the longest job i ever had was writing social media for the academy

so when bizarre tweets like this pop up, like it did today

i’ll get DMs and texts and etc asking “holy crap man, what was that tweet all about?”

and i have to explain that i havent worked there for years

and for the last half of the time i was there i had to go through extreme scrutiny to get

any

of my proposed tweets and instagram posts through

because i no longer had a boss who could shield me from those who didnt truly

live and breathe social media like i do.

so they didnt get it.

imagine if there was a committee who had the power to tell Led Zeppelin

dudes Stairway to Heaven is too long, can you trim 3-4 minutes from it?

and how about give the album a name?

youre trying to do your thing and be creative and witty

AND trying to gain followers all while maintaining a sense of the brand people love

with a fresh spin that is slightly unexpected

and may i say daring.

so i get it why someone in my old seat would *want* to make this tweet

and i also get why there may not be anyone there now who could give that person constructive criticism as to why they should throw it right in the trash

and i am super grateful that for two years i had a boss who could communicate with me in such a way that we could check off all the boxes:

  • interesting
  • insightful
  • fresh
  • unique to our brand and our assets
  • something others would want to share

when youre dealing with a 90 year old organization that aint easy

especially when the peanut gallery hears Stairway to Heaven and says

this isn’t at all like Whole Lotta Love, what gives?

if i was running the show over there the first thing i would say to the person creating the content is

women have it hard enough,

whore is a powerful word

in context of that movie it means one thing

but out of context, on our feed, even with what you think is a funny caption

it’s easily misunderstood and

should be avoided

in part because

of all the great lines written in the scripts of our overstuffed archives

that one was not one of them.