Word-whore. I write 'em. I talk 'em. Information, politics, media, and the cybers. I drink. I use bad words. All publication is a political act. All communication is propaganda. All art is pornography. All business is personal. All hail Eris! Vive les poissons rouges sauvages!
Stilgherrian’s links for 08 November 2009 through 18 November 2009:
See what happens when you don’t curate your links for ten days, during which time there’s a conference which generates a bazillion things to link to? Sigh.
This is such a huge batch of links that I’ll start them over the fold. They’re not all about Media140 Sydney, trust me.
Continue reading “Links for 08 November 2009 through 18 November 2009”
Yesterday I joined presenter Paul Turton on ABC Radio’s Statewide for the first of a few regular chats about social networking and social media and things Internettish.
Statewide is broadcast on ABC Local Radio throughout NSW from 1600 to 1800 weekdays, except in Sydney, Newcastle, Wollongong and wherever else they have their own local drive-time program.
Yesterday we talked about the etiquette of “friending” on sites like Facebook and whether it’s OK to refuse a friend request, where you draw the line between your personal and professional life, how people spread the news of the September dust storms for themselves and Rickrolling, amongst other things.
The program isn’t streamed on the Internet, alas, but I did a cheap-arsed recording using my MacBook Pro’s built-in speaker microphone [doh!], and I’ve posted the audio below. I’ll see if I can get a proper audio split next week.
I’ll be joining Paul every Tuesday afternoon at 1615 through until 15 December.
Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 17:27 — 20.0MB)
[The radio interview is probably ©2009 Australian Broadcasting Corporation, but since they don’t archive them I reckon it’s fair enough putting it here provided you just listen to it and I link back to Statewide and encourage you to listen.]
Thank you, Virgin Blue, for sending your “erroneous” email Friday night. You’ve done us a great public service. You’ve exposed a pack of greedy, selfish, shallow tools who deserve to be ridiculed publicly. Thank you.
On Friday evening, Australian airline Virgin Blue sent an email telling some Velocity Rewards members they’d been upgraded to Gold status. But as documented at mUmBRELLA, the email went not just to those entitled to the upgrade but their entire database — including people who’d opted out of email marketing.
Including me because, yes, I’m a Velocity Rewards member.
“That can’t be right,” I thought. “I haven’t flown with Virgin Blue this year.” Then I saw others saying similar things online and I figured the mistake was more widespread. I chuckled, knowing that someone had a bit of a mess to clear up.
Sure enough, three hours later a second email arrived.
Oops! Due to an error you’ve received our previous email by mistake. Please disregard the free upgrade communication as unfortunately you do not qualify for that upgrade.
We apologise for any inconvenience caused.
Mistake. Correction. Apology. That’s the end of the story, yes? Alas no.
Suddenly a whole bunch of people are demanding their Gold status should stay even though, like, they’re not actually entitled to it. People are “upset”. They’re demanding compensation, some even saying they should be compensated with a free flight voucher.
Compensated? Compensated for fucking what, exactly?
Compensated for being too stupid to realise the email was obviously a mistake? Compensated for having a vastly over-inflated sense of entitlement? Compensated for being so much of a consumer-puppet that you validate yourself by bragging about some confected faux-status symbolised by which colour plastic card sits in your wallet and then being embarrassed because, oh sorry, you’re actually still just another cheap-arsed prole after all?
I don’t think that’s Virgin Blue’s fault.
Losers.
Now of course there’s a metric bazillion blog posts and comments banging on about how this is “epic fail” on Virgin Blue’s part and how they’d have handled it so much better and faster. I won’t link to them because it’s too depressing to realise how many instant fucking experts appear after every little glitch is made public.
However I will link to Darryl King’s excellent piece about what he calls Crowd Spanking.
Why is it that the tools of Social Media make tools out of people?
Yes, companies, people and organisations of any sort can and should be open to criticism and correction of poor behaviour. I agree totally. However I don’t agree that Crowd Spanking of everyone that does something wrong is effective nor necessary …
Add some perspective. This is not a corporation that has exposed their staff and customer to asbestos and are denying compensation. It is an upgrade people! …
Before all the Social Media Gurus come up with the 10 things that Virgin Blue could have done better blog posts think through how businesses and people at work live.
Ex-fucking-zactly.
“Epic fail” on Virgin Blue’s part? Bah! Step back a little and think about the full gamut of things which an airline can get wrong and the potential consequences. Up one end, you’ve got mistakes where hundreds of people die in a ball of flame, traumatising their loved ones. Down the other end you’ve got… gosh! A marketing email that was sent to people by mistake.
To the folks who reckon they’d have handled it better and quicker, well, are you really set up to handle such an unusual situation on a Friday night when people have gone to the pub or gone home for the weekend? Personally, I reckon identifying the problem and getting the second email out in three hours isn’t a bad effort — especially when in the meantime there’s, you know, a fucking airline to run!
Well done, Virgin Blue. Well done.
I reckon — and this is just my opinion here — but I reckon we save the Really Big Stick for mistakes which actually matter. Also, stop being such selfish, judgemental little pricks.
[Update 16 October 2009: To illustrate some points I’ll be making in the comments, here’s a screenshot of the erroneous Velocity Rewards email.]
Whew! Media140 Sydney was exhausting and several kinds of wonderful despite some irritation. Many thanks to Julie Posetti and Ande Gregson and Sarah Allen and everyone else.
Oh, a thousand loose ends to tie up! How will I respond?
If you want me to expand upon any specific issues raised at the conference, please let me know in the comments.
Further process notes will be added as I go along, in the comments to this post. Or not. It’s going to be one of those days…
Stilgherrian’s links for 02 November 2009 through 05 November 2009:
[This is my presentation for the Media140 Sydney panel “Do Journos Do it Better? Journalists in SocMedia Communities”. This is being posted here automatically, at 5pm, just as the panel is scheduled to start. Given that sessions earlier in the day may cover similar ground, I may well re-word things as I go.]
“Do journos do it better?” Do journos do what better? I think this is actually the more interesting question: What is it that journalists actually do in our society?
Or, to stick with the question, what do they do in “social media communities” — although as I’ll explain, all communities are “social media communities”?
Now if I were presenting an Oscar I’d start by quoting the dictionary. “The Macquarie Dictionary defines ‘journalist’ as ‘someone engaged in journalism’.”
Very helpful.
However “journalism” in turn is glossed as “the occupation of writing for, editing, and producing newspapers and other periodicals, and television and radio shows”.
So the question as stated is meaningless. Of course journalists are better at “It” — journalism — because they’re the ones doing it. If you’re not a journalist you’re not doing journalism, therefore you’re not merely bad at it, you’re not even doing it at all!
Continue reading “Media140: What do journos do better, exactly?”