Today he’s one of the keynotes at the Forrester Consumer Forum

Notes:
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I’m here as the token EggHead of the event. I always go where no humanist has gone before.

If you want to understand the web now, you need to hire humanities grads – the questions about the web used to be technical questions, but now they are social and cultural questions – the kinds of things studied by liberal arts grads.

Describe Web 2.0 in 2 sentences or less:
“You make all the content. They keep all the revenue.”

Convergence culture is a world where every story, image, sound, idea, brand, and relationship will play itself out across all possible media platforms.

Along with convergence culture is participary culture – he actually used this slide:

Which is user generated content which originally came from this presentation.

The question now is really what can I do with your product.

We hear about people worried about losing control – the reality is you lost it long ago. Consumers can take your content and remix it and share it and publish it almost as publically as you can. You can sue, and shut a few people down, but the genie is out of the bottle.

The ability for “us” to control and remake content and republish it at an equivalent quality and fidelity as large media brands is fundamentally and radically different than previous eras of media.

But large media and brands have a place as well -all the parodies of the mac ads circulate in part because everyone knows the original.

There’s also great innovation going on here in terms of fan practices and how they are cocreating value.

There are all kinds of low cost experiments which remix the raw materials our culture provides and you can support and cultivate these in dialog – not shut them down.

Four Eyed Mosters and collaborative curating – creating a market for your product before it is even released.

Wizard Rock – over 200 wizard rock groups using myspace to create music with reference to Harry Potter – a whole genre of widely listened-to music that did not exist before it came bottom up, not top down.

Any platform that can be used to trade cat pictures can bring down a government – Ethan Zuckerman.

The fundamental questions are all about what this new participatory and convergent culture will be like.

The story of Fanlib – a company which wanted to create a commercial portal to distribute fan fiction – and some of the fans are revolting – they don’t want a commercial entity to run this.

Fanlib committed several obvious mistakes – 80% of the fan fiction writers are women, but the ad campaign was all men. The company told fans it wanted to empower them, but to corporate rights holders they were telling a different story – complete control, staying within the lines.

The community didn’t like the idea of things being regulated, commercialized, and brought into the lines.

Example of Stephen Colbert – but his studio sends a cease and desist to YouTube – different parts of the same company have different ideas of what this means. That is the current state of convergence culture.

One quick plug at the end for the Futures of Entertainment 2 conference.

Q: Is copyright dead?

A: No, but it is evolving. In the future, companies will have every right to protect their content but every incentive to let it go. It isn’t that they don’t have legal right but they should not use it.

Q: Is participatory culture even across the world?

A. Not even, but global. When the media folks went after Harry Potter fan fiction in Poland and Thailand, the kids in the US knew about it immediately. In some ways this group is more connected and interactive than anyone else. But there are other countries which are clearly left out. This is a global phenomenon, but not one in which everyone in the world participates equally.

Q: To what extent should brands try to control / engage in negative discussions about their brand?

A: You can’t shut it down. Your best response is to do something about what you’ve done that people are criticizing you for. If it is a misperception get out there and correct it – if it is an accurate criticism change the behavior.

Panelists:

• Jeremy Allaire, Brightcove
• Ze Frank
• Philip Kaplan (pud), AdBrite (and AskPud)

Q: What is media?

Philip – networks are going away. We are all our own networks now. You no longer care so much about the “package” so much as the specific content you’re looking for. It’s no longer important where you get your content from.

Ze – For the purposes of this discussion, I’d define media as anything you can advertise against or put a brand statement next to.

Jeremy – you have to also think about the metadata, behavior and context – it’s not just the idea that content can come from many places and go through many channels, but what opportunities there are to make that meaningful.

Q: It all sounds very chaotic – how do you control effectiveness, reach, etc?

Jeremy – in some ways this seems chaotic, but on the flip side it is less chaotic since it is addressable and controllable in a way offline mechanism are not – activity can be measured and tracked, etc. The business of measuring and valuing of things has to keep up and it hasn’t yet.

Ze – Two approaches – Design, top down work in order to create a high degree of predictability,
but also bottom up, in which predictability is different – it comes from a real time tracking of what’s going on. Chaos is the pov of using a top down strategy to control a bottom up mechanism or vice versa.

Philip – It’s been said that now the customer is your competitor – if you put something out that isn’t good they will tell each other and compete with your message – your ability to control the message through scarcity is gone.

Q: How do you take the system in place today (media buying traditions) and bring it into this new universe? How do we get from here to there?

Philip – Yahoo in their last call mentioned losing audience to places like Facebook, MySpace – as more effective ways of getting to those audiences. What we’re finding is that lots of brand advertisers are looking to smaller markets. 150x times differential between ads on ESPN or Joes Great Football blog – but the difference may not be justified given the audience belief in Joe versus ESPN. Aggregating smaller sites may create broad reach with leveraged costs.

Qs from audience: How do you get sponsors to adjust budgets to these online formats?

Jeremy – the reasons for the shift are well understood – this is where the audience is going, plus the ability to measure and track performance much more directly.

Ze – There are broad ranges in terms of how aggressively you move into this space – setting up an island in Second Life is very different than buying ad banners on facebook. There’s a huge difference between MMPG and setting up a forum.

Philip – this requires a lot of trust and transparency. You’ve got to build relationships, and measurability. There is no easy simple answer.

Q: In general new is risky. Easier to go with what you know. What would you recommend prioritizing given that there are so many new things to try.

Philip – care less about where the ad appears and more about the audience it reaches. Let’s also not be afraid of more intrusive approaches – making ads part of the content.

Jeremy – it costs a lot to do one 30 second spot – with new interactive techniques you can create many different versions in tools like flash which can be shared in many new places. Don’t get stuck with your old “creative” work which is what you’ve done before. Example of a drug site created by a drug maker which allows individuals on the drug to talk about their experiences – some of which may not be entirely positive – creates conversation and trust.

Philip – totally agree. They will talk about it whether you want them to or not – so it is much better to have a place for that conversation to occur.

Ze and Philip argue over reviews – Philip says most are negative, Ze says people really want to love you. (Maybe the difference between running Fucked Company and running the Ze Frank show).

Ze – it needs to be anchored in very simple interactions around your product – complex is ok, but make sure it is anchored in the experience of the product. Bad reviews are part of the experience – it won’t all be roses, but people will give positive reviews.

Q from Audience: Some of the internet laggards are now the biggest name, so what is the incentive to be an early adopter rather than a late adopter?

Philip – ebay was an early ad banner buyer, and eighth to sign up for LinkExchange, and that is part of how they became so successful. Early adoption made them successful.

Shar – but was it early adoption which made them possible or the model?

Jeremy – why start now? Learning. Having competence, intelligence, and knowledge about an emerging opportunity, you allocate some resources to it. This is the number one reason.

Shar – is there value in waiting, until there are best practices to follow?

Ze – on the fringes, sure. You don’t want to start your first experience with some radically new feature or site that is unproven – but you don’t need to stay out altogether just to be able to learn.

Jeremy – Second Life is a good example – this was conceptually very interesting, but maybe those large brands who built out whole experiences jumped in too soon, given the cost/effort involved as opposed to blogging or ads or video.

Ze – but don’t overlook the PR value as well. Stories about stories is a major way of getting publicity online – if you want people to think of you as an innovative brand, there are opportunities there, but don’t build them based on large scale mass engagement.

Philip – if you see something new and small but you think it will be interesting, don’t hesitate – take some risks. As other folks come to see it as interesting as well – you will have been there first.

Q: What about the dark side of social media?

Philip – Well, if you’re kryptonite locks and someone figures out how to pick your locks with a pen, and posts a video of it, that sucks.

Jeremy – we shouldn’t really think about optimism or pessimism – it’s here. It just is, and you can’t avoid it. If you spend all your time thinking about all the bad things which could happen, you’d just stay in bed.

Q: What about large media companies who want to retain attention?

Jeremy – need to connect product to audiences. We see a lot of people, for example, putting television shows online as is – is that the best model? On the other hand, lots of newspapers and magazine brands are creating original video content directly – appropriate content which connects with their audiences. Reach consumers where they are, not where you want them to be. You don’t necessarily need to think of getting users to “your site” so much as connecting users to your data. Let users take embed codes, they will drag video with them all over the web, and ultimately result in bigger audiences – even higher website traffic.

Philip – of course everyone can make content now. But what can media companies do that individuals can? Throw a lot against the wall and see what sticks. If you just keep doing what you’ve been doing – hey come to my site or read my magazine, you’re gonna be screwed.

Ze – The issue is really fracturing. I think the winner of all this is really brands themselves. Users are craving content to help put back together this mass of content we’re exposed to – these mass brands have some opportunity to be that context which replaces the “network” in the old model.

Q: What about people producing viral videos that are product placement?

Jeremy: Just don’t tell anyone. Make it a secret project.

Ze – Wow. I would stay say away from it. Be transparent, be upfront. It’s ok to be self-deprecating and upfront about what you’re doing.

Philip – if you’re gonna do that (fake viral videos) you’re gonna get caught. If you make a cool viral video about what you’re doing and make it an ad, that’s great. The good news that way is that if it sucks no one will know – if it sucks and it is a fake viral video, everyone will know.

Q: Isn’t the end just google? Won’t google just eventually buy everyone who’s ever created a video tool or video?

Jeremy – I obviously don’t agree with that (though they are free to make an offer). The argument Ballmer and others have made about Google is that they haven’t really produced any innovation outside search – they’ve bought innovation but not really innovated businesses they developed. Most of the significant scaled consumer innovations came from outside Google.

Ze – turning away from Google for a moment – there is a wave coming, which is around facilitating innovation – things like Facebooks open API support, Nokia building that kind of philosphy into hardware – we’re going to see a lot of innovative stuff coming up.

Q: What limits is the all going to run up against?

Ze – there are built in hardware limits in the wires and processors – but those are scaling well. The real limits we will run into are our human capability to process all these stuff – the ability to maintain relationships and live our lives in a world of information overload and fracture -that’s the bigger bottleneck here.

Philip – totally agree. You larger network of randomness (above and beyond facebook and myspace and such) – people who comment on the same stuff as you, or random email discussions, etc – these are getting larger and overwhelming – but smaller niche communities may be needed to be really workable for people.

Jeremy – from an infrastructure perspective we don’t see operational issues – the capacity is there and people are using it, but we don’t see that as a major hurdle.

Shar – summary.

It isn’t about positive or negative – it just is. It is happening whether you like it or not.

Start small – don’t have to try to do it all the first time.

(She had a third one which I missed while typing.)

At MTV, we’re pretty psched – being our fans BFF has always been important to us as a company.

It’s no accident MTV started as a cable channel – youth were most open to the potential of cable.

Together, we define what MTV is – it is the world’s largest brand gallery.

What we’ve learned: Four Guiding Truths that burn in all of us at MTV

1. It’s not the medium, but the content that matters most.
2. Build an emotional relationship with the users based on content they find compelling.
3. Give your audience a place and mechanism to find each other.
4. You have to let your audience help you shape your brand.

Message over Medium

Create compelling content, then figure out the best screens and experiences through which to engage users.

MTV.com – 10,000 video library – let users play what they want when they want. It isn’t enough to just play what we want online. Also Rock Band, which will let people engage with music in a new and interactive way – but even this starts with the creative impulse and the emotional connection first, then the technology approach.

Tools make a great experience possible – but you have to have a great idea first. At heart, we’re a company of great ideas.

How do you make it stick?

Start with a foundation of great content – then build an emotional relationship on that content with which users want to engage.

52 bands. What if we took all the time we spend promoting our programming – 11.5 hours every week – and gave it to different artists. So we did. We gave that time to new bands – to connect users to new music and up and coming artists.

In an era in which the music video has become a commodity, 52 bands has been a great way for listeners and bands to find each other.

College students were the first to raise their voices about the genocide in Darfur – the MTVu college network creating programming, PSAs, campus events, and a viral video game.

(Christina masterfully transitions from genocide in Darfur to Jackass via George Bush.)

MTV JackassWorld – coming soon.

Let your consumers speak to each other

Give your audience ways to find each other.

Think.mtv.com – “the largest online activist community ever”

Find others who are passionate about the same things you are.

Also the You-R-Here area on MTV.com – MTV’s always covered lots of tours, but this year we’re allowing users to help report through You-R-Here.

Help your audience shape our brand

We want our audiences to feel ownership of the experiences we create, the brands around which we collect.

The MTV Tr3s network for hispanic youth in the US, in which the brand itself was created with deep participation with users.

Real World Online Casting site – tapping into people’s connection with the Real World experience.

Choose or Lose and the presidential election – engaging the audience in a new way, with an outlet specifically targeted to their needs.

Summary:

First, start with great ideas.

Next, add a strong emotional connection.

Let the audience find people like themselves.

Give them ways to let us know what they think – good and bad, and listen to what they say – co-create the brand.

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Q: What about the stormy side of the BFF relationship?

A: I’d rather have people be passionate and upset than not carrying. We get lots of positive and negative feedback, but that’s good – we want engagement. It’s ok if people say bad things.

Q: You have the perfect audience who wants to consume, produce, and even be in media – but what if you were in an insurance company, or a paper goods company. Do these principles apply?

A: I think they do. The principles should transfer – it is about putting the audience or consumer at the center of what you do – you’d have different users perhaps, but the point is to focus on the user before the technology and before the tool.

Q: Are the youth audiences of MTV beyond TV, and beyond advertising?

A: Television is important to them, but it is just one of many screens. So advertising has to adopt and change – but that doesn’t mean it isn’t possible. As an example, one of the “remixes” at the VMA was with Herbal Essences and sponsored – that is advertising, but in a different way. The key is an additive experience for the users – not a separate or extraneous piece – but a good show with good content in it. A great piece of entertainment, not an infomercial for Herbal Essences.

Q: Is the MTV brand splintering? How can you cover all these different needs and not lose brand focus?

A: The music industry isn’t splintering – it’s dying, or undergoing an immense change. But the audience isn’t splintering, they want different experiences and we provide multiple different experiences – if you’re giving the audiences what they want you stay relevant. We get lots of criticism on MTV for not showing videos like we did 20 years ago – but you have to evolve and grow as your audience does. Every year new people join the audience and bring new expectations and new experiences – you have to keep in tune with what they are interested in and looking for – that’s what keeps your brand relevant.

Key point: Objectives, not technology, need to lead your effort

Don’t build a community just because your competitors do. Don’t just try to “generate buzz” – what is the goal you hope that buzz will accomplish? Figuring out what you’re trying to achieve will let you then measure what you are doing.

It isn’t “how do we get involved in the groundswell” but what problem are we trying to solve or what opportunities are we trying to create.

These are the main objectives:

1. Listening
2. Talking
3. Energizing
4. Supporting
5. Embracing

Analogies to organizational roles:

Research -> Listening
Marketing -> Talking
Sales -> Energizing
Support -> Supporting
Development -> Embracing

In the groundswell (ie, in the web 2.0 era), each of these needs to be transformed a bit. He went through each of them with some examples, including vendors.

Unfortunately, I didn’t hear a single mention of the use of open source to help deliver on these objectives – each objective ended with a brief table listing approaches and vendors – but no mention of assembling your own solutions with open source frameworks, despite the reality that open source frameworks are often the best solutions in many of these spaces.

I know Forrester hasn’t historically focused on open source and I don’t expect them to – but buying product solutions from proprietary vendors isn’t the entire universe. He also didn’t really cover how you integrate these solutions together – so that you don’t end up with five siloed solutions but a cohesive strategy and integrated set of applications which exchange and share data. [Note: this did come up during the Q & A - see the end of the notes below.]

Listening

Listening – this is like your old research department, which is designed to get information from customers.

Example of Lynn Perry, cancer patient, on waiting for treatment at the treatment center – sitting in the waiting room, recognizing “my time is more precious than theirs” – the importance of scheduling and managing people’s tasks in that context – while spending tons on treatment equipment, don’t ignore the need to manage people’s time.

National Comprehensive Cancer Network forum – supporting patiences and caregivers everywhere (SPACE?) – built by Communispace.

This is an example of using a private community (he points to vendors like Communispace, MarketTools, Think Passenger) to create listening opportunities.

The other approach is monitoring buzz in the blogosphere, etc.

Talking

This isn’t just about talking – but it is about conversation, and building brand by participating in the conversation.

Adidas Soccer page on MySpace – when you friend this profile, you get graphics you can use in your own MySpace layouts.

4 million impressions for 100k. This is highly effective talking strategy.

Talking can also mean blogging, something Forrester gets lots of questions about.

Energizing

This is about helping your best customers recruit other customers.

Jim Noble and eBags – energizing with ratings and reviews. He wrote a good review. The zipper broke. He engaged with the head of design from eBags, who actually took his changes to the factory in HongKong where they implemented the suggestions he provided.

Use ratings and reviews (vendors like Bazaarvoice, PowerReviews)

Or designate lead customers to energize others – by creating a brand ambassador program.

Supporting

Dell Support Forum – Posts from predator – 20,452 since 1999.

“I actually enjoy helping people. That’s what got me hooked: when you help people and they say ‘Thank You’.”

The point is people will be willing to help each other. (Vendors: Lithium, Jive, Prospero)

Or, enable customers to build solutions together (Vendors: SocialText, Confluence, Wikia)

Embracing

Work with users to create and prioritize new features, new products.

Salesforce.com idea exchange as the primary example. (Vendors: Communispace, MarketTools)

What about objectives before technology?

Getting back to objectives, Bernoff went through some ROI calculations – cost of running a forum versus answering support calls, cost of corporate communications (in and outbound) versus blogging, etc.

But it isn’t just about ROI – as you start doing this it is a reformation in the way you do things – it will change the company in more profound ways than just the ROI calculation.

–
First question from the audience – is about “who can help us” – he mentions that there are many companies which “can help you build communities” (quick plug – mine not Bernoff’s – companies like Optaros).

Another question from the audience asked about “an integrated approach” – he cautions that companies shoudl start with one objective and then grow from there – integrated is good, but it should be integrated which grows from initial successes – know where you are going in being integrated, but don’t try to do everything all at once.

(Note: somewhere in between disclosure and a plug: Optaros‘ work with Swisscom Mobile Labs is a Groundswell Awards finalist).

• Don’t get caught up in the next shiny object: forcus on creating experiences for people
• People ask how much control to give customers – but customers have already taken control and we’ll never get it back
• Twitter (with friends)
• Flickr

Carrie Johnson and Christine Overby just finished the day 2 opening remarks, talking about things carried over from day one – Richard Edelman’s “Windy City Rules” and “Be It, Don’t Buy It” (see Jeremy Pepper’s notes); Christine Hefner on Playboy’s use of new media (myspace, Playboy U) and organizational change (as in, if you can’t change the organization you’re in, change organizations).

Next up Josh Bernoff keynote.