My attention has recently been turned to the behaviour and expectations of audiences and cultural social activity. This post is a train of thought. Social Media is about connection, conversations, amplification. Bums on seats are not enough? Footfall is not enough? We want updates, checkins, comments. We build apps. We post on social networks.
Apps are useless unless you can convinced the audience they have to use them. Do they need them? Why should they? Is there a need for the resulting engagement. From an audiences point of view?
What value do successful apps and resulting engagement contribute to the event experience?
Is the app even meant to initiate legacy? Is it throw away? One hit.
The creation of an app around an event is to provide cohesion to an experience, an enrichment of the 'on the ground' engagement. The digital resonance providing the online enticement to participate from the wings, consequently exposed ambiently to amplified social media content.
I want my audiences to experience richly, and the emergence of social media offers that promise.
How do you convince someone they are missing out in a personal way. I don't want to evangelise I want people to get it in there own way. I guess that where the 'Internet adventurer and explore' tag line came from. I don't want to make anyone do anything but to chose a rich way of living.
Event tech needs embracing and introducing to audiences.
Night classes in:
- Twitter for audiences
- Path for your family
- Smart Phones on Holiday
- Blogging as a legacy (family history)
- Facebook discussion nights
When do we stop education the business community and start informing the consumer community on how to make better demands on the technology they have access to?
Business gets its value but their holy grail is a compliant consumer market. They want our 'likes', +1's , and praise. Where's the social? You can't turn consumers in to social conversationalists with a desire to connect beyond their daily world by salesmanship. They have to want it. It has to be meaningful and engage as a result.
It is tangible, the use of hashtags in current affairs. The election debates or Question Time. Trending keywords reveal all sorts of pulses.
Does a cultural audience have a social conscience? Entertainment is very self serving. Social Media could be seen as a Camera Lens capturing content. Recreational participation of culture is about the direct experience. Seeing theatre, watching a film or experiencing environments (art galleries and museums) The creation of real time social media is not why audiences attend. Having an 'on the ground' blogger's experience through the social technologies of social media is the best solution. They aren't there to document experiences of delegates or an audience but to be a delegate or be in the audience while telling their experience story.
How can future audiences benefit from that? How can attending audiences enhance their experience of the event? If a venue creates a media archive how do they digest it, make reference to it.
Sxswi SCVNGR keynote by Seth Priebatsch. Ted is a great event reference. Does making slides available with out the keynote commentary have sufficient value? An experiential archived audience perspective reference has to be the way to go.
The audience needs educating, empowering, informing about accessing active participation records. How do we do that?
