Tag: Facebook

Congratulations Melanie Ciolek!

~ Matt Armstrong

imageCongratulations to Melanie Ciolek on winning the USC Center on Public Diplomacy’s Prize for Best Student Paper for 2010. Melanie’s paper, How Social Media Contributes to Public Diplomacy: Why Embassy Jakarta’s Facebook Outreach Improves Understanding of the Limitations and Potential for the State Department’s Use of Social Media, was published on this blog back in June.

Melanie wrote “How Social Media Contributes to Public Diplomacy” as a student in my Public Diplomacy and Technology (PUBD510) last semester. (See and comment on the draft syllabus for Spring 2011.)

State Department and Social Media

~ Matt Armstrong ~ 1 Comment

imageHave you been wondering how many “fans” there are for the State Department’s Facebook pages? Interested in knowing whether the numbers are going up or down for a particular online “property”? Look no further than this site put together by the Office of Innovation within “R”, the Office of the Under Secretary of Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs. Go there and you’ll find that as of today, there are 1,011,712 fans for the 191 pages the department maintains. There’s data by site as well. U.S. Embassy Kabul has 3,682 fans, six times as many as U.S. Embassy Brussels (623). A quick look raises questions about the validity of the data, however. I was curious about the information resource center in Brazil (IRC Brasil) because the report showed zero friends, but the Facebook page shows 140. Probably just a minor glitch… Either way, it’s an interesting bit of transparency into public diplomacy.

See also:

Guest Post: Explaining Why Afghanistan Matters – Whose Job Is It?

~ Matt Armstrong ~ 5 Comments

By Tom Brouns

As highlighted in this blog and others, the use of “new” and “social” media by military and government organizations as a part of their public communication strategy is undergoing a quiet evolution – or in some cases, revolution.  Where consensus between allies is not a concern, organizations like US Forces – Afghanistan are taking the bull by the horns: their Facebook page amassed 14,000 fans in six weeks, and their 4500+ followers on Twitter are nothing to sneeze at.  In an alliance like NATO, progress has to be a bit more tentative and exploratory.  Regardless of the pace, increasing dialogue and transparency between military organizations and their publics should be seen as a positive thing.

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World Map of Social Networks

~ Matt Armstrong ~ 1 Comment

Interesting data crunching from Italy on social network use around the globe. See the map at right and the data below.

Some visible patterns to highlight:

– Facebook has almost colonized Europe and it’s extending its domination with more than 200 millions users
– QQ, leader in China, is the largest social network of the world (300 millions active accounts)
– MySpace lost its leadership everywhere (except in Guam)
– V Kontakte is the most popular in Russian territories
– Orkut is strong in India and Brazil
– Hi5 is still leading in Peru, Colombia, Ecuador and other scattered countries such as Portugal, Mongolia, Romania
– Odnoklassniki is strong in some former territories of the Soviet Union
– Maktoob is the most important Arab community/portal

Other country specific social networks:

– Iwiw in Hungary
– Nasza-klasa in Poland
– Cyworld in South Korea
– Friendster in Philippines
– Hives in Netherlands
– Lidé in Czech Republic
– Mixi in Japan
– One in Latvia and Lithuania
– Wretch in Taiwan
– Zing in Vietnam

The White House, Social Media, and Public Diplomacy

~ Matt Armstrong ~ 1 Comment

Be sure to read the interesting op-ed by Jim Hoagland in The Washington Post titled A President Goes Friending. It’s pretty clear Mr. Hoagland doesn’t quite know what to make of the new-fangled means of communication. To his credit, he admits it:

My reaction no doubt resembles that of a blacksmith at the turn of the last century catching his first thrilling, then horrifying, glimpse of a motorcar.

Mr. Hoagland is not alone. The media, many public affairs officers, and governments in general, tend to view “now media” as a distinct world and not another channel of communication. Of course with any new medium of engagement there’s a fear. The first “fast” media of the 20th Century, television, was not allowed to cover the US Senate in favor of the “slower” and more comfortable print journalists for decades.

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Can Facebook defeat terrorism?

~ Matt Armstrong

Maybe. From Gutenberg to pre-Revolutionary pamphleteers to the Internet, increasing the access to information has been a catalyst for change. Yesterday, Steve Corman looked at this question and noted that

[w]hile Facebook played an important role in the development of the protest march, it can be better described as a catalyst than a cause.

The media, formal and informal, new and old, is the oxygen both terrorist and counter-terrorist movements require to exist and thrive. The advantage of the latter over the former is truth, transparency, and promising futures. New Media’s ability to engage, mobilize, and empower transcends geography and time. It simultaneously reaches locally and globally, providing instant and “time-shifted” access to text, pictures, and videos. It also fosters trusting peer relationships that add credibility to messages and the movement itself.

Today, the State Department announced an event to facilitate more catalysts for change:

Facebook, Google, YouTube, MTV, Howcast, Columbia Law School and the U.S. Department of State Convene the Alliance of Youth Movements Summit

Dec. 3-5 Summit in New York to Bring Together Global Youth Groups, Tech Experts to Find Best Ways to Use Digital Media to Promote Freedom and Justice, Counter Violence, Extremism and Oppression

New York, NY, November 18, 2008—Facebook, Google, YouTube, MTV, Howcast, Columbia Law School, the U.S. Department of State and Access 360 Media are bringing leaders of 17 pioneering organizations from 15 countries together with technology experts next month in New York for the first-ever conclave to empower youth against violence and oppression through the use of the latest online tools. 

Rising star Jared Cohen (author of Children of Jihad: A Young American’s Travels Among the Youth of the Middle East) is a major force behind this event. The rest of the press release is below the fold.

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