Mele’s Musings

Welcome to Conference 2.0

To me, this is the tipping point – not only are consumers in control of media, they’re in control of ALL content.

Article excerpt: We’ve all been there: the dull business conference. A half-empty room of half-asleep attendees answer their e-mail on laptops and BlackBerries, while some hapless speaker lumbers through a PowerPoint speech. That scenario is about to change, thanks to the growing ubiquity of social media. Consider author Sarah Lacy’s disastrous interview of Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg at the annual South by Southwest Interactive Festival here. Lacy, a Business Week columnist and author of a forthcoming book on Zuckerberg and other Web 2.0 titans, drew the crowd’s wrath by asking Zuckerberg too many questions about his age and his company’s outrageous $15 billion valuation and not enough questions about issues more fundamental to how Facebook operates - things like trust, privacy, and accessibility to software developers. On top of that, Lacy interrupted Zuckerberg, seemed to flirt with him, and then grew hostile as the crowd turned against her. And did it ever turn. Many in the audience started posting their thoughts on Twitter, a service that broadcasts instant messages, and the ire built. The crowd began hooting and jeering, and finally, when she opened the mike to questions, the first person asked Zuckerberg: “Other than rough interviews, what are some of the biggest challenges Facebook faces?” Lacy turned to Zuckerberg, asked, “Has this been a rough interview?” and the audience member said, “I wasn’t asking you, I was asking Mark.” The crowd went wild.

The rest: http://money.cnn.com/

Musing: Honestly, when I first heard about Twitter, I thought it would be a 15 minute fad. It seems that the usefulness of this very simple app has found a purpose – instant, real-time community building. Which is both powerful and scary. The inmates are in charge of the asylum – for real. But, it’s inevitable, and it’s not necessarily a bad thing. Having insight into the truth faster is beneficial. Being able to connect quickly with others, and make collective choices is good. Here’s the best quote in the article “We always say that the crowd is taking control in a marketing buzzword kind of way,” Owyang said, “but now it’s actually happening.” The big question is how do we as companies and marketers tap into the potential power of this movement? How do you harness the power of the crowd? Perhaps just allowing crowds to form and paying attention to what they are saying is the first step. Wonder how this pans out in a retail setting? Whadda you think?