We, as Americans, have something that many in the world do not – the freedom to say what we want, when we want, about almost anyone or anything we choose – also known as the First Amendment to the United States Constitution.

Today, the First Amendment is being utilized by a consistently growing number of people.  Blogs, tweets, facebook pages, you name it and it’s being used to express opinions that, in many other countries, would cause the law to knock on someone’s door.

The moral of the story – become engaged.  Speak your voice.  If you care about something, anything, and you want others to care too, let them know about it.  The tools are there, you just need to find the right ones for you and run with them.

Sally, Chris and I will be posting more thoughts about NCHCMM soon, but I wanted to highlight a few points from John Whyte’s closing plenary. He’s the chief medical expert at Discovery Health Channel (you can read his blog here) and had some great insights about actually reaching the public with public health and social marketing messaging.

Three key points:

- Social Media/the Internet is important and growing, but broadcast media (television) is by far where people spend most of their leisure time.

- Stories actually make an impact. Nothing engages people like a story, and harnessing this power can advance a public health message more than a water-tight, perfectly crafted traditional marketing campaign. Consider using primetime television as a vehicle for your message.

- Empower, educate, and entertain.

We’ve been discussing the power of emotional, story-based social marketing with clients for years, and so it was nice to have this perspective succinctly backed up by Dr. Whyte. To underline this point, here’s an oldie-but-goodie Banyan favorite that drives home the need for social marketing and public health messaging to engage and entertain:

It is the easiest thing in the world for me to go to Twitter and, within 140 characters, announce that I have just been abducted  by aliens and that they come in peace to save our world, (only if I’m installed as Supreme Being, by the way).  But since I posted this declaration in a social media space I don’t have to explain the alien’s plans; share how they got here or where they are from; show why I’m the only one who can see them – I don’t have to be responsible for anything pertaining to what I’ve said.  That’s the down-side of one way communication.  Now, I really don’t think many people would take my claim very seriously, (since I’m prone to delusions of grandeur, or so says my Psychologist), but if I was a Congressman, Senator, radio talk show host, religious leader, or TV pundit – you know, people we all used to respect and whose opinions we valued – and I used social media to talk about fear instead of solutions or ideologies instead of ideas, I could probably influence a lot of people in our nation to become afraid, angry, unfocused, and hopeless – without being responsible for explaining myself or looking at how these type of statements do more harm than good.

I guess my point is, when it comes to social media, go ahead and embrace it, use it, love it – just don’t believe everything you read. Not everyone is as reasonable, balanced and well intentioned as you or I.  And don’t forget – look to the sky, the time is nigh upon us, which is why I’m having my crown fitted tomorrow.  Why wait ‘til the last minute?

This being my first professional mission, I went in slowly, kept my distance and made sure not to give myself away.  I knew these women would see right through me if I tried to become one of them, so I had to lay low and observe from a safe distance.  I stealthily dropped in to their domain.

To say this was unfamiliar territory, would be a major understatement.  The bright pink walls burnt my eyes, the constant gossip rang in my ears and that smell, I always thought it was a myth, but there it is, pickle juice.  I had hit the jackpot – what I need to know could be found here.

It took a little searching, I hit a few dead ends, but finally found the group I was looking for, “Smoking Mommies.”  I was stunned.  Here was a group of women, many obviously with child, puffing down on every size, brand and type of cigarette available (and a few puffing on a leafy substance not available at the mini-mart.)  The agency was sure to find all of this interesting.  I pulled out my little camera and snapped away, my audio recorder running, gathering everything they were saying.  It was at that moment I remembered I was no James Bond.  This was real life.

As I stared dumbfounded at my computer screen, my fingers running across the track pad, clicking through blog post after blog post, then numerous discussion pages and even the personal profile pages of many of the expectant mothers, I gained a further understanding of why I was sent to target these women through these social media networks.  These women were everywhere,  openly discussing a topic that, before my lurking mission, I had thought was a restricted to a small, isolated group.  How naive of me.

Findings in hand, we here at Banyan presented this information to the National Cancer Institute.  My first mission was a success.  The target had been acquired, now it was time for phase two, developing a plan of attack.

This “Social Media Lurking,” as we have come to call it, is an integral part in shaping the delivery of a social media message, what channels the message is sent over and who will find the message within these various channels.  Since that first mission, I have honed my skills, much like my mentor, 007.  We’ve put together quite an array of gadgets, allowing us to infiltrate our targeted groups even further and squeeze every last bit of information out of them that we need.

As the information becomes declassified, I’ll let everyone know about Phase 2.  But for now, just know that we’re out there…lurking about.

Also, Sean Connery is my favorite Bond.

Wrong.  Upon doing about five minutes of research I found the official statement made by the transplant surgeon at the hospital where Jobs received his new liver.  Then I popped over to the UNOS website to read up on the rules and regulations surrounding one’s inclusion on a hospitals transplant list.

Just the facts: Jobs was the sickest man on the transplant list.  That means he’s the first to get a liver when one becomes available.  Second, a person can be registered at as many transplant centers one wants, as long as one has the means to get to the center promptly when an organ becomes available.  Jobs does – his private plane is always gassed up and ready to go.  (No, life isn’t fair.  We don’t all have that luxury.  But he does.  If you could, wouldn’t you use it to save your own life?)

The voices that can state the facts with authority exist; articles were published on their websites (click the links within the text).  But that’s not enough.  These authentic voices need to be relayed across the Internet, on multiple forums, but with one unified message – the truth.  With information being spread at the speed of light from all corners of the globe, it’s important that the authentic voices are the ones heard the loudest, not lost in the shuffle.  Without this presence, we’ll continue to have twitter users like “redhotdot” saying, “@addthisTHIS IS WHY I AM NOT AN ORGAN DONOR! CHANGES NEED TO BE MADE STAT ON ORGAN DONATIONS!”  Oh, redhotdot, how you completely miss the point of SAVING SOMEONE’S LIFE!!

To think that because of the false, negative and hateful tweets and blog posts, even one potential donor changed his or her mind, well…that’s multiple lives that could have otherwise been saved, now left in hospital beds.  Dying.

Cynically, we attribute the move to cost cutting, but let’s remember that MTV basically invented a generation (mine) and has since been smartly attentive to the zeitgeist. This is the network that gave us “The Real World” 10 years before reality TV hit the mainstream, that gave us “Unplugged” and “Yo! MTV Raps” long before Grunge and Hip-Hop became dominant musical and cultural influences, and that, sure, gave us “Laguna Beach” and “My Super Sweet 16″ at least a little before the moment of materialism swept through youth culture.  So, when MTV Head of Programming Tony DiSanto claims that this was purely a creative decision, a response to a downtick in ratings, I’m inclined to listen. What’s interesting to me, and pertinent to what we do, is the rational behind the change.  DiSanto claims

“the slippage can be attributed to the generational shift of MTV viewers, with the channel’s brass focusing on the new teens and twentysomethings, “the millennials.”

DiSanto called them “the transparent generation” and said MTV’s development is being altered to appeal to them. “They don’t want to see a reality show that feels produced or is film-like,” he said. “It’s got to be real, authentic.”

He points to the recently premiered “16 and Pregnant” as an example of the type of unscripted fare that MTV is now after and touts it as one series that could fuel a turnaround.

We’ve long held Authenticity and Transparency as key tenets of Social Media strategy. It’s interesting that those ideals are beginning to now effect the strategies of broadcast media when targeting a generation that’s been growing up in Facebook – a generation that has, through just the sheer quantity of information it has easy access to, become somewhat resistant to manipulation.  Fifteen years ago, when the internet was first influencing my generation, there was alot of conversation about our “Digital Lives,” about what happens, what we choose to become when afforded the anonymity of online communication. A generation later, that idea has become basically irrelevant. When we engage with electronic media, with social media, and, yes, apparently with mass media we expect that what we see is what we get.

When our social media folks told me that I could “tweet” in real time from my phone – and be “re-tweeted” across the internet (if I had something interesting to say, that is) as well as instantly linked to my Facebook account – they said I looked at them like they told me that aliens had just landed on the front lawn.

The next thing you know we’ll have the technology to watch one TV show while recording another…

[Photo Credit: Mytypewriter.com]

That’s why I think he might disapprove of the recent Mashable headline “Demi and Ashton Use Twitter Influence to Fight Hunger.” Not to put words in your mouth, Matt, but I think you’d probably argue that it’s not Twitter feeding hungry bellies, no, but it’s KelloggCares and it’s Feeding America.  In fact, it’s Demi and Ashton’s influence and star power, (Twitter or no Twitter) that’s furthering the cause. And that, right there, is the interesting part of the story.

So, when we work with a client to listen to online conversations surrounding their area of expertise, or have them launch a blog or a Facebook page, we’re not excited that they’re there using tools that have been around for years, ones that spammers and adult escort companies have figured out. However, we are incredibly enthused to know that they can now start to talk about their issues, their causes, their successes, and what they are passionate about through another means, in a way that might reach a just a few more people.

This is an interesting moment surely, and powerful, symbolic acknowledgement by the US Government of the significance of these tools in this sort of conflict. Can’t help but think of Radio Free Europe.

Andrew Sullivan’s blog has served up an almost-constant feed of news items and eye-witness reports from Tehran, and one bone-chilling post in particular highlights the power of social media. A student protester in Iran uses Facebook to post videos of the aftermath of an attack, one video after another showing a first-person account of  the blood, the chaos, the death that surrounds him.

Its a terrifying reality that some Iranians are living right now, as I sit and type nine time zones away. But its one that deserves attention and recognition, as the living-room wars give way to the mobile revolutions.