Whoa. Check this out. Olivier Blanchard takes issue with the International Social Media Association for basically selling social media certification for $3k without, he says, any of the elements required to prove themselves as a certifying body – as opposed to just any old training program.

Read through the many comments in particular – several very good ones from association folks in there.

This brings up a lot of issues swirling around the blogosphere about social media “snake oil”, but to me it also has bigger picture implications about the nature of online collaboration, the creation of online associations (so easy to do – and yet it is really appropriate? should there be rules?), and specifically the implications of providing certification – in this case in a space where everyone is still learning. There is a lot of expertise on these issues in the association blogosphere and I would love to hear your take. Go read the post and comments, see what you think!

[UPDATE: Olivier posted a followup post, Let's Get Constructive about the future of Social Media Certifications, which goes into the topic more directly (less about the hoo-ha around the ISMA but more about the heart of the issue, namely is certification in social media useful and necessary?) Interesting followup discussion.]

• Share:
• Twitter
• Facebook
• Delicious
• Digg
• Buzz
• Association Jam

• Bit.ly URL for this post:
• http://bit.ly/5zO0kQ