When I read the social media gurus' thoughts, many buzzwords are used. Some of them are widely confusing for clients. Let's go for a list of 10 key-words that need to be simplified
- social media: well, newspapers don't speak, blogs don't speak, Facebook does not speak neither. So basically, if someone aks you what it's all about, I'd say it's "people talking to people" once they've logged in: it avoids to go deep into technical matters
- blogging: I had a little argument with a guy last week-end, who wanted to talk about servers' log etc. My parti-pris was to answer that now everybody's potentially a web-logger: when Mama logs in for her email account on Yahoo!, she now can publish contents through FlickR, interacts through MyBlogLog etc. So what's blogging? It's potentially anyone leaving a footprint online that can engage conversations with other internet users/bloggers
- Generation Y: I don't like this notion, as Mama can better use digital media than kids that have not been trained/who don't have any access to the web
- Life-Stream: it's linked to the former definition of blogging. Now your online & offline activities can be new life-stones shareable with your whole community & beyond
- WOM: no, it's not the noise of your nephew's moto. It's "word-of-mouth". Why is that important? Because what used to stay in a bar's discussion can now be found & recovered online. Our conversations are now kinda public, so as some analysis can emerge, you can get what people said years ago about an issue you're interested in. So Mama, when you ask your buddies what's the best Ibuprofen on your beloved forum: beware brands are watching you ;) which is a good news if you know it; you can be a true citizen lobbyist
Link to original post