allgood2's posterous

Malcolm Gladwell recently wrote an article for the New Yorker, SMALL CHANGE: Why the revolution will not be tweeted. This seemed to set of a firestorm in the Social Media community, but also in the community of nonprofits using social media; and I'm not certain why.

I think some of the response was obviously a rally against the feeling that Twitter, Facebook, and Social Media were being viciously attacked. But I stand firm in my perspective that regardless of if Gladwell loves, hates, or is ultimately disinterested in social media, his article wasn't an attack. It was researched, articulate, and mostly accurate.  A well composed article of the current benefits and limitations of social media; and yes, a sly criticism of our tendency to overstate things.

Twitter and Facebook are indeed revolutionary, but being revolutionary isn't the same as starting a revolution in activism terms. That said, I also believe less and less people care about starting a revolution so to that degree his points maybe moot. Those waiting for Clay Shirky to call Gladwell out, may have a long wait. I believe Gladwell's argument juxtapose well with Shirky's and others in the arena. We need to leave the all or nothing arguments to issues that actually deserve them, like elections and revolutions. Where you are in or you are out. Social media isn't that.

I think Gladwell, who I can't say is avid user of social media, does a very good job of defining what social media is and has accomplished. What social media has done and what is praise worthy and even revolutionary about social media is it's significantly lower barrier entrance for issues and causes. Before a donation or an action were the lowest barriers and it was hard fought to get people to do either or both.

Now days the barrier is a 'Like", a 'Retweet', a 'Shared Link', a 'Follow'. This has expanded potential audiences greatly; and if your primary goals were sharing information largely and widely, then this is great, fantastic even.

But if you're like most nonprofits or social causes, this is just a stepping stone. Yeah, it's made step one small and easiest to stand on; especially when it use to be a huge leap. This is a weak tie, and its a wonderful thing. We can enjoy it, revel it even, because its amazing and we didn't have the power to do so before.

We can or should be able to acknowledge a weak tie as a weak tie; and still be utterly proud of what we've accomplished, why it's important, how beneficial it is; and still say, "…but it's just a stepping stone; stage one or two of an action plan."

Even if the ONLY plan of action is to turn 10% of our weak ties into slightly stronger ties; that's cool. For some organizations we just need a large starting point, and people willing to perform small tasks—retweet, post a link, say thank you.

But for many organizations, we're trying to turn 2,000 followers into 20 retweets or 50 attendees or 100 members or 1000 donations—and sometimes donations will be easier than retweets and others retweets easier than donations; and its all dependent on ties—do they need to be strong, weak, or razor thin for you to use them well.

And we're learning how to use them well; and we're learning how to make stronger ties; and how to make donations both weak and strong ties; etc., etc. So why do we care if the next revolution is started via Twitter or just spread via Twitter. Acknowledging the strength and weakness of the tools we use is beneficial. Beneficial not just for the goals we are working now, but for the future revolutions. Placing Twitter or Facebook in its right place between 'you caught my interest for 1 minute on this issue' and 'you've inspired me to change my life on this issue' is a good thing. So why are so many people up in arms?

While Social Media is here for sometime, the truth is that Twitter or Facebook could be gone tomorrow, for any number of reasons. They are revolutionary tools, and they may have changed your life; but maybe they won't be the tools of tomorrow. Maybe tomorrow's tools will be better, more fantastically. Better able to convert passing interest into passionate commitment. Maybe tomorrow's social media tools will allows us to do that, exactly, but for now we're using the current tools to carefully cultivate and grow stronger ties with a larger and growing body of weaker ties. And that's good.

These people may not be willing to put anything significant on the line for the cause; but maybe we really don't need them to. Sometimes a simple 'I Like' is good enough. Good enough to persuade current funders, good enough to spread information, even good enough to find people who will be or are already more passionate. Weak ties offer a ton of potential, but they aren't strong ties.