Recently people have been surprised at my reticence to rave publicly on stage, in interview or over coffee about social media.
“But”, they cry, “you are so active on twitter”.
To my slight shame I did do an email interview with a kind lady from New York about the Internet, social media and democracy today – but that was because she was nice – not because I considered myself any kind of expert – I just put in my 2pth and I did point out that she should be talking to those with political science degrees who were also active online – rather than me.
I thought it might be easier if I just explain through a story why I feel the way I do.
The story
During the Easter holidays I took my children to Morocco on holiday. I didn’t book online as I had had a disastrous experience doing so previously; and anyway I have a friend who is a whizz travel agent and can always beat any online deal, she knows me and what I like and always comes up trumps. I called her, she emailed me the holiday choices, I emailed back my preference, pay online, get the e-tickets, check in online and we fly away.
Whilst in Morocco, I read books that I had bought on Amazon and go to hotel notice boards to choose the trips we might like to take. I check on my iphone to see whether these trips have been reviewed and find out which ones are the best value and most exciting and appropriate for the girls and I. Excursions chosen, with additional insight from others who have been on them before, I wait for a rep in reception at a designated time to book said trips, talk through in person what is involved, pay by card, and turn up at an agreed time to go on the selected adventure.
On the coach I meet a family who have children with similar ages to mine. Whilst the children bond over their DSs and Facebook stories, I talk to the parents: Rachel and Chris. It is through them that I discover a volcano has erupted (they knew from watching Sky News) and that our journey home might be affected. Having my iphone with me I check the BBC website and call out on twitter for updates.
The information and feedback I could find in a few minutes from twitter on that bus ride intrigued and amused Chris, who was aware of twitter, but not of its value. This triggered a discussion about the world I was involved in with government and digital engagement, that later (months later) leads to me helping him find a value in twitter, simply by monitoring what customers are saying about the brand he works for.
The children become firm friends over the course of the holiday and spend some time on Facebook on our respective smartphones – building new friendships through their own contacts and mates – introducing their friends to each other online as they discover more about their lives and realise connections or common interests, even as we are away. (They also spent 90% of the daylight hours in the pool shrieking with laughter and the occasional spat – whilst us adults snored on loungers with our books from Amazon and blue drinks from the pool bars).
My super travel agent lady, meanwhile, is texting me and emailing updates on what is happening, also following how happy/worried I am from my Facebook updates. Twitter and Facebook keep me sane: I can keep colleagues, friends and family updated on what is happening where we are, and roundly take the inevitable slacker jokes – and can even crowdsource an escape route should we need one.
When we get home, we swop all contact details with Rachel, Chris and family – including home, mobile, Facebook and twitter details. The children, unsurprisingly, are online to each other the minute they all get home and onto Broadband. I share a few texts with Rachel and Chris but we are Facebook friends, so I can see without interacting what fun they are having and vice versa.
We all decide that we should see each other again a few months after the holiday, and so organise over the phone when would be a good date. Thereafter, Facebook planning between the kids went into overdrive – with bemused interception from us grown-ups. Rachel, Chris and I only communicate by phone – but again, we talk about things that we have noted the other is doing from Facebook profiles – which is nice – not stalkery.
A great weekend is had, during which I taught Chris twitter and got him set up; Rachel was not interested but enjoyed seeing what we were discovering through twitter. But it was a balance, real life, windy beaches, lovely food, friendship and stories, yes – some of which were fuelled by Facebook knowledge and inevitable discussions about the value of twitter, sometimes.
A few weeks later and I am running Young Rewired State. Seeing as a centre is based in Norwich, not a million miles away from Rachel and Chris, I get in touch through email to see if I might stay with them for a night so that I can visit the Norwich centre – as well as catch up with them. Again, they knew all about Young Rewired State through Facebook – and the children were now even more close, so it was perfect.
That visit was awesome, and we had a lovely evening talking about real life things as well as events and happenings that we already knew about each other through the third party window of social media.
And so they were a great part of YRS, an extra bonus.
Since then I have been remiss in even looking at Facebook, or catching up with anyone to be honest. Tonight I was struck by a feeling that it was time to have a catch up with Rachel and Chris again. It was an automatic reaction for me to firstly swing by Facebook to see what they had all been up to before I got in touch; for a variety of reasons, mainly to check that they were about, to check that there was not anything dreadful going on that I might interrupt and also to show that I had actually taken notice of what they had chosen to share; it’s a natural etiquette for me now.
Tomorrow I will call Rachel – and confess I have written a blog post about them – and we can all organise the next meet (this will be at mine I think, my turn, Rachel and Chris, no?!)
Moral
So, you see, it is not any hatred of social media that makes me yawn when people start asking me to speak about it – it is just that it is such an interwoven part of my life now – and I wouldn’t expect to speak about my use of the telephone (which is dreadful) nor would I particularly like to try to unravel the value of social media. It is a part of life, it is the digital part – but hey, we are all part digital now, whether we like it or not.
Emma Mulqueeny 
Very well written. I’d like to add a whole load of smart-arse comments, but I can’t. Because you said it all there. Simply. It’s no great shakes; it’s just getting on with it.
Yes and even as I published it, I thought of a whole raft of other interactions around this holiday that I could have included in this blog post – but that would have been excessive 🙂 it’s life, and I am even a little bit embarrassed at having written this much about it!
The only comment I’d add – and I’m not alone – is that Twitter tends to be work-ish and FB tends to be personal-ish. So even there, slightly difft strands of social media for difft contexts…
Yes, I agree – but would you want to go up on stage and present for 15-20 minutes on that factoid? Or bother to write about it formerly? Or even have coffee with someone about that?
I think this is the least controversial thing I have ever read on the entire interwebs.
@Gordon 🙂 exactly! *sigh* you get the point. So you won’t find me at any social media conferences I am afraid
Wow, Morocco – we went a few years back before the kids were born, really liked it.
You do know that you have set a new standard by which social media stories will be told!!
I agree with your moral and as I sit here typing this comment on my iPhone, I can just smile and admire your excellent narrative.
:0)
Gosh Carl, am amazed you stayed awake through the telling 🙂 you made me laugh on twitter and here… yes, Morocco was fun!
From now on all stories about social media must be dull narratives – we will disrupt a movement – through boring them to death…
plan?
A few weeks ago I read a great book by @nancybaym (Personal Connections in the Digital Age). This post very closely describes the process of domestication: http://is.gd/eEopP
It was worth you writing!
Great! Couldn’t have said it better myself. One grammar correction from your horrible teacher mother! …. It would be: ‘…. which ones are the best, most interesting for the girls and me.’ (not I)
Subject is ‘girls’, object ‘me’) Only know this because I have a really fussy friend who is always correcting me!! (not I) Lovely story though, and beautifully, lightly told.
Thanks Mum *sigh* 😉
I know. Tragic isn’t it! social networking cannot save some people, they are so lame!!
Great post, Emma. I’ve been using the internet since I was 13 – that’s more than half my life – so it’s not that I’m an enthusiast, but rather a native. Online is just how I get things done. Sharing, collaborating and researching using the web is simply How I Do Stuff.
I do think there are too many pontificators on the subject of social media. The real experts aren’t just talking about it, but doing it – using the social web to get real, tangible and often brilliant stuff done.
Nice post. Yup – it’s just how it works now, although like Dave I do have many selves… Work/public and personal/private are still very different for me, and I have different profiles to match. I don’t like how FB and others try to drive people to unite everything, and I’m on a mission to find ways of keeping them seperate.
That’s a really good piece and maybe shows how far things have matured.
But, the but. But don’t forget, there is a larger raft of the population out there who aren’t digital natives.
I spend an inspiring hour with a community activist who helped organise a festival that 11,000 people came to. Very little of this interest came from his sole online activity – an infrequently updated blog.
“Ah, yes. Digital,” he said. “Don’t for get right now that’s for educated people.”
It’s about time you joined the exiled social-media-conference-circuit refugee club. Welcome aboard.
Nice post and as Gordon says above it’s completely uncontroversial ….if you’ve either done your time to learn what social media is about are web literate (& brave) enough to make the effort to learn. We can’t deny that there are still large pockets of communities out there who have yet to experience the flip of the digital mentality switch.
I’m not necessarily talking about those with issues of access but those who have avoided all things digital either out of fear/uncertainty or personal ideals. Much of the online engagement you mention would be anathema to a handful of local groups that I am working with at the moment.
So please spare a thought for the self-inflicted 😉
Like the post too, I like to think that social media could ‘quietly’ deliver the goods for those that are less confident with social media.
I guess, recently, I have only been meeting those whose job it is to make social media a massive tool for marketing/PR and have created big-wig services that makes (or maybe needs to make) social media look like a big scary monster to the average non-digital world business owner who is only just active on the professional email scene (for needing to serve the customer who is face-to-face), let alone twitter and others.
I have just introduced two young and wonderful people looking for work to linkedin, just like Emma with twitter for Chris, I hope it delivers for them too.
it’s always interesting how people all have a different take on things. Either your story could be a sign that all those people commenting on social media are now entirely redundant, in the same way debates on which would prevail, VHS or Betamax, now are, or alternatively that all such discussions on new technological developments and how they would or wouldnt change our lives always have been and always will be redundant – i.e. in not so modern parlance, that content is what matters [in this case the facts/story of what got communicated between whom is what is of interest, not how which in a past age would have celebrated the telephone rather than the tweet for exactly the same enhancement of connectivity].
I keep waiting for the day when [as predicted by an IT person i met a decade back] computing works, is boring and nobody even thinks about it, but meanwhile sci-fi, top gear, the gadgetshow, are just as much guilty pleasures for me as for anybody else 🙂
meanwhile, i can see this [& comments] being expanded into an online novella, perhaps titled ‘Not the secret diary of a social media mogul’?
ps what’s wrong with a good bit of controversy now and then?
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