RE: blogs are the new pink
By: Andrea Trapani
(Tom – Thanks for thinking of me. Way to add fuel to the fire.)
I actually came across this article last month when it appeared online. What really stuck out to me wasn’t necessarily the content of the article and how it relates to the growth of social media (it’s here to stay in one form or another, get over it critics), but many of the reader comments that followed.
zahn Jun 2, 2008 12:25 AM GMT
I have a fear of blogs. Plus sharing intellectual ideas freely is foolish!
If you’re comfortable in your industry position, why not share your knowledge? I would like to believe that interested parties and existing/potential clients would be more attracted to firms that openly share their knowledge with others. Those who are “doing” are now “teaching.” If you have a fear of blogs, no one says you have to participate. However, just don’t kick yourself if you start asking, “Why didn’t I do this months ago?”
thibaud May 29, 2008 6:57 AM GMT
So much noise, so little signal. For getting TRUSTWORTHY info advice and recommendations, we still have no online application that’s anywhere near as efficient as picking up the phone and calling uncle, school chums, colleagues etc.
I’m all for the old school methods of communication. But there are times when I want to reach outside my address book and see what industry experts have to say. Trustworthy? Well, they are “experts.” If you are a skeptic and have trouble believing with a blogger’s statement that they are an industry expert, Google them and read their credentials… or check on the success of their business. If you find good things, they must be doing something right. So, why not read there thoughts about XYZ topic. Their take on it just might be one you never considered. There is just a wealth of information out there to read and a million brains to pick. If I want to read about PR, I have enough RSS feeds pouring into my netvibes account from key decision makers, CEOs and thought-leaders to keep me busy for days. Domestic/International Business News? Head over to Businessweek’s site and simply highlight their navigation bar. There is a blog for each major subject they cover – from innovation to investing. Sports? There are plenty of blogs to go around (a shout out to Need4Sheed). While your family, school chums and colleagues might be a great source for information on specific topics, there are bound to be some things they simply cannot answer. My Uncle Gary may know plenty about how to unionize any automotive manufacturing plant, but he can’t tell me the first thing on how to get in front of the green business trend crowd. Guys like Adam Aston can. With blogs, I’m also pretty sure that if I was up late one night and felt like having some questions answered, heading over to an industry expert’s site to search for some insightful commentary will not result in a tirade of curse words and a hang-up at 3 a.m like a phone call to my Uncle.
Expert information, at anytime of day…. as long as you have a Web browser and an Internet connection.
And now, my favorite comment.
Chris Boese May 27, 2008 3:41 PM GMT
If the “new resume is 140 characters” then the people doing the hiring are going to end up with some incompetent and shallow candidates. While some employers may like the elevator pitch resume, I’d say the value for the time-stressed is traded off in terms of “you get what you pay for.” A company of one-liner employees? Did they all get their degrees from mail-order 3-month universities? At least they’ll be able to boil ideas down to Power Point slides, but the ideas will be as light-weight and shallow as the mind-set that spawned them. God save us from the sheer vapidity of a bullet point culture. Don’t you just wish brain surgery could be taught in 3-month bullet points too? How about advanced math and engineering? You really want to drive across that bridge? Reductio ad absurdum. Maybe the people who can be hired with 140-character resumes are only suited for the fake jobs created for the do-nothing Roman citizens, to justify a life outside real labor, which is reserved for the wage slave immigrants in this empire. Of course you can hire them with 140-character resumes! Their work must be that inconsequential.
Wow. Someone is a little sassy. Blogs, Twitter… etc., they are helping the world digest and deliver the message effectively. Sometimes the time required to deliver an elevator pitch is all you need to make a point… and sometimes it is all you’re given. Bullet-point culture is the wrong label for this movement. Those who employ such means and methods just want to reach people how they want to be reached… and avoid wasting their time.
I only have one thing to add: If I can deliver on the necessary points and sell myself or my client, story, angle, etc., to the right people with only 140-characters versus a full page, text document, I think this whole social media trend might be on to something here.
“Anything you can do, I can do better—- and faster.”