Day: September 11, 2009

If you viewed Jon Snow’s talk you’ll know that he gave a fascinating insight into the changes that have taken place in the media over the past couple of decades.

Of course it continues apace.

I haven’t seen a lot of noise in the PR blogosphere on this, but I thought Facebook’s set up of TechCrunch was certainly unique.

So we’ve had our fun with Facebook over the years (Why We’re Suing Facebook For $25 Million In Statutory Damages, Republican PR Director Calls Facebook’s Randi Zuckerberg “totally full of sh*t”, Randi Threatens a Bar Bouncer). But in general these things are supposed to flow one way – we mess with them, they take it gracefully.

Today that changed. They punk’d us, and we fell for it. Hard.

Writer Jason Kincaid noticed a new link “Fax this photo” on his Facebook page.  So he contacted Facebook, got no reply and posted a story on the new “feature”. 

But here’s the catch… the “feature” only appeared to members of the TechCrunch network. 

It was a set up.

Jason then called Facebook PR. Jaime Schopflin took the call and, apparently, couldn’t stop laughing for five minutes. Between laughs while catching her breath she mentioned something about this being a joke, that nobody but us could see it, and that they were placing bets around the office on how long before we noticed it and posted. And something else about teaching us to contact them before posting.

It certainly is unique….

Update:

• Peter Himler post

If you viewed Jon Snow’s talk you’ll know that he gave a fascinating insight into the changes that have taken place in the media over the past couple of decades.

Of course it continues apace.

I haven’t seen a lot of noise in the PR blogosphere on this, but I thought Facebook’s set up of TechCrunch was certainly unique.

So we’ve had our fun with Facebook over the years (Why We’re Suing Facebook For $25 Million In Statutory Damages, Republican PR Director Calls Facebook’s Randi Zuckerberg “totally full of sh*t”, Randi Threatens a Bar Bouncer). But in general these things are supposed to flow one way – we mess with them, they take it gracefully.

Today that changed. They punk’d us, and we fell for it. Hard.

Writer Jason Kincaid noticed a new link “Fax this photo” on his Facebook page.  So he contacted Facebook, got no reply and posted a story on the new “feature”. 

But here’s the catch… the “feature” only appeared to members of the TechCrunch network. 

It was a set up.

Jason then called Facebook PR. Jaime Schopflin took the call and, apparently, couldn’t stop laughing for five minutes. Between laughs while catching her breath she mentioned something about this being a joke, that nobody but us could see it, and that they were placing bets around the office on how long before we noticed it and posted. And something else about teaching us to contact them before posting.

It certainly is unique….

Update:

• Peter Himler post

If you live in the UK and Ireland, you know Jon Snow, the popular UK journalist and broadcaster very well.

During a recent visit to Ireland, the Institute of International and European Affairs hosted Jon for a talk he gave on the impact of new media.

He discusses his start in the media business and just how much things have changed over the years, and it’s not just about social media!

He bases his talk on how the three Ps have changed:

• Process
• Product
• Profit

Recommended viewing regardless of your location.

Link courtesy of Piaras Kelly.

At the risk of appearing (to the digerati at any rate) as something resembling a father dancing at his teenager’s party, can I ask a question?

The question concerns the current online nom-de-jour: “lifestreaming”.  Now stop me if I’m wrong here – and it wouldn’t be the first time – but a Lifestream is just a blog with more stuff on it. 

Is that correct? 

I mean, seriously, all we’re talking about is a blog (or in 1990s parlance a “web site”) with content aggregated from a host of different sources such as Twitter or Friendfeed or whatever you are having yourself.

So in essence a lifestream is just a blog with more stuff, right? A blog. A blog with more stuff.

Maybe I’m missing something.

Sometimes I really am amazed at our continuing need to re-name things to make them sound like they are far more important than they are… this affliction is often most acute when it comes to social media.

I mean, this piece from Business Week on Gordon Bell (from Microsoft Research) is more how I think of a Lifestream.

In the meantime, I think we’d all be better advised to focus on understanding how social media can positively impact our business.

Maybe I’m getting old, then again I’ve eight or nine years before I mortify my son at his party.