Wide-eyed and Jaded

Before I explain what this is all about, please know I didn’t say one of these words about myself. That is exactly why this list was created. “You’re so hard on yourself” is a phrase uttered to me often, and I heard a lot of it this weekend at PodCamp Boston 3.

It’s hard for me to take someone else’s advice regarding my personal life because I’m so stuck in my own mind. But my amazing friends who attended PCB3 with me helped me step out of my head for a while and appreciate Rayanne for everything Rayanne is.

After the final day of the conference, my group/our clique/the awesome Seesmicers went out to make sure we said goodbye on a high note. When I wasn’t paying attention, my e-mom passed around a napkin printed with the words, “Rayanne is” and asked everyone to choose five words that they thought described me.

You’ve seen the result.

The phrase I most clearly remember from PCB3 is: Seesmic is emotional.

I spent the weekend with about a dozen people I met many months ago on Seesmic. I have gotten to know these people online as well as I would have if I met them in person. When we departed early Monday morning, I cried. And cried and cried and cried. When my co-workers asked me on Tuesday morning how my weekend was, I had to choke back tears and tell them I wasn’t ready to talk about it.

I feel like I’m going through a breakup. The feeling was especially present when I expressed my complete sadness to some of the other PCB3 attendees and got responses like, “Yeah, it’s sad, but we’ll see each other again soon.” I thought I was too emotionally attached and was about to torture myself further.

But my friend (and one of the group) ChrisCavs said it best on a Seesmic post with something like this:

I’m glad I’m not the only one who’s constantly checking Flickr for new pictures and videos. What is it with this weekend? I guess we all needed something like that.

So, I’m not alone. PodCamp Boston was a wonderful experience. Seesmic is emotional. And I’ll likely have more to say about that later.

Photos by MissSomething and Starman.

One of the first things I was taught in my Online PR course was the importance of building, protecting and managing my personal brand. Keep up blog posts (I promise I’m working on this!), leave comments on other blogs, get involved in various online spaces, be careful of what you have on your Facebook profile, etc.

I found it pretty easy to produce some top notch Google juice of my own. It isn’t difficult when you have a name like Rayanne Langdon. Even before joining Seesmic, signing up to Twitter or starting a discussion about ethics on Inside PR, googling “Rayanne Langdon” turned up dozens of pages—most of which directly related to me. A LiveJournal account here, a profile on the CBC Radio 3 website there… I’ve existed online for a very long time. One of the first searches I did resulted in my re-discovery of an ICQ Foo Fighters fan group I made when I was 14. I called it Forever Foo. I’m a moron. Hah.

I was never scared of any of the information out there about me. I’ve never worried about what I did or said in the past that may rear its questionable head again. I’ve done and I still do some weird and ridiculous things on the Internet (more posts are a-brewin’), and I am not ashamed or embarrassed. I’m the girl who had Wayne Gretzky as an imaginary friend when I was a child, remember?

The intricacies of my online activities make me who I am. I love and am so proud of everything one can learn about me by doing a simple Google search. My heart goes out to those with names a little more common than mine.

So, when I see influencers teaching young people to constantly remain professional in all their online endeavours, I feel sad for them. I recognize the necessity to smarten up about the public photos posted on one’s Facebook profile, but I think introducing someone to online public relations by giving warnings about what can and will be used against them deters young people from wanting to get involved in such a space.

Yes, being social media savvy might help a student land a great job in the near future, but don’t lie—there are still plenty of communications jobs for those refusing to blog or tweet. Many people still need to be convinced that this a great place to be! Please don’t use scare tactics. And yes, I believe scare tactics are exactly what is being used.

We are all people. We all make mistakes and we all want to have fun. We can be responsible and human at the same time.

I haven’t been motivated to update this thing as of late. It’s not for lack of things to talk about, because I have a list of topics I’d like to discuss and ask questions about. There are many reasons why I’ve been less excited about blogging than usual, but this post is about only one of them.

I’m addicted to Seesmic, which is “a video micro blogging web application,” according to Wikipedia. The Seesmic blog explains the company:

Until now, online communication has lacked personality as it’s been limited to text (IM, SMS, email). Now, Seesmic brings conversation alive through video. See and hear people share their experiences straight from their webcams, join in live conversations, and engage in real interactions with real people.

The site is unbelievable, really. I’ve become friends with people who live in Brazil, Colombia, France, Puerto Rico and various American and Canadian cities. The platform is incredible, and it’s still in developing stages. In fact, those participating in the alpha release testing (such as Miranda and myself), are encouraged to voice their opinions on the site and provide suggestions. But, it’s really the people who make the site so enjoyable. I’ve never felt such a warm sense of community online.

I could go on about Seesmic forever, but I’d rather share with you some creativity I’ve been part of as a member. I can’t post a video in my blog yet (presumably because prblogs.org isn’t as advanced as Wordpress), but please visit the links below and let me know what you think.

During some musical exploration one night, I posted this video of me playing a cover of Piazza, New York Catcher by Belle and Sebastian.

Today, Lucas, a lovely boy from France, and I performed a duet of Anyone Else But You by the Moldy Peaches (made famous through the movie Juno).

There has been a lot of experimenting with collaborations on Seesmic. One night, I played my own version of Anyone Else But You, and was thrilled to have several people add their own parts to it (cello, saxophone, flute, drums). I won’t post any more videos right now, but please let me know if you are interested in seeing them.

EDIT: “The Seesmic Players” were featured on this episode of Seesmic Cafe.

There was a thread today about how PR professionals can use Seesmic. Some interesting ideas were presented both by creative folk interested in PR and those who are skeptical of PR people regardless. Miranda pointed out how Seesmic can improve video conferencing, which I think is particularly applicable in PR today because the platform allows the person creating the post to think about their response instead of busting it out without considering the consequence of their words or the reaction of others.

What does everyone else think? In what other ways can a tool like this be useful in the professional world?