written my paper for Strategy on mobile technology and the number of people in lower income families and less developed countries who have mobile phones was staggering. It has definitely become a great leveler for them to conduct their business and provide them with a communication tool wherever they go.

2) Text messaging is bigger than instant messaging.

At first this fact surprised me, but after some thought it does make sense. Since more people have mobile phones than computers, it should follow that texting is more prevelant.

3) Develop for one platform.

Now this was probably the biggest insight for me. Since we at work had been discussing a mobile strategy and what we should be doing, our first thought was to be developing for the lowest common denominator. But what Nick said was we really should just pick a technology and develop around that. Why should the people who have fancier phones suffer because some don't have phones that don't render as well.

Other thoughts...
The mobile internet has really taken off recently with much better web browsing on devices such as the iPhone, Blackberry Storm, Palm Pre, ... One big distinction made in class was the different between mobile internet and mobile social software (MoSoSo). Much of what we really do now a days is really just sites transposed to the internet. Only a few new applications really stand out and of those, the most popular are location based services. I think the best example I've seen so far of location based services was during Nuit Blanche this year in Toronto. Rather than handing out pamphlets, those with iPhones could snap a photo of an exhibit at a designated spot and the phone would then receive the information about the installation.

On a final note, I found it interesting how anti-social we have gotten with our mobile devices, a point that Nick pointed out. I remember when I was a kid and our family used to go for dim-sum and my dad would sit there reading his newspaper rather than chatting with my mom, brother and I. I thought it completely rude. But how many of us with our mobile devices now do the same...at lunch, in the elevator, on transit, on the road, ... Something to think about!

Saturday, 21 November 2009

Red Velvet Cupcakes & 채동하 (Chae Dong Ha)

Food is always one of those things that is can bring people together. While I often bake and bring dessert to bring family and friends together, it's not often that I get to have a friend come over to bake together.

So it was really nice that my friend and co-worker Marisa came over to share a bottle of wine together while I tried another recipe from the Martha Stewart Cupcake cookbook. A particular favourite of mine is the Red Velvet cake. My first experience in making Red Velvet cake was way back in 2004 when I made it for my dear friend Minda's birthday.

As I had promised to bring cupcakes to my classmates, I thought it would be a good chance to try out this recipe since I am planning to make it for my upcoming family housewarming party.

The cupcakes turned out extremely moist (given the 1 1/2 cups of oil!) and the cream cheese frosting was a breeze to make and delicious. Now despite the fact that there was tons of oil in it, I have to say that the recipe did make about 40 mini cupcakes and a 6" cake. I ended up bringing the cake to my grandfather and he really enjoyed it. He told me he wants one every week when I visit his for dinner.

On a different note, Chae Dong Ha, the former lead singer of my favourite Korean band, SG Wannabe, finally released his solo album, Essay. The album is definitely not much of a departure from his days from SG Wannabe which is probably why I'm really into the album. A lot of ballads and a bit of a rocker side towards the end of the album. One of my favourite parts of the album is the intro which is a compilation of piano versions of some of his hits with SG Wannabe and at the end he simply says "고마워" or "Thank You" as a little tribute to his former band mates. Very sweet. Here's my favourite song on the album so far, 너라서 사랑해 (I Love You Because It's You). Enjoy.

Saturday, 14 November 2009

Week 9 - Question of the Week

Okay so the order of the lectures has been switched around and therefore Week 8's question of the week will in fact be next week. Week 9's topic is Web 2.0 and Internal Communication which also happened to be my turn to present. I really enjoyed giving the presentation this week as it seemed much more two-way than other presentations given so far. If any of you from class are reading my entry this week you'll find it a bit of a re-hash from Liz and my slide deck.
Why is knowledge management important? How can web 2.0 social media technologies facilitate knowledge management?
It is helpful to first define what knowledge management (KM) is. Knowledge management is "the systematic process of acquiring, creating, capturing, synthesizing, learning and using information, insights, and experiences to enable performance" (Ardichvili, 2002). If we think about this in the business context, how much information do each and every one of us old in our brains at work? How much of it is so valuable to our organization that huge costs would be needed to replicate it if we left? I know it's a sick thought but my boss always says, "We need that information written down so that if you get hit by a bus, we still have it"!. Looking at the definition, I think that most of us are good at acquiring, creating, synthesizing, learning and using information but the key is that most of us, myself included, are probably pretty bad at capturing that information.

Other then the fact that the proverbial wheel is often needed to be re-invented because people don't capture this information, another major reason why KM is important is because that it can help our organizations to create "long term sustainable competitive advantage" (Alavi & Leidner, 2001). If I think about some successful companies, how is it that they continue to be successful for so long? Google, Apple, and Microsoft to name just a few examples must employ KM well. It's not that their products are that different but how they deliver those products and what innovative new products around those core business that distinguish them. There were plenty of search engines before Google came along but what made Google so special?

Web 2.0 and social media is a growing new way for organizations to help capture and process some of the information and process it into knowledge. One interesting statistic is that as millenials start entering the workforce, they will actively seek jobs that use social media (Meister & Willyerd, 2009). It's easy to see why this would be the case. Since millenials are uber-connected and use social media so much in their personal lives, they are not only familiar with the technology but see it as an essential way of communicating.

In terms of facilitation, there are many types of social media that can help with KM. Blogs can assist organizations with providing updates to people rather than "spamming" them with emails. It's a complaint I've heard often from people. Stop sending me so many email updates. With a blog, rather than pushing the updates out to people, people can pull the information at their leisure. Microblogging is yet another form of social media that can increase KM. While Twitter is all about getting your message out to the public, Yammer is all about getting your message out but only to those within your organization. This can help to free flow ideas out and solicit quick feedback from the entire organization. A final example and probably the most well known is of course a wiki. Like Wikipedia, company wikis can be a fountain of information IF populated. And that is a big IF. It take a huge effort to input information into a wiki and often time people don't have that time. More importantly though, they often don't feel like they are the knowledge experts to put information in the first place.

The bottom line when it comes to social media or any technology you are thinking of bringing into your organization is to stop and take a moment to push aside all those bandwagon jumping thoughts. Yes, social media is exciting and it seems as everyone and their mother has a Twitter account and Facebook group but take a step back. Look at what your basic needs are, look at your culture and realistically look at your workforce to see whether a social media solution would meet your needs and whether those in your organization would embrace it.

References

Alavi, M. & Leidner, D.E. (2001). Review: Knowledge management and knowledge management systems: Conceptual foundations and research issues. MIS Quarterly, 25(1), pp.107-136.

Ardichvili, A. (2002). Knowledge Management, Human Resources Development and Internet Technology. Advances in Developing Human Resources 4(4) pp. 451-463.

Meister, J.C. & Willyerd, K. (2009, November 11). The Uber-Connected Organization: A Mandate for 2010. Retrieved November 11, 2009 from http://blogs.harvardbusiness.org/cs/2009/11/the_uberconnected_organization.html

Saturday, 31 October 2009

Week 7 - Question of the Week

First of all, Happy Halloween. As I sit here writing my thoughts on another "Question of the Week", the Twitterverse is lighting up with greetings of Happy Halloween and people sighing that its unfair that they are doing work on a Halloween. Well my dear classmates, hope you all get your studying during the day so that you can partake in festivities tonight. If any of you are heading to Church Street to take in the sights, I may very well see you.

Okay, so onto the question:
Are social technologies creating a shift towards a better functioning model of democratic involvement? Or is this just an illusion? Are web 2.0 technologies being used for surveillance, public participation, or some mixture of both those things? How can governments best leverage web 2.0 technologies to meet their communities?
Wow, so we got a pretty hefty question this week. While at first I wasn't too enthused to write about this topic, after completing the readings and giving it some thought, it actually gave me a lot of thoughts and inspiration for my term paper.

While completing the readings, I thought back to when I read The Assault on Reason by Al Gore. While I have since sold my copy of the book back luckily I was able to find an excerpt on Time magazines website. You can read it here. In the introduction to his book, Gore wrote that we "must resolve to repair the systemic decay of the public forum. We must create new ways to engage in a genuine and not manipulative conversation about our future" (Gore, 2007). It is interesting because he goes on to write that the "Internet has the potential to revitalize the role played by the people in our constitutional framework" (Gore, 2007). One short year later, Barrack Obama's win in the presidential election was partially attributed to his successful online campaign. In this campaign, it has been written that Obama successfully communicated with the online population to create a dialogue (Self, 2009).

While much discussion has been made on last years US presidential election, let me say that I was not one of those people who followed this campaign closely. Therefore, let me bring the discussion back to a more personal level through the use of a personal example. My personal feeling is that the social technologies are creating a shift towards better functioning model of democratic involvement. About half a year ago, my community was about to have imposed on us the construction of a super bridge which would cut off access for citizens and local businesses to one of our made roads. Through the use of Facebook and email, our community was able to disseminate information, discuss pro and cons of the proposed bridge, share images of what it would have looked like and eventually organize a group to visit Queens Park to protest the bridge. In the end, we were able to stop the construction which would have in many of our eyes destroyed our community.

While this is only a particular example, it goes a long way to prove that social networks have assisted in giving citizens a public forum to voice their opinions. Of course, there are some drawbacks to the use of online forums. Namely the anonymity of participants can draw out slanderous comments and childish behaviour. As well, with the ever present privacy concerns of the internet, it could pose a risk for persons for exposure to personal attacks, especially if their opinions are more extreme. During the vote on Proposition 8 in California during the last election, certain websites were targeted using Denial of Service attacks to take them down (Christina, 2008). Therefore, this brings in the question of surveillance of the online public forum. With the recent announcement that the CIA in the US has purchased a stake in a company which monitors blogs and tweets how does this affect the every day citizen in what they blog or tweet? Will it make this new public forum more restricted for fear of reprisal?

Another drawback to the online community is just the huge volume of discussion. In my example, the use of Facebook was successful because it was one medium that was used by all. But as a government how can they manage all this input? This is a question posited by Beaverly and Ulma in their article "Citizen Involvement in The Digital Age. The Public Manager". In it they state that " local governments need modern ways to manage public input" (Beaverley & Ulma, 2008).

Therefore, my final point is that web 2.0 usage in government and as an online public forum is still an emerging topic. Through small and coordinated activities such as the one in my example governments will learn the benefits of web 2.0. I believe that governments will be required to build into their websites a social networking aspect to have an official point of discussion. However with the growing number of other social networking sites, technologies that search these sites for particular mentions of issues will also become important so that governments may monitor what issues are brewing and what the public is saying.

References

Bevarly, Dan, & Ulma, Jeffery G. (2008). Citizen Involvement in The Digital Age. The Public Manager. December 22, 2007, Volume 36, Issue 4. Source: http://thepublicmanager.org/cs/blogs/featured/archive/2008/06/13/citizen-involvement-in-the-digital-age.aspx

Christina, A. (2008, October 30). No on Prop 8 Website Under Attack. Message posted to http://gretachristina.typepad.com/greta_christinas_weblog/2008/10/no-on-prop-8-website-under-attack.html

Gore, A. (2007). Book Expert: The Assault on Reason. Retrieved October 31, 2009 from http://www.time.com/time/printout/0,8816,1622015,00.html

Self, B. (2009, February 12). The Secret's of Obama's Success. Retrieved October 31, 2009 from http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2009/02/12/2489302.htm