The Queen of Social Media Fights Fetishization

Arianna Huffington has written a very interesting and timely column for Huffington Post where she warns against "fetishization" of social media, where nothing matters besides catching up with the latest tweet, whatever it happens to be.

The title is a bit pompous - "Virality Uber Alles: Whatthe Fetishization of Social Media Is Costing Us All" - but it is a good read that makes you think for a minute of Marshall McLuhan. She is of course not against social media per se, but she cautions against falling in love with the tool, instead of using it to do good:

The media world's fetishization of social media has reached idol-worshipping proportions. Media conference agendas are filled with panels devoted to social media and how to use social tools to amplify coverage, but you rarely see one discussing what that coverage should actually be about. As Wadah Khanfar, former Director General of Al Jazeera, told our editors when he visited our newsroom last week, "The lack of contextualization and prioritization in the U.S. media makes it harder to know what the most important story is at any given time."

Our media culture is locked in the Perpetual Now, constantly chasing ephemeral scoops that last only seconds and that most often don't matter in the first place, even for the brief moment that they're "exclusive." 

(...)

These days every company is hungry to embrace social media and virality, even if they're not exactly sure what that means, and even if they're not prepared to really deal with it once they've achieved it.

(...)

Or as Sheryl Sandberg put it, "What it means to be social is if you want to talk to me, you have to listen to me as well." A lot of brands want to be social, but they don't want to listen, because much of what they're hearing is quite simply not to their liking, and, just as in relationships in the offline world, engaging with your customers or your readers in a transparent and authentic way is not all sweetness and light. So simply issuing a statement saying you're committed to listening isn't the same thing as listening. And as in any human relationship, there is a dark side to intimacy.

So, the road to social media hell is paved with well-intended hashtags -- as well as disingenuous or inauthentic ones.

Oprah, Olbermann and Orson Wells

Is there a connection between Oprah Winfrey launching "OWN: The Oprah Winfrey Network" and Keith Olbermann's sudden departure from MSNBC? Well, maybe! And maybe even back to Citizen Kane...

The Wrap writes:

"With two years left on his $7 million-a-year contract, Olbermann was seeking a full exit package but he really has his eye on creating his own media empire in the style of Huffington Post, according to the individual. That way, Olbermann would control his own brand and, in his view, potentially earn far more as an owner." 

Did Keith Olbermann Bolt MSNBC to Create Media Empire?

Does that mean that it wasn't the big bad Comcast engulfing NBC that caused the radical TV-commentator to jump ship. Was it greed? Or narcissism!

What does it mean when media stars starts their own networks? Is this a good thing for democracy? What happens to editorial integrity when the media channel is so tightly linked to one person?

Makes me think of Citizen Kane.

"Kane's career in the publishing world is born of idealistic social service, but gradually evolves into a ruthless pursuit of power." (from Wikipedia)  

Hans Sandberg

Santity Restored, at Least Temporarily

It was a great rally, and the fact that it was almost three times larger than Glen Beck's rally in late August, gives you a little hope for the american part of humanity. It was not a rally about nothing, but a rally about respect, about tolerance, for believers and unbelievers of all strands, for conservatives, independents and progressives, i.e. for human decency.
There was also an underlying critique, and it was geared towards the political coverage in our 24/7 news cycle, where "if it screams, it leads" has repaced the old adage "if it bleeds, it leads."

Alex Altman, from Time Magazine, reports:
"The press is our immune system," Stewart said. "If it over-reacts to everything, we get sicker, and maybe eczema." If you listened to the attendees, however, the point of coming was simple: "to have fun," as one D.C. resident (who didn't want to give her name because she worked for the federal government) put it. Marsha Eck, a 54-year-old teacher from South Bend, Ind., expressed hope that the gathering could provide "a model for a new kind of conversation." A trio of teenagers from Downington, Pa., who came with their high-school civics class and wore matching lime-green t-shirts so that their teacher could spot them, explained that the rally was important because "everybody is yelling but nobody listens to each other."

My youngest son Alex enjoying the rally.

Jon Stewart Rally Attracts Estimated 215,000


BP’s Chairman Spoke, and (Mostly) Said the Right Thing

Chairman Carl-Henrik Svanberg, Tony Hayward, and other top BP executives met with President Barack Obama at the White House and he delivered. BP promised to do everything in their power to undo the damage they have wrought, and compensate those that have and will suffer economic losses due to the spill. BP’s commitment includes a $20 billion fund that will be managed by Kenneth Feinberg, who oversaw the payment of compensation to the victims of the 9/11 attacks.

President Barack Obama, who was immediately castigated by the insta-pundits, and even taken to task by New York Times in an editorial for his speech last night, today came out with full force and seemingly in full control.

When the top executives from BP exited the White House, they were met by a press corps out for blood, but the silent Swede, Carl-Henrik Svanberg, didn’t act the part he had been assigned. Commentators were looking for arrogance, European arrogance, and one CNBC commentator quipped “is that a smirk on his face,” but the smile on Svanberg’s face was not arrogance, but nerves. He felt the immense pressure, and his English was broken and he talked about the affected people in the Mexican Gulf region as the “small people” (probably a direct translation of the Swedish expression “småfolket” which means common people, the little guy vs. the big and powerful.) He was obviously not aware that “small people” in America refers to “little people” (dwarfs.) But this should be written off as an honest mistake. What was more important was that Svanberg could report that BP is doing the right thing, and that they had agreed to President Obama’s demands. They have also decided to cancel all further dividends for 2010, amounting to over $10 billion, money that can now be made available to the people in the Gulf region, rather than the shareholders.

Svanberg expressed full understanding for President Obama’s “frustration,” and asked the American people for forgiveness. When asked about mistakes and wrongdoings leading up to the disaster, he said that the board is investigating this.

For president Obama, the last two days has been a proof of strength, a show of a different kind if strength than the pundits like to see. Less swagger and more analysis and then action. It is politics for result, even if it doesn’t always look as good on TV as when a president dresses up in a military uniform and declares Mission Accomplished.

For BP and Chairman Svanberg, the meeting in Washington, DC., was the first step out of the pit it dug for itself.

Hans Sandberg