It's a snowy Saturday morning here in NYC, and I think it's high time for a blog entry. I will certainly admit there are a few things I've been thinking about, so this is a fine time to examine those thoughts and get them out there.
Warning: this may wander just a tad.
One thing that's been on my mind is communication. In particular, I'd like to talk about the social media we use for communication with fans and readers regarding suggestions about material, general feedback, image sharing, and so forth.
I used to make polls on my various YahooGroups to help gather feedback. However, since YahooGroups changed its format drastically, making everything generally murkier to navigate on the Groups site, I haven't made any new polls in quite a while.
On this note, with YahooGroups being in such an weird state, I get the impression that people are finding it harder to actually find groups and join them, let alone visit the Polls section. If I were a new user, I may be a little put-off by the format. But in any case, I really liked YahooGroups, and I still like them as mailing lists - I'm subscribed to several, and I love digest delivery to my inbox - but I just think the new work-over of the main site is atrocious and harmful to the intuitiveness of the service.
One a more positive note, there are more accessible options and outlets.
For one, there is the absolutely wonderful (in my opinion) Twitter. I personally love Twitter, and I've loved it since I was first introduced to it in 2009. It was love at first sight. I always loved the Twitter widget, placed nicely onto a website for a sleek live feed of activity.
But to stay on my main topic...
Twitter has been absolutely wonderful for communication. Really, simply wonderful. How? For one, I have found it to be excellent for communicating with wrestlers and other industry professionals. I can communicate quickly and easily with people world-wide even faster than e-mailing. People Tweet using their phones, using text messages. We can have casual chat or quick back-and-forth, which may snowball into a new production idea or an impulse scheduling for filming.
Tweet, tweet, tweet. And *then* take it to e-mail.
Twitter is like a cocktail party... or a night club networking party.
You can just hang out and people-watch. You can silently observe what other people are putting out. If you see something you like, you can approach and try to make a connection. If you follow a lot of people, imagine that networking party with lots of people in the room. Many opinions, a lot of people, and sometimes a lot of talk in general. You can engage people in conversation, but sometimes the music is so loud that you may need to shout... or repeat yourself a few time. But usually "calling someone's name" will get their ear easily if you follow each other.
Twitter is sort of like a chat room (anyone else enjoy AOL chat rooms?). It's also light-weight and sleek. It's fast and low-profile. It's index-able micro-blogging. I'm trying to avoid a digression here. Stay on topic....
If I want to communicate something quickly to fans and readers, Twitter has been a great option.
Feedback can come in the forms simple as "Favorite"-ing and Retweets. But, most notably, asking questions via Twitter has gained me better actual specific response than YahooGroup or mailing list pollings. Fans who find their way to Twitter can also find themselves dipping into casual chatting with producers, wrestlers, and even each other. It's a nice, accessible community shout-box effect.
There's also Tumblr, which has been splendid for open image sharing, but hasn't been handy much for feedback. VeVe has been using Tumblr, and she's been very good about posting screen stills from recent videos. Tumblr has provided a good public place for posting these pictures, as an alternative to the YahooGroups Photo Albums, which, like with a lot of new YahooGroups, have been come harder to find and less accessible to new viewers.
In the interest of brevity, I'll skip discussion of YouTube and Facebook, since this would surely lead to long-windedness and tangents.
Just looked away for a moment, and now back to the blogging.
I must admit that I'm actually frustrated by the amount I'd still like to say about communications, social media, and wrestling media production. I'm frustrated because this would result in such an incredibly long blog entry, that I don't think people would be all that into it. I could be wrong here, but I'm guessing.
I want to talk about Wrestlers making social media accounts.
New talent / wrestlers are often both curious about and intimidated by the increasing role of online social media in the business. Personally, I think it's great. But, you know, I'm here writing this communication about communications, so...
New wrestlers may come in and, with panicked eyes, think: "Oh damn, I have to make a Twitter and a facebook and a youtube and a tumblr and a gmail and a macro blog and a mirco blog and a la la la. ?"
Well, maybe.
Ideally they would make these things because they are interested in using them to talk about their adventures. There are a myriad of advantages to having a strong online social media presence, as a model/performer, in this day and age. However, there really needs to be some genuine interest or natural inclination toward this form of sharing.
I won't go into this too far, but I will say this: at the very least, I think they should make and maintain a Twitter account.
Ok, I'm feeling a little purged now. Whew, and I didn't even have to say that much.
Well, there's that. The crowd in this coffee house is getting excessive, so I take it that's my cue to head out. I'll come back to blogging later to talk more wrestling-specific. But now, it's just getting crazy in here! Out into the snow!
Warning: this may wander just a tad.
One thing that's been on my mind is communication. In particular, I'd like to talk about the social media we use for communication with fans and readers regarding suggestions about material, general feedback, image sharing, and so forth.
On this note, with YahooGroups being in such an weird state, I get the impression that people are finding it harder to actually find groups and join them, let alone visit the Polls section. If I were a new user, I may be a little put-off by the format. But in any case, I really liked YahooGroups, and I still like them as mailing lists - I'm subscribed to several, and I love digest delivery to my inbox - but I just think the new work-over of the main site is atrocious and harmful to the intuitiveness of the service.
One a more positive note, there are more accessible options and outlets.
But to stay on my main topic...
Twitter has been absolutely wonderful for communication. Really, simply wonderful. How? For one, I have found it to be excellent for communicating with wrestlers and other industry professionals. I can communicate quickly and easily with people world-wide even faster than e-mailing. People Tweet using their phones, using text messages. We can have casual chat or quick back-and-forth, which may snowball into a new production idea or an impulse scheduling for filming.
Tweet, tweet, tweet. And *then* take it to e-mail.
Twitter is like a cocktail party... or a night club networking party.
You can just hang out and people-watch. You can silently observe what other people are putting out. If you see something you like, you can approach and try to make a connection. If you follow a lot of people, imagine that networking party with lots of people in the room. Many opinions, a lot of people, and sometimes a lot of talk in general. You can engage people in conversation, but sometimes the music is so loud that you may need to shout... or repeat yourself a few time. But usually "calling someone's name" will get their ear easily if you follow each other.
Twitter is sort of like a chat room (anyone else enjoy AOL chat rooms?). It's also light-weight and sleek. It's fast and low-profile. It's index-able micro-blogging. I'm trying to avoid a digression here. Stay on topic....
If I want to communicate something quickly to fans and readers, Twitter has been a great option.
Feedback can come in the forms simple as "Favorite"-ing and Retweets. But, most notably, asking questions via Twitter has gained me better actual specific response than YahooGroup or mailing list pollings. Fans who find their way to Twitter can also find themselves dipping into casual chatting with producers, wrestlers, and even each other. It's a nice, accessible community shout-box effect.
There's also Tumblr, which has been splendid for open image sharing, but hasn't been handy much for feedback. VeVe has been using Tumblr, and she's been very good about posting screen stills from recent videos. Tumblr has provided a good public place for posting these pictures, as an alternative to the YahooGroups Photo Albums, which, like with a lot of new YahooGroups, have been come harder to find and less accessible to new viewers.
In the interest of brevity, I'll skip discussion of YouTube and Facebook, since this would surely lead to long-windedness and tangents.
Just looked away for a moment, and now back to the blogging.
I must admit that I'm actually frustrated by the amount I'd still like to say about communications, social media, and wrestling media production. I'm frustrated because this would result in such an incredibly long blog entry, that I don't think people would be all that into it. I could be wrong here, but I'm guessing.
I want to talk about Wrestlers making social media accounts.
New talent / wrestlers are often both curious about and intimidated by the increasing role of online social media in the business. Personally, I think it's great. But, you know, I'm here writing this communication about communications, so...
New wrestlers may come in and, with panicked eyes, think: "Oh damn, I have to make a Twitter and a facebook and a youtube and a tumblr and a gmail and a macro blog and a mirco blog and a la la la. ?"
Well, maybe.
Ideally they would make these things because they are interested in using them to talk about their adventures. There are a myriad of advantages to having a strong online social media presence, as a model/performer, in this day and age. However, there really needs to be some genuine interest or natural inclination toward this form of sharing.
I won't go into this too far, but I will say this: at the very least, I think they should make and maintain a Twitter account.
Ok, I'm feeling a little purged now. Whew, and I didn't even have to say that much.
Well, there's that. The crowd in this coffee house is getting excessive, so I take it that's my cue to head out. I'll come back to blogging later to talk more wrestling-specific. But now, it's just getting crazy in here! Out into the snow!
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