Blogger: Mike Gotta (cross-post from Collaborative Thinking)
In an earlier post on social computing, I attempted to illustrate how I look at the topic and break social computing down into several sub-categories (e.g., social media, social networking), and the role social software plays as the tooling component. In this post, I'll offer up a definition of social media based on client interactions over the past several months.
Social Media, Definition V1.0:
Social media enables public and transparent participation models where people and organizations interact as peers. Social media possesses low-barriers to expression, engagement, and contribution to promote exchanges, relationships, and sense of community among its participants. Social media strategies include practices that facilitate behavioral and cultural contexts necessary for social media to be adopted and leveraged by its participants.
Social media itself is not a single technology or set of technologies as much as it is a design point for the application of social tools or leveraging of social platforms. Social media leverages a variety of network and infrastructure services, including end-user devices and form factors, to deliver contextual and situational user experiences that bond people with other participants in a trusted fashion.
Breaking it down:
Social media enables public and transparent participation models where people and organizations interact as peers.
I do not define what participation models are – which is a valid critique – but I actually prefer definitions that are somewhat open-ended and inclusive of many different implementation patterns. Examples of different participation models could include: online communities, social network sites, and / or Twitter-like systems – but the definition should not prescribe implementations.
I do believe that peer-like participation models are a key foundation for social media. Marketing, sales, or any other single enterprise area does not own social media. Therefore – no single business sponsor can try to grab the strategy – you need a governance model and decision framework. Whether it's based on a conversational model or a content model - the organization does not always lead - and neither to individuals - roles ebb-and-flow based on the type of participation model and context around the solution.
Public does not always been a complete access of any type of permission model (access controls) - but for those authorized - there is a "public" space for participation. Transparency is also crucial to social media. As with "public", transparent does not mean without any level of controls on what is shared. Public and transparent does not always mean that there are no controls but it does imply that there is a high degree of visibility and accessibility by those that have the opportunity to participate.
Social media possesses low-barriers to expression, engagement, and contribution to promote exchanges, relationships, and sense of community among its participants.
I think this is self-explanatory but it does imply the importance of media literacy - media literacies are becoming more crucial for effective participation in social media environments.
Social media strategies include practices that facilitate behavioral and cultural contexts necessary for social media to be adopted and leveraged by its participants.
This statement reinforces the idea that social media may not succeed simply because it is social media. Social media requires a certain level of design and adoption practices that concentrate on the myriad set of dynamics at play when you try to participate with people in a peer-like fashion. This part of the definition also would open a discussion on the practices needed to sustain social media solutions over time - that organizations need to adopt a program-like approach(change management, policies, governance, metrics, etc.).
Social media itself is not a single technology or set of technologies as much as it is a design point for the application of social tools or leveraging of social platforms. Social media leverages a variety of network and infrastructure services, including end-user devices and form factors, to deliver contextual and situational user experiences that bond people with other participants in a trusted fashion.
This part of the definition addresses those that feel social media is a particular type of technology. Social media is not about blogs, wikis, social network sites, iPhone apps, etc per se. It is a design point for a desired participation model. At some point - when you do get to the level of technology - then sure - sometimes it comes down to a tool discussion or a platform approach (e.g., leveraging Facebook or Twitter). But mostly it is about the participation model and how that participation flow helps the business in some way.
The mention of contextual and situational user experiences is important because often those elements are forgotten as people chase technology.
The idea of bonding people in a trusted fashion calls out the need to pay attention to underlying identity and security issues that also are not always in the forefront of social media initiatives.
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