I woke up the other day to five or six new bug bites - two on my elbow, three on my thighs. Since then, they've swollen to the size of golf balls, about 2-3 inches each in diameter. Even the scars from past bug bites look like bruises on my legs, meaning I now have to carefully choose my outfits for fear of looking like I'm in an abusive relationship (which is actually impossible because Max is in Europe). My body attracts mosquitoes like a pro, but reacts horribly to the subsequent lovebites (hm, sounds like I could be talking about dating?).

In any case, I've discovered the wonder that is Benadryl - yay antihistamines and chemicals that help me sleep well (I should get paid for this endorsement)! And since I'd rather not end this post with a lame (and scary) close-up of a mosquito, I'm posting today's Undercurrent danceparty so you can smile and laugh at my corny moves. Yes, I'm wearing shorts, but it's too blurry to see my poor, bitten legs clearly. As for the danceparty song, Sam's right - it's a Kylie Friday!

Twitter is a free social networking and micro-blogging service that allows users to send updates (otherwise known as tweets) which are text-based posts of up to 140 characters in length.

Pownce

Tumbler

Jaiku

"Just so you know, I'm not responsible if this breaks down." he said.
"Um, that's comforting..."

He brought me to the garage and handed me the keys. He had to explain the quirks of it.

"So I know you smoke, but you should be careful because the gastank is right behind you.."

The seats are bolted into place. I had to put the laptop behind me when I drove. It's actually a rocketpack if anyone asks.

"The gas gauge is broken. So just make some left turns and if you hear it slosh around, then you're good..."

Having used public transit and spent more money than this is likely worth with rentals over the past few months, I just laughed and thanked him. I love to drive and it meant the world to be driving damn near anything. Ah the price of mobility, eh?) Besides, as a rockabilly girl, I guess it's fine.

I was a little embarrassed when I drove up to Twiistup 4 in this huge beast.

"It's a beach truck."

The valet just smiled and said it wasn't that bad. I put my glasses on. I know it's bad. A few friends have told me I should try and get it on Pimp My Ride.

I arrived sans date after all. But my night was far from horrible. I was originally going to wear slacks but went with a dress last minute. Polka dots and a red bow. No heels, lest my feet be killing me in the morning. I'll need them for Mashable tomorrow.

I had an amazing time last night. I met a ton of new faces, and got to hang out more with some familiar ones.

I walked in and quickly found wmmarc and the TechZulu crowd. It was a rush. I was pulled this way and that. I talked to Vak and told him about how I'd been a fan of the site and wanted to help out. I ended up doing my first on camera interview for TechZulu. I was a bit nervous, but I think it went well. Things like that get easier in time right?

There were so many pictures taken. So much conversation and great people. I have another blog in the works about one of those in particular.
From the quirky to the ultra professional, it was an interesting turn out. And Mashable is going to be quite the party as well. Which I have to get showered and look for what exactly I'm going to wear to now. I swear gents, you have it so easy compared to us ladies.

I hope to see many of you again tonight and at more of the events. Yes, I'll be that teensy girl with the loud beast of a vintage truck.. unless someone else drives me or it breaks down before then (please don't beast.. please don't..)

Cats Flocking to new social networking site!

In the category of "I have a great idea and I know management will go along with it", we have the Purina Breeze cat litter social networking site.  Courtesy of Marshall Kilpatrick over at ReadWriteWeb

Feel free to shoot me other examples of where Corporate America just did not get it right.

It's not every day that you get to discuss social media with the likes of Robert Scoble. And, it's not every day that you get to attend a conference that makes that dicussion possible for absolutely free. Zip. Zilch. Nada out of your pocket.

According to its Web site, ConvergeSouth 2008 is focused on breakthroughs in creativity and diversity on the Web. It explores the digital revolution in publishing and expression, including blogs, videocasting and podcasting. Key speakers include Robert Scoble (as mentioned above), Anil Dash and Mathew Gross. You can register here.

The conference is October 17, with additional events happening on October 16, 17 and 18. Here's a link to the schedule.

Hope to see you there. Hat tip to my friend Mark Tosczak for letting me know about the conference. (He's been twice and gives it good reviews.)

If you enjoyed this post, please consider subscribing to my RSS feed, either by reader or by e-mail.

Late last week, there was a surge in searches for the graphic representation of Swastika so much so it showed up on Google Trends. TechCrunch’s Michael Arrington wrote a post on it here and mentioned it in a tweet here. It was Arrington’s tweet that I responded to, admittedly less calmly than I do with strangers, and it got me the following response from Michael Arrington:

I was also promptly blocked from following TechCrunch’s tweets, which is really no loss since being more ‘global’ in my outlook, I rarely read the Valley-centric site.

Meanwhile the ongoing conversation on Arrington’s post got hotter until Arrington came out to say that the meaning of the Swastika had been changed by World War II so the rest of us should just ‘get over it’. Expectedly that piece of advice went down like a lead balloon with many of TechCrunch’s readers – including many westerners who have travelled to and worked in other cultures – and the discussion there on got hotter and hotter.

Like much else, this is a multi-faceted controversy. I have taken a whole week to write about this for one reason - I want to have a reasoned approach to debate, and sometimes it is best to let things cool down a bit.

About the Swastika

I do not consider the Swastika a Hindu religious symbol but as identities go, it is a part of my complex, multi-layered, multi-faceted identity. However, I do know that the Swastika does not need me or a billion other Indians and Chinese to defend its honour, so to speak. Many have written about it with more genuine and simply more authority than the gentlemen telling us to ‘get over it’.

That is, of course, my rational mind at work. But if you, like me, lived in Europe, the frequent doses of revisionism would get your otherwise placid and rational goat too.

Prince Harry wears a Swastika on his armband for a fancy dress party – arguably in bad taste for the second in line to a European throne – and alarmists in the European Union rush to seek a ban on the Swastika. The ban was narrowly avoided due to opposition from Britain and other states.

As revisionism goes, Neha raised a pertinent point in her comment on TechCrunch’s post:

“Just because the KKK burned men on stakes - do you get all worked up about someone Googling for the crucifix?”

Worth a pause for thought, isn’t it?

Since we are all so tetchy, isn’t it time to make a tough choice?

Should we stop discussing the meaning of any and all religious or cultural symbols altogether? Or should we seek not to display our ignorance in such full bloom and instead seek a constructive dialogue that enhances our awareness?

What will it be?

About Arrington and 'normal'

Leaving aside the debate about "normal" on the web, the more pertinent point is Arrington's advice (or whatever you wish to call it) to ‘get over it’.

It is unclear what we need to get over.

Should we get over a few thousand years of history and culture for a few years of war?

Why should a few billion - that is billion with a 'B' - people, whose culture and values are embodied in the symbol, give it up for a madman's antics?

Over on the TechCrunch post, B. Shantanu made the point whether it is not time now to re-assess the understanding of the Swastika in an increasingly globalised world. Arrington did not respond but one of the commenters, who identifies himself as Frank Church on TechCrunch’s post, said:

“Sure, Mike will just change the opinion of every uneducated and unthoughtful person in the western world, and, “reassert the original meaning and significance of the symbol”. You are also part of the Tard-wagon? If consumer perception were easily manipulated, advertising spend would be lots smaller than $200B+. Moron.”

Notwithstanding the unwarranted epithet at the end of that point – after all, this is not a discussion about breeding – this commenter has a point. Perhaps we are giving Michael Arrington too much importance. After all, he just writes a Valley rag about Valley businesses that even some stalwarts of the Valley do not read (I have received some Tweets to the effect but it would be churlish to stick them here). To him, it is his bread and butter. To the rest of us, it is a drop of information in the enormous ocean of knowledge that we need to survive in a growingly complex and truly globalised world.

The world that no longer brooks quietly any arbitrary revision of its heritage.

John Maynard Keynes famously said:

“When the facts change, I change my mind. What do you do, Sir?”

That Hitler’s misuse of the Swastika changed the western view of the Swastika is a fact. Some changed their mind after World War II.

But globalisation of the world economy and the shifting sands of the balance of power is also a fact. Time to change our minds again?

About Google and corporate censorship

Subsequently, Google apologised to its users for the 'mistake'. Google’s apology says:

“We have an automated system to identify and remove inappropriate or offensive material in Hot Trends. In rare cases, when such material is missed, we manually remove these results from our Hot Trends list. We apologize to any users who were offended by this situation.”

So, let me understand this. After Arrington, now Google is the arbiter of ‘inappropriate’ and ‘offensive’ on the web. Right?

Pardon me for asking the obvious but isn’t the entire premise of Google’s business is that the search is ‘automated’? Did Google not want us to believe that “the algorithm rules, ok?”? So does it or does it not?

If the algorithm does rule, I suppose this means that I can now not discuss Swastika in my private emails on Gmail either because it would bring up ‘inappropriate’ materials up in the ads on the sidebar.

If it does not, I assume it would be one of those ‘rare cases’ of Google manually removing those results. Would it not? Does that not mean that the emails are no longer private? Is that technically not snooping? If not, what is the term for it?

Either way, Google’s credibility is in question.

Google faced considerable flak when it decided to censor materials in exchange for getting entry into China. They defended it saying that some access is better than no access. They also tried to convince us – and nobody is really convinced - that this was in step with their ‘don’t be evil’ policy.

With India and Indians, Google has a different struggle at hand.

India is one of the very few countries where Orkut, not Facebook, is the social networking site of choice. It is unclear how much money, if any, Orkut makes for Google. But what it does do for Google is get a captive next-generation audience to its products and services. That is nothing to sneeze at, not in an increasingly globalised world, which may not be on Arrington’s Valley centric radar but definitely is on Google’s global radar.

Tell us, Google, do you really think it is worth it?

End piece

The brouhaha however confirms a few things for me.

In a world, where a generation is growing up with the internet as their virtual sixth sense, discretion is not a better part of valour; it is an essential value that needs to be evoked every now and then. It remains important that readers are able to separate “journalism” from “commentary”. The former should be value-free reportage seeking as much balance as possible, the latter nothing but a value-based comment.

The controversy also shows that the web will shape the dialogue on cultural hegemonies. It will be an ugly sausage-making process, and we shall all be witness to and active participants in it.

And last but not the least, anybody, who says ‘I don’t do politics’ better revise their cliché quickly.

Modern business and globalisation is nothing, but politics. The sooner we recognise that, the sooner we will likely understand the dynamics, the better equipped we will be to strategise to win in the ever-changing world.

I’m doing better with it though, and starting to make decisions based on how valuable my time is to me, and how much of an impact I think I can have on things I’m doing and.. here’s the big one - how IMPORTANT is this to me in the whole scheme of things.

I read an older post today on 43 Folders and the very last item on the list helped, once again, to bring things into perspective:
Get pickier - You are the sole person in your life who gets to decide where your time and attention can go. Take that responsibility seriously by not wasting time on junk. You know in your heart what’s really important to you — does the current direction of your time and attention reflect that? Is “kid hugging” time where it should be in proportion to “Blackberry checking” time? Be mindful at the highest level about where you focus your energy, and always strive not to squander it on undeserving activities.

And there it is. Perspective.  For me though, it’s not that activities are ‘undeserving’ - not at all, in fact. Most of the things I’m saying “no” to these days are very deserving and are things that I’d probably enjoy doing - *IF* I had unlimited time - but I don’t.

Social media and social networking are powerful amazing things. I thank my lucky stars every single day to be part of such wonderful online communities.  That being said, if I let myself get completely wrapped up in every single community, every single event, every single committee, every single meeting.. I have no time for me.  I need time for me. I’m better for everything else, when I take care of “me” first.

1. Big businesses figure out new uses for media - because they have time and money to hire experts to see what's coming next, and the resources to really dive into the new media effectively
2. SMB's don't have the time or money to see as far ahead, since they're too busy running their daily business
3. SMB's see big businesses changing to adapt, then feel compelled to compete with big business on their terms, but cannot
4. SMB's struggle, and sometimes fail

To prove my point:

1970's - 1990's Broadcast advertising

1. Big business figured out that they could drive demand to their local stores/franchises through national advertising campaigns with high production value and massive reach (think Wendy's "Where's the Beef?")
2. SMB's tried to do their own local advertising campaigns that were expensive, innefective, and generally were not as clever to an audience used to professional media
3. Times were tough for local burger joints

1994-2001 Web 1.0

1. Big business figured out that, by selling on the internet and by correctly configuring their supply chain, they could sell products to people at lower costs and with greater convenience than most local stores (think Amazon.com, Outpost.com, DELL, BestBuy etc)
2. SMB's tried to move to online selling and to competing on cost
3. Times were tough for local book, computer and electronics stores

2007-present Web 2.0

1. Big business has looked ahead and realized that a) customers are increasingly connecting with people and businesses through social media, b) employees are increasingly using social media inside and outside of their jobs and c) with web 2.0 and supply chain improvements, even a big business can plop a small local version (Starbucks, Wal-Mart Neighborhood Markets, Dunkin Donuts) of a store in a local neighborhood and create community and customer loyalty (MyStarbucksIdea.com, Dunkin Donuts YouTube Channel, Dunkin Brands Serving Heroes Site, etc). They are just now trying to figure out how to use this new medium for their advantage.
2. SMB's will have to adapt and compete again (ending to be determined)

What do you think will happen this time around? Will SMB's be able to jump out ahead of big business?

As a way of exploring the social media space, please feel free to jump in and brainstorm some creative uses of social media at our "think-up" to finish the sentence: "The craziest/wackiest BUSINESS use of social media I can think of is.." Share your response here.

Speaking of ideas, what underlies this "MetaMee" concept is one big IDEA - Intelligently Designed & Evolving Aggregation. Right now, we have fragmentation across many websites and platforms. Someone needs to take all the bits and pieces, apply intelligent design with user needs in mind first, and allow us to custom-aggregate in a flexible environment that will accomodate an evolving web and its evolving users.

If this final post is your first exposure to this IDEA, here is the background: part 1, part 2, part 3, part 4 and part 5.

In part 5, we began a discussion of one of the key concepts, layering/stratifying of information. Here, I'd like to introduce several other key concepts that would make the MetaMee platform uniquely useful.

First is the idea of pivoting. I will use the term this way: the ability to take one piece of information and view it from different angles of approach and richness. Let's say, in my conversation stream, I see a tweet from Mack Collier, whom I had decided to follow. I find it interesting and want to know more. Right now, learning about Mack, or joining in on that conversation, might require me to go to Twitter, Plurk, Mack's Viral Garden website, etc., etc. But what I'd really like to do is click on that message, see it in a threaded view (if it is part of a threaded conversation), initiate a private chat with Mack, see tweets with similar themes from similar folks, see a more complete bio of Mack (based on what he has revealed of himself in the "layers" of his MetaMee profile), see what other data streams he has available that I can subscribe to (pix, other sites, LinkedIn, Facebook, etc.), and have the ability to give Mack ratings and recommendations that other MetaMee users can use to form their view of Mack. All from one place.

Some of these ideas I spelled out in prior post a while back, about the ideal social media interface (that is the bite-sized version of this much larger endeavor, an ideal web interface!). The fact is, by aggregating all of this into one place, and being able to pivot around, I can much more intelligently make connections with those that provide value.

Aggregation, in fact, is the next concept. Your comments on other people's blogs, your tweets, your posts, your purchases, your ratings - they're all over the place, aren't they? Your pictures, your contacts, your interests...wouldn't it be nice to pull all that together and have it accessible from one dashboard? It'll be a hard technical problem, granted. But the company/entrepreneur/team that pulls this off will find a ready audience.

We also need to be able to classify what comes in (we talked about classifying what goes out in part 5). I'd like to be able to take data streams, and people, and put them into buckets of my own making - you can do this with Google Reader, for instance. Being able to classify by topic, and/or importance, and/or whatever else I want, means I can intelligently aggregate and control. Crucial in the age of information overload. I also want to comment on and rate (think of Netflix and Amazon here) just about anything, which will lead to more intelligent recommendations by MetaMee, and also may help others if I choose to share those ratings and comments in my public persona.

Finally, let's summarize this whole thing with some imagery to help make sense of it all. In the vast ocean of this networked world, I am a salmon hatchery on a little stream. I launch my little fish (my media) out there, joining other fish coming from their streams, mingling in larger rivers and out into the ocean wilderness of the internet. But my fish - and yours - are tagged. When people catch our fish (see our photos, read our tweets, subscribe to our blog, etc.) they tell others where the good fishing is, and they come to our stream. If the fish are unhealthy, few will cast in their lines, or wish to visit the hatchery. Natural selection at work.

On the other side of the coin, let's say I have cable TV, with 468 channels available. That's a lot of noise! But I only want 22 of those channels (I think). I should be able to pick and choose only what I want for my constant streams, and grab tastes of others as they seem interesting to me (it still grates on my nervest that cable providers don't allow us to custom-create our own viewing packages. Hello??????). But the cable box is smart enough to know what I tend to watch, and even has a central hive mind that tracks what people who seem to be like me tend to watch. Then, when I power on, I can go to channel 23 for "Recommendations." Bingo! Now this interface to the broadcast (and narrowcast) world is serving me, and making sense of the ocean of content, while allowing me full and flexible choice.

Idealistic? Sure! But why should we shoot for mediocrity? Add your comments and thoughts, and let's find someone who wants to make us a MetaMee-type platform. To have such a thing to simplify our on-line lives would be...well, precious!

The principle assumption behind this ad campaign is that, for what I can only assume is a relatively low production cost, Absolut uses these comedians to target a specific audience. In particular Zach Galifianakis attracts a quirky, psuedo intellectual (well maybe a few of his audience members are actual intellectuals) urban crowd who are likely to hit the bars and maybe enjoy a vodka or two, three or four. That being said at no point does Zach actually endorse the product on the level; instead he makes fun of the advertising process which essentially makes this video akin to so many other viral marketing campaigns currently in existance.

The breakout moment of the video however is when the comedians take aim at the viral format of the video and joke about reverting back to a straight-forward endorsement advert. At this point the video is essentially working on the premise that advertising for a product in either a traditional or a viral format is just ridiculous. I'm reminded of an episode of the Simpson's when Homer is starring as a freak at Lollapalooza and two disaffected youths question whether or not they're being sarcastic, or if they even know anymore.

Intentional or not Absolut has asked that online marketing change direction and I couldn't agree more. If you haven't been jaded by the viral marketing campaigns already then you're lucky; if you haven't been jaded by traditional marketing methods by now then you must be very young. As a bit of a footnote I'd like to mention that the first people to make it clear that they found viral marketing annoying and amature was Coudal Partners in this video response.

So where will online marketing head next and what will we suffer for it?

I 10 tipi di conversazione che le aziende devono monitorare, secondo LeBrun sono :

• la lamentela, alla quale bisogna rispondere velocemente e trasparentemente, sfruttando l'opportunità di farsi ricordare per il buon servizio
• i complimenti: ringraziare chi li ha fatti ed eventualmente ricambiarli
• i problemi degli utenti, da ascoltare per conoscere i nuovi problemi e realizzare un servizio proattivo
• le domande degli utenti, alle quali rispondere pubblicamente in modo che tutti possano beneficiare delle risposte, ma anche sfruttare le domande degli utenti per ottenere insight
• l'impatto della campagna: misurare le conversazioni generate dalle campagne di comunicazione
• le crisi: monitorare le conversazioni in modo da gestire il dissenso, impendendone una diffusione virale e le conseguenti crisi.
• i competitors: ascoltare tutte le conversazioni a proposito dei competitors
• le conversazioni della folla: monitorare le conversazioni riguardante il proprio settore in modo da capire quali sono i temi che ottengono maggiore attenzione
• influenzatori: individuare le persone più influenti nella conversazione a proposito dei temi rilevanti e cercare di costruire una relazione con queste persone
• i bisogni delle persone: tracciare le keywords che gli utenti usano per esprimere i loro bisogni, in modo da rispondere ad una richiesta o aiutare a soddisfare una richiesta espressa.

Mentre le leggi (quasi) immutabili delle misurazione delle conversazioni proposte da Moffit consistono nell'analizzare:

• REACH - che audience raggiungono le conversazioni?
• RELEVANCE- supportano la direzione seguita dall'azienda ?
• INFLUENCE- tra chi avviene la condivisione e quante persone sono coinvolte?
• AUTHORITY-quanto è affidabile la fonte (trust)?
• ENGAGEMENT-quanto sono coinvolti gli utenti?
• INTERACTION-quanto possono interagire gli utenti?
• VELOCITY-quanto si diffondono velocemente i contenuti (viralità)?
• ATTENTION-quanto tempo dedicano gli utenti alle conversazioni?
• SENTIMENT-quanto sono positive le valutazioni nelle conversazioni?
• NET PROMOTER- ci sono dei suggerimenti di brand o di prodotto nelle conversazioni?

La definizione di questo paradigma delle leggi ha suscitato le polemiche di Adam Metz, che ha definito la conferenza della Eldeman solo uno strumento per rendere credibili le strategie sui social media grazie alla convergenza tra agenzie di PR internazionali. Inoltre secondo Metz attualmente esistono almeno tre problemi nel campo della misurazione dei social media:

-           Le tecniche che nel 2001 venivano definite "public relations", oggi vengono ridefinite social media perché le aziende si sono accorte che i loro servizi attuali sono inefficaci.

-          Le metodologie di analisi dei social media sono ancora vaghe e le aziende hanno appena cominciato a studiarle

-          Nella valutazione dei social media attualmente si viola la regola della ripartizione della spesa secondo la quale il 90% deve essere destinato alle persone che usano il software di analisi e il 10% alla piattaforma di analisi.

Una nota finale relativa alla situazione italiana: a nostro avviso da noi il problema non è "come viene ripartita la spesa" ma bensi che per ora non esiste ancora nessuna voce nel budget delle aziende dedicata all'ascolto e all'analisi del buzz online. Speriamo che nel 2009 le cose cambino.

*Lists: 25 Things You May Not Know About Tom Waits - "His favourite contemporary artist is Missy Elliot." [largehearted boy]

*Politics: Barack Obama to appear at this year's Lollapalooza?

*Videogames: Rock Band will offer more than 500 songs by the end of the year.

*Videogames: Carriers prepare to roll out cellphone versions of Guitar Hero. [textually]

*Social: Last.fm gets a makeover. Forgive me; it has been almost a year since I last scrobbled.

*Journey: The Las Vegas Review-Journal profiles listenerd obsession Arnel Pineda. Yes, I am verifiably insane.

*Off topic: What are the 10 greatest misspelled tattoos? "Only God will Juge Me." [mefi]

*Gone: I am going into the Northwoods, to the land of the Watersmeet Nimrods, where blogs dare not go. I will return at a later date, filled with beer and cheese, and wearing camouflage.

Anyhows, I was taking a look at Kasier Kuo's "Where are the Jonses? A cautionary tale" post, I've heard about this campaign before but as i was reading through it, i started trying to recall other campaigns which used social media tools, then i started thinking about general branding campaigns. I thought of some of the more famous campaign and their extensions and how long these have been around.

Those that come to mind immediately are Adidas "Nothing is impossible campaign" and the " Dream Big" extension. The "Got Milk" campaign and "Get the glass" extension. Intel's brilliant "Intel Inside" campaign was a classic which has been around for really long. The Marlboro man, etc....

So here comes the thinking pot where i throw and mix my questions and answers around. How long should a brand keep a campaign? Doesn't it get stale after a while? Do we really want to see an extension of the current campaign? Wouldn't something fresh rejuvenate the brand?

But then, on the other side, wouldn't it hurt ur brand image if you make a radical re-branding effort? Where's the consistency if Nike suddenly turns around and goes, "We're a classic brand for the distinguished sportsmen/women" (OK, a little extreme and unlikely).  Don't fix what isn't broken.

Really basic 101 branding stuff, but where do you draw the line when u feel your brand needs a face lift? Can't wait until sales are down cause that would mean going against an uphill task....

So thank god for social media! Hearing what blogs have to say about your current brand. Are you top of mind recall? Do you still reflect the same brand values you wanted to or do people view it as boring in the community...

Yet I am hesitant on using social media to test out a new campaign before a brand rolls out a multi-channel campaign. Should we test it out on communities that adore the brand? What would their reaction be if we pull out knowing they dislike it?

Sure we could do focus groups on a few groups of ppl ( Brand evengislist, day to day users, brand haters, etc..) But let us assume that the budget is really tight.Which route to take?

I'm now hoping the I'm talkathon campaign by Microsoft for social causes goes well because it's such a unique extension (Although some ppl beg to differ on the comments on my posting I'm Talkathon, Thumbs up or down?)

Oh yeah, according to this, brands thinking of setting up their own social networking site? Bad idea... Join the rest of the community at their homes, don't throw a one million dollar party that nobody goes to... (I love that quote).

One of the key slides was a comparison of Social Ad Networks current capacity which we see here. Across the top are the features offered to advertisers with the name of the network down the left hand side.

All advertisers offer standard display units, some offer Integrated (where you can see social network features such as a photo of a friend who is using the product), very few offer targeting (demographic by age and gender, geo by location or profile data by what people have in their profile interests) mainly because of terms of service restraints by the platform. 

The most interesting column is feature sensitive (or deep integration) where the ad networks provide a commoditised way of purchasing features that are intrinsic to the apps (a Resident Evil version of Zombie, a Mike and Ike sweets gift icon on Gifts or an Indiana Jones Fedora hat on Where I've Been). This is the gold seam for social network advertising.  

The only network really targeting this at the moment is Social Cash with its emerging Point Cash technology which allows apps to sell in game points (eg. coins on My Aquarium for example) to advertisers to offer as rewards to users who click on its ads.

This sheet is based on a review of their web sites and marketing documents. Since then I've met with a few ad networks to understand their offerings in more details and am building a picture of which have the winning technology.

Please do add any comments to this post and I'll try to update the framework with the most correct information about the various feature sets of the social ad networks.

775.18.07.08

The service has been down since 5 p.m. Singapore (GMT+8 ) for maintenance with a promise to be reinstated in an hour, but it's been more than 8 hours so far and it's still down.

I feel like something's missing in my 'online' existence. "Soon" isn't a good enough reassurance... it's too much of a relative term. 

Anyone knows the number for Plurker Anonymous?

Gen. Van Antwerp was quoted on why he is blogging in the article, as well as in this video on the Army's media site:

"This is the way of the future.  We should be out there, too - clearly and openly communicating with the American public every chance we get."

Is it effective?

The blog seems to be a great way to communicate more about what the Army Corps of Engineers does, as there may be many people that don't really know what types of projects they take on.  It also gives readers a view into the Gen. Van Antwerp's leadership tenets and style.  The blog is updated every few weeks, and it is already getting a variety of comments.  It could be improved with more interaction from Gen. Van Antwerp back to his commenters to really create a conversation, rather then just a communication tool.

The Army is blogging - what about you?

Does a blog fit into your organization's goals for interacting with customers?  Could you use it to better listen to what customers have to tell you?  Perhaps your company could use a blog to create a discussion around certain topics of interest to your customers.    Setting goals before starting a blog is key to making this social media tool successful.

If you have a moment - pop on over and give it a quick read. Would love to hear any thoughts you may have!

Tweet when you have a new blogpost, when you're going out and want other people to meet up, when your company has a promotion going on, even when you're in jail.  Wait, what?  Yep, Twitter actually saved a man from Egyptian Justice. 

Hopefully you won't ever need to use Twitter for something that serious, but in the meantime I think it's a great social networking tool that more people need to start adopting.

It's fun, fast and easy.  Not to mention free.  Social media is the best way to advertise.  And if you don't want to train a present employee to figure it out, you can hire an intern.  Everyone knows interns are the best cheap labor.  Or if you're feeling really ambitious, you could dive into it yourself!  See what this new world holds for you and your company!

In the short time that the CMSC has been meeting and collaborating we've managed to grow a network of civic minded technocrats that continues to grow and evolve.

• We've hosted events and learning sessions which include community outreach.
• We've built a handful of websites (1) (2) (3) (4) and connections that serve as information repositories and discussion points (including this one).
• We've been key to implementing a New Media Center at Comfest along with collaborating on free wi-fi at Goodale (year round pending); several CMSC members hosted workshops.
• Several active members have hosted and participated in Podcamp Ohio as well as this weekends Startup Weekend Columbus.
• Three members of our group, Tim Eby, Walker Evans and Helene Blowers recently participated on the panel of a Columbus Metro Club luncheon.
• Active members of CSMC joined with others in the community to build the movement to provide marked parking for scooters and motorcycles via this blog which resulted in the city responding to the need almost immediately.
• One future goal that is gaining traction within the city is Convergence Columbus.

We are a group of peers, a group of neighbors, a group of friends and a group of action. We continue to widen our circle of organizational collaboration as well; we want to thank WOSU, COSI, OCLC, Merion Village Community Center, Columbus Chamber, Experience Columbus, TechColumbus, Comfest, Podcamp Ohio, Columbus Metropolitan Club, Startup Weekend and the Columbus Metropolitan Library. So share with us what ideas you have and we'll figure out how to make it happen together.

Finally I'd like to suggest you go to CMSC member Jeff Johnson's blog Urban Infill to get one last bit of inspiration.

Wikipedia describes an ‘expert’ as, “someone widely recognized as a reliable source of or skill whose faculty for judging or deciding rightly, justly, or wisely is accorded authority and status by their peers or the public.”

But then again, is Wikipedia an ‘expert’ source? It’s constantly under the scrutiny of other ‘experts’ for its credibility and reliability. But are those critical ‘experts’ really ‘experts?’

Basically, what I’m getting at here is that defining an ‘expert’ is difficult, and sort of depends on a person-to-person basis. But, a few common words I picked out from the Wiki definition seem to stand out – WIDELY RECOGNIZED, RELIABLE, WISE, SKILLFUL, AUTHORITY.

When it comes to Doctors, Engineers and other accredited professionals it’s easy to brand them as ‘experts’ in their respective fields. But, what happens when you take a look at the Social Media industry?

Is there such thing as a Social Media ‘expert’? According to the Wiki definition of ‘expert,’ Chris Brogan, Brian Solis, and numerous other big names in the industry could be considered ‘experts.’ But, so could many other 15-year-old Millennials that grew up in the Web 2.0 age. Age hasn’t hindered them from becoming recognized, reliable, wise, skillful, and authoritative. It’s no secret that when it comes to social media, age is like a golf score- lower is better. Don’t get me wrong, as a fellow social media professional (and non self-appointed ‘expert), I value their thoughts and opinions greatly, and in no way am I putting them down.

So, where do you draw the line? Who’s an ‘expert’?

Nobody? Everybody?

Social media is such a broad, dynamic and uncharted area, we’re all ‘experts’ – if you’d like to get technical that is. EVERYBODY wants to be the first one to join every new, emerging social media tool (the majority of which are useless). EVERYBODY wants to Tweet about every webinar they participated in. EVERYBODY involved in social media is at an equal level with one another, because NOBODY really knows what’s next with social media, or how it’s ‘best used.’

So, if we’re all technically experts, and there is no real benchmark to base our next moves on, is anybody really an ‘expert’? I say no – social media experts DO NOT exist, but, LEADERS in the industry do.