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July 08, 2009
the floodgates of information
I used to engage with the world by sifting through news and commenting on it throughout the day. Back before I settled into a marketing career, I had the time, energy, and passion to Make My Opinion Known. On everything from Nic and Jessica to the so-called Axis of Evil.
These days, I find that I'm stuffing so much information into my day that I barely have time to breathe, let alone regurgitate it in a meaningful way.
I spend at least an hour a day reading marketing news: from e-newsletters to my Twitter feed to the articles found on my Twitter trail. Half the time, I bookmark the articles without reading them, assuming that at some magical point in the future, I'll have the time and head space to read it all. On top of that, I've got my daily work deliverables, eating, etc.
I wish I wasn't such an information junkie. Then, instead of using every new channel to gather more nuanced understanding of the world around me, I would take the time to contribute to the overwhelming flood of nonsense.
Take Twitter. I have absolutely no idea why so many people choose to write about their evening runs, their daily coffee breaks, and other diarrhea of the mouth. Do they really think I care? Do they ever stop to wonder who has time to read all this nonsense? It's bad enough I hear about headaches in FB status updates. People: leave the detritus of your life for the people who have to listen (e.g. your significant other and closest friends).
On FB, entertain me with amusing links or funny witticisms you found during the course of the day. Stop telling me what decade you're like, what nail polish color reflects your personality, and the rest of the nonsense. (Obviously, not a big fan of quizzes.)
On Twitter, Less Is Definitely More. Shireen, aka @digitalsista, has a ton of great insight to offer on social media strategy. But almost every day I think about un-following her because I just don't care to listen into snippets of a conversation begun offline that are really just the flotsam and jetsam of one woman's life. Maybe I'm too persnickety, but I want Twitter to be edited blogging: really only tell me things that I must know, not everything you can fit into 140 characters.
Not that I'm really one to talk. I feel like I update my Twitter accounts less often than my blogs. Why? Well, there's this little thing called Work. And not wanting to blab confidential client information. And, oh yes, Work. I'm more likely to post myparentsjoinedfacebook.com on my FB status than Twitter because, well, do I really need to show the whole world that I followed a link from my "work" Twitter account to a Time article that led me to the most hysterical tribute to family faux pas ever (before leaving work)? And to think, because of the floodgate that is a Twitter feed, I felt bad that I couldn't figure out who to attribute that link to.
I'm losing steam before getting to the point. I want to learn how to turn off the information flow and turn on my engagement with the web. I've lost my blog reading habits over the years of learning how to be a marketer and I doubt many people know who I am in the blogosphere or any other sphere of the web. I'm not really one of those "Connector" types sought after by marketers, unless you think about the diverse communities I touch via the WILPF sisterhood.
Pet Peeve of the Week: Market researchers describing millennial women as "post-feminist" and Gen X-ers as "Riot Grrls." These damn boxes you cram us into are getting quite suffocating.
Not sure I wound up at a point, but if you could help me learn to unsubscribe from industry e-newsletters and carve out time for my own writing in between watching E True Hollywood Stories, So You Think You Can Dance, and strategizing / executing integrated marketing, I'd really appreciate it.
Posted by cj at 10:25 PM | Comments (0)