Social Media for Practitioners

Social media for Practitioners from mikejohnston

Why worry about Social media? 

Well there's value in reputation, as there has always been.  It has been suggested that we have moved to a 'reputation economy'.  Social Media offers the Practitioner the opportunity to engage in conversations with other Practitioners and also their potential cunstomers.  But there are many issues not least around attention and time.  It comes down to focus, filtering and practice.

Understanding the power of networks underlies what we are discussing here.  Here is a great video that explains and illustrates this brilliantly.  It also introduces the idea of how knowledge is organised and organisation online will pop up again when you consider hashtags.




Where peoples' interest is aroused then they will propagate what they have found, learnt or experienced.  We have seen things that have suddenly been picked up and gain massive exposure, known as 'going viral'.  This video has been viewed 21, 372, 046 times in under 2 years.

How is it useful to Practitioners?

Here is an example of a band who have clearly spent a long time creating their online presence.  It's consistent but very connected in terms of the services they have used. 

Here is a smaller scale example of a great local (Bristol) artist Nuala Honan she is on;
Tumblr
Twitter
Bandcamp
Soundcloud

But the link to a Facebook is broken.  That's a shame since it's probably her most important connection.  Facebook deserves a whole workshop just on it's own.  Here's FB's recent advert.  It still amazes me!

Twitter basics.

Not one but 2 great guides:

• LSE guide to Twitter for academics - a fantastic guide that applies to practically everyone!
• The Beginner's guide to Twitter.

I used Twitterfall in the class which allowed me to enter the hashtag #iciasat and all tweets with that tag where then displayed in real time.  Twitter requires you to understand the importance of the name you use, your 'bio', 140 characters, #hashtags and url shortening.

There are ways of curating Tweets such as Storify, Paperli and Twylar. 

There are Twitter 'clients' (applications) that allow you to tweet and manage several social media streams (accounts) such as Hootsuite and Tweetdeck.  I can't get on with either!

At Bath Spa University we have been using social media to cover events live.  This is a good example of the uses of SM.  The Social Media Experiment.

What to write or blog?  YouTube created a great resource called The Creator Play Book.  Below is the old version.  The newer is available here.  It gives you a good idea of the way to engage people with video but the lessons are broadly applicable.

Photography.

There is a huge value to images online.  You can't afford to ignore this.

One of the oldest established service is Flickr but sadly it's been left to rust by Yahoo who bought it a few years ago when it was the 'go to place' for photos and photography on the Net.  It's been over taken in some ways by Instagram.  Here's my Instagram displayed with Statigram some things are more popular that others.  Notice the popularity of pets, plates (ie food before and after) and sunsets!

How Journalists are using Instagram (Pinterest, Google+, Soundcloud)

Facebook bought Instagram rather spectacularly and as a result here's the 'mashup' FB meets Instagram.

There is a huge photographic community online.  Tumblr, a blogging platform works very well for photography and has a very active community too - it's very connected.  Here's My Tumblr PhotoBlog.  Here's an example of a themed 'photoblog'.  I think it's rather good. London Shop Fronts 

Blogging basics

Blogging basics from mikejohnston

I use Blogger for my own blogs and currently with the students I work with.
There are some basic rules - this covers the main points well Do you make these mistakes when you  blog?

The requirement for images and video has become easier to satisfy.  Alot can be done with a modern smart phone.  I would suggest the purchase of one would be a good way into social media both as a way of understanding it and using it.  My current preference is the iPhone 4S.

Video publishing

Video publishing from mikejohnston

As well as video there is audio too.  Although this might be less applicable in some situations.

Audio publishing 2.0 from mikejohnston

A large part of social media is in discovery and curation and you should think about fitting into this ecosystem!  Pinterest is worth exploring.

Lastly you might like to explore using Linked in.  You can find me there.  I also have an 'AboutMe' account that provides a useful place to collect all my online activities.

Lessons in 'Quick turnaround' event coverage

Last March I took part in Bath Spa University's 'Social Media Experiment' coverage of X Media Lab Conference in Bath using Social Media.  X Media Lab Bath 2012 presented a great opportunity for Bath Spa University’s staff and students. A live, high-profile digital media event right on our doorstep. Event directors, Brendan Harkin and Megan Elliot, offered us a project that would enable students to use their media creation and publishing skills. I would support the students as Producer, helping them provide a variety of video coverage of the event.  We went on to produce 3 'quick turnaround' videos.  One shot during the VIP event launch at the Roman baths (Thursday).




One at the end of the main conference day (Friday).



One at the end of the mentoring weekend (Monday)



Later over the summer we produced a final 'overview' edit using all the material.



The footage was shot on Sony Z1 DV (tape) based cameras with some further material from Canon 7D.  It was a relatively slow and traditional process of ingesting, logging and capturing and editing.  The 'quick turnaround' wasn't bad but it wasn't actually very quick.

Today the Social Media Experiment was covering the ExPlay 12 event in Bath.  This time I decided to restrict the video team to iPhone.  How did we do?  How would it compare?

The quickest turnaround is 'one step' publishing.  We shot very short 'video bites'.  Then with no editing uploaded to YouTube and then Tweeted the link.  It worked but, perhaps having become used to having the ability to edit, I felt that the bites needed 'top 'n' tailing' - trimming, to tidy them up.  The uploading and tweeting workflow wasn't smooth.  Shot in Filmic Pro - uploaded to YouTube - tweeted.  All the detail and hashtags were entered twice without a keyboard.

'Two step' publishing was easier in someways.  Shoot on phone.  Transfer via USB lead and Image Capture.  Trim in QuickTime.  Upload to YouTube.  Tweet from YouTube.  Naturally we needed a laptop.  But the whole kit we used filled one shoulder bag.  YouTube does take a while - not long but worth noting.  Sadly when you tweet from YouTube the description doesn't automatically populate the tweet.  Which would have been neat and sweet!

The iPhone worked quite well - a 4s.  Problems with focus 'bubbling' and exposure meant that we used Filmic Pro which allows the frame rate to be set along with the focus point and the exposure.  We also had a small LED light (TecPro 'Fillini') which worked really well and made a huge difference to the quality of the image.  However the video quality wasn't high - not sure why we set it so low.  The interview eyelines were difficult to bring around enough.  Shooting video runs the batteries down quickly and we had to re charge at lunch time.  It's awkward to hold, so some sort of grip would have been a good idea.  Certainly a monopod would have helped.  Even without support, the videos were shake-free as a result of the image stabilisation in the app.  I had slight concerns that Interviewees wouldn't take us seriously with the iPhone - but this wasn't an problem.  None were surprised.  We used a shotgun mic (K6+ME66) with the phone - the built in mic would rarely have worked in the noise.  I made the lead by following this tutorial.

We started at about 11am and finished about 4pm.  All 15 of the video bites were up and tweeted by a leisurely 6pm.  As well as tweeting them individually they were playlisted in YouTube as and drawn into  Storify.



Lessons learnt?  Don't leave home with a decent mic and portable light.  Downloading the clips via USB and trimming in a laptop is the most sensible route to go.  Maybe it might work better with an iPad and editing in iMovie.  Tomorrow we'll give it a go.  I have my doubts about the ergonomics of shooting with the iPad and Filmic Pro is not full screen on the iPad.  But it will be interesting to compare with today's experience.

Working with SoundCloud

It's possible to work collaboartively with SoundCloud.  You can embed some code into a webpage that allows people to submit audio recordings to your account.

The Code results in this widget.

Send me your sounds

People clicking on the widget will get a display like the one above and be able to upload any file to that particular account.