Posts Tagged ‘Facebook’

Every so often, somebody does something that resonates with the public and inspires the masses. Yesterday, that person was Steve Slater, a 38-year-old JetBlue flight attendant.

It all started when a particularly uncooperative passenger gave Slater sass, refusing to sit down when he asked her to. Determined to reach her things from the storage compartment above the seat, she then hit Slater in the head with her luggage (accidentally, it seems) as he tried to intervene.

And after 20 years of service, Slater had had it.

Going over the in-flight PA system, he cussed out the passenger and then grabbed two beers before sliding his way down the exit chute, out of the plane and away from his high-stress job. Though potentially endangering those around him, his actions are representative of what several of those working in customer service probably have at least at one point in their lives wished they too could do.

Who knows how many other people quit their jobs in style yesterday, but let’s just say that between the Facebook pages and wide coverage of the event, something about Slater struck a cord with people. And in the midst of all this news flurry, one organization for a long time stayed noticeably silent: JetBlue.

As an Advertising Age article published yesterday specifically highlighted, JetBlue has been slow in updating its Facebook and Twitter accounts. Even as of noon today, its Facebook wall still had no trace of the Slater incident. The same was true for its Twitter.

Then, this afternoon a link was finally posted on both these social media sites to a blog post: “Sometimes the Weird News Is About Us.” And interestingly, it was a post about… staying quiet. In a surprisingly short note, Jet Blue writes:

It wouldn’t be fair for us to point out absurdities in other corners of the industry without acknowledging when it’s about us. Well, this week’s news certainly falls into that category. Perhaps you heard a little story about one of our flight attendants? While we can’t discuss the details of what is an ongoing investigation, plenty of others have already formed opinions on the matter. Like, the entire Internet. (The reason we’re not commenting is that we respect the privacy of the individual. People can speak on their own behalf; we won’t do it for them.)

While this episode may feed your inner Office Space, we just want to take this space to recognize our 2,100 fantastic, awesome and professional Inflight Crewmembers for delivering the JetBlue Experience you’ve come to expect of us.

Simple, clear, and professional, the post focuses on highlighting the positives of their other flight attendants and, by keeping mum, inadvertently acknowledges the sticky situation that JetBlue is in. While many find Slater’s actions funny, the blog post demonstrates how taking the situation too lightly as a corporation could make things complicated legally and potentially even reduce trust in their in-flight personnel. Furthermore, it is consistent with an official statement released to the press, which said the airline company was working with both the Federal Aviation Administration and the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey in investigating the situation. This previous statement also made to sure to include how “at no time was the security or safety of our customers or crew members at risk.”

“Usually when a flight attendant gets called out it’s for something they have done wrong that pissed off passengers,” said Jonathan Bellinger, the vice president of social media strategy at Ketchum, in AdAge. “But when an attendant does something where passengers say they wish they would do the same thing at their own job, that’s great. It’s a net positive story for the brand.”

So what took so long for JetBlue to respond on the social media front if all they had to do was repeat what they had already told traditional media outlets?

For the most part, this seems less like neglect than underestimating the importance of their social media reach. It’s been “about an hour” since the link to the blog was posted on JetBlue’s Facebook site and already there are 139 comments–and with 301,305 Facebook fans of the page itself, that isn’t a surprise. Marty St. George, the head of JetBlue marketing, alone has 1,958 followers for his personal Twitter, while JetBlue’s corporate handle has 1,595,120. Staying consistent in a message means updating all channels of communication, including social media, and especially social media if you are, as St. George described it, “a brand with a customer base that skews young and affluent; they are on social media, and we want to be where our customers are.”

[Photo credit: Lost Magazine]

Back in elementary school, library trips were awesome because they always meant one thing: playing Oregon Trail in the computer lab. Who knew a game that teaches kids how to buy too many things at the General Store, shoot more buffalo than they can carry back, and write funny epitaphs for poor friends who have passed away from dysentery could be so much fun.

Open up my Macbook today though and you won’t find any trace of my sharp-shooting past. Instead, tabs for Gmail, Facebook, The New York Times, Tumblr, and a probably some recently-discovered hilarious website (New Yorker Cartoons Captioned By Kanye West Tweets, anyone?) will most likely be sitting pretty on my desktop. The luxury of being able to access multiple streams of information simultaneously makes me wonder how I ever stayed entertained during the days of dial-up. And what does all this say about me?

Well, that I’m actually pretty much totally average.

While The New York Times earlier this summer took an in-depth look at the Internet’s effect on our brains, a recent study by Nielson Internet Research on top of that found that Internet users spend almost one-fourth of their time on social networking sites, shifting their attention away from more traditional online tasks like checking their email. The second most common use of the Internet, though, was playing social games like Farmville.

Which in a way makes sense: these games didn’t stop being fun. We just started being told it wasn’t socially acceptable to play them all the time anymore.

“Games have always faced a sort of puritanical challenge in this country, that they are okay to play as kids but weird as adults,” said Mia Consalvo, a visiting associate professor at MIT, in a recent article by The Washington Post. “But play is a fundamental part of our lives. And now, with these social games, many people who weren’t gamers have an outlet again to play games as adults.”

What is it that makes these games so addictive for everyone? The fact that they thrive with an already-established social network. This answer may seem obvious, but the idea of having a game community exist within a social network rather than having a a social network result from a game community (in which all members of that social network therefore play a game) is an interesting (and entirely logical) phenomenon. While the second scenario often is filled with individuals stigmatized as “gamers,” the first situation involves a wide spectrum of personality, gender, and age groups. And this fact has large business consequences.

Mainly, the proliferation of social games attests to the influence friends have on one another online. Unlike in the Oregon Trail of my childhood, social games normally require collaboration in order for players to stay interested and achieve success in a game. Yet, similar to Oregon Trail versus games like Halo, these social games can be “crude to the point of being almost retro,” according to MediaPost, with simple objectives and basic features. By supplying the element of entertainment, surprise, and competition, these games provide a heightened level of interaction between an individual and his/her social network, making it a popular way of meeting new friends while keeping in touch with old ones.

For businesses then, social games become an added arena wherein they can reach customers and establish brand salience. In an interview at MIT, Consalvo said, “There’s all this spillover right now as people are trying to figure things out, like what’s a casual game versus what’s a social game. There’s a lot of interest and excitement and people aren’t quite sure what’s going to happen or how they’re going to make money.”

But that’s not to say social games are not lucrative. While most games are free to play, many include different levels or add-ons that users can purchase at a low cost. For instance, based off of the recently-popular ”Double Rainbow” video  that became a bonafide Internet meme, Frontierville (a new game from the makers of Farmville) added a “Double Rainbow” decoration that players can purchase with in-game currency. It is estimated that $835 million worth of game-based purchases are made every year.

Furthermore, games have the ability to exist across platforms, from laptops to iPhones. The appeal of reaching large audiences who are actively and often engaged in a game has caused game developer and entrepreneur Jon Radoff to call social games “the most viable business model that has come along for social networks, even better than advertising.”

It also makes predicting how businesses will leverage this potential fairly complicated. Expectedly, it has been observed that more and more brands and companies are either building games themselves or providing advertising or product placements within already-established social games. In an interesting twist, however, some have also speculated that Google hopes to enter the social network by reversing the entire social-to-game process by building a social game site that has networking capabilities.

To me, this seems like a simple isolation of the social game trend, which raises a few questions as to its potential success. Namely, I wonder whether or not this would only create a new gaming community (thus, losing the mass appeal social games currently rely and thrive on), and if current social game players value a game more/find it more convenient to play if it exists within a social network that they have already established.

Either way, the build-up and rumors surrounding the release of GoogleMe is reminiscent of the anticipation and expectations that enveloped two other recent Google products–Google Buzz and Google Wave, eventually making both underwhelming. Hopefully, in this case, third time’s the charm.

If my friend Robert was a Pokémon, he’d be a Pikachu. If he was a Sex and the City character, he’d totally be a Samantha. I also know what color Rob would be if that even makes remotely any sense. Turns out he has all the qualities of “being” green. But right now, he’s unemployed.

During these past few months, I’ve noticed Rob and most of my unemployed friends spending more and more time on Facebook. How do I know? Because my Facebook feed has been inundated with minute by minute updates on my friends’ games and quiz results.

Now for the record, there’s nothing wrong with playing a few games or answering silly quizzes on Facebook once in a while. For the most part, it’s enjoyable to do and I even find that it relieves stress on those hectic workdays. But I knew Rob was too engrossed in Facebook quizzes when I found out he would make a fine “Hitler” by participating in “What Dictator are You?”

Like some of you, I’ve bought into the idea that Facebook was more than just a site for college students to upload pictures of them hanging out and being “cool.” I believed users would use Facebook as a platform for job placement and professional networking, especially during the recession.

However, what I find is that Rob and most of my unemployed friends are using Facebook to pass the time and satiate the boredom that comes from unemployment.

So beware young recessionites! Spend most of your time on Craigslist searching for jobs and spend less time on Facebook. Instead of being a fictional character and racking up fake money, wouldn’t you rather be what you majored for and start receiving a real salary?