Has it really been 10 months since the last FIR Live?

It may have been a while, but when we decided to bring the real-time single-topic panel discussion back, we did it in a big way. We’ll be talking about influencer marketing – what’s hype, what’s legit, what works, what doesn’t – with an all-star panel that includes:

• David Armano – EVP, Global Innovation and Integration at Edelman
• Gini Dietrich – CEO at PR firm Arment Dietrich, Inc, and Spin Sucks blogger
• Andrew Grill – CEO at UK-based influence tracking firm Kred
• Zena Weist – VP of Strategy at social software company Expion

Additional panelists will be announced once we’ve locked them in.

FIR Live will take place on Saturday, June 16 at 10am Pacific, noon Eastern and 6pm London. We’re still working out which platform well use, but were leaning toward a Google Hangout On Air. We’ll be back with details when we have them, but as with all FIR Live episodes, you’ll be able to weigh in with a call or comment in the chat room.

For now, be sure to mark your calendars so you won’t miss this provocative and informative discussion about a fast-growing social marketing tactic. If you’re not able to participate live, don’t worry – the segment will be made available as a regular FIR episode for listening when its convenient for you.

FIR Live #24
Saturday, June 16, 2012
10am PT / 1pm ET / 6pm UK

(Cross-posted from For Immediate Release, Shel’s and my podcast blog.)

The Tom Wolfe novel from the 1980s that’s the title of this post – along with the movie of the same name – comes to my mind when reading media reports and online commentary and punditry this morning about the Facebook initial public offering last week and its immediate (current) aftermath.

Many if not all of the novel’s ingredients of ambition, racism, social class, politics, and greed in 1980s New York City are playing out in what already looks like a 2012 update to the 1980s story.

At last night’s NASDAQ close, Facebook’s share price was $31 precisely, a fall of nearly 9 percent on the previous day’s close.

But look at the share price performance since the IPO on Friday – at last night’s close, a decline of over 26 percent.

So what’s happening with the stock of the biggest (and most hyped) tech IPO in history?

Facebook launched its IPO on the NASDAQ stock exchange in New York on May 18, 2012. The launch share price was $38. It’s been up and down like a yoyo ever since, but overall on a downward price trend.

There have been murmurings all week in the financial mainstream media and expert-opinion blogs about behind-the-scenes skulduggery and manipulation. Yesterday, some serious allegations began surfacing into the mainstream.

The Los Angeles Times reported that US financial market regulators are wondering whether Wall Street insiders heard data the public did not before stock trading began:

[...] Morgan Stanley, which led the Wall Street effort to bring the social network public, came under fire following reports that the bank had told some favored clients that the bank was cutting its revenue estimates for Facebook. The lowered expectations came after the tech giant expressed caution in a public filing about its advertising sales on mobile devices.

The legal issue raised could be “securities fraud – plain and simple,” said Ernest Badway, a securities lawyer in New York and New Jersey and a former enforcement attorney at the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. “You can’t be putting out two sets of numbers.”

This would be selective disclosure at least – an illegal act under US securities laws.

Headlining its report as an exclusive, Business Insider said it loud and clear:

[...] The analysts cut their estimates because a Facebook executive who knew the business was weak told them to.

Put differently, the company basically pre-announced that its second quarter would fall short of analysts’ estimates. But it only told the underwriter analysts about this.

The information about the estimate cut was then verbally conveyed to sophisticated institutional investors who were considering buying Facebook stock, but not to smaller investors.

Yep, selective disclosure. The Wall Street Journal says similar things. And most papers talk about lawsuits beginning to fly already from unhappy investors.

If all of this proves to be true on investigation, Facebook executives, individuals in Morgan Stanley and others could be facing criminal charges. Right now, it raises questions regarding the capability of those leading Facebook – including founder Mark Zuckerberg – as to their competence, never might matters of trust and integrity.

So what are Facebook, etc, saying about all of this? Nothing at the moment, according to the Business Insider report:

[...] Given the PR and legal disaster that the Facebook IPO is rapidly becoming, most official communications channels have gone silent. Facebook declined to comment. Morgan Stanley did not return a call and email seeking comment.

As students of crisis communication well know, if you say nothing, there’s a vacuum. And they know that there will be plenty of other voices to fill that vacuum on your behalf. The conversation continues whether you’re there or not.

How serious all of this really is for Facebook, no doubt we’ll know more by the end of this week. That’s less than three days away. Actually, I wonder whether Facebook has three days to get a grip on this.

And what of the Facebook small investor, the average-Joe punter? Well, you could probably do no worse than the advice suggested in this JoyofTech cartoon.

Happy investing.

PS: Worth reading Tom Wolfe’s novel if you haven’t, or re-reading it if you have. “What goes around, comes around” also springs to mind. And of course, we’re nowhere near the story’s conclusion yet.

[Later:] Prompted by a tweet by Paul Sutton, this 60-second TV commercial from financial services firm Allied Dunbar in 1995 has ironic relevance to this story:

(If you don’t see the video embedded above, watch it at YouTube.)

Related post:

• The Motrin storm: breathtaking speed and scale

Content summary: Michael Netzley in Singapore still without voice; FIR Speakers & Speeches podcast of Neville’s PRII conference presentation is up; next FIR Live on influence marketing set for June 16; Neville speaking at Like Minds conference in Exeter this week: discount price for FIR listeners; GaggleAmp update; News That Fits: high-growth companies in Europe embrace social media says Google-sponsored survey; GM ends Facebook advertising but Ford doesn’t; Ragan promo; Dan York reports on integrating Soundcloud and Flipboard (with added comment about Player FM), an internship opportunity with the Internet Society, and more; listener comments; the Media Monitoring Minute with CustomScoop; CIPR’s call to action for feedback on PR guidelines about Wikipedia engagement; TemboSocial promo; is it time for a C-level social media executive?; music from The Eisenhowers; and more.

Get FIR:

• Download the MP3 file (29.4Mb, 73:21)
• Subscribe to the RSS feed
• Get the show at iTunes
• Get the FIR app for your iPhone and for your Android device (visit the Android Market from your device)

Messages from our sponsors: FIR is brought to you with Lawrence Ragan Communications, serving communicators worldwide for 35 years, www.ragan.com; Save time with the CustomScoop online clipping service: sign up for your free two-week trial, at www.customscoop.com/fir; and TemboSocial (formerly Pollstream): helping you transform your communications goals into exciting strategies that will enable you to engage, educate and inform your customers and employees online, pollstream.com/fir/.

For Immediate Release: The Hobson & Holtz Report for May 21, 2012: A 73-minute podcast recorded live from Wokingham, Berkshire, England, and Concord, California, USA.

Links to websites, blog posts and other content we discuss in the show are posted as Delicious bookmarks to facilitate your connection with the discussions and sharing of that content.

• FIR #652 bookmarks on Delicious

Names of blogs, individuals, companies and organizations we discussed or mentioned in the show are posted to the FIR Show Notes pages at The New PR Wiki. You can contribute time stamps – see the show notes home page for info.

• FIR #652 show notes at The New PR Wiki

Share your comments or questions about this show, or suggestions for future shows, in the FIR FriendFeed Room. You can also email us at fircomments@gmail.com; call the Comment Line at +1 206 338 7960 (North America), +44 20 3239 9082 (Europe), or Skype: fircomments; comment at Twitter: twitter.com/FIR. You can email your comments, questions and suggestions as MP3 file attachments, if you wish (max. 3 minutes / 5Mb attachment, please!). We’ll be happy to see how we can include your audio contribution in a show.

To stay informed about occasional FIR events (eg, FIR Live), sign up for FIR Update email news.

So, until Monday May 28…

(Cross-posted from For Immediate Release, Shel’s and my podcast blog.)

Microsoft launched a “social search network” on Sunday – So.cl.

Here’s how Microsoft describes it:

So.cl (pronounced “social”) is an experimental research project, developed by Microsoft’s FUSE Labs, focused on exploring the possibilities of social search for the purpose of learning.

• So.cl combines social networking and search, to help people find and share interesting web pages in the way students do when they work together.
• So.cl helps you create rich posts, by assembling montages of visual web content.
• To encourage interaction and collaboration, So.cl provides rich media sharing, and real time sharing of videos via “video parties.”

We expect students to continue using products such as Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and other existing social networks, as well as Bing, Google and other search tools. We hope to encourage students to reimagine how our everyday communication and learning tools can be improved, by researching, learning and sharing in their everyday lives.

It sounds like a mashup of features from Facebook, Google+, Pinterest and other popular networking places, combined with search (especially Google’s new Knowledge Graph).

The description says it’s focused on students. Indeed, the FAQ says:

We are formally partnering with selected schools (including University of Washington, Syracuse University, and New York University).

It does add that anyone can join.

There’s a very good in-depth first-look walk-through of So.cl by Marketing Land: http://marketingland.com/microsoft-launches-so-cl-social-network-a-quick-look-12499

Interesting, Microsoft. I’ve signed up to kick the tyres, etc.

Have you signed up? Let me know what you think of it.

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Microsoft’s So.cl Goes Live
Microsoft’s social networking site, so.cl which gone live accidentally few months back is in fact launched by Microsoft and available to all at present, you can sign into this service with your Facebo…

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An interesting experiment gets its official launch this weekend when Monmouthpedia formally kicks off today.

The Welsh town of Monmouth is the focus of this Wikipedia project that aims to create physical connections between places throughout the town, and events in its history, with respective content on Wikipedia.

According to the description on Wikipedia:

[...] The project aims to cover every single notable place, person, artefact, plant, animal and other things in Monmouth in as many languages as possible, but with a special focus on Welsh. This is a different scale of wiki-project. The project is jointly funded by Monmouthshire County Council and Wikimedia UK. Monmouthshire County Council intend to install free town wide Wi-Fi for the project.

What this means in practice is that when you visit Monmouth – a town with a rich history as this Monmouthpedia infographic illustrates – you’ll encounter visual clues everywhere that let you know that detailed information about the thing on which the clue is attached is available on Wikipedia.

The ways in which the clues will be displayed are many:

• Larger ceramic or metal plaques for places exposed to the elements for articles specific to Monmouth.
• Smaller plastic, ceramic or metal plaques for labelling objects non specific to Monmouth, e.g. for use in the Flora and Fauna guide.
• Labels for use inside buildings, e.g. for objects in museums.
• Glass stickers in the windows of shops to give information on their professions.
• In addition there will be information posters, signs, notice boards and leaflets to help people contribute and stay informed.

And the visual clues themselves? QR codes.

If you have a smartphone and a QR code-scanning app (for Android smartphones, a good one is Barcode Scanner), you just scan the code and the relevant Wikipedia page will open on your device. As free wifi-fi will blanket Monmouth, no worries about connectivity costs.

What’s especially clever is that the page you get on your mobile device can be in any one of about 25 languages. Here’s how that works:

When a user scans a QRpedia QR code on their mobile device, the device decodes the QR code into a Uniform Resource Locator (URL) using the domain name “qrwp.org” and whose path (final part) is the title of a Wikipedia article, and sends a request for the article specified in the URL to the QRpedia web server. It also transmits the language setting of the device.

The QRpedia server then uses Wikipedia’s API to determine whether there is a version of the specified Wikipedia article in the language used by the device, and if so, returns it in a mobile-friendly format. If there is no version of the article available in the preferred language, then the QRpedia server offers a choice of the available languages, or a Google translation.

In this way, one QRcode can deliver the same article in many languages, even when the museum is unable to make its own translations. QRpedia also records usage statistics.

That’s what I call imagination.

If you’re interested in how this grand experiment will develop – Monmouth has been dubbed “The world’s first Wikipedia town” – keep an eye on the website and the blog. You can also connect on Twitter: @MonmouthpediA. Follow the hashtag #MonmouthpediA.

Related posts:

• A little imagination is key to success with QR codes
• Three things to make QR codes worthwhile
• More experiments with QR codes

If you listen to podcasts, Player.fm might interest you if you want an easy way to both listen to your favourite shows and discover new ones.

Player.fm is a podcasting service in the cloud. You use it in your web browser – there are no apps to install, just an easy-to-use method to create a free account called a channel, add the RSS feed addresses of podcasts to your channel, save, and listen. You can also add iTunes feeds as well as import an OPML file you already have.

I’ve been podcasting for over seven years and listen to a lot of other podcasts. Typically, I subscribe to them and get the audio files usually from iTunes via an RSS reader. The old fashioned way! It’s cumbersome and often imperfect, though, and probably one reason why I don’t listen as much or as often as I’d like to.

What Player.fm offers is streaming audio on demand. It really is easy to set up and use as I discovered today. The screenshot above shows part of the channel I created that includes 14 business/communications podcasts that I listen to often:

1. For Immediate Release (the podcast series I co-host with Shel Holtz)
2. IABC Cafe2Go
3. Inside PR
4. Jaffe Juice
5. Jay Baer’s Social Pros Podcast
6. Marketing Edge from Provident Partners
7. Marketing Over Coffee
8. Media Bullseye
9. On the Record…Online
10. PR And Other Deadly Sins
11. PRSA Voices of Public Relations
12. Six Pixels of Separation
13. Steve Lubetkin’s Professional Podcasts
14. Trafcom News Podcast

(For information on each one, see “16 business podcasts worth listening to” that I wrote in March. And in case you’re wondering why this post lists only 14, it’s because 2 on the original list haven’t been updated this year, 1 is behind a subscriber paywall, and I’ve included FIR.)

If you want to enjoy seamless listening, without any fuss, then go to http://player.fm/jangles, my Player.fm channel, and click on the big ‘play’ button with each podcast. Or, if you prefer to subscribe, here are three handy options:

• OPML file that you can  import into any other podcatcher including Google Reader
• RSS feed aggregating the latest episodes of all 14 podcasts
• iTunes link

As Player.fm developer Michael Mahemoff says in the FAQ:

Why play podcasts on a website?
Podcasts were originally designed to be downloaded, and that’s still worthwhile. But most podcast apps these days, including iTunes, provide the ability to stream content on demand. The nice thing about this is you can try a podcast a few times before subscribing to it. Player FM takes this a step further by letting you listen to podcasts without even downloading and installing an app. Even less friction for people getting into podcasts. Some publishers already provide their own interfaces to play podcasts, but the experience is different on every site and it’s not possible to listen to all of your favorite podcasts in one place. Many don’t provide play links at all, just offering a “Subscribe in iTunes” link. Player FM aims to make podcasts simple.

What if you want to listen on a device other than your desktop or laptop computer? Your mobile phone, for instance? (Does anyone still use an iPod or other dedicated MP3 player?)

That’s covered.

The screenshot here shows my channel on my Samsung Galaxy SII Android smartphone. I bet it looks similar on an iPhone, a Windows phone and most other smartphones.

I think this is an especially useful feature that offers, again, ease of use with on-demand audio streaming via wifi or other network you connect to including cellular. No apps to install, just use your mobile browser.

And that highlights one issue to think about – connectivity.

If you have no network connection, then you have no podcasts to listen to.

Typically, I listen to podcasts either at my desk (so on a desktop computer with a wired internet connection) or in my car (usually streaming the content of the Pocket Casts app on my phone to my car radio using a Belkin Tunecast FM transmitter).

The latter use with Pocket Casts will let you stream over your cellular network connection or via wifi. But I prefer to have the podcast audio files on my mobile device, mostly for audio quality reasons (mobile networks tend to be iffy in terms of speed and stability especially when you’re moving), not to mention the relative high cost of streaming audio data on 3G if you don’t have an unlimited data plan.

Player.fm may well be developing an offline-listening choice, according to the FAQ:

[...] We don’t yet have offline support, and we know how much you want to play podcasts in the car, train, or gym, where you might not have internet access. Fixing this is definitely a priority for us.

In the meantime, if you want a frictionless listening experience from streaming on-demand audio with no fuss, and you have a network connection, Player.fm is a great option.

(Via GigaOm)

Related posts:

• 16 business podcasts worth listening to
• Make podcasting take off for you

On April 26, 2012, FIR co-host Neville Hobson gave a keynote presentation at this year’s annual conference of the Public Relations Institute of Ireland (PRII) in Dublin. The overall conference theme was Reputation Management in the Age of Digital.

Could we genuinely have foreseen the extent to which technological innovations would have disrupted our way of working? asked the PRII. How social and digital media, in particular, would have given rise to consumer power and citizen journalism? Or that we would face unprecedented competition from a new wave of competitors?

These are powerful themes that were touched in every presentation and discussion. The PRII video-recorded every conference session (if you’re a PRII member, you can view the videos in the member area on the PRII website). They’ve kindly agreed to the audio of Neville’s presentation – called Reputation Management at Internet Speed – being made available to you in this FIR Speakers & Speeches podcast. You’ll get the most from it if you view the presentation deck as you listen, embedded below (or, if you don’t see it, view it at Slideshare).

Get this podcast:

• Download the MP3 file (18Mb, 39:16)
• Get the show on iTunes
• Subscribe to the FIR Speakers & Speeches RSS feed
• Get the FIR app for your iPhone or Android device

Share your comments or questions about this podcast, or suggestions for future shows, in the FIR FriendFeed Room. You can also email us at fircomments@gmail.com; call the Comment Line at +1 253 780 9125 (North America), +44 20 3239 9082 (Europe), or Skype: fircomments; comment at Twitter: twitter.com/FIR. You can email your comments, questions and suggestions as MP3 file attachments, if you wish (max. 3 minutes / 5Mb attachment, please!). We’ll be happy to see how we can include your audio contribution in a show.

To receive all For Immediate Release podcasts including the weekly Hobson & Holtz Report, subscribe to the full RSS feed.

This FIR Speakers & Speeches podcast is brought to you with Lawrence Ragan Communications, serving communicators worldwide for 35 years. Information: www.ragan.com.

Podsafe outro music – extract from On A Podcast Instrumental Mix (MP3, 5Mb) by Cruisebox.

(Cross-posted from For Immediate Release, Shel’s and my podcast blog.)

In the Wikipedia and Public Relations presentation to Wikimedia UK that Philip Sheldrake and I did last weekend when we participated in the Wikimedia UK annual conference in London, a significant aspect was sharing some content from a draft document prepared by the CIPR that’s designed to help CIPR members understand more about the Wikipedia community and how to engage with them.

It’s good to see that the draft text has quickly been posted to Wikimedia and is openly available for anyone with an opinion (literally) to comment. If you have a relevant view about Wikipedia and public relations that you wish to share, this is your time, your place and your opportunity.

So, have at it!

• Also, read Philip’s post that he’s just published with his assessment of events and backgrounds. And, see Paul Wilkinson’s post – credible views from someone who’s both a CIPR member and a Wikipedian.

Related post:

• Wikipedia and public relations

Content summary: FIR interview with Grantoo co-founder and CEO Dimitri Sillam is up. The Speakers & Speeches file from Neville’s talk in Dublin is coming this week. Neville recounts the talk he and Philip Sheldrake gave at the Wikimedia UK Annual General Meeting over the weekend. A discount code is available for FIR listeners interested in attending Like Minds Exeter 2012. News That Fits: brand humanization is not a social media fad; Ragan Communications promo; the rise of social influence marketing with Klout and PeerIndex; listener comments discussion; CustomScoop’s Media Monitoring Minute; Dan York’s report addresses audio apps for the iPad and iPhone, DRM, and the 2,000-plus applications received for new gTLDs; social TV on the ‘second screen’ evolves into content in its own right; TemboSocial promo; half of UK internet users say online ads are worth it in exchange for free content; music from The Scarred; and more.

Get FIR:

• Download the MP3 file (29.8Mb, 74:24)
• Subscribe to the RSS feed
• Get the show at iTunes
• Get the FIR app for your iPhone and for your Android device (visit the Android Market from your device)

Messages from our sponsors: FIR is brought to you with Lawrence Ragan Communications, serving communicators worldwide for 35 years, www.ragan.com; Save time with the CustomScoop online clipping service: sign up for your free two-week trial, at www.customscoop.com/fir; and TemboSocial (formerly Pollstream): helping you transform your communications goals into exciting strategies that will enable you to engage, educate and inform your customers and employees online, pollstream.com/fir/.

For Immediate Release: The Hobson & Holtz Report for May 14, 2012: A 74-minute podcast recorded live from Wokingham, Berkshire, England, and Concord, California, USA.

Links to websites, blog posts and other content we discuss in the show are posted as Delicious bookmarks to facilitate your connection with the discussions and sharing of that content.

• FIR #651 bookmarks on Delicious

Names of blogs, individuals, companies and organizations we discussed or mentioned in the show are posted to the FIR Show Notes pages at The New PR Wiki. You can contribute time stamps – see the show notes home page for info.

• FIR #618 show notes at The New PR Wiki

Share your comments or questions about this show, or suggestions for future shows, in the FIR FriendFeed Room. You can also email us at fircomments@gmail.com; call the Comment Line at +1 206 338 7960 (North America), +44 20 3239 9082 (Europe), or Skype: fircomments; comment at Twitter: twitter.com/FIR. You can email your comments, questions and suggestions as MP3 file attachments, if you wish (max. 3 minutes / 5Mb attachment, please!). We’ll be happy to see how we can include your audio contribution in a show.

To stay informed about occasional FIR events (eg, FIR Live), sign up for FIR Update email news.

So, until Monday May 21…

(Cross-posted from For Immediate Release, Shel’s and my podcast blog.)

Very interesting assessment of in-car technology with some quotable predictions from Intel, eg:

• By next year the car will be the third most-connected place in which people spend time.
• By 2016, how connected a car is will be a critical buying decision.
• In the future, if car ownership declines but increased use is still needed, connectivity might allow users to “log-on” to a vehicle. So it could even change colour and add the accessories of your choice. Just like a PC desktop, a machine would take on the persona of its user.
• In the US, the average driver spends the equivalent of two months of every year in car; it’s impractical for us to give up connectivity inside of the vehicle. The car is the mobile device of the future.
• We see people bringing physical goods into cars to personalise them, and we expect a digital equivalent to emerge.

Embedded Link

The connected car: coming to your street soon – Telegraph
Intel is investing in ‘connected cars’, which are the logical precursor to self-driving models. Matt Warman looks at the ways tech is getting into the car.

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• See also: “Volkswagen People’s car project, Hover Car, the flying two-seater” video on YouTube. And if you don’t recognize the car in the large image at the top, read on…