Bjørn Bergslien

Social media and technology: What future journalists need to know

Social media, the Internet and new technology have fundamentally changed journalism. In fact, if you want to be a journalist nowadays, you should have an understanding of IT and know your way around the social media landscape. And it would help if you were a programmer too.

According to Woody Lewis, a social media strategist and web architect, social media has changed journalism. In the article, he argues that “social journalism” will soon be an essential component of any news organization’s overall strategy.

Newspapers today use social networks such as Twitter, Facebook and YouTube to get ideas, promote content, share links and stories, create and maintain communities and collaborate with the public. The future is, as we’ve already established, social and collaborative.

Because of this, tomorrow’s journalists need to have an understanding of new media. In fact, universities have begun to include social media in their journalism degree programs. Students are taught how to use social media to promote content, to connect with the online journalism community, how to gather information, do “twitterviews” and maintain valuable sources. Ethics is also an important aspect of social journalism.

Social media training is a building block in the education of future journalists. Because today, you probably won’t be able graduate from journalism school and get a job straight away unless you know your way around cyberspace. As Joe Grimm, a visiting journalist at the Michigan State University School of Journalism says: Social media skills are often needed to qualify for a journalism job.

Grimm has looked at several job descriptions, and the trend is that you now need social media skills to qualify for most journalism jobs. News organizations combine journalism, technology and social media – so if you have an understanding of technology and social media, you’ll get much farther.

In December last year, Mashable.com had an article on so-called “programmer-journalists”: You need journalists who comprehend and appreciate technology to cope with new media demands from the public. As the newsroom and storytelling becomes increasingly interactive, aspiring journalists will encounter tougher technological preconditions.

In another article on Mahable.com, it says that tomorrow’s journalists must have a certain degree of programming skills (HTML, CSS, PHP, JavaScript and such) and they have to be familiar with multimedia storytelling.

The overall trend is clear: Future journalists who want to succeed need to have a deeper understanding of technology, multimedia and interactive storytelling techniques. They need to embrace the new media landscape and start using social networks. Without this, they’ll struggle to get a job.

MySpace is dead. MySpace is not dead?

It’s been a turbulent couple of years for MySpace. But now, the Rupert Murdoch and News Corp-owned social networking site is set to regain its popularity. What will be different this time?

Let’s wind the clocks back a year: In April 2009, one of the creators of MySpace, Chris DeWolfe, stepped down as CEO. He was replaced by Oven Van Natta, who lasted less than a year as CEO. Now, Mike Jones and Jason Hirschhorn are running the show. And they’re determined to restore the social media giant.

Even though MySpace has lost business, momentum and users, Myspace is not dead, according to Jason Hirschhorn. He tells The Guardian that MySpace is in no state of panic, regardless of what anyone else thinks. He and Mike Jones have a plan to “nurse MySpace back to prime health”.

So what will be different this time?
First of all, MySpace will focus on creating a new design that’s cleaner and more usable. Traditionally, the MySpace design has been a bit of a mess. Or it’s been what The Guardian refers to as “idiosyncratic” – in the sense that users can change and tweak the design pretty much any which way they prefer.

This is different from Facebook where design, colors, background, links and such are strictly controlled. Facebook also continuously work on new designs, fixing usability problems and improving the GUI.

MySpace will still be different – it will have the idiosyncratic feel – but I still think they’ve come to realize that they need to maintain and preserve a certain degree of usability. It needs to be easy to use, easy to share content, and easy to navigate. Otherwise the users get confused, no matter how “cool” or “fresh” it might look.

There will also be more games and applications – in addition to music and movie elements. Actually, this is starting to sound a bit like Facebook if you ask me.

MySpace is still dead
I think it will be very difficult to “nurse MySpace back to prime health”. Yes, they can change CEOs and promise users changes for the better. But in the end, the social media landscape is brutal. Users have moved away from MySpace and embraced Facebook. It will not be easy to allure those users back to MySpace. If they are to come back, MySpace will have to prove better than Facebook. And that’s not going to happen any time soon. MySpace remains dead.

Here’s a Search Volume Index on Facebook (blue) vs. MySpace (red):

Basic web usability: 4 elements that should be included on all sites

Regardless of what type of business, organization or company you are running – there are certain elements a user expects to find on your website: Search, navigation, your company’s logo and “Contact us”.

Element #1: Search
Best practices and eyetracking studies suggest that search should be placed on your upper right hand corner. That’s where the user expects it to be. Search is also one of the most important functions of your website – search is how most of your visitors find the information they’re looking for. Make it easy to spot and easy to use. And the results should, needless to say, be accurate.

Element #2: Navigation
Some people prefer search; others prefer navigating through the menu to find the information they’re looking for. Traditionally, navigational menus have been placed on the left-hand side, but thanks to blogs and changes in design, navigation is now commonplace both on your left, right and horizontally on top. More websites are experimenting with footer-based navigation. No matter where you place it, make sure it’s there and available to your visitors.

Element #3: The company logo
No, this is not so that your users know they’re on Company X’s website. Rather, I’d argue that the logo is a lifebuoy, in the sense that if your users get lost in the enormous amounts of content you probably have on your website, they can always find their way back to the beginning by clicking on the logo. The logo provides buoyancy to prevent drowning. Place it in the upper-left corner.

Element #4: Contact us
Once the visitor finds the information he is looking for, make it easy for him to contact you easily to find out more, to ask questions or to buy the product. On all your sites and sub-sites, you should have contact information readily available. Make sure that there is a “Contact us” link in the global menu, either at the top or in the footer. It’s easier and more user-friendly.

Because your intranet sucks: 5 tips to building a better intranet

Let’s face it: Too many intranets lack focus and are difficult to use. They are counterproductive and a hindrance in the sense that they inhibit employees instead of making them more efficient. Here’s what you can do to improve your intranet.

Tip #1: Understand that it’s not about the technology
First you need to accept the fact that an intranet isn’t primarily about technology. Yes, there’s an installation on a server somewhere. But for the majority of your employees, the intranet is a place to store, manage, share and find information. It’s a communications and collaborative hub. Your employees are the main focus; it should be intuitive and user-friendly for them.

Tip #2: Build a user-centric information architecture
Navigational menus are often structured in the same ways your organization is structured. That might make sense to the human resources (HR) or the information department. But too often, there is no logic behind this, and it becomes confusing and frustrating to the end-user (your employees). Navigation and information architecture should be structured according to what is instinctive and intuitive – not necessarily according to internal organizational structure.

Tip #3: Make sure search works as it should
Surveys show that navigation and search are two of the most important aspects of an intranet in a larger corporation. People use search to find other employees, knowledge, blogs and documents. Search is a key component – so don’t stuff it up or make it difficult for your employees to find and use.

Tip #4: Focus on the top tasks
Do you know what your employees’ top tasks are when they visit the intranet? Why are they even on the intranet in the first place? You need to do research, ask, evaluate and find out what the top tasks are and focus your user interface and functionality around those tasks. Too many intranets are chock-full of fancy functions no one seems to care about.

Tip #5: Incorporate social software
There’s no doubt: The future is social and collaborative. As your employees start using services such as Facebook, Twitter, Flickr, LinkedIn and other types of social media they will in turn start to expect similar platforms and technologies in a work environment. They expect to be able to communicate easily, share information, collaborate on projects online and comment on status updates. Enterprise social software will make its way into your business and your employees will love it.

You might be interested in reading:
Key trends in social computing for businesses 2010-2015
How social software drives organizational change

A summary of Socialnomics

I have just finished reading Socialnomics: How social media transforms the way we live and do business by Erik Qualman. The book looks at several interesting aspects of social media, how it affects human behavior and how it changes business.

The first chapter talks about the rise of new media – more specifically about topics such as search engines, online news, new business models, micro revenue streams and viral marketing (See Dancing Matt – who has become a so-called “Internet celebrity”).

Chapters two and three look at how social media changes human behavior: On the one hand it makes us more reserved and careful, because everything is open and transparent (What happens in Vegas stays on YouTube). On the other hand, social media stimulates “braggadocian” behavior (bragging and empty boasting). It’s all about me and my brand.

Chapter four deals with Barack Obama’s use of social media in the presidential race. This is to illustrate just how powerful social media can be.

Chapter five is about social media as a “referral system”. According to Qualman, we care a lot about what people we know think about a product or a company. We listen to people and their recommendations rather than companies. This means businesses have to rethink their marketing strategies.

“Social schizophrenia” is another term used in this book. In chapter six, Qualman argues that we can no longer act as multiple people with multiple personalities. Facebook and other social networks expose us on a completely different level than only half a decade ago.

The last two chapters look at how companies need to change their approach to marketing if they are to stay in the race. Social media is everywhere – marketing, communications, politics, job recruitment, sports and so on. The lines between business and personal personas are diminishing. Therefore, Erik Qualman argues, we need to take social media seriously.

What do I think?
The book has been criticized for being poorly edited and unfounded – and I must say I do agree with this. Much effort hasn’t been put into editing and proofreading the book. And some of Qualman’s arguments are groundless. This said, the book can be read in a couple of days; it’s an easy read. And it still highlights several important aspects of new media.