I like #6 as well. Social media isn't hard but doing it well can be if you don't take a collaborative approach–which you clearly do.

I'm giving a talk next week on social media to some people not very familiar with the topic and I'll probably reference this post (with attribution, of course).

I found this post to be very valuable, the more clarity we have the more successful we'll be when we're designing campaigns and producing events revolving around social media. Thanks for clearing up some of the fallacies we've heard, I just retweeted it and hope your message sheds some light and gives direction to those who are involved in one way or another in a social media program.
Jan Gordon, cyberland.com

I was somewhat challenged by a couple of the young'uns on the Social Media calendar, you know how 20' somethings are doomed to relive mistakes that others made because humans rarely have the ability to learn from history.

Case in point, I was asked what my experience with Twitter 'like' media was and I was somewhat confused by the question, what did they mean? Is there a PHD in twitology that they have? Is there some class out there that I missed? What could they really mean??

As in most confrontational situations I like to put a place holder in my brain and provide a short sufficient answer with the opportunity to address their concerns later.

This morning it came to me and I was wondering if there are any white papers, or people that have concisely documented the history of what today is called Social media.

My epiphany;
I began my life in Social Media in 1984 when I purchased my first computer, a commodore 64 with a 300 bps modem and logged on to Fido and other BBS systems. There I would chat with folks either online at the same time as me, or leave messages, share experiences, etc.
I progressed though several computers (next was an IBM XT) and several services, Prodigy, AOL, Comuserve, in a never ending quest to learn from others and share what I knew – fast forward (2010) I am sitting in a room full of people that are attempting to explain to me what social media is.

Am I alone thinking that we REALLY should learn from the past?

So, I have used the above 'Social Media' systems, and took up IT as a career in the mid 80's which allowed me to admin Office Vision, Sending messages across 3270 and 5250 terminals to chat, used pagers, the SMS clam shell RIM device, Motorola MicroTac Lite phones, saw the invention of the proto type ‘iPhone’ ‘The Simon (1992), integrated PBX systems with Lotus Notes and other systems to provide rich media and centralize access to communication resources, and on and on.

I am real interested in presenting or obtaining a presentation of the history of the Social Media World stating how everything old is new again, but know I do not know everything and would like to obtain or help create a more concise white paper?

Thoughts?