30 days in 22 tweets

It’s been a little over a month now since I started in my new role as President of Euro RSCG Worldwide PR, North America. In these time, we were graded by PR Week for its global Report Card, pulled together some preliminary creds, helped with the launch of the Home Base Program at Fenway Park in Boston. I logged thousands of air miles, saw clients almost every day and continued to live and breathe social media. I’m tired but exhiliarated, and looking forward to the next challenges.

Here are 22 Twitter snapshots from a very exciting month.

 
The fiancee of the person of interest in the Yale murder better get off MySpace and get herself a good lawyer; cyberspace isn’t always a pal.6:49 AM Sep 17th from web

How can a candidate for public office use Twitter smartest? Can you send advice and also Tweet it? Some say you can’t activate on Twitter?8:39 PM Sep 11th from web
        
Labor Day Rethink of assumptions about friends, + the definition of them. Think following and followers also awful terms. Who friends whom?12:34 PM Sep 7th from web
        
Holiday weekends to mark the end of seasons=bumpers to prevent us crashing headfirst into something new without pondering what kept us warm.2:50 PM Sep 4th from web
    
Prefer to escape into nostalgic conversations with old friends; has anyone noticed lots more interest in the past this Summer of Death?12:26 AM Sep 3rd from web
    
Half the people I know are overprogrammed and the other half have overdosed on chill pills.8:42 AM Sep 2nd from mobile web
        
@jaymfriedman i still think he seems like an awesome friend; ted kennedy should have shown us republicans make pretty good friends…10:51 PM Aug 30th from web in reply to jaymfriedman
    
My new favorite human is Orrin Hatch; watching him on the talk shows I wanted him to befriend me and advise me and argue with me…6:58 PM Aug 30th from web
    
Every co. needs a corporate flu policy + a plan for 9.11 + National Day of Service; in age of transparency, many things to jump ahead of…11:55 PM Aug 28th from web
    
John Kerry delivering speech of a lifetime at the Kennedy funeral8:34 PM Aug 28th from web
    
Kennedy’s long goodbye humanizing and warm; tonight’s speakers prove out the Irish dream, obituaries: “Irish sports page” (Senator C. Dodd)7:40 PM Aug 28th from web
    
Looking at photos of Senator Kennedy in 1980 and trying to remember the mind and mood; these 30 years redefined social and appropriateness8:11 PM Aug 27th from web
    
Ted Kennedy and Dominick Dunne dead on the same day. This summer of death drags on, and feels very heavy indeed. So many greats gone.11:18 PM Aug 26th from web
    
Brain tumors can be very evil. Ted Kennedy’s dignity and service till the end is inspirational. We need to find cures.6:47 AM Aug 26th from mobile web
    
Another 5:45 pickup; destination Westchester Airport for Chicago. Are early mornings aging me, or stress, or is this just called very tired?10:56 PM Aug 24th from web
    
Politics is the new marketing with brilliantly integrated campaigns that have a single USP. So campaign strategists are future CMOs?6:39 AM Aug 24th from mobile web
    
Feels like either there isn’t much Back2School shopping or just none where I live. Stores were empty this weekend when I went for checks.5:28 AM Aug 24th from web
    
Local is the new global even though globalization is here to stay. Watch retail move to pinpoint community relations.10:55 AM Aug 23rd from mobile web
    
Help me learn about Sears and Target and Kmart and Kohls. Who shops there? What is hot?9:41 AM Aug 23rd from mobile web
    
Saturday became Sunday and I’m trying to file my cluttered mind on a night when the hot tub is too warm and my to do list migraine-producing12:56 AM Aug 23rd from web
        
Fabulous day of speeches, but a 2:30 a.m. wakeup call to return to NY. Interesting take on gender is listening to spouses program in Brazil.9:49 PM Aug 20th from web
    
Have been in Belo Horizonte for 45 minutes + have completed four questionnaires to probe likelihood I carry any influenza. Feeling paranoid11:26 PM Aug 19th from web
    
To Brazil on the 9-something a.m. 40 hours in Brazil, a mini workweek I suppose, and back Friday p.m. Bad carbon footprint giving speeches.11:48 PM Aug 18th from web

The age of age

Fifty as the new 30 isn’t just an idle thought for me. Over the last year or so I’ve been in a state of high-energy excitement, experimenting with social media like a teenager with a new video game. I’ve reconnected with my younger self—remembering the early days of the Internet, when I was working at Chiat\Day. Over the last few weeks I’ve even rediscovered Apple, making the switch back with a gorgeous new MacBook Pro after years on PC. And through my friends Lee and Bob Woodruff and their commitment to helping heal wounded U.S. servicemen, I’ve rediscovered the power of the individual to impact good causes, just like back in my college days.

Though I still buzz with much the same future-pull energy as I did 20 years ago, I can’t help noticing the middle-age-sounding thoughts creeping into my mind and sneaking out in what I say and write. Looking back at my “60 Minutes” interview talking about Millennials, I now realize I sounded sort of like an elder complaining about “young people these days”; the chuckles of Morley Safer come from the same side of the generation divide as me! More recently I tweeted “Am I middle aged because my body is a weather vane or is this because my skull and neck are rebuilt with titanium?” I’ve even wondered if my annoyance with tweet typos is evidence of me swirling into some cranky abyss.

This year as I talk with friends and colleagues who are around my age I notice we’re all fretting about the future of news, as we see long-established newspapers and magazines of our youth folding or struggling. And of course the recent passing of great newsman Walter Cronkite saddens us all. But it only takes a quick survey of a few Millennials to confirm that worrying about the news industry is truly a generational thing. Younger people get their news on the fly from a patchwork of sources, rather than from scheduled doses of newspaper or TV reports. The fate of the traditional news industry doesn’t seem to bother them much.

But surely my rabid social-networking appetite is proof that I’m staying young, right? Actually it’s not. Apparently it’s middle-aged users—not digital natives—that are driving the growth of the Twitter user base now and spending the most time tweeting. Even Facebook demographics are tilting older fast. Our image of these sites skews young because they’re generally created (and initially populated) by young digital natives; Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg is still only 25.

There’s no doubt that my age group is staying younger longer, that we’re blurring the generational boundaries and refusing to accept aging as inevitable. It’s great to see mature people with decades of living behind them throwing themselves into new endeavors: marathons, startups, adventure vacations, new careers and even new relationships.

There’s also no doubt that, try as we might, we can’t turn the cellular clock back. A twinge in your knee at age 25 means nothing; at 45 you worry it may be arthritis. A hangover at age 25 just means you overdid it the night before; at 45 you wonder if you’ve lost the capacity to party. Forgetting a name at 25 is just carelessness; forget a name at 45 and you start fearing dementia … or whatever it’s called.

Still, as thoughts about getting older flit not so gaily through my mind, I can console myself with the knowledge that tens of millions of others are having similar thoughts. This year the median age in the G7 countries topped 40. So even if 50 is the new 30, no way is middle-aged the new young. But it is the new normal.

Will social networks get monetized?

This may well be a call of buzzing all the way to the bank, or to bankruptcy, and no one, not even this futurist knows which way Twitter is headed, just that I have an addiction.  The blogosphere certainly loves the good people of Twitterville.  Read more in this excellent feature in my favorite magazine, the Economist: Monetizing social networks: Tweeting all the way to the bank.

Bob Woodruff and Tweet to ReMIND make the Parade cover

Anybody I’m connected with on Twitter or Facebook has surely noticed me giving lots of character-love to the online charity event Tweet to ReMIND, which is in high gear all summer and got a boost last week when Parade featured Bob Woodruff on its cover and told his story to Sunday readers nationwide. Veteran news journalist Bob, a friend of mine, was on assignment for ABC News in Iraq in early 2006 when he was critically injured by an IED (improvised explosive device). The road to recovery was a long and grueling process for the Woodruffs and their family and friends, but during all that time in hospitals and rehabs, they were lucky enough to get to know many of America’s injured heroes and their families, which moved Bob and his wife, Lee, to establish the Bob Woodruff Foundation, home of ReMIND.org and Tweet to ReMIND.

Tweet to ReMIND is a vital project that’s harnessing social media to give back to the men and women who have risked their lives serving in Iraq and Afghanistan—many of whom are now coming home with physical and psychological injuries none of us can see. I helped develop the social media aspect of Tweet to ReMIND (we’re championing the collective strength of small donors and the networking power of Twitter for social good), working with Bob and BWF to rally tweeters and tally dollars that will go directly to helping these people heal and restart their lives at home.

Generation M: A movement for meaningful stuff that matters most

Back in December I published my trends forecast for 2009 and the real propeller of it all is The Ultimate Reboot. I’ve been tracking and rooting for the Reboot ever since, and it’s certainly coming to pass, step by step in politics and business, and at an ever faster pace in day-to-day life.

I love this wry but real “breakup letter to the establishment” take on the Reboot by Umair Haque, director of Havas Media Lab and founder of Bubblegeneration, who wants to disengage from the status quo, shed the bloated, plastic, supersize ways of the past and kick-start Generation M—a movement for meaningful stuff that matters most.

 And while there’s certainly an age-based generational shift happening right now, this particular generational shift isn’t about years, it’s about state of mind. And it’s already happening.

 http://blogs.harvardbusiness.org/haque/2009/07/today_in_capitalism_20_1.html

Trendspotting with American Airlines

Thanks to American Airlines’ American Way for a really fun piece—the magazine featured me in its May issue. We talked a lot about the art and science of trendspotting, and I got to share stories about some memorable (and some not-so-great) moments over the years.

The writer also spoke to my former JWT colleagues and to Adweek publisher Alison Fahey for background.

My favorite quote from Alison: “Marian takes reams of information and then simplifies it down to a point of view. She’s got some pretty kinetic energy and a restless mind. People say that I talk fast, but Marian makes me look like I’m in a coma.”

You can read it all here, plus my view of the top 10 trends changing business, consumerism and life right now.

Can brains be saved?

Author Lee Woodruff does a great job of explaining traumatic brain injury through the lens of her own family’s experience and others like them in her story for Parade Magazine. Find out more about it and the Tweet to ReMIND fundraiser at ReMIND.org.

Trendspotting with American Airlines

Thanks to American Airlines’ American Way for a really fun piece—the magazine featured me in its May issue. We talked a lot about the art and science of trendspotting, and I got to share stories about some memorable (and some not-so-great) moments over the years.

The writer also spoke to my former JWT colleagues and to Adweek publisher Alison Fahey for background.

My favorite quote from Alison: “Marian takes reams of information and then simplifies it down to a point of view. She’s got some pretty kinetic energy and a restless mind. People say that I talk fast, but Marian makes me look like I’m in a coma.”

You can read it all here, plus my view of the top 10 trends changing business, consumerism and life right now.

Twitter links generations and cultures to mourn a pop star

Everyone has a few of those “remember where you were when…” moments, responses to shocking historical and cultural events we’ve experienced (JFK, the Challenger explosion, 9/11). Will that kind of reaction change now that, instead of sitting alone and wide-eyed in front of the nearest TV, we can hop on Twitter and be part of the dialogue ourselves?

The death of Michael Jackson riveted a huge portion of the world’s population, like it or not. Twitter and Facebook were flooded with breaking news and mourners linking to songs and videos and remembering major life moments marked by his music—connecting people of all cultures via their own experience. Does all that chatter help dull the shock? Or just perpetuate the discussion endlessly? How does it change us as a society?

India Knight in the London Times: “The most remarkable thing about [Michael Jackson's] death, for me was being able to communicate instantly with friends, acquaintances and complete strangers all over the world — to share in an event as it developed, to think and engage and be provoked.”

“Farewell Trends”: Goodbye MJ, from Trendsspotting.com

Click through this presentation by Trendsspotting.com that pulls together some of the dramatic traffic-surge stats around the King of Pop’s death and controversy.