small talk 2.0

Next month I will start my new diplomatic appointment - media advisor and spokesperson of the Israeli embassy to France. It's the second time I will work as a spokesperson for the embassy. 10 years ago I did the same job in Moscow. Looks like the same job? Of course, Moscow is not Paris, Russia is not France, however the journalists are journalists everywhere, and the TV, newspapers and radio have much in common. But there is a big, huge, enormous BUT, that changed the world in the last 10 years. It's called social media. 10 years ago there was no Facebook. No Twitter. No Youtube. Even no DailyMotion or Odnoklassniki.ru. And, of course, no other social networks. Blogs were something marginal, and no part of the mass media, anyway. Today it's all history. Small correction: a history in making, since what we do today with the social media and how social media interacts with the traditional media are things that we learn by the method of error and trial. It's still new for...

American diplomacy and the State Department could serve as a good example of using social media in their work. American embassies were among the first to open Twitter accounts and use it for professional goals. The most well-known example of using Twitter by US embassy happened 4 years ago in Madagaskar during the coup d'etat attempt against the president of this country. The US embassy sent tweets in order to refute the rumors that the president of Madagaskar is hiding at the embassy... So if you consider opening the twitter account for your embassy, it is worth checking what the americans are doing. They are definitely leaders in this area, and they do it almost in every country. Their twitter accounts could help you understand how to do yours. I am not saying do exactly what they do. All I want to say is this: learn from them and do better! Here are some examples from US embassies in Europe. US Embassy in Vienna: http://twitter.com/usmission US Embassy in Geneva: http://twitter....

Diplomats discover Twitter. This is a fact. And I am not talking about the Ministers or Secretaries of State, like Clinton or Miliband. Because at the end of the day they are politicains, not diplomats. No, I am talking about the career diplomats, who started their diplomatic work as attaches and second secretaries, for whom diplomacy is not just ground breaking speeches, cocktail parties and all other nice things associated with this profession. These ordinary diplomats discover Twitter, and this is a worldwide movement. I know this for sure, after being introduced to the new social network of Diplomats: Diplodocus. I was excited to see there diplomats who mentioned on their personal profiles their Twitter accounts. I immediately put them all on a new list on my Twitter account. I called it Twitplomacy. You are welcome to follow the tweeting diplomats and diplomatic missions with this list, I promise to update it. by the way I also crated a list for my colleagues in the Ministry: Isra...

Usually I don't watch series. In fact, "24" is the only series I follow from the first season. And not just follow, but became kind of fan. I was trying to find an explanation for this. Yes, I love action, I like movies dealing with politics, diplomacy, international relations. However, all these things you can find in other series or movies. What is particularly good about the "24", and what attracts me the most, is that it always reflects real-life crisis situations and dilemmas. Sometimes, the international background of "24" is not just a reflection, but projection of the real-life tendencies. Of course, like in any movie, many details are exaggerated, stretched and unrealistic. However, this parallel reality of the movie resembles, at times too closely, the reality we live. Look for the 8th season of "24". The general background (for those who didn't see it) is set during the final phase of peace negotiations between the US President...

About a year ago I wrote a post explaining basic guidelines on using social media by diplomats (here: http://diplomatstalk.blogspot.com/2009/04/how-diplomats-should-use-social-media.html ). One year later, I would like to update some things and add others. After all, there is nothing like experience… I will comment about three major tools: Facebook, Twitter and Linkedin. So why Facebook? 1. More than 400 million users 2. The most significant users traffic, after Google 3. More than 60 languages 4. Popular in non-English speaking countries 5. Enormous potential for Public Diplomacy (at least today, because who knows what we’ll have in the future!) Basic steps for working with Facebook There are three Facebook page types for organizations: Fan page, Group or Cause. The fan page is most commonly used for organizations. It’s recommended to set up a personal page prior to opening the mission’s official fan page. Make yourself familiar with how Facebook works. Choose a person who is effectiv...

Today I had an opportunity to talk to a group of Development Communication specialists from countries-members in OECD. We were talking about potential of social media in promoting the cause of Development goals and international aid awareness (read more about the agenda here: http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/4/16/45155914.pdf ) , something that is defined by some experts as Web2forDev ( http://www.web2fordev.net/ ) No doubt Development 2.0 is gaining the moment. Participants from all the countries shared their experience with social media. It's true that the UK's representative, Julia Chandler from DFID, impressed al of us with the systematic and advanced approach towards integrating social media tools in the Development communication. However, the most important lesson for me was that all the participants speak the same "digital" language. May be because the average age in the group was closer to 30 than 50.... Here is my PP presentation at the seminar: http://www.linked...