Reading about Gutenberg, movable type, and printing in general always makes me think about just how far we’ve come in the realm of communications and the ability to disseminate information. As many of you know, I’m a letterpress printer, using machines that aren’t much different from the ones Gutenberg himself worked with five hundred, yep, that’s 500! years ago!!!

On the other end of spectrum, though, is the work that I’m lucky enough to do every day in the realm of electronic communications. Read the Wired, This Day In Tech, article, and allow your mind to wander, thinking about, imagining, the world of lead type, and heavy cast iron that was needed to get a message out there. Then think back a bit further to a time of hand scribes, and no dissemination at all except what could be passed word-of-mouth.

It’s kind of hard to imagine especially in a world rapid-fire tweets, Facebook status updates, RSS feeds, and blog posts just like this one, that not too long ago there was no Web, or iPhone, or Blackberry or anything else that permitted such awesome real-time, in the moment, communication. Just sayin’… pretty awesome.

Our struggle now isn’t the media, but finding the attention to dedicate to it all… Exciting stuff.

Last night on an unanticipated trip for some carry-out to my local eatery El Azteco in downtown East Lansing, I had the radio tuned to Michigan Radio, WUOM, and Marketplace was on. I really do enjoy Marketplace, and Kai Ryssdal, but last night I happened upon an excellent commentary by Charles Handy, a dude that I’ve never heard of, but now I’ll be paying a lot more attention to.

My favorite quote of his from the story was this: “if you are your own boss, it’s up to you how hard you work, or where, or when, or why.” And he doesn’t talk about this just in the context of being a strike out on your own entrepreneur, but also as an corporate entrepreneur working for someone else.

You can read about the story here, and download an Mp3 of his commentary here, but I will tell you what Charles Handy was talking about was absolutely the essence of what The Working Stiff blog is all about, particularly my post about the best investment you can make is in yourself. I highly recommend that you listen to this post. I found it to be fan-freakin-tastic!

For this week’s Social Media Take Away I’m featuring a post that I read last week in The Future Buzz blog, 50 Blogging Lessons To Know If You’re Starting Today. Adam Singer has a great blog going over there, one that I’ve been reading for nearly a year.

I’ve been doing this blog on here for less than a year, and to read some of the points on here that Adam makes is great for not just myself, but for anyone looking to start a blog, or looking to integrate blogs into their work or communications plans.

For entrepreneur’s, small business owners, and self-starters of any kind I would say that you should get started using social media. In fact, this should have been the first post in the Social Media Take Away series, but hey I’m improvising and making things up as I go here…

What is social media?

Social media is any web tools that allows groups to generate content and engage in peer-to-peer conversations and exchange of content (examples are YouTube, Flickr, Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, etc…)

Social media is particularly valuable for entrepreneur’s, small business owners, and self-starters in-general, I’m thinking artists – painters, musicians and the like, because it gives them low cost, high value, far reaching exposure for whatever they’re doing. As I write more about the social media value, I’ll cover some of these. For starters, I would say see this post on Twitter or items tagged with social media on this blog. Though, I’ll be covering stuff more in-depth, and high level, alike as I develop this feature of the blog.

If you’re an entrepreneur of any kind, it’s likely you’ve already started, but maybe you’re just not aware of it. Here are few signs of whether you’re an entrepreneur and don’t know it:

• Do you work harder than most for quality and value when others around you would prefer to maintain the status quo?
• Do you feel like you care more about the work, customer, and/or employer than those around you?
• Do you do your best work simply because you couldn’t imagine doing it any other way?

If you’ve answered yes to any of these questions then surely you’re an entrepreneur.

It’s easy to think that an entrepreneur is a business owner or the like, but really entrepreneurship is the just the willingness to do something and take responsibility for it. And actually, the definition for leadership isn’t much different, which is why entrepreneurship and leadership go hand in hand. The entrepreneur takes responsibility for their life, career, etc… and goes for it. There’s no need to begin at some distant point in the future, as I’ve said, you’re likely already doing it; make a conscious decision to start where you’re at.

I found the PR News Digital PR Next Practices Summit to be highly informative. It was a good chance to brush up on theories of social media in application, but it was also good to see some different things that people were doing. For me, though, there were a couple really great stand out presentations. The first one that really stuck out for me was:

Social Media Relations: Getting Positive Coverage in the Conversational Age, which featured the folks below, with their names being links to their respective presentations. This one was great:

Johna Burke (@gojohnab)
Vice President
BurrellesLuce

Julie Crabill (@julzie)
VP, Consumer Lifestyle Practices
Shift Communications

Monte Lutz (montelutz)
SVP of Digital Public Affiars
Edelman

The next one that I thought was really great, and I would say, possibly the best one, because the presenter, Paula Berg, was a great presenter, with a lot of enthusiasm and a real sense of humor about what she’s doing, was YouTube and Other Video Tactics to Advance Your PR:

Paula Berg (@PaulaBerg)
Manager of Emerging Media
Southwest Airlines

Here are some highlights from PR News Digital PR Next Practices Summit as posted on Twitter by attendees:

@montelutz #prnsummit – reporters are setting up spam filters for phrases like “great story idea” to weed out bad pitches –> @gojohnab

@gojohnab #prnsummit @julzie SM release preso old releases no longer applicable too much marketing speak not enough community and conversation

@cericwright @julzie says your brand belongs to the community at large #prnsummit

@montelutz “your brand’s already been hijacked. it doesn’t belong to you. it belongs to the community” #prnsummit ht @julzie

@nduhoski Check out Microsoft, Cisco, Ford for good social media newsroom site examples. #prnsummit

@nduhoski Google is as much a reputation engine as it is a search engine. #prnsummit

@nduhoski RT @DenverPRguy Your brand has been hijacked already. Its not owned by you but by the community. Be part of the community’s convo #prnsummit

@nduhoski When it comes to SM Best Practices: Beg, Borrow & Steal, then give back, credit. #prnsummit

@FlightpathNY Coke did not start their facebook page, even now they co-manage it with fans of the brand #prnsummit

@Rat_Race Lots of talk about engaging employees as brand advocates. Wonder how a work life balance fits in… Is there a balance? #prnsummit

@julzie @paullyoung “hits: how idiots track success” #prnsummit

@DenverPRguy Social Media users are 83% more likely to be brand loyal than non-users (from Paull Young, Converseon at #prnsummit)

@FlightpathNY Relationships with community members is the most critcal element & the most difficult to measure. Transparency remains paramount #prnsummit

@kdpaine RT @DenverPRguy: Relationships are what makes SM successful. UR measurement plan should track what those relationships look like. #prnsummit

@paullyoung says that the most powerful analytics tool is the human brain, use common sense #prnsummit

@mtkiefer @leeodden “if content can be searched on, it can be optimized” #prnsummit

@MerrittPR Incorperate links within online content and don’t have link read: click here but rather imbed within content of release or copy #prnsummit

@DenverPRguy Amen. “One of the biggest dangers of social media is not getting involved.” #prnsummit

@gojohnab Good #CEO ‘s recognize smart people no matter what level in the organization and will engage when appropriate #prnsummit

@gojohnab: #prnsummit Matthias Preschern: Content is king. Participate by linking in vs. Trying to build communities on your own

@MerrittPR Why does the blogosphere matter? B/c 71% of all journos read blogs for content #prnsummit

@MerrittPR Engage the blogosphere BEFORE, during and after a crisis! #prnsummit

@DallasLawrence Great comment by Southwest at #prnsummit – no link between quality of video and views. In other words, content and authenticity rules

So what’s gone well today?
Pretty much everything.

• I had a great car ride to Detroit Metro airport, traversing Michigan in the fall with the colors at full brilliance… awesome!
• There were no waits at the airport
• Security was smooth
• I had a great and smooth flight into LaGuardia
• I had an awesome cab ride that had me singing Bobby Humphrey’s Harlem River Drive, as I sat in the cab driving on Harlem River Drive – Nice!
• Filled my belly with some authentic New York style pizza, a first, and I’m still not convinced that’s it’s better that Chicago style, or more specifically, DeLuca’s the Lansing original, though that’s sure to draw up on some controversy.

But all this is an aside, because I’ve come to New York City to attend the PR News Digital PR Next Practices Summit. Basically, this is a chance to get informed, and fill in some knowledge gaps on a variety of digital PR, electronic communications, and SEO/SEM stuff that I think will be of value to my employer, me, and my readers.

If you read this, and you’re attending, say, “hey,” if you see me….

I talk to a lot of people about Twitter. I was a serious non-believer in Twitter, for a long time. I registered an account not long after they opened up shop, and I just didn’t get it. I mean, I got it, but the idea of micro-blogging, and “What are you doing now?” seemed to be creepy and narcissistic, actually I still feel that way, but I have found value in it.

It’s not that I care so much about what somebody just ate for breakfast, or that they’re stuck in traffic, or “so excited for the weekend!” which may have some value among groups of Twitter users, but next to none for the general Twitter pool. However, it’s the quick blurbs of information with links to articles I’m interested in, interviews, and other information that has really pulled me into being a user.

The take away: If you’re looking for articles, information, breaking news and the like, I would say that Twitter has a lot of value. I would also say that if you tweet about your work, your interests, etc… and it caters to the sort of PR and tech folks that are on Twitter then they might get the message, and you might be able to build interest in what you’re doing locally; eventually making real-world, physical contacts.

Some of my regular readers may have noticed that the site has been changing over the last month or so. This really started with the merging of the Digital Imperative blog and my music/design site. I wanted to bring my career workinline with my creative and artistic work here at mattborghi .com. Since then I’ve been reading some of your comments, emails and past posts (of which this is post #90) and thinking about the editorial direction and content overall of The Digital Imperative. This week it became clear to me that while I might talk about Google, Twitter or Yahoo, or Web and Digital Strategy or communications, as well as posting videos or Mp3s of recent work at the core of my message is that of entrepreneurship. Whether you’re a corporate entrepreneur working inside the walls of a Fortune 500 company, the small business owner who’s reach is much more local than global or a Do-It-Yourself artist trying to gain a broader audience for your work — Entrepreneurship is an attitude.

It took me talking to a trusted colleague this week for that to become clear to me. We spent a good amount of time talking about what it means to be a small business and a small business owner. Entrepreneurship encompasses a series of soft skills, including ambition, persistence, organization, attitude and most importantly a belief in one’s self, but there are many other words that describe what an entrepreneur or entrepreneurship is.

I plan to spend more time talking about entrepreneurship and what it means to be an entrepreneur. Keeping in mind that my definition of an entrepreneur is looser than most. I define an entrepreneur as someone who works to put something together and is willing to take the risk for it.  This goes together with the newly-crafted editorial statement that I crafted for this site: The best investment you can make is in yourself.

So that’s the plan, and the direction I plan on taking with things. I’ll still be talking about social media, Web strategy, communications and the like because of course it’s absolutely the entrepreneurial spirit that drives one to undertake these things, especially as best practices are being written as we go. As always, I welcome your feedback, and look forward to the continued conversation.

Certainly, it’s a generational thing, or maybe just a communications preference, but for me, I just don’t like talking on the phone like I did when I was a teenager or in the early years of cell phone ownership. Send me an email. Email is unobtrusive, and allows for the most basic relay of data. I can respond at my leisure. I can organize my thoughts, and put them out there in front of me before committing to them. I can have a record of what I sent, because you never know when you might need a record of what you’ve said. Unlike phone calls from strangers, where I hang up almost immediately, I seriously consider and think about email propositions from strangers. Email just works really well. Sure there are folks who talk about the death of email by texting, and texting, sometimes, is an even more basic relay of data, especially when lenghty thoughtful statements aren’t needed, but that’s for another post. Bottom line: Send me an email, and I’ll guarantee that I’ll read it; entice me and I might even respond.