Unfortunately, I missed last week’s Future of Media summit so I’ve been trawling through some of the participant commentary. Overall, I think a lot of these debates are getting a bit tired and repetitive and it would be good to get some reality in them.
There is a peculiar lack of perspective in the contributions of many participants both on-stage and off-stage (and isn’t interesting how many social media advocates, just like real people, crave the onstage limelight rather than being up the back of the room in the long tail):
1. The scale of social media
If you’re inside the social media bubble it is easy, very easy, to exaggerate the importance of social media as we know it now and perhaps as it will be in the future.
For instance, for many years now we have been hearing predictions like this one from Gordon Whitehead (a great blogger and smart marketer):
there’s going to be a huge media train wreck and it’s
heading towards those media and news organisations that are ignoring
the huge social networking & media groundswell.
This, I’m afraid, is largely wishful thinking:
- Major media response.Tthe biggest players in social media are in fact major media companies both traditional media companies (like News Ltd, ABC, BBC and so on) and big ‘new’ media companies, specifically Google and Apple (hugely important in podcasting and vodcasting). Contrary to what many social media evangelists like to believe, big media has been fast to adopt social media. The reason, of course, is that social media can deliver millions of links and page views for media websites.
- Audience size. Some people do live in Twitter or second life, others have a heavy involvement in social media in all its forms but the numbers are still miniscule as a share of the overall audience size. While social media is adding some more competition for more traditional media outlets (as well as some handy business opportunities), it is a long way off being the main game. Social media is a supplement to traditional media providing highly valuable extra information and commentary but it is an error to confuse that with some sort of serious challenge to media overall.
2. Bloggers vs journalists
This is one of the most tedious parts of the whole debate. Part of it flows from the silly idea that blogging and micro-blogging are a serious challenge to the media. Bloggers often exhibit frustration that journalists want to keep drawing a distinction between bloggers and journalists and part of it is the ignorance and arrogance of many journalists who tend to sanctify their craft beyond anything that is reasonable.
While bloggers can be journalists (ie doing original reporting in an objective way) and while journalists can be bloggers (ie adding commentary and additional insights), the two are not synonymous.
I think we would all be better off if we left this argument off the table and just recognise that there are differences and similarities and so what?
3. Monetisation
The people who make real money are largely the owners of companies who provide the social media platforms where others post their content e.g. google (including youtube, blogger).
For most bloggers, the reality is that their social media incomes will never exceed minimum wages unless they can make it in consulting and public speaking about social media i.e. passing their knowledge along.
Mostly, social media ventures are still in ’start-up mode’ with lots of people working around the clock and burning out trying to get up their traffic and google juice etc. These ventures are not stable employment in the way that traditional media allows people to work a relatively normal work week for a consistent and livable wage.
Blogging works for most people as an additional (non-core) activity as a way to promote your business, book, consultancy services, speaking engagements and so on. Or as a hobby.
It also works for organisations as a cheap way of extending their other PR, advertising and marketing activities. And here again, we need to have perspective. Even companies that are big into social media still seem to spending no more than a few percent of their communications budgets on social media.
I don’t want to downplay the importance of social media, I just think that it’s not helpful to keep exaggerating social media and to talk as if it’s going to sweep all before it. We can all do better if we keep a firm and realistic perspective on where social media fits in.
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9 Comments
Trevor, thank God, finally some perspective. I completely agree.
Good reality check in many aspects, but it is important not to overlook the changes that are happening (even if slowly).
I run into twitter/blogging/etc skeptics who say “The only people I know who use these tools are marketers or tech people…” all the time. It is true, those are the major users of most social media tools now days.
But remember that there was a time when e-mail and web pages were used almost exclusively by techies. Now e-mail is commonly used by all generations. Now that isn’t to say that twitter or blogging will reach that level but it will increase.
In terms of blogging become more than a hobby for average joe, that may be true. However with the interest and increase in bloggers and people reading blog I would not be surprised to see a shift that makes blogging more lucrative when done well. Adsense and advertising can make you a survivable income once you reach a specific level… but blogger networks really have been revolutionizing small bloggers. Not only in helping extend their reach, but also in terms of monetizing their content.
Blogs that have the audience of a typical small news publication (40,000 readers) make plenty of money to support at least the blogger him/herself.
While I agree there is not a train wreck coming, there is more going on than a few techie fads.
Excellent article, and I must admit I largely agree with it. Bubbles, hype, waves – we’ve seen it all before. I would like more talked about collaboration as a discipline and science and Social Media as a stimulus, rather than the means to an end. Blogging and Twittering can be very cathartic and I think there are a lot of citizen journalists out there that aren’t too bothered about monetisation. They are perhaps (like I) simple information hobbyists…
Patrick – I agree with you and it is important not to go too far in downplaying the potential importance of social media just as it is important not to get carried away with the ‘revolutionary’ or ‘train wreck’ nature of these technologies
Steve – I think most of us will stay hobbyists, because it allows you to write what you want when you want (well pretty much) without becoming a slave to a fickle market.
Trevor Cook – the voice of reason. Shame you weren’t there on the day.
Nice post, Trevor; particularly the bit about bloggers v journalists. I’ve been both and the “debate” is indeed dull.
I wrote a post yesterday about podcasting in particular because there’s a distinct fading of the community of amateurs in forums like Podcast Pickle, which I put down to podcasting being hard. The main players in podcasting are old media outfits because they have the expertise in content and production. If they’re newspapers that don’t have the audio skills, they can pay for it and they do. Most amateurs can’t compete — it’s not just about buying a microphone and chuntering into it.
Hi Trevor,
It will be interesting to watch social media evolve as more Australian corporations use it as a medium to hold two-way conversations with customers and/or key stakeholders.
My assumption is the traditional PR/Marcomm units will evolve to become media units as the corporation’s content will need to be ’social media’ worthy in order to attract and retain the target audience.
Comment about Bloggers vs Journalists:
While it doesn’t always happen in traditional media, there is an expectation traditional media/journalists report not only on the facts but offer a critical analysis of current or future implications.
If blogs or micro blogging continue to become a bigger portion of the media we consume (ex – Plugger monitors comments from Twitter) critical analysis will become a premium offering that traditional media could use to differentiate itself against the various other sources of media.
Great post.
Maybe next time, you might get my point if you were there at the conference.
great common-sense post Trevor. It is difficult to argue against hard stats and traffic figures, and of course the big media companies have the budgets to acquire anything that looks like it might be competitive (save the odd one or two that got away like Google!), but on the other hand it’s early days – Twitter may not be ground breaking, but it might be. It’s very new and although social media in it’s current form isnt’ threatening too many people, there are some big underlying changes happening right now. For instance, tv audiences and newspaper and trade mag readerships are shrinking and web traffic is growing. And the web brings new technical possibilities and business models, so for me it’s too early to be dismissive
giles