The "Social Media" Truman Show

Social Media is what it is. In my own words, content that gets shared. Good content sometimes go viral, and bad content, should just never see light.

In the not-so-new age of marketing, where there is much emphasis on "Social Media", most companies sometimes forget that content is king. Good content or a good product, whether digital or not, is easier to market, if not, sometimes do not require any marketing at all. Most of the people in sales would probably agree. Although some might say that a really good sales person will probably be able to sell anything. Then again, possibly yes, but probably with more packaging, fancy commodities and time.

Question to ask: Do we have a good product to sell in the first place? What is it? How are we going to market it online? How do we measure it's effectiveness? Is it really indeed below-the-line? What have we achieved thus far?

While hiring the 'experts' to take this 'untrodden' path seems like a good solution; be it the fact that it is genuinely more cost-savvy or easier to lay the blame if it eventually doesn't work out, it is important to know that numbers and figures should not be the baseline of Social Media.

Likes, Fans, Followers and anything else that substantiates reach or "interaction" with figures is an easy spell for the social media agencies; not saying that most are, but not saying that most don't take the easy way out either. Creating fake accounts and fake interaction is a piece of cake that can be made with a script these days. Identities will need to think deeper.

While shares can be created as well, it's important to create content good enough for oneself and the target audience to share. 

The only time I probably created something that went decently viral was during the haze period to poke-fun of the situation. It was very much targeted at the situation everyone was in, and to really have a good laugh with what seemingly was bizarre yet possible.

The way I see it, the important factors are: 1. 'Recency'/timeliness, how recent is your content to the event 2. Ease of relating to; simplicity, is it easy for the reader to understand and relate? 3. Appropriateness; a right joke at the wrong time is just wrong in anyway 4. Usefulness, will sharing this content benefit anyone? Help anyone? Is it important information? Or will it brighten up someone's day? 

Any and everyone these days is and are a Social Media Expert, we curate content that we feel we can relate to and is appropriate and best able to represent the profile of our identities. Some people go as far as to script the right content or to remove poorly received content.

It is important for big identities to note and act likewise.

Validation is important, but to validate oneself or an identity with figurative factors such as Likes, Followers or Fans is a sad phoney, self and society driven entrapment. Self-validation should take precedence, and is important for identities to find the balance between commercial value and identity integrity. The worst I've seen are individuals and identities that have embarked on a staged validation, whether self-staged or not, both are equally degrading.
Why would one choose to live in "The Truman Show" whether the director is oneself or another?

My side of the story? I've seen the light and felt the flames of social media, it is a double-edged sword, and whether you're representing a corporate identity, celebrity or just simply yourself, I'lll briefly conclude that it requires a good swordsman to wield. 

So if you're new to all of this social buzz, take every posting you make online whether publicly or privately as an official e-mail to the whole wide world. Once you hit send, you hit send.

personal space, the phone and the web

I just finished customising my twitter background and display picture, picked the most recent and presentable photos for Facebook's display picture and cover photo and not to forget, tweaked the blog and this new header to a good fit.

Hello narcissism. Everyone loves being presentable and well presented, what more on their own platforms. I started blogging again recently, but as you can tell, haven't been that committed. Used to be the blogger that had my own blogskin properly done right down to the last code, each button was customised, you wouldn't find anything else similar on the web elsewhere. But lookie now, nowhere near dude.

I'm not lazy, but perhaps things like that don't excite me any more, but nonetheless, glad to be back to air my thoughts. In fact, really glad! What could have been better? If I had my own work station of course.

Different people define their own work stations in different ways, some find comfort in their laptop, some find it in their own personal desk while others might have filled their mobile phones with their souls and everything related to life. I can't imagine what happens when they lose it. I didn't pour my life into a 4-inch hand held, so it wasn't that bad when it went missing. But nonetheless, it sucked, real bad.

To value-add to your read, check out the app "Look Out" it's available on both Apple and Android platforms and gives you a better chance of getting your lost phone back!

Moving on to man's next best friend, that lives on battery packs and portable chargers since the usual batteries won't do it. My Samsung Galaxy S4 Active cannot last a day without the portable charger I got from the IT show. What a real first world problem. Gotta admit I cannot stop checking Twitter and Instagram when in the first place, I don't even follow that many people! haha

I'm picky about the people I follow by the way, who wants to open their Instagram to a feed filled with... nonsense? haha

Anyway, getting back to topic, having attended a few marketing seminars recently shed more light on how cellphones have evolved from being the device to communicate to one that can do so much more; socialise, check, educate, entertain and errr stalk people on? haha, I mean, no one needs to attend a seminar to know all that, it's all happening around us.

But quite interestingly, the figures being put forth by the professionals are quite interesting! And their studies on how despite social media platforms that were meant to replace chunky traditional e-mails, are actually, sending you e-mails! Not to forget, the average amount of time a person checks his/her phone a day! Did you guess it already? Well, the web says 110, but local studies came up with 54, I guess Asians are pretty much less distracted then. And that all shows how much potential and value there is in investing in cellphone related apps and accessories. Don't forget me when you make it big. ;)

The cellphone definitely is a PA and more, that's why many people are sent into a whirl when they lose their cell! Social Media IS taking the world by storm, but then again, how much of the existing content are sought after? 

Quite honestly, most of these 'popular social media influencers' aren't worth following, well at least to me, if you're honestly looking for interesting reads and insightful content.

I honestly cannot imagine scrolling a blogpost which is 80% filled with images depicting this person's attempt in making 54 different facial expressions in the same setting. But it amuses me that people ARE following such influencers, I have no idea how that value adds to anything at all. The again, long texty ones like this are boring as well. :P

There are people out there who make the attempt to gather good content and offer more than their 5 cents worth and I find that truly commendable! To top it off, some of them are such good lookers that they can probably finish a blogpost with a swimsuit photo without looking offensive. whether it is by figure of speech or not.

Maybe one day when I finally have my own workstation and trusty camera then can I be fully back on the social media platform! :)

when I grow up

I wanna be a star, I wanna get rich, I wanna be famous

hahahaha! I hope I got the lyrics right, for PCD's "When I Grow Up"

Being the kid in the family that has really been influenced by the media, I always thought it would be awesome if I got to do something in front of the screen, or at least behind the radio. Anything associated with the term celebrity or media face/voice seemed to have always caught my attention.

The reason I'm writing this is because of a small happening at a coffee shop near office during lunch time. Just factually reporting the situation, one of the store owner came up to me and told me it's such a waste that I'm not casting on local television, the humble me couldn't help but secretly be happy for the small compliment. Though I know it's the colour of my hair that makes me look like I'm some kpopstarwannabeyadayada.

Some people have also told me that I may have a radio voice when I tried, and a friend added that that also meant I had a radio face, hahaha, I guess it swings both ways!

I wished someone gave me a break, and I would like to start small and work my way up, since I don't really think that I was born for this; with a natural knack for just speaking in front of a big crowd and talking about just anything under the sun, but quite honestly, I'm willing to work for it.

I've tried being a small time presenter, not sure if it even qualifies as presenting. And basically, we just ended up with like what, 20 takes? Ha ha! It was good fun though! I also tried doing Voice Over before, with a script behind the backdrop, hahahahahaha!



Being someone who's really media conscious also means that the way I look at things and people get 'distorted' as well. I look at people through the lens; a really distorted paradigm, that eventually affects the way I perceive and think about things and those around and in front of me.

It works both ways.

Quite interestingly, I was wondering, what if media never existed, how would that have affected the way we turned out? The way we look and think of people and things? How different would it be?