Social Media Influencing Behavior

Is anyone else with me when I say I am really enjoying Socialnomics? It’s such an easy read and it really holds my attention though out the entire assigned reading.

Anyway, that being said, I’m going to focus my blog post to those readings.

In chapter 2, Qualman talks about the rebellious guy and the prudish girl and how the guy’s behavior might change if he is in the girl’s online network. That got me thinking: So often we view social networking sites as a way to express ourselves, however, I think we publish what we want others to know about us because we want to be portrayed in a particular way. In a way, social media acts as a gatekeeper for information for who we want to be, instead of who we truly are.

I found the case studies on microblogging to be very interesting, in particular the story around Comcast. I thought that was great that they hired someone to follow Tweets on Comcast, however, I feel it is somewhat reactive in nature because they only acted after a problem was identified. However, I will give them kudos for righting a wrong. Additionally, it’s a great PR move on Comcast’s part because it shows they care about their customers.

I found conclusion that a friend posting on a social media site to be very interesting. Qualman stated that if you have a friend who is known to be very picky about a particular product or service, their posted opinion could be easily dismissed. For example, I have a brother-in-law who works with computers and I could see him easily dismissing a particular brand of computer because he has much higher expectations of a computer than the average user.

In chapter 3, I loved the sub-heading: “Are you on Facebook?” is the new “Can I get your phone number?” From my experience, this is SO true! I was trying to set my sister up with a guy from my work and he simply said, “Tell her to add me on Facebook.” I think the idea of blind dating as we know it is gone because someone can easily look up someone on Facebook by a first and a last name.

Overall, it’s interesting to see the way social media influences our lives and the choices we make.

Blogging in Secret!

My Experience with Blogging

I actually have a personal blog, which I write for myself more than anyone else. Considering it’s password protected, and my husband is the only one with the password, I guess it truly is for myself. The first blog I ever had was in college before “blog” became a buzzword (does that make me sound old? I’m only 27!) and it was just called a “LJ” (short for Livejournal). My family and friends had my LJ URL and I updated while I was studying abroad in England. Fast forward to July 2010 – I started my blogger.com blog, which is what I still write in today. I write an average of one post a day – mostly about what’s going on in my life, nothing very exciting at all. The main reason I haven’t shared my blog with anyone is because it’s my space to be completely honest with how I feel, while not worrying about anyone else’s feelings. Apart from writing in my own blog, I follow several personal blogs, and blogs on natural food eating and DIY/home improvement blogs (how many times did I say “blog” in one sentence? ha!).

Reading Reflections

In Nardi’s article “Why we blog,” they state that in blogging, the reader gets a strong sense of the author, which could be why we’re drawn to them as humans. If you respect someone and view them as creditable, it’s no surprise that you’re likely to tune into their opinions on topics you’re interested in. Something else that struck me in that article was this: “Most bloggers are acutely aware of their readers…calibrating what they should and should not reveal.” I think this is precisely one of the big challenges of blogging. Authors have to censor themselves to some extent so not to alienate or offend their readers, who make the blog successful in the first place.

In Du and Wagner’s article about learning logs, it stated that web logs could be used instead of written papers to prove understanding and comprehension on the students part, which I think is a fantastic idea because it creates discussion between students and the professor instead of one-way communication that papers provide between the professor and the individual student. Plus, I think there are some very interesting and insightful disucssions that could pop up in a blogging environment that normally wouldn’t be brought to light in traditional circumstances.