Meow, Meow, Myspace! Social Media and Pets

Social Media has changed how we interact with our pets and others

As I write this blog, my "child" is sitting on my shoulder, serving as both muse and distraction. This "child" is not, in fact, human; it is my one year old cat who plays quite a large role in my life. When he is not removing keys from the laptop or snoring on the couch, Soscal, my cat, enjoys staring into the screen because it is bright and it moves. These two traits are major prerequisites for holding a feline's attention. However, some pet owners have taken this interest to a novel level with the creation of social media profiles for pets of all kinds.

A Place to Call Their Own

Time recently reported that pet owners have banded together to create a version of Facebook entitled Doggyspace andMycatspace . These websites feature pet profiles that allow the owner to post pictures, create status updates, and befriend similar breeds. Instead of focusing on the human, these sites are supposed to be from the pet's perspective. Doggyspace claims that it "is a social utility that connects people with friends and others who love dogs. People use Doggyspace to keep up with friends, upload funny dog videos, and to give their dogs their own cyber place." The site, along with Mycatspace, features blogs, headline pet news, and forums to discuss the joys and trials of pet parenting. Doggyspace also allows users to search by breed in order to find other Great Dane devotees or German Shepherd groupies.

Making it Accessible

The Iphone and Ipod Touch now feature a Doggyspace app. Users can easily access information about their pet's "friends" while on the go. Videos and groups encourage member participation while the unique pet focused forums could save hours of pet training or veterinary care if users band together to compile knowledge about a specific breed. Mycatspace is not quite as informative; though blogs, forums, and pictures do exist on the site, the main purpose seems to be entertainment value. There are several games that members can play as well as cutesy pictures for desktop backgrounds and screen savers. Only members can access the main parts of the site which does not lend itself to visitor stops.

Making Anonymity Easier

Blossom states in his book Content Nation that one of social media's biggest goals is to entertain. While this goal is most certainly the end result of the pet sites, they can also serve a very practical purpose. Users of social media who are not comfortable with sharing their name, city, or workplace can still find a way to express themselves online through pet profiles. By personifying your pet, you are allowing other users glimpses into your daily life and your personality. It gives pet owners the interaction that they may need with people of similar interests, but also allows the user to take the emphasis away from their own body or careers. Time also claims that "pets write messages to one another about shared interests and offer advice on health problems, training or local dog-friendly parks. Some have even enlisted their caretakers to arrange offline play dates." The user can extol Fido or Sassy's latest accomplishment for an audience of interested peers. What better way to use social media then for enjoyment?

A Few Problems

With more than 700,000 users of Doggyspace, social media for cats and dogs has really taken off. However, what about gerbils, snakes, bunnies and assorted other pets that do not fit into the traditional American home? Some bunnies have sneaked on to Doggyspace with the explanation that a Bunnyspace does not yet exist. So, unless your the owner of a dog and cat, you may have a hard time finding the social media site for you. Also, the dogs on Doggyspace tend to rack up friends even faster than their human counterparts. For this reason, it is imperative to keep personal information from infiltrating the site as it distributed to people you do not know except through the website. Caution would have to play a role in using the sites.






Soscal the cat

Overall, pet social media seems to be taking off at an advantageous time. People and their pets have gotten closer than ever and it no longer seems odd to create a profile for your furry friend. In fact, it may just allow me to figure out how to stop my cat from scratching my couch or how to appropriately keep him tick free. And all of this may mean a happier kitty, which means a less mutilated keyboard. I give it a two paws way up.

Sh*t My Dad Says

The Problem
I have to admit that when I began to write today’s post, I was a bit stumped. I wanted to blog about the true power of social media and how it could catapult seemingly random people, events, or trends to overnight success, but I couldn’t find that single best example to illustrate my point. Luckily, my oldest daughter was home for Easter, and she did not fail me. I always knew that paying for her eight years of college would someday reap big returns.

The Idea
She directed me to a Twitter page with the unlikely name of Sh*t My Dad Says. Once there, I was able to read the many words of wisdom spoken by 74-year-old Sam Halpern as they have been faithfully recorded by his n’er-do-well 29-year-old son, Justin. The curmudgeonly dad says things like, "A parent's only as good as their dumbest kid. If one wins a Nobel Prize but the other gets robbed by a hooker, you failed," and, "I didn't say you were ugly. I said your girlfriend is better looking than you, and standing next to her, you look ugly." The son Tweets these pearls verbatim to the rest of the world.

The Content
I read through several pages of the Tweets, and I have to admit that I was very amused. As you can probably tell from the title, Sam Halpern’s language tends toward the raw side of the spectrum, but if you don’t let the word choice get in your way, the man is genuinely funny. And his son’s idea to share these observations via Twitter was nothing short of brilliant, despite his father’s comments to the contrary, comments such as “you don't know sh*t, and you're not sh*t. Don't take that the wrong way, that was meant to cheer you up.”

The Power of Social Media
Oh, I was about to forget to tell you about the power of social media. It has been less than a year since that very first tweet. During the initial month, Justin gained 250,000 followers. Now over 1,200,000 followers have signed up for his Tweets, including about 100 who joined while I was writing this post. He has a Facebook page called Sh*t My Dad Says that boasts over 150,000 fans, many of whom seem to like to share the sh*t that their own dads say, and he even has the dubious honor of a knock-off Facebook page with another 35,000 followers.

The Book
He posts frequently on his popular blog, Sh*t My Dad Says. He has a website called Sh*t My Dad Says. He has compiled all of his father’s sayings into a book called Sh*t My Dad Says, which ranks #64 at Amazon.com based solely on pre-orders (the book does not come out until May 10). And then there is the CBS television pilot, which will feature none other than William Shatner in the role of that wise old philosopher, Sam Halpern, and which will assumably be called something other than Sh*t My Dad Says.

So there you have the power of social media. An unemployed entrepreneur conceived of an idea, branded it, marketed it, and once it gained critical mass, stood back and watched it all happen. Justin Halpern made it look easy. Or, as his father put it, "Oh please, you practically invented lazy. People should have to call you and ask for the rights to lazy before they use it."

Pepsi's "Refresh"ing Campaign

Pepsi Forgoes Super Bowl for Social Media

"Pepsi refreshes the world." This message is prominent throughout the soda product's new social media site. In a risky marketing move, Pepsi decided to forgo their usual hefty commercials during the Super Bowl this year. Instead, Pepsi launched a social media campaign designed to allow social media users to submit philanthropic ideas that are then voted on by other users. The ideas that receive the most votes will be monetarily supported by Pepsi. Pepsi has committed $20 million to the effort in an attempt to revitalize their marketing strategy.

Divided into sections like Arts and Culture or the Planet, Pepsi categorizes the ideas into monetary categories, starting with $5,000. Submissions are due by the fifteenth and are then voted on until the end of every month. Seems simple, right? Wrong. Hours upon first releasing the campaign, Pepsi's Facebook site became a sounding board for the issues with the submissions. Technical issues kept many philanthropists from submitting their ideas and Pepsi was forced to respond to the complaints. Though the issue was soon resolved, it gave bad publicity to an effort that needed as much positive attention as possible to work. As one blogger observed, " this is not a good way to launch a massive social marketing campaign aimed at fostering warm-and-fuzzy feelings towards Pepsi."

Unfortunately, philanthropy doesn't seem to have the same "fuzzy feeling" that Cindy Crawford inspired in her famous Daisy Dukes. It was 1992 when Crawford blessed the Super Bowl by guzzling Pepsi while two little boys said that the Pepsi can was "be-a-u-tiful." The end of the 1980's and the beginning of the '90's was still characterized by the common culture. Michael Jackson, Madonna, and Cindy Crawford were huge American symbols of pop culture. Their influence seemed to be universal, so the bet on Crawford could not have been a risky one.


Flash forward to now. Without such a common culture, what Super Bowl ad could compare? Pepsi may not be able to replicate their memorable ads, but they can inspire a new generation of Pepsi drinkers. Though I do not remember the original Cindy Crawford ad, I am old enough to now realize the impact of Pepsi Refresh. If Pepsi is trying to reach my generation, the Millennials, what better way than to appeal to our sense of philanthropy? The idea that Millennials, generally known for their immense interest in self, are trying to make a difference may be novel, but it is true. According to Tactical Philanthropy advisors, Millennials are volunteering more than any other age group. Most learn to do this act in college, as it is frequently required of most scholarship and fraternal organizations.

Social Media is a genius way to appeal to this generation as well. Asking someone my age to go to Facebook and submit an idea for a philanthropic endeavor is not hard, despite the initial technical difficulties. After just browsing through the various topics, I came across a project to provide low income mothers with diapers. It ranges from concerns like this one to providing SmartBoards to science students in rural America. However different, these projects have the same goal- to better America and the world one Pepsi (or idea) at a time. I can live without the Super Bowl commercials if it means more babies have diapers and more students have technology. Maybe I am just a typical Millennial.

By making this year's advertising about bettering each other and the planet, Pepsi has invited us to once more have that common culture. We can work together to achieve goals and can help others while we're at it. And that, more than Cindy Crawford in Daisy Dukes, is "be-a-u-tiful."

A Billion Good Reasons for Social Media

Recipe for Disaster
The general consensus at the New York Times seems to be that post-bankruptcy General Motors must develop new and inexpensive ways to gain supporters. And rather than doing the same old things in the same old ways—which turned out to be Detroit’s recipe for disaster—they must become innovators in the global automotive market. They must continue to make the hard choices when it comes to their products and employees, but they must also get the word out to the motoring public in a timely and cost-effective manner.

Advertising on a Shoestring
The days of million-dollar media buys are over for GM. At least, they are while I’m in charge, and until they pay back that thirty billion, I definitely intend to have my say. The car-buyers of today are a different breed, and GM must change with the times if they are to survive. In light of this new reality, it appears that the General Motors Corporation is embracing social media as one tool in its bag as it explores different ways to keep its potential customers informed.

Blogging for Motorists
Blogging is one good example. GM has seven official blogs, all of which can be found at GMblogs.com. They are well-done, professional affairs written by a variety of General Motors executives and employees. The blog I explored in-depth—the Fastlane—used many of the methodologies espoused by John Blossom in Content Nation and by Safko and Brake in The Social Media Bible. Thus there were plenty of internally-linked photos, links to videos and podcasts, a scheduled webchat, short, well-written text blocks, and a good measure of interaction with the site’s 2059 registered readers.

Facebook
Another medium that GM seems to be successfully employing is Facebook. Once I arrived at the GM Facebook page, the first thing I noticed was that they had over 112,000 fans at the site. This may not be an impressive number to General Motors, but it certainly got my attention. In addition to a selection of posts from GM executives and employees, there were videos, fan videos, over 1000 fan photos, a well-used discussion board, and a Chevrolet Volt naming contest. In all, it seemed to be a successful site with plenty of interactivity.

Twitter
After viewing the Facebook page, I clicked over to GM’s Twitter page for a look. They listed over 13,000 followers and have sent over 4000 Tweets since they began using the service. On the day I checked it out, there were over 6900 active followers waiting for the next Tweet, and there had been 20 Tweets during the previous 24 hours. As you might assume, GM uses Twitter to disseminate news about its products and services, and they appear to employ several full-time Tweeters.

Other Sites
In addition to these main sites, General Motors also posts on Flickr, Posterous, MySpace, and of course, on their own website. At first glance, all of this activity looks promising. GM appears to be making the right moves at the right times, and their message seems to be getting out to the right people. But one of the problems with teaching old dogs new tricks is that, in the end, old dogs are still old dogs. All of the sites and posts I explored were exceptionally well-done, as if a large, multi-layered corporate media department had done them.

Staying the Course

No, there’s nothing wrong with that, as long as GM is able to stay focused on the fact that they’re in a new ballgame now. They were once the world's largest automaker, and for most of my life they were one of the top ten financial entities anywhere, ahead of such notables as General Electric, IBM, and The Soviet Union. The year before they crashed and burned, GM’s advertising budget was 1.3 billion dollars. That’s billion with a B. The year before that, it was 1.5 billion.

The thing is, I would hate to see them backslide. And maybe they won’t. But old habits die hard, and if GM’s social media efforts are carried out by the same people in the same departments with the same mindset as the folks who spent 1.5 billion dollars in 2005 on the way to losing over 8 billion dollars that same year, you have to wonder how long they can remain born-again. I may never get my $30 billion back.

Will Twitter Elect the Next President?

Watching the coverage of President Obama’s State of the Union address last week, I was struck by the attention given by major news stations to Tweets and Facebook posts, as well as blog comments. CNN kept a running image of the country, showing the divisions between red and blue as the social media updates came in, and providing a Twitter analysis of the speech. Even the White House jumped into the media pool, launching a free iphone app days before the speech. The app enables users to stream live events from the White House newsroom, as well as “get up-to-date information directly from the Obama Administration right to your iphone,” so users could conveniently view the speech right from their phone.

Of course, this type of strategy is to be expected from the tech-savvy Obama administration. And, as expected, the White House web site also features the first official White House blog, with frequent updates, mostly by White House staffers, but periodically by cabinet members and others in the administration. Maybe the president himself will blog someday.

The 2008 Presidential Election

All the attention given to the social media aspect of the State of the Union address was reminiscent of the 2008 election season. On November 5, 2008, an article on BusinessWeek.com titled “The Vote: A Victory for Social Media, Too," referred to the 2008 election as the "first social media election," and discussed the unprecedented effect all forms of social media had on the election. According to the article, Facebook kept a running tally of users who checked a box indicating they had voted -- and the number had exceeded 4 million by around 10pm. Facebook users could also send each other virtual Obama or McCain buttons, and many wrote on friends' walls showing support for a candidate.

YouTube also came into play in a big way during the campaign season. PBS teamed up with YouTube to ask American citizens to "Video Your Vote," a campaign for people to shoot videos of their voting experience and then upload them to a special section of YouTube.

Not to be left out, Twitter provided another non-partisan voting tool, the Twitter Vote Report, a collaboration of volunteer software developers, designers and others who teamed up with blog techPresident to allow voters to share problems with their voting experience.



As reported on the techPresident blog, Nina Keim and Jessica Clark of American University's Center for Social Media compiled a report describing the project and its results:

"...Developed in less than a month, the project generated more than 12,545 submissions, marshaled more than 7,500 contributors, and involved nearly 20 highly skilled volunteers and partners."

Where Will It Take Us?

We know that the Obama campaign led the numbers in social media, in terms of friends on MySpace and Facebook, and being first out of the gate to use Twitter. The McCain campaign jumped on the bandwagon, but never managed to amass the number of online supporters. However, both camps were heavily dependent on social media by the time election day rolled around. As the use of social media continues to grow and its importance to our culture expands, future candidates will have an unprecedented opportunity to use this free avenue to reach mass numbers of people with targeted messages without dipping into their advertising budgets. Clearly, social media influenced the 2008 election -- what will be its influence on the coming elections in November for Congress -- and what will be its effect on the next presidential election? Will social media become the most important tool in a candidate's arsenal?

Oh Goodness, We're All Gonna Fail!

I know you, dear reader; we are probably a lot alike. I imagine at some point in the last quarter of 2009, you perused the KSU Spring course listings in the hope you would find the perfect class – you know, the one where you don't have to read too much; the one where you don't have to write too much; the one that won't take up every last minute of weekend enjoyment when the winter weather turns to sun and fun.

Like you, I went through the list. One by one, I went through the offerings:

Professional and Academic Editing? Too hard.

Poetry Writing? Poetry is confusing.

Environmental Writing? I recycle my soda cans; isn't that enough?

And then, much like a beacon in the night...a healing balm to my chafed soul...an ice cold beer after mowing the yard on a scorching Summer day...it was there. The clouds parted, golden rays illuminated the two words, breathing hopeful life into this student.

Social Media.

Word up.

“So, I'm going to get to play on Facebook for a grade?,” I asked aloud. Sweet. I am positive you thought the same.

Little could our minds comprehend how Social Media, particularly Facebook, would lead to academic catastrophe. For some, possibly worse.

All this time I've been thinking Facebook was fun. It was a great way to reconnect with old friends. It helped me keep in touch with the family members that were only used to hearing from me on Christmas.

But then, I was made aware of “The Study.” This confounded document led me to the understanding that we have all been set up to fail this course. It's true.

In 2009, researchers at The Ohio State University concluded that there is a direct correlation between Facebook and college academics. Specifically, students who use Facebook tend to study less and carry lower grade point averages.

“We can’t say that use of Facebook leads to lower grades and less studying – but we did find a relationship there,” said OSU doctoral student, Aryn Karpinski, co-author of the study.

Typically, Facebook users in the study had GPAs between 3.0 and 3.5, while non-users had GPAs between 3.5 and 4.0.

Ahhhh!!!,...I can feel my 4.0 slipping away through my browser!

However, if there is a silver lining to the OSU study it's that science, technology, engineering and business majors were more likely to use Facebook than were students majoring in the humanities and social sciences. Of course, that's only good news for our colleagues who avoided Social Media altogether.

It gets worse. Much worse.

After the initial pangs of despair subsided, I asked myself what else could possibly happen to me – to us – from partaking in Facebook during this Social Media course. The list is long and deadly, but I feel you must know that Facebook's evil tentacles reach long and deep. Besides destroying academic hopes, it also ruins friendships, is bad for marriages, is a detriment to adolescent minds, single handedly laid waste to the birthday reminder industry, raises the risk of cancer, and in some extreme cases, ruins Christmas.

Folks, don't say I didn't warn you when come May and you check Owl Express, you see a big “F” next to your name and Social Media.

Doppleganger Week on Facebook: Who's Your Celebrity Look Alike?

Is that my friend Nikiah or is it Lisa Nicole Carlson from Ally McBeal?

And I never really noticed that my favorite uncle’s childhood best friend (oh what a tangled Facebook friend web we weave), looks just like Chris Elliott. But now I’ll never get this image out of my head.

Why am I suddenly comparing all my friends to celebrities? Because its Doppelganger Week on Facebook. Nobody, not even the gurus of all things social media over at the Mashable blog, knows where or how Doppelganger Week started, but it has taken Facebook by storm. Like the “What color is your bra?” status update meme and Wayback Week, Doppleganger Week is the newest fad, and it has practically everyone on Facebook changing their profile pictures to a famous face. Now, as I scroll through my friend feed, I do double takes when I see the celebrities my friends (sometimes misguidedly) think they look like.

While internet memes (an idea, catchphrase, game, or concept that spreads quickly via the internet) are by no means new to Facebook, memes that require users to change their profile pictures are. But they make sense. Facebook, more than any other social media platform, encourages users to be themselves. And that includes uploading pictures from their real lives. While people might be tempted to use another picture – such as a funny avatar or a company logo – on Twitter or online forums, Facebook is all about just that… the user’s real face. I’m just surprised that Facebook, a platform that’s celebrating its 6^th birthday this week, didn’t adopt memes that played on user’s pictures even sooner.

I confess I rarely get told I look like a celebrity, so I haven’t picked a doppelganger. Should I be annoyed? Or proud that my striking good looks are so um... unique?

Since I was having trouble finding my famous twin, I did what any social media user worth her salt would do. I asked other Facebook users. I got suggestions like Julie Dawn Cole (Veruca Salt from the 1971 movie Willie Wonka and the Chocolate Factory) and Janeane Garofalo. I liked both ideas, but I thought I might find someone even better, so I turned to Google. After searching the keyphrase, “find my celebrity look alike,” I stumbled across MyHeritage.com’s Celebrity Collage.

…Which is clearly broken. After uploading this picture, I, flatteringly, received an 80% match with the elegant Grace Kelly, a 78% match with smoking hot Mary Louise Parker, and a 75% match with Gene Tierney. I think this website is trying to sell me something, don’t you?

I then tried FaceDouble.com, which wanted my email address before finding my celebrity look alike, and then claimed that I looked like two separate teenyboppers named Rachel, neither of which I felt at all resembled plain little ol’ me. I suppose the art of internet-based celebrity look alike identification is as yet an inexact science.

I have yet to pick my celebrity doppelganger. Have you? You’d better get on it, because soon enough Doppleganger Week will be gone the way of the dodo, and Wayback Week, and the What Color is your Bra meme…

Side note: More interested in finding your true facial twin than your celebrity twin? Then check out Coke Zero’s Facial Profiler made especially for Facebook. While it seems to have some of the same problems as My Heritage’s Celebrity Collage and FaceDouble.com, this snazzy app claims that it will find your twin among Facebook’s over 350 million users. ...Once again, I was “unique.”

Did you have better luck than I did finding a twin? Post your results in the comments!

Jennifer Escalona is an Atlanta-based professional blogger and social media consultant who writes about small business, technology, and intercultural marriage. Follow her on Twitter and Facebook or read more of her work at JennEscalona.com.