I’m no computer genius, my older brother fulfills that role in my family, but when he isn’t around my parents turn to me for questions on computers and the internet. They assume that since I grew up with technology in my childhood, I should have the answers. If they had questions on how to set up an email account, I was there. If they needed help paying bills online and setting up a zip drive for work, I got it done (with only a few setbacks).
Then somehow between going to college and sitting in Philip Nardone’s Agency PR class at Syracuse University, I found that technology had gotten the best of me. I was constantly hearing about new media and its involvement in PR. I was vaguely aware of blogs and podcasts but didn’t realize the impact they were having on the profession. I realized that I needed to understand these forms of new media to succeed in the PR industry and decided to volunteer to write for PAN’s blog as well as attend the new media series run by a student here at SU.
Now I’m more aware of the uses of new media and PR everywhere I look. Such as JetBlue’s CEO relaying a message to the public explaining their recent problems via a YouTube video that can also be found on its Web site. Or it can be found in companies such as Mercedes expanding PR tactics to include the virtual world of Second Life. Participating in a webinar for class last week proved to me that new media is fully integrated into my life now, whether I want it to be or not.
While I think I’ve got a better handle on it, my brother will always be the computer whiz in the family and I’ll continue to call him incessantly for tech advice. However, I think I’ve come a far way from my first experience with new media, which was thinking the computer boxes my brother and I received on Christmas when I was nine were actually three television sets.