When Leslie and I started E-WRITE in 1996 “the e-mail” was a very new tool and Al Gore was inventing the Internet. We knew that e-mail and the web would change how we communicate. But who could have envisioned Facebook, Twitter, YouTube or blogs? I’ve noticed that...
Social Media Writing Courses
2010 AP Stylebook Announces “Website” is One Word; “E-Mail” Retains Hyphen
The Associated Press announced yesterday that it has added a separate Social Media Guidelines section to its 2010 AP Stylebook. The new section includes information on correct use of such terms as "... app, blogs, click-throughs, friend and unfriend, metadata, RSS,...
Is E-Mail Dead? Not So Fast!
Since 2006, pundits have been predicting the death of e-mail. The word on the street is that people--particularly under 30s--have abandoned e-mail for IM, texting, Facebook, Twitter and other social media. Jim Lodico, author of the Social Media 2.0 blog, summarizes...
Download Social Media Toolkits from Mass.gov
From the National Association of Government Communicators list, I'm reposting information about a great resource: three social media toolkits from the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. (Thanks to Susan Parker, Director of Mass.gov for this info.) The toolkits cover...
Research Report: Old Writing Rules Apply to New Social Media
While updating our web writing courses, I've been scouring usability research to find new studies that apply to web writing. The findings from two separate research studies from the Software Usability Research Laboratory (SURL) at Wichita State University remind me...
Social Media Press Release: Tips and Examples
Does the traditional press release format work in the world of 24-hour news, blogs, Facebook and Twitter? Many media professionals think the 100-year-old press release format is ineffective and obsolete. They're calling for a new approach. Read my companion post: The...
Social Media Press Release: A New Approach to the Old Problem of Getting Noticed
When more than 50 people lost their lives in a train wreck in 1906, Ivy Lee—the father of public relations—issued the first-ever news release, a public statement about the crash from Pennsylvania Railroad officials. The New York Times was so impressed with this...
