The University of Brighton (UK) hosted the first European Conference on Social Media (ECSM) on 10th and 11th July 2014. The event attracted delegates from more than 30 countries across many disciplines to discuss research in this emerging field. During these two days, delegates attended keynote speeches, different presentation streams and a poster exhibition.
The conference opened with a keynote by Dr Farida Vis on “The Evolution of Social Media in Research“. Dr Vis presented an overview of the benefits and potential pitfalls of social media, including big data, ethics, and research design. Although social media research is still developing, lessons can be learned from the first decade of the 21st century. The keynote concluded with some issues to consider for the future of social media research.
David Gurteen, in his keynote, addressed the way “Towards Smarter Socially Mediated Conversations” starting from his own experience of world cafés. These conversational groups provide people with an informal environment in which to exchange ideas and thoughts on issues of mutual interest. He discussed how, with society finding itself in the midst of the digital age, these offline world cafés can be transformed into an online equivalent. Answers are still being searched for, as is the case with many other elements in this online environment. However, for this particular example, it might not be a question of transformation/adjustment, but rather an issue of fully redeveloping something that serves the same purpose and fits within this different dynamic environment.
These thought-provoking keynotes were supplemented by different presentation streams, each of which addressed more specific domains within social media research. Attention was devoted to topics as cultural dimensions and virtual learning commons, social media in marketing, social media and innovation, and social informatics. Having attended the “opportunities and challenges” stream, it again became clear that bringing people from all over the world and across disciplines has the potential to enrich discussion. A presentation stream on “Facebook” addressed language used on this platform and the implementation of it in University learning. The presentations on “Social Informatics” elaborated on the diffusion of innovations frameworks, ranking the authenticity of social network members and the use of the social media canvas in strategy formulation.
Brighton gave a glimpse of the rich potential of what future conferences can be. It was striking to see how well-represented marketing and business were and how health and social care have scope to raise their profile at next year’s conference in Portugal.
