Using social media for a cause.

Last year you couldn’t have missed the name Meka Akerejola if you were in Abuja. The already popular On Air Personality became a sensation once news broke of his ailing health and the need to help him raise a staggering sum of N7,000,000 for a surgery in India.

I was seating at my desk the day I heard read.  The incessant red bleep on my Blackberry was a symptom of the virus known to man as a broadcast, which had infected it. It was one of those ones you skim through impatiently to see if it deserves your attention. Someone needed saving… mhmm, mhmm, a kidney disease… nod, nod….then I saw the name and dropped the phone in alarm. It was Meka Akerejola, someone I knew.

I dialed his number from my contact list anxious to prove it was not so.

I had met Meka when we called him Mekadon. It was 2006 in Ahmadu Bello University’s Hot 100 fm. Memories. Standing in front of the room that housed the station in Suleiman hall, co-hosting with him on a show where I interviewed someone and talked about making lemonades when life throws you a lemon, I remember someone said I laughed too much … memories.

Then I moved to Abuja and he gave me my first tour, I remember NCC (Nigerian Communications Commission) had just been built and he took me to see it, it was the most beautiful building in the city at the time. It was this Meka, my Meka, whose name was trending on twitter, facebook, radio and blackberry.

I was going to see him.

I wanted to see for myself.

I wanted to stop him from dying.

We laughed at how he had become an instant celebrity; his phone was constantly ringing now. Different people wanted to help, they didn’t want him to die and he didn’t want to disappoint them. There was also the downside to his popularity. He didn’t like the pity, the “Eyas” and “Peles”, most of all he hated the pause at the beginning of the calls, that deliberate silence to allow him say the first “hello” to hear if his voice was frail and sickly.

But largely he was positive. Taking his very public travail in stride.

The crowd funded #SaveMeka campaign with appeals for N1000 donations, turned out to be a very successful crowd sourced effort championed via social media.

This Sunday, we meet Meka and take score, did social media pass? What helped, what failed and what can be done better next time? All this and more in iBlog’s March edition where the conversation is about using social media for a cause, even the cause of saving a life!

Heinrich Boll Stiftung foundation will also be there talking about a cause close to their hearts, Vistagarnier Limited will be teaching on "how to monetize your blog and affiliate marketing", it will be a fun spread!

Reserve your seats today. Ping 26BEF129

Venue: Juice place 2, Funk Shui Lounge, 25 Libreville street, near DSTV, Wuse 2, Abuja.

Date: March 24th, 2013

Time: 5:00pm

Session 1: Affiliate marketing and your blog with Vistagarnier Intl. PLC

Session 2: Using social media for a cause!Guest Appearance by OAP, Meka Akerejola, Rhythm FM (#Save Meka) and Heinrich Boll Stiftung

Ticket: N3,500

Be a part of the social media community in Abuja- omonaikee@yahoo.com for details

 

Ooowe Emmmmm Geee!

Soooooo long time no write..... and seriously i miss writing and blogging and doing me sooo much that i had to make the decision to ignore certain commitments this weekend just to get some me-things done! But let’s not make a big deal of it, right? I left and now I’m back so here’s to hoping you love me like i never left!

Been blog surfing during my hiatus though and certainly enjoyed checking out some blogs. One fashionista, friend and blogger gave me a sunshine award- YAY! Have always wanted some kind of blog award and would have grovelled, begged and bribed someone to give me one if she hadn’t, lol!), so thank you to Uduak of finally me for passing along the sunshine award! YAY!

I learnt a lot about blogging while i was away. I learnt from bloggers like The Third World Profasional, For Style Sake and Finally Me that blogging can be a fun way to chronicle the sunlit glow of the life of a young, fashionable, adventurous unmarried girl! I do admire these girls.

I totally love For Style sake blog for the sentimental plot which like salt removes the putrid tasteless show- offiness of personal fashion blogs. For Salewa and Segi, two sisters who started their blog to preserve their sisterly bond in a common love for fashion, blogging obviously isn’t just for style sake. I also love Finally me for the free- spirit and sweet heart behind all her posts. Third world profashional is something else. I will read her journal of adventures served with a mix of slangs that switch between expressions from Ibo land, Lasgidi (Lagos), QC (Queens College), Aberdeen (Abz like she calls it) or Londres (French for London)! I read somewhere about blogging being a helpful tool to expose the world to the culture of a people and her blog does good evangelism for the Nigerian penchant to expressively draw you into the world of their experiences with a use of language that explores sounds, tones, inflections and even other languages just to convey more than words to you. Nigerians are very entertaining in that sense.

I learnt from Myne whiteman writes and My Feisty Pen that it’s ok to approach your blog from a professional angle and display your work for connoisseurs, collectors and art- lovers to admire. That it’s ok to use it to validate your talent and build your portfolio, your audience and popularity. Of course i love my feisty pen for her sheer writing talent (i will read your novel, personal interview or blog girl, just keep it up) but Myne Whitman takes it further by being an online mentor to other blogger/published – writer hopefuls and if there was a professional blogger, she gets close; she responds to every comment, checks out the commenter’s blog and even remembers ancestor blogs i never met or heard about!

From Sisi Yemie i learnt that reading pidgin can be as much fun as hearing a Nigerian comedian crack jokes in pidgin. That wafi “crase” can come across in written words without you having to see a dramatic expression or hear a voice pitch back and forth in the same sentence like a hijacked baseball.

I love When I Move Back To Naija mostly because she is a dear friend. From her blog i learnt its ok to pop in and out of blogville because the real living is worth so much more than a few gratifying comments.

I also love Corner Shop with Adiya because she plays by the book leaving comments and all and since one good turn deserves another i started leaving comments on hers as well. Though she’s moved, the concept of her blog is sooo original. Publishing small business is something you’d see on TV formats but she is totally original doing it blogging too.

Finally my best blogs of all time are from two girls who have taken blogging to the nth level. I used to follow Bella naija’s blog from 2007 and i easily converted to a daily visitor when she turned her blog into an online fashion/entertainment website. I also used to follow Favoured girl’s blog from way back, in fact my favourite place to go used to be A Girl’s Journey Down The Aisle. I loved it because it was selling the brand of influence called good.

So, many thanks to all this bloggers for entertaining, edifying, sharing, inspiring, adding sunshine to a boring and demanding work week, cracking me up, making me smile, adding to my lexicon of street lingo and conundrum of social culture e.t.c... you get the gist! More than passing you a sunshine award, i thought I’d let you know how you make the sun shine. Abi?

So it was my birthday while i was away, i turned 27 and i seriously don’t feel as old. Inside i feel ten years younger but it only takes me a minute with a 17 year old to feel my age! More seriously turning 27 increased my restlessness about the race between time and the fulfilment of my dreams where the passage of time seems to be winning. I have made up my mind that the next three years racing to the big three-0 will be nothing like my last three. I feel more settled, i have matured as much as i probably need to and i am as prepared as I’ll ever be so the appointed time is now!

I intend to do something with my potential and turn my reality from “i want to do” to “i do” and this blog will be a platform for you to follow up on what i am doing in each of my target areas and also keep me accountable about getting omonaikee more out there than it currently is (by the way, omonaikee isn’t just the name of this blog; it’s the name of my media company and the essence of my brand). So get ready to see content in interviews, music, radio, television, and project and published!

From me? Expect more. So much more.