Workshop presentation for UTS Research Week 2012 (Sometimes I really have no idea why I persist with Slideshare other than it being a free service. Again, the embedded hyperlinks have not been uploaded from the original document. This will present problems for the actual blogs linked on slide 11. I'll need to provide those links later. Sorry.)

1. UTS Research Week 2012:
Make me famous with social media
All images taken by Mal Booth unless otherwise specified. Most are available using CC licensing on http://www.flickr.com/
photos/malbooth/

2. WHAT WE’LL BE COVERING
1. Why? The background
2. What? The basics: setting it up
3. How? Some tips
4. What else? Things we’ve no time for

3. 1. WHY?
A quick review of
some reasons for
researchers to use
social media

4. “We want to be connected to
one another, a desire that the
social surrogate of television
deflects, but one that social
media actually engages.”
Clay Shirky Cognitive Surplus
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d2/Internet_map_1024.jpg
TV was one to many, social media provides us with a facility to establish many to many connections.

5. “. . . media is the connective tissue of society.”
“. . . things used to be separated into public media . . . and
personal media . . . Now those two modes have fused.”
Clay Shirky Cognitive Surplus
For those who don’t know it this photo is of Millennium Bridge. It is a pedestrian only bridge that connects
Southbank (near the Tate Modern) to the north of the Thames near St Paul’s Cathedral, seen here in the
background. It isn’t so far removed from the quote above.

6. This is a screen shot of Gary Hayes’ Social Media Count for just 31 seconds in early-February 2011. Pretty
impressive statistics. There are any number of ways to present imposing social media statistics, but I guess what
really matters is what is being done.
See also:
http://wallblog.co.uk/files/2011/01/facbook_vs_twitter_infographic.jpg
http://mashable.com/2011/01/24/the-history-of-social-media-infographic
http://www.bbc.co.uk/archive/growingknowledge
http://www.stumbleupon.com/su/2wpAsg/s.hbr.org/dPg4wJ

7. Benefits
Connections
Participation
Interactivity
Communications
Instantaneous
Extends reach
Learning
Sharing wisdom
This is just my own quick & dirty list. I’ve highlighted those that I think are the most important benefits with the
most potential for researchers with an imagination.
The benefits vary from an individual perspective, so I’ve tried to be generic here. I’ve also avoided the marketing
benefits because if social media turns into marketing media, people will flock away from it in droves.
Connections means that social media encourages and facilitates connections online and I think that can only be a
good thing, whether they be for those you work closely with, other colleagues in your institution, or your global
peers. Participation in narrative, discussions and in the exchange of expertise is a major benefit facilitated by
relatively simple and free social technologies giving everyone the opportunity to have their say should they wish.
Interactivity refers to the fact that social media has changed communications in the media from one-to-many to
many-to-many and from a one-way to a two-way process. So Communications have been broadened and now
almost everyone has an endless list of possibilities for communicating. Social media can offer you an
Instantaneous outlet and sometimes an instantaneous response to questions, observations, invitations, etc. The
extension of reach is a huge benefit. It works that way for both organisations and individuals through the sheer
global scale of the web. The web doesn’t really care when you are online or where you are - you can connect
regardless of those factors. This facilitates access to the wisdom of crowds too. Social media offers major benefits
in terms of your learning in many different areas and on many different subjects, simply through writing and
creating content on the read & write web.
For researchers, perhaps the most important way that you can benefit from the use of social technologies is
through the sharing of wisdom. Social media can help you start this through some simple tools that facilitate the
sharing of tags, bookmarks and references. Of course you still need to sort the cheese from the chalk, but you
probably do that already in traditional media anyway, so all it takes is a bit of time getting familiar with the
networks you select and it also helps to have list of trusted advisers you can run to when confused or in need or
advice. It can all lead to a deeper collaboration through tools like wikis and the active participation in online
communities.
See also:
http://www.slideshare.net/ignatia/social-media-benefits-for-researchers-def

8. 2. WHAT?
The basics:
getting
started
The basic building blogs we think will prove useful to researchers.

9. twitter.com
Connect
Ask
News feed
Test voice
Share
Search
Hashtags to try & follow: #phdchat #shutupwrite #<yourFOR> e.g. #robotics
Use a Twitter client or application like Hootsuite or Tweetdeck to track and follow streams of hashtags.

10. Like FB, but no ads
or games
Find & follow peers
Share papers,
presentations
Keep a CV there
Job hunting?
Ask questions
Academia.edu can serve as a very effective and academically credible profile for you on the web.
The more you use it, the more effective it becomes.

11. Blogs
Promote your research
Tap into communities
museum geek
Home on the web
Explorations of Style
Martyn Pedler Learn by writing
The Three Month Thesis Trial & test
The Thesis Whisperer
Share
Research Blogging
Research@UTSLibrary Learn
A blog can serve as your home on the web that keeps everything together, gives you a test bed, helps you learn about the
read & write web and allows potential collaborators to see more about you than a simple CV/resume. Simply by sharing
posts on your blog you can tap into communities that may be able to apply some or all of your research, thus allowing you
to recruit participants for your research.
On the left above are a few blogs of academic research interest as examples to get you started.

12. Social
Profile
bookmarks
Citations
Share
h-index
Cloud access
i10-index
Search/find
Promote
Organise
Setting up a Google Scholar profile is a simple and useful exercise in seeing just how famous you are on the (open)
web, academically. Try it because it is easy & quick. Here’s how: http://scholar.google.ca/intl/en/scholar/
citations.html
Using a social bookmarking tool like Diigo allows you to keep all of the things you find on the web in one place so
you can both access them anywhere later and share them (if you want). You can also keep notes about those
bookmarks.
Join or subscribe to our Diigo group that shares content especially relevant to academic researchers:
http://groups.diigo.com/group/research-utslibrary

13. 3. HOW?
Some tips
An image from BikeTank at u.lab. See BikeTank.org
This was an amazing 16 week Design Thinking process that welcomed people from all over Sydney to work with UTS
academics and staff on socially innovative ways to improve inner city living.

14. Start with your own tribe
It is probably best to start within your own “tribe” as Seth Godin would say. Then branch out when you feel more
comfortable. Networks can be funny things and a bit tribal to begin with so it is easier to stay on familiar ground.
Don’t just be happy with family members and close friends on Facebook. You know your interests, so maybe try
another platform that seems appropriate.

15. Perspective
Scale from the tool colour group by Robert MacPherson
Keep what you do in social media in perspective with the rest of your life. It isn’t everything.
Try to remember that not everyone is going to be hanging on everything you do or say, so you cannot expect
instant responses al the time.

16. Listen
hello mate by Stephen King
Listen to what is said online and try to understand why. You don’t need to react to everything. Sometimes people
are just letting off steam.

17. Engage
Engaging in social media is probably one of the main things: just be involved. Do more than just lurk.

18. Play, fail,
learn
It really is OK to try some different new things and make mistakes. You won’t be punished or kicked out. Listen to
feedback and if in doubt ask someone what the form is, but experiment and play.

19. Respect
Respect for others is key. The social web is multi-cultural and it generally isn’t popular to be intolerant, ignorant
or abusive.

20. Be real
Audrey Hepburn by Douglas
Kirkland
Some people say that anonymity is OK, but I don’t agree. I think that you need to be as real as possible to have
any real impact. You don’t need to give everything away, but the social web can be really generous with you if you
make genuine contributions.

21. Be careful how
sitting hen by Tae-Geun Yang
much you reveal
There are many ways to make sure you do not give everything away. Just read the guidelines and learn how to
adjust the settings of the applications or tools you are using to suit your own interests.

22. Don’t feed the trolls
jolly giants by Steve Croquett
You can read what the trolls are doing on the blog posts of any major newspaper or media enterprise. They enjoy
being abusive and hurling insults in ongoing arguments, usually from the safety of their own anonymity. Don’t
encourage them with a response.

23. Be patient
It isn’t always going to happen instantly, although sometimes it does. Wait for people on the other side of the
world to wake up and then catch-up on their networks.

24. Readings
Everything is The Wealth of
Miscellaneous, David Networks,
Weinberger Yochai Benkler
The Wisdom of
Tribes, Crowds,
Seth Godin James
Surowiecki
Cognitive
Surplus & Here
The Long Tail,
Comes
Chris Anderson
Everybody,
Clay Shirky

25. 4. WHAT ELSE?
Things we’ve no time to cover
These links, for the scholarly explorer, might also help you to increase your fame simply by participating or joining in, or by
saving you time through free web tools.

26. Networks
http://www.researchgate.net/
http://www.researcherid.com/
http://network.nature.com/
http://www.epernicus.com/
http://www.postgraduatetoolbox.net//
http://sciencestage.com/
Links:
http://www.researcherid.com/
http://sciencestage.com/
http://www.epernicus.com/
http://www.researchgate.net/
http://www.postgraduatetoolbox.net/
http://network.nature.com/

27. Reference & Citation
http://www.citeulike.org
http://www.connotea.org
http://www.zotero.org
http://www.mendeley.com/

28. Collaboration
http://www.myexperiment.org
https://docs.google.com/
http://wiggio.com

29. Mindmapping & Data
Presentation
http://www.mind42.com http://flare.prefuse.org
http://www.bubbl.us/ http://www.degrafa.org/
http://popplet.com/
You may also be interested in:
http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2011/01/07/creating-and-distributing-presentations-on-the-web
http://freemind.sourceforge.net/wiki/index.php/Main_Page
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3mrtu4MmthE (short video on Game Storming)

30. Utilities & Crowd Sourcing
http://www.backupify.com
http://www.quora.com
https://www.dropbox.com/
http://ideascale.com/
Some related articles:
http://www.techi.com/2011/01/quora-has-social-trumped-the-semantic-web/
http://www.quora.com/Drew-Benvie/Quora/What-are-your-top-tips-for-using-Quora-10-from-me-to-start
http://radar.oreilly.com/2011/01/esri-australia-ushahidi.html
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=question-time