Within minutes, @Gizmodo, and probably the other two sites, managed to gain control and delete the messages sent out. But according to the now-deleted tweets from Gizmodo, as acquired from my Tweetdeck:

Can’t be good news.

You can follow real-time updates on Twitter (via search: @Gizmodo, for example) or on Google real-time updates.

EDIT: Most recently…

Last week, Chinese authorities arrested Cheng Jianping (online alias of Wang Yi) and sentenced her to a year-long labor camp for “disturbing social order” — or more specifically, for retweeting a satirical message about attacking Japan’s pavilion at the Shanghai Expo.

The original message that Cheng reposted was from her fiance, joking about recent protests in China in which some Chinese smashed Japanese goods. Her fiance wrote, “Anti-Japanese demonstrations, smashing Japanese products, that was all done years ago … It’s not a new trick. If you really wanted to kick it up a notch, you’d immediately fly to Shanghai to smash the Japanese Expo pavilion.”

Cheng retweeted the above, adding to it, “Angry youth, charge!”

According to statements from Amnesty International to Reuters, her tweet was retweeted by only three people. The group also stated that she may be “the first Chinese citizen to become a prisoner of conscience on the basis of a single tweet.”

The director for the Asia-Pacific within Amnesty, Sam Zarifi, added, “Sentencing someone to a year in a labour camp, without trial, for simply repeating another person’s clearly satirical observation on Twitter demonstrates the level of China’s repression of online expression.”

Though Cheng may be the first arrest on the basis of a single satirical tweet, this isn’t the first time we’ve seen China crack down the whip on the use of social networks and media. The most popular example may be that of recent Nobel Peace Prize winner Liu Xiaobo, jailed for his low-level activism and use of media to speak up against the Chinese government.

Just a few days ago, the organizers of the Chinese Blogger Conference — started in 2005 — were forced to cancel the annual event due to pressure from authorities. The venue was announced just four days before the two-day conference, but the venue’s owners reneged the location’s use for the conference after being pressured by authorities.

Blogs, social networks, and other mediums used for information sharing have been harshly regulated in China. There are few avenues by which users can still voice themselves to some extent. A Twitter microblogging equivalent, Weibo, was launched in China after the Twitter ban but posts are closely monitored by Chinese government. Again, programs and companies like Tweetdeck also allow for a backdoor entry way to reach the banned mediums. The Amazon Kindle seems to be popular as well, as the e-book technology gives people a way to connect to Facebook.

It’s interesting to see how social media and networking will continue to unfold and develop — or not — in China.

Web Director Kate Sands Adams considers the IRC online strategies surrounding the earthquake in Haiti last winter to be among its biggest successes.  The IRC was able to raise an extraordinary amount of money in a short time as well as contribute to increased media coverage of the disaster.

Furthermore, the IRC raised $10,000 on the Facebook Causes application.  This is especially impressive because, according to the Washington Post, fewer than 50 of the approximately 179,000 groups using Causes have been able to raise this amount. The organization also has frequent smaller scale success like when New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof retweeted an IRC tweet, which exponentially expanded the tweet’s reach.

Do not be fooled into thinking these successes are due to luck or public concern during disasters alone.  The IRC’s successful fundraising and advocacy are the result of strategic planning and careful analysis of past online trends.

According to Adams, the organization used to keep a relatively low profile in all aspects of its work.  However, in 2006, the IRC underwent a major rebranding campaign to raise its visibility.  Adams says that external communications have been ramping up ever since and the web has become especially important as a marketing tool to reach new audiences.  Although the IRC has a solid core of long-term supporters, the organization knows the importance of reaching new people.

Ruth Fertig, Online Community Builder at the IRC, adds that cultivating new audiences is a primary goal of the social media strategy as well.  The IRC hopes to turn people who follow the organization on Facebook, Twitter or YouTube into activists, donors, volunteers and sometimes even employees.

Another important goal is to raise unrestricted funds, which the organization can allocate wherever they are most needed.  According to Adams, this type of funding is crucial for sustaining the IRC’s ongoing work as well as responding quickly and effectively during emergencies.

In order to achieve its goals, the IRC has made a priority of tracking its successes. In evaluating advocacy campaigns, the IRC looks at how different types of content drive users to sign petitions or write to leaders.  In terms of fundraising, the IRC monitors criteria like the number of individual online donors, donation amounts and repeat donations.  On the social media platforms, a successful post or tweet is one that many users share or one that sparks conversation via comments or wall posts on Facebook.  Here, a challenge is to pinpoint exactly what it is about a particular post or tweet that makes it go viral.

As a result of tracking trends, Adams, Fertig and the other members of the web team at the IRC have amassed a collection of best practices for engaging potential activists and donors.  Fertig emphasized that forming best practices is key.  It saves her time and allows her to do her job better

Adams has found an important practice is to react quickly to website analytics data. During their efforts surrounding the earthquake in Haiti, the IRC found that it was extremely effective to rapidly post new content, photos and video from the ground.  It allowed them to communicate the urgency of the situation and inspire people to help.

The IRC has found that maximizing use of multimedia in general is very effective.  Analysis of IRC website traffic shows that most people tend to click on pictures and video and will stay on a page longer if it utilizes multimedia.

Another lesson is to listen to users and let their needs drive content.  Fertig describes social media platforms as “places for a two way conversation.”  As the IRC’s Online Community Builder, she spends a large portion of her time listening to and monitoring what the IRC’s online community is saying in addition to putting out their own content. She adds that asking questions on social media platforms is a great way to engage people and spark conversations.

Fertig also reaches out to bloggers and generally encourages others to be the IRC’s “megaphone.”  She has found that messages are more effective in the community if “they take the cause upon themselves.”  In response to the many requests for support they receive from individuals hoping to hold awareness or fundraising events, the IRC recently launched iRESCUE.  This “Do-It-Yourself Fundraising” site gives people the resources they need to spread the word to family and friends.

Similarly, through its research, the IRC has found that people are moved by individual stories as well as what is happening on the ground.  The IRC’s Blog, Voices from the Field, was created to give the IRC’s field staff a place to write about their experiences and share their pictures and videos.  Adams says that it is the place where her colleagues in the field “take center stage.”

However, because staff in the field are busy with a variety of lifesaving tasks, they have less capacity to contribute content, photos or video to the blog.  To address the challenge, the team now has four information officers around the world who work closely with field staff and the external communications team to share that important perspective from the ground.

In addition to listening to their audience, Adams finds it important for the IRC to “talk to them in a language they understand.”  Although most of the IRC online community is well informed about a variety of issues, web content producers must use everyday vocabulary and refrain from being overly technical.

The IRC’s web strategy can set an example for other international nonprofits seeking to enter the Web 2.0 world.  Learning from best practices and listening to target audiences can help a small team reach big goals.

Kept under wraps until today (the release of their beta version), Rockmelt is a Mountain View start-up that Andreesen invested in and advises. The idea is that it is built entirely around social networks such as Facebook and Twitter, making a more social browser.

According to the RockMelt blog:

RockMelt does more than just navigate Web pages. It makes it easy for you to do the things you do every single day on the Web: share and keep up with your friends, stay up-to-date on news and information, and search. And of course, RockMelt is fast, secure, and stable because it’s built on Chromium, the open source project behind Google’s Chrome browser. It’s your browser – re-imagined and built for how you use the Web.

After poking around a bit, it seems that the browser looks and feels similar to that of Chrome, which makes sense since Google’s model is their foundation (it even has the Incognito mode). Along the edges of the browser are your Facebook friends and Twitter and RSS feeds, allowing you to chat, message, or check status updates regardless of what site you’re currently on. These are updated in the background and utilize a “push notifications” function that informs you of the messages and updates that are piling up back there. The browser utilizes the company’s cloud service to provide the feed pushing, allowing for faster updates and surfing. Basically, if you’re familiar with these social networking sites, it seems pretty easy to understand and use.

[YOUTUBE] RockMelt: Your browser. Re-imagined.

In addition to being a sharing and networking platform, Rockmelt boasts of its improved ease and speedy search capabilities, its ability to personalize and back up information by the Cloud system (it’s the first browser you log into, unlocking your personal world at any computer you use), and it’s “rock solid” foundation, being built on at a secure and stable core.

You can sign up for your beta version, follow them on Twitter or like them on Facebook.

The use of social media and new platforms in the U.S. races really took off during the Presidential election, with Obama being fairly Internet savvy and definitely a Crackberry addict. Other political candidates have since utilized social networking sites and new media outlets for their campaigns.

Tonight, we can keep track of news in specific regions on Twitter, with hashtags such as #nycvotes; we can check out ratings on Facebook; and more.

Of course, there are some flaws. For instance, Foursquare is attempting to track users’ voting (see map).

“Check-In and include #ivoted in your shout out to get your limited edition iVOTED badge.” – Foursquare

It would seem that most people in California and New York vote but not so much between. But the reality is probably plenty of people in between are voting; they just aren’t on Foursquare…or have smart phones…or mobile technology in general…

But nevertheless, it’s a good movement. As tech enthusiast and blogger Mark Chou writes, “I love what Foursquare’s doing here. Using tech to encourage civic engagement? Check. Attractive data visualizations? Check. Next step – using Foursquare data to develop predictions more robust than exit polls!”

Haha, perhaps. Hey, if we can use these sites to predict hurricanes, why not politics. They’re pretty similar anyways.

Everyone from the presidential to the parliamentary level is getting involved. According to Tungaraza’s blog, current President Jakaya Mrisho Kikwete has an official site and Facebook page. Kikwete’s running mate, Gharib Bilal, also has a Twitter account. Not to be outdone, one of the opposition candidates, Wilbrod Slaa, has a Facebook page, although he has fewer fans that Mr. Kikwete.

According to another blogger, Ndesanjo Macha, one parliamentary candidate has stood out as especially social media savvy. Zitto Kabwe, the parliamentary candidate for Kigoma North has utilized YouTube and Flickr in addition to Twitter. Kabwe tweets in both English and Swahili and also shares links to videos of campaign activities on other sites. He also used Twitter to dispel rumors about his death and express concern about armed police presence at political rallies. Kabwe is one of the youngest members of parliament so it’s not surprising that he has been eager to use social media as part of his strategy to engage with younger voters.

It’s yet to be seen whether social media campaigning will have a major impact on the elections since such a small proportion of the population has access to the internet via computer or smart phone. However, Tanzanian bloggers seem hopeful and internet access in the region will only expand in the future.

Photo source: Global Voices Online

Then, some of friends and colleagues (the most emphatic ones), will try to give a more scientific response in order to delete from my face that annoying expression of somebody who is totally disappointed with their answer. They would argue something like: “These are platforms in the Internet where people can communicate, connect with other people, find friends, participate in debates etcetera… By the way Marta, are you kiddin´?” (This can be considered level 1 of social media knowledge – he or she really believes he knows what he is talking about).

To what I argue that No, I am not kidding, I want just to understand how social media is being used as a tool by for profit and non-profit organizations”. In this moment, she or he looks at me with visionary eyes. “Let me explain you, Marta: many businesses are now using this social media as a way to connect with their customers, to have feedback from them…Many NGOs and advocacy groups are also using these new web-based tools to increase their outreach, fundraising, followers… It is the new era of communication!”. This answer might be assigned a level 2 or 3 of knowledge, according to the degree of excitement in the exclamative proposition.

Depending on the level of “on the loop” that he or she is, they might start talking about crowd-fundraising websites as Kiva.org, mass collaboration as Wikipedia or InnoCentive for R&D. Somebody that even took a course about social media could tell me some success stories of businesses and NGOs using this new media: “Didn’t you know that Obama used the social media in the electoral campaigns? Didn’t you hear about how successful his team was in reaching votes and crowd fundraising?”. Levels 4 and 5 of potential “knowldege”. This might be actually my current status: it seems I am on the loop by my real knowledge is still quite empty.

Ok, I surrender. I still don’t know how this social media really makes the advantage.  Probably it is my fault as I am not being very clear in my question. Let’s try again: How did these social media success stories actually work out? How can I go to an NGO and assure them that I will develop a social media strategy that will bring them thousands of fans, followers, and crowd fundraising?

This is going to be my personal goal for the rest of the semester.  I´m gonna explore best practices in the field and learn how to implement them. I am eager to learn the real content and dynamics of the social media.

Twitter has connected millions of users to one another, created online dialogues via trending topics, helped agencies and companies grow its supporter base, allowed for people to share information, provided a cheap way to text a friend internationally, been a help in promoting social events and causes, and even allowed freshmen in college to document every drunken moment of their weekend. So what haven’t we used Twitter for yet??

Evidently, a predictive tool for science and economics. But that’s all changing now.

Not too long ago, Takeshi Sakaki, Makoto Okazaki, and Yutaka Matsuo of the University of Tokyo presented a paper investigating the real-time interaction of events such as earthquakes via Twitter. The paper discusses an algorithm in which tweets are monitored and used to detect a target event. They use a classifier of tweets based on features such as keywords, number of words, and context. With each Twitter user as a sensor, they created a probabilistic spatio-temporal model for the target event that allows them to find the center and trajectory of the event location.

Taking that concept, can Twitter predict more than earthquakes, typhoons, and other aspects of science?

According to The Tehcnium, Twitter can also predict “the performance of films better than market-based predictions, such as Hollywood Stock Exchange, which have been the best predictors to date.”

Even more recently, Cornell students Johan Bollen, Huina Mao, and Xiao-Jun Zeng presented a paper on Twitter moods predicting stock market outcomes. There are several methods but the most popular seems to be based on an algorithm called the Google-Profile of Mood States (GPOMS). Looking at over 9 million tweets from over 2 million users, researchers use key words and categorize tweets into a level of six states: happiness, kindness, alertness, sureness, vitality and calmness. When compared to the stock market trends at those times, the correlations seems to exist in the calmness factor and whether the market goes up or down within 2 to 6 days.

Other methods can be read about on Technology Review‘s site.

So there we have it. Twitter has exceeded its original intent of being a status updater and a microblogging platform. It’s gone beyond social networking or even social media marketing. It has stepped out of the social sector and into the realm of science and economics, taking on yet another role as a calculative tool for predictions.

Rob Wu, founder of the networking and fundraising platform CauseVox, emphasized, “The history of advocacy and marketing goes like this: we started with face to face approaches, then it went to snail mail, then TV and radio, then email, and now we’ve rapidly moved into a society that is growing more into the online space.” He went on to talk about the prevalence of social media marketing and the use of technological innovations in this field.

“Social media marketing is very hot right now…[but] no, it’s not a fad. It’s definitely going to stick around for a long time because it’s just another channel that reaches supporters…it’s going to stay especially because the younger people – people who are 35 years and younger – are plugged into this online space and are comfortable with finding non-profits and causes through this medium.”

The goal now is to get non-profits into the same space where their supporters are. But how is this effectively done?

Taking a look at Restore NYC, a start-up that officially became operational a year and a half ago, one can see the power of a small non-profit when it takes social media, the web, technology, and innovation by the reins. Founded by three friends sitting around a dining room table one night, Restore seeks to bring holistic care to international sex trafficking survivors in NYC. Their services range from counseling to ESL to job training to legal advocacy.

Being in the heart of NYC, one of the major epicenters of digital progression, Restore knew that they had to do more than just create postcard-like fliers to hand out. Even having a website was barely enough; after all, who didn’t have a website nowadays?

“When I first started in the summer of ‘09, we only had a website and it was really poor,” stated Lance Villio, Operations Coordinator at Restore. “It wasn’t up to date in any way and even the information on it was inaccurate. Our website is supposed to be the face of Restore to a majority of the public; I felt we really needed to change it.” He mentioned that they also had a Facebook but that it was not being maintained well.

Working alongside one of Restore’s board members, Greg Wong, a partner at the marketing and branding firm the Longitude and co-founder of the social enterprise Hello Rewind, Villio made sure that the organization not only had a functioning and informative Facebook page and website, but also an active blog and Twitter account.

“For non-profits, I think it’s vital to have a Twitter page,” Villio said. “And to be consistent with it, otherwise people lose interest. For our supporters, it just keeps people in the loop…For us, it allows for us to track what we’ve done, see other organizations and what they’ve been doing…so networking, basically.”

Restore felt strongly that having an online presence wasn’t just to stay socially or digitally savvy but also to remain transparent. “Transparency is really important in any non-profit. People want to know — and we want people to know — what they’re being a part of and what they’re giving to,” added Villio.

He pushed their online presence further by encouraging video logs (or vlogs) on the website as well, allowing followers to “get real faces, and get to know what’s going on first hand.” Despite the limited resources available to the agency, Restore honed in on what it did have and what it could do.

Through these mediums, they were able to connect with people and groups they would not have likely encountered in “real life,” including videographers, photographers, magazines such as Red Rover Style and Her Journey Magazine, people in various industries such as fashion and retail, and social media gurus like Desiree Frieson, who happens to have a passion for advocating against sex trafficking.

Restore felt that it was doing well reaching its current supporters and being discovered by new fans. Their online presence was active through Twitter and Facebook and their events and projects were successful. Then the young agency decided that they needed to hold a large campaign with the goal of raising at least $50,000 to maintain the first ever safehouse for internationally trafficked women in NYC. Faced with this goal, Restore knew that Tweeting for donations was not going to cut it this time around. Fortunately, through yet another connection, they discovered CauseVox.

According to its website, CauseVox is a “brandable platform that engages…advocates, reaches more supporters, and effectively tells [the non-profit’s] story, all in a fresh, easy to use, and affordable service.” Founder Rob Wu felt strongly that small- and medium-sized organizations were “struggling with technology and how to utilize it” as well as encountering difficulties in fundraising. CauseVox tackles both issues with one platform. Because technology isn’t easy to use – “especially for smaller organizations,” said Wu – he and his friend Jeff Chang developed a supporter-based, or peer-to-peer, fundraising platform. Wu also calls it network fundraising.

Remarking about non-profits in general, Wu agrees that they are seeing the need to “latch on to the social media movement” but that this needs to go beyond just having a Twitter account under the agency’s name. While the methods Restore and other media-savvier non-profits are utilizing are “good for raising awareness, building and getting your message out there, it’s not so much a platform for fundraising.” Regardless of whether an organization is not-for-profit or for-profit, all need a flow of funding. Unfortunately, awareness-building doesn’t necessarily bring in those needed dollars.

“Yes, there is Twitter and Facebook fundraising methods,” Wu said after giving some specific examples, “but the reality is that the returns are not that high and the higher returns are seen when non-profits utilize more than that.”

CauseVox was created exactly for this purpose. It caters towards non-profits in an easy-to-use way to create support. It is completely customizable, “like having a blog,” with modules that the organization can play around with.

Non-profits often have a passionate group of supporters, and CauseVox allows for them to tap into these supporters’ networks. Restore’s campaign, titled Brick by Brick, was the perfect pilot project to demonstrate this. It ran from August 22nd to September 30th and was entirely an Internet-based campaign. A supporter could create his or her own fundraising page and blast that out to friends, families, coworkers, neighbors, etc. via mediums like Twitter, Facebook, email, text, and blogs. Those friends, families, coworkers, and neighbors then donated to that supporter’s page. So now Restore, rather than just getting the support of one person, now gets the support of that one person and his or her network.

“Brick by Brock was really effective because it gave people a voice on their own pages as well as a way to help,” Villio stated. He acknowledged the ease of use with CauseVox, criticizing only one detail. “It would have been better if there was a way to link emaill addresses in supporters’ contacts or address books rather than manually sending out the page to each person. Obviously, anything to take time off of what our supporters need to do is best.”

Wu also acknowledged that there were minor tweaks that needed to be done with CauseVox but mainly they were moving forward to building up and adding to the platform.

“The cool thing,” Wu added, “is seeing how social media is incorporated. Our next step actually is to integrate something similar to Facebook posts or blog comments. We’ll plug in the ability to leave comments on one another’s fundraising page. This allows for non-profits to extract data; see who is supporting who, what conversations are emerging, and what their constituents care about.”

On both Restore and CauseVox’s ends, they reported that there were nearly no problems throughout the process of the campaign. Wu mentioned that a “hiccup” involved may have been exporting data in terms of the platform – gleaning out email lists, for example. But other than that, both parties acknowledge that there were no hurdles and the campaign went smoothly.
In fact, Restore NYC raised nearly $130,000 from the Brick by Brick campaign, including a gift from an anonymous donor that matched dollar for dollar every new donation made during the campaign. With this money, the agency can provide two years of safe housing for sexually exploited women in NYC.

Villio expressed Restore’s gratitude for collaborating with CauseVox, saying, “[CauseVox] is going to be a very successful program. It’s genius because it allows people in their own words to describe what they are doing — people want to personally send out a message for a greater good in their own way.”

Restore is one of the many smaller non-profits that realize that handing out informational packets is not enough; even “doing” social media is not enough, but that social media and advocacy is an entire package. Through their utilization of innovative technologies such as CauseVox, coupled with the power of mass social media through networks like Twitter, blogs, and Facebook, they showed that even a young and small non-profit can be digitally relevant and change lives.

“The key to all of this is learning how to use each tool specifically,” Villio commented in regards to mediums like Twitter, Facebook, blogging, and other platforms. “They can perform so many different functions, you just have to be creative and purposeful with them.”

That is the exact challenge facing the United Nations Global Compact.  The Global Compact is the UN’s initiative encouraging businesses to align their operations with ten principles of human rights, labour, environment and anti-corruption.  Over the last six months, the organization’s priorities have been two major events, the UN Private Sector Forum and the Global Compact Leaders’ Summit, both with strict attendance policies limited to elite leaders of business and government.

At the same time, the Communications Team at the Global Compact realizes the increasing importance of social media and its potential to foster dialogue about corporate social responsibility.  A recent discussion with Dr. Sean Cruse, who is responsible for all Web Content at the Global Compact, brought to life the tension the Communications Team is facing in its social media strategy.

The organization’s first foray into web 2.0 was the Global Compact blog, which launched in the spring of 2009.  According to Cruse, the blog has proven to be an effective outlet for interesting stories that are not newsworthy enough for a formal press release.  Later that fall, the Global Compact set up accounts on LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter, all of which now have strong followings.  There are currently 304 members in the LinkedIn group, 479 fans on Facebook and 2,172 followers on Twitter.

But a social media site is only as good as its members, content and freshness. And just who are all these followers?  Odds are they aren’t always the elites that the Global Compact is trying to connect with.  “Given the ultimate audience of people we’re trying to reach to attend the [Global Compact Leaders’] Summit, it’s not serving our purpose of getting the right people into the room.  At the end of the day, CEOs and Heads of State aren’t going on Facebook,” argues Cruse.

Another challenge Cruse finds particularly in moderating discussions on LinkedIn is that many of the group members are promoting themselves or jockeying for a job.  In Cruse’s opinion, there is “no real dialogue about corporate sustainability.”  He remains somewhat skeptical as to whether value is being created through the group’s discussions.

Limited resources and staff buy-in have also been a challenge for the Global Compact in creating new content and shaping discussions.  Like many organizations, the Global Compact only has one or two staff members working on social media as one of many responsibilities.  It takes time and resources to create new social media content and guide discussions relevant to the organization’s mission.  Cruse also admits that social media is not a high priority among staff in the Global Compact office.

The Global Compact doesn’t plan on scrapping its social media program anytime soon, though.  Despite its limitations, Cruse says that social media is still “part and parcel” of a good communications strategy.  For better or worse, having an active following on its blog, Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn gives the Global Compact a degree of credibility.

Moreover, the Global Compact found that social media, when utilized at the appropriate time, can be effective in publicizing the outcomes of its projects. At the advice of a team of graduate student consultants, the Global Compact decided to make social media and integral part of its Summit’s communications strategy. Throughout the three-day Summit and in the days after, the Communications Team found the blog and Twitter to be the most effective ways send out messages quickly and link back to the Global Compact website or to other articles published online about the Summit.

The organization was also able to recruit a team of well-established corporate social responsibility bloggers to live-blog the entire three-day Summit.  The bloggers were able to effectively disseminate the Global Compact’s messages to the large audiences already engaged on their websites.

The ups and downs of the Global Compact’s first year in social media have given it cause to rethink its strategy.  Gaining buy-in and involving the office’s entire staff could be an effective way to boost the organization’s use of social media.  For instance, staff working on gender issues could be responsible for periodically posting discussion questions and comments on the Facebook or LinkedIn pages.  This would lower the resource burden for the Communications Team and produce higher quality content as those with the most expertise would be involved in the discussion.

It seems that, at least for the Global Compact, social media is more helpful for some activities than others.  At the end of the day, it is just one of many tools the Communications Team can choose from to achieve its goals.