What has Social Media ever done for you - facing the music.

This post has been stewing for a few days, and its genesis goes something like this.

On Tuesday afternoon, I saw a message (on Twitter) from a person who a few weeks ago I never knew, talking about 2 other people who a few months ago I never knew, who were going to be playing at a gig, and another person I met last year was going to be playing with them. A few quick messages and there I was, and had a great evening listening to some great music, in pleasant surroundings because - strangely enough - the other people on Twitter who also decided to go wound up chatting to each other as well - so going on my own was not a "spare part" story at all..

So, to Lobelia Sabo, Steve Lawson and the Woods, Dodds & Lawson band, and Lloyd Davis thanks for a great evening, you guys rock - and roll, and jam, and sing torch songs, and between the wars classics .

Now, two other things about this.

Firstly, big picture nothing has changed in internet social media in 20 years since the first bulletin boards, the first usenets, the first listservers, the first internet groups - it was ever thus. The internet has always been a social media, because we are social animals, and the 'Net differs from previous comms media in allowing easy group interaction in asynchronous and synchronous mode.

Secondly, like being in a parallel universe where things are not quite the same, everything has changed just that bit. Broadband social media is higher bandwidth, so is just socially more efficient:

- I can tell you that these people are good - but you don't have to believe me - this time round you can go to their websites, follow a link to their music and YouTube videos, and see for yourself
- More context data about the other people attending the gig allowed ice to be broken, conversations to be had etc far more freely - I think this has facilitated more face to face meetings faster - it still happened on the textnet, but took longer.
- It's my view that this extra context allows people of more diverse background to communicate with each other more easily. I think the variety of people mixing via social media is far higher now.If I think about my use of Groupware, it resolved into belonging to many special interest groups rather than "belonging" to many people with special interest.
- This definitely lessens the friction of face to face interactions with people you don't know in strange places you've never been to
- I also think that the fact there is a feedback loop means that behaviour is moderated - be an a**hole and you then have to face those same people on the social net the next day
- Another outcome has been the amount of collaborative group working I'm seeing springing up around me now - I suspect being able to get a bigger bandwidth view of someone allows others to make up their minds about whether they trust someone or not far faster - plus that feedback loop effect as well.
- I suspect this time round its just easier to use, so a larger group of people are using todays comms media - and increasingly they are women too.

But apart from that?

Well, it also gave serendipity - one of the other acts couldn't make it, so up stepped Miriam Jones, who I also thought was rather good - and turns out she is also on my social network, so another connection is made......

There is another post on this - about talent, Zipfs law rewards, and the shift in music business models - but that is for another time.