Bad week for blogger & radio hosts, mixed week for txt & tweets

June 25, 2009June 25, 2009 / Angelo Fernando / Leave a comment

Talk about mixed signals!

I came across two SMS stories that left me feeling that we are still getting our minds and lives around the potential of one-to-one communication and what social media has delivered.

The first was about how SMS is being used as an early warning system in Bangladesh. to alert people to possible floods.
The second was how someone used SMS in Uganda to perpetrate a hoax swine flu warning. It appeared to come from the health ministry.
Then there’s the story of a blogger issuing death threats. OK, he’s also an Internet talk show host.
And this one about radio talk show host Michael Savage threatening to publish names and photos of people at Media Matters.
But in order to bookend this with good use of social media, check out how a student, going by the audacious Twitter handle of TehranBureau, is using it to keep the world updated with events going on there.

Seven building blocks for a good story

June 24, 2009 / Angelo Fernando / Leave a comment

We all tell stories, in some shape or form. They could start off with something like “Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way” (Anna Karenina). For the rest of us –even as we question the established technique— there are several ways to go after and craft a good story.

Tom Hallman, in last month’s Quill the magazine of the Society for Professional Journalists wrote a great piece on what separates a good story from a great one.

Distance – a story is more than a bunch of quotes, he says.
Stories are about things – People, not ‘things’ give people a chance to identify with the story
Direction – take the reader someplace
Pacing – Vary lengths of paragraphs
Theme – the best stories have an universal theme
Voice – this speaks for itself. You need to find your voice
Strong middle and powerful endings – pay attention to the entire story, not just the beginning

From: Building Blocks to a good story.

Hallman is a Pulitzer prize winner and features writer for the Oregonian.

Let’s rediscover the art of storytelling

June 17, 2009June 18, 2009 / Angelo Fernando / Leave a comment

I was chatting with a friend on Facebook who celebrated his mother’s 87th birthday, and how it’s not too late to listen to the wonderful stories our parents have to tell –if only we listen.

I always regret not recording some of his stories, especially when I spent the last few weeks with my dad. He had a fine art of storytelling. We use to call them ‘long stories’ and ‘yarns’ because he always threw in a bit of drama and lots of narrative detours to keep us riveted. He taught English and history, so he seemed to have the right ingredients of storytelling.

Today I always carry my digital recorder with me, because there are those unexpected moments that just present themselves, and you just want to capture it.

So this project, called the Interview Project from filmmaker David Lynch is something I just love. It is the fine art of letting people tell their own stories, on camera. Listen to this one, for instance, recorded last Saturday, June 13 in Moab Utah.

It reminds me of the StoryCorps project, begun in 2003.

To get back to my friend –and ex journalist — the point I made is that we are so busy telling our stories, posting nuggets of information about our lives, our accomplishments, our backyard barbecue … that we sometimes forget to listen.

I only wish the stories on Interview Project are not so short. They look tightly edited, and you end up feeling that a lot more of, say, Gordon’s story ended up on the cutting floor. Maybe there is a longer version, maybe the stories is part of a larger project. I checked if I could interview the folks behind it, to get the story behind the story.

Stay tuned!

Twitter and the politics of Iran

June 16, 2009 / Angelo Fernando / Leave a comment

Follow up to my previous post on Iran.

People have devised two ways for people caught in the middle of the crisis to anonymously post to Twitter.

One here.
And another one here.

In related news -related to the perceived power of Twitter over censorship — the State Department apparently asked the folks at Twitter to postpone a scheduled maintenance shutdown. According to this AP report the request was made “to keep information flowing from inside Iran amid the growing crisis over its disputed election.”

Oddly enough, as this is is being posted, Twitter is down for maintenance! On the Twitter blog, they had this to say:

“our network partners at NTT America recognize the role Twitter is currently playing as an important communication tool in Iran. Tonight’s planned maintenance has been rescheduled to tomorrow between 2-3p PST (1:30a in Iran).”

As Andrew Sullivan observed in the Atlantic, The revolution will be Twittered.

Quotes for the week ending June 13, 2009

June 13, 2009June 13, 2009 / Angelo Fernando / Leave a comment

“Authentic communication is the new requirement, a paradigm shift has already happened, and most companies and communicators haven’t made the shift.”

Barbara Gibson, in her last post (The Last Hurrah) as outgoing IABC chair.

“that onerous system of checks and rewrites and hand wringing where legions of non-writers add their personal stamp to a piece of communication … to the point of unreadability.”

Steve Crescenzo, citing one of the two biggest obstacles to effective internal comms. The other is an overzealous IT Team.

“Twitter Tees brings community-powered t-shirt design to Twitter.

Threadless, which launched a way for Twitter users to vote on 4 T shirts with tweets that include “in space, no one can hear you tweeet” and “140 is the new 420”

“He’s the most … trollish person I’ve ever worked with!”

Leo Laporte, after cutting off Tech Crunch’s Mike Arrington, who suggested that Laporte had received a free Palm Pre.

“Did I really want to tell the world that I was out of town? Because the card in my camera automatically added location data to my photos, anyone who cared to look at my Flickr page could see my computers, my spendy bicycle, and my large flatscreen TV all pinpointed on an online photo map.”

Israel Hyman of Arizona, who claims his house may have been robbed because of his Twitter updates.

“We got the cure for Search Overload Syndrome.”

Microsoft Bing copy, on Facebook

“Every three years, the world completely changes, which makes strategic planning difficult. But while you can’t predict a future, you can prepare yourself for multiple futures.”

Mike Curran, the unofficial jobs guru of Silicon Calley, who is retiring after 23 years as director of NOVA

“we forgot the relationship part of public relations”

Lee Hopkins (@leehopkins) tweeting at the #IABC09 conference in San Francisco this week

“Although the pandemic appears to have moderate severity in comparatively well-off countries, it is prudent to anticipate a bleaker picture…”

Dr Margaret Chan, Dir Gen of World Health Organization, on raising the global pandemic level to Level 6

“a high-stakes poker game”

Former U.N. Ambassador Bill Richardson, on North Korea sentencing of two US journalists, Laura Ling and Euna Lee

My foray into podcasting – Light Bulb Moments

June 11, 2009June 12, 2009 / Angelo Fernando / 1 Comment

Happy to note that I now have six podcasts published on iTunes.
They are also here at the Decision Theater blog.

More to follow!

I began the podcasts, Light Bulb Moments as a complement to the Decision Theater blog that bears the same name.

But none of this happenned overnight. Podcasting is an interesting a curious exercise. As those who do it will tell you, there are many components to it, from the interview prep, to the editing (if you’re not going live to the drive, as some pros like Mitch Joel and CC Chapman do), and the publishing.

My deep appreciation to two people –fellow IABC members– who have been my inspiration to get started: Shel Holtz and Neville Hobson. For the past –what was it?– three or more years I’ve listened to several communications and PR podcasts, and still do. But For Immediate Release has been one show I never fail to get back to. I learned the nuts and bolts of the trade from their book, How to do everything with podcasting, then took a class at ASU, and jumped in. Suddenly the deep-end doesn’t feel so intimidating.

A note about Light Bulb Moments. It’s a sort of a peek behind the curtain, if you will, at what goes on here at the Decision Theater.

The core area (left), a room with floor-to-ceiling screens is a high-tech interactive environment. It’s used for planning –scenario planning– systems thinking and policy making.

We work with cities, businesses, govt agencies, school districts / schools and non-profits; more recently in pandemic influenza planning exercises. It looks very complex from the outside. So since part of my job is to communicate and distill that complexity, podcasts are perfect for this. It lets me capture the light bulb moments, plus the nuances –right down to the ambient sound.

Full-on social media coverage for IABC World Conference

June 8, 2009June 10, 2009 / Angelo Fernando / Leave a comment

While I had to skip attending this year’s IABC World Conference that kicked off yesterday, it may be the year that best defines how how communication had turned a corner, with so many ways of covering an event.

Check this list of staff covering the event via Twitter.

Just a cursory search of the usual tools and you’ll find many ways to follow people and presentations, back-channel chatter, and some background to the events. Here are a few. I will update this as the conference proceeds.

Twitter, Of course. The Hash tag is IABC09. Goes without saying that almost everyone member at the conference is tweeting.

AudioBoo. The podcasting app for iPhone users. Already people like Donna Papacosta and Bryan Person have uploaded content.

For Immediate Release podcast. Show #455 from the conference flow.

Twitpic: Bryan Person, Shel Holtz, and others capturing the conference photos

Flickr: images from Linda Johannesson and others

YouTube. Again the IABC09 tag brings up new content all the time. (Must watch: Hilarious ‘Grumpy Old Men’ series.)

PROOF POINTS:

Real-time coverage: Within minutes of Best Buy’s Brian Dunn receiving the 2009 Excel Award, I was listening to a snippet of his speech, uploaded to AudioBoo, by Neville Hobson.
Member participation. Linda Johanneson, traveled to San Fran on a scholarship. Instead of providing a conference report when she returns, she’s documenting it at a blog (Outathagate) as it happens!
Podcasts from Bryan Person recorded in his iPhone: DailyBoo

Obama’s ‘Body of work’ speech gags critics

May 16, 2009May 17, 2009 / Angelo Fernando / Leave a comment

This video is worth watching, if only to see how the president of the United States put an overblown media controversy to rest –giving that phrase a new context, now.

For those not familiar with this flap, ASU had not intended to give the president an honorary degree –an old college custom lavished on commencement speakers. It was a policy that had been in place for years. But a statement by the university raised the ire of some, exacerbated by media chatter. The statement had the phrase “his body of work is yet to come” and attracted headline such as “ASU stiffs Obama.”

ASU didn’t change its policy; it created 2000 ‘Obama Scholarships’ instead.

So it was interesting to see the pres weave in that phrase many times, to take it to a different level. In the vein of any parent, any teacher that tells a young person ‘you never stop learning,’ and ‘don’t sit on your laurels…’ he stressed sacrifice and finding greatness that lies within. “Don’t stop adding to your body of work!”

The entire speech is here.

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Angelo Fernando's blog since 2004

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