people knowing me well, know that i love a good debate. Below i want to share an article i used to challenge myself to find ways to make social media relevant. I love this article because it does stretch even teh firmest believers in finding the right arguments to counter the below article.
now fellow digital marketers: read and feel challenged :-)
I Hate Social Media<http://www.idc.com/getdoc.jsp?containerId=lcUS22086209>
Cushing Anderson<http://www.idc.com/getdoc.jsp?containerId=PRF000009>
November 17, 2009
uugh - I hate social media!
Social media (and many other phenomena including informal learning) is facilitating a culture where everyone's opinion is considered equally valid. Regardless of background, topic or complexity of the subject, blogger, talk show hosts and loudmouths on the bus can complain into their phone (or whatever medium) that the coach is an idiot, the government is out to get them and their kid is too smart for school and within moments their opinion can be treated as authoritative because its "published". But, as an observer of things and an analyzer of futures, I would like to put my staff of knowledge in the ground, stick my tongue out and blow "phthewt". (Though my wife would complain, I have no sense of the irony of that action.)
The Patriots lose a game against the Colts because the Patriots' coach decided that an unconventional strategy gave them a better chance to win than a more common strategy. Some/many/most of Patriot Nation blames the coach for a bad decision on the basis of the "fact" that they absolutely lost because of failure to execute that play, and yet they might not have lost if they had done something (anything) else. When presented with statistical evidence of the "odds of winning", a talk radio hosts this morning disparaged "odds" and relied on his own observations to say what works. (BTW - In that situation, the Patriots had a better than 70% chance of winning that game no matter what they did; They had a 79% chance of making the first down, and winning, and a 70% chance of punting and winning - or something like that<http://www.boston.com/sports/football/patriots/articles/2009/11/17/belichick_had_the_numbers_on_his_side/> ) But they had a 30% chance of losing no matter what they did. So why are we spending so much time talking about this? I hate social media for giving every opinion a megaphone.
This morning the news is filled with the "controversial" recommendations by the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force against routine screening mammography in women aged 40 to 49 years. "The benefits are less and the harms are greater when screening starts in the 40s" according to the co-chair of the task force. As the husband of a woman impacted by these recommendations, I thought this was worth looking into. According to one local TV announcer turned pundit on the TV stations' blog "Pardon me if this Doctor's daughter is more than a little skeptical about this "Government Panel.<http://cbslocalblogs.prospero.com/n/blogs/blog.aspx?nav=main&webtag=wbz_morning&entry=1032>"" The TV announcer/now commentator goes on to imply that this is a cost decision and over-stepping of government bureaucracy - "Should a Government Panel be over-ruling scores of physicians on this?" she asks.
I absolutely don't know the math on this, but I am sure context is important: With very little effort, I found the panel's recommendations<http://www.ahrq.gov/clinic/uspstf/uspsbrca.htm>. The very next words following the "controversial" recommendation were: "The decision to start regular, biennial screening mammography before the age of 50 years should be an individual one and take patient context into account, including the patient's values regarding specific benefits and harms."
If a procedure hurts more than it helps, patients and their doctors should know that - and should choose based both specific circumstances and the broader "recommendations". If insurance companies use this as an opportunity to stop reimbursements where doctors and their patients believe earlier screening is justified, the blogosphere, pundits and egomaniac analysts should complain about that - no one but a patient and her doctor should be dictating treatment options. But disparaging the research because it doesn't agree with past recommendations, or because we disagree with health care legislation in Congress, or because one can cite many examples where early detection and treatment were successful is ignoring the far more numerous cases of false positives and complications that come from misdiagnosis. Its easy to incite discord when talking about a "government panel" and "health care" in the same breadth, but a knee jerk reaction doesn't seem to be warranted in this case. Unfortunatly, an "anchor-pundit" is free to imply whatever misdeed has gotten her hackles up, claim authority because she is the daughter of a Doctor, and doubt these recommendations without reading past the first sentence of the home page. I hate social media (with the emphasis on either word) for facilitating indignation without understanding.
Also this morning, a respected colleague sent me a link on the learning styles of "digital natives"<http://www.zefrank.com/explicit/2009/11/digital_natives_complete.html> and rhetorically asked if our university model of education was passe? I read the piece, thought for a nanosecond and let my head fall noisily to my desk. [BTW digital native<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_native> is a phrase coined by Mark Prensky to describe people of a certain age - younger than me, but not necessarily kids, who have always known and used digital tools.]
I can't conclude that education as we know it is done for from this blog post - there are 76 million students (K-college) in the US - 17.6 m in college. Our education system is designed for "mass education" and it has many problems - funding, inappropriate measurement and objectives, poor stakeholder prioritization, however its biggest problem is it has very little variation in the model. (Words are getting in the way - "very little" meaning limited distribution in the overall population amongst the wide variety of options that are available.) The digital native blog post reflects the observations of a learning environment that expresses nearly the exact opposite of the most populated form of our instructional model: no structure, low kid-count, no instructors. However, in no way does it suggest the more common model is invalid. It also is very reflective of both the environment and the wonder of a school called "Summerhill" that was opened in the 1920s. Summerhill operates<http://www.summerhillschool.co.uk/pages/basics.html> on a principle of "free school" - a decentralized network in which skills, information, and knowledge are shared without hierarchy or the institutional environment of formal schooling.
Selecting a set of 30 "young-ens" who have gotten themselves noticed for one reason or another - putting them in an environment where they are expected to interact without structure is not an experiment or a naturally evolving system - it is a clever marketing "tactic" (aka gimmick) for Deutsche Telekom to get bloggers to write about their more traditional event. The observations of one "young-en", Max, may suggest areas of investigation for improving both the "classical model" of education and possibly seeds of ideas for creations of new models. However, one observation does not a downfall indicate. I hate social media for what often is a lack of context.
On a positive note, taking observations seriously reminds me of a medical site dedicated to facilitating the exchange of observations<http://www.sermo.com/> about drugs, devices and clinical issues. These aren't presented as "facts" - but as observations that can be validated by others and ultimately investigated by researchers who will take the time to understand the issue and its complexities. When you put 110k doctors in a room and can organize the cacophony you can get some really good insight. But one expert making an observation out of context and who broadcast to the world leaves a lot to be desired.
The reason my head hit the desk so loudly is because even "experts" can fail to consider the broader context and complexities interwoven with existing processes before claiming some magnificent insight. I have recently returned from the Elliot Masie's Learning2009<http://www.learning2009.com/> event [if you time it right, you will see my picture on the right side]. On the main stage, in front of 1300 people and in reponse to a question from Elliot, an economist turned education observer claimed the "old model" of instruction will be dead in 10 years. Access to information will eliminate the need for extensive study and every one could be functionally an "expert". Nice thought, very little supporting evidence for the conclusion. Then we heard from Chesley Sullenberger - the pilot who landed the plane in the Hudson after his plane's engines failed right after takeoff. He believes that years of conscientious training, a deep passion for getting better at his profession, and tremendous effort at improving the work culture and leadership capabilities of airline pilots were each critical to the successful resolution of that mishap. He has even written a book<http://www.amazon.com/Highest-Duty-Search-Really-Matters/dp/0061924687> about it. Not an education expert, but some valuable, experience based insight worth considering. (See, I don't mind taking advice from a lone voice, but I prefer the lone voice to have some credibility, expertise and, OK, I'll admit it, grey hair.) I hate social media permitting us to elevate opinions to authority.
Speaking as a pundit, egoist and blogger, I have to say that I hate social media. To uncover truth, trends or the "future", current observations can be valuable inputs ('"The future is already here - it is just unevenly distributed" - William Gibson<http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/William_Gibson>) but MUST be placed in the broader context of (more) complete understanding, circumstance and with consideration of the opinions and conclusion of informed people. The increasing prevalence of social media, talk radio and loudmouths on the bus, makes it too easy for ill-considered opinions to drown out more reasoned thought.
For social media to live up to its transformative potential it should
* Amplify the collective opinion - wisdom of crowds works.
* Facilitate understanding and if that leads to indignation, OK
* Faciliate ever increasing context - the story is endless, and the web can help us organize it
* Ensure we understand where the opinion comes from.
Caroline Dangson, IDC's collaboartive applications/social media analyst has reseached corporate guidance <http://www.idc.com/getdoc.jsp?sessionId=UKQUSR331O0YQCQJAFICFFAKBEAUMIWD&containerId=220235> for participating in social media. She adds items like
* Support opinions with facts
* Add value, not noise
*
Be transparent about who you are
I will now retire with my staff of knowledge.
