Flack's Revenge

MIT Technology Review covered an effort by developer Gilad Lotan that visually charted the spread of Twitter buzz caused by the recent unrest in Iran.  According to the article:

During the Iranian elections in June, microblogging site Twitter became a
way for protesters to communicate with each other and with the rest of the
world. Stories of oppression, police brutality, and violence spread via
140-character tweets despite the government’s efforts to filter
Web content and control
Web traffic inside the country.

A new visualization tool developed by Gilad Lotan, a programmer and designer at Microsoft Startup Labs, shows just how information related to the elections spread through
Twitter, via the most popular Twitter conversations and retweets.

I found this to be fascinating on a number of levels.  It illustrates the ability of social media to play a starring role in events (and influence them) as they unfold. Also, the tool he developed shows what is possible when it comes tracking the spread of buzz.

I have been blogging about improved tools for tracking online info, and the story definitely caught my attention.  So I sent Gilad an email and had the following exchange with him.  Please read and enjoy.  And feel free to comment if you are aware of any metrics, analysis and reporting tools for Twitter.

Q (Bob Geller): I know your effrot is a work in progress and possibly won’t be packaged or commercialized.   Are you aware of any existing commercial products or Web utilities that report on and help analyze Tweeting and Retweeting activity?

A (Gilad Lotan): My work is definitely in progress and will not be commercialized. I’m looking at the possibility of releasing the code to other developers or creating an online service where people can subscribe to personalized queries, which would be free. However, I would need to change the UI quite a bit, as this project is designed to fit the Iranian Elections content. An actual tool would need to be much more functional, and probably not written in JAVA.

There exist a variety of web “trending tools” that follow twitter and highlight retweeted messages (i.e. http://www.retweet.com/), however none that I found do the type of analysis that my visualization enables. None make matches between similar texts and highlight differences in words authors used to portray the same message.

I imagine that with the upcoming rollout of Twitter retweet API support, it will be substantially easier to follow retweet trails to the originating tweet, and have similar analysis, without the need for the more complex set of Natural Language Processing queries that I am performing.

Q: I found a site called Retweetist.com that could help too.  In addition to the advanced functionality you cite – visualization, NLP content matching – it would be great to find a dashboard that enables basic Twitter metrics, and provides reports on who replies, Retweets, how many followers they have, etc. to see the reach of Tweets, replies and RTs without jumping through hoops.  Are you aware of any such tool?

A: I am not aware of a tool similar to what you’re describing. I feel like I have stumbled upon subscription based tools that do some metrics/analytics, but none attempt to tackle any of the NLP problems.

The NY Times recently covered promising developments in the area of tools that help analyze online news and information.

The article Hot Story to Has Been described several efforts under way that aim to chart the evolution and propagation of stories. I will be writing in more detail about the Web-based tools listed that are publicly accessible in a future post.

The article Mining the Web for Feelings reported on advances in the ability to automatically detect the tone of a story. These tools are variously called sentiment analysis or opinion mining because they go beyond mere facts to infer the tone of articles.

This has been kind of a holy grail for online monitoring and artificial intelligence. It requires analysis of words and context to detect the nuances of sarcasm, for example, and “understand” the sentiment of the writer.

I visited the websites (where available) for each service and plan to eventually kick their tires, write about them, follow their progress and share this info.

The one that seemed most accessible and thus easy to check out and review was Newssift, from the Financial Times Group. The information on the site did not make clear how many sources it searches across. But my quick look and a few searches convinced me that this is a tool worth spending some time with and checking out further.

E.g., plugging in a generic tech term like “cloud computing” revealed overwhelmingly positive sentiments about the topic (see below). Along the left panel it shows the frequency of the term by source type, and shows the top people, companies, themes and regions associated with the term. You can refine the search by selecting specific people, companies, topics etc. that are suggested and displayed along the top panel.

If you select a company, you can see a chart of sentiment trends, making this a great tool for exploring the evolution of brand perceptions. Very cool indeed!

The NY Times public editor (an ombudsman for the paper) wrote about potential conflicts of interest regarding tech gadget writer David Pogue.  The article describes Pogue’s many and varied activities:

In addition to his weekly “State of the Art” column in The Times, and his blog and videos on the newspaper’s Web site, and his weekly e-mail newsletter,
he appears regularly on “CBS News Sunday Morning,” CNBC and NPR. He
also entertains lecture audiences with satirical ditties on the piano —
he once aspired to be a Broadway composer — while informing them about
the latest gadgets… Pogue originated “The Missing Manual”
series of help books for the technologically challenged

I learned a lot from this article.  E.g., I have always found Pogue to be informative as well as entertaining.  But who knew that he’s a real entertainer?

Oh, and one more thing: did I mention (as the article did) that Pogue has two books out on Apple Snow Leopard, a product that he has reviewed for the NY Times?  Hence the ethical conundrum that is the subject of the piece.

As the article says:

… The Times and other news organizations are going to
face more of these situations as journalists worried about the economic
health of their employers seek outside sources of income and as the
companies turn to independent contractors, like Pogue, for more of
their content.

That is why the brand is so important – the personal brand, as well as the publisher imprimatur.  People generally respect the NY Times’ reputation as a trusted source for news.  Anyone who reads Pogue knows that he’s a straight shooter.

On a related topic, the FTC is causing many to reevaluate the trustworthiness of online media as the agency mulls updating its guidelines on paid endorsements to include social media and blogs.

Kevin Grossman noted his concerns about this on HRMarketer .

The Marketing Roadmaps blog has a post on this, and is also hosting a webinar today on the topic of Blogging with Integrity that promises to shed light on what is happening and what to expect regarding FTC disclosure rules.

Although most of the focus has been on reviewers that get paid with cash and/or swag, others are getting caught up in the debate.

One prominent blogger – Anne Giles Clelland – is responding via the first ever (that I am aware of) completely transparent and legally vetted policy.

Her blog Handshake 2.0 (as her tag line says, Even online, it’s still who you know) is a forum in which businesses can promote themselves and connect with others.  Although clients pay to get featured on the blog, Handshake Media is completely upfront about its model.

When it comes to building personal brands, there’s been much buzz about building your online presence by working on your profiles and the like.  I feel that there also needs to be some discussion about the way people interact and “behave” online.

As I said in my post Evolution of Core PR Skills, you need to understand the mores of blogs, micro blogs and social networks and be comfortable communicating in these forums.  But what exactly are the mores of social media?  They can vary from community to community, and also are influenced by the nature of the community.

E.g  on Twitter, it is considered to be acceptable and even desirable to repeat your thoughts and those of others verbatim.  Not so on blogs.  Status updates on Facebook that are all business all the time might seem mercenary.

While social media and networking offer endless opportunities to have your message heard, it is important to understand that you are making an impression in the process.  That impression can be good or bad, and it can be lasting.

How you communicate online says things about you.  They may be inaccurate but perception is everything right?

Who are these People?

We all know them; there’s (at least) one in every crowd.  You talk to friends, family and coworkers and compare notes, and lo and behold, the same people jump out as irritants.

As networks multiply and more people jump on board the rules of the game evolve.  I often caution people to be wary of so-called social media experts (is there some kind of degree or certification program that I am not aware of?).

There’s no single right way or wrong way; different approaches can work for different people.  And I don’t want to fall into the trap of being a Social Media Scold, a social networking type (namely, the people who are constantly calling out the right way and wrong way) that I am sure many find irritating.

Then again this is my blog, my forum and I am allowed to spew here about things that irritate me.  So, without further adieu, here are some of the types that frustrate me:

Town Criers: These are the same ones who, in years before social networks, felt like they had to update people with endless details about their family and business interests via mass email blasts and newsletters.  They are usually all about me me me, all talking and very little back and forth

Name Droppers: These are the flagrant strivers, the ones who feel that the way to elevate their online profiles is to blab about the A listers they hob nob with.

Crypto Fascists:  These are the people who trick out their Tweets with so much inside baseball, hash tags, etc.  I understand the function of hash tags but there’s a downside to using them.  You limit your audience by being obscure, and make your missives harder to read.

Blabbers: The ones who monopolize airwaves

Spammers: (genus Facebookus Spammus): Constantly annoying with pokes, applications, invitations

Blurters:  Just spew whatever is on their minds, without much thought to punctuation, spelling or propriety.  Frequently these are the same people that share T.M.I.

This blog seems to be one that attracts readers, but not many comments.

I know I get readers from the metrics I track (yes, occasional comments too).  And, every once in awhile, when I get frustrated that my posts do not generate more comments, I am heartened to get a kind note, see Tweets, Facebook comments and sometimes even place on “favorite PR blogs” lists.  (Thanks, Wax blog, Brendan Cooper, Tony Mackey, etc.)

I have a feeling that I am not the only blogger in this situation.  Our time is a zero sum game, and people are increasingly distracted with ever more content choices.  More time reading means less time generating content like comments.  And research has shown that content creators (commenting falls in this category) are far outnumbered by passive content consumers.

I think much of the buzz around content that used to be confined to blogs now takes place on Twitter and social networks. It would be a step forward for the social media world if someone invented a widget, or if the blogging platforms made it possible to aggregate comments related to blog posts from Twitter, Facebook, etc., so that they appear under the related post.

It seems like a no brainer (I am not saying the solution is easy to develop, just the fact that there is a very obvious need).  Is anyone aware of such a solution?  Is it out there and I have just somehow managed to miss it?  Please indulge me and ignore the title of this post.  I don’t want to look desperate but comments and answers would be appreciated.

Extra points: what movie is the subtitle of this post from?  Your clue is in the image