DON'T DRINK THE KOOL-AID!!!! I like wine, I drink what I like. Let's have an open, intelligent dialog about social media and what it means personally and to society as a whole without ego, emotion, or name calling. It is a meaningful and serious topic. Steve Heimoff has brought up a point we all should think about everyday, not just in our wine worlds.

We are not more efficient, communicative, or integral by twittering to thousands of followers (that's just spam; does anyone remember where the word spam came from, or what SPAM really is). We are not more popular by having more and more “friends” on facebook. I read a post where a parent proudly stated their young children each had over eight hundred “friends” on facebook. I cringed at that thought. Wal-mart, Coca-Cola, Apple, Nike, (……..insert your favorite winery) are not our “friends”. We are not more important or influential by the number and use of PDA's on our waists.

Steve had other valid points. Hardy Wallace, Tom Wark, Steve Heimoff, Dr Vino, Wine Dude, even Vaynerchuk, or Jamie Goode are any of them quitting their day jobs. I am not criticizing them or their blogs, the fact is if I had to pay to read their article, per day, per week or whatever I probably wouldn't, I would go on to the next blog. As an advertiser would I pay, 1.00, 2.00, or 5.00, per click from anyone of these sites, maybe. Would I ppc from all of them, No.

Hardy Wallace road the largest social media wave, in the wine world, to arguably the best blog gig ever. Almost immediately their was backlash from twitter heads about Murphy-Goode not playing by social media rules. The flack didn't damage the competition or the position. Harvey Wallace brought the juice, brought the fun an delivered a huge buzz and massive name recognition for MG and KJ. Sounds like Harvey was 24/7 MG for six months straight out, made some decent cash for while, had fun, and produced for MG/KJ. The experiment had a six month incubation in the end the plug got pulled, why? I'm sure there were personal reasons on Harvey's, part to keep true to himself and to do what was right for him, I applaud that. But on the side of KJ it had to be they weren't getting the ROI they wanted, which is to say they weren't getting much of a return in $$$ or intangibles converted to $$$ considering it doesn't seem they spent much on a campaign that went viral from day one and then Harvey helped put it over the top.

What a rant, I could go on and on, but let me say, like anything else there should be a balance in social media, some people won't see any relevance or good from it and others won't see the negative effects on themselves or society as a whole. It's use should be thoughtful and limited.

Randall Grahm gave a speech at UC Davis recently on wine and the wine industry, of course, that parallels some of the issues of social media.

http://www.beendoonsolong.com/2010/02/why-shoul…