Search engines and democracy
One of the most interesting classes of the Digital Media and Politics program at Stanford was given by Laura Granka, who works both at Stanford and at the Google User Experience Team. She explained how search engines work and how they influence politics and society thru their sites’s ranking.
Is digital media changing political representation?
One of the most interesting phenomena that politics is going thru is its disintermediation. As digital media allows any citizen to take part into politics and represent him/herself, representation has to adapt. Theoretically, mass media are getting rid of their political role and citizens are taking this role by themselves. At the same time, politicians are also not so necessary any more, as more and more people want to be able to take part in public decisions by themselves. But is this really happening?
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Changes in politics: from filling meetups to developing social networks
During the Social Media and Politics program at Stanford we had the opportunity of listening to Will Bunnett, senior e-mail writer of the Obama4America campaign. He gave to us great insider information of what was going on behind the web sites created for the elections. You can summarize it in the following way: Winning elections is not any more about filling meetups and stadiums, but about developing active social networks in order to involve people.
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Why there will never be an Obama in Europe?
One of the most interesting lessons we had in the Social Media and Politics class at Stanford was related to the Obama campaign. And the conclusion is clear: his case can not be copied in continental Europe. There will never be an Obama in countries like Germany, France or Spain, because our systems are too different.
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Should journalism be just a hobby?
One of the last meetups I attended in Silicon Valley was by Tom Foremski, former columnist of The Financial Times, at the Jewish High Tech Community. He left his job as a paid journalist to start a new blog and he’s being doing well for a while. Not any more, as the advertising industry’s crisis is also hitting him.
Is there more democracy with blogs?
As you know, I have being studying social and media and politics at Stanford University. And the relationship between blogging an democracy was one of the most relevant issues that we had to deal with. Obviously, there is not a single conclusion but some spare ideas:
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The Facebook Era
When I started working with social networks back in 2004, nobody really believed in them. Not even Google. Nevertheless, they have become mainstream. Almost all people under 25 are using them and older people are quickly signing up. Among all these networks, Facebook is clearly the leader and the fourth largest world site, which explains why Clara Shih’s new book is titled “The Facebook Era”.
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Mobile Monday Silicon Valley and the (difficult) future of SMS
“SMS are going to disappear in 5 years”. This is the most interesting quote I got from Mobile Monday Silicon Valley, a monthly event which gets around 300 people together in San Francisco or Palo Alto. This time the subject was as popular as the monetisation of the mobile web.
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To Free or not to Free
I don’t believe in free things. Even on the digital era. It’s a marketing strategy, which should not be confused with a business model, as Chris Anderson has done in his last book, which Seth Godin is also defending. You give something for free because you expect users to come and later offer them some ads or some products to buy.
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There is a lot of bullshit in Silicon Valley
The Silicon Valley’s ecosystem is great at saying how good you are. It’s like a bunch of consultants just telling you what you want to hear (without the nice wording from consultants). Luckily, when you launch, you have users and customers that will tell you “the real thing”.
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