OPEN

All of my online time has been focused around work projects for a while so I’m once again in catch up mode. Here are some interesting thoughts that have hooked me…

Danah Boyd on managing your identity online: “Create a public internet identity…. Say NO! to Facebook public search option…. Expect unexpected audiences…. Write blog comments as though you are writing your own blog…. Treat video and audio just like text… [they] aren’t searchable, but they will be.”

Euan Semple on needing stronger social stuff than Facebook can offer: “[it’s]the cappuccino of social networking. Loads of froth and chocolate shaken on the top.”

Jeff Jarvis’s essay on newspapers in 2020: “By 2020, we had better hope that newspapers aren’t just papers anymore but are valued members of larger networks that enable their communities to gather, share, and make sense of the news they need…. rather than asking what a newspaper will be, I think we should ask what a news organization’s relationship with its community can be…. by 2020, I predict, the surviving news organizations will be built on large and efficient advertising networks.”

Lloyd Davis invokes a Simpsons parable on the topic of attention: “Struggling with my conscience, I whispered to Adriana next to me “How do you handle trolls offline without resorting to physical violence?”. The Simpsons, of course, has the answer – Treehouse of Horror VI – The Attack of the 50ft Eyesores in which Homer steals a giant donut from a collossal Lard Boy advertising statue prompting Lard Boy and several other promotional likenesses come to life and terrorise Springfield. Lisa asks an ad man what to do – he explains that the advertisements need attention to stay alive and so aided by a nifty jingle performed by Paul Anka, the townsfolk’s attention is ironically drawn away from the misbehaving mannekins who all fall down dead.”

Umair Haque restates the fundamental truth of our age that will end advertising as we know it: “Marketers have to figure out how to make “ads” that benefit consumers – not impose nuisance costs on them…. Either marketers discover how to benefit consumers, directly, vitally, tangibly, visibly – or they will go the way of record labels and film studios.”