The infographic developed by Hill+Knowlton Strategies (the consultancy employing me), Canadian Business for Social Responsibility and GlobeScan summarizes a couple of findings from GlobeScan's Radar Report. You can participate in a webinar on the report this Thursday, May 31st from 1:00 - 2:00 p.m.

(Image from http://www.volacci.com/content-strategy)

In a presentation this week, Altimeter Group partner, and social web decoder, Jeremiah Owyang made the point that the next social media title within organizations will be "content strategist". He didn't say what he meant by "content", but when used in the context of the web it tends to mean "what the user came to read, learn, see or experience" (from the Rach and Halvorson book referenced below).

A few people like C.C. Chapman have been talking for some time about the importance of what we put on our social platforms as companies or individuals. His book Content Rules is a guide to how to create "killer" content on a range of social platforms. Melissa Rach and Kristina Halvorson have also come out with the second edition of their book Content Strategy for the Web which dissects the elements of effective content-focused creation for social and digital platforms.  

But there are a few things happening right now that are adding octane to the discourse:

1. Having become 'social' by creating a presence on Twitter, Facebook, Pinterest or what have you, some organizations are recognizing that simply inhabiting a social space does little to meet a business or campaign goal.
2. Experience on social networks is leading enterprise social media specialists to realize that structured, rich, substantive, and energizing content  -- not sanitized 'messages', or 'news' as defined by marketing departments -- drives the perception of a platform's worth and a desire on the part of a constituent or customer for an ongoing relationship.
3. The quality of social content has become a natural differentiator when people choose to connect, stay on or come back to an organization's social site.
4. Organisations are learning that with social web assets there isn't always a straight line between a visit and an action, but the tone, language, images and the authenticity of interaction they find there will keep people on the site perhaps long enough for the sale, recommendation or behaviour change to become far more likely.
5. Online magazines, curators and aggregators have raised the bar for how we want news, ideas and  products presented and stories told. Personalized social magazines like Zite and Flipboard create in us a preference for lively, eclectic and engaging visual and written material.

There is a need for someone within organizations to manage social content strategy with creativity, efficiency and discipline. The Chapman and Halvorson/Rach books can help provide guidance. For those who want to jump right in, though, here from the people at OpenText is a graphic representation of some of what content strategy involves.

Time and again companies and government are caught out not taking the influence of social web activism seriously when it comes to the flight path of high profile issues.

Yesterday in the Toronto Star, national columnist Chantal Hebert points out the failure of the Quebec government to factor social media into its campaign strategy for handling the Quebec students' strike:

In a Radio-Canada interview last week, Beauchamp said part of her predicament stemmed from a failure to anticipate the impact of the social media on the dynamics of the stand-off . . . There is no doubt that throughout this episode, the former minister and her colleagues have been missing in action in the social media. By comparison, the Montreal police force is decades ahead of the Quebec government.

D'oh . . . to quote Homer Simpson . . . Yes, the social web is a tool for activism: It is the new demos.

The perennially huffy National Post columnist Christie Blatchford grumbled about judges keeping evidence from juries because they "don't wholly trust" them. She was referring to damning information from the accused's computer demonstrating he is a sexual predator that was not allowed in evidence. The judge ruled that the police acted illegally in not obtaining a secondary warrant to seize and search the contents of the killer's laptop.

Her article mixes two clearly distinct issues: the question of whether judges indeed needlessly keep facts from juries for a variety of reasons -- an accusation I am not in a position to comment on -- and the question of whether the authorities should be required to get a specific warrant to seize and search someone's computer.

It is essential to separate the two, because the latter has sweeping implications for protecting privacy and the rights of individuals.

Our computers, tablets and smart phones are central to our lives. We often have an intimate relationship with them and treat them (forgive the pathetic fallacy to follow) as confidante and confessor. The confessions stored in their memory are in rare instances heinous and criminal, and the authorities should be able to access them, as they would a file cabinet in a house, IF they are investigating a serious wrongdoing. But, as with a physical search of a house, the police should be required to get a warrant for which cause has been demonstrated to a member of the judiciary.

As much as the convicted killer in this case deserved the life sentence awarded (or worse), it would reinforce a dangerous precedent for all of us if the contents of his computer could be accessed without a warrant. The amount of sensitive private information many of us have on our computing devices justifies legal supervision of who, when and how they can be accessed.

Interviewed as part of a series of articles in The Guardian on who will 'own' the Internet, Sergey Brin (co-founder with Larry Page of Google) took exception to how his interview was used. However, in his rebuttal post on Google+, he made the following statement about the offensive on internet freedom by various governments:

Today, the primary threat by far to internet freedom is government filtering of political dissent. This has been far more effective than I ever imagined possible across a number of nations. In addition, other countries such as the US have come close to adopting very similar techniques in order to combat piracy and other vices. I believe these efforts have been misguided and dangerous.

Does this mean that Google will continue to challenge countries that want to control Google search results as China did?

Among the people also interviewed were Rosebell Kagumire, a journalist and blogger from Uganda, living now in Kampala, as well as ‘Femi Adesina, a British-born Nigerian web and creative technologist, both of whom commented from slightly different perspectives the whole Kony2012 discussion.

The 35 minute podcast attached here is worth listening to for its unique view on how the social web can amplify a cause or campaign.