Facebook and “maintained social capital” – a study at Michigan State University

Read about an interesting study on Facebook conducted at MSU (thanks to Alec Saunders).

The group attempted to establish a correlation between different forms of social capital and heavy Facebook usage. To put it simply, social capital is the benefits we gain from being connected. (For an exhaustive study of social capital, read “Bowling Alone” by Putnam). In it Putnam establishes bridging social capital and bonding social capital. Bridging social capital represents the our relationships with acquaintances, whereas bonding social capital describes the close relationships we have with friends and family. The study, however, introduced a new form of social capital: “maintained social capital.”

Maintained Social Capital

Maintained social capital refers to those relationships, and the benefits we derive from them, that we maintain despite having shifted geography, interests or workplaces. In the case of Facebook, they may be the relationships we forged in high school with people who went off to different colleges. The authors of the study write:

Social networks change over time as relationships are formed or abandoned. Particularly significant changes in social networks may affect one’s social capital, as when a person moves from the geographic location in which their network was formed and thus loses access to those social resources.

What makes Facebook, other social networking sites, and the Internet in general so interesting when it comes to social capital, to put it plainly, is its uncanny ability to help people keep in touch. The authors of the study quantified those relationships using survey questions such as, “If I needed to, I could ask a high school acquaintance to do a small favor for me,” or “I’d be able to stay with a high school acquaintance if traveling to a different city.”

Social networking sites solidify our past relationships, and have huge benefits for personal and professional gain. Taken the above example, if you’re traveling to a city where you don’t know anyone, how easy it is to peruse your network of friends on Facebook or MySpace to see if an old friend or acquaintance got a new job there? Perhaps you wouldn’t feel comfortable crashing on their couch, but you might drop them a line to see if they are free for dinner one night.

On the one hand, the Internet is exciting because it’s fast; dynamic. On the other hand, however, it’s also much more stable; permanent.

Interesting stuff…

Christian Century opens up site to independent bloggers

A big move for an old magazine
An editor over at U.S. Catholic, where I worked this past summer, informed me that the Christian Century, a Christian magazine with more than one hundred years of history opened up its site to independent bloggers. (Founded in 1884, it was renamed the Christian Century in anticipation of the 20th century!)

First off, I wanted to point it out and give kudos to the staff over at Christian Century for making the move.

Secondly, apparently the way it all started was one writer, Real Live Preacher, taking it upon himself to come up with the idea and recruit all bloggers to make it happen. This fact illustrates an important facet of opening up your site, or your platform as a more traditional or mainstream news and information site. The mantra, “if you build it, they will come” just doesn’t work.

There needs to be someone, whether it is a writer on staff or a community outreach coordinator or advocate, reaching out to bloggers to convince them to contribute. They can write anywhere. You have to convince them it is better to do so on your site.

Or you may have to do more…
This past spring I worked with a dozen other graduate students in the spring on the Medill Media Management project. In the course of our research into hyperlocal community news sites, we spoke with some editors at the Rocky Mountain News. When they launched YourHub, a community news site reliant heavily on user generated content, they stressed the importance of soliciting content from the community. Actively. One editor told us that if you have to go door to door and explain to people what a blog is and how it works, then that’s what it takes.

Now not all of us have the resources of the Rocky Mountain News, but to be in conversation with the community (or audience, or readership, or viewership, or whatever), you need to truly be in conversation with the community.

Issue with YouTube embed

First off, sorry you’re having problems. We know how frustrating that can be.

To be honest, I’m a little confused by what you mean when you say you e-mailed embed code from YouTube to your social networking site. Here’s instruction on the easiest way to get a video from YouTube up and running on your social network. If this doesn’t answer your question, there are more questions below that will help us figure out the problem.

Copy the embed code from YouTube.
From you network, click on “Add a Video.”
Paste the embed code you copies from YouTube into the form provided.

You can also drop the embed code directly into a blog post, if that best suits what you’re going for.

If that doesn’t solve the problem, here are a few questions.

Is this a video you uploaded to YouTube? Or did someone else upload it?

Where would you like the video to appear? Simply on your site? In a blog post?

What do you mean when you say you e-mailed the embed code from YouTube to your social network?

Thanks for taking the time. We appreciate it.

Facebook’s marketplace capitalizes on database of social networks

I’ve been meaning to post on this for a while, but here’s my argument why Facebook’s marketplace feature has the potential to unseat Craigslist as the home for online classifieds, and is at the very least a much bigger deal than it’s been touted.

As I was perusing Facebook some months back looking for an apartment in Chicago, I found one in the Uptown neighborhood where the price was right. I read the description, looked at some pictures and saw the contact information to e-mail the person who posted the ad.

Thus far, nothing too different from Craigslist.

Then, at the very bottom of the post, I saw a little message that read “Send Brandon a message? You are not friends with Brandon, but you are both friends with Jessica.” (See more recent example involving an iPod Nano).

It hit me. Leveraging its enormous database of social networks, Facebook effectively eliminated the anonymity behind a classified ad AND established reputability between buyer and seller.

This is huge

Now, whether Facebook’s marketplace will become the home for online classifieds may be a bit of a stretch. But, as anyone who has used Craigslist can testify, there’s nothing more frustrating then not knowing (1) the identity of the person with whom you’re dealing and (2) whether or not they are reputable.

Identity and reputation.

Now, other sites (notably Amazon and eBay) have done with these two issues using reputation ratings systems. But for peer-to-peer transactions, sitting on an enormous database of connections (or friends) could easily be another, perhaps easier way, because it’s automated and requires no effort on the part of the user.

Something for newspaper sites to chew as they look further into hyperlocal sites and offer classified solutions that attempt to rival Craigslist.

Newspaper Association of American report on video in the newsroom

So I’m conducting research for the NAA on the present usage of videos on American newspaper’s Web sites.

I’ll be keeping my eye out for stories, posts, studies and reports on the phenomenon.

One personal anecdote/prediction before I embark:

Born and raised a lover of print, I’ve always held a particularly disdain for the “cold” medium of broadcast. I want to be in control of my media consumption, not a passive recipient of it. In thinking of newspapers creating video for the Web, I lament that newspapers haven’t gotten there sooner. It’s the one online arena where they’ve got nothing to lose!

Big Broadcast and Television are beginning to figure out online video. As newspapers migrate more into that space as well, I just hope they didn’t miss the opportunity to beat broadcast to the punch.

Newspaper companies create content, not newspapers

Here’s another tidbit I took away from an interesting conversation at the Inland Press Association: to survive (and thrive) in a new media landscape, newspapers must undergo a shift in thinking. They must conceive of themselves as creators of content, not producers of newspapers.

During our question and answer session, I repeatedly emphasized the importance for newspapers to use the Web as a platform rather than a medium; a place upon which to empower communities with tools to build, share and interact with the news.

In thinking of the Web as a platform, however, newspapers must first realize that their job is not to produce a physical product, but to create content.

The connection between those two points is so important because it affects newspapers in a very fundamental way, right down to the content management system they use to produce their end product.

The gentleman who brought this to my attention pointed out that many newspapers are (tragically) focusing on how to most quickly and efficiently repurpose their individual newspaper articles for the Web site. They’ve got it backwards. They ought to be focusing on the news first, then the newspaper.

Just a thought…

Inland Press Association annual meeting in Chicago – recap

As I posted earlier, I spoke today at the Inland Press Association annual meeting in Chicago on the expectations of young journalists, along with David Nelson, Kelly Mahoney and Jon Rubin. I’ll post more later, but for those young journalists, here’s a list of the pressing concerns on the minds of your future employers (necessarily paraphrased):

If you were editor-in-chief of newspaper with 50,000 circulation and 50 reporters, and you had one year to turn the paper around in a new media landscape, how would you do so from an organizational standpoint? Would you train your reporters? Would you hire new ones?

What is your dream job?

Do you believe that younger readers react differently to advertising as compared with an older generation?

In term of getting to know your audience, how would you go about that if you were writing for a small newspaper in a rural, homogenous, geographically dispersed community?

From small, community newspapers that struggle with high turnover, what characteristics would influence us to stick with smaller papers rather than move on?

What role should journalists play in the shaping of the end product?

Are wire services impractical investments for newspapers?

Here’s a headline from an article from the International Herlad Tribune that appeared in the Boston Globe today:

“Merkel aloof as public questions troop presence in Afghanistan” (I think it was originally “Merkel aloof as public wavers on Afghanistan” when I saw it in print, but they must have tweaked it for the Web.)

I majored in German in college, so when I saw the headline while reading the Globe this morning, I recognized the German chancellor’s name and dove right in. Then I asked myself, “Is Angela Merkel a household name to the average reader of the Boston Globe?” (Note: I’m not asking if her name “should be,” I’m simply asking if she is). I plan on polling a few of the people I’m staying with out here in Boston, a group of students getting their master’s of education at Boston College, and see what they say. But I think not.

And that brings me to the question.

Are wire services simply impractical for the paper version of the newspaper?

The article in question was wire copy from the International Herald Tribune. It’s a good piece of news, and actually quite interesting if you follow German politics and foreign policy. But I don’t think it serves the average citizen of Boston much, if at all. For one thing, it’s word for word the same article the IHT ran. Now, I’m not saying that is remarkable. Far from it, it has become standard for a paper to plug its pages with wire copy to fill its paper, without having the time or resources to position it locally by making an extra phone call.

And I’m not saying the news is unimportant. If anything, I think it is incumbent on the United States and its citizens to analyze the foreign policy of our European neighbors.

But – and here’s the thing – is it relevant to the reader?

I’d say no.

From the reader’s point of view, no where in the article am I told why this is important to me. The story hasn’t even been localized to the United States, let alone the Boston area. For those who herald the future of newspapers as excelling at local coverage, this ain’t it.

Anyone else have a different take on this? Anyone from the Globe want to weigh in on the editorial decision to run it without additional reporting? Or are the foreign policy issues of Germany that important to the Boston area?

Inland Press Association 122nd Annual Meeting, Chicago, Illinois October 21-23

To young or aspiring journalists: I’ll be speaking at the Inland Press Association’s meeting on the future of the newsroom with fellow Medill graduate Kelly Mahoney and Medill professor David Nelson.

The question

What do young journalists expect in the newsroom of the future? I’ll be providing my insight to editors and publishers on what young journalists expect of their future employers and work environments, but I’d love to get input from other writers. So, to turn the question your way…

What do you expect in the newsroom of the future?

(Anyone familiar with Gannett’s “data gathering centers” or any other newsrooms doing interesting things in mobile journalism, citizen journalism, social media and multimedia please share).