Let me start by saying (a) that I am a fan of James Surowiecki and enjoy his writing and insight; and (b) I think he has a point in his ‘wisdom of crowds‘ thing.

Heck, the whole idea of democracy is based somewhat on the premise that large groups of ordinary folks can exhibit common wisdom.  As Lincoln once said, “God must have loved the common man … he made so many of them!”  I know that some of you read this and think of the current political environment and might conclude otherwise but over the long term democracy has served us … ok, it has served most of us … quite well thank you.

But the cold reality is that crowds can also be stupid.  Very stupid.  And crowds are particularly stupid when then face things that they find foreign, strange, and uncomfortable.

A recent case in point.  The Mississippi school district that canceled their senior prom rather than allow a lesbian to attend in a tuxedo with her girlfriend.  Yup.  You read that right.  Grown adults so afraid of a teen age lesbian couple that they canceled prom night.

I don’t think it matters what you think about gays and lesbians.  And I don’t think it matters what you think about teenage gays and lesbians.  You may believe it normal and a sign of a maturing, evolving culture.  Or you may find it unnatural and a sign of society going to hell in a handbasket.  Or somewhere in between.  Doesn’t matter.

That a school district would cancel prom over fears that kids might see two girls making out is just stupid.  Don’t Mom and Dad know that their children have already seen that and more on Fox?  Do they think that if they cancel prom gays and lesbians will disappear?  That their children won’t get ‘infected’?  Don’t they realize that this lesbian couple is already in their children’s high school?  That rather than make this go away that it shoves it in everyone’s face.

Crowds do bizarre stupid things when faced with cultural fears.

I know first hand growing up in Jefferson Parish Louisiana in the 1970s.  I attended a public high school that was ALL boys.  Yup.  Public school.  All boys.  Why?  Because after desegregation some of the white parents – let’s call them a crowd of white parents at the time – figured that while they may have to accept that their white children will have to go to school with blacks, they could make sure that their white girls won’t have to mingle with black boys!

And that was that.  High school was divided into all boys and all girls schools.

Stupid, stupid, stupid.

Conclusion?  Crowds can be dumb.  And it isn’t hard to find examples (can anyone say … housing bubble?).  So look around.  What crowds are you hanging out with?  What are they doing?  Occasionally they can be wise.  But they can just as easily be stupid.

Chart your own course.

Let me be clear.  I’m not in therapy.

Maybe I should be.  Nothing wrong with it.  Just not for me right now.

By “my therapist” I refer to my beloved and longsuffering wife the social worker and therapist who explained to me and for all of us the real story behind the Tiger Woods ‘apology’.

Recently she enlightened me on another recent event – the President’s health care reform summit.

Did you see it?  Any of it?  I found it fascinating and apparently others did as well.  There was so much interest that it crashed some of the sites that were carrying it live.

If you did see it you may remember the opening by President Obama and his desire to focus on the positive things they can agree on.

Focus on the positive.  Talk about things upon which we all can agree.

It went down hill from there.  Apparently the one thing they couldn’t agree on was to focus on what they agreed on.  What they did seem to agree on was sniping, digs, invectives, and occasional ad hominems – typical political talking points.

As my wife explained it, this was (like the Tiger episode) therapy in motion.  Again, let me paraphrase:

It looked like some of the first sessions you have when you are working with dysfunctional families, spouses, or parents with their children.  You always start with asking them to identify positive things about each other.  It never works.  Never.   Every time they come back with criticisms.   You’re not five minutes into the session and people are screaming at each other, letting loose f-bombs and a host of  “asshole”, “jerk”, “bitch” commentary.  They just have all this pent up anger and hate for each other.  They want — no, they need — to get all that stuff off their chests and on the table for everyone — at least the ‘independent’ therapist — to see.  They can’t help it.  They just have to go negative before they can begin getting to the positive.

The problem with the President is that he didn’t do this sooner and didn’t do it long enough.  You can’t do therapy in one session.  You only get people to move over time, little by little.  You have to wear them down.  If the President had done this twice a week for six months, I bet he’d have gotten folks to open up and talk about those positives.

But like therapy, this stuff takes time.

My therapist!  She’s not only beautiful but absolutely brilliant!

The problem with most people’s view of the Tiger Woods apology is they view it as making an apology — not as making amends.

There have been no shortage of critics of the Tiger Woods’ televised apology.

George Will said of it on ABC News, “if your problem is that your behavior has revealed your public persona to be a fake, you shouldn’t stage this grotesquely fake press conference.”  The folks at the industry publication “PR Junkie” had a field day.

It was awkward, and it felt like one of those hostage videos when someone is forced, at gunpoint, to read a statement damning his or her nation and culture.

Even gold medal skier Lindsay Von got into the act.

Not only do we have a plethora of experts on public apologies, it seems that a good portion of those experts have about as much compassion and forgiveness in them as Nurse Ratched.

Clearly there’s a good portion of the public out there who never think along the lines of “there but for the grace of God go I.”

Tiger Woods is a dog that is down and there sure seems to be a lot of kicking going on.

Good for him?  Not really.  Good for us?  Absolutely not.

I look at it very differently and have my wife to thank for that.  Yes, my wife feels bad for Tiger Woods.   You might think that wives would be the first to cast a stone at Woods.  But you see my wife is a social worker.  She sees stuff like Tiger Woods all the time.  Much worse, actually.  She not only works with people that have addiction problems, she works with their victims as well.  She’s no softie when it comes to this stuff but I’d argue that she has more real world experience — and perhaps even more moral standing — to comment on this type of behavior than do Mr. Will or Mrs. Von.

Her reaction to this video was (and I’m paraphrasing):

This is a man in therapy.

His apology is not an apology, it is an effort to make amends.  Go read the twelve step process.  He is on the middle steps.  He went through each group of people that he hurt.  One by one.  Apologized to each.  Said it would be actions not words.  He’s doing exactly what he is supposed to do.

Let me tell you how awful the type of therapy is that he is going through.  It is humiliating.  It is degrading.  You have to accept that you’re a pervert.  A predator.  A sicko.  It isn’t pretty.  He’s not apologizing in the sense that people know it.  He’s trying to make amends to those he hurt.  He’s doing what he’s supposed to do.

I Feel for him.

That, my friends, is the attitude of compassion.

Criticize the apology and Woods all you want.  What was most interesting to me was that his focus WAS NOT golf, the Masters, getting back to the game. His timetable appeared to be in function of his ability to climb the twelve steps of recovery.  And I saw Friday’s televised event as him working on steps 8 and 9:

“make a list of all persons we had harmed, and be willing to make amends them all; and make direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others.”

Can’t fault a man for that.

In fact, isn’t that something everyone should consider?

I’d like to introduce you to an important book.  It is Jaron Lanier’s “You Are Not a Gadget:  A Manifesto.”

But first, a few questions.

How are you?  Everything good?

How about your life on social media?  How is that going?

Have you updated your blog? Gotten any comments lately?  Any trackbacks?  And your Facebook page?  What is your friend count?  Who’s writing on your wall?  How about your Twitter feed?  Have you checked in with your Google account?  Gone through your Google alerts?  Charted your progress with Google Analytics?   Have you checked in with Foursquare?  Did you get a new badge?  How are your Twitter client numbers?  Is your following getting bigger?  Are your “retweets” growing?

Is this you?  Is this what social media is doing to your life?

For those who are regular visitors to the JuiceBar you’ll know that I’ve a love/hate relationship with social media.  I think a lot of us do.  And the irony of me taking on social media through social media is certainly not lost on me.

Enter Jaron Lanier, the father of virtual reality.  He is an admitted computer genius and geek but also a musician and artists.  And as he looks around at what social media has done, he’s none too happy.  His recent book “You Are Not a Gadget:  A Manifesto” is a great read.  Yesterday’s Washington Post review had a good summary paragraph up front.

A self-confessed “humanistic softie,” Lanier is fighting to wrest control of technology from the “ascendant tribe” of technologists who believe that wisdom emerges from vast crowds, rather than from distinct, individual human beings. According to Lanier, the Internet designs made by that “winning subculture” degrade the very definition of humanness. The saddest example comes from young people who brag of their thousands of friends on Facebook. To them, Lanier replies that this “can only be true if the idea of friendship is reduced.”

If you think that’s good, try this.  Here are a couple of excerpts from an interview on Amazon’s site.

Here Lanier talks about how Web 2.0 actually works against the average Joe …

The problem is not inherent in the Internet or the Web. Deterioration only began around the turn of the century with the rise of so-called “Web 2.0″ designs. These designs valued the information content of the web over individuals. It became fashionable to aggregate the expressions of people into dehumanized data. There are so many things wrong with this that it takes a whole book to summarize them. Here’s just one problem: It screws the middle class. Only the aggregator (like Google, for instance) gets rich, while the actual producers of content get poor.

And the big problem according to Lanier is this crazy idea of the “liberation” of information — as if what we’re doing on the social media front is akin to the storming of the Bastille.  Lanier writes:

The original turn of phrase was “Information wants to be free.” And the problem with that is that it anthropomorphizes information. Information doesn’t deserve to be free. It is an abstract tool; a useful fantasy, a nothing. It is nonexistent until and unless a person experiences it in a useful way. What we have done in the last decade is give information more rights than are given to people.

Think about that.

With the whole huffing and puffing of social media claiming that “Content is King” … are we in turn making ourselves slaves?

There’s a buzz around a recent report by the public relations firm Edleman.  For ten long years they have invested in something they have called the “trust barometer.”  Think of it like a trust weather vane.  Where is trust going?  How strong is that wind?  Who becoming more trustworthy?  Who is becoming less?

Now I’ll admit that I’m skeptical about all such research.  One reason is that I do that for a living.  I know how tricky it is to measure ANYTHING related to public opinion, much less values and beliefs.  Measuring trust is right up there with predicting the path of nanoparticles.  In fact — to carry the quantum physics analogy further — you can spend a lot of time just defining what you mean by the word trust.

But I digress.

The most recent report by the Edelman Trust Barometer is a juicy “man bites dog” story.

Amidst the growth of social networking and consumer generated content, people are trusting their friends LESS, not MORE.

Yes, you read that right.  All that money and time we spend on peer-to-peer communication has resulted in people thinking less and less of each other.

Seems that the more and better I get to know you, the more I realize that you’re not smarter than me.  You’re just another Joe.  Warts and all.

Perhaps even worse.  With all your tweets, and posts and streams I come to the startling realization that you are even MORE screwed up than I AM.  And I’m a really screwed up person!  I should know.

Because I know myself only too well, I don’t trust myself with a lot of things.  Now I’ve read your blog, your Facebook page, your Twitter stream and I’m not impressed.  I thought you had it all together.  But you sound a lot like me.  Why the hell should I trust you?

I write all this knowing people who read this blog are saying the same thing about me.  They read this and say — “who the hell is this guy?”  Why the hell am I listening to him?  I’m perfectly fine with that.

And that’s the lesson of social media.  We knew it before blogs and MySpace pages.  Familiarity can indeed breed contempt.

And that was the mistake all along.  The big myth in social media was that peer-to-peer communication would elevate everyone.  That there would be wisdom created in crowds.  That trust would emerge as we all got to know each other.

But something different happened along with way.  We didn’t change.  We remained ourselves, just with a lot more avenues to express that.  And we exposed the true nature of trust.

I don’t trust the shallow frat boy.  I don’t trust the occasional remark.  I don’t trust just any old joe just because he or she is my age and looks like me.   I don’t trust folks shilling for that latest cause.

I trust people who don’t look at me as a customer, a potential sale, or a Linked In connection.

I trust people who look at me as a person, a human being, and a friend.

I have to credit this to my brother, Jim.  This was the letter he sent to folks at his firm.  I did a short write through and sent to folks at my firm.

Dear Friends of the JuiceBar,

I grew up in New Orleans.

Our family had season tickets for the first years of Saints existence.  My dad took me to the very first Saints game in 1967.  I was 11 years old.  Tulane Stadium.  The Los Angeles Rams kicked off.  Rookie wide receiver John Gilliam caught the ball and ran the kickoff back for a touchdown!  A touchdown!  Our very first play.

Saints then went on to lose 13 to 27.  It has been downhill ever since.

I have been a Saints fan for over 40 years and experienced only 9 winning seasons.

Having the Saints in the SuperBowl is a surreal and a bit delirious.

As you also know, New Orleans citizens look for any reason to party.  The song Stand up and Get Crunk is being blasted out of speakers all across the ‘Nawlins’.  Regardless of tonight’s outcome, I encourage you to stream it, download it and play it on Sunday evening.  Don’t forget the volume. If you feel inspired, do a little dance with beer in hand in tribute to those who have suffered for so long.

Know that you’ll be joining every New Orleanian in the country – whether they’re in the Crescent City or not – whether the Saints win tonight or not …

“Laissez Les Bon Temps Roulez”.

Geaux Saints!

I have long maintained that the biggest asset of any individual, brand or organization is ALWAYS is also its greatest liability.

Really.  I really say this.  A lot.

Don’t believe me?  Just ask folks that work with me.

So now the rage in social media is “streaming.”  That is not what I’m doing now.  I’m blogging.  And now I find out that blogging is passe.  Twitter stream.  Facebook stream.  Posterous.

Experts say blogging is so … “slow and methodical.”‘

We don’t want that!  What we need today is “fast and chaotic.”

While fast and chaotic may indeed be a more accurate reflection of everyday life … allowing a constantly changing free exchange of thoughts and information … there’s always a dark side.

For a funny but insightful look at this dark side I strongly encourage you to read Ed Docx’s article Twittering Fools, in the Utne Reader, reprinted from Prospect.

Tired of the mindless commentary from ordinary people who have less knowledge and expertise about subjects than my three-year-old grandson, he writes:

I don’t care what Andy from Cheadle thinks about the Gaza Strip, the ice caps, Manchester City, or even Cheadle. Nobody cares. Nobody except Andy, and presumably he already knows. When I turn on the radio or the television, or when I open a book or a newspaper, what I want is an expert. I want insightful commentary. I want stylistic elegance. I want eloquence. I want uninterrupted expertise.

And that’s the dark side of all the social media wackiness out there.  I’d just as soon my life not be a Joycean stream of consciousness.  Given everything going on out there I’m getting more and more attracted to things being a bit slower, a bit more methodical.

“Streams”.  Stream this.  Stream that.

But you’ve got to ask … streams of what?

I work in a field that is awash with experts.  Indeed, seems there are more experts in what I do,  than people.

I’m talking about social media but I probably could be talking about anything.

Roderick Low posted a good summary of the dilemma (along with some good prescriptions) in which he cites the blog Broadstuff that noted given current growth projections …

“by 2012, we would have as many as 30 million ’social media experts’ plying their trade globally.”

Wow.  30 million experts.  That is a lot of experts.  I wonder who they will be working for.

In fact, based on what I see a good percentage of today’s experts don’t have clients.  What are we going to do with all these experts?

Which brings me the second area of job title explosion:  commentators.

With all the new media out there we’ve got more than you can shake a stick at.  Actually a lot of them you’d just as soon hit with a stick not just shake it at them.  But given the explosion of everyday commentators you’d only end up playing “whack-a-mole” (how is that for tortured stream of conscious imagery?)

Just one thing about those commentators.  A lot of them never really have had any direct experience in what they are commenting on.  This is particularly true in politics.  Have Rush Limbaugh or Keith Oberman ever run for office?  Ever worked in government?  Ever practiced constitutional law?  No but they sure can comment on it all.

Experts with no clients … commentators with no experience.

Here’s a suggestion.  We follow our brethren in sports.  Watch a football show.  Maybe one or two laymen but they are always teamed up with former coaches and players — that is, people who have actually had experience in doing what they are commenting on.

Experts who actually do work.  Commentators who actually know from experience what they are talking about.

What a concept.

There’s a nightmare in Haiti.  But it is not really a nightmare.  Because when you wake up it is still there.  And it gets worse.  It will be there tomorrow and the next day and the next.  Many people are trying to help.  But what happened quickly won’t be undone quickly.

That is the rub of life.  Disaster often strikes quickly.  Recovery always takes time.

Today amidst all the tragedy we celebrate the birthday of Martin Luther King Jr.

Why?

Because while he lived in the nightmare of segregation and prejudice, he also worked towards the dream of a world without it.

Because having the dream was only half the battle.  Keeping it.  Holding fast to it.  Making it part of who you are.  Incorporating it into your waking up and going to sleep.  Never letting go.  Never letting up.  Always standing firm even when people spurn and ridicule.

And so even though we face the difficulties of today and tomorrow, I still have a dream.

It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream.

I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal.”

I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia, the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit down together at the table of brotherhood.

I have a dream that one day even the state of Mississippi, a state sweltering with the heat of injustice, sweltering with the heat of oppression, will be transformed into an oasis of freedom and justice.

I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.  I have a dream today!

I have a dream that one day, down in Alabama, with its vicious racists, with its governor having his lips dripping with the words of “interposition” and “nullification” — one day right there in Alabama little black boys and black girls will be able to join hands with little white boys and white girls as sisters and brothers.  I have a dream today!

I have a dream that one day every valley shall be exalted, and every hill and mountain shall be made low, the rough places will be made plain, and the crooked places will be made straight; “and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed and all flesh shall see it together.”

Thank you Reverend King.

Now.

What’s your dream?

As folks who drink at the JuiceBar know, I write a lot about travel.

So here’s a travel story with a simple lesson.

It is amazing what happens when you are nice to people.  It is even more amazing when you go the extra mile and do something surprisingly pleasant.

The day started with a 4:30 am alarm from my BlackBerry.  I love my BlackBerry.  I hate my alarm.

I lay there thinking.  Can I stay in my bed?  Please?  God, it is early!  In my mind I sound like a 10-year-old.

By 5:15 I’m heading down the Dulles Toll Road ready to attack a day trip to Boston.  Leave at 6:30 am.  Grab a cab.  Make a 9 am meeting.  Break.  2 pm fly-by.  Head home on the 4:30 pm.  Able to make a meeting back in Northern Virginia at 7:30 pm.

The above is the reason I have not watched the movie Up in the Air.  The movie is way too close.

Slug through security.  People mover.  Gate B66.  And here is where things get interesting.

Flight delay.  Mechanical problems.

It is 6:15 and the agent is actually cheery.  Upbeat.  Moreover she’s open, honest and most of all accessible.  Next update at 7 pm.  Bing.  At 7 am she’s talking to me.  Next update at 7:30 am.  7:30 am comes and bing, she’s talking to me again.  Answering anybody’s questions.  More agents begin to cluster around the gate readying to move.  Decision made.  Next update will be at 8:30 and there’s a 9 am flight so let’s get everyone on to the 9 am flight.  Agents fan out.  There’s running through travelers like a California wildfire through Hollywood.  I timidly note to one agent that my meeting in Boston starts at 9 am.  So I don’t know if this whole flight is worth it.

He says to me, “Let me know what you decided and we’ll take care of you.”

Thirty minutes later, after a handful of emails and a couple of calls with my CEO, we pull the plug on the day trip.

I go back to a DIFFERENT agent and tell him my decision.  I’m so used to being abused, charged, and refused that I don’t even ask for a refund.

Turns out I didn’t have to.

“Oh, yes, Mr. Johnson.  My colleague mentioned that he talked to you.  Totally understand.  He already told me that we’re going to issue you a refund.  Should just take a minute.”

I love JetBlue – for today — because …

• They were nice.
• They were accessible.
• They did something that they didn’t have to do.
• In fact, they did something that others NEVER do.

I say that I love JetBlue today because I’m just as human (and fickle) as anyone else.  But if JetBlue continues to do this, they may be taking a lot of travel away from United.  At least from one traveler I know.

[ENDNOTE for anyone from JetBlue reading this.  It was the agents at Gate 66, flight 1250.  They were ALL great.  Please do something nice for them.]