I'm 2 years late to Ryan Holiday's book"Trust Me, I'm Lying". Never much of a PR person, I learned immediately out of his nonfictional accounts of becoming a"media manipulator" that marketing can be everything after you've built a fantastic product. Since I have to return the publication by 12/20 into the San Diego Public Library, I figured this is a great time to write down my notes as a blog post.
Quotes from"Trust Me, I'm Lying"
"We play by their rules long enough and it becomes our game" --
"Social networking isn't a set of resources to permit humans to communicate with humans. It is a set of embedding mechanisms to permit technologies to use people to communicate with each other, in an orgy of self-organizing... The Matrix had it wrong. You are not the batter power in a global, human-enslaving AI, you're slightly more precious. You are part of the switching circuitry"
"it is a prime example of the feminist blogosphere's tendency to tap into the industry force of what I have come to think of as"outrage world" -- the frequently occurring firestorms awakened on mainstream, for-profit, woman-targeted websites like Jezebel and also, to a lesser degree, Slate's very own XX Factor and Salon's Broadsheet. They are triggered by writers who are pushing readers to feel what the writers assert is righteously indignant anger but that is really just petty jealousy, cleverly promoted as feminism. All these firestorms are great for page-view-pimping bloggy enterprise."
-Emily Gould from Slate.com
"Companies should expect a full scale, organized attack from critics. One which will concurrently overrun blog comments, Facebook fan pages, and an onslaught of sites, resulting in mainstream media appeal. Start by creating a social media disasters plan and growing internal fire drills to expect what could happen."
"Our selves are the house in which we live; they are our news, our personalities, our experience, our types of art, our really experience."
-Daniel Boorstin
Practice Advice in the Novel
Control your Wikipedia page (use any press mention from sites or conventional media)
Examine the top stories and you will notice a pattern: the top stories all polarize poeple. If you create it threaten people's 3 Bs -- jak zagadac do dziewczyny z instagrama behavior, belief, or possessions -- you receive a massive virus-like dispersion
Write stuff bloggers could post right away with no work. Feed them their very own lies"help them trick their readers"
Silence on blogs is your worst.
Faking escapes with email editor (from different sources) can operate if you have the Ideal connections
Prominent headlines that screamed excitement about utlimately unimportant news
Luxury use of images (often of little relevance)
Shade comics and a big, thick Sunday nutritional supplement
Ostentatious support of the underdog causes
Utilization of anonymous sources
Prominent coverage of high society and events
Concepts from the book
Ongoing Narrative /Iterative Reporting -damage is already done, there is no such thing. Iterative reporting is bullshit, folks treat information headlines as"cultural fact", the damage is already done, even it it is a baseless accusation.
Faking escapes with email editor (from different sources)
The Psychology of Error -- Errors and mistakes get rewarded, causes outrage = pageviews = money
For instance, each picture is a different load display = more pageviews (short term vs. long-term metrics). Usability vs. profitability -- publishers are focused liberally on pageviews, but in the long term, user trust will be important. Meanwhile, reckless bloggers are making countless sensationalizing untrue stories.
Snark -- deadly weapon (humour in its dark form. Example = "Your Daily Douchebag: John Mayer Edition". Another online example: Hot Chicks with Douchebags
All that occurs -> All that's known by media --> All that is newsworthy ->All that is printed as news -> All that spreads. This is the systematic restricting of this information seen by the public
My Action List / Courses in the Book
Headlines matter
Websites hold a lot of power
The right contacts at the right blogs in a specific industry hold lots of sway. Example: Apple statements
Building a brand new site with high viral grip (but with the right user metrics in mind) can take off fast. Sites like Watch Mojo, Ebaumsworld, Break.com, ride the wave of copying content from other people, organized in a digestible manner that consumers can quickly disperse. Millions of dollars are created this way while sources are never credited. There must be a means to do both.
There is a need for a reputable news source, or an industry specific source that does not pander to"mass hysteria". Case in point: refinery29.com