How ISA Sections CanLeverage Social Media & Internet Technology

Presentation Handout

Presenter: Jon DiPietroPrincipal, Bridge-Soft President, ISA Boston Sectionjon.dipietro@isaboston.orgwww.jondipietro.com

What is Social Media?

Courtesy of Dave Grayhttp://www.flickr.com/photos/davegray/153025183/Tools to create, publish, share and consume contentsimultaneously at large scales

How Does Social Media Work?

Don’t focus on technology:

“These tools don’t get socially interesting until they get technologically boring.” –

Clay Shirky(www.shirky.com) Iran election on Twitter (go to search.twitter.com and search for #iranelection)

Why Does Social Media Work?

Extremely low barriers to entry: little or no time or money.Network effects: Exponential spread of ideas (member to member to member) rather than linear (institution to audience).

N e t w o r k E f f e c t

Network Size

Linear Viral

Small World networks: Groups spread messages within, while

“messengers” jump from one n

etwork to another,eventually reaching a tipping point.Focus on the messengers to reach wider audiences.Example: Civil engineer who is also member of Audubon society and transfers story of protecting baldeagles between groups.

The Long Tail of Social Media

80/20 rule. Institutions historically focus on top 20%

Amazon model: “We sold more books today that didn't sell at all yesterday than we sold today of all the books that did sell yesterday”

Chris Anderson: Selling less is moreSeth Godin: Far better to reach 5000 people who want to hear your message than 5 Million

who don’t

Case Study: PSNH (twitter.com/psnh)

December 2008 ice storm:

2” of freezing rain

, 400,000 outages, 55% of NH, 780+ utilitypoles, 13,600+ fuses, 1,300+ transformers, 408,000 calls, 105 miles of cable, 13 days.Used Twitter to disseminate information.