@media08 - Kevin Anderson, Blogs Editor at the Guardian

Kevin Anderson kicks it off his presentation discussing how to build a direct connection with the audience and begins with some of the Faux Pax that Mass Media commits when trying to use social media:

• Mass Media is focused on celebrity not engagement
• Mass Media doesn't know the difference between "provocative" and "through provoking"
• Mass Media focuses on building a network of free labour instead of relationships

He uses a some great Jon Stewart clips to finely illustrate the point...

He has a couple great slides on the Guardian's thinking around the user engagement cycle:

Casual (just stopping by) -> Connected (signing up and engage in light interaction -> Committed (signing in for personal benefit) -> Catalyst (blog, e-mail, etc) -->

and what they're doing "beyond social networking" :

Casual (bookmarking, tagging, adding to group, attention data)
Connected (commenting rating, voting, endorsing)
Committed (UGC, tools for content and users, profiles)
Catalyst (networked journalism)

He makes a point that I strongly agree with : you can do a ton with existing tools outside - it is just the creativity and willingness to change.

He illustrates this with a really cool thing where he asked a question about US Elections on Seesmic and asked if people would want to be embedded on the Guardian Blogs. He got a ton of responses saying how great the Guardian was and then from a whole lot of Americans discussing there issues for the elections. This resulted in over 40 video responses...

This perfectly illustrates the power of some creativity and the use of consumer focused internet tools - he thought this up on the way to work and it was executed a couple of hours later.

The biggest challenge isn't technological but social and cultural.

Note to self : Playing Daily Show Clips is always a winner with the audience!