School has been keeping me occupied and eating my brain and time (I feel like) for the last year and a half. I embarked on the pursuit of my master's degree nearly two years to the day - handing in my application for the MACT program before the December 15 deadline. Little did I know what I was getting myself into.
There have been readings, group papers, online discussions, sleepless nights, frustration over APA formatting, laughter and probably too much alcohol consumed. My mind as been expanded by the material I've read, the friendships I've made with my classmates and how applicable my learning has been to how I do my job.
The end is near, I'm finishing my final two classes before starting my research project in January. God willing I will be wrapping up everything in August 2013 and graduating in November. It feels like this degree has gone on forever but today I received the best warm fuzzy ever (thanks Kate!) with this story on my research: Can LinkedIn be used to engage with alumni?
I'm so blessed and thankful to have a job, family and colleagues that have been so supportive during this time.
Showing posts with label social media. Show all posts
Showing posts with label social media. Show all posts
Wednesday, December 5, 2012
Monday, June 18, 2012
Music under a wide Open Sky....
Apologies for blogging so infrequently lately. I thought that going school-free for the summer would free up my time but sadly I'm even busier it feels. I really can't complain though, getting out and about around Edmonton has been a great trade off for my studies so far.
Last weekend I had the pleasure of volunteering for the 3rd annual Open Sky Music Festival in Edmonton. I may have had a connection through my roommate and PR star Natalie Harper but it was just the perfect kind of event to get me out of the house and kick off my summer.
Boasting the reggae, surf-rock and alternative sounds of groups such as The Wailers, Shane Philip, The Whytes, Five Alarm Funk, Souljah Fyah and others (see here), the weekend, while rainy, was still a great chance to get out and dance. The best part of the weekend was getting the opportunity to meet all of the local and international artists one-on-one and see how humble and real they all were.
I've got a few pics and videos posted but it was hands-down one of the best weekends I've had in a long time. Count me in for next year!
Last weekend I had the pleasure of volunteering for the 3rd annual Open Sky Music Festival in Edmonton. I may have had a connection through my roommate and PR star Natalie Harper but it was just the perfect kind of event to get me out of the house and kick off my summer.
Boasting the reggae, surf-rock and alternative sounds of groups such as The Wailers, Shane Philip, The Whytes, Five Alarm Funk, Souljah Fyah and others (see here), the weekend, while rainy, was still a great chance to get out and dance. The best part of the weekend was getting the opportunity to meet all of the local and international artists one-on-one and see how humble and real they all were.
I've got a few pics and videos posted but it was hands-down one of the best weekends I've had in a long time. Count me in for next year!
Scott Cook & The Long Weekends
Five Alarm Funk
Micheal Bernard Fitzgerald
Lesley Pelletier
The Wyhtes
The Wailers
Chali 2na
Five Alarm Funk
Kim Churchill
Wednesday, May 16, 2012
Can social media spark and maintain the next revolution?
In his article Small Change: Why the revolution will not be tweeted, Malcolm Gladwell probes the emergence of Twitter and Facebook as tools to mobilize the masses for protest. He believes that really Twitter and Facebook are just tools and they can not create or start revolution like the organized sit-ins in the Deep South of the U.S.A. in the 1960s.
An interesting discussion erupted in class today when we discussed this article, one that everyone seemed to participate in. At first when I read this article I went back to look at the date on this article ~ because I felt that it was written before the Occupy movement. I was right (it was written in 2010), and while Gladwell wasn't privy to some of the events that happened this past year, I understand what message he was trying to convey in this article.
Yes social networks have a plethora of tools to choose from today to help stay in touch. And yes these tools have been used to motivate the public to join in something that they believe in. Gladwell argues that these "revolutions" or social movements that are organized via Facebook or Twitter have no lasting impact unlike Rosa Parks sitting at the front of the bus.
This is where I beg to differ - I think that while the tools may have changed, the reasons for being involved are still the same. In fact my classmate Amanda put it best, "It's not about the social tools, it's about the social movement. The reasons why people want to be a part of something have never changed." I agree with her - the desire to be involved in something that will make a difference has always been a part of people's DNA. Today we just have different ways to mobilize and educate people.
I see where you're coming from Mr. Gladwell but I don't agree with what you're saying.
An interesting discussion erupted in class today when we discussed this article, one that everyone seemed to participate in. At first when I read this article I went back to look at the date on this article ~ because I felt that it was written before the Occupy movement. I was right (it was written in 2010), and while Gladwell wasn't privy to some of the events that happened this past year, I understand what message he was trying to convey in this article.
Yes social networks have a plethora of tools to choose from today to help stay in touch. And yes these tools have been used to motivate the public to join in something that they believe in. Gladwell argues that these "revolutions" or social movements that are organized via Facebook or Twitter have no lasting impact unlike Rosa Parks sitting at the front of the bus.
This is where I beg to differ - I think that while the tools may have changed, the reasons for being involved are still the same. In fact my classmate Amanda put it best, "It's not about the social tools, it's about the social movement. The reasons why people want to be a part of something have never changed." I agree with her - the desire to be involved in something that will make a difference has always been a part of people's DNA. Today we just have different ways to mobilize and educate people.
I see where you're coming from Mr. Gladwell but I don't agree with what you're saying.
Monday, May 14, 2012
Slave Lake: One year later
Tomorrow the community of Slave Lake marks a sombre anniversary. It was one year ago that a wildfire rolled through their community, destroying most of the buildings and infrastructure and forcing many families scrambling for cover.
I remember a year ago sitting at my computer writing a paper for COMM 503 and watching with horror as my Twitter feed filled with photos and panicked pleas from shelters and organizations as they mobilized to help the displaced population.
I blogged about Slave Lake last year, the tragedy and horror that I witnessed the night of the fires. But in the days following the fire, I remember classmate Dianne tweeting locations where others could drop off clothing and personal hygiene items. I remember my co-blogger Felicia mobilizing her social network on Twitter and Facebook, collecting enough items to fit in a shipping container to be sent to the families in Slave Lake.
Out of so much heartbreak and tragedy I saw people come together, whether they knew each other or not to help others who needed it. That is really the power of a social network to me.
I remember a year ago sitting at my computer writing a paper for COMM 503 and watching with horror as my Twitter feed filled with photos and panicked pleas from shelters and organizations as they mobilized to help the displaced population.
I blogged about Slave Lake last year, the tragedy and horror that I witnessed the night of the fires. But in the days following the fire, I remember classmate Dianne tweeting locations where others could drop off clothing and personal hygiene items. I remember my co-blogger Felicia mobilizing her social network on Twitter and Facebook, collecting enough items to fit in a shipping container to be sent to the families in Slave Lake.
Out of so much heartbreak and tragedy I saw people come together, whether they knew each other or not to help others who needed it. That is really the power of a social network to me.
Friday, May 11, 2012
Globally networked movements
Occupy Wall Street, Anonymous, the Vancouver riots of 2011, the on-going student protests over tuition hikes in Quebec. What do these all have in common? For one these are movements spanning across Canada and around the world. Secondly they document specific events that have defined who and what they are, drawing attention worldwide.
In Jeffrey Juris' article Networked Social Movements: Global Movements for Global Justice, he references Manuel Castells, a well-known researcher of networks of power. According to Castells, the information age has helped cultivate groups of communal resistance "that have arisen in opposition to economic globalization, capitalist restructuring, and the disruption caused by global financial and cultural flows...Beyond creating alternative cultural codes, however, activists are generating new networking forms and practices that allow for the production of global webs of resistance, while providing diverse models for building an alternative, more directly democratic and globally networked society" (p. 345).
I can't help but think about Castells' thoughts and how it applies to some of our most recent networked movements. Occupy and Anonymous have really been reaching out to audiences through social media to draw attention to their situation and motivate the masses in support.
The Vancouver riots captured delinquency as it happened, and eventually the photos and videos posted to online accounts like Twitter and Facebook were used to incriminate and charge those who had committed the crimes. Even at the moment there are ongoing blog posts, tweets and media stories being filed about the tuition hike protests in Quebec.
These movements are loose and uncoordinated, lacking true leaders. According to Castells all militant actions and protests are forms of symbolic communication (p. 346). I know I personally have come down pretty hard on the different movements and specific events, mostly because I was viewing them through my personal lens. What Juris, Cleaver, Kadushin and Castells have done is make me appreciate the different contexts that these movements have grown and thrived from.
In Jeffrey Juris' article Networked Social Movements: Global Movements for Global Justice, he references Manuel Castells, a well-known researcher of networks of power. According to Castells, the information age has helped cultivate groups of communal resistance "that have arisen in opposition to economic globalization, capitalist restructuring, and the disruption caused by global financial and cultural flows...Beyond creating alternative cultural codes, however, activists are generating new networking forms and practices that allow for the production of global webs of resistance, while providing diverse models for building an alternative, more directly democratic and globally networked society" (p. 345).
I can't help but think about Castells' thoughts and how it applies to some of our most recent networked movements. Occupy and Anonymous have really been reaching out to audiences through social media to draw attention to their situation and motivate the masses in support.
The Vancouver riots captured delinquency as it happened, and eventually the photos and videos posted to online accounts like Twitter and Facebook were used to incriminate and charge those who had committed the crimes. Even at the moment there are ongoing blog posts, tweets and media stories being filed about the tuition hike protests in Quebec.
These movements are loose and uncoordinated, lacking true leaders. According to Castells all militant actions and protests are forms of symbolic communication (p. 346). I know I personally have come down pretty hard on the different movements and specific events, mostly because I was viewing them through my personal lens. What Juris, Cleaver, Kadushin and Castells have done is make me appreciate the different contexts that these movements have grown and thrived from.
Wednesday, May 9, 2012
Birds of a feather don't always flock together
This post is dedicated to @leahmcyyc, a rebuttal of her post What is your innovative threshold? (you know I couldn't resist answering back).
Leah makes a great case for Rogers' diffusion of innovation theory, referencing a bit of Kadushin, to explain how she got onto the Facebook bandwagon early into the adoption process. She also references the "tipping point" when Facebook exploded in front of everyone's eyes and her "snobby friends" finally joined the worlds largest social network.
Ok, here's my soapbox moment. I'm not on Facebook. Never have been, and if I have my way, never will be. Why? Well at first it was a principle thing for me - I watched my PR classmates jump on the bandwagon, trying their hardest to see who could collect more friends than the other. Ugh, popularity contest? Count me out please.
Then I started thinking of how I stay connected with people socially and it solidified my rationale to not be involved with Facebook. My good friends (high school, both undergrad degrees, throughout my travels, etc.) I still keep in touch with through other means. Most of them I still have a mailing address, email address and/or telephone numbers for and I'd prefer to pick up a phone and call them or write them a letter any day. I'm pretty good at staying in touch so I DO actually call and write.
I was talking about this with @hburridge yesterday and I explained that I've chosen different social technologies to increase and maintain my networks. It's helped me personally and professionally, connecting me with friends present and past. I was not an early adopter to Twitter (I joined in 2009), but within my group of good friends I was the first on the scene, and they are just finally joining me now. I look forward to networking with them in this space, and they've told me that if I've held out this long from joining Facebook, to stay off...that it's a dying network.
Not being on Facebook doesn't make me a snob (at least I hope that's not what I portray), it just means I've found different, equally robust ways to stay in touch with those that I mean to.
Leah makes a great case for Rogers' diffusion of innovation theory, referencing a bit of Kadushin, to explain how she got onto the Facebook bandwagon early into the adoption process. She also references the "tipping point" when Facebook exploded in front of everyone's eyes and her "snobby friends" finally joined the worlds largest social network.
Ok, here's my soapbox moment. I'm not on Facebook. Never have been, and if I have my way, never will be. Why? Well at first it was a principle thing for me - I watched my PR classmates jump on the bandwagon, trying their hardest to see who could collect more friends than the other. Ugh, popularity contest? Count me out please.
Then I started thinking of how I stay connected with people socially and it solidified my rationale to not be involved with Facebook. My good friends (high school, both undergrad degrees, throughout my travels, etc.) I still keep in touch with through other means. Most of them I still have a mailing address, email address and/or telephone numbers for and I'd prefer to pick up a phone and call them or write them a letter any day. I'm pretty good at staying in touch so I DO actually call and write.
I was talking about this with @hburridge yesterday and I explained that I've chosen different social technologies to increase and maintain my networks. It's helped me personally and professionally, connecting me with friends present and past. I was not an early adopter to Twitter (I joined in 2009), but within my group of good friends I was the first on the scene, and they are just finally joining me now. I look forward to networking with them in this space, and they've told me that if I've held out this long from joining Facebook, to stay off...that it's a dying network.
Not being on Facebook doesn't make me a snob (at least I hope that's not what I portray), it just means I've found different, equally robust ways to stay in touch with those that I mean to.
Image courtesy of: http://www.flickr.com/photos/48110918@N06/
Monday, May 7, 2012
Being like the Borg?
I really enjoyed this week's readings and how Kadushin as well as Benkler and Benjamin Phelan transitioned from small social networks to the way organizations network.
The Hive (quibbling aside amongst the researchers in the first half of the paper) really delve into the world of eusociality - is a term used for the highest level of social organization in a hierarchical classification (Wikipedia definition). At the heart of this article appears to be moral behaviour and the differences between altruists and individualists - with the belief by Darwin that the actions of altruists would overpower the selfish actions of individualists. And all of these beliefs are understood and derived from looking at how ants perform in a colony and how bees perform in their hives.
If you apply this type of mentality to the social networks of today, does Phelan's article still ring true? Can altruistic traits be encoded in DNA and passed on from generation to generation (as Darwin tried to determine)? Well it seems that good character traits, like altruism, aren't just a part of your physical make-up. It's also determined by the environment one is raised in and the behaviours that exist in that group.
I was drawn back to an article that I had analyzed for our first assignment in COMM 501 - Communications Research. In the article I read about the Sichuan earthquake in China, and how media helped spread the message about how survivors could be involved in the relief efforts. I kept thinking that while we as humans are more socially networked today thanks to the Internet, it seems to take a worldwide catastrophe to motivate us to altruism.
Gone it seems are the days where people did things out of the good of their own hearts. Now it seems that only when disaster visits the doorstep do people feel motivated to step out of their insular bubbles and help their fellow man. I would like to think that personally I could have my altruistic side tapped for much less than disaster but I don't truly know how I would react. How do you think you would in the same situation?
The Hive (quibbling aside amongst the researchers in the first half of the paper) really delve into the world of eusociality - is a term used for the highest level of social organization in a hierarchical classification (Wikipedia definition). At the heart of this article appears to be moral behaviour and the differences between altruists and individualists - with the belief by Darwin that the actions of altruists would overpower the selfish actions of individualists. And all of these beliefs are understood and derived from looking at how ants perform in a colony and how bees perform in their hives.
If you apply this type of mentality to the social networks of today, does Phelan's article still ring true? Can altruistic traits be encoded in DNA and passed on from generation to generation (as Darwin tried to determine)? Well it seems that good character traits, like altruism, aren't just a part of your physical make-up. It's also determined by the environment one is raised in and the behaviours that exist in that group.
I was drawn back to an article that I had analyzed for our first assignment in COMM 501 - Communications Research. In the article I read about the Sichuan earthquake in China, and how media helped spread the message about how survivors could be involved in the relief efforts. I kept thinking that while we as humans are more socially networked today thanks to the Internet, it seems to take a worldwide catastrophe to motivate us to altruism.
Gone it seems are the days where people did things out of the good of their own hearts. Now it seems that only when disaster visits the doorstep do people feel motivated to step out of their insular bubbles and help their fellow man. I would like to think that personally I could have my altruistic side tapped for much less than disaster but I don't truly know how I would react. How do you think you would in the same situation?
Wednesday, May 2, 2012
Sharing generously
On Tuesday we had a guest speaker in our class, Dr. Raul Pacheco, and he talked about how we as students and practitioners of communications on social media could create and maintain our social profiles effectively.
I'm no stranger to social media - I've been blogging since 2008, been on Twitter and LinkedIn since 2009 and picked up other social platforms along the way (Yelp!, Foursquare, Instagram, etc.). I've even collaborated on other blogs with friends and been part of a group wiki. Being social for me personally is like the air that I breathe - something I am naturally inclined to do.
However something Dr. Pacheco said on Tuesday resonated deeply with me - share generously with your networks and don't be afraid to let your personal profiles creep into your professional profiles and vice versa. I remember struggling with that concept when I first started the Twitter feed for my organization (@UofAPublicHlth).
For months and years I had been tweeting from my personal account, building a steady group of followers and solidifying some great relationships. I knew how I wanted to portray myself personally in the online environment but was scared stiff to tweet on behalf of my organization. I won't lie, the first few months were pretty terrible...I had built up a great group of followers but they weren't our internal folks and they weren't the media members I had hoped to engage with.
One day out of desperation I contacted the social media expert at the University of Alberta at the time and asked him for some advice on how I could grow and connect with audiences from our professional account. I remember Andy telling it to me straight and it went something like this, "You have this amazing personal network of followers and those you follow. You have great conversations with these people and you share relevant information. This is what is missing in your company Twitter account. Don't forget that even professional accounts need to show a personality - it helps build credibility."
Once that lightbulb came on for me my organization's Twitter feed skyrocketed and I haven't looked back since. So while I also share generously with retweets, comments and connections on my social media platforms and on those I follow, I also remember to share just a little bit of who I am on the places where I live socially.
I'm no stranger to social media - I've been blogging since 2008, been on Twitter and LinkedIn since 2009 and picked up other social platforms along the way (Yelp!, Foursquare, Instagram, etc.). I've even collaborated on other blogs with friends and been part of a group wiki. Being social for me personally is like the air that I breathe - something I am naturally inclined to do.
However something Dr. Pacheco said on Tuesday resonated deeply with me - share generously with your networks and don't be afraid to let your personal profiles creep into your professional profiles and vice versa. I remember struggling with that concept when I first started the Twitter feed for my organization (@UofAPublicHlth).
For months and years I had been tweeting from my personal account, building a steady group of followers and solidifying some great relationships. I knew how I wanted to portray myself personally in the online environment but was scared stiff to tweet on behalf of my organization. I won't lie, the first few months were pretty terrible...I had built up a great group of followers but they weren't our internal folks and they weren't the media members I had hoped to engage with.
One day out of desperation I contacted the social media expert at the University of Alberta at the time and asked him for some advice on how I could grow and connect with audiences from our professional account. I remember Andy telling it to me straight and it went something like this, "You have this amazing personal network of followers and those you follow. You have great conversations with these people and you share relevant information. This is what is missing in your company Twitter account. Don't forget that even professional accounts need to show a personality - it helps build credibility."
Once that lightbulb came on for me my organization's Twitter feed skyrocketed and I haven't looked back since. So while I also share generously with retweets, comments and connections on my social media platforms and on those I follow, I also remember to share just a little bit of who I am on the places where I live socially.
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