“A waitress just hit me – punched me for no reason”
“Ignore the bad and focus on the good!! Positivity! :)”
“Such a nice day out!!!!“
These are the public messages of one of Hollywood’s most influential celebrities. And though they may sound like the vapid musings of an excited 12-year-old, over a million people check in to read them every day. These are the tweets of Lindsay Lohan, Hollywood’s notorious jailbird princess who draws more attention from the internet than Apple and Yahoo combined.
The prolific techie educators at Pennsylvania’s newest higher learning institution Harrisburg University of Science and Technology see something very wrong with this picture. If social media is a revolution, should we really accept as its leader someone who has violated probation more times than Robert Downey Jr.? This week, the university hosts its first Social Media Summit, a free day-long event where authors, experts,
organizational leaders and scholars will log off of Facebook for a few hours to lead panel
discussions on how social networking is leading protest, improving business relations, and fueling entrepreneurship.
“There is more to social networking than Tweeting about your pizza,” says summit organizer and HU Associate Vice President Steve Infanti. Social media and social networking are constantly evolving and, like traditional media, it will create new challenges and new opportunities as it evolves. There is nothing wrong with buying Facebook ads but there is more to it than Facebook ads and business people in Pennsylvania should be aware of that.”
As Harrisburg University has evolved over its first five years, its coursework has reflected the changing tone of the social media landscape. The same can be said for how people handle social media as a whole, as many use various means on these platforms for promotion, be it through a TikTok followers app or through any other means. Infanti and other administration officials have made blogging, networking technology and social media application a priority for business-minded graduates entering an increasingly connected workforce. Infanti and summit organizers look forward to the day where social media is no longer seen as a blind panacea, but a tool that can be used for networking, employee communication, education, globalization and training; or even (gasp!) ignored completely.
“Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, YouTube; these sites have not been around very long so its a little like the Wild West out there still,” says Infanti. “Not every organization should be buying ads or using it for marketing, some people should use it for employee engagement. Every business should have a social media strategy but your strategy might be, and maybe it should be, not to use social media.”
Source: Steve Infanti, Harrisburg University of Science and Technology
Writer: John Steele