If you take a stroll down Harvard Street near Coolidge Corner in Brookline, MA, you’ll pass a black hole portal that leads to Roxbury. Just before you take your running start to jump through a la Platform 9 3/4, you’ll stop for a closer look and realize that what you see is not in fact a black hole. It’s a large screen linked to a camera that is live broadcasting a street corner in Dudley Square. A set of microphones and speakers links the two locations with audio. You’ll soon discover you’ve stumbled across a virtual street corner. The description of the “digital media public art project” from Virtual Corners.net is below:

Beginning in June 2010, a storefront in Coolidge Corner, Brookline, and in Dudley Square, Roxbury will be transformed into large video screens, providing pedestrians of each neighborhood with a portal into one another’s worlds. Running 24/7, life-size screen images and AV technology will enable real-time communication between residents of the two neighborhoods.

The neighborhoods we have chosen to connect are transportation and cultural hubs with rich and intertwined histories. They are only 2.4 miles apart and a city bus runs directly between them, yet very few people from either neighborhood visits the other. Using technology developed to bridge geographical distances, Virtual Street Corners instead traverses the social boundaries that separate two important neighborhood centers with significant historical connections.

Here’s my talk on the future of careers:

In short, I see our work shifting toward

- more time spent managing technology

- flexible work environments and

- the continued rise of small businesses.

If you ever get a chance to attend a TEDx event, definitely go. This one was eye-opening, inspiring and a great way to refresh my mind. I learned a lot and will definitely be looking to attend more events like it in the future. Check out more TEDx Talks at their YouTube channel.

Secondly, I realized that I had some branding issues. I classified myself as a “Future PR Star” on my old blog. I went to a PRSSA National Conference in San Diego in November and realized that the reputation that comes with “PR” isn’t something with which I want to brand myself. Too often people think “media relations” when they think “PR.” That’s not me. Yes, I want to establish and maintain mutually beneficial relationships between organizations and their publics. That’s “PR” by textbook definition. But times have changed for those two letters, and the reputation hasn’t kept up. Now we call what I want to do terms like “marketing,” “social media marketing,” “corporate communication,” and dozens more.

“PR” has expanded, so my personal brand needed a face-lift. One of my favorite PR professors asked on the first day of class, “Why are you here? You want to be hacks? Flacks? Spindoctors? Liars? That’s what people say when you tell them you’re in PR.”

No; I don’t want to be any of those things.

My goal with this newly redone blog and e-portfolio: Establish myself as a credible and experienced communicator with a passion for content creation and new media marketing. So check in on me every now and then. I just might accomplish that goal.

]]> http://ericleist.com/2010/02/01/my-blog-its-alive/feed/ 2 Eric It's Alive http://ericleist.com/2009/08/26/district-9-movies-rolled-into-1/ http://ericleist.com/2009/08/26/district-9-movies-rolled-into-1/#comments Wed, 26 Aug 2009 19:56:09 +0000 Eric Leist http://ericleist.com/?p=32 ]]>
This week, I went to see “District 9.” After reflecting on it for a bit, I saw that the movie’s downfall has some valuable lessons about the unity of messaging. It’s failure to appeal to a single mass audience by blending different movie making styles provides further evidence for the need to segment audiences.
Synopsis
(I’ll try to do this without giving too much away, though I wouldn’t recommend this film to anyone who isn’t a blood relative of the cast members.)
District 9 chronicles the story of a government agency’s attempt to relocate over a million aliens living in a fenced-off district near Johannesburg, South Africa. We follow Wikus, a well-meaning and naive agent heading up the operation. The film documents the historic removal of the alien mothership and the events leading up to it.
What’s wrong?
The movie has multiple personality disorder. It begins as a documentary, sprints into an action film, flirts with being a love story, and then jumps back to documentary-style. At first, I thought this movie was going to provide a thoughtful commentary about who we are and how we treat each other. It changes its mind away from that goal about 20 minutes in, though.
So what?
Some people like mockumentaries. Some people like action. Some people like both. The lesson learned is that you can’t mix and match elements of different previous successes to create your own. That’s what “District 9″ tries to do, and it fails. It is the result of too many creative people sitting in a room dreaming up a screenplay without a down-to-earth realist to keep things in balance. Is it entertaining? Yes. Are the special effects great? They’re spectacular. Does it deserve to be at the top of the box office? Sure. But it will be soon forgotten; stashed away from movie greatness with the likes of “Cloverfield” and Spielberg’s “AI.”
What if…
The movie got me thinking about what it would be like to release several cuts of the same movie. What if “District 9″ came out as one cut true to the documentary-style through and through and was showing in the theater next door as the action movie. Like the college website that has different landing pages for different audiences, (students, parents, athletes, alumni, etc.) what if “District 9″ created the same story with different genres to appeal to different crowds. Might the movie be just as significant? Maybe. Might it make more money as well? Possibily. I would pay to see both versions after seeing the first one. I suspect others might too.
I’m not trying to change the movie industry here, I’m just asking “what if?”

Correct
Judging by the current trends—and online media has changed a lot since this video came out—let’s take a look at what it got right.

Newsbotster – Although it hasn’t grown into the massive media force the video predicted, the idea that news is social and what your friends care about has certainly been adopted in the past couple of years. Facebook’s Newsfeed is essentially….well, news! The video says, “News is more relevant than ever before.”

Amazon – The video labels Amazon as “the standard for internet sales” and it continues hold that status mostly because of the personalized recommendations the site encourages. Chris Anderson’s 2009 book “The Long Tail” constantly cites Amazon as an example of how unlimited shelf space eliminates scarcity and reshapes our ideas about the economics of supply and demand.

Personalization – The video refers many times to how influential the element of personalized media is. RSS and Twitter feeds dominate our online experience. To use a personal example: I don’t have cable; I get just about all of my news from my Google Reader account by subscribing to blogs, podcasts and RSS feeds.

Mobility – The end of the video touches briefly on how personalized media will become mobile. This bit is coming true to a much larger extent. The iPhone and BlackBerry have changed they way we think about phones. There are now pocket laptops capable of just about anything. We can now consumer just about any kind of media anywhere we go, says Edelman’s Steve Rubel in a recent blog post.

Incorrect
Tradiational media organizations are an “afterthought” – Not so! With the increasing number of bloggers and Twitterers disseminating information online, traditional media organizations will serve as a fact check. Blogs are, as David Meerman Scott says, the voices in the barroom. The opinions they express should be given no more credibility than would a stranger’s in a bar. Traditional media organizations are necessary for truth, and they must keep that in mind as they struggle to survive in the free-information online world.

No monopolies – Here is where, I think, the video goes entirely askew. Combining Google and Amazon may be a possibility, but there will always be competition among online media organizations. The spirit of competition and free enterprise that built this country will once again come into play in the digital world. Take a look at what Apple is doing allowing third-party developers to use the same software its developers use to make iPhone apps.

“Much of consumer created content is untrue” – The average Britannica page contains 3 errors, while the average Wikipedia page contains only 4. Is consumer-created content really “much” less reputable?

Finally, the video misses how much of media today is socially driven. We are constantly connected not only to information through media but information and people through media.

I’d like to see what The Museum of Media History would put in a video today considering the emergence of sites like Facebook Marketplace and Twitter. It’s almost impossible to predict accurately the future of online media, because by the time you finish a prediction, the future is already here and changing.

1) What was the most favorable surprise you had, this semester, about the field of public relations?

I was very pleased to learn about the upward mobility in large PR firms. At least the way firm-structure was presented to the class, advancement for an entry level employee in a large firm directly correlates to how much he or she works and how many billable hours he or she logs. When I am breaking into the professional field of PR in a few years, my life will be flexible. I will be able to—and I will want to—work a large number of hours for my clients. At the PRSSA Advanced Conference, Gary Sheffer, executive director of corporate communication for GE, spoke about how some large firms and large corporations will hire several young recruits with the intention of keeping only one or two after the first year and a half. That says to me if I work hard enough and produce enough, I will be appreciated and eventually promoted. I like the idea of being in control of my career to at least that degree. Learning about this aspect of PR firms excited me about my future.

2) What was the most unfavorable surprise you had, this semester, about the field of public relations?

The cultural differences in ethical expectations for media relations were unsettling to me. Studying the ethics of PR, I learned journalists in the Middle East almost never write a favorable story without payment or gifts from a public relations practitioner. In other cultures, the ethical lines are blurred. In America, Dr. Wright said at times PR professionals fear buying a journalist so much as a hotdog because they don’t want to be accused of bribery. At other times, our text book says, some advertising purchases in publications are accompanied by an understanding that a favorable article will be written about the advertised product. The biggest unfavorable surprise came to me upon realizing as the world shrinks and becomes more interconnected, inter-cultural media relations will be very confusing in terms of who owes what to whom in exchange for press coverage. This confusion is one of the main reasons why I would prefer, if possible, to work in the private sector exclusively on the domestic front. So while it was unsettling to me, it also helped me narrow down what type of PR I would like.

3) Why is public relations the art, science and business of manipulating of audiences–and is therefore unethical?

Public relations by nature is unethical because it is conducted by advocates who are paid to represent a corporation, government or organization. Regardless of how they try to persuade an audience into changing attitudes and behaviors, the sheer fact that they are being paid to do so makes the information they present unbalanced and slanted. They portray their client in a positive light because they are hired to. It does not matter whether or not that positive light is deserved, because since PR practitioners have monetary incentives to convince audiences, their words cannot be entirely honest. They are not expressing neutral unbiased opinions; therefore they are consciously manipulating audiences. They are intervening on the naturally formed attitudes that would not otherwise change. Honesty is ethical, but public relations will never be truly honest because it presents biased information to the publics.

4) Why is public relations more than the art, science and business of manipulation of audiences–and is therefore ethical?

Public relations serves a higher purpose, making it more than the art, science and business of manipulation. There may be a science to delivering messages and an art to crafting the perfect press release, and some people could say aiming to change audience behavior is manipulating. Those people would only be looking at the tactical elements of PR, failing to grasp the overarching concept. Public relations fosters communication and establishes meaningful, mutually beneficial relationships. Connecting people with those whom they can help and who can help them is an ethical act. There are a lot of regulations practitioners need to follow in order to keep their methods as ethical as their ends. Provided PR is executed in an ethical manner, its higher purpose will be fulfilled.

2002

2005

2009
And I don’t know about you, but just about half of the Tweets I get include a link and a one-line phrase or headline attempting to draw clicks to it.

Even Facebook has conformed to the Twitter “quick fact” format.

This capsulizing trend is penetrating deep into our media culture—and with a common theme: Concise and complete, yet teasing catch phrases try to lure our attention to their content. Whether it’s clicking a link to a product homepage, turning to the Business section or dragging news-hungry tweeps to a blog, the Art of Tease is changing quickly. Advertisements or marketing schemes that try to reel in customers by showing them only a preview of their product or service no longer thrive. The new goal is to present the target audience with the main idea of the message simply and clearly. The Marketing Experiments Blog creed states “Clarity trumps persuasion.” It’s happening all over the web.
The majority of advertisements on Google and Facebook consist of one or two sentences and a picture. The most effective of these ads have an attractive picture and some concise writing is a necessity for delivering a simple and interesting message. Consumers, microbloggers and even the average Joe love this “get to the point” method. They eat it up. They won’t tolerate anything less (or should I say “more?”).

So what does this mean for all of us? I can spot two emerging trends.

First, our own writing will improve from this exposure to succinct material. With Twitter as the fastest-growing social media tool at 1382%, microblogging is taking off faster than ever before. Lindsey from Synthesis Communications writes in her blog article “Why Twitter Helps You Write Better”:

Twitter has a 140 word character limit in which you must express yourself as succinctly as possible. Several times I’ve found through my tweets that I’ve gone on too long and had to reword my sentences. This rewording has made my sentences clearer and easy to read.

If we want people to read our content, we have no choice but to write better. So many people are blogging nowadays that great writing will prevail by presenting interesting content in intelligent and direct ways.

This prevalence is the second trend. Blogging and microblogging will hinge on quotable material. Other sources will quote content they find worded in witty ways. Ann Wylie, president of Wylie Communications, presents some tips on writing sound bytes for press releases. The same or similar rules will apply to all content.

The Bottom Line: Anyone who wants attention directed at their content will need to keep up with the rising demand for simple, clear and direct language.