“To help its readers save time, The New York Times Co. is implementing new technology that enables its Web site users to control the news and information they view. To boost its communication channels with the outside world, Sun Microsystems Inc. lets its employees maintain Web journals, called blogs, that are open to public view on the company’s Web site. Both companies are at the forefront of what some experts say is an emerging technology field that all businesses will need to understand in coming years.” July 16, 2004 article from the East Bay Business Times
Universal McCann’s latest research (i.e., March 2008) on the impact of social media shows a few clear trends. Some are obvious and all are interesting:
- Individual users are producing content (with an ongoing shift towards participation)
- Video clips and podcasts are leading the next charge of on-demand media (with video clips the fastest growing platform)
- A majority of participants in the study joined a social network (17,000 users in 19 countries were surveyed)
- “The widget economy is real.” (Dive on in!)
- Collectively blogs rival traditional media (thus making the blogosphere part of the mainstream media)
- Surprise: China has the largest blogging community in the world (more than the US and Western Europe combined)
The report also offers a definition of social media:
“Social media is an important shift, as it summarizes the importance of interaction, the consumer, and the community. The term emphasizes the idea that as a collective it can have as much impact as any traditional media platform. In truth, to claim social media as ‘new’ is slightly misleading. From the beginning, the internet was founded on message boards, chat rooms, and peer to peer communication. What has changed is the mass involvement that modern social platforms inspire” (emphasis added).
The blogosphere is alive with posts about this report. ReadWriteWeb stated “…with China having 42m bloggers compared to the US’s 26m, there is large scope for social media to flourish there – even despite China’s political issues with social media,” and Digital Information added “despite the popularity of Facebook and MySpace, other countries dwarf the U.S. in joining social networks.”
You can view the full report here, but be warned, it is a 26MB PDF file and while we always encourage our users to check primary source material, you may be better off browsing McCann’s site for the basic facts and figures, or simply trying the Daylife search “Universial McCann” AND social media. Size and content aside, the report itself is a beautifully designed document.