Pearls Before Swine

Comic strip by Stephan Pastis, printed Nov. 16, 2008
Reprinted with permission from the artist.

A media professional's perspective

For added perspective on the uses of Facebook by non-colleagiates I reached out to Rory O’Connor, a fellow at the Shorenstein Center on the Press, Politics, & Public Policy at Harvard University. I learned about Mr. O’Connor from a recent Washington Post story on politics and social networks, in which he commented on how he and his peers are using Facebook.

Mr. O’Connor is the co-founder and president of the media firm Globalvision, and oversees the nonprofit media-watchdog site MediaChannel.org. He is the author of the recently published Shock Jocks: Hate Speech & Talk Radio and co-author of Nukespeak: The Selling of Nuclear Technology in America. A regular online columnist for AlterNet and MediaChannel, O'Connor also writes a blog called "Media Is a Plural." At the Shorenstein Center, he is researching trust, journalism and social networks.

Mr. O’Connor was gracious to respond to three questions I emailed to him about his perspective on Facebook.

Harry: From what you’ve seen, has Facebook had a substantial effect on politics? If so, is it more regional/national or local?

Rory: Absolutely it has. More than substantial, I would say the impact has been tectonic. As the just completed presidential campaign demonstrated, social media such as Facebook have begun to revolutionize politics and campaigning -—and perhaps governing will soon follow. In any event, Obama’s e-campaign will undoubtedly become the template that people study for the next 2-3 years as they prepare for 2012 and beyond. MyBarackObama.com, which was directly modeled on Facebook, was one underpinning of Obama’s success. Also one of Facebook’s founders, as I’m sure you are aware, played a key role in Obama’s Internet strategy and actions.

Harry: Are people past the age of college using Facebook for work? If so, how?

Rory: Yes of course —- people like me! Journalists, for example, are increasingly using social media to assist them in all sorts of ways. Jose Antonio Vargas, the author of the article you cited in the Washington Post, used it during the Virginia Tech shootings last year and it helped his team win a Pulitzer Prize! Jose also gives several examples in his article of people using social media for political work for both Obama and McCain.. And lots of others in various fields now are experimenting now with using different FB approaches and applications —- from targeted ads to promotion and marketing to forming groups, etc..

Harry: Is Facebook increasing _active_ social connections between those past the age of college? If yes, how?

Rory: Yes, Facebook offers what is called ‘bridging’ social capital -- networks of ties and connections that are looser but more extensive than those we have with family and close friends (i.e. ‘bonding’ social capital) FB has made it extraordinarily easy to form groups (due to its low ‘transactional cost’) and as a result -— now that the site has opened to all —- has greatly facilitated adults past college age in finding and connecting to ‘old’ friends and acquaintances they might have lost touch with in the past. As a result, it’s now easier than ever before to stay actively in touch with literally hundreds of people in a ‘loose, extensive’ network of social ties — something that was previously much more difficult.

Affiliations and applications

Weeks ago I wrote on this blog that, as some news reports indicated, certain companies were using Facebook as a place to recruit new employees and to (passively) promote their products. With the help of a couple of weeks worth of Google News alerts for 'Facebook', I've learned about a few more ways that organizations are working creatively on Facebook.

Companies' activities on Facebook range from the fuzzy to the focused, from soft branding to serious promotion. The West Midlands Police Department in the United Kingdom is posting information on how to stay safe at night, advice on crime prevention, and photo albums of police dogs on their Facebook group page (Timesonline, Oct. 16th), in an effort to reach out to young people. Over 300 people have joined the group within a few weeks of its creation.

As I heard from my MCIS colleague David Spira (aka the Geek Whisperer), a Johnson & Johnson subsidiary formed a Facebook product page for "ADHD Moms" - - as an online forum for for mothers of children with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder. The page offers monthly essays with practical active, downloadable podcasts, article downloads of success stories, and a poll. The ADHD Moms Facebook page has over 5,500 fans.

Facebook applications are a fertile territory for businesses to seek new brand awareness and new customers. According to an article on MarketingProfs.com (Nov. 4th: sorry, premium membership access only), Travel Channel's "Kidnap!" application has become a case study in subtle & successful promotion on Facebook. Launched this past August, "Kidnap!" lets Facebook users 'kidnap' their friends who then must answer trivia questions about the hideout's location to escape. Users receive a virtual passport with links to pages on Travel Channel's website, which describe travel highlights of the locations mentioned in the game. The article reports that the Travel Channel application has over 2.4 million users, is one of the top 30 Facebook applications, and directs about 60,000 clicks to the Travel Channel website each day.

On the other hand, sometimes a company's Facebook application can create negative buzz. A posting on CNET News takes Pizza Hut to task for its Facebook application, which (the author contends) is basically a retread of the pizza ordering capability available on Pizza Hut's website. The author criticizes Pizza Hut further because, once a pizza is ordered through the application, a notice is sent to all the requester's friends: "X has logged on to order from Pizza Hut!"

An encouraging postscript to the CNET rant about Pizza Hut - in a footnote to the original posting, the author reports that (within about 24 hours!) Pizza Hut contacted him and promised to retool the application so it would be less intrusive. I give Pizza Hut a lot of points for their openness to criticism and their promptness in responding.