In terms of the “asking permission” experience, I really enjoyed seeing people’s reactions when I introduced myself before panels. I encountered little to no resistance/confusion, and most people seemed to feel kind of honoured to get coverage from the “official” account (which, likewise, made me feel like a badass). However, it was a shame when I arrived to a panel too late and had to deal with the question of whether or not I should tweet any content. On that note, I think it would be great to aim for some sort of announcement to all of SCMS next year that presenters should specify if they would like the content of their talks to remain off the record.

And I very much agree that getting more SIG/Caucus-based “official” accounts up could really amplify the effectiveness of our mission to spread the SCMS experience to all!

However, I will say that every single person I asked either said “of course!” (like I was crazy for asking) or some version of “Twitter? Are you going to be nice? Then Ok.”(still giving me the crazy look). So I am going to go out on a limb here and say most people are okay with having their work tweeted (unless they explicitly say not to, and I know there were panels this year that made such announcements) as long as they know the folks doing the tweeting will treat their scholarship with care and respect.

Aren’t the rules of Twitter just like the rules of life: “Whenever possible, don’t be a jerk”

I wish I had something more provocative or concrete to offer in terms of takeaway, but am mostly hoping that others can use this as a jumping off point for discussion about whether these “pockets” of unTweetability will persist, whether they have use and, as an extension, whether we should try to preserve or even create them…..

1. We agreed to send out an email to all SCMS members, alerting them that we would be live tweeting panels/workshops.

2. Whenever possible, we tried to arrive at the panel/workshop a few minutes early and ask the participants if you have their permission to tweet about their scholarship. Unfortunately, due to the terrible elevator situation at the Drake, I ended up arriving at 2-3 panels/workshops a few minutes late and didn’t have the chance to formally ask permission. In those cases, I tweeted (when possible) members of the panel to alert them that I was in the room and live tweeting their work. Ideally, in the future, people who feel strongly about not having their work made public on social media will state so at the beginning of their talk.

3. we attempted, when possible, to spread ourselves out. We agreed that no one should have to miss a panel/workshop that she really wanted to see, but we made an effort to be in different places. Again, this did not always work out since there were only 5 of us and several of us have overlapping research interests. This is why it would be great if some of the SIGs/caucuses had their own twitter accounts next year and teams which pledged to cover a certain amount of sponsored panels/workshops. As a Twitter user, you know that some panels and workshops get A LOT of attention while others get none. It would be great to see a conference twitter stream that is more reflective of the diversity of the conference.

4. include the initials of the tweet’s author in individual tweets so that there is some accountability.

One more thing I would add to this list is to make it clear when the author of the tweet is editorializing rather than simply paraphrasing the scholarship. This seems to be a big fear–that people’s ideas will be misrepresented. For example, one of my tweets about a workshop generated responses from a few people who were not there and I had to clarify that I was editorializing. I tried to be more careful after that.

On a side note, I feel like this kind of meta-commentary is building a case, slowly and surely, for junior colleagues to claim digital work as tenure-worthy work.