Last week I had the great opportunity to go back to Georgetown University. I am an alumnus of the Communications, Culture and Technology Masters Program (photo credit: Dick Leonhardt in 1963!)
This program is at the crux of communications’ new order. Conceived in 1996, the program recognizes that communications has become multidisciplinary. It involves cultural norms and behavioral patterns, communications media forms, and technology’s certain impact on the way we interact in our communities. Social media certainly fits in!
Students have the ability to choose their own path within a wide variety of CCT and other department courses to forge an understanding this dynamic movement. It was fascinating talking to the students, who are getting into some really bleeding edge studies of Facebook identity, social media network usage, and more. CCT students are the future of communications, and many alumni have moved on to very successful careers.
It brought back fond memories, too. I got to catch up with CCT Program Director Linda Garcia, who has guided the program from its rocky sophomoric efforts to an established powerhouse in the Greater Washington region. Back in 2000, my thesis focused on mobile Internet’s potential to surpass landline usage and built a diffusion model.
GNOVIS Podcast
While there I had the opportunity to do a podcast with GNOVIS Managing Editor Brad Weikel. GNOVIS is the official student journal of CCT, so check it out. Lots of fascinating insights. In the podcast we discussed:
- How the book happened, including it’s name
- Brian Solis, and the nature of PR 2.0
- The goal of moving executives from one-way to two communications
- jetBlue versus Southwest social media
- New media is old fashioned relationships
- PR’s slow adoption of social media
- Bubble: The rise of dot bombs in the current environment
- The culture part of CCT and sociology