I'm two years late to Ryan Holiday's book"Trust Me, I am working". Never much of a PR person, I learned quickly from his nonfictional account of becoming a"media manipulator" that advertising can be everything after you've built a fantastic product. Since I must return the book by 12/20 into the San Diego Public Library, I figured that this is a good time to write my notes down as a blog post.
Quotes from"Trust Me, I am Lying"
"We play with their rules long enough and it becomes our game" --
Orson Scott Card
"Social media isn't a set of tools to permit individuals to communicate with people. It's a set of embedding mechanisms to allow technologies to use humans to communicate with one another, in an orgy of self-organizing... The Matrix had it wrong. You are not the batter power in a worldwide, human-enslaving AI, you're slightly more valuable. You Are a Part of the shifting circuitry"
-Venkatesh Rao (Entrepreneur in residence at Xerox)
"It's a prime example of the feminist blogosphere's tendency to tap into the market force of what I've begun to consider as"outrage world" -- the frequently occurring firestorms awakened on mainstream, for-profit, woman-targeted websites like Jezebel and also, to a lesser degree, Slate's own XX Factor and Salon's Broadsheet. They are triggered by authors that are compelling żona mnie zdradziła readers to feel what the writers assert is righteously indignant rage but which is actually just petty jealousy, cleverly promoted as feminism. These firestorms are great for page-view-pimping bloggy enterprise."
"Businesses should expect a full-scale, organized attack from critics. One which will simultaneously overrun blog remarks, Facebook fan pages, along with an onslaught of blogs, leading to mainstream press appeal. Start by creating a social media disasters plan and growing internal fire drills to anticipate what could happen."
-Jeremiah Owyang
"Our illusions are the house where we live; they are our news, our heroes, our adventure, our forms of artwork, our really experience."
-Daniel Boorstin
Practice Advice from the Novel
Control your Wikipedia page (use any media mention from blogs or conventional media)
Examine the top stories and you'll see a pattern: the best stories all polarize poeple. If you create it endanger people's 3 Bs -- behavior, belief, or possessions -- you receive a huge virus-like dispersion
Write stuff bloggers can post immediately without any work. Feed them their very own lies"help them trick their readers"
Loaded headlines are popular
Silence on sites is the worst.
Faking leaks with email editor (from various sources) can operate if You've Got the right connections
Prominent headlines that cried excitement concerning utlimately unimportant news
Luxury use of images (often of little significance )
Imposters, frauds, and faked interviews
Shade comics and a big, thick Sunday supplement
Ostentatious aid of this underdog causes
Use of anonymous sources
Prominent policy of high society and occasions
Concepts from the publication
Ongoing Narrative /Iterative Reporting -harm is already done, there's no anything. Iterative reporting is bullshit, folks treat news headlines as"cultural fact", the damage is already done, even it it is a baseless accusation.
Faking leaks with email editor (from different sources)
By way of instance, each picture is not the same load screen = more pageviews (short term vs. long term metrics). Usability vs. profitability -- publishers are concentrated liberally on pageviews, but in the long term, consumer trust will be important. Meanwhile, reckless bloggers are making countless sensationalizing stories that are untrue.
Snark -- deadly weapon (humor in its own dark form. Another online illustration: Hot Chicks using Douchebags
All that happens -> All that's understood by media --> All that is newsworthy ->All that is published as news -> All that spreads. This really is the systematic restricting of the information seen by the public
My Action List / Lessons from the Novel
Blogs hold a Good Deal of power
The right contacts at the right blogs in a specific sector hold lots of influence. Example: Apple statements
Building a brand new site with high viral grip (but with the ideal user metrics in your mind ) may take off quickly. Websites like Watch Mojo, Ebaumsworld, Break.com, ride the wave of copying content from other people, organized in a digestible manner that users can quickly spread. Millions of dollars are made this way while resources are never credited. There must be a way to do both.
There is a demand for a reputable news source, or an industry specific source that does not pander to"mass hysteria". Example: refinery29.com