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Social Octogenarians - Pickens Plan and Social Networks
By Dominic J. Litten | July 9, 2008
One of yesterday’s bigger national stories was that of oil tycoon T. Boone Pickens, Jr. and his new energy plan. The Pickens Plan aims to reduce American dependence on foreign oil by exploiting the country’s “wind corridor” from the Canadian border to West Texas. The overall goal is to produce 20 percent of the country’s electricity.
On the surface, it sounds good, and the plan may or may not work. But I what most impressed me was that the site was built entirely with social media in mind.
One of the mantras we use, (and by “we” I mean me and my fellow social media nerds) is that if you have something worthwhile, share it. And Pickens allows users to do this in spades with a full array of social bookmarking tools and profiles from Facebook Groups to Twitter accounts. On top of that, if you venture into the Push section of the site, you can join the plan’s own social network for those who share similar concerns.
While the initiative is great, I hope that Pickens’ people have thought this strategy through. While I can only guess how much time will be spent monitoring these networks - and for how long - I am most curious how his people will handle the inevitable: disagreement and dissent.
It’s only a matter of time before some people’s interactions become overly political or even mean spirited. Will they shut down the profiles? Erase comments? My hope is that his social media advisers will let it go. Why? Because that’s part of the deal when you open that social media door. Companies and individuals must take the good with the bad and learn to address the community without blackballing disagreement.
In another tidbit that may only interest me, when the site was unveiled yesterday, the press contact’s email was from a PR firm email address. Today, however, the same contact’s email address has been changed to one on the Pickensplan.com domain. While there may be a plausible explanation for this, in the era of transparency and being upfront with your audience, I wonder if someone felt a Manhattan PR firm email address may change visitors’ perception of the organization?
At any rate, I’ll be monitoring the site on a regular basis as this could be a fascinating case study down the road. I just hope Mr. Pickens and his advisers can keep up.
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July 9th, 2008 at 10:29 pm
What was the PR Firm’s name?
July 10th, 2008 at 2:26 pm
There is a public Forum for discussions about Pickens plan :
http://www.pickensenergyplan.com
Cheers.
July 21st, 2008 at 3:51 pm
“Companies and individuals must … learn to address the community without blackballing disagreement.”
It’s this aspect of social media, Dominic, that I think is most revolutionary to the PR world. You can’t keep all the bad comments out forever. “Lies, more lies, and damned lies” are harder to perpetuate in the Internet’s era of transparency.