I am a professional blogger. This means I am pretty tuned into the Internet and what’s happening. Social media and the whole Web 2.0 phenomenon are second nature to me. It is the same for other bloggers. But, those of us who are familiar with all this stuff make up a small percentage of the Internet. In fact, most of my readers here on PCMech (yes, that means YOU) are probably not very in tune with social media.
Myspace. Facebook. Twitter. Blogs. RSS Feeds. All this stuff is probably in that category of stuff which other people do, but not you. Or perhaps you’ve never heard of it. Or perhaps you think you understand it all and find it to be a huge waste of time.
So, this is granny’s guide to social media and Web 2.0. I’m going to keep it short (on purpose) and explain to you the primary trends and why it would be worth it to take part
Social Networking
Social networking simply refer to normal human interaction taken to the web. In real life, you meet people. You meet yet more people through people you already knew. Those contacts can provide you information, contacts, ideas, viewpoints, etc. In real life, the statement “it is all in who you know” is true. The Internet simply makes the job a hell of a lot easier.
When you go to a social networking site, you set up your own profile. On your profile, you can say almost anything you want and sometimes even change the design of your profile. In short, your profile is like your own web page and that page represents YOU on that particular social network. Once you’ve created your profile, you go out into the network and make “friends”. Now, these friends do not need to be friends in your non-Internet life. Remember, these are simply contacts. Maybe you know them in real life, maybe you don’t. I, for one, have never personally met most of my online friends.
These social networks also let you join groups so you can talk and interact with people of similar interests.
When it comes to social networking, the big players are Myspace, Facebook and LinkedIn. There are others, but I really don’t care for them. Now, Myspace is like the Google of social networks (meaning it is huge). There are a LOT of people on Myspace, however some surfing around that site is most likely going to lead you to the assumption that social networking is about nothing but picking up the opposite sex, music, gaming and basically being a teenager. For this reason, I personally think Myspace sucks – HOWEVER it is still the big kahuna.
Facebook is MUCH better than Myspace, in my opinion. It works essentially the same way, however you will find that there are a lot more “normal” people on there. Also, Facebook does not allow people to change the design of their profile pages (which is great for avoiding the trashy looking pages and embedded background music common on Myspace profiles). Facebook allows all kinds of customization, though, to your profile. Facebook “applications” are simply cool things you can add to your profile from other sites (not Facebook). You add them with a few clicks and it is very easy to do.
LinkedIn is another great social network, but this one is geared toward professionals. There isn’t anybody looking for chicks on LinkedIn. LinkedIn is great for networking with real business people or even looking for work. I have personally gotten unsolicited job offers through LinkedIn, so the site does work.
So, again, why bother with this? It is because operating in an island doesn’t help anybody. This world is about people and the Internet helps people meet people like never before. Social networks are awesome in that it helps connect you to others you would have never met otherwise. And you can use those contacts for anything you like, including random chat, market research, getting ideas, getting help, etc.
MicroBlogging
You may or may not have heard of a blog. Chance are you have but are either unclear about it or chalked it up to another one of those things nerds do. But, to get an idea of what a blog is, take a look at this very website: PCMech.com. This is a blog. It is nothing more than a synchronous collection of posts. When you go to our homepage, you can see our most recent posts in the order we posted them. That’s a blog.
Not, MICROblogging is the same thing, but it is, well, small. Meaning the posts are very small. In this case, maximum of 140 characters. And we are talking about Twitter.
Twitter is a microblogging platform. You set up a profile and then you submit “tweets” that simply answer the question “what are you doing?”. Now, you don’t necessarily need to answer that question – that is just what Twitter puts there. Many people enter “tweets” that do not answer that question.
But, why send a tweet? Why post to a microblog what you’re doing at any particular moment. This seems offly vain, right?
On Twitter, the value of it lies in who you follow and who follows you. When you follow a person on Twitter, that means you can see their tweets and they show up on your screen. When they follow you, then they can see what you tweet. By combining the two and expanding this out among a network of people, what it leads to is a real global conversation. Everybody is sending in tweets. They may just reply to other people’s tweets. You reply to a person why including their Twitter username prefixed by an “@” sign in your message.
To illustrate, my Twitter username is “davidrisley”. To send me a tweet reply, you would simply put “@davidrisley” in your tweet and I would see it.
So, you can think of Twittering like instant messaging on a grand scale.
But, here’s that magic question again: why bother? Well, again, it is a conversation with other people involved. You can have conversation with people all around the world over Twitter. You can also use Twitter to send mass updates to all of your followers. For instance, I publicly show my Twitter profile here on PCMech so that people can follow me on Twitter and I can keep them informed on various things exclusively over Twitter.
Imagine standing in front of a movie theater wondering what movie to see. You pull out your cell phone and send a “tweet” asking what to see (yes, Twitter can accept messages over your mobile phone, too). Within a couple minutes (if you have people following you) you can get back a couple movie recommendations. You then go and get a ticket. This is the kind of thing you can do by taking advantage of Twitter.
Change The Way You Think About the Internet
Web 2.0 is a generic term that refers to the evolution of the Internet into a medium for user collaboration. To a lot of people who have been using the Internet for awhile, it is hard to get out of that mode where the Internet is just a big collection of web pages. You go search for information, read it, and get back offline. In other words, that is a ONE-WAY FLOW. It makes you nothing but a observer rather than a participant.
Today, the Internet is about so much more than reference material you read. It is about using the Internet as an extension to your daily life and to collaborate with other people. It is about using the Internet to converse with people you wouldn’t otherwise be able to.
If what I’ve been saying in this article is new to you, I invite you to change your way of thinking. Then, get involved with the SOCIAL side of the web. I am a professional blogger. I’m a busy guy. I don’t use these things because I enjoy idle chit chat with strangers. I use them because they are truly powerful for creating contacts, and contacts are important when it comes to business and life.
Connect With Me
To illustrate, you can connect with me pretty easily. Chances are you don’t know me and will likely never meet me in person. However, there is nothing stopping you from having me as a contact. Here are my profiles:
Once connected with me on these sites, you have a direct line to contact me and get personal replies back from me. See, this is how it works.
Stay tuned for more on this topic both here at PCMech and at PCMech University.
David Risley is the founder of PCMech.com. He is the brains, the thinker, the writer, the nerd.
