By Pete Sigrist and Liam Thomson

Yesterday was Ed Balls Day. You may not have noticed it, but tens of thousands of people hit social media to take part in this unlikely celebration of a social media gaffe by shadow Chancellor of the Exchequer Ed Balls. Balls’ own response was a moment of brilliance, and we think there are lessons here for companies and brands wishing to take control of digital conversations.

An internet meme was forged on 28 April 2011 when Shadow Chancellor, Ed Balls, accidentally tweeted his own name to the amusement of Twitter users. This obvious mistake sparked thousands of retweets as the joke was shared around the world. At 4.26pm yesterday, almost precisely two years since the original tweet was posted, an anniversary celebration of sorts took place.
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Here at 33 we specialise in offering clients and individuals big and small the best social media advice you can find – and the world is taking note. We may still be less than a week into December, but it’s been a busy month for our team as they take to print and the airwaves to offer pearls of wisdom about engaging with an audience on Twitter.

First up our very own Sam Phillips went head-to-head with Nadine Dorries on the benefits and risks that social media poses to our elected politicians. We think Sam won hands down, but decide for yourselves here. This was followed on Monday by our MD Peter Sigrist jumping in a cab and speeding across London to speak to the BBC World News about the challenges facing the Pope as he adapts to life on Twitter.

His Holiness already has over 350,000 followers without a single tweet to his name and that’s just on his English account. The Vatican has claimed that he will see every tweet issued by the account himself, but given he is managing accounts in several different languages, Pete rightly expressed scepticism about how successful the channels could be.

The key challenge for the Vatican will be engagement – how can they use the tool to converse with followers across the world rather than simply broadcasting soundbites to them. So if anyone from the Vatican or David Cameron’s office reads this – you know where to find us, Pete’s ready and waiting for your call.

The Leveson report is due out on Thursday and amidst the shouting matches about the future of the printed press and whether they’ll be given one final chance to prove they can effectively self-regulate, one crucial question has been largely ignored.

What happens to internet news sites and blogs? Will the post-Leveson world see the Huffington Post, Politics home, etc treated in the same way as the Guardian and the Independent? They can already join the political lobby, so there is a precedent for treating them in the same way. But is this enough, or will they continue to exist in a grey area?

No one seems to know and even more puzzlingly, no one really seems to care. While article after article has been written on the merits of self vs. statutory regulation (neither is perfect, but the former is preferable) almost nothing has been written on whether the average blogger will be regulated in the same way.

Currently the Press Complaints Commission only covers organisations who have signed up to be part of it and it’s hard to imagine any of the previously mentioned sites signing up for membership. We don’t know whether the Leveson Inquiry will recommend a mechanism that compels media organisations to sign up – but if he does it would be surprising if this applied purely to the printed press.

But if it does apply to online publications, where does it end? At what point does society draw the line and say your site is too small to require regulation? 10,000 page views a month? 20,000? Or are we going to say that every site, no matter how small, which posts topical news and comment pieces will be expected to sign up. The latter is obviously an unworkable option, but such is the lack of debate around the issue that we simply don’t know what will happen.

Even if in the short term, Lord Justice Leveson decides to only recommend changes to the system governing the printed process, this is an issue which will not go away. It’s only a matter of time till The Guardian goes digital only and other papers will surely follow. Does a switch to digital only mean they are suddenly exempt from regulation? And if not, will we have to undergo this whole process again as the government scrambles to figure out how to regulate the online press.

This is not to underplay how fast misinformation and rumour can spread on the internet and how vital it is that people can correct false articles or rogue websites. But that doesn’t mean we should be comfortable with the idea of the government being able to regulate material published on UK based sites.

We wanted to share one of the coolest things we’ve seen in for a while – a natty new infographic generator from Microsoft, aimed at helping SMBs in the UK get graphical in their web marketing.  You can try the new tool for yourself, but to give you some inspiration, we created one for our lovely charitable initiative, 33 for Good.  What do you think?

(You can see our 33 for Good infographic in it’s full glory here)

In China connections mean power, so it is no surprise that social media have become such big business here. For many, the networking landscape in the East is a mystery. But how do these Chinese sites compare with what we have in the West? Are social media sites in China really that different?

The top social media sites in China are -

Sina Weibo: According to research by the DCCI, (Defense Cyber Crime Institute) Weibo users account for nearly 89 per cent of total Chinese web users. But Sina Weibo should not just be thought of as the “Chinese Twitter,” because it has evolved to mean a lot more than that.

On Twitter any images or videos you attach to a post have typically appeared as a link. On Weibo they appear immediately, so Sina Weibo has been a more immediate visual experience, although Twitter now seems to be following Weibo’s lead by embedding content within tweets.

Renren: What is thought to be the Chinese version of Facebook, however, is called Renren. It has 147 million registered users and 31 million active users per month. Renren is set to take over as the social networking platform for the college-educated population in China. Renren has a similar look and feel to Facebook. A timeline design was also introduced in August, though it is still not available to all users but it involves a cover photo and life events. However, there are some major differences – Renren’s ads are less targeted and most of the revenue comes from its games.

Douban: Douban is an open forum popular among intellectual Chinese interested in films and books. There are 60 million registered users. Yang Lei who works for CMoDA (China Millennium Monument Museum of Digital Arts) described Douban as “unique” saying that it started as an online community sharing cultural interests but has become a social media site and is “fast becoming the most concentrated cultural community, with the most diverse cultural content”.

Weixin: Weixin, or Wechat as it is now known, is also growing. It is a mobile voice and text app with social features such as “friend discovery”. Mobile space will be the next battleground between Chinese social networks because 69 per cent of Chinese people access the Internet through mobile devices.

As well as these top sites a few location-based services such as Jiepang, similar to a FourSquare app, and Momo, a dating app, have gained popularity in the past year. The Pinterests of China Mogujie and Meilishu have also become popular.

These social networking sites are similar to a lot of the top UK sites, proof once again that the trends are not dissimilar to what we see in the West. However, rather than imitating Western sites, the Chinese have now started to go beyond what we have. They are innovating to create a better experience for users, adapting to Chinese tastes and values. For example, take Renren, although it started as a virtual clone of Facebook, it now has instant messaging and gaming capabilities, light blogging and video sharing.

Social media sites have adapted to suit Chinese Internet users who tend to use Weibo and other sites more on weekends than at work. Research has also suggested Western users retweet information faster.

The way brands interact with users via social networking sites is also different. Mary Bergstrom, founder of The Bergstrom Group, a consultancy helping brands understand the Chinese consumer, said: “Brands know that young people spend more time online and value online communication more than other audiences so they emphasize these channels. Right now, true communication between brands and consumers in China is in its infancy. Consumers don’t necessarily trust a lot of what they see; they know that followers and endorsements on Weibo are for sale, and they know that fake products and information pervade the Internet. The next stage in communication between brands and consumers will have to emphasize authenticity and generous exchanges.”

Brands are already becoming aware of how important it is to engage with the Chinese consumer through social media. Yang Lei, who works for the China Millennium Monument Museum of Digital Arts, said that the “commercial exploitation of social media has surpassed its Western buddy at an unprecedented rate because of its rich media-based system design”.

Despite these subtle differences, it might surprise you to hear that social media sites in China are open to the same abuses that ruin the Internet for many Western users. Mary Bergstrom argues that in some ways these abuses are actually more “serious” and “organized”.

She says: “Netizens (the Chinese slang word for web users) can easily be challenged by false claims and personal affronts. China is also the origin of what is called a ‘human flesh search engine’ – essentially a form of online stalking that can lead to confrontations and even actual harm in the physical world.”

Bergstrom adds, “Extremes work in both positive and negative, though; human flesh search engines have also been launched to help people find missing relatives, uncover criminals, and affirming communications are critical for building a sense of belonging.”

With reliance on the these sites growing, evident in news last week that Weibo now has 400 million users, it seems that the main difference in how Chinese people use social media, is that the connection is much deeper. Bergstrom claimed that this was due to China’s one child policy, which has led to more being expected of the single child and stricter academic work schedules leaving little time for young people to “connect offline”.

She said: “Online, youth are able to find a critical and beloved means of experimenting anonymously with identities and expressing opinions and experiences they would not be able to offline. This intimate connection starts as soon as youth go online and the connection continues and expands, as they get older. Ultimately over time, young adults need multiple simultaneous connections to feel tapped in.”

There are certainly similarities between how social media are used in China and the West; there are also some very notable differences that make the networking spectrum in China unique. Social media in China is starting to move beyond what we have in the West and the connections that are being made online are even more deeply rooted in society.

Sarah is Foreign Expert at 21^st Century, a newspaper connected to China Daily and has also written for The Guardian and Wired. She blogs at sarah-marsh.co.uk

Christmas ads have become an art form.  Last year’s John Lewis ad has been watched on YouTube over 4.5million times. As the greatest imaginable testament to the God, Consumerism, People are seeking out adverts – we are watching ads for free, and we are doing so in huge numbers. Christmas ads are hugely expensive, increasingly high profile, and therefore totally indicative of brand values.

This year, Asda drove the sleigh right off the reservation with this festive monstrosity. A 30-second spot of Emmeline Pankhurst turning in her grave would have illustrated the same point for less money. The ad has (thus far) generated 180 complaints to the Advertising Standards Authority and will be the subject of formal investigation as a result. The twitter account @EverydaySexism, which reports on overlooked, everyday inequalities, absolutely exploded, retweeting complaints from men and women everywhere expressing their shock at the ad.

Ignoring pressure from social media, Asda apologised for the offense caused, but defended the ad, with a blog post entitled “Mums see themselves in our Christmas ad”. According to the Asda blog, “Mums have been tweeting that it’s “so true to life””. I’m sure Asda thought this was an endearing move, but to anyone engaged in the conversation around continuing gender inequality it simply reinforces the point: women are – to this day – shouldering the vast majority of housework, childrearing and other domestic duties. Sometimes market research can indicate a social trend that needs changing. Instead, Asda have decided  to reinforce it in the name of selling more yule logs.

Here’s the thing: I’m sure it is familiar to lots of mums, but it shouldn’t be. What the market research probably didn’t mention is this: Equality in domestic duties is important. Domestic equality opens up huge opportunities for women, and (I like to think) for men, too. But for now, Asda defends their position that women alone should be doing all the present-buying, house-decorating, child-rearing, sprout-boiling, turkey-stuffing, dish-washing, and house-tidying. In the very least, it is an affront to every single father trying to keep Christmas merry, and every working mother without the time to prepare. But why am I wasting my time with this? Better get back in the kitchen…

A recent article published on Sky News Australia, releases the findings of a report by Ernst & Young Australia that time wasting at work costs Australian businesses $87bn per year. The findings suggest that “Unnecessary meetings, unimportant emails and the use of social media at work were the biggest time-killers, costing businesses big dollars in lost wages.”

While unnecessary meetings and unimportant emails can be huge problems within the workplace, and social media can lead to mass procrastination, there are more important things to look at when it comes to helping employees to “not waste time.” However, there are a few tips that can help with even these things…

The Unnecessary Meeting

Unnecessary meetings are the bane of my existence. Back in the days when I used to work in a large corporation, I was told within my first month that the best way to skive was to “just book a meeting with someone”. If you find yourself falling into this trap, there’s a simple way to get rid of the unnecessary meeting issue… Avoid them. If anyone invites you to or suggests a meeting that you feel isn’t worth having, or could be achieved in another way, then ask if a call or email conversation could fix it. More helpful, instead of sitting down for an hour to talk through options, suggest a solution to the problem instead. You’d be surprised at how much being ‘a little bit forward’ can cut out unnecessary face to face meetings.

However, sometimes you just can’t avoid meetings, especially within agency life. Another way to cut down how much they affect your work is to set aside one day of the week/fortnight to have as many of the meetings as possible in a week. This basically means that you have a day that is written off, and you know you’re not going to get much actual work done that day. It not only frees up your days, but also frees up your mind for your ‘meetings day’, allowing you to focus entirely on what’s being discussed, instead of thinking of that important deadline that you have to meet that afternoon.

The Unimportant Email

This one gets cited a lot as a massive time waster. There is definitely truth that you can end up spending a ridiculous amount of time in dealing with email in one day, but there is a balance to be struck. Again, there are a few easy tips that can help unclog your inbox… First, learn how to use Rules. Spend a few hours of analysing your inbox for the worst offenders, then set a rule for those emails to skip your inbox and be placed into a folder in the future. Then you can check those at your own leisure, instead of having your ‘new email’ constantly flash up. Another quick rules, courtesy of Drew, is to set up a rule for any email containing the word ‘Unsubscribe’. This automatically cuts down spam.

However, there is something to be said for the odd unimportant email floating around the office. Proscribing to every employee what is important and what isn’t is a sure fire way to achieve unhappy employees. At 33, we have a LOL alias set up, which everyone can choose to be on. This is where we share everything from interesting articles that we’ve found to LOLcat and animated gif extravaganzas. Instead of keeping it ‘underground’ and private between a few people, it makes for a much more open, trusting environment to encourage this behaviour instead of prohibiting it. It’s not like happy employees are less productive… in fact, it’s quite the opposite.

The Dreaded Social Media

Back in the days when I worked in-house, I almost got fired for appearing on the MD’s hit-list of ‘people wasting time at work on non-work websites.’ The culprit? Twitter. It turns out that back in 2008, having Tweetdeck open all day meant approximately 6,000 hits to the Twitter website within the average workday. The MD saw this and just about signed my execution order. However, what he failed to ask was what I was actually doing with Twitter in the background. Between 2007 and 2009, I worked as a designer, developer, web admin and digital marketing manager at this company. Twitter and forums were my lifeline to a vast sea of knowledge, just about teaching me everything I did for their company. It provided quick answers to problems, peer review on ideas and work and kept me up to speed with the industry.

One of the worst things we can do as employers is to sever this completely. Sure, social media is used to procrastinate. However, if someone really wants to procrastinate, they’re going to find a way to do it regardless of what you have banned. Again, training staff on social media, making it part of their job and encouraging it can lead to much happier, productive workers. Also, there is something to be said about forbidden fruit being much more appealing than something that is de rigeur.

The future of work

One of the things that we’ve been looking at quite a bit at 33 is ways of working, and what this will look like in the future. Pre-internet ways of working are no longer productive, especially when taking into account the general feeling of GenY towards work. What is generally lacking in old ways of working is an element of trust. If you trust your employees and let them figure out the ways they want to work, as well as the ways they want to productively procrastinate, it leads to much higher rates of productivity, a happier workplace and greater employee loyalty.

If you would like more tips on being efficient at work, I highly recommend Tim Ferriss’ blog (and book), or keep an eye on the relatively new WorkHacks blog. You might also want to check out Anywhere Working, a 33 client blog that focuses on the future of working.

A man turns to his friend at the pub and makes an obscene comment about a recent tragic incident. He gets a stern look from the regulars, but nothing more comes of it. What he’s done may have offended people, but he hasn’t broken any laws.

Barely 10 minutes down the road, a student makes a similarly offensive comment about the same situation – but he chooses Twitter, not the pub as his platform. The next morning he’s awoken by a summons to the local police station where he learns he’s going to be charged with a criminal offence.  

So what’s the difference? Why is it ok for the man to say offensive things in a pub, but a criminal offence for the student to tweet them?

The answer lies in Section 127 of the Communications Act 2003, which states:

“A person is guilty of an offence if he sends by means of a public electronic communications network a message or other matter that is grossly offensive or of an indecent, obscene or menacing character.”

Crucially, nowhere does it say that the message must have been sent to the individual or organisation it is offensive or menacing to. This has been highlighted in two contrasting cases. First the Robin Hood airport case – where a joke tweet about wanting to blow an airport up if the weather meant the individual missed his flight, led to a case going all the way to the high court and a debate about freedom of speech. This case was eventually thrown out; with the Court of Appeal concluding that the tweet was clearly a joke and could not be considered to be a message of ‘menacing character’.

The second case – that of Liam Stacey highlights the danger of tweeting something offensive to your own followers, only for it to be widely shared and the reach multiplied thousands of times. . It’s doubtful that Stacey ever intended or dreamed that his tweet would gain such publicity or that he genuinely meant the message to reach Muamba. But the public and media outcry about his undeniably offensive comments led to him being jailed for a comment that would have been shouted down or ignored in a pub setting. Stacey has since expressed remorse and will have this hanging over him at every job interview or meeting he ever attends – surely the public shame is sufficient without the need to jail him for one idiotic decision?

A new development, and one with potentially far-reaching consequences is the comment made by Keir Starmer during a talk at the London School of Economics that retweeting a tweet found to be in breach of the act was an offence in its own right – something prominent legal bloggers and journalists are still digesting. But this raises a further question – last week many people retweeted and commented on Nick Griffin’s ‘threatening tweet’ towards a couple involved in a landmark gay rights case. Does their clear disagreement with Griffin’s actions make them safe from prosecution should the Police believe he has a case to answer?

What is clear is that much more needs to be done to examine how the existing laws can be used regulate social media sensibly and in a way that means the courts are not having to make kneejerk reactions to public outrage.

For a more detailed examination of the relationship between Twitter and the law the Guardian have put together a list of the 10 legal risks you need to consider.

Three years ago we launched our social media agency 33 Digital. The last year of that journey has been amazing. We’ve doubled in size and we launched our first dedicated international office in Sydney. 

We’ve gone from this: 

To this (half of our London office): 

Now the next phase of 33 Digital’s growth is ready to kick off: we’re hiring in New York, Munich and Paris for imminent office openings. 

We’re looking for people with experience of social media and PR, at all levels. Ideally you’ll be a local and you will have agency experience. If you’re a boss who is used to going out and making things happen, winning clients and running teams, we’d love to hear from you. If you’re an account manager, account executive or something similar, have a passion for social media in communications consultancy, you should get in touch too. An entrepreneurial spirit is a must, as is a passion for social media (did we mention that?). 

We work for some awesome clients who we love to bits. They keep us busy with all kinds of awesome, like social media marketing and PR, analytics and listening, community management, design and build. 

Check out our site and you’ll see how we like to work, some of the brands we work with and who we are. And the things we do like 33 Labs and 33 For Good. 

Then if you’re interested, email us something interesting to youre.hired@33-digital.com and we’ll get right back. Or stalk @drewb on Twitter as he’s the one you’ll meet. We look forward to hearing from you!

UPDATE: Would you believe it? Total Politics read this piece below and then got in touch. They invited us to contribute an opinion piece alongside none other than Nadine Dorries of jungle mania fame. The piece, “Does social media do more harm than good to politicians?” can be read over here, right now. Take a look and let us know what you think.

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This morning, the issue of David Cameron’s new Twitter account divided the 33 office right down the middle. A useful tool for a Prime Minister, or an empty-shirt exercise destined for failure? Here, Peter Sigrist and Sam Philips battle it out:

The case FOR David Cameron’s Twitter feed – Peter Sigrist

At the time of writing this, Team Dave isn’t off to the most auspicious start on Twitter.  Follower numbers are looking strong, but content is lacking spirit.  ‘I promise there won’t be “too many tweets…”’ was slightly funny for Team Dave insiders but suggests a man who sees this as a hobby.  And yet…

Twitter shouldn’t be a hobby for a politician.  It’s the real deal.  The chance to shape the debate, unfiltered access to the electorate.  You may get roughed up for your undiluted views but you have the chance immediately to respond to objections, painting your reasons in colours of your choosing.  Twitter’s never going to be a place for quick consensus, but it has the potential to give Team Cameron an unprecedented sense of the spread of opinions in the country.

For a politician of Cameron’s stature, this should have him salivating.  No one ever became great except through many and great mistakes, and Twitter could and should be the perfect proving ground for bold ideas, gently floated, some to prosper and many to die.  Anyone with the confidence and deftness to engage in that sort of debate will possess stronger opinions and better ideas at the far end, with ambiguity and vagueness forced out through honest argument.

A politician of Cameron’s stature should relish the opportunity to dip his cup right into the middle of the fast-flowing stream of Twitter, with all its head and heart, emotion and ideas, inspiration and stupidity.  From Cameron’s point of view, as we all knew when we started using Twitter, it’s about who he follows.  Reward those making valid arguments with your attention, ignore the idiots.  Sometimes, perhaps regularly, he will face opprobrium and abuse.  But what walkabout on a street in Middle England does not come with its fair share?  Most of all, Cameron the tweeter should gain from closeness to the British populace; gain from the authenticity of the imperfect argument; gain from the ability to tell the people he Governs – “this is what I believe”.

Twitter should be the perfect place for a man of the stature of the Prime Minister to tread carefully, get some things right and some things wrong, and gain respect.  But in order to get anywhere at all, he needs to tread.  It’s fine if the drumbeat of the Official David Cameron Twitter feed is prosaic: ‘About to appear on @MarrShow‘.  But the real value to him as a politician and a leader, and to us as the British people, will be realised when he’s himself, for better or worse.

People and the media these days are more accepting of gaffes if you are honest about them and deal with them in a human way.  You need the stomach for the odd mistake, but which politician hasn’t always known that?

Let’s see if David Cameron takes this opportunity to have his voice heard.

The case AGAINST David Cameron’s Twitter feed – Sam Philips

Why shouldn’t David Cameron have a bash at Twitter? No reason at all, he absolutely should give it a go if he’s genuinely interested in it.

He probably shouldn’t do it, just because the other kids are doing it though. It’s much harder to establish and maintain an interesting, informative Twitter feed, than it is a blog for example. Twitter is live 24/7, there’s the expectation to be reactive and responsive, to show the real version of the world you live in, while a blog allows the user to be more considered and less ‘on’.

And so if this new way of sharing doesn’t come naturally, then it could become a problem. You might appear as disingenuous or perhaps worse still for a leader, disconnected.

For a Prime Minister, image and character perception is everything. Every step a leader takes has been well considered and he or she knows a slight error could seriously affect public perception and opinion ratings.

Twitter places notable people under a lens for inspection. It’s a curious and wonderful thing, this new access to that human side to those who were previously presented to the world with an airbrushed finish. It’s a new world, and with it there is a new order to be understood and respected…

Stephen Fry used this brilliantly, to raise awareness of mental health issues. And he exposed his personal mental health challenges in front of an enormous audience – that news travelled across Twitter, on to blogs, and then ended up in national papers and across broadcast. That’s quite some impact. But what can David Cameron do with this space, if he uses it effectively?

Can David Cameron, as leader of this country, present himself on Twitter in such a way as to inspire and encourage a nation, to fill us with confidence? Can he smash down the old order of formality, help to disassociate people from the sense that politicians are disconnected and dishonest?

An interesting debate broke earlier at 33 Digital – some people felt disappointed that celebrities they had previously liked had betrayed themselves with tweets that exposed their true selves. When it comes to a politician, that kind of exposure could cause serious problems. Especially during a time of political apathy, the populous vote may be easily swayed.

The alternative to diving in to Twitter is to take on a safe approach. Employ a team to manage that feed for you, keep it factual, and avoid the crowd where you can. Especially if they’re a bit bitey.  And for now, at least, that seems to be what we have over @David_Cameron.

The tweets with twitpics are like micro press releases, the tone of voice is slightly off. I’ll be watching eagerly for the first question Mr Cameron asks his 94.6K following, and the first time he engages directly with a follower. For now I’m not convinced David Cameron knows how to make the most of this medium, or indeed has the inclination. And for me, having the inclination to, is essential for truly getting involved with the Twitter community.

So, there you have it folks – what do you think? Fodder for The Thick of It? Or savvy PR move?