Social Media Case 9

I have never heard of a General Authority trying to sell something related to their calling or a talk they have given. I remember when the Ponderize talk was given, but I did not hear anything about the website that was created and the merchandise they tried to sell. It made me kind of sad to hear about, and while they probably had pure intentions to begin with, it was disheartening to see them try and profit off the church. This church leader did apologize, and said that he should have stopped this website from ever being started. However, the damage was done and he still received heavy criticism. Ponderize was meant to mean ponder and memorize, but after this event the Urban Dictionary had a different definition for the word.  

While I believe that you should not use your religious position to try and sell merchandise, I do not think the General Authority and his son meant any harm by what they had done. It makes me wonder if other church leaders knew they were planning on launching this kind of website and if it was okay for them to do so. I also think that if the proceeds of the merchandise were going towards a charitable cause, they should have stated that in the first place and not after the fact. It just made them look guilty and like they were trying to make up for doing something wrong. It also kind of made it seem like they were only going to donate the proceeds because people were unhappy with what they had done.

Devin Durrant and his son Ryan probably did not think they were going to be so heavily criticized, and I think that is the case for a lot of people. They do not think of the power of the internet, and how many people are going to scrutinize what you do.

Social Media Case 8

We need to always be careful about what we do online, because no matter how simple or unintentional it may be, it could always come back to haunt us. I think this is the case for the server Chelsea Welch. Chelsea was fired for posting a picture of a receipt where a customer, Alois Bell, was upset about the mandatory tipping. Bell stated that she gave God 10%, so why do you get 18? She scratched out the tip line, and signed the receipt Pastor Alois Bell. Welch was not even the server who waited on Bell, she just happened to see the receipt and take a picture of it. In the moment, she probably thought it would be funny to post, or even a way to blow off steam because it is really frustrating when you work hard and get stiffed. She probably had no idea her actions would go viral, as they so often do. What started out as something she probably deemed harmless caused her to lose her job. You can hear what she had to say about this situation here.

Pastor Bell was at first furious over the incident, and wanted everyone who had been working that night to be fired. She was receiving a huge amount of backlash for her actions, and was being called out for being UnChristlike.  After receiving more criticism she claimed that what she had done was a ‘lapse of judgement’ and felt sorry for the whole ordeal. You can watch a short news clip detailing the event here. Her reputation was really damaged and while she did not lose her job, she received a lot of criticism online. She felt ashamed because she brought such negativity to her church and ministry. While this should have never gone viral, it is hard to feel sorry for her when she acted so rude.

Applebee’s policy  was very clear that you could not do anything to breach the confidentiality of a employee or guest. Chelsea knew this when she signed her contract. While Chelsea was fired, I think the Pastor’s reputation was much more damaged. People were rallying for Chelsea and saying it was unfair for her to be fired. People were commenting awful things about the Pastor and how it was unacceptable, especially because of her position.

Social Media Case 7

Being in the public eye can mean your every move will be scrutinized. If you are in a position where you know people are going to be watching you, you have to be very careful about what you do and say. I think this is especially true if you are in politics because not only are people going to be carefully watching you, there are those people who are going to be watching specifically for mistakes. I feel like we live in a society where the higher your reputation, the harder you have to fall. I think this is the case with Anthony Weiner.

He was in a high position of power by being a Democratic representative. Because he had such a big reputation he had a lot to lose, and that he did. When he was investigated and later charged for texting explicit images of himself to a young woman who was a minor, he lost everything. You can read about his court case here. It details what happened, and how the sentencing was judged. Not only did he lose his position, his wife filed for divorce, he was sent to prison, and had to be registered as a sex offender.

At first he denied what he had done, but the truth eventually came out. I think that although he eventually came clean to what he had sent, the damage was already done. When I hear about a public figure denying any sort of scandal and trying their best to cover it up, only to realize they can’t so they tell the truth, I tend to not accept their apologies. To me it seems that they are not remorseful about what they did, they are remorseful about being caught. Anthony had several cases of sexting scandals  and only after he realized he was going to be charged did he stop denying what he had done and start apologizing. When your every move is being watched, I do not think trying to hide what you have done will do you any favors. It will only make you seem guiltier.

Online Reputation

Online Reputation – Jayci Hale

While I felt a little creepy digging into another person’s life, it was interesting to see how much I learned by going through different forms of media. I researched Jayci Hale, and found out a lot about her. Jayci Jean Hale is from Grantsville Utah, and graduated from high school in 2013. She attends Utah State University and is a Communication Studies major. She seems like a really happy person who loves life and is a lot of fun to be around.

Cheerleader

Jayci was a cheerleader at her high school, and it seemed to be a big and important part of her life.

After graduation she became a Honeybee for the baseball team The Bees and has been doing so for the past few summers. She is a huge sports fan and says that baseball is her favorite, with football as a close second. She seemed very involved in her school, and continued with that spirit of involvement when working as a Honeybee.

Lifestyle Blog

Jayci not only has her social media cases blog for this class, but also runs a lifestyle blog about the things she is passionate about. You can see why she has this blog and read about it here.   On her blog she talks about fashion and has links to different stores where she got some of her clothes. She also has beauty tips and advice on her favorite products. She also cares a lot about health and fitness, and shares her tips for meal planning and gives examples of healthy meals she enjoys. Jayci also seems to be a fan of traveling because it is a main point of her blog, and she has a post all about a trip she took with her boyfriend to Las Vegas. In the post she details where they stayed, where they ate, and what shows they went to. She has a fun sense of humor and is not afraid to joke around, while still maintaining a professional voice on her blog.

She gives good reviews about places to and good food to order, and continues her healthy lifestyle by giving healthier options to order. Her Pinterest also shows her passion for healthy lifestyles and traveling. She enjoys sharing her lifestyle not only through her blog, but through what she pins and posts about on her  Instagram.

Life Quotes

From several of her social media profiles, Jayci has posted inspirational life quotes which shows that she not only takes great care of her physical health, but also her mental health. Some of these quotes include:

·         “The world is so much bigger than your brain, stop living inside your head.” – Unknown

·          “The best day of your life is the one on which you decide your life is your own. No apologies or excuses. No one to lean on, rely on, or blame. The gift is yours. It is an amazing journey, and you alone are responsible for the quality of it. This is the day your life really begins. “ – Bob Moawad

·         “You still have a lot of time to make yourself be what you want.” – S.E. Hinton

She seems really comfortable being herself, and wants to share that with others with these quotes. One from her blog is

Social Media Case 6

When I think of a video going viral, I usually assume the video is going to funny. With this case the video was very simple, but it had a very powerful message. When Officer White made the decision to play ball with these kids, it made a huge statement. He could have merely told them to keep it down and been on his way, and the footage of that would not have been watched by anyone. He broke what some might consider the normal protocol and did something that showed these kids and their community that he really cared about them.

When Officer White stopped to play basketball, he probably was not thinking that the footage from his dash cam was going to go viral. He probably was not thinking that he was going to be able to make a huge change with this one game. He probably just wanted to play some basketball and show these kids that the Officers were not out to get them, but were actually watching out for them. If this had been staged, or had Officer White planned this out, I do not think it would have had the same effect. It probably would have come off as some sort of publicity stunt and would not nearly have been as genuine. I also think that Shaq would not have wanted to become involved if it had been preplanned. Because it was something that just happened, it was a spontaneous moment of a cop doing something great for a group of kids, which is why it went viral.

A lot of good came from this incident, and it was not just Shaq coming and playing a pickup game. Officer White was able to start a foundation that raises money to build relationships between the Law Enforcement and youths, you can see the foundation page here. They also were able to build a basketball court in the backyard of one of the kids who was playing ball from the video, and were visited by Harlem Globetrotter Buckets Blakes, which you can read about here.  

Social Media Case 5 - PayPal

I have never had a PayPal account, but I have donated money to charities through different means, some of which have been online. If I found out that the means which I donated through were keeping part of my donation for themselves, and were not allowing the money to be used for the cause I donated to, I would be extremely upset. I think it is understandable why people were furious and took to the comments section to voice their anger.

It seems like PayPal had fallen into an expert blind spot, they saw they had received recognition and wanted to share how well their company was doing. They did not seem to think that their actions with Regretsy would be associated with their mention in Forbes. It seems foolish to me that they thought they could delete away the negative comments and that would make everything okay. That is like putting a sticker over you check engine light and saying that your car is fine. What is worse is that when they realized they had messed up to the point where deleting could not fix things, it seems that their apology was not completely truthful. They claimed to be working with the owner of Regretsy and giving a donation as well. I am not sure if they ever were true to their word, but after posting the apology the owner posted about how she had yet to be contacted, which you can read about here.

I think there are definitely times when the comments section becomes abused and we fall into the ‘Natalie Portman’ effect where the point of the post is completely misdirected by off topic comments. These angry comments were not about PayPal being highlighted by Forbes, but reprimands for what they had done with Regretsy. While the comments were not about what the post intended them to be, I think this is an instance where having a ‘Natalie Portman’ effect is okay. A company that is ‘fishing for compliments’ in a way by showing they had been highlighted in Forbes, but is also doing harsh and unfair business with other groups should own up to all of their actions. They should not try to delete their problems away.

It seems like it is another moment where a company is forced to apologize not because they realized they made a mistake and are truly sorry, they are sorry because they got caught. This article  from Today news showed that PayPal seemed to not really care, and were not truly invested in fixing the problem until they saw how much backlash they were receiving. 

Social Media Case 4

Nestle Funner Options Menu

I had never heard of this until reading about it for this social media case. I thought it was really funny and creative. It reminded me of a video that went viral that I saw a while ago. It was of a school's answering machine that gave a list of options. They were sick of how the students and parents were treating them and gave options like, if you want us to raise your child press one, and if you would like to lie about where your kid was yesterday press two. The Nestle one was much more lighthearted, but that's what I thought of when listening to the voice message.

I thought it was interesting that there was mostly positive feedback. From these two sources, all the comments about the options menu were positive. It seemed to work really well for Nestle to have so many people enjoying their options menu.

http://winged-pigs.blogspot.com/2010/02/need-smile-call-nestle-hotline.html 

https://www.twobillsdrive.com/community/topic/111558-call-the-nestle-hotline-for-a-good-laugh/ 

I could see how it would be frustrating if you truly were trying to get a hold of the customer service line but were unable to because the line was clogged with people just wanting to hear the funner options. But it does seem that for the most part people thought of it as a good laugh and a fun thing to do.

I think that by having something like this could be risky but it was done in a way that let the consumers control the conversation. If everyone hated it, it might have ended up the same way as the McDonald's hashtag went. But it was very popular, and many people were talking about it in a good way, and were sharing it so others could join in on their fun. McDonald's was trying to get a certain response out of people, they wanted heartwarming stories to be associated with their hashtag, and it quickly backfired. It seems that Nestle just wanted to have a unique aspect about them, and maybe give people a smile.