Thoughts On Teachersday.sg And #tday09
August 31, 2009 – 10:07 pm | by Daryl TayToday Coleman tweeted that the Ministry of Education’s teachers’ day website was a risky move, and coincidentally at the time when I clicked on the link the one and only “careless” tweet appeared (screenshot courtesy of Coleman):
Teachersday.sg
Yes, I give MOE credit for trying something new and for experimenting, but there are still points to be made/lessons to learn:
1) It may have been the only negative tweet, but I think we need to think about these things. Who else will see these tweets besides the teachers? Other kids? Parents of kids? It’s entirely possible to get on to a service like Pheed.me and remove foul language in advance. And I think we need to be keenly aware of our target audience.
2) I understand that the purpose of keeping it uncensored was to maintain authenticity, but looking at the tweets that came out.. I’m not sure how many were just set up for the sole purpose of tweeting this one hashtag.
3) As Daphne points out, this web portal wasn’t largely publicised and therein lies why this was the only “careless” tweet. If more of the general public got to know about it, I bet it wouldn’t be long before tweets like “Miss Lim from [whatever] school I remember you for being such a b!tc# 20 years ago and I hope you’re still single #tday09” start appearing, and this turns into a #skittles fiasco – where people tagged on racist/malicious comments to the #skittles hashtag for everyone to see.
So for a moment, let’s forget this is the Ministry of Education (MOE), let’s forget that the people tweeting are predominantly kids, and let’s think about it in the real world:
First, while I don’t think the people who are involved are inexperienced or ignorant of social media, I think they jumped on the shiny object bandwagon without thinking it through. From their blog post:
If Facebook was the vehicle that brought social media to the mainstream, Twitter is the shiny new Ferrari F70 of the online space
Accurately said. I shiny new Ferrari isn’t an everyday, run-of-the-mill car. It’s like re-taking your drivers’ licence test again and making sure you understand the vehicle and can control it under all sorts of conditions, sunny or stormy.
Second, I know I’ll get some flak by being critical of something like this where there’s one negative post in a sea of hundreds. But that’s not where I’m coming from. It’s not specific to the case. It’s specific to the understanding, usage and application of social media that I think we have to be aware of. Those of us who are fortunate enough to work in this space really have to be conscious of this. If you did this for a client, or your CEO of an MNC and they saw this happen. What do you think are the odds you’d get budget for your next “social media experiment”? Slim to none?
Basically, I think you have to be careful how much risk you take with your brand. It’s great to hand over control to the consumers, but you gotta know your audience. Have you already been in the community cultivating “antibodies” for awhile who will come to your defence when someone steps out of line? Or are you jumping in cold? Just because you introduce a platform for one, noble purpose, doesn’t mean it will be used that way by everyone. And you have to take the good and the bad.
Back to the specific case, although the boy managed to delete his tweet and seemed quite embarrassed afterwards, I really hope he doesn’t get punished or anything because of this. It was a conscious decision to make this platform public, and therefore consequences that arise of it being public comes from that choice to be public, not the user.
After all, he just served as a reminder to us that anybody can be made aware of anyone’s social media efforts at any one time, and they’re not always going to be in sync with your organisation.
Tags: know your audience, metacole, ministry of education, teachers' day website, teachersday.sg, twitter
6 Responses to “Thoughts On Teachersday.sg And #tday09”
By Daphne Maia on Aug 31, 2009 | Reply
Good post. As always.
I just feel like this is a site where people post stories but nobody reads. Or rather, the intended audience doesn’t get to read it. Which makes it a wasted effort. And these resources and man hours could’ve been put to better use, in that case.
By Jonathan Wong on Aug 31, 2009 | Reply
I think MOE has already started proactive filtering.
Check out the current query they are using for searching #tday09 tweets:
“http://twitter.com/#search?q=-RT -via #tday09 -fuck -shit -@chunchuan”
(You can see the search query by clicking on the “Join the conversation link” on the page.)
However, this won’t scale, not to mention if anyone clicks on the link, they will see the words “fuck” and “shit” prominently on the top of the Twitter search results page.
I don’t think this is a battle that can be won…
By Daphne Maia on Aug 31, 2009 | Reply
But the filtering for @chunchuan doesn’t seem to work, does it? i still see messages from the boy.
By Daryl Tay on Sep 1, 2009 | Reply
@Daphne Maia: Thanks. Well I wouldn’t say it’s wasted, but it’s probably not the result they wanted.
@Jonathan Wong: Well there are other, easier methods that aren’t reliant on Twitter and that won’t be public, but some homework needs to be done.
But yes, essentially, but introducing a hashtag on a public platform, the battle to keep away negativity can’t be won. Which is my point. It’s not about clamming down on that one guy (cos really, five other people will take his place), it’s about accepting that such things WILL happen, and managing expectations around it.
By Jo Jordan on Sep 1, 2009 | Reply
You know, this could just be a teachable moment. Though these kids are younger, when I taught a large uni class, I watched furore’s in other classes when someone went far beyond crass – they were abusive to the point of “hate” – and a student would be disciplined and banned.
I responded differently. In the break of my first semester, I wiped my board clean and told the students frankly what had happened in the other course and said I wiped my board because I hadn’t told them the rules at the beginning and I didn’t want anyone in trouble.
Then I gave them one rule. That we were a uni and we defended the right to free speech. Indeed it was in black and white in the education act that we were the conscience of society. But we were a uni and we asked for people to say things properly. That was the only rule – say things properly.
We had a bit of blue language from time to time but it was never ‘hate’ speech. It might be critical but it was usually supporting someone who was sweating over something. And students often corrected their own language and apologised when they realised what they had said could be misinterpreted.
Couldn’t the same philosophy be drilled down to lower levels? Let students say what is uncouth so they realise that it adds little value and they find more apt and accurate ways to communicate and to draw people to their cause? We shouldn’t underestimate them – or rather we should allow ourselves to be surprised and delighted by them.
A counter-point view for what it is worth.