Social Media Roundup: More Deep Thoughts on Internships

With internships again under the microscope, one former intern in the association space speaks up. Also: traditional media’s increasing embrace of events.

There are always two sides to every debate.

In the case of internships, it’s not just the employers who have a vested interest in such programs, obviously. An intern’s take on the value of internships, in today’s Social Media Roundup:

What a Former Intern Says

Associations offer awesome internship opportunities says @AmericanBakers  (opens in a new tab) former intern. http://t.co/lkHIQne6Wr  (opens in a new tab) #assnchat  (opens in a new tab)

— Kristen McCue (@klparkermsu) October 29, 2013  (opens in a new tab)

Straight from the source: Last week, we covered Condé Nast’s decision to drop its unpaid internship program, which drew mixed reaction from former interns and largely negative comments in the press. We raised a few questions about the story, including what it meant for internships in the nonprofit space. One person thinking about this issue is Samantha Moore, the meetings and membership coordinator for the American Bakers Association, who interned with the association on three separate occasions before taking on a full-time gig. She says her experience was definitely worthwhile. “This subject is near and dear to my heart because without my internship, I would not be the meeting planner I am today,” she writes in a post on the Event Garde blog  (opens in a new tab). “I hope that my story provides guidance for other young meeting professionals and persuades other meeting planners to implement stellar internship programs in their own associations.” Do you have an association internship story of your own to share? (ht @klparkermsu  (opens in a new tab))

Old Media, New Events

Media outlets embrace conferences as profits rise. “Everyone is getting into the game.” #assnchat  (opens in a new tab) http://t.co/ZlHQKdXzHY  (opens in a new tab)

— Deirdre Reid, CAE (@DeirdreReid) October 29, 2013  (opens in a new tab)

A reliable moneymaker for media outlets: Speaking of Condé Nast, it’s one of the big-media companies that’s embraced conferences as a revenue source  (opens in a new tab). The event business is becoming a profitable one for the media industry, with tech outlets (most famously AllThingsD), news outlets, and literary magazines all getting in on the game—and in one case, a famous magazine editor dropping the magazine to go events-only. (I covered one of these events, GigaOm’s paidContent Live, earlier this year.) Why this, and why now? According to The New York Times, events are a reliable revenue source at a time when revenue is anything but reliable. Is the future of news the same as the present for associations? Good question. (ht @deirdrereid  (opens in a new tab))

What else could the media world learn from associations? Let us know your thoughts in the comments below.

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