Kara Swisher

Recent Posts by Kara Swisher

Ford's Social Media Guru Scott Monty: "Social Media Is the Cocaine of the Communications Industry"

Today, BoomTown got the best quote ever from Scott Monty, when I asked him over lunch about his comparison of social media tools to an illicit drug.

“Social media is the cocaine of the communications industry,” said Monty, who has been global digital and multimedia communications manager for Ford Motor Company (F) since mid-2008.

Riding that Twitter train, high on Facebook cocaine?

I got him to repeat it, during a keynote interview with him at Blog World Expo in Las Vegas.

While we had some sound problems–par for the course at conferences–Monty got the attention of the crowd with the metaphor, especially after he launched into a spot-on impression of comic Bill Cosby doing a famous bit about cocaine.

All joking aside, Monty did make what was a very good point about the sometimes explosive impact of social networking media compared to the traditional kind.

Monty channeled Cosby for me again for a video interview here, in which we talk about that and also about how big companies are dealing with social media.

Here’s the video:

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Just as the atom bomb was the weapon that was supposed to render war obsolete, the Internet seems like capitalism’s ultimate feat of self-destructive genius, an economic doomsday device rendering it impossible for anyone to ever make a profit off anything again. It’s especially hopeless for those whose work is easily digitized and accessed free of charge.

— Author Tim Kreider on not getting paid for one’s work