Social Media University, Global (SMUG)
Suus Non Ut Difficile • Home of the SMUGgles
I’m in Philadelphia today for a presentation and panel discussion as part of the third annual Lee White Innovation Institute. Here are the slides I will be using:
I plan to update this post with some thoughts after the discussion. I hope event participants will continue the conversation here in the comments.
It’s funny because it’s not that far from reality…
One of the points I regularly make in discussing social media tools is the opportunity they provide for providing in-depth information to people who have a particular interest. The example I most frequently cite is this 10-minute video on myelofibrosis, which has been viewed more than 5,200 times on our Mayo Clinic YouTube channel.
It doesn’t matter that Dr. Mesa’s video lacks mass appeal; it provides important information for patients with myelofibrosis and for their families, giving them just what they need, and what they are interested in seeing because they have strong personal motivation to learn about this type of blood cancer.
What you see embedded below is another example of a video with limited mass appeal. Shawn Riley (@rilescat), who blogs at HealthTechnica, hosts a regular TV talk show called Health Connections on our local Austin, MN PBS affiliate, KSMQ. When we announced our new Mayo Clinic Center for Social Media, the producer of Health Connections asked if I would come on the program to talk with Shawn about social media in heath care, and about our new center. This interview was broadcast locally last Tuesday, and now the 27:47 program is available (thanks to viewers like you) on YouTube.
I don’t expect this video to get anything near the traffic of Dr. Mesa’s discussion of myelofibrosis. But if you’re among the global niche those interested in applying social media in health care, you may find it helpful.
I’m as big an advocate of social media as you’re likely to meet. Still, I think Washington Post columnist Kathleen Parker went a bit overboard in yesterday’s offering, Facebook and social media offer the potential of peace:
Not to be a Pollyanna, but it is striking to realize that peace becomes plausible when barriers to communication are eliminated. More than 500 million people use Facebook alone. Of those, 70 percent are outside the United States. MySpace has 122 million monthly active users, and Twitter reports 145 million registered users.
I actually think Ms. Parker does have a bit of the Pollyanna principle running through her argument. And it’s kind of nice for me to have people like her occupying the “extreme optimism” end of the social media spectrum. It makes me seem more moderate. I agree that building more friendship connections is helpful, but I’m not anticipating a Nobel Peace Prize for Mark Zuckerberg.
While I don’t see social media ending the Middle East conflict, I do see these tools playing a huge role in connecting and strengthening relationships within organizations and among those with common interests.
That leads me to one of Parker’s paragraphs that I thought was particularly illuminating, as it relates to the practice of many companies in blocking access to social media sites from their corporate networks:
Obviously, some countries don’t like these media for the very reasons we do. People talk. Facebook is blocked in Syria and China and until recently was also blocked in Iran, Pakistan and Bangladesh. Where freedom flourishes, so do open channels of communication.
As we celebrate Labor Day in the United States, maybe opening access to social media sites at work wouldn’t rank among the all-time achievements for employee-friendly workplaces. It probably won’t usher in a Millennium of peace, either.
But at least it would make your company more open than China, Syria and Iran.
Does your company block access to Facebook, Twitter and YouTube at work?
I had an opportunity on Wednesday to record a conversation with Shel Holtz, co-host of For Immediate Release, for one of the podcast series he produces with Neville Hobson. This one, Lee Aase on Mayo Clinic’s Center for Social Media, is part of the FIR Interview series.
I believe I met Shel seven or eight years ago, and in the last four years we’ve gotten to know each other well through social media and in speaking together at conferences. In fact, he’s going to be one of the speakers at our Mayo Clinic/Ragan Communications Social Media Summit in Jacksonville in September.
In our FIR conversation we go into a lot of the detail about our new Mayo Clinic Center for Social Media, so for those interested in more background on what we’re envisioning for its role, and how it came to be, I think it will be helpful.
Listen here.
Let me know what you think!