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The Power of One Little Tweet

posted on October 3, 2009

It is a rainy Boston Saturday.

As I sat on the couch, taking the first sips of coffee with my computer on my lap I saw a back and forth on Twitter happening about Sesame Street, my initials and a bunch of other randomness. Of course, as I will often do, I sent a reply to one of my buddies stating how much I’d love to some day get on Sesame Street and how I grew up loving the show.

It was an offhand comment that any of us could make, but the funny thing was that this wasn’t enough for my buddy Schneider Mike.

The next thing I know I check back into TweetDeck and see this tweet kicking off a mini push to try and get me on Sesame Street. You can read the blog post here.

Now, who knows if this will end up getting me ever on Sesame Street, but that really isn’t the point. The point to me is that this is what social media is all about. Anyone can get a spark of an idea and run with it as hard and fast as they want. No one had to give anyone permission to decide and start doing this. He didn’t think about the ROI or reason. He was just compelled for reasons only known to him and he did it. That is what I love about this space.

I also love that I’ve got a community of people around me who are good hearted souls and we all help each other out. From the littlest of gestures to the biggest of favors. The true power has always been about the people and that is why this little thing made my morning. Of course it also made me pull up my all time favorite segment from the show.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z4VNMERVsC4[/youtube]

Of course I’ve also got a big grin on my face as me and the kids are laughing at how funny this all is. But, if Snuffleupagus gives me a call I’ll be sure to let you know. That would be some awesome fun for Digital Dads!

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Categories: Rambles
  • http://ronamok.com Ron Ploof

    To me, the most important line in this post is “…for reasons only known to him…” YES! It’s the intent behind our online activities that makes this stuff work. Unfortunately, it’s also what makes the concept of Social Media so elusive to those classically trained in the art of communication.

  • Ellen Rossano

    Good Morning CC!

    I saw the same thing you did, but what I loved was how you thanked Mike for his “random act of kindness.” It was the thanks part that caught my eye…

    Hope this all helps you get to Sesame Street!!

  • http://www.cafeparadiso.com Mayco Castro

    Hey CC. Greetings from sunny Costa Rica!

    I think that all of us who follow your tweets shared this morning the happiness that you experienced this morning. I don’t know if it was the inner child in me or just the regular guy, but either one or both got also a big smile! I believe that most of us love to see anybody reaching their wishes or dreams, because we get to share their happiness and we receive hope to continue believing that one day our dreams may come true as well.

    Continue being such a great guy and father. I believe that we harvest only what we plant… so continue planting good acts of random kindness and they will come back to you. That’s why my one of my favorite movies is “Pay it forward”. Regards,

    Mayco Castro
    http://www.cafeparadiso.com
    San Jose, Costa Rica

  • http://www.cc-chapman.com C.C.

    Ron, that is something I was thinking and completely forgot to write.

    Over and over I have clients or get asked when I’m speaking “what makes something go viral?” and while this isn’t viral it is the answer.

    You just never know when someone is going to connect with something. I sure didn’t know anyone was going to react to me sharing a love about a television show. Especially not like this!

    Sure, you can make things attractive to people, but a lot of success of anything online is organic. Someone sees, hears or reads something and it creates an emotional reaction in them to react to it. You’ve ALWAYS got to be thinking how you could make that happen when planning out something.

    And guess what? A lot of times, it is something just like this where no planning was involved. It just sort of was. Confusing unless you live, breath and play in this space and then it’s obvious.

  • http://www.kunocreative.com/blog John McTigue

    I totally agree. The more spontaneous a tweet or blog is, the more likely I will read it and RT it. Why? Because it temporarily exposes the soul of the author, and that’s where the real meat is. If I could figure out how to filter out all the automatic stuff that requires no thought and no passion, I’d spend all day on social media. As it is, I follow and filter people (like you CC) who come up with the spontaneous stuff more often.

  • http://jeffcutler.com Jeff

    Don’t you know that Snuffleupagus is invisible?

    And cool isn’t the word – AMAZING AND FANTASTIC would be proper words when someone from PBS calls to…

    …tell you how to get, how to get to Sesame Street.

    :-)

  • http://www.whitneyhoffman.com Whitney

    This is amazing and fun! Sesame street has been such an integral part of my life- and I am so glad the old segments live on YouTube- I love African Alphabet- and could you guess how much Jim Henson would have loved twitter?

    Good luck- That would be fun- Teach kids about technology on the Street!

  • http://www.polarunlimited.com/readitfor.me steve cunningham

    CC – what a great story. It’s a great example of the power of not putting the filter before publishing (a la Clay Shirky’s thoughts in Here Comes Everybody) – so many more useful connections can now be made. Good luck!