If you live in the Portland, Maine area, and you use Twitter, you have probably heard of SMUG.  For the uninitiated, SMUG stands for “Social Media Usability Gurus.”  It’s a parody blog, Twitter account, and Facebook profile page that mocks so-called Social Media experts.  The owner of the account is not afraid of offending anyone, including local internet micro-celebrities and social media aficionados.

SMUG keeps his real-life identity a secret.  I imagine that it’s so he can hurl his snarkiness without fear of retribution.

The first SMUGup

On September 9, SMUG hosted the first ever “SMUGup.”  The big draw was that SMUG would finally reveal himself/herself/itself to the attendees.  I was in attendance, and like most of the people I spoke with, was skeptical that we would actually get to see the real SMUG.  As it turns out, our skepticism was warranted.

Disappointment

SMUG was not revealed.  We were greeted with a bevy of professionally produced low-grade swag (pens, business cards), posters, programs, and surveys.  And we were shown a video, allegedly a live feed of SMUG addressing the attendees:

Clues to SMUG’s true identity

Has SMUG grown too careless?  The recent event revealed many clues about the perpetrator.  The first clue is what I’ll be addressing in today’s post.  SMUG, or an agent of SMUG, disguised his voice in the video address, but it seems like he used a simple pitch adjustment.  If you want to adjust the pitch back, well, there’s an app for that.  So I took the liberty of adjusting the pitch on the audio.  Unfortunately, I can’t identify the voice – it must be someone I don’t know very well.  But perhaps one of my astute readers (and I know there are a lot of you!  Hi, mom!) can figure it out.

Without further ado, I present to you, the unaltered voice of SMUG.

Why I Am Doing This

I don’t have any problem with SMUG.  Although he/she/it has been a little caustic with me on Twitter, he’s been a lot worse to other folks.  I find the whole thing pretty funny.  I think a lot of the “experts” have no idea how desperate they look while trying to cash in on something they barely understand, and SMUG puts them in their place.  But I love a challenge.  I think it takes cojones to think you can pull off hiding in plain sight, in the tiny world of our small city’s social media community.

Part of me is reluctant to even try to figure this out, because it might ruin the fun for me and for everyone else.  But I also think SMUG needs to be knocked down a peg, and shown that it’s not that easy to hide behind an anonymous account.  He can’t hide forever.

Unless you’ve been living in a cave, you have heard about or participate in Twitter (no disrespect to those annoying, ubiquitous Geico cavemen.  Hell, they are probably on Twitter now).  If you do tweet, then you probably know about #followfriday.  For the uninitiated, #followfriday is a tradition whereby you tweet your recommendations of fellow twitters worth following.

What started as a quaint concept in a single tweet by Micah Baldwin (@micah) avalanched into an internet meme.  You can read about this phenomenon’s history in a great article on Mashable and on Micha’s own blog.

Fellow blogger, Portlander, and all-around great guy Rich Brooks (The Rich Brooks) posted some advice on his company’s blog on how to properly do follow Friday, and I think his points are worth repeating.  At the risk of sounding like a social media curmudgeon, here is my take on how best to do #followfriday:

DO: Post an explanation on why someone is worth following.  I might be following you because you live in my hometown.  If you follow someone else because they share your hobby, then they might not make a good match for me.  Tell me why I should care about your friend.  The tweet below says I should follow @staffphoto for photographs (I think).  Well done, @lucaseditor!

DON’T: Retweet other people’s #followfridays, especially without any explanation.  An occasional “oh, I agree, @reallycoolguy is worth following” retweet is one thing, but some of the #followfriday’s are getting downright spammy:

Above – what is this?  Spam?  A bot? I can’t even tell.  Below – who are these people?  And why is this particular list so special that it’s worth parroting twice over?

DO: Tell us about interesting twitterers that regularly make you chuckle, teach you something, or share interesting links.  Tell us about the people who make you love twitter and keep you coming back.  And it doesn’t hurt to use a catchy “teaser” that makes me want to check out a profile:

DON’T: Worry about offending your friends if you don’t mention them in your #followfriday. Worry about the quality of your tweets.  If you’re rattling off a list of people in your friends list because you’re afraid of otherwise offending them, then you’re diluting your own credibility and the quality of your tweets.  And don’t sweat it if you have nobody new to recommend this week – you’ll be inspired next week!

DO: Share people who you would want to have learned about sooner.  When #followfriday actually works, it’s a beautiful thing, just ask MsLatina and Nachhi:

DON’T: Please don’t fill your entire feed with #followfriday’s for several hours in a row.  I followed you because I thought you were interesting.  I agree with this guy, @ajayshroff:

DO: If they’re interesting, it’s definitely okay to help out a new friend on twitter who doesn’t have a lot of followers yet.  We all have to start somewhere. #Followfriday is all about spreading the word about interesting people.

Conclusion

I don’t claim to be a “social media expert” or “twitter guru,” so take all of my humble suggestions for what they are: opinions from a crotchety old grump with a blog.  I actually really do enjoy #followfriday, and I sincerely hope that it doesn’t lose its usefulness because it isn’t used as well as it could be.  What are your suggestions?