These are my links for August 16th through August 17th:

  • What Makes Social Media Trustworthy? – An enlightening survey that shows levels of perceived ‘trust’ in different forms of social media, with blogs by people you know as the most trusted source, but Twitter/Facebook updates less so. The best element for creating a sense of trust: be open to both positive and negative comments, and sustain a high quality dialogue in your online community.
  • What Nonprofits Can Teach Brands About Social – US research shows charities are trendsetters for using social media, with an impressive 97% adoption in some form of social media use. What a great way to engage with volunteers, givers and stakeholders.
  • Trinity Mirror’s Birmingham Mail Linking Out To Local Bloggers – The hyperlocal trend continues, and this time local blogs are being used by local papers to stem the loss of journalist content (cynical view) or to create interactive, locally driven content. This article talks about a relationship between the publisher and blogger, but via the Twitter watercooler it appears that no permission has been sought in fact. This open up an interesting dilemma for bloggers: by releasing a RSS feed, are you giving permission for others publisher in the professional media to re-publish your work? Creative Commons license give scope for this.
  • MTVN UK Does A Bebo, Commissions Its First Online-Only Social Drama – The future was looking bleak for interactive drama in UK since the main funder of the form, Bebo, has gone into demise. Youth brand MTV has taken up the mantle by commissioning an issue based drama, Being Victor,combining filmed, blogging and social media elements.
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These are my links for July 12th through July 14th:

  • What makes the perfect Transmedia Producer? – In-depth discussion on the types of skills and approaches which are working in transmedia. It's heavily led to the Alternative Reality Game (ARG) producers rather than wider producer of entertainment media for new platforms.
  • Social media monitoring: time to say ‘sod it’? – Thought piece on why moderating – and interrupting – Joe Public's conversations in social media may not be a great idea. I think it depends on what you do – people often Tweet about brands because they want help/ response, and certainly being responsive on your own profiles is critical. Joining in wider conversations (e.g. forums or general discussion) will depend on how useful a contribution you can make to the discussion. This may favour technology/product suppliers more than consumer goods and services.
  • UK online video stats: Youngsters favour C4 and ITV over BBC – Blimey: how online video has grown. 2010 sees 5.5 Billion online vdieo viewed each month in the UK, with BBC, ITV and BlinkX as fastest growing properties. Interestingly, the desirable youn 'uns (16-24 year olds) are preferring ITV and Channel to BBC properities.
  • Concept Feedback | Free Concept Reviews for Marketers, Designers and Developers – Here's an interesting 'concept' – this website is a community of designers which lets you upload your concepts for design, websites and print and get feedback from other community members. Offer enough feedback and it's free, or pay a small fee. A great way to get feedback within a community wider than your own organisation, but in a closed setting.
  • Cultivated Play: Farmville – Intelligent article by A. J Patrick Liszkiewicz on why Farmville defines many of the rules of being a good game, but creates social capital through effectively a peer pressure to be kind to your friends (& Farmville neighbours). I'm wondering in anyone in the gaming/digital industry actually like Farmville – no evidence yet, but no denying simple, formulaic social gaming is a major global phenomena. (hat tip: Pete Ashton).
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These are my links for April 8th through April 11th:

  • The Collapse of Complex Business Models – Author and academic, and writer of "Here Comes Everybody" Clay Shirky write a good piece on simplifying bureaucracies and business models, using the example of user generated video and 'In The Motherhood', a small hit online drama that failed as a conventional TV series.
  • Forecast: TV, Internet Will Lead Advertising Back Up As Print Wanes – Predicted stats for advertising from 2008-2012 globally, showing that TV (after a fall) is set for growth to return to 2008 levels this year, and internet advertising will continue strong growth, whilst print, cinema and advertising are set for a slight decline in spend. Of digital, the strongest growth will be in paid search followed by display advertising.
  • Digital Economy Bill: Quick Guide To All 45 Measures – Great summary of the Digital Economy Bill, due to be passed as law this Monday, showing all 45 measures, and which have been withdrawn. Interesting to see that Channel 4 now have a remit of distributing film and supporting 'innovative content' and children's programmes as part of their public service remit.
  • What Social Media Will Look Like in 2012 – Insightful article by Freddie Laker on how social media will grow to become an intrinsic part of the digital experience by 2012, as the semantic web and user recommendation seemlessly interweaves with search, ecommerce and other web experiences. I like the idea of seeing aggregated realtime updates of users before you put in a phone call, and ratings as a core part of the e-commerce experience.
  • Bebo’s friends desert it – Business Analysis & Features, Business – Yet another social networking giant looks set to bite the dust.. as MySpace hangs in there, Bebo looks set to have its doors shut by owners AOL. Failure to invest and understand the needs of its youth demographic, particularly in failing to support social gaming, have led to the downfall of the fun site. Big shame as Bebo were once investors of online TV programming such as Kate Modern, and this gap, coupled with Endemol's recent annoucement of scaling down their digital team due to limited online tv investment, heralds the death-too-soon of pureplay web television.
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These are my links for March 29th through March 30th:

  • BBC – Research and Development: The Mythology Engine – representing stories on the web – A very interesting article on a new BBC R&D experiment into the 'mythology engine', basically an online way of following the story universe of long-running drama. I could have done with this lately when I was trying to work out how to catch up on many gaps years of Eastenders storylines (answer: you can't. Wikipedia non-linear character profiles next best bet). I had no idea BBC was researching these kind of transmedia storytelling concepts – very much look forward to an eventual roll out.
  • Crossing the digital threshold – DIGITAL OPPORTUNITIES – This is an article I wrote for Arts Professional magazine for their 'digital opportunities' edition. It's about a current client, Threshold Studios (a media training organisation) and how they are meeting challenges of entering the digital space for both comms, marketing and training their beneficiaries. Some other good articles in the magazine too including an experiment with Twitter as a social tool by Pilot Theatre. This content is usually behind a paywall so have a look at it quickly…
  • Google wins AdWords trademark case – There seems to be quite a bit of wrangling going on with copyright holders trying (rightfully) to protect use of their trademark whilst (wrongly) restrict others to use their trademark name. This ruling ensure that all words – trademarked or otherwise – are fair game in the online advertising space.
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These are my links for February 9th through February 11th:

  • New BBC Director Mandates Journalists Use Social Media – Look like BBC, along with other news rooms, are insisting that journalists 'get with da programme' and get connected with Twitter, RSS etc as a news gathering and feedback reponse. Hoorah.
  • Cross platform storytelling links – Some links I will soon be checking out to interactive storytelling projects from an Indie Training Fund event I recently attended.
  • Big brands see mixed results on Twitter – US stats showing many big brands are achieving more success on Facebook than Twitter, where even Apple don't have a presence (is this REALLY true?). Article suggests Twitter is waning in popularity, but actually for me it's maybe taking up on more specific niches which attract special interest group and a more connected community (and big brands, that probably doesn't include you).
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