From Conventional Wednesdays to Blooming Wednesdays ....

Today, Wednesday, March 31, 2010, I feel possessed, mesmerized, captivated, owned, surprised, amazed, eluded ….. I am astray at putting words and strings together as they simply don’t exhibit the elegance to describe the unbelievable experience I underwent. It is tortuous to express and communicate my sentiments as of the today’s happenings. It would be unjust to write about it. It all happened today, It all happened today …….. The day took off just like any other day. It felt nauseating to wake up early. I managed to gain my composure to go to my school, Stockholm School of Economics. Apparently, a guest lecture was scheduled in the Media Management Course to be given by Tomas Bacoccoli, a relatively unknown personality to us who is passionate about music. I arrived 5 minutes late into the class and saw that Tomas was just getting started with the proceedings. He was to discuss branding and its relationship with certain entities in addition to how to attract consumers. He pinpointed the importance to create an emotional attachment between the brand and the consumer to make a product a formidable success. That is where the emotions started to peak. He started uncovering the profound mysteries in such an awesome way which consequently, had every single individual engaged so deeply throughout the session that went nonstop for over one hour and a half, something that rarely happens in a class at SSE. I am definitely sure it would have seen all too conventional if it wasn’t for Tomas. It seemed so different from our other lectures. Everyone was emotionally involved. His mysterious skills, his tone of voice, his examples, his jokes, and the structure of the presentation encompassed great balance, great substance, effortless flow and above all, emotionality. I was stunned, REALLY STUNNED! At the same time, I felt blessed to have been a part of the audience. I felt proud. I felt honored. It seemed nothing short of a miracle to view Tomas’s consistency in evoking the audience in front of him so mysteriously. He amalgamated academics, experience, passions, emotions, sentiments all in one absolutely sublimely. It was striking! His statements and expressions made me project them on myself literally. They affected me emotionally. It made me dig deep to look into myself. There seemed to be facets of mystique involved. I was lost for a while really reflecting on Tomas and observing him. I appreciated some thoughts on synergies between today’s episode and the magical universe of Harry Potter and being experiencing them physically.

It went on and on. Tomas acknowledged he had the audience engaged. He could feel it. Tomas concluded by saying he missed out on something that he’ll address later. People were reluctant to move. They wanted to listen more from Tomas. They wanted to see more of Tomas’s actions and reactions. Time was up. We considered ourselves unlucky not to be able to witness more of Tomas’s exhibition. Nevertheless, the encouraging aspect made waves later during the day when it was made public that Tomas will be having another session at the TEDXSSE4M event on April 21, 2010 at Stockholm School of Economics. I anticipate it to be an even greater exhibition.

Give to Receive, Receive to Give

The new BUZZ word!!! "SOCIAL MEDIA" ..... Quite alarming, isn´t it??? Recent stats suggest that this term has been around for quite a while now. Does this mean that the so-called term "BUZZ" is implausible or is it really new? Well, this is quite a predicament which could potentially shape out to be an extensive debate.

My recent move to Northern Europe has compelled me to get involved in Social Media somewhat. Why so? Well, the reasons are two-fold. First, the nature of my daily routines involve studying a Masters program in Media Management at two of the finest institutions renowned worldwide namely, Royal Institute of Technology (KTH) and Stockholm School of Economics in the capital of Scandinavia - Stockholm. Having spent a couple of months here assessing my curricular studies which reflected on certain elements pertinent to Social Media, I reached a conclusion that the best way to learn Social Media is to actually exercise Social Media, thereby conferring a practical perspective. I must outline the way I approached this entire situation. My initial involvement into practical Social Media was purely incidental and unconsciously driven. We are living in an era where it may be considered criminal not to be in possession of an email. It would be perceived to be really odd to make a statement along those lines in a world where boundaries are becoming fuzzier and hard to define. This, consequently, helped me establish an initial contact with this entire eclipse. This contact has strenthened significantly over recent years. The exponential development in the area of media technology and the brisk response to new services has obliged the progress in this particular relationship. I foresee this relationship would strengthen in the upcoming days, months and even years - so to speak! The second reason that justifies my association with Social Media is life in Sweden itself. It is considered a common practice in Sweden to communicate via email and having a strong acquiantance with social media for several purposes which, in turn, has proven to be quite successful in a variety of ways. Adding more spice to this speculation, it is considered a good line of attack to reach the masses here as well. Sweden is also among the top countries that encloses numerous bloggers. This entire story line has had an influence on me as well somewhat and has driven me to compete for the zeal to engage myself more into this communication exchange. It is considered a reasonable medium to express interests, thought, sentiments and emotions. Social Media is taking its toll pretty well here. Watch out, though! Bells may start ringing when I mention this. Is toll the correct terminology to be applied? I am a little skeptical right now. Possibly it is the correct terminology. Nonetheless, with the essence of social media becoming increasingly social (not to mention it is FREE to use), the term "toll" becomes futile. Anyhow, avoiding debates for now! This can be looked into further later on ........

I have to reiterate that a blog is good way to express and communicate thoughts, behavior, interests, sentiments and emotions. From a personal perspective, I would actually need to undergo this experience before I come out jumping to statements that I have heard from peoples' mouths. I will try to stay active on this issue and share my experiences of this wonderful country. I have had the opportunity to endure nice experiences here where I have come across several extraordinary, tender, humble and sweet people (one person in particular!) who utter flowery words that just steal the moment. I anticipate I am destined to continue towards this. I wonder if Social Media and Blogging assist this in addition to my aim to contribute to the development of modern media in ways I can. Time will tell. Effort is required. Anyways, this is it for now.

Hasta la Vista!