Social media is making my soup cold

Ordering was a breeze before social media interrupted the restaurant experience. You’d look at a menu, choose what you wanted, tell the server, then talk for a few moments until the apps arrived.

Now you’re a good 12 minutes into the visit before the menu’s scrutinized. First, there’s checking in via Four Square. Otherwise, how’re you going to get your points and badges? They bring you nothing other than the right to tell the wife, “I just got a badge for blah-blah-blah.” She responds with the sort of look Charlie Sheen must know well.

Then there’s checking in via your phone’s Facebook app. And why not? Isn’t it essential your friends know where you’re eating?
And don’t forget checking in on Yelp You’ve got a foodie rep to preserve.

By that time the server has flitted past three or four times to see if the pen can be uncapped to take orders. No such luck. More networking may need to be done.

If someone saw your Facebook alert, there might be a comment posted. How can you not check, read it, and respond? If could be a recommendation of what to order.

If you’re lucky, maybe the rest of the party orders appetizers for the table. Then you’re off the keypad until the food arrives. This is why cell phones have cameras. An image has to go on Flickr or Facebook.

Eating is when the pressure really builds. Enjoying the food is one thing. Sounding smart in your Yelp or Urban Spoon review is the challenge. And what if, God forbid, you’re the only citizen reviewer who loves or hates it?

I’m as much of a social media fan as anyone. But I wouldn’t mind if you could hand over your smart phone during a meal the way you check your coat. Certainly it’d help with table turns.

Fingers may be sorer than feet this NRA show

Let it be noted that this is the year social media changed the dynamics of the NRA show.

The convention hasn’t even officially started, yet Twitter and Facebook are already being used with all the ordinariness of breathing to make acquaintances, tout products, provide weather updates, share travel tips, recommend cocktails, bemoan hectic schedules, flag good parties, and promote educational events.

Twitter will be used to solicit questions for show speakers and to cover the convention, by media old and new. There’s an official Tweet Up, as well as a meeting of Fohboh, one of the industry’s social media. Meanwhile, the tweets keep coming, highlighting the mundane, the hilarious, and genuinely rich fodder for thought.

It’s as if one big conversation is underway as everyone goes about their usual show business. And anyone can tune in, with no introduction needed. Eavesdropping is encouraged.

It’s an instant interconnection the industry has never seen before—still small, but used enough already to be felt at the show.

But the phenomenon could prove more than just a curious new means of instant communication. It could be a way to bolster the show’s effectiveness by bringing seeker more readily together with provider. Tweet a need, be it information, a product or a contact, and a 140-character lead could be provided rapid-fire by someone who’s monitoring this extensive and hyperactive foodservice party line.

It could also draw more young people off the sidelines and into the game. Because social media is a preferred form of interaction for industry members of a tender vintage, it’s a comfortable way of plugging into the restaurant community, which in turn can foster involvement—going to shows, participating in associations, working on common causes, sounding off on shared threats, thinking about larger industry issues. In short, contributing more than 140 characters of input on restaurant issues.

But it’s late on Friday night, and I need to be fresh for tomorrow’s inaugural show event: A sessions for chain executives on the use of social networks and other word-of-mouth media. Which, by the way, I'm tweeting.