Regulations and Social Media

This is a special Thursday Thoughts.

I publish (post) new stuff on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, but every once in awhile, I will add an extra article if it is timely and I don’t want to wait.  I schedule the updates to this site in advance and have some waiting in the wings for December already.

Yesterday Amber Recker asked:

Amber Recker ‏@amrecker

So Twitter, how do you feel about social media certificate classes and training programs?

And here are some of the answers:

Kevin Erb ‏@kevinerb

Training programs=good. Cert classes=meh. Depends, I guess, but mostly…meh.

Scott Howard ‏@ScLoHo

Training =good. Certificates = worthless =no standard

Derek Pillie ‏@dpillie

Isn’t that the problem though? Energy should be directed to developing standards of practice in social

Scott Howard ‏@ScLoHo

Yes, but each platform should offer their own certification(FB, Twitter, LinkedIN, Pinterest)

Derek Pillie ‏@dpillie

Something like the old MCSE cert is fine, but a “social media cert” should be about practices, not platform

Scott Howard ‏@ScLoHo

that’s like measuring morality vs knowledge

Kevin Mullett ‏@kmullett

the thing of it is, clearly other traditional forms of education and certificates suffer the same issues.
and IMHO, it shouldn’t be just SM without a broader understanding of online & offline marketing. Clarification, SM alone without direction or background on tying all together is diminished

There were a few other comments but then I asked Amber why she asked the original question and her reply:

Amber Recker ‏@amrecker

In the last week, 3 people have asked me if a class being offered at a local college is worth it.

Good, because Amber and everyone else in this conversation do not need to take a class, everyone of them can teach a course on social media.

However this brings up a bigger question of accreditation.

We want certain people in our life to be able to prove that they are capable of doing the job they claim to be able to do.

The doctor has his degrees hanging on his wall.  The mechanic has his ASE certification. The lawyer is a member of the bar.

All of these involve some degree of government oversight and regulation.

Venture into the computer world and you can earn certifications from Microsoft and Apple for passing knowledge based tests.

The standards are set by the companies that offer the accreditation.

Now we know that there are some bad doctors, bad mechanics and bad lawyers.  Often this is due to a lack of following a moral compass, not incompetence due to ignorance.

There was a time in our history that you did not need accreditation to be a doctor, lawyer or mechanic.  Many where self-taught,  others were mentored, and some were fakes and con-artists.

Did government involvement rid us of the bad apples?  Not really.  I like being able to trust my life to a professional, but it take more than just certification.  I recently switched dentists and my new guy found treatment options to take care of the cause of a problem instead of just dealing with the symptoms like my old dentist was doing.

I recently got a 2nd opinion on some major car repair work and saved a bunch of money.  But it was not just the $$$ it was trust that won me over.

Bottom line regarding regulations and Social Media:

1. Because I don’t want government involved and screwing things up, (and taxing us, etc) I don’t want them involved.
2. Because the social media technology is continuing to change faster and faster I believe standards should be set by the companies who are giving us access to their platforms.
3. The best way to find a social media professional is to evaluate their work and conduct which is available online.

Your thoughts?