What’s in your social web?
With all the talk of “social” in the web today, I started getting really tired of the references to social networking or social media and so on. After all, isn’t networking social by its very nature? What I eventually came to recognize though is that all these tools online are just another means to extend and empower us in life. Whether for our personal or professional lives, the way we’ve adapted these tools and technologies is the important part. I’ve come to call these tools and the use of them the “social web” as it’s a culmination of the technologies and how we use them.
So past all the great site and service ideas, there is actual real-life functionality. That’s what we’re looking for in most of this, simply some way to connect easier, or communicate faster, or share ideas with more information and context. Through our use of these web 2.0 technologies we like to lump together and call “social media” or “social networks” there is something more important to each of us: how we use it.
My question, then, is how do you use the social web? Is it for work? Is it for play? Is it to connect with friends & relatives? Is it to build your brand? Do you use it to speak for yourself or your company? What’s in your social web?
Photo credit: ecstaticist
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Comments
Comment by Nicole Hamilton Hi Rick,
Tech difficulties…hoping I haven’t submitted this post 5 times…
I started following you on Twitter today so I thought I would stop by and check out your blog. Interesting post. As I begin using social media as a means for our company to communicate with anyone and everyone (hopefully), I think the greatest challenge has been deciding how to blur the lines between my company use and personal use. While our audiences are different I think regardless, ultimately, your true voice shines through. I am ok with this knowing that I was brought on board @ Flirt because of it. However, the greater challenge for me has been deciding when to comment, especially when I may have on one of my personal platforms, and when to hold back.
Even if I were to create separate profiles on Facebook, one for our company and my personal one, I know as a consumer/stakeholder I would still be as to authenticity of the voice on the other side–I may even see if a company blogger has a personal blog, and so on. You get my point. I think often the lines of transparency blur between company and personal use. Which is the point, or at least I would hope this is the case–to be as authentic and real as possible. So why not go all out? And hopefully, if you are as lucky as I am, you will have a company who supports either/or because they hired you for that very reason in the first place.
So I guess to get to the point, I think it is all of the above, because your brand is you and you are your brand. Friends or family, customers or stakeholders, whoever your communicating with I think I always keep in mind that if I am using a social network, most likely these two “different” audiences will be connected to one another in some way anyways 
Comment by Nicole Hamilton and maybe I should read over my post first, sorry about the choppy second paragraph, hopefully you can still get a good idea of what I was going for.
Looking forward to some of your future post.
Comment by Rick Mahn malbiniak, Nicole,
The social web is a great place to explore, connect, and keep in touch with so many, so easily. Thanks for your points - I love learning about how others use these tools and explore them for their companies, clients or themselves.
For branding or for socializing, it’s an exciting, wild world.
hi rick,
i was having this same conversation with my mother on a long car ride yesterday. she’s nearing the 60s, needs screen by screen printout tutorials to check her gmail, and couldn’t be more removed from the facebook generation.
she’s the type that clips out wedding announcements, or news clippings when my friends make the local papers. she hadn’t sent anything in a while, and launched into her dan rather style news coverage about my, well, social network. it seemed for every update of information she had, i had two or three more recent updates. “how are you staying in touch with them?” i’m not, facebook is.
facebook (specifically) allows me to bridge connections with friends and classmates from the long long ago that i’d probably never run into again, if it weren’t for facebook. now i know if a classmate is in iraq, or if they just popped out (another) kid, or if i’m really the only one from my class that’s still unmarried. does it make those connections artificial? no. does it replace real life communication? no. it complements them.
but to finally get to your question, how do you use the social web? all of the above, but rarely all of the above across all of the different social networks (the granular social web). my facebook friends don’t want to hear me hock my brand, unless my brand is something my friends would appreciate even if i wasn’t behind it. my linkedin network probably doesn’t care to see drunken pictures of me flashing my belly button (risque!). each has a different audience, and each audience has unique interests.
cool, my coffee is gone