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Shel Israel, author of Naked Conversations, was the keynoter this morning at BlogOrlando. Currently, Shel is working on the SAP Global Survey (available on his blog), a survey of social media throughout the world in the form of interviews.

Before blogging, conversations couldn’t scale. It was two people on opposite sides of the fence. Others could not get involved. A few years ago a fundamental change took place and today, the situation is very different. Blogs are used not just to publish one’s opinion, but as with Naked Conversations, they are used to get feedback and improve on books before they are published. With Naked, they blogged the interviews, then blogged the chapters, then blogged for feedback on what they were missing. To get the most we were told, you have to give the most.

With the SAP Global Survey, an interesting thing happened. People took the questions that Shel was asking and started to ask them to others. People then created their own questions and asked those, and so on and so forth, all across the blogosphere. There are other social impacts of social media. A group of Kenyan orphans had their story read by a Silicon Valley VC, thanks to blogging. That led to the stories of others in similar situations being told. All across the blogosphere.

“Why would I work for someone who won’t trust me to speak my own opinion?”

Blogging is getting into the enterprise. They just don’t completely understand what to do with it. Some companies are beginning to understand though. Microsoft humanized the recruiting process via video blogging. Nikon gets product feedback via a blog. Blogs get people involved. SAP is trying to understand, Shel is helping.

So, what has changed since Naked Conversations was published? Not the fundamentals: cultures shape social media globally, but they are the same; social media is popular with global youth wherever an Internet connection can be found; language is the biggest barrier to the spread of cross-cultural social media.

Takeaways

• Blogging is like a pebble in a pond, it ripples
• Blogging has a “Long Tail”
• Kid’s stuff is vital - they are the up and coming generation - listen to them

Advice

• We are in a transformational period - keep watch
• Address two processes
• Join in, don’t pitch
• Listen and respond

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