Cluetrain-Plus-Ten: On Social Media Policies

The ClueTrain Manifesto is the seminal writing that first defined the rise of the social web, the "market as conversation", back in 1999. From Wikipedia:

"Fundamental to 'The Cluetrain Manifesto' was the premise that the Internet provided a new and unique forum for communication that would ultimately shift the nature of business communication and marketing. Essentially, the change that is central to this text is one of breaking down corporate barriers and forming a conversation between those within and those outside a corporation -- online marketing would be more about holding conversations with people rather than broadcasting half-truths about products and services. The authors of the manifesto suggested that such a shift would occur through substantial and pervasive changes in current company-to-consumer interaction. Communication would shift from mission statements and marketing media aimed at consumer segments to open dialogues or conversations between businesses and consumers."

The manifesto is made up of 95 theses that break down and define the paradigm shift that we are all now familiar with.  

Ten years later, blogger Keith Macarthur had the idea to celebrate this big anniversary  by setting up a wiki - "Cluetrain-Plus-Ten" -where bloggers could sign up to each write a blog post about one of the 95 individual manifesto theses, to be published on the anniversary, April 28, 2009.  Of course it's a a few days later than that, but when I came across this via Twitter it was noted that there were still a few of the theses that had not been picked, so I thought I'd go ahead and play.

So here's the one I chose.

Thesis 41: Companies make a religion of security, but this is largely a red herring. Most are protecting less against competitors than against their own market and workforce.

In the association world, it wasn't so long ago that not everyone even had a website. At the association where I used to work, I remember helping them build the website in 1997-98 - just before the Cluetrain Manifesto. This association was already 70 years old, the internet was a new and exciting way to advertise their programs. A broadcast system that could be more immediate and could grow as the organization grew (though systematically, not organically!).  Websites, databases, electronic registration, shopping carts, all these things got more and more complex over time, and while they now allowed stakeholders to click on things and buy things and sign up for things, it was never about two way communication. It was never about the conversation.

And here we are now - how times have changed. With the conversation age and the relationship economy has come the associated risks of letting people speak - even if they might be wrong, or malicious, or defamatory, or anti-trustworthy (new word, you like?). We're all trying to figure out how to best allow our communities to interact and converse in a safe, protective yet non-spirit-dampening way. Openness and transparency are concepts still very new to a lot of organizations. Letting go of that pesky myth of control is still very uncomfortable. But organizations are, slowly but surely, realizing the truth of that 41st thesis from the Cluetrain Manifesto - that if you put in too many barriers to participation, in this new world your people will go elsewhere. Your members will congregate in places they can talk freely - about you or about anything. Your staff will build relationships through their cellphones if they can't get access on their office computers. As with Jurassic Park, life will find a way. (Hat tip to Scott Brinker for this perfect analogy).

But we're all working on it!  We're testing out policies, looking at examples from the corporate world, discussing how to adapt them to our industry.  Which gives me a perfect reason to remind everyone about Lindy's fantastic series on her blog about social media policies:



Introduction - social media policies cover concerns which are different depending on whether you're talking about your own "official" spaces or about your activities on unofficial outposts. These concerns are also different if you are talking about policies for employees, for members, for commenters, etc.; and the risks are different in each case.

Part 1 - what are we talking about? "The true goal of every type of social media or web policy should be to make interacting on the social web easier, more comfortable, and safer for your stakeholders."

Part 2 - unofficial outposts - create guidelines that encourage meaningful participation.

Part 3 - Policies for official outposts - do you need them? well, depends on the risks you're trying to mitigate.

Part 4 - Policies for your homebases - how to build a circle of trust for your website, your white label community, your blog community.

"Summing up four posts in one sentence:

Trust your peeps to do the right thing, and help them define what the right thing is."

I hope you will help us share your models and samples by adding links to your organizations' policies, terms of service, disclaimers etc. in the Association Social Media Wiki.  Lindy and I are also working on templates for you - if you have any advice, or thoughts, or needs, or wants to share on that please get in touch. This is a steep learning curve for our industry, but I'm excited by how fast we're learning.  I'm excited to see how the Cluetrain-plus-twenty will look!

...Want more? Check out Dave Fleet's series too.