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Social media and the shift of trust from institutions into processes

This is actually chapter 6 from my book.  I have put it here in order to liberate it from a restrictive means of distribution – so it can operate effectively in the social digital space. The liberation of content from a restrictive means of distribution is, of course, what the social media revolution is all about. Apologies therefore for its reference to other chapters and concepts not similarly liberated (unless you wish to buy the book of course).

Back in chapter two I mentioned that I think one of the most profound changes that the world of social media is heralding is a shift of trust from institutions into processes. The reason this is so important is that trust (and its close cousin influence) is the single most important commodity upon which all societies are built.

We live in a society where trust lives in institutions. We trust banks to look after our money, because there isn’t another way to create the bonds of trust necessary to conduct financial transactions at any form of scale (insert your own joke about trust and bankers here). We trust the media to present to us a representation of the truth (insert your own joke about…). We also trust governments… (say no more). We are, perhaps co-incidentally, at the moment suffering a reversal in our trust of institutions but perhaps this may be more than just co-incidental. Part of the reason may be that we are starting to see other ways to scale the creation of trust, that don’t rely on its management within institutions. There is nothing like a bit of competition to create dissatisfaction with the established order. Continue reading →

Thongs on the internet: the next big internet thing

FireShot Screen Capture #259 - 'Buy Internet Thongs & G-Strings I Personalised I - CafePress UK' - www_cafepress_co_uk_+internet+underwear-panties_cat=100115Around this time last year I was asked by Savas Onemli, the editor of Digital Age in Turkey, what I thought the big thing in 2013 was going to be.  I said Big Data.  Phew!  So recently I was asking myself the question, what might be the big thing of 2014.  I think Big Data is still going to be pretty big, but I think the new thing we will be talking about (which is closely linked to Big Data) is The Internet of Things.

I have just got back from Brussels where I was taking part in a panel discussion on Big Data at the annual get together of the European Association of Communications Agencies (EACA).  One of the issues I raised was that the amount of data out there was about to explode on account of the fact that things, not just people, were now becoming connected to it.  In the Big Data context I called this ‘the kettles that spy on your life’ – for this, essentially, is what happens when we connect things to the internet: they become spies, either on your  life specifically or on life in general.

I was first introduced to this idea about 18 months ago when I saw a presentation by Andy Hobsbawn at the Social Media Influence conference.  Andy was an enthusiastic supporter of the idea and one of the possibilities he suggested was what might happen when jeans, or other items of clothing, acquire an internet identity.  As soon as he said this the thought that flashed into my mind, however, was not ‘how intriguing’, it was ‘oh, my God’.  The whole thing seemed to be a terrifying prospect, not just the ability of these things to become spies but also the multiplicity of issues that might emerge when we start to give things independent identities and personalities that interact with our own.  Does this mean we will have to start giving things rights for example?  We are having enough difficulties dealing with issues like our own rights to privacy and data protection in relation to Big Data as it is (one of the issues also discussed at the EACA event), let alone dealing with our items of clothing – underwear, data and privacy: welcome to the Internet of Thongs.

Joking aside, the fact that things will join us on the internet as producers and quite possibly consumers of data clearly re-inforces what I already believe, which is that we are not going to solve this privacy and data protection thing by looking at initial sources of the data, because otherwise we will end up giving rights to our underwear and asking its consent.  The answer has to lie in controlling how data is used, not by controlling the way in which it is sourced.

However, the reason I now know this will be the Big Thing of 2014 is that I have just heard a piece on it on the BBC’s World at One programme.  It was approached in the same way the BBC and Radio 4 always approach these things which is to damn it with frivolity.  “Goodness me, a rubbish bin connected to the internet, whatever will these (silly) people think of next” was the general tone of the piece.  “Goodness me, a computer that everyone can own, whatever will these (silly) people think of next”.  Whenever the BBC (in fact traditional mainstream media in general) doles out this sort of treatment – you can be sure they are talking about the next big thing.

 

 

The BBC Culture Show, YouTube and the future of TV

FireShot Screen Capture #248 - 'BBC iPlayer - The Culture Show_ 2013_2014_ YouTube - The Future of TV_' - www_bbc_co_uk_iplayer_episode_b039r4s9_The_Culture_Show_2013_2014_YouTube_The_Future_of_TVI have just watched the latest programme of the BBC’s The Culture Show.  It looked at the phenomena that is young people creating ‘programmes’ on YouTube that are attracting audiences as large as those associated with conventional TV programming.  It therefore posited the question “Is YouTube the future of TV?”

On one level it was an interesting and well produced programme – but on another it was naive and deeply flawed, exposing the familiar inability of traditional media to understand social media.

The first flaw was the idea that social media only starts to become serious when it produces something that looks like traditional media.  The artists and programmes featured may well be generating large audiences, but they none-the-less represent only a tiny fragment of the content or usage of the platform that is YouTube.  It is of course this other usage of the platform, that The Culture Show did not feature, which is having by far and away the greater cultural, social and economic impact.  But because this didn’t look like TV, it was ignored.  This is a usage, incidentally, which YouTube itself is also ignoring, because you can’t easily grow advertising dollars within it. Continue reading →

Big data: turning hay into needles

Here is a quick riff on an analogy.  Small data analysis is all about looking for needles in haystacks.  Big data analysis is all about turning hay into needles (or rather turning hay into something that achieves what it is we used needles to do).

Being more specific.  Small data analysis (i.e. the only form of data analysis we have had to date) was a reductive process – like everything else in the world where the data and information channels were likewise restrictive, largely as a result of their cost of deployment.  Traditional marketing, for example, is the art of the reduction – squeezing whole brand stories into 30 second segments in order to utilise the expensive distribution channel of TV.  Academic analysis likewise – squeezing knowledge through the limited distribution vessel that is either an academic or a peer-reviewed publication.

As a result the process of data analysis was all about discarding data that was not seen to be either relevant or accurate enough, or reducing the amount of data analysed via sampling and statistical analysis.  The conventional wisdom was that if you put poor quality data into a (small) data analysis box – you got poor quality results out at the other end.  Sourcing small amounts of highly accurate and relevant data was the name of the game.  All of scientific investigation has been based on this approach.

Not so now with big data.  We are just starting to realise that a funny thing happens to data when you can get enough of it and can push it through analytical black boxes designed to handle quantity (algorithms).  At a certain point, the volume of the data transcends the accuracy of the individual component parts in terms of producing a reliable result.  It is a bit like a compass bearing (to shift analogies for a moment).  A single bearing will produce a fix on something along one dimension.  Take another bearing and you can get a fix in two dimensions, take a third and you can get a fix in all three dimensions.  However, any small inaccuracy in your measurement can produce a big inaccuracy in your ability to get a precise fix.  However, suppose you have 10,000 bearings.  Or rather can produce a grid of 10,000 bearings, or a succession of overlapping grids, each comprised of millions of bearings.  In this situation it is the density of the grid, the volume of the data and, interestingly, often the variance (or inaccuracies) within the data that is the prime determinant of your ability to get an accurate fix.

To return to haystacks, it is the hay itself which becomes important – and rather than looking for needles within it it is a bit like looking into a haystack and finding an already stitched together suit of clothes.This is why big data is such an important thing – and also why a big data approach is fundamentally different to what we can now call small data analysis.  It is also why there is now no such thing as inconsequential information (i.e. hay) – every bit of it now has a use provided you can capture it and run it through an appropriate tailoring algorithm.

Note to marketing department: there are no audiences in social media

audience(Here is my column for publication in this month’s Digital Age).

Organisations only start to create measurable value from the usage of social media when the senior management of those organisations really understand what social media is all about.  Unfortunately, the journey towards this understanding is often a long and difficult one.

The first mistake senior management usually make is to assume that social media must fall somewhere within the remit of the marketing or communications department.  This is an easy mistake to make because this thing is called social ‘media’ and media is something that marketing people are paid to understand.  Marketing people themselves are usually keen to assume responsibility because it seems to present opportunities to create this thing called engagement with their customers which sounds good.  They will also find that the agencies they deal with are already knocking on their doors trying to sell them social media solutions and they are not knocking on the doors of any other departments.  Therefore having the marketing department take responsibility for social media seems such a logical decision that it barely generates any consideration at all.

However, there is a fatal flaw in setting off in this direction.

Marketing depends for its success on the identification or creation of an audience. Continue reading →

I am an anti-social-media expert

I am an anti-social-media expert according to Steve Henry (one of the founding ‘H’s in HHCL – voted Campaign magazine’s ‘Agency of the Decade’ in 2000).  I quite like this.  I think the key lies in the punctuation (as in eats, shoots and leaves) in that the hyphens imply that I am anti social media experts as distinct from an antisocial expert.  Although Steve’s description of me as someone who – mentally – is a drinker in flat-roofed pubs that welcome Rotweiler owners, leaves room for plenty of ambiguity.  (Key in that one is the word ‘mentally’ I believe).

But I guess you only have to look at some of my recent posts to see plenty of push-back against the establishment of social media folk who – mentally – drink in the child-friendly gastro pubs.  Socially, of course, I go for child-friendly gastro so perhaps Brian Solis has a Rotweiller and a pair of Doc Martens in the cupboard.

What is the E=MC² of social media?

To continue the theme of simplicity.  I like analogies and stories.  Here is one about simplicity and the need to shift from observation to explanation.  Before Einstein, physics appeared to be a complicated business and there were lots of people running around describing this complexity.  Then Einstein came along and said “you may see complexity, but what I see is E=MC²”.  This is probably the greatest piece of simplicity the world has ever seen.  Even I can understand that formula and yet it has the power to the explain the way universe works.

It didn’t necessarily make physics itself easier, but it provided a framework for understanding it and building practical applications.  We need something similar in social media.  We have plenty of people running around describing what is happening, but not enough people trying to explain why it is happening.  We need to find the E=MC² of social media.

My attempt at it is this.  The social media revolution is all about the liberation of information from restrictive means of distribution.

That is it.  The medium is no longer the message, the message can be itself, freed from the requirement to shape itself to the channels (networks, platforms etc) it has to sit within.  The implication of this for communications is the we are likewise liberated from the need to talk to audiences.  The implications of this for society in general is that trust has been liberated from institutions and can now live within transparent processes.  Information can be trusted on its own account, rather than via trust vested in the channel or institution from which comes.  After all, what is Twitter?  It is not an institution, it is a process, Wikipedia likewise.

Unfortunately, we all remain channel or institution fixated, because that is the way we have always done things, or because we have a commercial interest in a particular channel or institution.  Or because to embrace the implications of this shift is to accept that the world is going to change.

Article on Big Data in Sunday Telegraph’s Business Technology supplement

FireShot Screen Capture #242 - 'Richard Stacy_ The algorithm is the most powerful tool of social control since the sword - Business Technology' - biztechreport_co_uk_2013_07_richard-stacy-the-algorithm-is-most-powerfHere is a small article on Big Data I wrote as the opening shot in the Business Technology supplement published yesterday in the Sunday Telegraph.

Big Data is certainly a big buzzword, but there are those out there who say Big Data is nothing really new.  As a rule I find these people have careers based on what we can now call small data (or perhaps that should be Small Data).  Big Data certainly is something new, and there are two reasons why it is aptly named.

First, Big Data is really big.  It is not just a bit larger than the data we had before, nor is it just lots more of small data.  Big Data is defined by the fact that it is so large, it cannot be handled by the tools or techniques conventionally associated with data analysis (one of the reasons its rubs small data people up the wrong way) and this also means we can use it to do things which were not possible when all we had was small data. Continue reading →

The latest croissant of absurdity from the SocialBakers

Every month I receive an email from measurement / metrics company SocialBakers alerting me to the latest  league table of performance for UK Facebook pages.  I usually avoid opening this email because it depresses me, perpetuating as it does, the view that Facebook activity and social media in general is a numbers game that is all about creating the maximum number of fans and this thing called engagement.  However, this month I took a look, just to see if things were changing.  They were not.  The part of the report that always depresses me the most, remained depressing.  I have shown it below. Continue reading →