I started this blog less than a year ago as an experiment. I couldn't understand what all the fuss was about around blogging, facebook, youtube - and certainly not twitter. What difference would any of this make and why should I care?
Well, was I wrong.
Not only have we elected a new President - thanks largely to these social media tools - but my communications consulting practice has taken off! Suddenly, through sheer experimentation and sense of adventure, I now know more about the power of these tools to incite real change. I find myself pulled into all kinds of interesting and meaty projects that are transforming opaque, inefficient bureaucracies mired in resistance and inertia. Cool!
Come full circle yesterday. In a book arts listserv, I incited a little riot by suggesting that twitter et al. might be useful artist tools for researching topical content, running an informal survey to generate content related to a book art project, taking the pulse of a certain "target audience," or increasing awareness for one's work simply by showing up in select conversations. Several folks soooo didn't get it.
Kind of like the naysayers in my day job. I don't think this is an either/or thing - and that it's still evolving. For me, these tools are only as powerful as the choices people make to engage offline as well. Maybe that's why I cherish the book arts - and indeed, my work as an agent of change inside messy organizations. I relish the low-tech, hands-on grounding both give me in an otherwise info-saturated, too-often disconnected world.
For anyone who is interested: