Using the right word

Glamorous words. The last new entry fantastic words found in some sophisticated - or pretending to be - books. They make us feel special, to impress people - including by creating them the lack of comfort when it is understanding what we want, in fact, to say. But, as clothes, words have a very contextual use. A very sophisticated silk dress and rich jewelries we decide to wear at 8 o'clock in the morning are not improving our image, but - if we are not very kitsch- make the other doubt seriously about our capacity to make rational choices about our life. Even some of them we do not want to hear about, what we dress is telling a lot about ourselves.

The same, the words. I always appreciate people who are able to use a diversified vocabulary. The condition is to use the right word, when necessary.

One of the challenges I am facing very often is exactly about finding the right words. In the PR messages, you need to be as clear as possible, for an audience who, in general, do not have too much time. And want to hear or read your messages very fast. An to remember, at least 10%.

So, if we agree that the same think could be said in more than 10 times, we hope to agree as well that the number one and number two choices of describing something should be the simplest one. Without diminishing by this the core concept, or without weakening the ideas. But, making it understandable for a broad area of individuals.

Using sophisticated words and constructions is not at all a sign of intelligence. And nobody will pay you more because of your hectic vocabulary. But for being able to make things understandable and decryptable. Do you feel humiliated or under used according to the professional and academic capacity you assume to have ? Maybe you are not in the right professional position!

Live from your home

Another not new but useful "discovery" I would like to shortly write about: the Webinar. An important tool for education, trainings, sharing information and ideas.

I will not enter too much in the technical idea behind this system, as long as it is very easy to already find the appropriate references on the Internet. I would rather like to focus a bit more about the so to say, "philosophical" implications of this system.

What a Webinar is offering, at a very general level: the possibility to have live meetings, independently of the geographical localisation of the participants. All you need is a computer connected to Internet. In some cases, you need a camera as well and a microphone. The program for watching the webinar is easyly downloadable. The direct access is possible after log in, according to coordinated sent via e-mail.

In the front of your computer you might follow business presentations or trainings on various topics. The information could be presented in the Power Point format or as a live presentation. The participants - in unlimited number - are able to address questions - in writing - at the end of the discussion. After, you have to follow the usual rules in terms of feedback - sending the presentation to the participants, managing a couple of questions and observations. If it is about the presentation of a company, you have to see how many of your attendance is interested to continue the communication, would like to take part to other kind of presentations - eventually, paid - or to classes in an extended format.

Minimum costs, lots of advantages. One of the most important is related to the learning process, but the business potential cannot be neglected as well. If you have something to say, just with a bit of technical skills and another proportional bit of smart PR, you are very close to find the right audience to share your toughts.

Social Language Networking

I discovered the details about the social language networking sites completely accidentally: an article from the NY Times. I would always love to learn new languages and to improve the ones I already knew. Without exercise, continuously, we cannot maintain a coherent relationship with our language skills. And, in some cases, it could be available including regarding the mother tongue.

In Western Europe, and not only, learning new languages - and, in general, the idea of continuous education - is not only an useful tool for understanding new cultures and acquiring new mental abilities, but also to help your professional career. More language spoken, more chances to find a new and better paid job. And the market is offering a lot of new opportunities to those able to adapt. China and the new vague of interest for learning Chinese is just the most recent case-study.

But, when you want to learn a foreign language, some of them with a different system of writing and different logical structures, you need lots of time and, last but not least, money: to pay the classes, to but materials etc. The tandem-partner idea could work as well, but again you have to be able to allocate a certain amount of time - daily, weekly or monthly, depending of the emergency of learning a new language.

Given these apparent difficulties, the idea of social language networking sounded very appealing for me. And decided to register on the largest one - LiveMocha. The system is basically one following the idea of the tandem partner: you could register for a class - the choices are amazingly rich: from the classical English to very rare ones; soon they will be also Thai, Lithuanian, Norwegian or Filipino. It is truth that in some cases, for some non-widespread languages, the quality of the translation is not very high. Or, you do not have always the native speaker pronunciation.

Part of the training is for free - the basic - you learn basic words and are able to make short sentences. You have exercises, after each lesson, you are able to share with other members, native speakers of the language you are trying to do. There are some speaking exercises as some written tests. As a native speaker, you could be as well contacted by other members in order to review a homework or spoken submission. And, you could start when you have time - a lunch break, a short morning hour. It's up to you to manage your time. For American English, French, German, Italian, Spanish and Mandarin Chinese, there are offered Travel Crash Courses. Up to your degree of involvement in learning and the submission process, you receive points you could convert in credits for learning the language(s) at an updated level.

In addition, you have all the time the opportunity to find people interested to share their language, to talk with, to improve your grammar and vocabulary.

Of course, not all of the participants are fully interested in (only) reading a language. Some are looking for dates as well. Knowing more languages could improve as well the chances to find a perfect match, isn't it? But, despite all these small problems, the system in itself is very interesting and shows that Internet could make wonders in improving yourself and getting more and more knowledge. Knowledge as a social process.

Random Communications - The Roulette's Principle

After mIRC and ICQ, huge chat hubs providing opportunities of various kind of conversations to millions of unknown partners from all over the world, a new concept, tailored about the principle of the roulette - random video and audio conversations with strangers randomly "chosed" by a computer is getting increase popularity - chatroulette.

It was created by a young 17 year old from Moscow - just in order to answer some needs a teenager used with this kind of comunications discovered while using current similar sites. For entering the site you have to guarantee - a word is a word - that you are at least 16. As far as I tried, it is no way to check it so, more or less is a matter of chance. The principle is not too complicated: you are directed to various kind of people, you are talking with and if you want, to push the "next" button and are directed further. And, in fact, you could never stop, as long as you could be in direct contact - visual as well - with people from all over the world who, comparatively with other websites, they could see you and you could see them.

The door to various kind of abusive behavior is open, as the system itself is in process of improving/changing/adapting to the needs and risks of the users.

Our communications habits are changing and the roulette system is only a simple answer to a simple need we, as humans, discovered in ourselves, to know more people, from various kind of the corners of this big world. It is interesting that the main trends are set by the very young - it was the same with Google, with Facebook, for example - that the other age group of the population is following and to whom it is adapting easily. At the end, there are no barriers, we could enter purposively or not, in touch with various kinds of people, to know an impressive number in only a couple of hours.

The good part is that we are able to improve our knowledge about world, about other cultures, to improve foreign languages or to feel less alone. To consider communication and the words as the main tool to use in getting in contact with the world. The bad side is related to the possible abuses - from various sexual exhibitionists and pedophilia - following the widespread use of these free access websites. But, at the end of the story, it is still about information: as long as you are aware and you know what to do, how to defend yourself against this kind of behaviors - blocking, reporting abuses, going to the next conversation - you could survive. Is in a way similar to the dangers that usually you could encounter in the street: people could rob you, beat you, aggress you. You have to be able to recognize the good and the bad and to drive yourself as safe as possible. Staying home just to prevent various kind of dangers is not the wise solution, isn't it?

The eight "sorries" of Tiger Woods

For celebrities, image management is not easy. The success of choosing sport stars for endorsing brands was, at the very beginning, mostly based on the general value assigned in the society of sports as incarnation of fairness and ethics. What it counts is the fair competition, the effort, the courage to go beyond your limits. Positive associations, a synthesis of the general historical representation of sports, since the old Greek times.

Or, at least, it was the case for a long time. But, shortly, we arrived at the very normal conclusion that these "stars" are as humans as we are, plus the advantage of benefiting of lots of money to be able to get out of unpleasant stories. The popularity of a sport star could extend the popularity of a brand. Or, could operate the opposite transfer, in damaging the general image of a specific product. The role of the constant monitoring from the part of the companies of the level of awareness of the public image of the celebrity is playing an important role in preventing any negative publicity for the brand itself.

In this case, no wonder about the recent decisions from the part of major American and international companies to rethink, reconsider or stop their collaboration with one of the world's richest sportsman and typical American hero - Tiger Woods. In the last days, the news - mostly the American TV channels as CNN, but not only - were over saturated (again) with news about him. As since the end of the last year, permanently updates about his sex affairs were on the top of the news all over the world. (In fact, I always considered a bit nonsensical this sick interest in the life of celebrities, in countries were their activity is without any direct relevance for the local agenda. What is the point to dedicate one full page of a newspaper in Bosnia about the life of Britney Spears? For example. But this is another issue I will, probably, address in a special dedicated post.)

From the point of view of the communications, at least for the moment, the management work very well. His last Friday intervention, is interesting as a lesson in this respect. He admit he did wrong - during the 14 minutes 52 seconds intervention he apologized eight times - and harmed its family and wife: "I am deeply sorry for my irresponsible and selfish behavior I engaged", "I stopped living by the core values that I was taught to believe in", "I hurt my wife, my kids, my mother, my wife's family, my friends, my foundation and kids around the world who admired me". He promised to follow the appropriate therapy and to return to his Buddhist faith, while focusing on the work of his foundation dedicated to education. This focus on learning could suggest that he, as well, have many things to learn as well.
As usual, the media should share a part of responsibility in such cases: "However, my behavior doesn't make it right for the media to follow my two-and-a-half-year-old-daughter to school and report the school's location". But, in fact, this is the share of his public image: he was a media creation and was the favorite of the media in the good times. It is, in a way, normal, to be under the close scrutiny of the media because he sells. Even when he is guilty of wrongdoing. And, the huge part of responsibility is belonging to him.

He is nor the first, neither the last sport hero to suffer this kind of treatment. In the world of football, these cases are more often and are rising a lots of questions about our representations and sources of authority. Now, the question, after this 14 minutes 52 seconds of apology, is if he will be able to keep his promises or will act similary again. A question as hard to answer as the one regarding his return in the game of the world competitions.

In the same time, whatever important is the image support of the celebrities, the brands - today maybe more than even - should communicate more than sensations and feelings. If the aim is to project a long-term image, the brand administrators should think of the whole concept of the notion incarnated by the brand: the messages and their endurance, the insertion into the social network, the permanent need to monitor constantly the feed-back from the part of the consumers - generically called "consumers"; in fact, it could be about normal buyers or voters.

Useful tips

for getting the best out of blogging. Including from the financial point of view.

Digg or Delicious?

Just refreshed today my two accounts on Digg, respectively Delicious.
My test for the following days will be to try to discover which is offering more advantages and why.
Let's test it!