With corporate communications dramatically shifting to online media the past couple of years, new technology applications have emerged in its wake to better accommodate this change. Some examples include RSS feeds, avatars, “Technorati tags,” “tag clouds,” “quotables,” “iFrames” and podcasts, just to name a few. Not surprisingly, public relations practitioners that haven’t been bit by the tech-savvy bug find themselves severely out of the loop, resulting in the lack of potential exposure for clients.
I began this post as an informative piece focusing on the new and emerging technologies being applied to blogs and online press releases. But the more I delved into this type of research, the murkier the waters and the more frustrated I became. I quickly discovered that my vocabulary and knowledge is severely lacking; terms and concepts such as the above-mentioned “tag-clouds” and “iFrames” were completely over my head. Isn’t my generation supposed to be in-the-know and leading the way in these emerging technologies and their application to corporate communication?
Perhaps a more pressing question is, what are the implications not only for the communications field, but how we, as people, interact with one another? Call me old-fashioned, but isn’t there something to be said for dealing with a real person versus an…avatar? Or, check out http://www.current.com/. This site dubs itself “the next generation of user generation,” a social news network completely run by the public. Anyone can contribute information about any topic under the sun through link postings, webcam videos, etc. Littered with unpredictable content, it makes me wonder whatever happened to looking up the daily headlines from the New York Times online.
I’m leaving this open-ended because quite frankly, I need some direction. How tech-savvy am I expected to be in this business?
I began this post as an informative piece focusing on the new and emerging technologies being applied to blogs and online press releases. But the more I delved into this type of research, the murkier the waters and the more frustrated I became. I quickly discovered that my vocabulary and knowledge is severely lacking; terms and concepts such as the above-mentioned “tag-clouds” and “iFrames” were completely over my head. Isn’t my generation supposed to be in-the-know and leading the way in these emerging technologies and their application to corporate communication?
Perhaps a more pressing question is, what are the implications not only for the communications field, but how we, as people, interact with one another? Call me old-fashioned, but isn’t there something to be said for dealing with a real person versus an…avatar? Or, check out http://www.current.com/. This site dubs itself “the next generation of user generation,” a social news network completely run by the public. Anyone can contribute information about any topic under the sun through link postings, webcam videos, etc. Littered with unpredictable content, it makes me wonder whatever happened to looking up the daily headlines from the New York Times online.
I’m leaving this open-ended because quite frankly, I need some direction. How tech-savvy am I expected to be in this business?
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