Prolific Social Media & Citizen Engagement

• The name of the social network Twitter was originally “Twttr”.
• It took 3 years, 2 months and 1 day to get to the billionth tweet.
• Today it takes one week or less for users to send a billion tweets.
• 10 tweets per second mentioned Starbucks.
• The average Twitter user once tweeted 307 times.
•  Barack Obama’s victory tweet was retweeted over 800K times .
• The 2012 election broke records—31.7 million political tweets.
• 32% of all Internet users were using Twitter.
•  69% of follows on Twitter were suggested by friends.
•  In 2012, almost 1 million accounts were added to Twitter.
• USA’s 141.8 million accounts represented 27.4% of all Twitter.
• 50% of Twitter users were using the social network via mobile.
• 2012 brought an 800% increase in top TV show tweets.
• The London Olympics generated 150 million tweets in 16 days.
•  Super Bowl 2012 had 13.7 million football-related tweets.
• Religious leaders expected one retweet for every 500 followers.
• Musicians expected one retweet for every 30,000 followers.
• 64% of consumers purchases are based on social content.
• 91% of 18-34 year old's using social media talked about brands.
•  60% of U.S. smartphone owners visited social networking sites.
• 46% of U.S. social media users accessed Twitter via cell phones.
• 31% of smartphone Internet time was spent social networking.
•  Infographics added to Stumbleupon generating 746% more pageviews than other kinds of content.
• 181,354 people on Twitter used the term “social media”.
• Katy Perry,  Justin Bieber, Barack Obama and Lady Gaga have more Twitter followers combined than the entire populations of Germany, Turkey, South Africa, Canada, Argentina and Egypt.
• Saudi Arabia ranked #1, as the fastest-growing Twitter nation in the world with a 300% year-on-year growth rate, and more than 3 million active Twitter users.
• 16% of U.S. Internet users were on Twitter.
• The average Twitter user had 126 followers.
• The average business had 14,709 Twitter followers.
• More devices are connected to the Internet than there are people on the planet.
• The “Castle in the Sky” TV screening generated 25,088 tweets per second—the most ever.
• YouTube on Twitter  has 40.1 million followers.
• 60% of Twitter users were female.
• Twitter users once spent 21 minutes monthly on Twitter.
• 92% of retweets were based on interesting content.
•  Between 2008 and 2011, there was a 5,000% increase in the number of employees at Twitter.
•  The official Twitter account for Sweden was once run by a different citizen every week.
• McDonalds employed 10 people to run their Twitter account.
• @RealTimeWWII, a Twitter account created by Oxford history graduate Alwyn Collinson, narrates World War II on Twitter in real time; all the tweets are manually written with no script.
• Infographics shared on Twitter once got 832% more retweets than images and articles.
• Twitter is available in more than 25 languages.
• Beginning of 2014, Twitter had more than 240 million users.
• There were more than 500 million tweets per day in Jan 2014.
• Twitter is now worth more than $11 billion.
• 16% of customers used Twitter to interact with businesses.
• 75%, or three out of four, heads of state utilized Twitter.
• The Library of Congress acquired the entire Twitter archive.

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H     Check out Del Harvey in this Ted Talk, where she discusses her role as the head of Twitter's Trust & Safety Team, and how she keeps 240 million users safe.

Reference: https://www.mediabistro.com/

Prolific Digital Media Strategies

Click the Link below for Video Footage of Slideshow Presentation:

The Administration & Finance and_Information Technology Division

" Asking government to articulate what success looks like and be accountable for results, is something that every citizen should expect." —Governor Deval Patrick of Boston, MA

• A- MASSPIRG Transparency Rating
• Women make-up 51.1% of Executive Branch Employees
• 5.7% of Eligible GIC Enrollee's Participating in WellMASS
• AA+ Standard & Poor’s Bond Rating
• 197 Cities and Towns participating in CIC Grant Prog.
• 87 Communities used Muni Healthcare Reform
• 1,016 A&F Twitter Followers
• 523,297 Open Checkbook 
• Stabilization Fund Balance is 7.04% of Annual Tax Rev.
• 8 Secretariat Strategic Plans Published in Jan'13
• 14 A&F Agency Strategic Plans Published in Feb ‘13
• $216M saved since '11 using Muni Healthcare Reform
• $36M Invested in "Self-financing" Capital Projects
• B MA Digital States Survey Rating
• 86% select A&F Agency for Excellent Customer Service
• Minorities make-up 25.2% of Executive Branch
• Aa1 Moody's Bond Rating
• 247, 159 Members Enrolled in the Health Connector
• 17 Administration-proposed Reforms Implemented
• 9,040,019 A&F Website Unique Page Views
• 5.2% of Commonwealth Subscribe to Wellness Init.
• 96% of Federal Grants Awarded
• 3^rd Largest Reserve Account in the Nation FY13
• -9.3% per Capita CommCare Spending growth Rate
•  $1.56B in Rainy Day Fund

“Rating Agencies rate everything and ratings affect all of us" 

—Annette Heuser

Taking On the Big Three Credit Rating Agencies

Prolific Inspectors Rating Scale in Points

"AAA" for 0 - 13 | "BBB" for 14 - 27  | "CCC" for 28 or more

A triple-A rating go out to Senator Al Franken (Democrat of Minnesota) for pursuing tighter rules that would institute more stringent control over the Big Three Credit Rating Agencies ("Big Three"). His unwavering determination and effort spurred on the Security and Exchange Commission (SEC) to officially conduct a feasibility study concerning the potential launch of a public utility company that would oversee Standard & Poor (S&P), Moody’s and the Fitch Group. The implementation of these new rules and tighter control measures coming by way of oversight would promote greater investor protection through education and transparency while staving off or even preventing conflicts of interest.   

Rating Description: Prime Grade Points: 10

A triple-C rating go out to the government for failing the American public. They allowed the Big Three to exist and operate, as an oligopoly for many years past, and thus hold a global market share of 95% of the credit rating business— a form of imperfect competition that grants them considerable leverage to collectively wield immense power over other market players. But power corrupts and absolute power of this magnitude has the potential to corrupt absolutely. It can be catastrophic to the financial growth of the country, and has already resulted in a conflict of interest, as well as little-to-no transparency in the Big Three's past dealings. 

Rating Description: Substantial Risk Grade Points: 42

A triple-A rating go out to Bethany Mclean and Joe Nocera for authoring a powerful book entitled, “All the Devils Are Here, the Hidden History of the Financial Crisis,” where they shed light on the fact that an “erosion of standards, a willful suspension of skepticism, a hunger for big fees and market share, and an inability to stand up to investment banks issuing the securities” was the root cause of the financial crisis (p.111). Especially since, the Big Three Credit Rating Agencies continued to issue triple-A ratings on sub-prime loans that were packaged into mortgage-backed securities, which ultimately defaulted giving way to the bursting of the housing bubble. 

Rating Description: High Grade Grade Points: 13

A triple-C rating go out to the Big Three Credit Rating Agencies for having a hand in on the U.S. housing market crash and financial crisis of 2007- 2010; or worse still, being considered “key enablers of the financial meltdown” by the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission (FCIC), which was a 10 member commission appointed by the President to examine the root cause of the financial and economic crisis here in the United States and abroad. 

Rating Description: Low Medium  Grade Points: 37

A triple-A rating go out to Annette Heuser, the Executive Director of the German Bertelsmann Foundation for conducting a TED talk and dishing criticism out about the Big Three and their ill-conceived ways of rating the national economies. But more important than that is her vision for launching a prolific International Nonprofit Credit Rating Agency (INCRA). One that serves the public good and shifts the balance of power away from the Big Three. By adding a new nonprofit player into the mix, it would not only increase competition and transparency while creating a more inclusive financial credit rating system, it would indelibly change the game, and thus provide better overall quality and services to the public-at-large. See the TED Talk below.

Rating Description: Prime Grade Points: 5

TED Talk featuring Annette Heuser 

        The 3 Agencies with Power to Make or Break Economies 

Also See: Franken Pursues Tighter Rules for Rating Agencies