Selected by thatdamnredhead

• 
  Holy Kaw!

• Why Google Chrome is the best web browser

  9 Feb 2010 | 3:43 pm

  Firefox, Safari, Internet Explorer, Opera, and Chrome—the competition for the title of best web browser never seems to end. Until now. Slate has compiled a list of reasons why Chrome wins out over the rest. See a few below: Minimal interface. It’s simple, and it’s intuitive. What’s not to love? It’s fast to open and runs efficiently. Bookmark synching, making your shift to Chrome even less of a hassle. Full story at Slate. More great Slate content. Photo credit: Fotolia Permalink | Leave a comment  »

• Skier survives 17 hours under avalanche in Switzerland

  9 Feb 2010 | 3:26 pm

  A twenty-one-year-old skier was found alive after being buried underneath an avalanche for seventeen hours in the Swiss Alps. The lucky lad was pulled from the snow with only mild hypothermia and no major injuries. The man was skiing off piste near Evolène in the Swiss Valais when he was buried by the slide. His parents reported him missing and a search operation commenced. They soon found evidence of an avalanche measuring fifty by 150 meters. The rescue team was unable to do anything due to security issues, so they came back the next morning with a helicopter. The rescue team found…

• Time lapse video of massive D.C. snowfall

  9 Feb 2010 | 2:59 pm

  Snowocalypse 2010 continues pounding away at the east coast, but for those of us not buried up to our belly buttons in a winter wonderland, it can be hard to imagine the magnitude of the snowfall. Luckily, a YouTube-r in Washington D.C. armed with a Nikon D200 snapped a shot every five minutes on February 5 and 6 to create a really cool time lapse video that can put anyone in awe of the tag team of weather evil doers, Mother Nature and Jack Frost. Full explanation of video’s creation at YouTube. Stay up to date on weather happenings. Permalink | Leave a comment  »

• Muppets' Beaker vs. YouTube haters [video]

  9 Feb 2010 | 2:32 pm

  YouTube comments: the place where grammar and common sense go to die. Even a darling Muppet like Beaker can’t escape the cruel folks that troll the video sharing site, leaving a slew of nonsensical and stupid comments in their wake. Full selection of Muppet videos at Muppets Studio. The best videos from the old internets. Permalink | Leave a comment  »

• Facebook’s dirty little secret: Coal-powered data center

  9 Feb 2010 | 1:41 pm

  Earth-loving Facebookers could have their hemp panties in a bunch over word that the world’s most popular social networking site has opted for coal to power its new Oregon-based data center. Rather than tap into the plethora of renewable energy sources in Oregon, Facebook decided to use a coal plant in Idaho because of cost issues. Coal power offers incremental price increases not available with more Mother Nature-friendly energy options like hydropower. No word if Mark Zuckerberg has started driving a gas-guzzling Hummer to work now too. Full story at Tree Hugger. Tons of resources to…

• 
  Mashable!

• The Location Implications of Google Buzz

  Jennifer Van Grove

  9 Feb 2010 | 3:28 pm

  We learned earlier this morning that Google Buzz adds a shared social experience — very similar to FriendFeed and Facebook — to your Google contact circle via Gmail. Google also made it very clear that the mobile component, especially around location, is important to the product as a whole.Location plays a big role in Buzz — we saw this with the introduction of the snap, Google’s answer to the check-in.That one key feature demonstrates how right we were when we predicted late last year that “everything points towards Google taking big leaps on the location front…

• Google Buzz: What It Means for Twitter and Facebook

  Samuel Axon

  9 Feb 2010 | 2:59 pm

  So far, Google has failed to launch a successful social web product to U.S. Internet users. Orkut has taken off in including Brazil and India, but not in North America. Wave is a neat concept, but it has proven too abstract to catch on.Is Buzz — Google’s new Twitter and Facebook-like social stream — the product that’s going to win Google a dominant — or at least prominent — place in the social web?That all depends. Integration with existing social networks are critical for Buzz’s success — especially Facebook. I don’t believe Buzz can enjoy significant…

• Sports Illustrated’s Swimsuit Issue Delivers Video from Page to Phone

  Brenna Ehrlich

  9 Feb 2010 | 2:08 pm

  Bummed because you don’t have the time to salivate in front of the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Edition Ustream? Well, now you can get plenty of SI content sent directly to your cell: All you need is a physical issue of the mag and a camera phone. Once you pick up your issue (available on stands today), simply search through the pages for the JAGTAGs — or 2D barcodes — featuring a black and white image of what they’re calling a “mobile beauty.” Snap a photo of the JAGTAG and send it via MMS in order to get behind-the-scenes videos of the models sent directly…

• What Google Buzz Means for Mobile

  Christina Warren

  9 Feb 2010 | 1:31 pm

  GMAIL USERS: You can now follow Mashable’s official Google Buzz profile here: http://www.google.com/profiles/mashableEarlier this afternoon, Google announced Google Buzz, a semantic approach to social status updates that live inside Gmail. The demonstration video showed off some of what you can do with Buzz on your desktop — but what seems really exciting is what Buzz can do in your pocket. Android and iPhone Optimized SitesIf you visit http://buzz.google.com on your iPhone or Android device, you’ll be taken to a WebKit-optimized interface for using and connecting with…

• Google Buzz: Competitors and Experts React

  Ben Parr

  9 Feb 2010 | 1:17 pm

  GMAIL USERS: You can now follow Mashable’s official Google Buzz profile here: http://www.google.com/profiles/mashableIt’s no shocker that the web is buzzing about Google Buzz (terrible pun intended), Google’s most aggressive push into social media yet.The new social updating and aggregation feature integrates with your mobile and your Gmail, providing a service that seems like a hybrid of Foursquare, Twitter, Facebook and Yelp.People are already taking sides, including some of Google’s competitors. Yahoo struck first, putting out an e-mail about its own previous (and…

• 
  TechCrunch

• FriendFeed (and Gmail) Founder’s Reaction To Google Buzz: “This Seems Vaguely Familiar”

  Erick Schonfeld

  9 Feb 2010 | 3:34 pm

  As soon as Google Buzz was released earlier today, all the early adopters piled in to give it a spin. Paul Buchheit, the creator of Gmal and a founder of FreindFeed, was among them and his initial reaction was: “This seems vaguely familiar . . .” Or, as he put it elsewhere, “There’s a FriendFeed in my Gmail. Sweet! “ It is vaguely familiar to him on various levels. Like FriendFeed before it (which was acquired by Facebook), Buzz acts as a way to bring together different social streams together—Twitter, Flickr, Picasa, Google Reader shared items, status updates,…

• Baidu Raises Revenue Forecasts In Wake Of Google’s Potential China Exit

  Robin Wauters

  9 Feb 2010 | 2:43 pm

  Baidu, the leading search engine operator in China, this afternoon reported blow-out financial results for the fourth quarter of 2009. The company’s Q4 profit rose 48.2% to 427.9 million yuan (approx. $62.7 million), or $1.80 a share. Revenue rose 40% to 1.26 billion yuan, or about $184.7 million, compared to the same period a year ago. In the wake of Google’s stand against censorship of its search engine in China and its consideration to cease business operations in the country altogether, Baidu – to Wall Street’s surprise – raised its sales forecasts for the…

• Scrapblog’s New App Lets You Make Pretty Scrapbooks From Your Facebook Photos

  Leena Rao

  9 Feb 2010 | 2:35 pm

  With 400 million users, Facebook is seeing 2.5 billion photos uploaded every month. Scrapblog, a startup that allows you to make beautiful Flash-based online scrapbooks, is hoping to help Facebook users make pretty collages of their photos via a new Facebook app, Share the Love. When you first start using Share the Love, the app will employ Scrapblog’s recently launched QuickMix technology to instantly generate a photo collage with up to ten Facebook photos. The photos will be automatically arranged with a set theme, which you can change easily (Valentines themes appear to be set at the…

• Microsoft Seizes 23 Domain Names In One Swoop

  Robin Wauters

  9 Feb 2010 | 1:58 pm

  Apple recently made headlines here on TC for depriving an individual of 16 .com domain names that contained some of the company’s brand names, including MacBook and iPod. Microsoft saw that move and then played an even better hand: the company was granted no less than 23 .com domain names in one fell swoop earlier this month. Of those, 22 relate to the software giant’s desktop operating system, Windows, while one contained the trademark-protected term ‘XBOX’. The website addresses were all registered in June 2008 by a person with the peculiar name nonamo c/o nonamo…

• TED: Now with More Elitism?

  Sarah Lacy

  9 Feb 2010 | 12:33 pm

  Let me say upfront: I have never been to TED, mostly because I have never been invited and I can’t imagine a world where I justify paying $6,000 for a conference. But I live in Silicon Valley so every year leading up to the star-studded event, I have to hear about it from nearly everyone I know: People who love it and people who hate it. For the last few years, these conversations have gotten ugly. What I’ve seen and heard from the outside depicts the sad transition from what used to be an inventive, elite industry conference that cross-pollinated experts from the worlds of technology,…

• 
  ReadWriteWeb

• Apple's Virtual Reality Store: Second Life or XBox Live?

  9 Feb 2010 | 3:38 pm

  While the rest of the world was caught up with Google Buzz, Apple was quietly granted a patent for a virtual reality App Store. The store patent encompasses details such as seasonal and time-based lighting, color schemes and a basic storefront representation. A few bloggers have already criticized the patent as a relic from SecondLife past, the store may have more use when we consider it in the context of the XBox Live marketplace. Sponsor According to Patently Apple, the patent is one of several awarded to Apple today. First filed by David Koski in 2006, the abstract explains that a…

• Foreign Startups Looking to U.S. Incubators for Help

  9 Feb 2010 | 2:40 pm

  Entrepreneurship in Europe has a problem. A lot of their talent is "crossing the pond" to increase their chances of finding early-stage funding. A lot of venture firms in Europe tend to play the safer hands that they are dealt, investing in proven companies rather than new startups looking for seed funding. Though organizations like Seedcamp are doing what they can to reverse this trend, incubators in the U.S. like TechStars are still seeing an increase of international applications, many likely from Europe. Sponsor In a recent blog post, TechStars Boston director Shawn Broderick shared…

• Weekly Poll: Is A Private Cloud Just A Glorified Data Center?

  9 Feb 2010 | 2:00 pm

  We are in our third week here at ReadWriteCloud. One of the weekly features we do is a poll about an issue related to cloud computing or virtualization. Last week we asked if you plan to invest in virtualization. This week we are asking: Is a private cloud just a glorified data center? You'll see the poll in the right sidebar of the main ReadWriteCloud page. We had a pretty small sample to work with last week but the results show that virtualization is living up to its promise as one of the most important IT investments being made in the enterprise. Sponsor This week, the question turns to an…

• Can Google Buzz Succeed Where FriendFeed Couldn't?

  9 Feb 2010 | 12:20 pm

  Google just launched Google Buzz, the company's new social networking service which will be tightly integrated with Gmail. There can be little doubt that Google Buzz looks a lot like FriendFeed, the social aggregation service that was acquired by Facebook in August 2009. Today, FriendFeed's developers are Facebook employees and aren't likely to continue to improve the service in any meaningful way, while the active user community on FriendFeed continues to shrink rapidly. Given the similarities between the two services, we can't help but wonder if Google Buzz will be able to succeed where…

• How Google Buzz is Disruptive: Open Data Standards

  9 Feb 2010 | 11:31 am

  Google rolled out a social stream service today called Buzz. It looks on the surface like Facebook, FriendFeed and other stream reading and writing services. It will compete with Facebook and Twitter. Under the covers, though, this major product was built by a team of people taking a radical new approach to online publishing: Buzz is all about open, standardized user data. Google Buzz data can be syndicated out to other services using the standard data formats called Atom, Activity Streams, MediaRSS and PubSubHubbub. That couldn't be more different from Facebook. Google has taken open data…

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  ProBlogger Blog Tips

• Blog Like a Cartoonist – Six Stunning Secrets to Help You Break Through Bloggers Block

  Darren Rowse

  9 Feb 2010 | 11:24 am

  And now for a guest post with a difference from Cartoonist Mark Anderson from Andertoons.com who created this comic to illustrate the writing techniques he uses to create his cartoons, and how they can help bloggers push through writer’s block. Post from: Blog Tips at ProBlogger. Blog Like a Cartoonist – Six Stunning Secrets to Help You Break Through Bloggers Block Share This

• Have a 37 Minute Coffee Break with Me [Audio Interview]

  Darren Rowse

  9 Feb 2010 | 5:43 am

  If you have a spare 37 minutes today to grab a coffee with me (or at least are doing something that will allow you to listen to something for 37 minutes in the background) check out this interview I did with Robb Sutton late last week. Robb’s also transcribed it for those who prefer to read. In the interview Rob asks me about a whole range of stuff including: my background in blogging my philosophy on lots of sites vs focusing upon a single (or just a few) sites the process of going full time (and my wife’s six month ultimatum) my shift in focus to e-books and membership sites a…

• What Is Your Blogging Goal for February?

  Darren Rowse

  8 Feb 2010 | 6:22 am

  A few days back I asked readers a question: What Have You Been Putting Off and What’s Holding You Back? Some of the responses to the question in comments (and via email and Twitter) revealed a lot of bloggers really wanting to step things up and get what they’ve been putting off done. So – lets set some goals – what do you want to achieve by the end of February? I’m not going to be calling you up to check up to see if you’re meeting your goals – but hopefully in putting them down publicly you’ll find yourself a little more spurred on to reach…

• 9 Tricks I Used To Triple My AdSense Earnings In 30 Days

  Daniel Scocco

  7 Feb 2010 | 6:34 am

  Guest post by Daniel Scocco from Daily Blog Tips. I have been using Google AdSense to monetize my blogs and websites for as long as I remember. In fact it was the first method I ever tried (I made a whooping $15 on my first month… back in 2005). Over the years I migrated to other methods (e.g., direct sponsors and affiliate marketing), which made AdSense become merely an inventory filler. I was still making around $1,000 monthly from it, but whenever I could I would use other methods over it. Then some months ago I started noticing an upward trend on the CPC of my sites, and I figured that…

• How I Got Some Paying Sponsors Without Really Meaning To

  Darren Rowse

  6 Feb 2010 | 6:21 am

  A guest post by Josh Hanagarne. World’s Strongest Librarian was about four months old when I got interested in sponsors. I’d read the articles about how to do it, and none of them sounded that plausible for me and my situation. For one, my traffic wasn’t impressive, certainly not to the point where sponsors were approaching me. And, while my blog has become slightly more focused in its first ten months, it wasn’t targeted at any group of readers in particular, so I wasn’t sure how confident niche advertisers would be. It’s a little more focused now, but I can’t really think of a…

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  Social Media Today

• Google, Gmail, Relevance Filtering & the Future of Social Media

  9 Feb 2010 | 2:43 am

  [This blog post was cross-posted with my new blog on the Forrester Blog for Interactive Marketers:  http://blogs.forrester.com/marketing/2010/02/google-gmail-relevance-filtering-the-future-of-social-m...

• China and Feeling For Stones: a Conversation with Zhang Hai Hua

  9 Feb 2010 | 2:25 am

  Author of Think Like Chinese on Des Walsh & Friends show The other week on my Des Walsh & Friends show on BlogTalkRadio, I had the pleasure of speaking with a woman of great accomplishment and busi...

• Forresters Blogging patch

  9 Feb 2010 | 12:46 am

  I have never been a fan of  Forrester Research – but  they produce a lot of good research. By the way, have you noticed a lot of the research firms have been acquired  or are merging of late.   So, ...

• Splitting Up the US – How About the Rest of the World?

  8 Feb 2010 | 12:05 pm

  That’s the map of the US based on Pete Warden’s analysis of Facebook profiles. So I live in Socialistan – of well, I grew up in a Communist country, if this is Socialism, I can handle it But wha...

• User-review sites, when shills go wrong

  8 Feb 2010 | 10:35 am

  Urbanspoon, the user review site and social network for foodies, has been running a contest to find the "most romantic restaurant" in cities across America. Great idea with Valentine's Day coming up, ...

• 
  Liz Strauss at Successful Blog

• Why Businesses Still Aren’t Engaging Online With Their Customers

  ME Liz Strauss

  9 Feb 2010 | 6:54 am

  A Guest Post by Frank Angelone Are you a business? Whether you are a large corporation or a small business, you should be engaging with your customers. As many already know, the best way to engage with your customers is through social media. There are so many sites available at your disposal to be an active participant, yet many businesses still aren’t using social media to its full potential. Why is this? Well, I believe it can be answered in 5 bullet points… Laziness. It’s as simple as that. If you don’t engage in social media, your sales for your business…

• 3 Simple Steps to Add Irresistible Influence to Your Brand

  ME Liz Strauss

  8 Feb 2010 | 7:20 am

  Magnetic from the Very First Minute! What makes a person or a company unforgettable from the second you interact? Why do some folks motivate and energize us? What is it about some folks that attracts people so powerfully? What makes a magnetic personality? Is it possible for a company or a brand to have those qualities? Can we carry them online and off? 3 Simple Steps to Add Irresistible Influence to Your Brand The brands and the businesses we love don’t just deliver on a promise. They make us feel good about working with them and feel good about being part of what they’re doing.

• Beach Notes: What Goes into Effortless?

  ME Liz Strauss

  7 Feb 2010 | 7:25 am

  by Guest Writers Suzie Cheel and Des Walsh A couple of times recently we have seen this man at our local beach, Rainbow Bay, with a didgeridoo ( or yidaki), the traditional Australian Aboriginal musical intrument. This day we saw and heard him playing with the end of the “didge” submerged at the water’s edge. My thought was that there might be some spiritual explanation, connecting with the spirits of the sea, etc. A bit of a web search suggests something more mundane. Evidently the exercise of playing the instrument in this way trains the diaphragm and builds the player’s…

• Thanks to Week 224 SOBs

  ME Liz Strauss

  6 Feb 2010 | 8:56 am

  Successful and Outstanding Bloggers Let me introduce the bloggers who have earned this official badge of achievement, and the right to call themselves Successful Blog SOBs. I invite them to take a badge home to display on their blogs. They take the conversation to their readers, contribute great ideas, challenge us, make us better, and make our businesses stronger. I thank all of our SOBs for thinking what we say is worth passing on. Good conversation shared can only improve the blogging community. Should anyone question this SOB button’s validity, send him or her to me. Thie award…

• SOB Business Cafe 02-05-10

  ME Liz Strauss

  5 Feb 2010 | 7:03 am

  Welcome to the SOB Cafe We offer the best in thinking — articles, books, podcasts, and videos about business online written by the Successful and Outstanding Bloggers of Successful Blog. Click on the titles to enjoy each selection. The Specials this Week are Doc Searls Weblog What you have to appreciate, even admire, is how well Apple plays the vertical game. It’s really amazing. What you also have to appreciate is how much we also need the horizontal one. The iPad needs an open alternative, soon. There should be for the iPad what Google’s Nexus One is for the iPhone. Up the creek…

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  Logic+Emotion

• We Are The Media. Do We Trust Media?

  David Armano

  9 Feb 2010 | 9:22 am

    First, an informal disclaimer. While I work for the firm (Edelman) that conducted the 2010 Trust Barometer, the following opinions expressed are personal and I was not involved with the research or creation of the report. That said, I wanted to express a few non data based thoughts around the the specific finding that there is less trust in a "person like yourself".Now, let's get into why this is worth discussing. Based on comments and conversation which I've seen in industry publications and elsewhere there seems to be a concern that this finding flies in the face of social conventional…

• The Unofficial SXSW Survival Guide

  David Armano

  6 Feb 2010 | 12:07 pm

    Having passed on my slot to the folks at Dachis Group, I will not be speaking this year at SXSW (interactive) but I will be attending. It will be my second time, and I'm happy to share that there will indeed be a sequel to the sleeper hit event last year known as "Allhat". This year we are going with "Allhat II: Return of the Cattle", and it's sure to be even better complete with local live music thanks to the support from Edelman Digital. That said, there were several things I learned from surviving SXSW, and you might want to take some of them into consideration.Go With The FlowSXSW can…

• Why I'm Not Writing a Book (Right Now)

  David Armano

  31 Jan 2010 | 8:17 pm

  There's really nothing like a book—they are portable, intimate, useful, influential and the good ones tend to go "viral" in the sense that you share them with people you know. And of course today we have new ways to digest them: from audio to Kindles to iPads etc. A question I've been getting a lot lately is:"When are you writing a book"?I've had some interest—from publishers you've heard of. But the answer is:"Not right now".My logic is simple. One cannot serve two masters—and serve them well. Either my full time job or the book would suffer. So the time is not now. I've got things to…

• Six Ways to Find Social Media Talent

  David Armano

  29 Jan 2010 | 6:40 pm

  More articles on Harvard BusinessAs organizations move their social media strategies from theory to practice, they discover a difficult truth they must confront: Finding the "perfect" social media talent is practically impossible. To start, the field is flooded with thousands of self proclaimed "experts" who have reinvented themselves to take advantage what looks like a growing business opportunity. Maybe they do know social media, but many don't. They need to be vetted. More broadly, most candidates for social media positions fall at the ends of a spectrum. On one end is the person who…

• The 5 Reasons You're Failing In Social Media

  David Armano

  21 Jan 2010 | 1:28 pm

  1. You really don't want to engage directly with customers, employees, etc.—you just want them to hear what you have to say. 2. You're not ready to create new roles, update process, re-distribute resources and budgets, re-train people, and revise old policies. 3. Social media actually threatens how you make money—but you pay lip service out of fear.4. Politics.5. You see it as a career advancing opportunity as opposed to a significant business transformation.Reverse any of these, and you've likely improved your chances of succeeding in a business environment that's becoming increasingly…

• 
  chrisbrogan.com

• Earn Your GED- Find Success Tomorrow

  chrisbrogan

  9 Feb 2010 | 1:30 am

  No, not your General Equivalent Degree. The GED to which I refer is “guest experience design.” What the heck am I talking about? I’ll tell you. Old words: customer service. New words: guest experience. Disney, where I am this week, has a concept called a Moment of Truth. A moment of truth is “any time a guest comes into contact with any aspect of a business, however remote, is an opportunity to form an impression.” Note that it’s “an impression.” It can be good; it can be bad. Why “guest?” Because guest is much more hospitable than…

• Pursue the Goal Not the Method

  chrisbrogan

  8 Feb 2010 | 1:30 am

  In the back of a town car hired to take me to the Kansas City International airport, talking to Jeff, a driver with two kids, self-proclaimed ADD, and a history of quitting rote sales jobs every few months, I realized something of importance to the story of what’s brought me to this place: I am a seeker of the goal, not the method. Now, to unpack. The Method Is What We’re Taught to Pursue We learn our times tables. We learn the 50 states (in the US, at least). We are taught all these rules, these patterns, these systems, these methods. Musicians learn their scales. Painters copy…

• Your Blog From the Prospect’s Point of View

  chrisbrogan

  7 Feb 2010 | 7:34 am

  When you use your blog to complain or report sideways about the industry at large, what message is that sending to your potential new clients? If you’re spending your time analyzing what other people in your space are doing, citing why they’re wrong, and providing your commentary about all the things they’re doing, what does your next potential customer come away thinking? Is your negative commentary helping them make a buying decision? I’ve rarely seen the tactic work in traditional advertising. You can graze them a little bit. For instance, I’m a bit fond of…

• Just Lucky I Guess – Kitchen Table Talks

  chrisbrogan

  6 Feb 2010 | 1:46 pm

  In this Kitchen Table Talks video, I just want to address all the nice folks who call me lucky, or who think I’m just sitting around being handed my lot in life. Can’t see the video? Click here. Direct link to the video “Lucky” is absolutely what I am. Here’s what I do to earn my luck: Write a blog post or two a day. Write a newsletter every week. Comment and connect with others daily. Answer and send hundreds of emails daily. Read voraciously. Work with the best clients I can find. Reach into new markets weekly. Travel extensively. Seems lucky to me. People…

• Some Of The Third Tribe Conversations

  chrisbrogan

  6 Feb 2010 | 1:02 pm

  I’m really enjoying participating in the forums at the Third Tribe site. I was just adding my two cents to a handful of forum postings, and thought that I’d show you what some of the topics we’re talking about are, so you’d have a sense of what’s going on. We don’t really share the contents, because the people participating there like having the chance to speak openly/candidly about their marketing challenges, but I don’t see the harm in sharing a few of the topic titles. Here they are: Favorite copywriting and marketing books? Third Tribe Blogroll? 2…

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  Social Media Explorer

• Viralheat Plants Stake As Affordable Social Media Monitoring Solution

  Jason Falls

  9 Feb 2010 | 3:00 am

  The landscape of social media monitoring solutions has always had about four tiers. There’s the mostly manual but free, the entry-level business pricing (around $100 per month), the standard (about $500 per month to start) and the expensive (“research” approaches that go into the thousands per month.) While Scout Labs made a big splash a year ago with their $99 per month price point while still offering much of the same features and functionality of the more expensive options, there has still been a gap in the market. For the small (or frugal) business that wants less manual…

• Corporate Blog Success Starts And Ends With Business Metrics

  Jason Falls

  8 Feb 2010 | 3:00 am

  The social media purists will tell you that a corporate blog serves as a community hub for your brand. They say it gives your customers a connection point to your company and engenders a sense of community. In some cases that’s true, but you’re going to see me exploring corporate blogging a lot more this year to follow up on a theory that your “community” or “audience” for your blog isn’t what you think it is. That, and the ultimate judge of a corporate blogging effort must be more closely tied to success metrics than making everyone feel good. As you…

• Wanna Neat Job In Public Relations?

  Jason Falls

  5 Feb 2010 | 3:00 am

  Waggener Edstrom Worldwide is hiring a public relations account director in their Seattle office. They reached out to me with an offer to post an ad for it over there in the sidebar. As we’ve discussed before, I only accept advertising from companies whose product or service is relevant to many of you and I insist those advertisers provide me with some subject for editorial content to accompany the ad as well. The requirements gave them pause since the folks helping them with the advertising offer weren’t used to this editorial-advertising hybrid, so I decided to help them a bit…

• What Every Company Should Know About Social Media Policy

  Jason Falls

  3 Feb 2010 | 3:00 am

  A social media policy is a company’s first line of defense against risk in social media marketing. Shockingly, only one in three companies has a social media policy in place. While I’m sure that the majority of marketing managers and decision-makers who read Social Media Explorer are ahead of the curve, there’s a good chance your company doesn’t have a written policy. *UPDATE* – eMarketer published a story and research on companies without social networking policies just hours after we went live with this post. 69% of American companies do not have social networking policies for…

• What Inbound Marketing Is And Why You Should Have It

  Jason Falls

  1 Feb 2010 | 3:00 am

  I spend zero dollars marketing my business. “Marketing” in its traditional sense includes advertising, baiting media outlets with press releases and, to paraphrase David Meerman Scott, buy, beg and borrow for leads and attention. The way people find out about my business is through two primary mechanisms: Word-of-Mouth recommendations and finding me through search engine results. Word-of-Mouth, in this instance, is inclusive of people passing recommendations online. If an account manager at a public relations firm is looking for a social media consultant and asks his or her…

• 
  Dan Zarrella

• Watch The Science of Social Media Marketing Webinar on YouTube

  Dan Zarrella

  8 Feb 2010 | 10:27 pm

  A combination of much of the research I’ve been doing for the past 3 years, my “Science of Social Media Marketing” presentation is one of my favorite to give. It combines statistics, marketing, history, math, social psychology, memetics, epidemiology, steampunk, zombies and absinthe. I talk apply lessons from sources including urban legends, rumors, homeric poems and proverbs. The first time I did it, was for a record-breaking 12,000 plus registrant HubSpot webinar and the most recent time was for O’Reilly Media. O’Reilly was able to get the whole, one-hour talk,…

• Data Shows That Self-Reference Does Not Get Followers

  Dan Zarrella

  28 Jan 2010 | 6:18 am

  If you like this post, or any of my work, please, nominate me for a Shorty Award. Following up on my last post using TweetPsych Data, I looked at a metric opposing social behavior: self-reference. This time the dataset is well over 60,000 Twitter accounts. What I found here is pretty clear, accounts that have more followers do not tend to talk about themselves much. Want more followers? Stop talking about yourself. If you like this post, or any of my work, please, nominate me for a Shorty Award. Share this on Facebook Share this on del.icio.us Email this to a friend? Share this on Linkedin…

• Data Shows That Social Behavior Gets More Followers

  Dan Zarrella

  25 Jan 2010 | 6:14 am

  If you like this post, or any of my work, please, nominate me for a Shorty Award. The linguistic analysis engine behind TweetPsych has given me a bunch of cool data points to analyze, so I’ve begun to look at various factors and their relationship with follower counts. Using a database of over 30,000 accounts that have been analyzed with TweetPsych, the first dimension I’ve looked at is “Social Behavior”. The “Social Behavior” category includes inclusive language like “we” and “you”, as well as language that describes relationships…

• The 8 Elements of Contagious Ideas

  Dan Zarrella

  19 Jan 2010 | 7:09 am

  In the research I’ve been doing over the past few years into why ideas spread, I’ve found a few common characteristics of contagious ideas across mediums and centuries. The list below contains those characteristics, and while its still an evolving set, the vast majority of successful memes I’ve studied have had some (or all) of them present. I’ve also tried to include takeaways, tactics you, as a marketer can use to apply these concepts to your viral campaigns. If you like this post, or any of my work, please, nominate me for a Shorty Award. Seeding The first group of…

• Zombie Marketing: How to use Combined Relevance to Go Viral

  Dan Zarrella

  13 Jan 2010 | 9:15 pm

  If you like my stuff (or zombies) please, nominate me for a Shorty Award, thanks. I’ve given my science of social media marketing presentation a few times now, and one of the points that has stood out as an audience favorite has been a tactic I call combined relevance. I did a survey a little over a year ago where I asked people why they shared content online, both one-to-one (as emailing or IM’ing a link to a single person) and broadcast (like Tweeting a link to thousands of followers). In both cases the faraway most common answer was relevance. Respondents often said things like…

• 
  The Harte of Marketing

• Getting Management Buy-In For Integrated Marketing & Communications

  Anna Barcelos and Beth Harte

  4 Feb 2010 | 4:41 pm

  There are a lot of marketers out there that understand that integrated marketing and communications (IMC) is a preferred way to do business because it is an outside-in approach. If an organization isn’t integrated, what are the best approaches to getting management buy-in? Anna Barcelos and I wanted to share nine key ways to provide management with the value of IMC. Sales-Oriented Vs. Market-Oriented – Which Are You? It’s often been said that the mindset of “If we build it, they will come” is not viable for long term business. To understand why, let’s look at the difference…

• Integrated Marketing & Communications, Redux

  Beth Harte

  19 Jan 2010 | 5:50 am

  The hiatus is over! For those who have been loyal readers of this blog, Happy New Year! And I thank you for hanging in there with me while I took the time to consider where to head next.    For a long time I focused on marketing, PR and social media, but rarely the integration of them all. The focus of The Harte of Marketing for 2010 (and perhaps beyond) will be integrated marketing & communications. While integrated marketing communications (IMC) is nothing new, the embracing of social media surely puts IMC back in the spotlight as its principles are similar to long-standing IMC…

• An Unscientific Test of Authenticity & Transparency: How Much Do They Really Matter?

  Beth Harte

  30 Sep 2009 | 8:04 pm

  Although my blog is technically on “hiatus,” I felt this post was too important to not post it here (versus my digital marketing notebook on Posterous). I am still thinking about the direction my blog will be heading, but I know one thing for sure…it will include a lot more analysis, testing, and less opinion.  As a marketer, testing is at the heart of what we do (or should do) and I for one have been lax when it comes to testing social media. Without testing all aspects of social media, we are, unfortunately, arguing from ignorance.  The first test: Authenticity,…

• Putting myself on a time out.

  Beth Harte

  28 Aug 2009 | 11:19 am

  I wrote a really verbose post, but a good friend told me that what I had written didn’t sound like me (you know who you are…thank you again!). So, here’s take two.  This past year has been truly exceptional and while I love blogging, I am not a writer. So from that regard, I struggle. I know this is *my* blog and I can do with it what I’d like, but I also don’t want to produce crap content. I have SO many thoughts rattling around in my head but the pressure to make them perfect stops me from writing them down. And the time to make them perfect doesn’t…

• Gardening…The Social Media Way

  Beth Harte

  12 Aug 2009 | 6:34 am

  Teresa Basich and I teamed up to write this post after discussing David Armano’s post. Teresa kicked off a group conversation by asking the insightful question “Now, what could we add to David’s blueprint beginnings?”  Teresa wrote 3/4 of this post, so if you like the way her uber-smart brain works, be sure to check out her blog,  Overcommunicated, too. Back in June David Armano of Dachis Corporation had an interesting post on debunking social media myths featured on the Conversation Starters blog of the Harvard Business Review. David discussed how organizations…

• 
  brandflakesforbreakfast

• making tv more real

  9 Feb 2010 | 5:09 am

  If you're a fan of the Office, you know that Dunder Mifflin was just acquired on the show, and the characters are going through the typical process of a corporate acquisition.NBC has a great history of tying the on-screen fun to the internet world, and they haven't stopped with the acquisition. Check out the site for the new parent company, Sabre Corp. The employee welcome video featuring Christian Slater is especially heart warming. Thanks, RJ!

• winter olympic fun with samsung

  9 Feb 2010 | 5:03 am

  Samsung just released a series of videos celebrating winter sports in a more fun way than the typical figure skating or half pipe riding.

• don't have a valentine? how about the meter maid?

  9 Feb 2010 | 5:03 am

  Skittles has launched a promotion that's asking you to join their "mob the rainbow." A rainbow mob is like a flash mob, only it doesn't necessarily involve showing up to a particular place, and its goal is to spread happy rainbow goodness. (Like a flash mob for lazy people.)This particular rainbow mob is all about sending some random meter maid a valentine. If we all do it, she'll get a kabillion valentines and be the most loved meter maid in meter maid history. Or, she'll be really freaked out and give us all tickets.Nice idea, and great tie to the rainbow of deliciousness.

• mardi gras, without all of the drunken nakedness

  9 Feb 2010 | 4:40 am

  This year's Mardi Gras is more than likely going to be better than ever. If you've never experienced Mardi Gras, or - if you've only experienced it as a drunken tourist, you owe it to yourself to check out My Mardis Gras Experience.It's a blogger's experience of Mardis Gras for the first time as a local. They've also channeled in plenty of the typical social media streams, so there's plenty of content for all to see.It's brought us by Tabasco, and promises to be family friendly. So you can show your kids without fear of boobies or man spears. From @scottmonty.

• denny's: the series

  9 Feb 2010 | 4:17 am

  After you're done with this morning's free Grand Slam at Denny's, you can enjoy more Denny's internet goodness.Because many people didn't believe that the chicken takeover of the SuperBowl was enough, they've created more. More chicken videos, served up like a second helping of flapjacks. Or another Moon over Miami. (You can actually call Janeth at Denny's too - which is a nice touch.)

• 
  Six Pixels of Separation

• This Will Change Everything... Again

  Mitch Joel

  9 Feb 2010 | 7:50 am

  What do you make of articles that say, "this will change everything for Marketers?" The truth is, I'm just as guilty as the next Journalist, Blogger and Writer to publish thoughts like that. The truth is, those types of sayings and thoughts are popping up in every form of media a lot more often these days. The truth is, it's true. We tend to lump everything we see in the digital channels as "Social Media" and it's probably one of the biggest disservices we can do to the online channels and platforms. YouTube is nothing like Twitter and Twitter is nothing like Facebook, yet…

• Marketers Miss The Mark With Twitter

  Mitch Joel

  8 Feb 2010 | 5:19 pm

  How long has it been since we had a, "Twitter is dead" article? AdWeek published the article, The Tweet Hereafter, yesterday and it will probably make no sense to any Marketer who sees any of the Social Media platforms as something more than just another advertising channel. "Like Second Life, Twitter has become a wasteland for brands. Verizon, a company that spent more than $1 billion on advertising in 2009, has around 5,000 followers -- about 0.3 percent the amount that Perez Hilton has. Coca-Cola has 15,000. Apple's not even on Twitter. And some corporate Twitter accounts…

• Measuring Real Success Online With Google's Analytics Evangelist, Avinash Kaushik

  Mitch Joel

  7 Feb 2010 | 10:22 am

  Episode #189 of Six Pixels of Separation - The Twist Image Podcast is now live and ready for you to listen to. Seth Godin wrote a seminal book called, All Marketers Are Liars. Avinash Kaushik tells us about how marketing connects and how to measure it in such a practical and real way, that some Marketers can't stand the honesty that comes out of his mouth. Maybe Kaushik should write a book called, Some Marketers Hate Avinash Kaushik? Along with being the Analytics Evangelist for Google (and Blogger over at Occam's Razor), Kaushik is also the best-selling author of two books, Web Analytics -…

• There Is Nothing Wrong With Making Money

  Mitch Joel

  6 Feb 2010 | 12:11 pm

  For some reason, no one in Social Media is really allowed to make any money. It's verboten. It's against the community spirit. It's the wrong thing to do. That's just, plain stupid. Yes, the new digital channels are primed for those who are looking to connect, communicate and engage in conversations, but if there is no benefit in the end, then all is lost. For some, that end benefit will be dollars in the bank, for others it will be social capital (check out Tara Hunt's amazing book, The Whuffie Factor, for more on that), for some it will be the growth of their personal brand (which in turn…

• What Motivates You?

  Mitch Joel

  5 Feb 2010 | 5:26 pm

  There are some people who do the heavy lifting when it comes to thinking about why human beings do the things we do. Dan Pink (aka Daniel H. Pink) is one of those thinkers. He's the author of some of the best (and best-selling) business books like Free Agent Nation, A Whole New Mind, The Adventures of Johnny Bunko (the first American business book done in Japanese manga) and his recently-released hit, Drive - The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us. Here's how his Blog describes Drive: "Drawing on four decades of scientific research on human motivation, Pink exposes the mismatch…

• 
  NPR Programs: All Things Considered

• Study Examines Brain's Risk Center

  9 Feb 2010 | 1:20 pm

  Scientists have shown that our aversion to losing money is all in our heads — specifically a part of the brain called the amygdala. A study of two people with damage to the amygdala, but no other part of the brain, found they had no problem taking risky bets that most people would avoid.» E-Mail This     » Add to Del.icio.us

• Pakistani City Becomes Suspected Taliban Hot Spot

  9 Feb 2010 | 1:00 pm

  The sprawling Pakistani port city of Karachi has long attracted outsiders, among them tens of thousands of ethnic Pashtuns fleeing war in both Afghanistan and northwestern Pakistan. The authorities in Karachi say the latest wave of migrants contains more than refugees.» E-Mail This     » Add to Del.icio.us

• Obama Urges Bipartisan Work On Jobs Bill

  9 Feb 2010 | 12:00 pm

  President Obama said Tuesday Democrats and Republicans should be able to come together and pass a jobs bill. The comments came at a meeting with congressional leaders from both parties. » E-Mail This     » Add to Del.icio.us

• What Went Wrong With Prius Braking System?

  9 Feb 2010 | 12:00 pm

  Automaker Toyota announced Tuesday that it's recalling about 437,000 Priuses and other hybrid vehicles worldwide to fix brake problems. David Champion, senior director of automotive testing for Consumer Reports, discusses how the braking system for the Prius works.» E-Mail This     » Add to Del.icio.us

• Study: Mediterranean Diet May Lower Stroke Risk

  9 Feb 2010 | 12:00 pm

  The Mediterranean diet may be healthy not only for your heart but also for your brain. Researchers at Columbia University Medical Center report patients who ate the diet — rich in fish, fruits and vegetables — suffered fewer small strokes than those who ate a more traditional Western diet. » E-Mail This     » Add to Del.icio.us

• 
  NPR Topics: Concerts

• A White House Celebration Of Music From The Civil Rights Movement

  9 Feb 2010 | 10:30 am

  Listen live tonight right here, as The White House Music Series continues. President Obama and the First Lady host a concert for Black History Month, featuring performances by Bob Dylan, Natalie Cole, Jennifer Hudson, Joan Baez, Smokey Robinson and more.» E-Mail This     » Add to Del.icio.us

• Live Wednesday: Gerald Clayton Trio At The Village Vanguard

  9 Feb 2010 | 10:08 am

  He's the son of a bassist, the nephew of a saxophonist, the neighbor of his bass player and the roommate of his drummer. And now, the graceful, nuanced, 25-year-old pianist is making his debut at the venerable club. Listen live at 9 p.m. ET.» E-Mail This     » Add to Del.icio.us

• Jessica Lea Mayfield On Mountain Stage

  9 Feb 2010 | 7:36 am

  Singer-songwriter Jessica Lea Mayfield of Kent, Ohio, began making music in her family band at the age of 8. By age 15, she had cut White Lies, her first EP of original songs. Since then, Mayfield has attracted the attention of many, including Dan Auerbach of The Black Keys.» E-Mail This     » Add to Del.icio.us

• Edmar Castaneda: Tiny Desk Concert

  8 Feb 2010 | 7:00 am

  Castaneda is the sort of musician who isn't afraid to challenge the established order. He's carving out a place for himself in Latin jazz on an instrument you don't often hear in his style of music: the Colombian harp. Castaneda recently parked himself behind Bob Boilen's desk and crafted a transporting mix of tradition and improvisation.» E-Mail This     » Add to Del.icio.us

• Dierks Bentley On Mountain Stage

  8 Feb 2010 | 2:00 am

  Country singer Dierks Bentley once worked in the videotape library for The Nashville Network, soaking up tradition while singing his nights away for tips. But these days, his career as a musician takes center stage.» E-Mail This     » Add to Del.icio.us

• 
  White African

• TED 2010 – Fellows Program

  HASH

  9 Feb 2010 | 11:41 am

  I’m in Long Beach, California for the annual TED conference. This year I’m a Senior Fellow, which means that I get to see and spend time with old friends like Jon Gosier and Juliana Rotich, other Fellows from year’s past and enjoy some first class discussions and mentoring from groups like McKinsey and Duarte Design. I’ve been taking pictures of the TED Fellows, you can find them on my Flickr set. The really great shots are by the TED photographers, and you can find those here and the TED Blog. More on the amazing and eclectic group that is this years TED Fellows. Some…

• Mobile Web East Africa – Stream

  HASH

  2 Feb 2010 | 10:45 pm

  [I probably won't be able to keep this up all day, but I'll try to blog/stream what's happening here at Mobile Web East Africa as best I can. Refresh for updates] It’s day one of the Mobile Web East Africa conference in Nairobi. This is a new conference, started up in South Africa to great success, and now spreading to other regions of the continent. Paul Kukubo of the ICT Board Paul Kukubo, of the Kenya ICT Board, is talking about the future of tech in Kenya, and how the government’s aim is to be a major hub for technology in the region. Explaining how the changes in the industry…

• Malili: Kenya’s Planned Technopolis

  HASH

  28 Jan 2010 | 1:52 am

  I’ve had two meetings with Kenya’s Permanent Secretary Bitange Ndemo (Ministry of Information and Communications) in the last week. Both times a certain project kept coming up in the conversation. It’s called Malili – a 5,000 acre East African technopolis – a city built up for technology firms and it’s the Kenyan government’s way of creating a regional ICT brand. My first thought up on seeing the pictures: it looks like Dubai has come to Kenya. The Malili project is modeled off of other large technology and research parks around the world. One often…

• iHub: Nairobi’s Tech Innovation Hub is Here!

  HASH

  25 Jan 2010 | 3:11 am

  iHub – Nairobi’s Innovation Hub for the technology community – is here! It’s an open space for the technologists, investors, tech companies and hackers in the area. This space is a tech community facility with a focus on young entrepreneurs, web and mobile phone programmers and designers. It is part open community workspace (co-working), part investor and VC hub and part incubator. A number of us in the Nairobi tech community have been discussing the need for a physical nexus for the tech community here for a couple years, so it’s great to finally be so close to…

• Working on Ushahidi’s Haiti Response

  HASH

  18 Jan 2010 | 7:25 am

  Last Wednesday started out pretty normal for me. Then it stopped. The US-based members of the Ushahidi team informed me of the earthquake in Haiti, and then the madness began… 6 days later, what’s happened? Ushahidi is heavily involved in mapping and integrating crowdsourced information from Haiti into an aggregated map that is being used by both people on the ground who need help and those who can provide relief. Teams of volunteers in Kenya, Uganda and the US have been working to solidify the platform and make this effort work. Keep up-to-date in our Situation Room and our blog.

• 
  Ideate - Small Business in South Africa

• 1 min. with a Superhero: Rich Mulholland from Missing Link

  Fred

  7 Feb 2010 | 9:00 pm

  This morning, we’re chatting to the president of presentations, the svengali of slide shows, Richard Mulholland, the founder of Missing Link, a specialist conference and presentation strategy company. Richard has the unique job of telling CEOs what and how they should present. Rich, we hear through the grapevine that you used to be a rockstar roadie – is this true? Yeah, I was a lighting tech and designer, I toured with bands like Iron Maiden, Deff Leppard, Bon Jovi… and Cliff Richard (?!) Awesome. I’m trying to picture the mosh pit at the Cliff Richard concert. So, is it…

• Introducing Gareth Cotten!

  Yolandi

  4 Feb 2010 | 12:07 am

  We’re happy and excited to introduce our latest contributor to Ideate, Gareth Cotten – our own Finance Coach. Gareth will be supplying us with personal finance and business tips which will cover essential money-management techniques, practical ideas of how to save money; as well as business insights, ideas and suggestions. A few years ago, Gareth started coaching informally; mostly to other small business owners who approached him for advice. This lead to him start his Facebook page named “Finance Coach (by Gareth Cotten)” in 2008 which soon became an extremely popular source for…

• New York Times Charging Readers For Online Content

  Yolandi

  3 Feb 2010 | 1:59 am

  America’s most popular newspaper website has now decided that its era of free online journalism is drawing to a close. Now, what does this mean for the consumer and how could it affect the industry? I did some research on what people are saying about this and here’s what they think: The New York Times has plans to set up a paywall around its digital offerings which will be introduced in the beginning of 2011. Readers will be able to view only a specific number of online articles for free per month and there after pay for other content. Here’s what people have been commenting on a few…

• SA online retailer holds Woolworths to ransom

  Fred

  2 Feb 2010 | 11:37 pm

  I’m a huge fan of guerrilla marketing. As a business owner, I’m well aware of the limitations of marketing budgets and the ongoing quest to spot snappy marketing opportunities. And so, when I saw this from my colleagues over at Yuppiechef, I rubbed my hands in glee. I’ve been tweeting about it like crazy, but I think this deserves a dedicated article – here’s the story: Recently, Woolworths launched a Valentine’s competition and advertised the wrong website address on posters nation wide. (Skande! For a digital dude like me, that’s like arriving naked…

• The missing link in web development and design

  Mike Saunders

  2 Feb 2010 | 11:00 pm

  The internet is becoming one of the most competitive environments to market yourself in. Search engine optimisation has become mandatory in all web development projects and we now see the world turning to social media in the search for internet users. Now more than ever we need to differentiate ourselves online. We need to stand out and we need to be clear in our offering to our customers. The missing link in most website is focus. Without focus we simply confuse our audience and alienate ourselves from their desicion making process. Finding our focus online can be tough because we are afraid…

• 
  South Africa Rocks

• AD:DYNAMO: FREE Digital Marketing Seminars

  Nic Haralambous

  4 Feb 2010 | 12:40 am

  17th February 2010 in Cape Town, at the CTICC – to register visit http://www.addynamo.com Seminar Line Up: 9am-12pm: Advertisers: The Digital Marketplace…and the role contextual Pay Per Click advertising plays Speakers Katherine McChesney (Habari Media), Sean Riley (CEO of AD:DYNAMO) Feb 17th, CTICC Rm#160 Gain a comprehensive understanding of all aspects of digital marketing. The seminar is suited to businesses wanting to manage their own digital marketing initiatives, and to any advertising or marketing executive looking to beef up on the industry, terminology, trends and digital…

• Support a good cause and win a celebrity dinner

  Nic Haralambous

  1 Feb 2010 | 12:43 am

  That’s correct, not only can you do good for Africa but there is a little incentive in it for you too! You can win a celebrity dinner if you simply enter the Breadline Celeb competition. Breadline Africa, a local charity that believes in giving a hand-up not a hand-out, wants to take you out to dinner with one of your favourite local celebs. All you need to do is to make a small, or big, donation towards alleviating poverty in Africa and you could win an evening out with Just Jinjer, Heinz Winckler, Sasha Martinengo or 94.7 Highveld Stereo’s Bailey Schneider. The competition runs from…

• South African ads from the 80’s – FLASHBACK

  Nic Haralambous

  31 Jan 2010 | 11:32 pm

  This is insane. I can actually remember most of these adverts. Can you? Thanks to @buge for the heads up!Similar Posts: Should political parties be allowed to advertise? Blast from the past Mnet gets innovative in the dark My eTV debut with thanks to SA Rocks! It starts with you – new ad for South Africa

• South Africans to become most protected consumers in the world

  Nic Haralambous

  25 Jan 2010 | 1:03 am

  This post was written by Sikelelwa Gogo. It’s a New Year and South Africa is abuzz with excitement about all the impending changes coming our way – everything from the Guatrain to the World Cup. These 2 events alone are going to have a huge impact on socio-economic landscape. General South Africans, and businesses alike are looking for opportunities everywhere. But whether we strike it lucky or not, there are huge changes coming which will make all of us happy regardless. On the legal front, there are exciting legal and policy changes that will have a positive affect on us all. I want…

• Customer Service Compliments to kick off 2010

  Nic Haralambous

  20 Jan 2010 | 11:00 pm

  Most of us take a couple of days to dust away the cobwebs and get back into the swing of things after the festive season madness.  The same often applies for suppliers and retailers, so it’s great to read a stream of compliments on the getclosure! website about SA suppliers that are already on the ball in terms of customer service (see below). In line with the Don’t Complain Campaign, remember that suppliers need your feedback to improve their service – if you’ve experienced great service, click here to share your story and it will be published in the getclosure compliments section;…

• 
  AfricaNews - RSS News

• Gambia: Opposition reacts to firing of ministers

  9 Feb 2010 | 7:49 am

  People's Progressive Party (PPP) leader in Gambia Omar Amadou Jallow has said President Jammeh has woefully failed in tackling corruption in the country. Jallow is the least pleased with the way Jammeh hires and fires Ministers without justification. Jallow said a credible government would have explained the circumstances surrounding such massive…

• Senegal confirms H1N1 outbreak

  9 Feb 2010 | 12:07 am

  The Senegalese Minister of Health and Preventive Medicine, Modou Diagne Fada, confirmed that the country had been hit by the epidemic AH1N1 influenza. According to earlier reports, the first cases were detected in the religious city of Touba and nearby Diourbel (located in the central part of the country). These places where the scene of religious…

• Somalia: 17,000 migrants flee to SA annually

  8 Feb 2010 | 2:04 pm

  At least 17,000 illegal migrants from the Horn of Africa flee to South Africa every year, most of them transiting through Kenya, a senior U.N. official said on Monday. Tal Raviv, a regional programme officer at International Organisation for Migration (IOM) has said that crisis and poverty were forcing Somalis and Ethiopians to carry out dangerous…

• ICC drops charges against Sudan rebel leader

  8 Feb 2010 | 1:25 pm

  The International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague, Netherlands has dismissed war crimes charges against Sudan rebel leader Bahar Idriss Abu Garda. The rebel leader was accused of arranging the killing of 12 African Union peacekeepers in Darfur in 2007. But ICC prosecutors ruled that there was not enough proof to lead a trial. "The chamber is…

• Egypt: Crack down on opposition

  8 Feb 2010 | 1:17 pm

  Egyptian authorities have arrested thirteen senior members of the Islamist opposition movement, the Muslim Brotherhood. The organization's deputy leader, Mahmoud Ezzat, and two senior members Dr. Essam el-Erian and Abdul Rahman el-Bir are currently in detention alongside ten other lower-ranking members, arrested in raids throughout the country,…

• 
  INeedCoffee

• The Phoenix Coffee Crawl

  1 Feb 2010 | 9:00 pm

  What is better than visiting one awesome coffee shop? Visiting five, right in a row! My Aunt Jackie and I had the pleasure last month of participating in a Phoenix area “Coffee Crawl” and it was a blast.

• Best In Show 8

  20 Jan 2010 | 9:00 pm

  Coffee comics from Best in Show.

• Blade Coffee Grinders

  17 Jan 2010 | 9:00 pm

  Though coffee lovers are eager to spend tons of money on a huge variety of expensive coffee machines, they often forget to buy themselves a coffee bean grinder!

• Best In Show 7

  12 Jan 2010 | 9:00 pm

  More comics from Best In Show.

• Coffee From Thailand

  29 Dec 2009 | 9:00 pm

  Nacha coffee, a grower based in Chiangmai, Thailand, produces a strain of Arabica Typica that will win over anyone skeptical of the taste quality of South East Asian coffees.

• 
  CoffeeGeek.com

• KitchenAid ProLine Grinder, Eli Kaynan

  9 Feb 2010 | 5:26 am

  Bottom Line: For the price, look elsewhere.Read review...

• Lelit PL 041 Espresso Machine, Armbrooke Thorne

  8 Feb 2010 | 4:02 pm

  Bottom Line: Overall, I've been very pleased with this little machine, and very happy that I bought it over its mass produced department store price competitors.Read review...

• Aerobie Aeropress, Lance Marlo

  6 Feb 2010 | 4:11 pm

  Bottom Line: Smooth coffee every time.Read review...

• Ascaso Grinder - i1, i2 Models, Michael S

  5 Feb 2010 | 7:58 pm

  Bottom Line: The best grinder at its price point.Read review...

• Ascaso Grinder - i1, i2 Models, Michael S

  5 Feb 2010 | 7:54 pm

  Bottom Line: The best grinder at its price point.Read review...

• 
  COFFEE - Google Blog Search

• Nuclear Coffee VideoGet v4 0 2 55 - Tastro Downloads

  Tastro Downloads

  9 Feb 2010 | 2:03 pm

  (HF) hotfile.com Nuclear Coffee VideoGet v4 0 2 55 - HotFile. (NL) netload.in Nuclear Coffee VideoGet v4 0 2 55 - NetLoad. (ST) storage.to Nuclear Coffee VideoGet v4 0 2 55 - StoRage. (TT) torrent.torrent Nuclear Coffee VideoGet v4 0 2 ...

• The High Definite » Coffee Break

  Endswell

  9 Feb 2010 | 8:29 am

  Coffee Break. February 9th, 2010 Endswell Leave a comment Go to comments. 6 Global Corporations Started By Their Founder's Shitty Luck – [Cracked]. 100-Year-Old Shackleton's Whisky Barrels Recovered In Antarctica – [Arbroath] ...

• Have a 37 Minute Coffee Break with Me [Audio Interview]

  Darren Rowse

  9 Feb 2010 | 5:43 am

  If you have a spare 37 minutes today to grab a coffee with me (or at least are doing something that will allow you to listen to something for 37 minutes in the background) check out this interview I did with Robb Sutton late last week. ...

• Coffee for Less: February Giveaway! | Product Reviews by The ...

  admin

  9 Feb 2010 | 5:00 am

  I know many of you are experiencing record snowfall in your areas, so I know you will love this giveaway from Coffee for Less! While we may not be getting.

• Morning Coffee – Feb 9 – Raptors Republic - ESPN TrueHoop's ...

  AltRaps

  9 Feb 2010 | 4:49 am

  Morning Coffee – Feb 9. By AltRaps · Candy & hoops keep him happy | Toronto Sun. Evans could have been one of those guys who goes home and rehabilitated his mid-foot sprain, but instead he was an everyday presence with his teammates. ...

• 
  The Coffee Detective Blog

• Feb 7, Coffee Review: CoffeeAM India Mysore Gold Nuggets

  7 Feb 2010 | 7:56 am

  This India Mysore coffee is light-roasted and quite unique in its taste profile. Mild, yet bitter, yet sweet...and more.

• Feb 5, Still searching for a stainless coffee maker - healthier option

  5 Feb 2010 | 4:51 am

  I've been searching everywhere for a stainless option to the percolator. I love the idea of the single cups you've reviewed, but they all have plastic

• Feb 4, Melitta makes the very best...coffee!

  4 Feb 2010 | 3:43 am

  Many, many years ago I received an offer from Gevalia Kaffe that I couldn't resist: a pound of coffee and a Melitta coffeemaker for $10.00, with no further

• Feb 1, Coffee Reviews in plain English

  31 Jan 2010 | 4:34 pm

  A collection of coffee reviews, written in plain English.

• Feb 1, Coffee Review: Rocketfuel Coffee Hawaiian Kona Dark

  31 Jan 2010 | 4:31 pm

  Rocketfuel Coffee Hawaiian Kona is a terrific coffee with a sweet taste and dark undertones.

• 
  Coffee Cup News

• 1 Year Supply of Coffee Prize! – Episode #112

  Jason Coffee

  9 Feb 2010 | 11:46 am

  Cant View? Click Here Overview I was really excited in this episode. #1 – I was live on Ustream.tv for the first time in about 1 year. , #2 – I announced a HUGE prize brought to us by Buy Well Coffee. ( a 1 year supply of coffee! ENTER HERE.) & #3 This coffee was really unique and delicious. Coffee & Description C & C Specialty – 100% Kona Coffee Sweet and smooth with milk chocolate and marshmallow notes. Overall Rating 89+ Points Aroma: 8.5 Acidity: 6.5 Body: 8 Flavor: 8.5 Aftertaste: 8.5 Question of the Day? What should we giveaway on Coffee Cup News? Related…

• Coffee from the Philippines, In the Snow! – Episode #111

  Jason Coffee

  6 Feb 2010 | 2:48 pm

  Cant View? Click Here Overview An outside episode where Jason tastes a coffee from the Philippines while it is snowing outside. – I want to thank my Sheryl for bringing this coffee back from the Philippines for me! This coffee was born in 1998 and has a unique label of a boat sailing. Coffee & Description Starbucks Kape Vinta A black pepper spiciness, black cherry with a dark chocolate finish. Overall Rating 89 Points Aroma: 8 Acidity: 7 Body: 8 Flavor: 8 Aftertaste: 8 Question of the Day? Have you ever traveled outside of the country you currently live in? Where? Related Posts…

• Rocketfuel XXX Coffee Review – Episode #110

  Jason Coffee

  4 Feb 2010 | 6:36 am

  Cant View? Click Here Overview Jason reviews an unique coffee with many interesting layers of flavor from Rocketfuel Coffee. Coffee & Description Rocketfuel XXX Coffee Complex and smooth delivering layers of fruit, chocolate and a mild nuttiness. Some of the fruit flavors include mango and grape juice. Overall Rating 89 Points Aroma: 8 Acidity: 7 Body: 9 Flavor: 8 Aftertaste: 7 Question of the Day? Did you get sick this winter? Have you tried Rocketfuel Coffee? Related Posts Ethiopian Yergacheffee, The Coffee Beanery | Recent Coffee Tastings Enjoy this Post? Subscribe to Future Posts Here…

• Cuisinart Grind & Brew Coffee Maker Review – Episode #109

  Jason Coffee

  29 Jan 2010 | 5:37 pm

  Overview Jason reviews the Cuisinart Grind and Brew Coffee Maker that he got for his birthday back in August. Machine & Description Cuisinart Grind and Brew A very esthetically pleasing coffee maker that grinds and brews your coffee. It has simple functionality with timers and setting that make it easy to use. The only downside to this machine is that it cannot brew a 12 cup pot of coffee in one go. This is a major downside to me since it is a 12 cup pot. Overall the machine is just ok. Overall Rating 2.5 out of 5 Functionality: 2 Esthetics : 4 Ease of Use: 3 Quality: 3 Price vs Above…

• Hanging Out & Drinking Coffee – Episode #108

  Jason Coffee

  26 Jan 2010 | 10:41 am

  Cant View? Click Here Overview Jason talks about an upcoming brewer review and a delicious coffee from Ethiopia. Coffee & Description Coffee Beanery Ethiopian Yergacheffe Grapefruit acidity with a buttery smoothness. Overall Rating 89 Points Aroma: 7 Acidity: 8 Body: 8 Flavor: 8 Aftertaste: 8 Question of the Day? Where are you from? Do you still live there? Related Posts Ethiopian Harrar, Barista on Duty | Recent Coffee Tastings Enjoy this Post? Subscribe to Future Posts Here Social

• 
  Wired: Gadgets

• Google Tricks Out Snowmobile Cam for Stunning Slope Views

  Priya Ganapati

  9 Feb 2010 | 12:49 pm

  Google's Street View team shoots the slopes of Canada's Whistler mountain using cameras with extra hard drives attached to a snowmobile and an SUV. Ski downhill on the Olympic runs for a real off-Street View.

• Apple Job Posting Hints at Webcam in Future iPad

  Brian X. Chen

  9 Feb 2010 | 10:07 am

  Looks like future iPads will include cameras. At least that's what we infer from an Apple job posting for a quality engineer in its iPad Media division. The question remains, how soon?

• Austrian iPad Will Be Subsidized With Contract

  Charlie Sorrel

  9 Feb 2010 | 6:19 am

  According to iPhone blog TamsIJungle, Hutchison Telecom in Austria will be selling the iPad at a steep discount if you sign up for a two year contract.

• Macworld Expo 2010 Caters to Apple Fans — Without Apple

  Brian X. Chen

  8 Feb 2010 | 5:30 pm

  The Macworld trade show goes on without Steve Jobs. But will it live another year?

• Stormy Weather Cannot Defeat Re-Engineered Umbrella

  Dylan Tweney

  8 Feb 2010 | 3:48 pm

  Saving up for a rainy day? Consider using some of that cash on an umbrella from Blunt. This reinforced dome will hold up to gusts short of hurricane force.

• 
  The Altimeter by Charlene Li

• Welcome to new Altimeter Group partners: Alan Webber and Lora Cecere

  charleneli

  26 Jan 2010 | 10:00 am

  I’m pleased to announce that Altimeter Group has brought on two additional partners to meet the growing demand of our clients, which now number over 40 retained clients. Alan Webber and Lora Cecere each bring with them unique areas of expertise, but what makes them great partners for Altimeter is their ability to help clients understand and address opportunities and problems created by emerging technologies. Trends such as open government and supply chain/demand orchestration disrupt traditional business and organizational models, creating both problems as well as opportunities. We…

• “Socialgraphics” webinar slides and recording now available

  charleneli

  20 Jan 2010 | 11:59 pm

  Thanks to everyone who attended the webinar we held today on “Understanding Your Customers’ Social Behaviors“. Many people wanted to attend the webinar but weren’t able to because of schedule conflicts. So we’re making the slides and a video recording (slides and audio) available here. You can also download from Slideshare.net (for slides) and drop.io (for the recording). Also, there was a vibrant conversation taking place on sites like Twitter, using the hashtag #socialgraphics (for search of just the tweets on the day of the Webiner, use this link). Understand…

• Webinar introducing "Socialgraphics", a customer-centric approach to social strategy

  charleneli

  11 Jan 2010 | 6:16 pm

  Jeremiah Owyang and I will be running a free Webinar introducing how we are thinking about how companies can understand their customers through what we are calling "socialgraphics". To register for the Webinar: Register for Free Webinar: Understand Your Customers’ Social Behaviors, Hosted by Altimeter Group Wednesday, January 20, 2010 11:00 AM – 1:00 PM PST Beware of plans or proposals that start with “Twitter Strategy” or “Facebook Strategy” Instead, they should have a “Customer Strategy” that focuses in on how customers behave…

• From the Cockpit: Altimeter Updates

  jeremiah

  2 Dec 2009 | 4:21 pm

  From time to time, we want to keep our community updated with what’s happening at the Altimeter Group, we’re continuing to grow, having fun, and will have more announcements in the upcoming future.  Here’s a partial snapshot of the partners progress to date: Ray has taken on new clients focused on the Social CRM space, and continues to be a global traveler, keynoting the SAP user group conference in UK and France.  He was recently accepted as the latest member of the Enterprise Irregulars, a collection of the top minds in the Enterprise Software Market. Deborah has…

• Saleforce.com integrates social with Chatter launch

  charleneli

  18 Nov 2009 | 6:21 am

  At its Dreamforce conference, Salesforce.com announced the launch of Chatter Collaboration Cloud. On the surface, it may look like merely Twitter integrated deeply into Salesforce.com’s offerings, but it’s really a social platform that can integrate multiple inputs that will accelerate the opening up of enterprise applications. I was pre-briefed about the announcement, so will walk you through major highlights and also discuss a few implications. Overview Chatter Collaboration Cloud reflects a recent expansion in Salesforce.com’s offering, continuing where Sales Cloud 2,…

• 
  ManagingCommunities.com

• Fair Use for Forums (and How to Explain to Your Members That They Can’t Quote Entire Articles)

  Patrick

  7 Feb 2010 | 8:34 am

  photo credit: Horia Varlan It’s important to be proactive on matters of content theft and copyright infringement. A large part of this is text quoted from other sources. With some exceptions (public domain works, works by the Federal Government, works released under alternative licenses to copyright, and more), you can’t allow your members to post [...]

• Poachers Are the Bad Guys (or “Poaching Community Members is Like Building Your Community on an Ancient Burial Ground”)

  Patrick

  3 Feb 2010 | 6:46 pm

  photo credit: Gusjer You’ve got a brand new community on basket weaving. You badly want people to come to your site. So, you go to the largest basket weaving community on the internet and start discreetly inviting members. Maybe you instant message or e-mail them off site, so that the people running the established community [...]

• Video: “The Art of Responding to Feedback From Your Community” Presentation at South by Southwest (SXSW) Interactive 2009

  Patrick

  31 Jan 2010 | 1:57 pm

  At last year’s South by Southwest Interactive (see my recap), I gave a solo presentation titled “The Art of Responding to Feedback From Your Community.” The basis of this talk was a blog post made on this site in January of 2009. The presentation is based around my three steps for responding to feedback. In short, [...]

• I Speak at Conferences and Events

  Patrick

  29 Jan 2010 | 8:22 am

  photo credit: BuzzShift For what seems like forever, I’ve been working on my just launched about and speaking pages. Probably the biggest reason I did it was because I’m hoping to speak more. Since finishing “Managing Online Forums,” I’ve done 11 engagements at 7 different events. While this doesn’t make me a veteran, it means I’m not [...]

• ManagingCommunities.com Turns Two Years Old!

  Patrick

  27 Jan 2010 | 9:04 am

  photo credit: kiewic It was two years ago today that I launched ManagingCommunities.com. Once you reach a certain age, time just seems to fly by! In light of this milestone, I wanted to take a moment to thank all my loyal readers. I appreciate your support and your contributions. I hope that I’ve provided value to [...]

• 
  Marketing Profs Daily Fix

• Trending ‘Functionall’

  Ted Mininni

  9 Feb 2010 | 4:28 am

  Reinier Evers founder of trendwatching.com can always be counted on to weigh in on new trends every month. As is the case with all prognosticating, there’s always the risk of being wrong. But in Evers’s case, I think he’s had considerably more hits than misses. Trendwatching’s latest caught my eye more than most. The headline screams one word: “Functionall.” The subhead: “Why simple, small & cheap appeals to all.” The definition of Functionall: Captures the phenomenon of simple, small and/or cheap products and services designed for low(er)-income consumers…

• MarketingProfs B2B Forum Ramp Up: What I Have Learned About B2B Marketing

  Kathy Bushman

  9 Feb 2010 | 3:36 am

  As part of my journey in developing the content for an educational conference, in this case MarketingProfs B2B Forum, I do a lot of research. I spend a lot of time on the web looking at competitive conferences (and non-competitive conferences) as well as reading many white papers, articles and blogs. We also take seriously any feedback that we’ve gotten from the attendees at our last event and we poll the MarketingProfs community about topics they need education on through crowdsourcing, discussions on our community sites and in the form of questions sent out as tweets. But most important…

• Guest Post: The 4 Pillars Of B2B Marketing-The Lifecycle Of a B2B Campaign

  Ann Handley

  8 Feb 2010 | 6:37 am

  By Achim Klor SterlingKlor Communications I recently read an excellent post by Paul Dunay on Social Media Today presenting the 4 C’s of B2B marketing. We’ve known about the 4 P’s of marketing for years: Product, Price, Place and Promotion. Paul argues the 4 P’s are primarily a B2C mix. The 4 C’s, however, (Content, Connection, Communications, Conversion) illustrate the marketing mix for B2B. Sounds great, but how should B2B organizations implement the 4 C’s marketing mix into their campaigns? I would like to highlight an approach that has served our B2B agency very…

• Interview With Seth Godin: Linchpin

  John Wall Christopher Penn

  8 Feb 2010 | 6:21 am

  In this Marketing Over Coffee brought to you by MarketingProfs: We talk with Seth Godin about his new book: Linchpin Marketing Over Coffee with Seth Godin Direct Link to File Show length 23:30 00:52 What’s Linchpin about? 02:30 How do entrepreneurial linchpins fit in to large organizations? 05:40 Who are the artists? 06:55 Can you get beyond Dunbar’s Number? Gary V. is using Twitter to add two zeros. 08:10 What is The Resistance? What is Emotional Labor? 11:22 Thrashing – a classic Marketing problem, and yes, Duke Nukem! Real artists ship. 14:16 Is there any future for mass media…

• How To Build a Brand Internationally

  Paul Williams

  5 Feb 2010 | 6:21 am

  Congratulations! Your company is successful locally, and now you want to share what you do with the world. In many ways, the process will be like re-starting your business. Many of the activities you performed to launch your initial business are the same you will employ in each of your new international markets. However, much of your time will be spent translating (literally and figuratively) to ensure you are locally relevant to your new customers. A Brand = A Reputation The term “brand” can be confusing. Think of a brand as a reputation. Building a reputation in any new market…

• 
  Web Strategy by Jeremiah

• Quicktake: What Google Buzz Means

  jeremiah_owyang

  9 Feb 2010 | 11:26 am

  Google launches status update features Google launches Buzz, which many will find similar to Friendfeed now part of the Facebook family.  Google Buzz will enable content to be aggregated, and then prioritized based upon the people you already email with, which Harry McCracken and I call this a social graph based on history, “Historical social graph” or HSG. Secondly, this Google Buzz feature will rate and rank content based on activity and interaction within your social group. Users can choose to publish the Buzz in public, which will display on the Google Profile page. They…

• Register For Webinar: Developing a Social Strategy by Objectives

  jeremiah_owyang

  8 Feb 2010 | 10:11 am

  Left: There are four main categories of social strategy, yet with over 20 subset objectives, which we’ll discuss at a high level. Organizations that focus on social technologies suffer from the symptom of ‘Fondling The Hammer‘ .  True social strategy stems from business objectives –not the latest technologies. So often, companies develop social tactics based on the latest tool that’s sprung forth.  Yet, so far and few in between to organizations develop an actionable plan based on business goals. This second in our no-cost webinar series is coming up on the…

• People on the Move in the Social Media Industry: Feb 4, 2010

  jeremiah_owyang

  4 Feb 2010 | 8:31 pm

  The submissions are defintly picking up, I’m seeing more submissions than before. Why? I attribute this to the start of the new year when many folks change up jobs, and the slight uptick we’re starting to see in the economy. In an effort to recognize the changes in the social media space, I’ve started this post series (see archives) to both track and congratulate folks who get promoted, move, or accept new exciting positions. Please help me congratulate the following folks: Congrats to Jeannette Gibson (Twttier) who has moved to corporate marketing to run social media at…

• Matrix: Companies Should Factor ‘Social Influence’ Into Total Customer Value

  jeremiah_owyang

  3 Feb 2010 | 6:00 am

  Case Study: An Influential Mom Blogger Caused Mainstream Crises Popular blogger, Heather Armstrong (@dooce) was dissatisfied with her non-working Maytag appliance.  Following protocol, she called their support number, yet her issue was not solved.  Stonewalled, she argued/warned the support staff that she was on Twitter, yet didn’t receive special assistance.  Escalating further, she then flexed a muscle and told them she had over 1,000,000 Twitter followers –yet the support rep did not budge.  Finally, she blogged and Tweeted against Maytag, initiating a boycott by her…

• List of Corporate Social Media Strategists, Corporate Community Managers in 2010

  jeremiah_owyang

  30 Jan 2010 | 9:36 am

  As an industry watcher, I look at trends, data, spending, technologies, yet what’s really important is watching the trend of professionals as they grow into these roles managing disruptive technologies.  Update: Brian Hayashi has created a spreadsheet of this with additional info –like Twitter handles. We’re staying coordinated so the data is matched, follow Brian on Twitter. [Connecting with customers using social technologies is deceptively challenging, as most outsiders don't recognize the leadership to change internal cultural. Now, in public, let's recognize those who…

• 
  Chris Pirillo

• The Buzz About Google

  Chris

  9 Feb 2010 | 1:45 pm

  The Buzz About Google is a post from Chris PirilloGoogle has stepped up their game yet again with today’s introduction of Google Buzz. Buzz is touted as a new way to start conversations about the things you find interesting and share updates, photos, videos and more. It’s built into Gmail, so there’s nothing to sign up for, install or configure. Buzz makes use of your current contact list within Gmail, so you already have a built-in set of friends, as well.You can choose to share publicly with the world or privately to a small group of friends each time you post. Connect…

• What Easter Eggs are Found in Google?

  Chris

  9 Feb 2010 | 9:31 am

  What Easter Eggs are Found in Google? is a post from Chris Pirillo Add to iTunes | Add to YouTube | Add to Google | RSS FeedDevir has done a few screencasts for us in the past, with a lot of positive reviews. This time, he decided to have some fun, and show off several of the Easter Eggs he has found around Google’s sites. Don’t adjust your screen. The video is pausing at the beginning on purpose! That was Devir’s way of having a little fun with you all!The first Easter Egg deals with the infamous Loch Ness Monster. Apparently, if you have iGoogle configured right, you will…

• Do We Take Technology Advances Too Far?

  Chris

  8 Feb 2010 | 6:56 pm

  Do We Take Technology Advances Too Far? is a post from Chris PirilloIn the name of being the best, technology manufacturers are constantly pushing out new product, along with updates to older generation devices. Often, these new gadgets boast something new and improved, making our lives better in some way. Once in awhile, though, we get a product that makes us scratch our collective heads and wonder what on Earth the company in question was thinking of.Are companies pushing themselves TOO hard to create the next big thing? Are they sometimes sacrificing quality – and sometimes pushing…

• Samsung LED TV Review

  Chris

  8 Feb 2010 | 6:04 pm

  Samsung LED TV Review is a post from Chris Pirillo Add to iTunes | Add to YouTube | Add to Google | RSS FeedSome people ask what products I choose to buy myself to use in my home. This television is the latest acquisition of mine, and it’s one that I’m seriously happy with. This gorgeous TV is the Samsung 46″ 1080p LED HDTV. The picture is so much better than what this video will show you. It’s seriously crisp, clear and beautiful. This ultra-slim 46-inch LED HDTV boasts full HD 1080p resolution for the sharpest, smoothest picture possible.This TV is so much more than…

• Is There Too Much Noise in Social Media?

  Chris

  8 Feb 2010 | 4:50 pm

  Is There Too Much Noise in Social Media? is a post from Chris PirilloAn article over on TechCrunch today sparks an interesting thought. Michael Arrington states that “The online social landscape today sort of feels to me like search did in 1999. It’s a mess, but we don’t complain much about it because we don’t know there’s a better way.”. He continues that rationale by discussing how things used to be years ago, when we would use things like AltaVista to search, and end up with a bajillion unwanted results… never to find what we were really looking for.Michael is…

• 
  Social Media Club

• #SMCEDU Chat: Social Media in the Classroom…What’s the Incentive?

  Yong Lee

  9 Feb 2010 | 7:41 am

  Social Media Club Education Connection (aka #SMCEDU) is a national initiative whose goal is to unite educators, students, and professionals to further the development of social media curriculum in our schools, enabling a wider network of learning and workforce preparedness. #SMCEDU is a part of Social Media Club, a nonprofit organization that is working to promote media literacy and connect people to share what they are learning about social media. Last week, Social Media Week wrapped up in five different cities around the world. I wrote about a panel event held in New York on Friday that…

• Social Media Week New York Panel: The Future of Social Media in Higher Education

  Yong Lee

  5 Feb 2010 | 7:42 pm

  On Friday, McGraw-Hill hosted a panel discussion on the future of social media in higher education. The panel included: Adam Ostrow Editor in Chief, Mashable.com Dr. Kathleen P. King Professor, Fordham University; Professor, Transformation Education, LLC Greg Verdino VP Strategy & Solutions, Powered; author of microMARKETING Mary Casey NYU Student and Founder of Jatched.com Vineet Madan VP Strategy & Business Development, McGraw-Hill Education The panel was moderated by Yianni Garcia, a marketing specialist at GradeGuru.com, tweets from the discussion can be found under #smwmcgraw.

• SMCEDU Chat – What Motivates Students to Participate AND Create Good Content?

  Yong Lee

  1 Feb 2010 | 1:25 pm

  Our #SMCEDU chat was joined by more new faces today (always exciting); our continued discussions are broadcasting some great ideas and thoughts! I’ve received wonderful feedback on the chats, and I believe as more contribute, the quality, breadth, and depth of our shared lessons will grow. I love seeing both students and educators discussing educational topics on equal footing. The professors involved in our weekly chats are gracious in not only sharing with their peers, but in answering the concerns of the students’ voice. It would have been especially gratifying to hear students…

• SMCEDU-RVA Hosts Social Media U: Fundamental Shifts in Learning, Sharing, and Collaboration

  Yong Lee

  29 Jan 2010 | 11:41 am

  Richmond, VA, proved once again to be a leader in advancing social media in education as the SMCEDU-RVA organization hosted Social Media U on Tuesday evening at the University of Richmond. Tuesday’s event, billed as an exploration of the “Fundamental Shift in Teaching, Learning, and Collaboration,” focused on the concerns of educators and the issues they face in incorporating social media into the classroom. Although education was at the center of the discussion, the audience was peppered with students and professionals seeking to grasp more understanding of social media as…

• Social Media Camp SF Schedule ++

  Chris Heuer

  28 Jan 2010 | 5:02 pm

  Big thanks to all the early participants who signed up on blind faith and to all the sponsors who are subsidizing our participation costs (especially for the lucky few who got one of the $5 tickets). We have been working hard to build a great single-track Social Media conference that will be the backbone of a strong ‘camp’. Each of the sessions below are designed to be 45 minutes with 15 minute breaks in between. Due to the layout of the building and proximity of the rooms to one another, we will be sticking to this schedule as best as possible. In under a week, with the support…

• 
  The Buzz Bin

• Trust Me

  Mike Mulvihill

  9 Feb 2010 | 3:00 am

   By Mike Mulvihill  Photo: Exercise in Mistrust from Black wolf Okay, so the last 18 months have been near cataclysmic for many Americans.  We lost our money in the stock market, our jobs and even our homes. We’re mired in a two-front war. We loaned money to save the very institutions that created the financial collapse of the Great Recession, only to have them thumb their noses at us by loaning little of our money to help small business and average American’s while they continue to pay out big bonuses.  No, I’m not disillusioned (well, maybe a little).  But now the 2009 edition of…

• Fragmented Branding – The 21st Century Reality

  Geoff Livingston

  8 Feb 2010 | 12:05 am

  by Geoff Livingston We live in a world where anyone can hijack a brand and put it on the Internet with their own views, positive or negative (image by Brent Nelson). Brand control no longer exists, in large part because of widespread fragmentation of traditional and citizen-created media. The resulting brand distortion creates a situation where communicators attempt to paint the abstract. The abstract takes pieces and puts them together to create a larger picture. Sometimes the pieces are clear, other times they are not. In the case of fragmented branding, some pieces are issued by corporate,…

• Toyota Took Risks. Did PR Know?

  Michael Whitlow

  4 Feb 2010 | 8:22 pm

  The recent massive recall at Toyota, aside from breathing new life into a moribund General Motors (an Obama conspiracy?), raises an interesting question for public relations folks. If your management makes a conscious decision to take more risks in manufacturing, is it also obligated to communicate this strategy’s potential impact to stakeholders, particularly customers and investors? Toyota Taking its Lumps The Lean Manufacturing approach at Toyota puts standard parts into a wide variety of vehicles in their lineup, and by doing so raises the risk that failures will cause havoc to…

• The End of Social Media Fiefdoms?

  Jenn Riggle

  4 Feb 2010 | 3:00 am

  By Jenn Riggle Photo courtesy of antaldaniel Like the Fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989, we’re seeing the barriers between the different social media platforms begin to topple. I guess this isn’t surprising, as we see social media become more and more a part of our every day lives. The good news is that this makes it easier to maintain your different social media accounts and integrate their information. The bad news is that it’s also easier to maintain your various social media personalities and become a “Social Media Sybil” (okay, I’m really dating myself here). Probably the…

• Rapid Brand Deceleration

  Mike Mulvihill

  1 Feb 2010 | 9:02 pm

   By Mike Mulvihill Ten days. In today’s social media fueled world, a crisis can begin – and even end – in hours, if not minutes. Ten days. That’s how long it took Toyota to announce a fix to the rapid acceleration (faulty gas pedal) problem that prompted a recall of 4.2 million cars worldwide and 2.3 million in the United States, including some of Toyota’s best-selling models, such as the Camry and Corolla. To make matters worse, millions more had been recalled earlier because of floor mats that could catch the gas pedal causing a similar sudden acceleration issue as the…

• 
  Convince and Convert Blog: Where Social Media and Email Collide

• The Social Impact of Friendships and Lies

  Jay Baer

  9 Feb 2010 | 3:56 am

  Do you trust me? Social media relies on the premise that we’ll believe what people tell us more readily than if we were told the same thing by a nameless, faceless company. That’s why brands go to great lengths to humanize themselves on the social Web. But, a new study by Edelman (whose digital arm features social media and ebusiness genius David Armano) claims that bond is eroding. A survey of 4,875 adults (500 U.S.) world-wide shows that just 25% of respondents said their friends and peers are credible sources of information about companies – a decline of 20% since a…

• Please Help Me Pick a New Look For My Blog

  Jay Baer

  5 Feb 2010 | 3:02 am

  I’ve been making a few tweaks to Convince & Convert recently, with the help of my friend (and Wordpress/SEO ninja) Chuck Reynolds. We’ve added Disqus as the commenting system. Changed the sharing tools to incorporate Sexy Bookmarks plug-in (Michael Stelzner at Social Media Examiner turned me on to it). We’re working on tweaking the subscription center at the top a bit, too. But I need your help with the biggest change – the header. I’m a big believer in humanization of your blog (in fact, it’s one of my 11 must-dos for serious bloggers). And while I…

• 11 Mind-Blowing Reasons Your Company Needs Facebook

  Jay Baer

  4 Feb 2010 | 3:16 am

  Wow. Remember when MySpace was the dominant social network? Seems like a long time ago, as the past three years have seen Facebook approach, catch, and blow past MySpace to become our preferred online hangout spot. Now, new data released by Facebook and third party researchers show just how influential Facebook has become in our daily lives. Combined with several critical adjustments to how Facebook publishes “news” and intersects with other sites, the state of Facebook is mind-blowing. And important for business. Here’s 11 things about Facebook that you need to know: 1. 350 Million…

• The Chicken and the Egg Social Media Conundrum

  Jay Baer

  3 Feb 2010 | 3:49 am

  There are many ways social media differs from traditional marketing. It’s approachable and human. It’s a two-way dialog, rather than unilateral declarations. It treats the customer as a teammate, rather than a target. But there’s another big difference. In social media, the audience comes after the message, not before. Remember that when you buy a print ad, or billboard, or print a direct mail piece, or buy radio time, or banner ads, or bus benches, or hire a skywriter, you are doing so because you have some idea of how many people will see your message, and that they are…

• Is Your Company More Interesting Than My Wife?

  Jay Baer

  2 Feb 2010 | 3:02 am

  If you’re going to succeed on Facebook, you don’t just have to be more interesting than other companies, you have to be more interesting than my friends and relatives. Are you prepared for that? My friend Jeff Widman runs BrandGlue, a consultancy that helps companies better manage their Facebook fan pages. He told me recently that since Facebook rolled out the news feed changes (they decide what gets shown on your news feed based on what you’ve “liked” and commented upon in the past, and what your friends have “liked” and commented upon), that only 2…

• 
  louisgray.com

• Google's Open Tools and APIs Make Buzz Hum

  9 Feb 2010 | 1:35 pm

  The debut of Google's new social venture, Buzz, came with all the subtlety of a freight train. Like a freight train, you could hear the rumbling of Buzz as its launch approached, fueled by the vast array of open social tools that the company has been championing over the last few years, and a number of key hires that show Mountain View's commitment to making users' data portable and non-siloed, in visible contrast to alternative networks, most notably Facebook, who has made it notoriously difficult to export data in its six year history.Though clearly a 1.0 version product today, Buzz is…

• How Google Buzz Validates but Marginalizes FriendFeed

  9 Feb 2010 | 12:34 pm

  When FriendFeed debuted on the scene in late 2007, it was one of the simplest ways to aggregate all of my updates from the social outposts I have all over the Web, see friends' updates and have a discussion around their shared items. Now part of Facebook, the product continues to have an extremely loyal, albeit relatively small, community, who embraced the technology and made it a platform for social interaction. The site, which was among the pioneers of real-time streams and the surfacing of popular items, has seen its technology mimicked and imitated by many, but its complexity helped to…

• Google Buzz Mobile Moves Beyond Latitude/Longitude

  9 Feb 2010 | 12:00 pm

  In addition to the morning's news that Google had launched Buzz as a major social push for Gmail, the company, in parallel, announced a new Web application for mobile devices, supporting both Android and iPhone platforms, that not only brings Buzz to the mobile phone, but also adds Buzz to the company's existing Maps application, showing Buzz from activity in your specific location. Leveraging the years of investments in Google Earth, Google Maps, Google StreetView and other location-based services, Google Buzz immediately ships with an advantage - determining the true identity of a location,…

• Google's Newest Mission: Organizing the Social Experience

  9 Feb 2010 | 11:30 am

  With today's introduction of Google Buzz, you are going to see a lot of reactions and news stories that say Google is trying to "kill" competition, including Twitter and Facebook. Given the company's hit and miss track record on introducing or cultivating products with social elements, it is no surprise that Google's introduction of Buzz can be viewed by some with a level of skepticism, or distrust, as the Mountain View company extends its reach on the Web. But in discussions I had with members of Google's team behind the new venture on Monday, it wasn't the squelching of competition they…

• Google's Buzz Brings Social Sharing, Aggregation to GMail

  9 Feb 2010 | 11:11 am

  Google's growth from its roots as a spartan, but highly effective, search engine has been as transformative as the changes the Web itself has seen over the last decade-plus. As the Web has evolved to include more rich media and social connectors, so too has Google evolved, as the company now operates not just the most popular data discovery engine but also some of the Web's most popular data creation and sharing engines, including Gmail and YouTube. But the company, so far, has struggled a bit in connecting its wide array of properties and making them feel personal and social. Today, with the…

• 
  Altitude Branding

• When To Take It Private*

  Amber Naslund

  9 Feb 2010 | 4:00 am

  A comment by Jen on my post about using Twitter DMs for business asked a specific question: How do you know when to take a conversation into more private channel, versus continuing it out in the open? In other words, you have a disgruntled customer on Twitter. Do you respond via @ reply or DM? You’ve got a negative post on your FB fan page. Do you respond there, or try to contact that person through Facebook mail instead? When do you address an emerging issue or question directly in a blog comment versus requesting a conversation in a different medium, like a phone call? Something…

• Wanna Write? Read Voraciously.

  Amber Naslund

  8 Feb 2010 | 4:00 am

  A writing habit is cultivated by two things: Writing a lot. Reading even more. The more you write, the more you get to practice flexing vocabulary and voice as well as how to put your ideas into clear thoughts. The more you read, the more you capture lessons about tone, sentence structure, cadence, and idea flow.  And the more you do both, the more everything you touch, see, hear, and read becomes the seed of something else to write about. There are some great posts out there about cultivating a writing habit, like these: Cultivate a Writing Habit: Chris Brogan 10 Steps to Create the Habit…

• Why Not To Do Business in Direct Messages

  Amber Naslund

  7 Feb 2010 | 6:00 am

  Look, I think Twitter is great. I use it all the time, and without question it brings me business, sends me great information, helps me build friendships and relationships. I’m a fan. But there are some shortcomings to trying to do business in Twitter Direct Messages (DMs), and I think they’re important to consider. I’ve noticed a lot of folks in my stream trying to swap them out for email, and it just doesn’t work as well, at least for me.  I’ll be curious to hear your take. Here’s why: DMs can get consumed by the stream. DMs are linear, and if you use a…

• 
  Regular Geek

• Software Engineering Task: Mentoring and Assisting Others

  Rob Diana

  8 Feb 2010 | 6:13 am

  As a software engineer moves throughout their career, they take on more responsibilities. Some of these responsibilities are mentoring junior developers and assisting others that may be having problems. Mentoring is thrown around in many conversations when dealing with senior level professionals. It is assumed that people know what to do when it is mentioned. I am not going to assume that here, so let’s take a look at the dictionary definition for mentor: a wise and trusted counselor or teacher So, as a mentor, you are expected to be a counselor and teacher of people that may be your…

• Simple Tips For Clean Memory Management In Java

  Rob Diana

  4 Feb 2010 | 4:45 am

  The other day I was asked how much I knew about Java garbage collection. I am not a performance guru, so I admitted that I knew very little, basically only that it works. As the conversation continued, I realized that while I did not know much about the internals of the garbage collection mechanism, I did know a few things what it did. First, a quick refresher on how garbage collection works in theory. You continuously create objects in Java, but at some point the memory needs to be cleaned up. Generally, if you create objects within a method, those objects may be garbage collected when the…

• Traditional Programming Language Job Trends – February 2010

  Rob Diana

  2 Feb 2010 | 5:53 am

  About 6 months ago, I looked the the job trends for various programming languages. Given that TIOBE released their yearly programming language rankings, I figured I should update the job trends again. In this update, I will use the TIOBE rankings to determine what languages to include. Based on those rankings, I have changed the list from Cobol, Java, C++, C#, Visual Basic and Perl to Java, C++, C#, Delphi, Objective C, Perl and Visual Basic. The Delphi inclusion is purely due to the TIOBE ranking and has nothing to do with any opinion I may hold. First, let’s look at the job trends…

• Apple’s iPad Is What Laptops Should Have Been

  Rob Diana

  28 Jan 2010 | 5:30 am

  Well, Steve Jobs dropped a bombshell on people. The iPad was not what people were expecting. As was expected, some people love it and others hate it. However, the one point of agreement between these people is confusion. What exactly is the iPad revolutionizing? There was plenty of hype that the Apple tablet device would revolutionize computing as we know it. This is obviously unattainable, even for Steve Jobs. The fact that the iPad is positioned as a device between your iPhone and your main computer is also confusing. We have netbooks right now, but they are really just smaller laptops and…

• Apple Is Successful Because They Make Complex Look Easy

  Rob Diana

  26 Jan 2010 | 5:17 am

  As people wait in line to worship at the Altar of Apple, I figured you might want a break from the rumors. However, a post I planned to write months ago decided to take a more concrete shape due to the fanboi frothing. Apple is successful with much of its new technology. Not just a little successful, but hugely successful. They put the Macs back on the map by catering to their digital media users. By doing this, it seems like Apple had seen the light and realized their true path, make complex tasks simpler. In that post months ago, Process Rarely Fixes The Problem, I made a mistake. I took…

• 
  AriWriter

• TV vs the Web: Who Wins This Super Bowl?

  Ari Herzog

  8 Feb 2010 | 12:20 pm

  Today’s newspapers and internet headlines scream the score of last night’s game and point me to repositories of the advertisements to watch. Considering I didn’t follow pro football all season, why be an ignoramus and pay attention at the final hour? No thanks, not my style. I spent the day out of town instead and had an enjoyable evening. My sentiments are not alone as scores of people sent Twitter updates throughout the night that they weren’t watching the game either. Despite our indulgences in other pursuits, over 51 million American households tuned into the CBS…

• Showcase Sunday: How RescueTime Tracks Your Online Productivity

  Ari Herzog

  6 Feb 2010 | 9:01 pm

  Enjoy this video I made for you about an online tool called RescueTime. -- Thank you for reading Showcase Sunday: How RescueTime Tracks Your Online Productivity at AriWriter Related posts:How Readtwit Improves Twitter Productivity Q&A: How to Save RSS Searches in Google Reader? How Unfollowing May Increase Twitter Productivity

• Introducing Gwen Bell to You on Satisfying Saturday

  Ari Herzog

  5 Feb 2010 | 10:06 pm

  One year ago today, Gwen wrote about her wedding to Joel, the man she met on Twitter: We’re going to live-stream video during the day. That means if you can’t physically be here for the wedding, you can still watch it. And participate remotely. We’ll have comments off on the live-stream in order to keep, ahem, naughtiness to a minimum. We’ll instead use a hashtag for Twitter to allow virtual guests to talk with us. It was sometime in late-2008 between their engagement and the wedding plans when I first tweeted her. I forget the impetus other than it had something to do with my…

• Share 1 Online Marketing Tip and Win 250 Free Business Cards via PrintRunner

  Ari Herzog

  4 Feb 2010 | 9:01 pm

  There are a slew of printing companies that you can visit online to order business cards, post cards, banners, and other paper materials. Many firms recognize the power of the web and have had e-commerce sites for years, such as VistaPrint (from which I’ve ordered business cards in the past) to Elite Flyers (a start-up operation with 3,000 monthly visitors to its website, such as me when I printed campaign post cards last summer). PrintRunner is an established company, founded in 1999 and employing over 60 today. They’re based in California. The firm is experiencing tremendous…

• How I Find Blog Post Ideas – and You Can Too

  Ari Herzog

  3 Feb 2010 | 9:01 pm

  Over dinner with Brian Rivard last night, he mentioned he read my blog and asked how I decide what to write about each day. I grinned and told him I’d write my next blog post answering his question. Here goes. Visiting my blog archive I can see the last few articles I’ve written. Take a look: Even if you haven’t read each article preceded by a bullet, you can get a sense about the subject matter — and guess why I might have written it. Web tools I used or were alerted to have spawned some blog posts, such as the one about the Wibiya toolbar or the other ones about…

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  Social Media Rockstar

• The Dangers of Social Media Imbalance

  Brett Borders

  25 Jan 2010 | 4:57 pm

  Social media is quietly forcing an integration of “work” vs. “play” into the mainstream business culture. Networking and socializing used to be quarantined into special times and locations – like conferences, power lunches, and parties. But now virtual cocktail hour and watching cool videos have been integrated into our desktop, inbox and phone with apps and constant reminders that keep us distracted connected. Social media is forcing an integration of work and play, in business. image: Mike Oleveri & Rev. Xantos Some companies, consultants and HR…

• VIDEO: A Brief History of Social Media

  Brett Borders

  28 Dec 2009 | 1:36 pm

  Here’s a video of a short presentation I did on the history of social media. It traces the evolution of social media back from phone phreaking in the 1950’s, to the BBS’s and online services of the 80’s, to the real-time mobile web and social collaboration tools of today. If you’d be willing to take a second to rate the video on YouTube, I’d really appreciate it!

• 3 Core Principles of Social Media Productivity

  Brett Borders

  22 Dec 2009 | 2:38 pm

  This is a guest post by Chris Goddard from Affilorama.com – an affiliate marketing training site. Technology has a habit of embedding itself in our lives – so much so that we start working by its schedule, rather than by our own. Unfiltered, social media can be too much to handle! image: theVanCats There isn’t a single application or service that, in my mind, does an excellent job of aggregating multiple social feeds into one manageable interface. (Sorry FriendFeed fans… but I’ve never been satisfied with you!). Hopefully one day there will be, but for now we have to rely on…

• Why Narcissistic Personality Disorder Loves Social Media

  Brett Borders

  8 Dec 2009 | 7:04 pm

  Spend any length of time in the social media scene and you’ll almost certainly encounter a person with a severe character flaw called Narcissistic Personality Disorder (NPD). The psychiatrists’ DSM manual describes it as “a pervasive pattern of grandiosity, need for admiration, and a lack of empathy.” Narcissists (NPD people) are excessively preoccupied with personal adequacy, power and prestige. Everyone has some need for attention, but NPD people are pathologically obsessed with it. Joe Pesci’s character in Goodfellas is a perfect example of malignant…

• 11 Ways to Get More RSS Subscribers

  Brett Borders

  16 Nov 2009 | 6:48 pm

  One year ago, I started this blog with the goal of improving my writing skills and also my connections in the social media world. I also wanted to practice creating viral content. Out of 48 posts, 12 of them (25%) went viral and got over 200 retweets. Near the end of my first year I had about 2000 RSS subscribers – a modest number. There were an average of 9900 monthly unique visitors, with a peak in April of 16,894 unique visitors. While some people have figured out how to get blog subscribers much more quickly, I was more successful than with my other blog – which only got…

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  Dumb Little Man

• The Power of Thinking Big

  Mark Harrison

  8 Feb 2010 | 5:03 am

  We've been conditioned to think small, simplify, not to be greedy, and to overall expect less and demand less from life. We’ve been taught that we should be happy and thankful with what we have and that there are many others less fortunate than ourselves.I read somewhere that, as an experiment, someone put two adverts in a newspaper. They were for the same job, doing the same work with the same hours, but one of them offered to pay a salary many times the other. Guess what? About ten times more people applied for the lower paid job! People think small. And that's one of the reasons they…

• Who’s In Charge of Your Life?

  Ali

  7 Feb 2010 | 12:04 am

  This might seem like an odd question. Who’s in charge of your life? Who tells you what to do? Who says which choices are valid, and which are silly or self-indulgent?On the surface of it, if you’re an adult, there’s probably no-one standing next to you and telling you exactly what you should be doing. But many of us have ceded control of our lives to someone else. Often unconsciously, we’ve taken on their values, even their likes and dislikes, and we’ve made them their own.Do you ever feel that you “should” be doing something that you aren’t? Why? Is that impulse really from…

• 8 Foods That Will Hide Your Bad Breath

  Krizia MissK

  6 Feb 2010 | 4:54 am

  There’s nothing worse than having bad breath and not knowing about it!There are certain foods that are guaranteed to cause bad breath. Most people are quite aware that eating foods such as curry, garlic, onions or coffee before a meeting or function might be the kiss of death when it comes to social etiquette.You can try chewing gum, but you’ll have to chew for a long time because until that bad-breath-causing-food clears from your system (which can take up to 24 hours), you’ll be stuck with that bad breath. That’s unless you know which foods you can eat to mask the problem.When it…

• 50 Ways You Can Create a Better Day

  DLM Writers

  5 Feb 2010 | 6:45 am

  Every now and then I wake up in a crappy mood, feeling totally unmotivated and not wanting to do anything or see anyone. It could be due to something bad happening the previous day, or it could be due to nothing at all. I just feel crabby for no reason. Weird, I know. But, I'm sure you know what I mean. Everyone has experienced dreadful waking moments in the past.In fact, it is not really surprising that a lot of people nowadays feel bad the moment they wake up. If you are bombarded with negative news like the recent airplane crotch-bomb threat and the Haiti earthquake, it is little wonder…

• 5 Reasons You May Want to Start a Side Business

  Ali

  4 Feb 2010 | 3:10 am

  Whether your “real” work is a full-time day job, an academic course, or taking care of kids, you might have a few hours to spare each week which you’d like to use productively. Have you ever thought about starting a side business?A few years ago, I thought that “business” was the realm of tough go-getters with a focus on profit and nothing else. Since then, I’ve met lots of individuals who run their own businesses from a couple who make rosettes for horse shows in their spare time, to people working as consultants with government organizations. These business owners come from all…

• 
  Mind Hacks

• Nine Legendary Hypochondriacs

  vaughan

  8 Feb 2010 | 12:00 am

  ABC Radio National's Late Night Live has a fascinating discussion with the author of a new book on nine famous hypochondriacs: James Boswell, Charlotte Bronte, Charles Darwin, Florence Nightingale, Alice James, Daniel Paul Schreber, Marcel Proust, Glenn Gould and Andy Warhol. I'm not sure Daniel Paul Schreber is necessarily the best example of someone with hypochondria is he is famous for writing a personal account of being genuinely mentally ill and floridly psychotic. However, I've not read the book and the programme focuses on better known figures so I am open to being convinced (certainly…

• Bonuses generate more heat than light

  vaughan

  6 Feb 2010 | 9:11 am

  The engaging behavioural economist Dan Ariely has just become a columnist for Wired UK and in his first article he describes how the promise of performance-related pay often backfires leading people to do more but perform worse. To see the effect of bonuses on performance, Nina Mazar (assistant professor of marketing, Toronto University), Uri Gneezy (professor of economics and strategy, University of California, San Diego), George Loewenstein (professor of economics, Carnegie Mellon, Pennsylvania) and I conducted three experiments. In one we gave subjects tasks that demanded attention,…

• 2010-02-05 Spike activity

  vaughan

  5 Feb 2010 | 12:00 am

  Quick links from the past week in mind and brain news: Sex addiction is a feminist victory, according to an article in Slate, apparently because it allows man shaming. Malevolence-based medicine rears its ugly head. The BPS Research Digest covers research finding CBT-based self-help books might do more harm than good for people who worry a lot. The public are asked for their opinion on the recent news that The Lancet retracts the Wakefield autism paper, by The Onion. Neurophilosophy has an excellent piece on big news that the first evidence for navigation essential grid cells in the human…

• Eureka brain special and more fighting

  vaughan

  4 Feb 2010 | 10:00 am

  The Times has just released its monthly science magazine, Eureka, with a special issue on the brain and all the articles freely available online. There doesn't seem to be a way to link to a whole issue, but inside you'll find an excellent piece on the use of transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) to temporarily switch off bits of the working brain, a profile of neurosurgeon Huma Sethi, an article on commercial brain-computer interfaces, a remarkable piece on how old injuries can 'return' to affect phantom limbs as well as an exploration of the link between brain activity and sporting skill.

• Time to think

  vaughan

  4 Feb 2010 | 4:00 am

  Bioemphemera has found some wonderfully left-field brain illustrations by Dutch graphic designer Rhonald Blommestijn. The image on the left is a brain made out of clocks. Blommestijn's blog is full of strikingly surreal eye-candy that manages both to inspire a feeling of wide-eyed wonder and illustrate scientific themes. They're certainly very original takes on the subject and the neuroscience images are particularly vivid. Link to Bioephemera on Blommestijn's brain illustrations. Link to Blommestijn's blog.

• 
  New York Times

• East Coast Braces for Another Storm

  By LIZ ROBBINS

  9 Feb 2010 | 3:29 pm

  Officials said that New York City schools would be closed on Wednesday, as the mid-Atlantic region prepared for another powerful storm.

• Dozens Buried in Afghan Avalanches

  By ROD NORDLAND

  9 Feb 2010 | 3:23 pm

  Deadly avalanches buried hundreds cars along a high mountain pass that links Afghanistan’s capital to its north, killing at least two dozen people.

• Galleon Defendants Ordered to Turn Over Wiretaps

  By ZACHERY KOUWE

  9 Feb 2010 | 2:52 pm

  U.S. District Judge Jed S. Rakoff has ordered Raj Rajaratnam and other defendants in the Galleon Group insider trading case to turn over wiretap recordings to the Securities and Exchange Commission, which has brought a parallel civil complaint against Mr. Rajaratnam and other individuals.

• Americans Jailed in Haiti Plead for Help From U.S.

  By IAN URBINA

  9 Feb 2010 | 2:12 pm

  The 10 Americans detained on child trafficking charges say the U.S. government could be doing more.

• China Report Shows More Pollution in Waterways

  By JONATHAN ANSFIELD and KEITH BRADSHER

  9 Feb 2010 | 2:08 pm

  China revealed that water pollution in 2007 was more than twice as severe as had been reported in the past.

• 
  Seth Godin

• TEDthink

  Seth Godin

  9 Feb 2010 | 3:00 am

  Can you factor this? If you're like most people, you get a little queasy at the thought. And when you were in tenth grade, you surely wondered why they were bothering you.(the answer is (x-2) times (x-2), in case you were curious.)It turns out that the real reason you needed to do this work was to be able to play with numbers in your head. Abstract numerical thought is an important skill among educated people.Which brings us to TED, a conference held every year in Long Beach. It's going on right now. Watch a few TED videos and try to get ahead of the speaker. They have an idea...it's probably…

• Frightened, clueless or uninformed?

  Seth Godin

  8 Feb 2010 | 2:57 am

  In the face of significant change and opportunity, people are often one of the three. If you're going to be of assistance, it helps to know which one.Uninformed people need information and insight in order to figure out what to do next. They are approaching the problem with optimism and calm, but they need to be taught. Uninformed is not a pejorative term, it's a temporary state.Clueless people don't know what to do and they don't know that they don't know what to do. They don't know the right questions to ask. Giving them instructions is insufficient. First, they need to be sold on what the…

• The least I could do

  Seth Godin

  7 Feb 2010 | 3:35 am

  One way to think about running a successful business is to figure out what the least you can do is, and do that. That's actually what they spent most of my time at business school teaching me.No sense putting more on that pizza, sending more staff to that event, answering the phone in fewer rings... what's the point? No sense being kind, looking people in the eye, being open or welcoming or grateful. Doing the least acceptable amount is the way to maximize short term profit.Of course, there's a different strategy, a crazy alternative that seems to work: do the most you can do instead of the…

• iPad app of my dreams: the digital talking pad

  Seth Godin

  6 Feb 2010 | 8:10 am

  Here's the spec. If you build it and it's great, I'll use it and I'll blog it.A while ago, I posted about the talking pad and a modern version of it.I think there's a killer app version of this for the iPad, and I hope someone will build it. The talking pad is an interactive presentation tool for smart people.OverviewIt's a very simple concept: a collection of pages (slides, images, type, let's call them pages) that are easy to navigate in a non-linear way. Along with the standard zoom features, I'd like to be able to write on any of them in real time using my finger. I can also call up, on…

• The relentless search for "tell me what to do"

  Seth Godin

  6 Feb 2010 | 2:26 am

  If you've ever hired or managed or taught, you know the feeling.People are just begging to be told what to do. There are a lot of reasons for this, but I think the biggest one is: "If you tell me what to do, the responsibility for the outcome is yours, not mine. I'm safe."When asked, resist.

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  John Jantsch

• PR is Only Dying If It Isn’t Evolving

  John Jantsch

  9 Feb 2010 | 5:51 am

  SharePR is Only Dying If It Isn’t EvolvingThis content from: Duct Tape Marketing Marketing podcast with Brian Solis (Click to listen, right click and Save As to download – subscribe now via iTunes For this episode of the Duct Tape Marketing Podcast I asked Brian Solis, Principal of FutureWorks and co-author of Putting the Public Back in Public Relations, about the future of the PR industry as we know it. There’s plenty of doom and gloom surrounding the practice of public relations in the social web world, but Solis suggests, and I totally agree, that there’s a…

• 5 Questions You Should Ask Every Customer

  John Jantsch

  8 Feb 2010 | 5:33 am

  Share5 Questions You Should Ask Every CustomerThis content from: Duct Tape Marketing Constantly seeking feedback from your customers is a great way to learn how to market your business more effectively. If you’ve never done this before, do it immediately as it is one of the best ways to discover what you do that actually differentiates you from your competition. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve worked with a small business that had no idea what its competitive advantage was until we heard it right from the mouths of happy customers. Seeking feedback is also a great way…

• Weekend Favs February Six

  John Jantsch

  6 Feb 2010 | 8:14 am

  ShareWeekend Favs February SixThis content from: Duct Tape Marketing I’ve added a weekend post routine that I hope you enjoy. Each weekend I write a post that features 3-4 things I read during the week that I found interesting. Generally speaking it won’t involve much analysis and may range widely in topic. (Flickr image included here is also fav image of the week) Image credit: Dr Swan Enjoy! Good stuff I ran across this week: Siri – An iPhone app that acts like a personal assistant – you can ask to find things by name – nearest Starbucks or by broad category –…

• Extending Your Presentations Through the Backchannel

  John Jantsch

  5 Feb 2010 | 5:18 am

  ShareExtending Your Presentations Through the BackchannelThis content from: Duct Tape Marketing The term “backchannel” was coined in the field of Linguistics in the 1970’s to describe listeners’ behaviors during verbal communication. It is commonly used these days to describe the behavior or conversation going on in social media while a speaker is making a presentation. In some conferences the majority of the people listening may be actively Tweeting throughout a speech. Like it or not, managing the backchannel has become a part of presenting, in person or online.

• Analytics from a Really Smart Guy

  John Jantsch

  4 Feb 2010 | 1:19 pm

  Analytics from a Really Smart GuyThis content from: Duct Tape Marketing Marketing podcast with Avinash Kaushik (Click to listen, right click and Save As to download – subscribe now via iTunes Avinash Kaushik, author of Web Analytics 2.0 is one of those rare people who can take a somewhat dry and mathlike subject of web analytics and make it sound easy and even fun. I got to spend a few minutes with Avinash for this episode of the Duct Tape Marketing podcast for some tips about this important, but often overlooked topic. Web Analytics can seem like a scary subject, but it’s…

• 
  Brian Solis

• The State of Social Media Around the World 2010

  brian

  8 Feb 2010 | 3:09 am

  If you were to look at Social Media the United States and many other parts of the world, you would believe that the world of Social Media was flat, dominated by social continents including Facebook, Twitter, blogs, YouTube, and Flickr. As we zoom in, we visualize other established and emerging social services that depict provinces and outlying settlements of our social atlas.Upon publishing the original Conversation Prism, which was the culmination of a year’s work documenting and organizing the social web by usage and conversational patterns, the world responded by creating…

• The Roles of Facebook and Twitter in Social Media Marketing

  brian

  5 Feb 2010 | 4:14 am

  Social Media marketing is rapidly earning a role in the integrated marketing mix of small and enterprise businesses and as such, it’s transforming every division from the inside out. What starts with one champion in any given division, be it customer service, marketing, public relations, advertising, interactive, et al, eventually inspires an entire organization to socialize. What starts with one, a domino effect usually ensues toppling each department, gaining momentum, and triggering a sense of urgency through its path. And, it also marks the beginning of our journey through the ten…

• Mobile Internet Market to Eclipse Desktop Internet

  brian

  3 Feb 2010 | 4:42 am

  Sounds like a sensationalistic headline, but if you read Morgan Stanley’s latest series of reports on the Mobile Internet, you’ll walk away with the same impression.Morgan Stanley’s global technology and telecom analysts documented the rapidly changing mobile Internet market to provide a framework for emerging trends and direction.To set the stage, Morgan Stanley forecasts that the mobile Internet market will be at least 2x the size of desktop Internet when comparing Internet users to mobile subscribers.According to the report, Apple’s iTunes + iPhone/Touch ecosystem…

• The Human Algorithm: How Google Ranks Tweets in Real-Time Search

  brian

  1 Feb 2010 | 4:57 am

  In 2009, Google struck a deal with Twitter, rumored at $15 million, to integrate tweets into keyword related Google searches. And last month, Google also integrated real-time search technology to surface blog posts and news content as they hit the Web – dramatically improving the previous five to 15 minutes its spiders would take to crawl the Web. I should also note that Collecta also offers the ability to search the real-time Web, but its results also include popular networks within the social Web. Between Google and Collecta, Twitter Search is starting to show its age.The opportunities…

• Who is the ME in Social Media?

  brian

  29 Jan 2010 | 4:11 am

  Good friend Stowe Boyd recently shared a quote by Gabriel García Márquez, “Everyone has three lives: a public life, a private life, and a secret life.”Indeed, quite simply many of us live life allowing specific, trusted individuals to know us in one or more of our personae. Our moral compass as well as outside influences affect how we balance our three lives. The size and permeability of our personal dividers vary in the separation of each life and resemble doors that open and close based on our desires. We nurture each individually with slight coalescence, but concentrate on…