When Reichskanzler Wilhelm Marx accosted the Weimar Germans for the first time via Radio as a mass medium on December 23, 1926, his advisors must have had a certain understanding of the potency of the medium in terms of ‘informing’ the citizens, in those days also referred to as propaganda, not having the current more negative connotation. Since the early days of deploying the medium as a mass medium of information, it rapidly developed into a medium of manipulation and even intimidation, propagating diverse social utopic experiments. Barely seven years after the occurrence, the German National Socialists with Joseph Goebbels as their communications mastermind and herald, understood the potency and relevance of ‘owning’ this medium and letting it work to their advantage. But not just the Nazis understood the power of mass media as a political instrument. It was President Roosevelt who prepared the American people gently for war with his so called fireside radio talks, claiming the United States of America to be ‘The Great Arsenal of Democracy’. Radio had, by then, become the true medium of propaganda. What has become of that ever since? This paper focuses on the topoi and developments of radio from the early days of mass medial propaganda to contemporary new digital media.
Discourse analysis of primary and secondary sources from the past and the present lead to the conclusion that not only traditional radio but also contemporary social media like Twitter and Facebook all carry the same fundamental agency through the topoi to turn a media into a propaganda tools with fundamentals such as envisioning utopia, mass manipulation, fear of isolation and adjacent, as the thread that runs through it, wanting to belong to a group.

Together with Marieke I submitted an abstract to the QUIS13 conference in Karlstad Sweden. This abstract got accepted which gives us a great platform to discuss big data in the hospitality industry.

Abstract:

Social media is rapidly becoming a viable way of service marketing and customer engagement in the hospitality industry. Many businesses in the industry have created accounts for popular platforms such as Facebook and Twitter (Kasavana et al., 2010). While many already use the Web as a promotional tool, social media enable the opportunity to directly build customer relationships. Facebook for instance, allows businesses to publish information, multimedia content and engage with their customers to e.g., share their experience, answer questions or learn about their preferences. Being active on social media has become increasingly important for the hospitality industry. Customers turn more frequently to social media and the Web for evaluations of a restaurant before going out to eat there (Lewis & Chambers, 2000). For them: “the most powerful tool is word of mouth from a friend, and social media are an extension of this” (McCarthy et al., 2010).

After the European Soccer Championships and the Olympic Games it is time to start a new (school) year. This year will begin differently than the other years, because in two weeks we will have to vote for the Dutch elections of the “Tweede Kamer” (The House of Commons).

Coming up: the provincial elections. On March 2, I again have to decide who gets my vote and especially why. Right now I am a true undecided voter. For that reason I am looking for the politician and the party that is able to convince me. So for the last few weeks I’ve been looking on Twitter and television to find the most reliable politician and party.

The twitter revolution is roaring in the Middle East. Looking at the headlines at this moment (Sunday evening) they are about continuing revolts in Libya, thousands demonstrating in Morocco, daughter of an ex president of Iran taken prisoner during demonstrations and last but not least calls for revolution on the internet in China.

A few months ago I wrote about the use of Twitter by politicians. It was election time. Politicians all wanted to influence the public opinion by posting tweets, and they did. Tweets and retweets followed each other rapidly. During some debates on national television, the debate itself was the subject with the largest number of followers on Twitter worldwide. Meanwhile, the battle for the votes was fought and a government has been formed. Our new prime minister Rutte was one of few politicians who didn’t use Twitter during election time. Will he be using Twitter? And how active are the other politicians at the moment?

Since Obama’s election we seem to be convinced that Twitter is an important instrument when you want to win the elections. But the question is: is this true? And is it true in all countries?