Interactive Media

I have been at the interactive media conference the past couple of days in Miami. It is a conference that focuses more on the interactive side of online publishing. The industry is definitely moving in the right direction in regards to using social media to benefit the company. Something I see a lot though is that a newspaper company will not have any social media aspect to their site and will try to play catchup by throwing up blogs and a forum quickly. The error is not in the technology they use but the fact that they didn't put enough time into planning on how to have the blogs and forums benefit them as a content company. Wikis provide the platform that enable the social networking technology to be aggregated, syndicated, managed, and opened to the community in a format that is conducive to contribution. Even though wikis are new to the industry, the technology isn't that foreign from the users if they are already using blogs and forums. As the industry grows, the wiki will be a platform that will enable the growth of the community.