Learning by Doing, Learning by Sharing

My first experience of blogging, which found an echo of my mind, is from the movie Julie and Julia.

Learning by Doing. In the story, Julie, turns to her 30s (me too), is at loose ends feeling nothing is sure (some sort unsure of my future facing the graduation in May) except when she is cooking: “you can come home and absolutely know that if you add egg yolks to chocolate and sugar and milk, it will get thick, it’s such a comfort.” (Also, what I am quite sure about is my interest in social media and advertising). In attempting to revitalize her marriage, restore her ambition, and save her soul, Julie decides to learn how to cook by cooking all 524 recipes in Julia Child's Mastering the Art of French Cooking, Volume I, in a period of 365 days (Learning by doing, that’s why I decided to learn social media by blogging. I also set a deadline, the period of the following 5 months before I go back to China).

Learning by Sharing. Another important purpose, and benefit, of Julie’s blogging is as she says: “people are reading it, I am sure.” Sharing gives Julie’s project the meaning and cures her uncertainty and frustration of the life. Sharing makes her feel that she is not alone, and such feeling motivates her during those low tide periods. Sharing brings readers’ ideas, critiques, supports, and advices. What's more important, sharing creates a forum for dialogues of those people sharing the common interests, characters, and beliefs. Instead of Julie’s strong proclamation: “I have thoughts, I can write a book,” I would argue that people have thoughts which inspire mine, and we together can make difference.

I think, these are the two major features of social media such as blogs. Doing means you really create the content by yourself, and you are the initiate author; sharing means you are never alone: you have readers out there and you are also the reader of their comments, and you, together with your readers, are creating something new.

In this blog: Social Media Ideas and Critiques, I will post my reflection of the readings and lectures in my social media and PR class base on my past work experiences and current social media cases. The topics may cover current popular events, advertising and PR campaigns, academic and professional research, communication theory, or the practices of public relations. It can be a brainstorming session for a non-profit organization PR program, a harsh critique of some misdeed using social media, a literature review and synthesis of relevant studies, and online print ad and TV commercial show. There will be two new postings each week with regular responses to the comments.

Julie ends her blogging project by saying that "back exactly where we started--just Eric and me, three cats and Buffy...sitting on a couch in the outer boroughs, eating, with Julia chortling alongside us...." I wish that in the end of mine, I can confidently say that “back exactly where I started—my computer, social media books and class notes…sitting in front of my desk, editing blogs, responding comments with some music from Niccolo Paganini, but with more friends known from the blogs, and full brilliant ideas can’t wait to be carried out, and excitement of bring my learning back to China, and more…”

Let's get started, Bon appétit!