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HOME >> ZEICHICK'S TAKE

Zeichick’s Take: Social media and you

By Alan Zeichick

May 4, 2009 — Are you all a-twitter about Twitter? Is your face on Facebook? Are you linked into LinkedIn? Is there space on your MySpace? Are you a-gog about blogs?

I’ve just come back from a publishing conference where a major topic of discussion was the use of social media, like those mentioned above, to help form communities. The feeling is that social media is super important in today’s world.

At SD Times, we believe in social media—or at least, some of us believe that. Some of us are enthusiastic about social media. I’m one of them: I have pages on Facebook and LinkedIn, and am an active blogger and Twitterer.

However, others on our team are skeptical about social media as a concept; some think that it’s a fad hyped by the more mainstream general media itself, which gets all hung up on Oprah’s first tweet or the explosion in Facebook subscribers.

In that context, it’s unclear how to respond to stories that say that 60% of new Twitter subscribers don’t last a month. Does that mean that the service is a failure? That it’s not for everyone? Or that those individuals might come back later? Certainly my experience suggests the latter interpretation: I signed up for Twitter a long time ago, went dormant for many months, but then came back to it later.

Of course, our use of social media isn’t just personal. For example, we have an SD Times Facebook page and a Twitter account, which we use to tell you about newly posted stories, as well as a blog where our editors share their thoughts and comments.

What do you think about social media? How important is it to you? How do you use it? More importantly, how can we use social media to better serve your needs? Please write to me at feedback@bzmedia.com, or leave a comment on my blog.

Alan Zeichick is editorial director of SD Times. Follow him on Twitter at twitter.com/zeichick. Read his blog at ztrek.blogspot.com.

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