What is social media influence? Can it be measured? Daniel Romero, a Ph.D candidate at Cornell University, in collaboration with Hewlett-Packard’s Social Computing Lab, studied about five week’s worth of tweets and drew some conclusions, including:

“Having a large number of followers does not imply having influence in news social media. Furthermore, not having a large number of followers does not mean lack of influence.”

Romero’s piece, Twitter is Linked to Quality of Content And Not Quantity of Followers, appeared yesterday on Tom Foremski’s excellent Silicon Valley Watcher blog. Romero cites the changing role of mainstream media and the recognition that traditional media outlets must get into the social media game.

The research involved a sophisticated algorithm to compute influence, which was used to compile a list of 100 most influential media outlets on Twitter. At the core of this notion of influence is the idea that the links (only tweets with links were studied) most often retweeted were an indicator of influence.

I think this is a perversion of the concept of influence, one which substitutes “ability to reach the most eyeballs” for actual influence. The dictionary definition of influence is essentially “the power to affect behavior.”

Compelling someone to repost a link indicates that they found the linked information interesting, but even more so, that they thought the people in their network would find it interesting. There are very human impulses involved here, the desire to be the first with breaking news, the desire to impress, the desire to amuse, the desire to be seen as informed.

So the link to the amusing video I posted of a cat trying to climb into a little red wagon (not bloody likely) may have received 500 retweets. But where is the influence? Is driving site traffic the only influence metric that matters? Even then, there’s no site traffic until the link is clicked and the page is loaded.

I haven’t bought off on the new media definition of influence. When a company’s marketing strategy calls for influence, they are absolutely looking to affect customer behavior. The intent is to have customers consider the company, its products and services (awareness), make a purchase, then make another purchase (loyalty) and recommend the company to others (evangelism). Clicking a link to see an interesting image, video or news item may be the first step in this process, but it is a tenuous one, disconnected from the realities of the business, with almost no certainty of conversion to any of these other more important behaviors.

The futurists are screwed. Today I downloaded the Netflix iPhone app and sat at a table outside a local deli totally in awe that I could stream feature length movies, almost anywhere, on demand, to my phone — with pretty good quality. Are you kidding? That would have been unimaginable five years ago.

Writers are constantly challenged to come up with “gee whiz imagine that” future scenarios, which is becoming harder and harder to do. As a speechwriter. I’ve worked for a number of CEOs and other senior executives in the Silicon Valley and across the globe. Often, I am asked to come up with these “incredible future” scenarios for an executive keynote.

About a year ago I was called in to work on some futurist stuff for the CEO of a major company. The corporate communications team had done a pretty good job with the first draft, but it wasn’t futurey enough. For example, they had “Imagine you hear a song on the radio you like, but you don’t know who the artist is. You hold your phone up to the radio, it ‘recognizes’ the song and the artist and title appear on your screen.” Unfortunately, as you probably know, it exists (and did then). It’s called Shazam, and there’s even a free version. I can’t tell you what I did come up with because that work belongs to the client, but I will say it was a tough assignment.

Another time I was writing for the CTO of a semiconductor company, and as I worked on the speech (a keynote can take several weeks or months to write), a couple of our future scenarios popped up in the news and had to be scrapped. I couldn’t write fast enough to stay ahead of one life-changing development after another.

It’s no wonder people say they can’t keep up (with whatever). The pace is crazy. And I’m not going to speculate (right now at least) on what’s next.

The University of North Carolina seems to be cracking down on social networking abuses in the wake of last week’s news that UNC’s football team was under investigation for “academic misconduct.” According to ESPN’s College Nation Basketball Blog, team captain Marvin “Austin, who has been questioned by the NCAA about improper contact with agents, posted around 2,400 (Twitter) messages, including ones of him buying designer sunglasses and running up a $143 bill at Cheesecake Factory.” Others have been engaged in questionable conduct as well.

UNC has announced an update to the social networking policies (which it says are not related to any one thing) in its Student-Athlete Handbook, according to a column today by Tim Gardner on USA TODAY’s “Campus Rivalry” site. Gardner goes on to quote a story in The (Raleigh, N.C.) News & Observer in which reporter Robbi Pickeral reports “each team must identify at least one coach or administrator who is responsible for having access to and regularly monitor the content of team members’ social networking sites and postings.”

Pickeral writes that the updated handbook now requires if an “athlete’s online content violates the law or NCAA, University or athletic department policies, sanctions could range from removal of the posting to dismissal from the team.”

We are seeing harsher and harsher social networking policies across all industries and organizations. While it’s understandable that athletic officials might want to control unauthorized and damaging communications, much of what came out in the UNC case seems to be truthful but embarrassing. One could argue that the “solution” is for people not to behave immorally, illegally or in violation of university or NCAA rules in the first place, rather than try to stop athletes from tweeting about their indiscretions.

But when do social media bans or excessive controls (whatever those are) affect 1st Amendment freedoms? The NHL, NFL and NBA have all instituted Twitter bans at times when the use of sites like Twitter and Facebook would affect or interfere with game play. That seems entirely reasonable. Professional sports teams are businesses. “Regular businesses” generally have in their “Standards of Business Conduct” bans against representing the company in a bad light, divulging confidential information, and failing to use company time for the purpose for which the employee was hired. Professional athletes could potentially do all of these things with the misuse of Twitter.

But are there rules against acting like an idiot? Expressing one’s opinion on a political party or candidate? Posting videos of cats doing silly things? Tweeting “Hi, mom!”? These things would seem to be protected by the First Amendment and could hardly be seen as damaging to the organization. Will the latest UNC ban keep athletes off of Facebook and Twitter altogether? Is that unfair or unreasonable?

A high school student contacted me asking for career advice. She’s doing PR for her high school football team, and she wants to start now finding and creating career opportunities. If you’re early in your PR career, maybe the advice I gave her will help you:

“I was encouraged to hear you’re doing PR for the football team. My first bit of advice would have been to see if there are any opportunities to do public relations/public information at school, or for the district. Keep doing an awesome job in this role. You’ll be able to use it on your resume, and employers look for continuity, even in volunteer/unpaid positions.

You should look into the Public Relations Society of America (PRSA) if you haven’t already. The society’s job board is open to members and non-members alike, and will give you an idea of the kinds of jobs companies and organizations are recruiting for. PRSA membership is too expensive if you’re not a working professional, but the organization puts on some awesome conferences and panel discussions.

Don’t confine your networking to in-person industry get-togethers. You’ll be spending time with the same people. Twitter and LinkedIn are great resources. Once you have a network of PR friends on Twitter, you’ll see announcements for tweetups, in-person get-togethers. (Most are in bars, unfortunately. Here in Santa Cruz we sometimes do them in parks or in other places where people of any age can attend.)

Never listen to advice that will keep you from accomplishing your dreams. I once saw a job posted on the internal web site at the company where I worked. My current boss told me I wasn’t ready for that job, and should hold off applying. I applied any way, got the job, and held it for almost five years.

Separate your career and personal life. Recruiters absolutely look at Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn when identifying and evaluating candidates. Surveys reveal they do not like sex and drug references, heavy drinking, obscenity, slang and even misspelling and emoticons (smiley faces). I’m not suggesting you instantly age 20 years, but be professional and remember, right or wrong, you are being watched online.

To ‘cover’ sports, you don’t need anyone’s permission. One way to develop your writing skills and stay in touch with sports would be to start a blog. It’s not PR exactly, but it gets you in the game.

Find additional volunteer opportunities, or internships, in allied fields. Search first in your primary field of interest. In your case, maybe there are other sports teams in your area that could use someone like you who could step in and help with little or no training. You’re obviously proficient with social media. Maybe there is a team in your area that needs help getting into the social media world. Offer to build them a Facebook page and a Twitter account. Suggest yourself as a community manager.

You should also ‘cast a wide net’ when looking for your next position. Look at college sports and professional sports. Look at women’s sports. (Not putting down women’s sports, just suggesting you look at every category.) Look at Monster and PRSA for jobs, as well as International Association of Business Communicators (IABC).

Craig’s List often has internships and entry-level PR jobs. I’m not sure why, but Craig’s List is a magnet for cheap and unscrupulous employers, so be careful and do some research on companies that are not familiar to you.

Once you’ve been in an internship for a while, and you’ve learned a little about the organization you’ve been working for, you might be able to ask that they make you a regular (paid) employee.

Another way to learn about the field and grow your network is through informational interviews (like the one you did with me). You should feel free to contact anyone in the industry and ask for 30 minutes on the phone or via Skype. The worst anyone can do is say no, and you’ll meet some interesting people and learn all kinds of things.”

This is hardly a complete guide to getting started in PR, but I do hope I’ve offered something of use. If you know of useful resources, or have additional advice for young PR folks, please leave a comment.

If you’re a regular reader of this blog and you’re very observant, you may have noticed the Social Media Informer badge on my right sidebar. I was asked to participate in this week’s launch of this new site which looks to have a great strategy for aggregating and distributing social media content. As of the launch of Social Media Informer, I find myself in the good company of Chris Brogan, Alex Blom, Kyle Lacy, Janet Fouts, Simon Mainwaring and many others.

Social Media Informer seems unique in several respects. I like that content is organized by topics and themes so visitors can read related items, and learn about blogs and bloggers who write about what interests them, but what’s more appealing is that Social Media Informer is designed to drive people who like my posts back to my blog. I’ve been involved with a number of aggregation sites and similar ventures in the past whose strategy is to capture and hold readers.

I’m looking forward to seeing how things go at Social Media Informer.