That is one of many McLuhanisms Brian Wieser is searching for on a Marshall McLuhan library Web site to help him narrow his definition of social media.

"It has to be portable," he says, adding: "Consumers generating content, and influences perceptions, whether it is public perceptions or private perceptions."

The one area of social media that can be offline is pharma," Monfried suggested, noting that with all the rules and regulations governing prescription drugs, much of the marketing surrounding prescription drugs is really social interactions between consumers suffering an ailment, and the conversations they have with doctors, pharmacists, and ultimately, other parts of the healthcare system -- none of which may actually take place online.

That's what Wieser asked Lotame's Monfried. "Most of it is not intent based," he replied, adding thatmMost of it, Monfried argues is people simply posting status updates for their friends.

"It's like your postal example. It's a piece of data, but is it social?," Lotame's Andy Monfried asks Brian wieser. "I don't think so. It's like saying everything is social media." Monfried's view is that social media needs a data stream associated with it for it to have any practical application for marketers. Monfried points to me typing into my BlackBerry, and says that me uploading this conversation up on MediaPost Raw is social media, but until it is tagged, and categorized, that content has little context or value. Monfried and Wieser debate the merits od defining …

Nifty chart on Brian Wieser's twitter page, if you can find it. It's a chart showing the u.s. Postal services revenues fro 1790 on. "Is that social media?," Wieser asks during our cab ride across town to Lotame. I argue that unless those letters were shared with more than one other person then it is. If not, then it's not. Us postal service revenues fro 1790 Is that social media?

In the cab now heading to Andy Monfried at Lotame, and Brian Wieser is checking his new followers. "A-ha, Tim Hanlon is following me. I finally got him, Wieser gushed referring to the VivaKi digital media guru who is now following him on Twitter.

Much of today's social media journey with Interpublic's Wieser has been spent on "defining" social media. Wieser asks Breen if it can be offline: "Yes," says Breen, but he adds that unless it's shared online, "what's the value in that?" Breen also says we're learning what's valuable, and what's not on the social media chatter. "It's kind of like a brand by brand thing." "I may write in a tweet that I went to X retailer today, but that doesn"t mean - should say, 'Hey, Brian, come into my store today!'"

"Suddenly, you've got all these pages, and they're multiplying exponentially," says interpublic's Bant Breen. "When the social media space gets more interesting for me is when we get behaviorally targeted data," he adds. Facebook is burning a billion dollars a year in bandwidth costs. What's the upside? Breen thinks the potential is with "micropaymen systems, but the big social networks have been slow to "embrace it." "There are many potential revenue streams to this stool," says Breen, adding that where interpublic has found the greatest success, is by bringing four things together: Broadcast tv, search media, …