Controversial Call to be Made at SXSW for Publicly Funded Social Media Application

March 7, 2011 - PRLog -- Bill James, CEO of We Engage LLC, today released a paper which details his Core Conversation topic for the 2011 SXSW Interactive Festival, ‘Trust in Social Media: Is Censorship Succeeding?”.

Mr James ( http://www.weengage.com ) makes a controversial call for supporters of government funded broadcasting to push back hard to increase funding to the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB) and establish an online interactive division under its management. Rather than cutting funding to groups like the National Public Radio (NPR) and the Public Broadcasting System (PBS) in television, funding should be increased to support publicly funded broadcasting and to embrace a public option in interactive media.

“I know I’m going to be attacked for saying this when the GOP are banging the pot trying to starve out government funded broadcasting by cutting funding to the CPB, but the big fix in my mind would be a government funded social media network option where we aren’t waiting on the pleasure of a profit focused private company and its executives to do something about the shortcomings of user functionality, privacy, trust and the enforcement of terms and conditions.”

In his paper which provides a background to the Core Conversation which will be held at the SXSW Interactive Festival in Austin on Sunday March 13, Mr James says “I’m calling it. If there ever was a social media revolution, if social media ever was the new communication channel where trust and relevance were the currency of engagement and democratized influence was the outcome, I’m pronouncing it dead… or on life support and in critical condition.”

“I don’t believe any of the major social media applications are really focused on maintaining a culture of trust or authenticity in the long term. They may wish to maintain order in their digital digs so as to ensure businesses run uninterrupted and raise no red flags to groups like the Federal Trade Commission (FTC).  As for sustaining an attempt to improve human relations or promote trust and authenticity among users, the major applications seem terminally distracted by their search for the business model that will drive revenues, profits, IPOs, mergers and acquisitions.”

The paper can be viewed in its entirety at http://billljames.wordpress.com/ .

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'We Engage' is an outsourced provider of community management services in social media. We assist our clients to sustain a culture of trust and brand advocacy by engaging subject to agreed protocol, brand strategy and tactics.