I’m a capitalist philosophically, an entrepreneur by disposition, and a communicator by experience.  I’m co-founder of a communications firm, Qorvis, which seeks to achieve ongoing success by achieving a very high level of quality in everything we do.  If you are in similar shoes, “new media” has been a major issue of yours for several years with increasing intensity.  As part of our concern, we have expanded our capabilities in (and knowledge of) using digital communications channels significantly; we have been able to do some pretty interesting and cutting edge innovations ourselves.  Most recently, we have ventured far into mobile communications, for example with the , which seeks to achieve ongoing success by achieving a very high level of quality in everything we do.  If you are in similar shoes, “new media” has been a major issue of yours for several years with increasing intensity.  As part of our concern, we have expanded our capabilities in (and knowledge of) using digital communications channels significantly; we have been able to do some pretty interesting and cutting edge innovations ourselves.  Most recently, we have ventured far into mobile communications, for example with the 2009 Presidential Inauguration Guide application for smart phones, a project we did in concert with Patton Boggs and PointAbout.  We have also been aggressive in using social media very effectively – our SaveNetRadio campaign, for example, was broadly lauded by Congressional staffers as one of the “grassroots campaigns of the year.”  But we have an unrelenting concern to become a true leader in the space, and so we keep asking whether we are far enough ahead of the curve.  As we continued to address that concern (which for me has boarded on paranoia), we encountered a fairly typical problem:  you need to have a basic understanding of where you want to go before you set out on a path to get there.  Ahhhh … there was the rub!  Where did we want to go?  To answer that, we had to first ask: Where does it look like things are heading?  And the answer that I, at least, came up with was: “I don’t know.”  So I set off to try to get an answer to that question.  This is the first of what is likely to be a series of articles about a unique experiment I have personally undertaken to get that understanding.  It represents a major commitment of time and effort, but I think it is necessary.

The First Thing I Discovered When Trying To Build My Understanding About “New Media” Is That Nobody Gets It Really.  Really.

Fortunately, through a combination of the success of Qorvis and my years of being in the communications business, I have been able to access lots of really smart people whose experience and intelligence I can leverage to help me get smarter.  That, combined with my passion to get my arms around “new media” and my fondness for great dining at great restaurants, led me to have scores of meetings with various new media experts.  I’d ask questions.  Push.  Suggest ideas to stimulate reaction.  And after a while, I found myself oddly thinking of Socrates’ Defense (The Platonic Dialogue “The Apology”).

Socrates had to defend himself against allegations that he was teaching things to Greek youths by essentially passing himself off as the smartest, most wise man.  So, he explains, he set out to find the truly smartest people to get their understanding of wisdom and intelligence.  He met with politicians.  He met with poets.  He met with artisans, and this is what he observed:

“At last I went to the artisans, for I was conscious that I knew nothing at all, as I may say, and I was sure that they knew many fine things; and in this I was not mistaken, for they did know many things of which I was ignorant, and in this they certainly were wiser than I was. But I observed that even the good artisans fell into the same error as the poets; because they were good workmen they thought that they also knew all sorts of high matters, and this defect in them overshadowed their wisdom – therefore I asked myself on behalf of the oracle, whether I would like to be as I was, neither having their knowledge nor their ignorance, or like them in both; and I made answer to myself and the oracle that I was better off as I was.”

Wow.  That’s exactly what happened to me.  I went to bloggers.  I went to search engine experts.  I went to social media gurus.  I went to young experts, hoping that because they grew up with new communications habits I could benefit by their perspective.  I met with people with decades of experience, hoping they could give me the perspective that experience brings.

From each, I got “the” answer.  I was told a blog posting should be between 400-600 words.  I was told that a blog posting needed to have lots of value, so make it in-depth.  Oh.  I was told to post everyday.  I was told that wasn’t necessary.  I was told that Twitter was the be-all and end-all.  Wait.  Twitter is just a fad.  It’s really Facebook.  No.  It’s IMs.  It’s search engine optimization.  No.  It’s not worrying at all about your own blog – it’s all about posting on other people’s blogs.  It’s small niche groups.  It’s big groups.  It’s closed.  It’s open.  It’s WordPress and this new widget.  Look here.  Look there.  That’s where the answer is.

I decided, like Socrates, that the experts I asked for opinions were absolutely accurate in what they said, and totally wrong in their understanding of what it was all about.  They all looked at a huge issue from a narrow perspective.  They looked into a big house by peeking through a small window that let them see one room.  They were right about what they could see, but they didn’t look into other rooms.  They didn’t see how one thing related to another and another.  They lacked a robust systemic understanding of what was really happening.  They could help me understand a “room”; they could not help me understand the house – make that the mansion – make that the mansion that is in a constant state of renovation and expansion.

I Decided:  I Wasn’t Going To Truly Understand Digital Communications (or “New Media” or Whatever It’s Called) By Making It A “Side” Issue.  I Had To Make It A Primary, On-Going Focus.  That’s What I Have Done.

I’ve taken at least three months away from the office.  I’m connected of course and engage in “normal” work.  But mostly, I am spending every day involved in gaining a better understanding of the digital aspect of communications.  So, I am writing for my own blog on a daily basis now.  And I am experimenting with various ways of promoting it, using technology, social networking, advertising, other blogs, etc.  And I am visiting other blogs to see what looks to be working and what isn’t.  By the way, my definition of “working” is consistent with my view of why to try to communicate in the first place: to bring well-crafted messages that will move a specific target (that can be one person or masses) to take certain actions that will result in desired goals.  That’s an important point because when you go looking for “neat” things in new media, you can find lots of them, but way too many are so very very cool but don’t really have a point.

I’m doing a great deal of reading, observing, talking and corresponding with others.  My goal isn’t to become an expert on any particular part of new media – my goal is to obtain a robust systemic overview and then help Qorvis adopt the approach and retain the additional expertise we need to cover all aspects of the communications revolution.

I’ve come to one conclusion so far:

Digital Communications Needs Branding.

Maybe it’s me.  I hate the word “blog.”  If you were going to give a name to a butt-ugly dog, “Blog” might be good.  It’s almost demeaning as a word to describe something that I think is a major phenomenon of very deep significance.  But I think it is too late to capture that word and bring it out of the daily lexicon.  I think it is there for good.  But I do not think we should be saddled with the word “blogosphere.”  What an awful word.

In fact, I do not even know what to call what it is that I am looking at.  “New Media” is probably the best phrase, but that sets up a perspective where something is wrong with “old” media.  And whereas there is a lot wrong with the newspaper and television and radio businesses as we have known them, “old” and “new” media shouldn’t be seen as an either/or situation.  There is no need to be an advocate and supporter of one and a rejecter of the other.  When it comes to communicating, as has been a basic premise of this Death Of Time blog, any and all distribution channels should be used, and pitting “old” versus “new” is counter-productive to that goal.

So, look for more of my thoughts on this whole area over the next few months.  Maybe I’ll get to some breakthrough idea that will make everything clear.  Is there a unifying theory for the new world of communications?  Interesting question.  I do not know the answer yet.  But I do think this:

To Understand What Is Happening In The Communications Industry, Go Observe A Lava Lamp.

There is that glob.  You can’t describe it with any word other than “glob.”  It is constantly changing.  Moving in space.  Reshaping in form.  That’s what is happening in communications, with one important difference.  At least the glob in a lava lamp is contained within the glass container, so its size is limited.  But new media has no such limits.  At the same time it is moving and reshaping, it is also growing.  And that complicates even more the ability to define it.

And this all means that I may not get the robust overview I want over the course of the next three months or so, but I’ve learned enough to know that the experts and specialists and gurus who do assert a deep understanding don’t really have an accurate perspective now.  And because they are so enamored with their particular approaches and solutions, they are likely to become increasingly smart about their area of expertise and increasingly dumb about the entire system.