5 Reasons Why You Won’t Find Me Posting on Quora

January 25, 2011 by

The last few weeks I’ve been seeing all these articles about how Quora will be the next Twitter or Facebook and is the biggest blogging innovation in 10 years. Quora is a crowdsourced answer site that is a cross between LinkedIn‘s Q&A feature, Reddit, Yahoo Answers, and Wikipedia.

With everyone so excited about it, I signed up and checked it out. After a week of use, however, I’ve concluded Quora is a lot of hype. I only see myself monitoring a few discussions on Quora every now and then to find inspiration for blog posts. I don’t plan to spend much time commenting on or answering questions. Here are the top five reasons why:

  1. Not convenient.Unlike responding to a tweet on Twitter or an update on Facebook, answering a question on Quora is not something you can do quickly (or at least shouldn’t), say, in the small amount of time you have when your child is putting on his/her pajamas.
  2. Not timely.What is great about Facebook, Twitter, Foursquare, etc. is finding out about breaking news when it happens or what your friends are doing. While Quora lets you find out what intellectuals are saying about a particular topic, most answers have little or no news value.
  3. Not trust worthy.Quora is too easily gamed, at least for now. Celebrity up-voting and self-promotion can create too much noise, preventing the best answers from bubbling up to the top (this does mean if you are in charge of monitoring a brand, you need to track Quora to keep nasty reputation issues from brewing).
  4. Not necessary.I already do not have the time to review (let alone respond to) all the interesting Q&As the LinkedIn groups I belong to generate, so I don’t need another opportunity to drown in information overload (particularly with Facebook Questions, a similar kind of Q&A on Facebook, set to debut in the next few weeks).
  5. Not compelling.Come on! How many people spend hours reading Wikipedia and textbooks (especially ones with very few pictures and illustrations) in their spare time? You go to them once in a while when you have a question or want to double check a fact but then you move on.

So why would anybody spend hours on Quora? The main benefit I see is flaunting your expertise and basking in your popularity. In the words of Silicon-Valleyphile Robert Scoble:

“I find that there’s something addictive about participating [in Quora] instead of here on my blog. Why? Because when you see people voting up your answers or adding their own replies in real time it makes you realize there’s a good group of people reading your stuff. I don’t get that immediate rush here (here I have to wait for comments to show up, which isn’t nearly as immediate).”

For you to get the same rush as Scoble, however, you’d either have to be a celebrity like him or have way too much time on your hands. In the words of Mashable tech writer Tamar Weinberg: “Quora is a lot of people showing off how smart they are.”

Enough said.

Am I crazy? Do you think Quora will be bigger than Twitter and Facebook combined? Please share your thoughts in the comment section below.

Filed Under: Miscellaneous, Technology Tagged With: , , , , , ,

The Social Media Revolution Nobody Watched

January 14, 2011 by

“Huh?” I thought to myself as a Twitter retweet from @Galrahn flashed across my screen: “I just watched a government fall on Twitter while #CNN interviewed the Jeopardy host about a robot contestant.” Then I saw another retweet from @pareen reading: “I am relying on someone live-tweeting al-Jazeera to keep up with Tunisia news. MSNBC reports that Martha Stewart’s dog split her lip open.”

“Wow,” I thought, “what is going on?” So I checked the Washington Post’s web page but couldn’t find any reference to Tunisia’s government falling. Then I ran Twitter searches for Tunisia and “Ben Ali.” Sure enough, I found a tweet from @SultanAlQassemi reading: “BREAKING NEWS: Al Jazeera Tunisian dictator Ben Ali has left Tunis and Tunisian Parliament Speaker Fuad Mbazaa has taken power.”

Obviously, Twitter scooped U.S. network television and print journalists on this event by a landslide. But after reading more about the events in Tunisia, I learned that wasn’t the most important Twitter connection to the toppling of the Tunisian government story. Many news outlets are reporting that social media played a key role in the government change over, while others are saying it played a small (but not insignificant) role. Unlike Iran’s Twitter revolution, which I wrote, about last year, events in Tunisia were less clear, at least from the United States. As Foreign Policy magazine noted:

“Iran’s diaspora was especially effective at promoting the Green Movement to an online audience that followed tweets, Facebook posts, and web videos avidly, hungry for news from the front lines of the struggle. … For users of social media, the protests in Iran were an inescapable, global story. Tunisia, by contrast, hasn’t seen nearly the attention or support from the online community.”

Global Voices blogger Ethan Zuckerman wrote:

“What’s fascinating to me is that the events of the past three weeks in Tunisia might actually represent a ‘Twitter revolution,’ as has been previously promised in Moldova and in Iran. … So why isn’t the global twittersphere flooding the internet with cries of “Yezzi Fock!” (the rallying cry of the movement, which translates as “We’ve had enough!” in local slang)? …

“Perhaps we’re less interested because the government in danger of falling isn’t communist, as in Moldova, or a nuclear-armed member of the Axis of Evil, Iran? Perhaps everyone’s read Evgeny Morozov’s new book and followed his path from celebrating the Moldova twitter revolution to concluding the internet is most useful for dictators, not for revolutionaries? …

“I don’t know whether most people are missing the events in Tunisia because they don’t speak French or Arabic, because they don’t see the Mahgreb as significant as Iran, because they’re tired of social media revolution stories or because they’re mourning the tragedy in Tucson. I’m disappointed and frustrated, not just because I care deeply for Tunisian friends who have been working for justice in their country for years, but because real change in the world is a rare thing, and it’s a shame that people would miss the chance to watch it unfold.”

All I can say is I am glad I happened to be viewing tweets from a Twitter list about Sudan’s referendum around 4 p.m. when the news caught my eye. I lived in France in 1988 and 1989 and remember many news stories about Ben Ali promising to bring democracy to the former French protectorate.  He had ousted predecessor Habib Bourguiba in 1987 in a bloodless coup by declaring the then 83-year-old mentally unfit to hold office.  Ben Ali’s promises of a democratic Tunisia never materalized and he essentially became a dictator over the years.

While I recall hearing recently about riots in the Tunisian city of Sidi Bouzid as well as a leaked U.S. diplomatic cable describing Ben Ali’s family as “the nexus of Tunisian corruption,” I had little sense, as a consumer largely of U.S. media, that Ben Ali was about to be ousted and the role social media was playing.

It will be fascinating to read more analysis on social media’s role in Ben Ali’s departure (as well as whether it will mark any real change) as more of the U.S. media and blogosphere jumps on board the story—albeit a day late and a dollar short.

Do you think the events in Tunisia were a social media revolution, Twitter revolution, Facebook revolution, WikiLeaks revolution, or none of the above? Please share your thoughts in the comments section below.

Filed Under: Relief & Development Tagged With: , , , , , , ,

Panhandler’s Viral Hit Is ‘Dragonfly Effect,’ Not a Fluke

January 8, 2011 by

If you think the YouTube-catapulted rise of Ted Williams—the now-famous homeless man with the “golden voice”—is a fluke, you should read The Dragonfly Effect, by author-couple Andy Smith and Jennifer Aaker.

The book is a must read for anybody interested in using social media to drive social change. It’s full of big strategies, small tips, and real-life success stories proving you don’t need money or power to inspire seismic change in a Web 2.0 world. All you need is motivation, a good wireless connection, and an understanding of social media and psychological insights.

The William’s video, as originally posted by the YouTube user identified only as “Ritchey” on Monday, is a perfect example of a “Dragonfly Effect” communications piece (the same principles would hold true for an e-mail, tweet, blog post, Facebook update, etc.).

When “Ritchey” wrote, “Throwing this video from The Columbus Dispatch out there, hoping we can find this talent a place to call home,” he framed the video perfectly to focus viewers on a concrete goal–helping out a talented homeless man. The video itself did the rest:

  • Grab your attention with something unexpected: a panhandler with the “God-given gift of a great voice”
  • Engage your empathy when Williams says, “God bless you” for receiving a dollar, tells his story about drug and alcohol addictions, and shares his hope for a new start
  • Make you feel good and useful to share his story and forward the video

That’s the “Dragonfly Effect” formula for success—Focus, Grab Attention, Engage, Take Action—while connecting people with tangible meaning and joy (and without provoking paralysis about the depressing scale of the problem at hand).

It’s hard to say whether “Ritchey” knew about the “Dragonfly Effect” formula when he or she posted the video on YouTube. It is certain, however, The Columbus Dispatch doesn’t know about it and the video was strengthened when the newspaper lost control of it (there’s an excellent post on The Columbus Dispatch’s lack of social media savvy on the prTini blog, including great recommendations for traditional media outlets to protect their content while still capturing online attention).

Just as the “Dragonfly Effect” formula was designed to do, “Ritchey’s’ small act (which completed the formula and went beyond reposting a great video without a clear call to action) had a ripple effect, leading to significant and rapid change. Watch the video below to see Williams recording a new KRAFT Macaroni & Cheese ad, one of the many jobs he has been offered this week.

What do you think about the “Dragonfly Effect” and this video? Do you think “Ritchley’s” addition made any difference? Please share your ideas below.

Filed Under: Books, Causes Tagged With: , , , , , , , , ,

Video Clip of the Month: Anti-Genocide ‘Paparazzi’

January 1, 2011 by

My January 2011 video clip of the month is a MSNBC news report about an unprecedented plan to use crowdsourcing to stop war and war crimes in their bloody tracks.

The plan, the brainchild of American actor George Clooney, is using commercial satellite images and the Internet to monitor the border between northern and southern Sudan. Oil-rich South Sudan is set to vote Jan. 9 on a proposal to become independent from North Sudan, a move the former U.S. Director of National Intelligenc fears could reignite civil war and lead to genocide.

Under the “Satellite Sentinel Project,” real-time satellite images will be combined with field analysis from the Enough Project and the Harvard Humanitarian Initiative to document movements of troops and tanks, masses of people fleeing, or bombed or burned villages. The United Nations Operational Satellite Applications Program will then publish the data online using Google Maps and Google Earth technology for the world to see.

“We want to let potential perpetrators of genocide and other war crimes know that we’re watching, the world is watching,” Clooney said in a prepared statement with John Prendergast, a journalist, human rights activist, and Enough Project co-founder. “War criminals thrive in the dark. It’s a lot harder to commit mass atrocities in the glare of the media spotlight.”

Clooney and Prendergast pointed to western Sudan’s Darfur region, where thousands died and many more were displaced after the government in Khartoum cracked down on a local rebellion. 

“Since photographers could not get access, it took years to amass evidence of genocide,” they said. “But now we can witness in near real-time and put all parties on notice that if they commit war crimes, we will all be watching, and pressuring policymakers to take action.”

While this video clip of the month is a little off topic for my blog, I couldn’t pass it up. The project may represent a historic moment for peacemaking and real chance for peace for the people of South Sudan. That makes great news—and a great video clip—for the new year. Check it out below.

What do you think about Clooney’s anti-genocide “paparazzi?” Please share your thoughts below.

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Filed Under: Relief & Development Tagged With: , , , , , ,

Google Mini Wave Quietly Washes Ashore

December 19, 2010 by

Have you ever received an e-mail with critical information about an event but an unrelated subject line? If you didn’t flag it and needed it a few weeks or months later, you could end up wasting quite a bit of time digging for it. 

Solving this problem by keeping all related conversations in one chronologically organized spot was the genius behind Google Wave, the social networking platform Google launched with much fanfare last year. While many saw its potential, adoption was minimal causing its development to be halted and its code to be open sourced in a stripped down version renamed Apache Wave.

I was intrigued to learn this weekend that Google Labs was quietly debuting a new product called Shared Spaces, using Google Wave technology. According to Google Lab’s official about page, here is what it is meant to do:

A shared space is an easy way for you to share mini-collaborative applications, like scheduling tools or games, with your friends or colleagues.

Shared Spaces seems to be basically Google Wave gadgets that exist outside of Google Wave. Under Shared Spaces, you will be able to quickly create a “space,” grab a gadget from the gallery of 50 that already exist, and then paste the Space’s URL into a chat window, e-mail message, tweet or any other content-sharing platform you normally use.

This is a big improvement over Google Wave, which required you and your collaborators to create and use special Google Wave accounts and e-mail addresses to use it. It’ll be interesting to see if these changes help Shared Spaces, which so quietly washed ashore, turn into the next wave in social networking  or even the tsunami Google Wave was hoped to be.

Filed Under: Technology Tagged With: , , , ,