Drew B's take on tech PR

Corporate communications and how social web technologies will cannibalise email

Two articles came through to me over the weekend on the topic of how social web technologies are replacing email. The first is this feature on BBC News Online titled: social networks are the new email, and explores how more and more people are using FriendFeed, Facebook and Twitter instead of email. 

The second is this in-depth blog post from a chap called Hutch Carpenter. His post titled: microblogging will marginalise coporate email, goes to a depth that the BBC article doesn't and includes a couple of useful graphs that articulate microblogging and its role in corporate communications. 

This part of his post stood out for me: 

Reflecting both on [a recent statement from the Google CEO calling microblogging a poor man's email] and my own use of Yammer at my company, I’m seeing that microblogging is slowly replacing a lot of my email activity. As more companies take up microblogging with services like Yammer, Socialcast, Present.ly and SocialText Signals, employee communications amongst employees will both increase and divert away from email. 

So there you have some new social web technologies to try out and see how they might help in your comms. 

Social Media Cafe comes to Thames Valley

Yesterday for the first time the Social Media Cafe event came to Thames Valley. A group of about 15 media and technology industry people descended unannounced on a cafe called Workhouse Coffee, on Oxford Road in Reading (which serves THE best coffee). 

It was great to catch up with people who, through doing digital PR I have encountered and worked with over the years. And seeing new faces was great as well. Neville Hobson, Matt Brady, the absent Benjamin Ellis and I organised it, and joining us for some seriously nice coffee were Andy Piper, John McGarvey, Nicky Davis, Ravi, Catherine Warrilow, Steve Lamb, Adrian Moss and others who I didn't get a chance to meet. 

One highlight was when the owner realised that we had organised this networking event on a wiki and over Twitter and thought it was ridiculous. So a friend of his offered to set up a Twitter account for him there and then. The chosen username? @itsridiculous. Now you can follow Workhouse Coffee. 

For the next week I will use Twitter instead of Google whenever I

I experienced Twitter beat Google at its own game today, and it has led me to start an experiment in live social networks over the archived web. I am going to spend the next week using Twitter instead of Google whenever I feel the urge to 'Google' something. 

Here's why. Today I was Googling restaurants near my home that I could go to for a sunday roast. A few suggestions from the people in the room and my own experiences helped. But I thought I'd ask Twitter: 

"Where does a good sunday roast near Reading / Pangbourne / Berkshire?" Responses I got back over the next few minutes were first class. 

Stuff I couldn't find anywhere else. They came from people who I follow and / or who follow me on Twitter, so they were personal and personalised. They were not bookmarks, reviews or 'diggs'. They were people's views and they came out of nowhere. I received them as both replies and direct messages. And for what it's worth, they told me to try: the four Points, Malmaison, The Bull and Butcher, The Pot Kiln, The Wellington Arms, The Royal Oak and The Swan. Wow! Then when I mentioned on Twitter that I used Twitter instead of Google, again I got a big, favourable response. I think this just might me a worthwhile experiment. If not, well, then at least the world gets to read the rubbish that I type into Google! 

So follow me in my experiment if you have some time to spare / waste, and try it out if you're feeling like a refreshing change.

Launching the Reading arm of Social Media Cafe next week

Neville Hobson, Matt Brady, Benjamin Ellis and myself have decided to start the Thames Valley arm of social media industry networking event Social Media Cafe. Neville and Matt have both written up about the launch, and if you want to come, just add your name to the list. See you there.

I've been to the original, London Social Media Cafe, which is on Friday mornings in Soho. The people I've met there have been such useful contacts. It's the first time I met in the flesh a lot of the entrepreneurs, media and technology innovators who I now count as either colleagues or friends. I hope that with Thames Valle's strong technology leaning, our new arm of Social Media Cafe will take off.

And as Matt said, we're going to hold it in the best coffee shop for miles around. :)

Google CEO on Email and Twitter

If you know me you know I think there's something terminal about email as a universal communications platform, something that both IM and microblogging has helped us break. Here's Google's view of how technology like Twitter could reinvent email - or how it could fail. Courtesy of Silicon Alley Insider.

Google already bought a competitor to Twitter - Jaikiu - and did nothing with it. I wonder if Twitter could transform the usefulness of email the way Jaiku couldn't?

Link via Neville Hobson.