Social Media (15 December 2009)

If LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter sound Geek to you, you’re only partially right. According to the statistics, very few of us who are over 50 are especially enamored of the new communication channels. Sure, we may have been the pioneers of e-mail, and most of us managed to adjust to cell phones without a problem, but we (and I’m in that group) haven’t quite figured out how to make good use of “social media.

Usage statistics show, however, that young people (those 30 and under) have flocked to social media sites like ducks flock to water, and those between 40 and 50 aren’t far behind. While I am not sure about the quality of communication taking place on such sites, I am sure about the quantity. I am old enough to remember the days when people were beginning the migration from typewriters to computers and from letters printed on paper, put in stamped envelopes, for delivery by a postal service. Back in “those days,” I knew a secretary who quit her job because her employer was going to take her typewriter away and give her a computer. At about the same time, a well-known professor of business communication told me, “I don’t have an e-mail address, and I don’t want one.”

At the time, it seemed clear to me that the handwriting was on the wall. The old ways of communicating were on the decline, and the new ways were ascending. The same is true now. It is clear to me that, once again, the old ways are declining while the new ascend. I have, however, been less enthusiastic about embracing the new technologies this time around. My cell phone, for example, does nothing more than place and receive phone calls. Yes, it has voice mail, but it neither sends nor receives text messages, nor does it access the Internet.

One of the clearest examples of the change in communication styles are the following remarkable statistics: The number of text messages is up tenfold in the past three years. Americans sent an estimated 1 trillion text messages in 2009. Will texting make phone calls obsolete?

Although it hasn’t been without some kicking and screaming, I’ve found myself being pulled into the emerging technologies. I’m on LinkedIn, and Debra and I are on Twitter (as SCSMattersLLC), and Facebook (each of us has an account). I continue to be surprised what some friends and followers publish in the new media. One person, who seems to be sensible otherwise, “tweets” when she gets up in the morning and when she goes to bed at night and about every 30 minutes in between. If she is going to miss a scheduled time, she tweets that she will be away and won’t be able to tweet for a while.

I find that absolutely fascinating. I don’t understand the need for that kind of constant communication, but I can definitely see that a major shift in communication practices is taking place. There was a time, not only for me, but also for many others, when I subscribed to and faithfully read a daily newspaper and a newsweekly. These days I get my news from the Internet and TV news. I used to write and mail two or three letters a week (more before the arrival of the Internet and e-mail), and that’s down to two or three a year at this point because nearly everyone I know at this point prefers e-mail.

There was also a time, not only for me, but also for many others, when I subscribed to and was active in a number of subject-based, e-mail discussion lists. The lists still exist, but the number of posts has dwindled. What was once a flood of messages has essentially dried up. Where have those subject-based discussions gone? I haven’t seen them on Facebook, and Twitter’s tweets aren’t long enough (a 140 character limit) to facilitate extended discussion of complex subjects.

Every new technology—and, I think, social media must be considered a new technology—has a learning curve. I can remember the early e-mail struggles, with people putting Post-It notes on their computer screens to help them remember usernames and passwords, e-mail gone astray, and the “thank you for thanking me” extensions that continued sometimes even after the original exchange had been forgotten. Those of us who need to will adjust. Those of us who can’t will be like the secretary who quit her job when her typewriter was replaced with a computer.

You’ll know that I have made the necessary adjustments when I post a blog that has a tag line saying, “Uploaded from by Blackberry....”

joel@scs-matters.com
www.scs-matters.com