Image by Alvin Bloody Carpio via Flickr
Louis Gray posted a video on the seven secrets of social media on his blog as part of an article What Social Media Is and What Social Media Is Not. If you have not watched this video yet, catch it below. The speaker is Perry Belcher, and the video is something that you want to watch right now.

What is interesting is that the first key secret is “Be Remarkable” in that you want people talking about you, person, company, and message. The second is “Be Fun,” have a personality, and make people comfortable around you. The Third is “Be helpful,” that means that you are helping people get over their fears and be supportive. The Fourth is “be supportive” in that we are all here to be nice to each other and help each other out. The Fifth is “Be Controversial” do not worry if you piss a few people off if you believe in what you are saying, but do not worry if you cannot make everyone happy all the time. Number six is “Be Resourceful” give people stuff that will help them and make life better. Number seven is “Don’t be an asshole”, no one wants to buy things from you, they want to get to know you better, and see if there is a natural value there.

Social Media is all a big party where you get to know people, meet people, and is you Incorporated. Do not do anything that will compromise your character, and they will hold you accountable, your credibility will be based on your personality and what you do.

How are we doing here? We all know about Social Media Trolls, we all know about some of the egos, issues, concerns, and faux pas that are made on a nearly daily basis in social media. We also know that in general, we do ascribe to the bigger ideals helping, being fun, being remarkable, be supportive, and when we really do believe in something, being controversial. Overall, social media has been remarkably clean in relationship to other networking systems, and almost generating a closely knit society where vetting happens based on who you know, and how helpful/informative/valuable your information is.

This is one of the most fascinating videos to watch, because we are in danger of losing what is social media to what social media is not. As companies chase after fewer and fewer non-tapped out customers, they will use social media to start marketing. This is not completely bad, but the desire to sell more stuff is going to alter the way that we use and consume social media. What will end up happening, much like what happened in the Rave and Hip Hop cultures is that the dynamics will become so fluid that traditional media cannot latch onto it and monetize it. While there will be sites like Facebook, the “in crowd” will be on other systems, and hopping system to system as marketing and PR start to catch onto the game.

New media is going to have to keep on revamping itself and what it means to culture, to maintain its non-marketing basis as Perry believes it is. We have seen this kind of process encompass the entire Hip Hop culture and Rave Cultures, including downtempo, electronica, experimental, video, and other forms of music/entertainment. Raves have replaced the radio, Bittorrent and other distribution methods (including closed communities) are used to distribute the raw music, and a small group only informs consumers of what trends are changing. Social media will begin to start making its own disposable distribution channels within the larger frameworks of social media sites. Alternatively, they will make their own sites given most of this can be done cheaply if not free.

Much like social media, we as consumers of social media might have to adopt the same change and camouflage techniques that the Hip Hop and Rave cultures represent and present information to their consumers. This is where knowing the thought leaders will be important in social networking, it might end up being the only way that we can keep communities clean, and in line with what social media is.

Tags: perry belcher, Louis gray, video, interesting, idea, rave, hip hop, cultures, similarities, cool