facebook blog

Ebook Gratis (another file)

2010-03-23T05:46:00.000+02:00

Klo ada yang masih mau ebook gratis, ini ada link downloadnya:

Affiliate 2009

4 juta dengan Televisi

anti failure

belajar kriptografi

2012 kiamat???

10 Cara Cepat

24 ilmu milyarder

cetak uang – ambil uang di atm

Berbisnis lewat Facebook

5 Cara Tepat

Cover Ebook

hypno site

ebook sampah-sin light alkaizer

Membuat Blog dengan blogger

gygapro smart mpu

langkah belajar SEO

keyword terlaris

menembus batas internet

Cara Gila Jadi Pengusaha

dollar pertama

Ebook-ebook diatas adalah hasil pencarian dan pengumpulan dari internet, slamat menikmati…

Pada postingan selanjutnya, akan saya lampirkan file SMUO (System Mesin Uang Otomatis), tapi jangan takut, yang saya lampirkan nanti gratis kok, nggak usah bayar kayak yang ditawarkan website2 lainnya… ditunggu ya…

[Via http://nadasms.wordpress.com]

Fair Trade News Update

2010-03-23T05:02:00.000+02:00

Image via Wikipedia

Sorry for the brief absence from blogging. I was very busy these past two weeks. Womens Future Benefit has had a lot going on and that kept me away from writing.

Last week I was the guest speaker at the South Jersey Fair Trade Alliance, here in New Jersey. I had been asked to make this appearance for a while, and I finally agreed. It was a wonderful opportunity to share our Project with new people.

Actually, I got to run our idea of making a Fair Trade store here in Atlantic City by them. It was an interesting evening, but it kept me busy getting ready and preparing for my “speech”.

Another BIG thing that happened for Womens Future Benefit, is that we have been given the GuideStar Partners Exchange Seal. It shows that we are “Partners in Trust” with GuideStar vouching for us being honest and transparent as a nonprofit.

We have filed on their site, for public inspection, our Annual Report and our Financial Report. So, if any of you wonder if we are the real deal, please check us out.

Another thing that is news, is that Womens Future Benefit is on Google Buzz. This is a great tool for us to use in our nonprofit business. We are able to follow Fair Trade news, blog about it, and post it.

I am also using Google for finding fresh Fair Trade news. So, you can look forward to more interesting topics to come. I always have this blog in mind when I get into these new things. How can I make this more interesting for you as the reader.

Another Fair Trade thing is Facebook. I have made many connections on Facebook with Fair Traders. If you are interested in getting to know us on a more personal basis, please consider joining Facebook, if you don’t already. I have provided you with a direct link to my profile. From there, you can join Womens Future Benefit’s Cause or Fan Page. When you search Groups, we are there too. You can also search “fair trade” and find a lot of us just hanging around and taking the trade.

You will find that the social networks are having more Fair Traders joining and creating groups. If you have local social sites, try looking for them. They could always use members and you could get involved directly into your area.

I just wanted to jot this out for you all to know that I am still alive! I have not forgotten about my faithful readers, who keep hoping for something new and fresh. Sorry for the little delay. Life happens.

[Via http://wfbip.wordpress.com]

Facebook Akan Mempunyai Saudara Kandung

2010-03-21T05:17:00.000+02:00

Pendiri Facebook Buat Jejaring Sosial Baru

Chris Hughes yang berusia 26 tahun pendiri bersama Facebook dan pembuat situs My.BarackObama.com sedang melakukan aksi besar ketiganya dalam ranah teknologi.Aksi I adalah sebagai pendiri Facebook bersama dengan Mark Zuckerberg, teman sekamarnya saat di Harvard.

Aksi II adalah tidak mengambil bagian dari hiruk-pikuk jejaring sosial dan bergabung dalam kampanye presidensial Barack Obama, di mana wajah baru dari Carolina Utara itu menjadi bagian utama tim.

Di sana, dia melayani Obama sebagai arsitek My.BarackObama.com atau biasa disebut sebagai MyBO, jejaring sukarelawan dan massa akar rumput yang paling sukses dalam kampanye presidensial Amerika.

Dan aksi III? “Saya menginginkan pengembangan global dan teknologi,” ujar Hughes kepada HuffPost Tech.

“Dengan pengembangan global, kita berbicara tentang payung yang sangat luas, di bidang kesehatan, agrikultur, pendidikan. Saya sadar bahwa saya ingin berbuat sesuatu di ruang tersebut dan saya menghabiskan banyak waktu berkeliling (di negara seperti Kenya dan Senegal, di mana dia jatuh cinta) dan berbicara dengan banyak orang seperti Jeff Sachs, seorang ekonom terkemuka dari Universitas Columbia yang masuk dalam 100 Orang Yang Paling Berpengaruh di Dunia oleh majalah Times sebanyak dua kali,” jelas Hughes.

Hughes menambahkan bahwa dirinya menghabiskan setahun terakhir dengan riset, studi, belajar apapun yang bisa dilakukan dalam ruang lingkup yang dia maksud.

Namun Kamis dia mengumumkan peluncuran situs Juno yang dalam bahasa Afrika sama dengan Yoruba yang artinya bekerja sama. Situs itu gabungan kedermawanan, sifat sukarela dan jejaring sosial menjadi satu.

Saat ini memang masih dalam tahap pengembangan, namun situs tersebut akan diluncurkan secara penuh di musim gugur yakni antara bulan September dan Oktober.

[Via http://ntunkz.wordpress.com]

Weekly Reader: J-students doing it wrong, C-Span (all of it) goes online, and more

2010-03-21T05:05:00.000+02:00

How to be a better blogger [Broadcasting Brain]

Class full of journalism students, but only one has a blog [Dave Taylor]

Social media skills needed for journalism jobs [Poynter]

MSNBC slideshow gets 78m pageviews [Poynter]

C-Span’s full video archive now online [NYT]

Please say you don’t use Facebook for storing photos [PetaPixel]

(Photo: Drew Olanoff)

[Via http://journalism395.wordpress.com]

Day 37

2010-03-20T05:53:00.000+02:00

Today started out pretty good. I fell asleep in the couch last night listening to some story Megan was telling me (sorry for a pulling a mom on you Meg and falling asleep while you were talking). Thankfully, I fell asleep on the comfy couch, not the broken with bars that dig into your body. I woke up a few times throughout the night, but I was too tired to make that trek upstairs. Anyway, my morning on the couch started out nice. I woke up just enough to see my dad come in very early and put a couple blankets on me, which was just sweet. It doesn’t matter how old I get – my dad still takes care of me. I love my dad. Because I was not in bed, I did end up getting up earlier than normal for me, which was good because I was able to get to work earlier. Perfect, because I needed to leave earlier .

When I got to work, I was surprised with treats in my top desk drawer from my dear Gale. Gale is like half my work mom and half my homie. She is wonderful, and I am able to confide in her and depend on her for anything. She always makes me feel like a superstar and has been there for me anytime I’ve come to work after a rough night or when I’ve just been having a hard time with things. She is understanding, thoughtful, and has the kindest heart. She is just a beautiful person, and I am so grateful to know her. I’m not even bothered that she’s from Canada . The other day I said I was craving old school candy and wanted Charlston Chew, so she brought me a Charlston Chew and Pez (!) and hid them in my desk. Mid-morning was so much better today! Thank you my love!

As I said, I left work early to go get my hair done. Lisa, my stylist, rocked my color today. The perfect blonde. I also got to sit there for a couple hours and hear her crazy stories. Girl! Always a good time with her.

Now, I’m just having a chill night and home, and I couldn’t be happier (well, I’m sure I could be happier, but this is cool). I should be doing homework, but I’m taking the night off. I got to chat with my mom, who I haven’t even seen since Sunday. Megan and I got to engage in one of our favorite activities – making fun of people on Facebook (they make it so effing easy). Megan has all these hilarious and quite appropriate sounds clips on her phone that she pulls out as we’re ragging on people. Ah, what a joy.

So, I’m breaking from life by just hanging on the couch. I just enjoyed a classic episode of South Park (the one with George Lucas and Steven Spielberg), and now I’m watching Ghost Adventures.

Complete vegging. I’ve been out every night this week – this is much preferred tonight .

[Via http://projectseelife.wordpress.com]

Lazy

2010-03-20T05:38:00.000+02:00

I just now realized that I evidently didn’t write a post yesterday. These two days since I got back have been ridiculously lazy and I need to fix that and soon. . . way too much to do to be lazy. Yesterday I slept until 4 PM and then did essentially nothing except work a bit on the Bach assignment for next week. Today I woke up at 2 PM, was planning to grocery shopping (but didn’t), took a shower, and then headed off to a 5 1/2 dinner party (which was quite lovely, involved me coming home with several expensive cheeses, and allowed me to meet the children of one of the piano professors here), from which I just arrived home about an hour forty-five ago, and I’ve been lazing around ever since. I really do need to try and go to bed now, though, because I’m planning on getting up at 10 AM so that I can get my groceries and then practice. . . I am still quite worried about the John Williams concerto ready and how I have only until Thursday to fully prepare it. . . I think that why I’ve been avoiding practice – fear usually has that effect on me. As for NCAA, my bracket started out 6-0, but then when progressively downhill from there. Facebook has allowed three brackets per person this year, and so one of my other brackets is actually doing better now than my favorite one, and so my currently score on that bracket is 25 (out of 32) and total possible score of 173 out of 192 (based on how my first round incorrect picks effect future rounds). I’ve also been playing the CBSSports.com Round by Round challege, so we’ll see if I can do well at all at that. My mother keeps telling me that she’s heard that the chances of winning the bracket challenge (i.e., getting everything correct) are equal to the odds of winning the lottery two days in a row. While I disagree with this (because it is not completely random, but does involve at least SOME amount of knowledge and basic reasoning [though it is to be argued that one can do just as well picking blind. . . not sure about this or not]), I do find it amazing how quickly everyone’s brackets can go down in flames. For example, there is not a single person entered on Facebook that still as a perfect bracket. In fact, that title was taken away last night, even before the 16 or so games that happened today! It’s really quite mind blowing! We’re only 32 games in and yet NO ONE in that decently giant (certainly over 300,000 people) bracket pool is still without error. Wow. It makes me think of the story/fable of the man who asked(was it an emperor that he asked?) for doubling amounts of rice for 30 days. . . you know, the one who asked for one grain of rice on the first day, two on the second, four on the third, and so on. The one who he asked of course agreed because it appeared that he would not have to give up much rice, and yet the amount increases ridiculously quickly. By the time we get to the 30th day, the grains of rice come to 536,870,912 (just on that day alone). I feel that this is much like the way the bracket mentally works – it’s suprisingly difficult to realize how difficult and complex it is! Here’s a synopsis of the story of which I was thinking. Don’t know why it popped into my head, by the way, but it’s interesting what the brain associates as belonging together (though I do believe that I actually was thinking about this story a few weeks or months ago for whatever reason). The book synopsis is from Barnes and Noble and it’s for a book called One Grain of Rice: A Mathematical Folktale (by Demi) and is definitely the particular story of which I was thinking. Until tomorrow. . .

A traditional tale of India, as well as miniatures produced in that country in the 16th and 17th centuries, inspired this visually striking book. Set off by simple red and gold frames, Demi’s (Buddha; Buddha Stories, see p. 108) atmospheric, authentic-looking illustrations-some featuring shiny gold backdrops-dominate these graceful pages. Figures sometimes dart beyond the frames, too, adding a Western mobility and quickening the visual appeal. Revolving around a raja who hoards his people’s supply of rice during a famine, the tale teaches a lesson about selfishness as well as a basic multiplication theorem. When Rani returns some grains of rice that spilled from one of the raja’s baskets, the ruler gives the girl the reward she requests: one grain of rice on that day, and for 29 subsequent days, double the amount of rice as the day before. Underscoring just how astute the child’s negotiation is, Demi includes a double-page foldout depicting the take on the 30th day: 256 elephants carry 536,870,912 grains of rice, bringing Rani’s total yield to more than one billion grains-enough to feed the entire kingdom. Unfortunately, readers follow a rather monotonous path to reach this effective conclusion, as the author recites a litany of how many bags and how many grains of rice are delivered on various-though thankfully not all-days in the time period. In the end, it isn’t the plot that impresses, but rather the elegance and serenity of the accomplished art.

[Via http://musicalmess.wordpress.com]

She/he's only a few tweaks away from complete insanity

2010-03-18T05:53:00.000+02:00

Drag queen my ass...

Ah, yes, the old friend that everyone has that you are excited to hear from but when you do you realize that you do not want to talk to this person, really. They find you on Facebook or something and the next thing you know you’re ‘friends’ again. Within months, you’re loaning them money and sending them gifts, because you remember the old person you used to be friends with. I’m wondering if my judgement was just WAY out of whack at one point in my life because I’m tellin’ ya, I have heard from some real beautes lately and they are just like school in the summertime–no class.

They tell you their tales of woe and how they need a back operation or money for their transmission and you feel bad for them because you’re doing okay and what’s a few hundred bucks amongst friends? They’ll pay it back, right? WRONG. No matter how nice you are to these mental defectives, they don’t understand that you need that money back as it is a loan but I guess it’s my fault for asking for it back. HOW DARE I? And then you get the emails telling YOU that YOU are a LOSER, and that you are on drugs and have sex with trash guys, etc. Um, I am clean and sober, jagoff and honestly, my sex life is my own. As celibate as I am, at least I have the chance of getting laid sometime within the next decade, unlike you who steal from your friends, spend all YOUR money on prescription pain killing drugs (but that’s okay, right) and never ever make good on anything, ever. And then you wonder why you are alone and nobody wants to be around you. All you do is hold grudges against people for YEARS (I could name names here, but decorum prevents me from doing so). Any great length of time to hold a grudge is too long. I don’t have the energy for it. Too bad some people just cannot live life on life’s terms.

I was watching Dr. Phil the other day and there was this oxycontin addict on there and he said (get this) ‘It’s not that I want to get high, I just don’t want to feel bad’. Nice. So I shan’t go into too much about drug addicts here but hey, come on, this guy was trying to get one past DR. PHIL. Good luck with that one, buddy.

More later.

Tamara

[Via http://tamaramanor.wordpress.com]

Reading (and recommending)'Breathe Social': The New Rules of Relationship Management, another view of Altimeter recent report

2010-03-18T05:52:00.000+02:00

Despite the proverbial

via ‘Breathe Social’: The New Rules of Relationship Management.

Despite the proverbial “the customer is always right,” the relationship between the customer and the company has long been organized for the benefit of the latter. But the ability for companies to completely control this relationship has disappeared.

Social CRM: The New Rules of Relationship Management, a report from the Altimeter Groupreleased earlier this month, serves to help companies and organizations understand the changing territory. The report offers a thorough framework with which companies can strategize their adoption of social CRM projects.

Based on research with companies who have pioneered an embrace of social technologies for relationship management, the report lists 18 use cases that serve as entry points for social CRM efforts. These include social customer insights (tracking customers’ preferences via social media sites like Facebook), rapid social marketing response (defending the brand in real-time), and crowdsourced R&D (eliciting real-time feedback to enhance innovation).

Free iPod Touch!

2010-03-16T05:50:00.000+02:00

I’m sure you’ve received invites on Facebook to join a group and get a [insert anything of value and interest here] absolutely free, as long as you invite all your friends, etc.

I hate to break it to you, but those things are a lie. A common saying in the business world is that there’s no such thing as a free lunch. Basically, you spam all your friends, end up giving out your contact info, and waste time answering stupid questions.

Instead of wasting time on lame Facebook pyramid schemes, check out The Daily Californian’s March Madness promotion. Called “Catch the Madness,” this contest is a scavenger hunt where you visit 12 participating businesses to pick up tickets and have a chance to actually win an iPod Touch.

Check out the information below:

I’ll be tabling for The Daily Cal from 12:30-1 pm tomorrow, so stop by if you have any questions. We’ve been working very hard in the ads department to get this promotion underway, so it would be awesome if you could participate, check out some new businesses, and have a chance to win an iPod Touch for a change.

I promise we won’t steal and sell your identity, and you’ll get the chance to visit new places outside of campus for a change. All the businesses should be within walking distance of campus. Good luck!

More Daily Cal news soon at randomtidbitsofthought.wordpress.com.

[Via http://randomtidbitsofthought.wordpress.com]

Text in the City - Virtual Vice?

2010-03-16T05:38:00.000+02:00

A week or so into our innocent and (intended to be) lighthearted ‘experiment’, we’ve had mostly great feedback, and a few squeaky wheels. We would like to address, briefly, the squeaky wheels.

I would preface this by noting that MOST people use FB in a very responsible way. For that majority, it is simple: a forum to talk with old and new friends, exchange stories and pictures, but still behave as if they were really interacting with others in the flesh. It may even be nothing more than a starting point to gather contact information and then reconnect with friends in the 3D world.

However, for some people, FB (and texting to some extent) is a virtual vice, an intimate friend… and a slight to the real human beings on the other end of the countless computers involved. This group of people exhibit classic signs of addiction.

1. Defensiveness: FB is guarded jealously and defended with acerbity, e.g., our impersonal ‘experiment’ has absolutely NOTHING to do with any one person yet, personal attacks and comments have come this way.

2. Impulsivity & Repetition: it is a compulsive stream-of-consciousness narcissistic narrative, spewed forth without thought, the visual text equivalent of a 24-hour surveillance camera. A related issue is lack of control. It encourages ‘hit-and-run’ behavior; nasty comments can be dropped on impulse with no real repercussions for the dropp-er. Is it a consequence-free environment? Perhaps. FB removes the physical aspect of human interaction from the equation and as a result, disinhibition runs rampant. Some de-volve into a more primitive version of the self, forever acting on impulse and driven by the paleo-brain.

3. Psychological dependence: how many times in a day is FB checked and moreso, can a person stand NOT checking it?

Finally, I think because the whole idea of FB seems harmless enough, those who exhibit addiction lack insight into these issues. I, for one, understand how a person can become addicted to something. That is the whole point of our FB Vacation! We all wanted to get back to the real world and remind ourselves of what is REALLY real. And the blog is our way of sharing the experiences in a thoughtful, responsible, and modern way.

Of course, we are all entitled to our opinions; I would simply like to encourage that to be offered gracefully. Don’t forget, more time spent on FB and human interactions that are comprised mostly of ‘small talk’ are positively correlated with depression, sadness, and apathy… and even increases in social anxiety and ‘cyberbullying’. Just because there is no feedback when posting on the internet in the form of a facial expression, a smile, a frown, or any other body language, doesn’t mean actions have no impact.

(Written by Stefanie, who has a Ph.D. in psychology)

[Via http://parlezjen.wordpress.com]

Is FarmVille addictive?

2010-03-14T05:58:00.000+02:00

As many of you know, FarmVille is the most played game on Facebook. If you never heard of it (which I think everyone did hear of this game), basically what it does is that you own a farm. In this farm you can grow seeds, plants. You can build buildings, feed animals. That’s what it does basically.

So let’s come to the question,

Do you think FarmVille is addictive for you or you don’t care about this game?

Leave a comment or email me on: janc13@di-ve.com

Thanks for your support,

Jan

[Via http://jantechblog.wordpress.com]

Create Cool Facebook Landing Pages—Maximize Your Facebook Fan Page

2010-03-14T05:32:00.000+02:00

If you’re the leader of the brand, ya gotta love Facebook Fan Pages.

More than 400 million people have Facebook profiles, so surely to goodness that number includes your customers, clients or supporters. The Facebook Fan Page is an newly essential tool for broadening your web presence and deepening your relationships with those who care about your goods, services and ideas.

On a Facebook Fan Page, your brand advocates gather to interact, engage and get involved in what you’ve got going on. While your main website is mostly “information,” the Facebook Fan Page is all about “conversation.”

The Facebook Fan Page Landing Page is a great way to create a branded, inviting welcome. If you’re not familiar with a Landing Page, check out this Facebook Fan Page or this one or even this one.

Do you already have a Facebook Fan Page? Are you looking to start one? If you need help creating smart Facebook strategy, uploading branding elements and infusing great content and conversation, contact me today!

I can make your Facebook Fan Page a customized, maximized extension of your total marketing program. I create landing pages, trackable conversation starters and promos so you’re assured effectiveness and overall ideas/strategies to support your brand and marketing programs.

I can also offer similar solutions for all your social networking profiles. As a business person and social media pro, I’m a go-to resource for solutions that work!

[Via http://updatefacespace.wordpress.com]

Accepting a Friend Request could be Dangerous

2010-03-13T05:51:00.000+02:00

ABC News/Getty

This morning I was shocked when I learned that six months ago, a 19-year-old girl from Bogota was killed by two men who she had met through Facebook. The story made headlines in all the Colombian newspapers at the time the crime happen on September 17, 2009. However, I had not heard about this horrible story until today that the main newspaper from Colombia, El Tiempo, ran an article about the assassins being sentenced to 25 years in jail.

After investigating the crime, Colombian authorities found that the victim, Ana María Chávez Niño, had accepted Anderson Sierra, one of the two men who committed the crime, as her friend on Facebook. Seemingly, he gained the victim’s trust and they started a friendly relationship through this social networking site.

Anderson Sierra resided in Medellin while the victim lived in Bogota. Nevertheless, the girl and Anderson Sierra made arrangements to meet in Bogota. The police report explains that Mr Sierra came to the lobby of the girl’s building, where security cameras were in place, and greeted the girl with a kiss on her cheek. The murderer was with his friend, Juan Sebastian Obando. The two male and the young women went up to her apartment where later that afternoon she was killed.

This is a horrible incident, and made me, once again, wonder about who we are letting get into our lives through these social networking sites. I am very carful when I accept friends and for the most part I only accept request from people who I know. Nevertheless, there are young and naïve people, like Ana Maria Chavez who open their lives to strangers.

highposition.net

Many would think that this type of case could only happen in Colombia because, in the eyes of many, is a dangerous country. Yet, only a few days ago a man was jailed in England after being found guilty of kidnapping, raping and killing Ashleigh Hall, a 17-year-old childcare student from Darlington.

I am not suggesting that Facebook was directly responsible for the death of these girls. Of course if these men wanted to commit crimes, they would have found ways to do it. Nonetheless, it helped as a platform to gain the girls’ friendship and create different identities that they could trust. I don’t believe that all the people who are part of the social networks are bad or have bad intentions, but it only takes one bad person to ruin the lives of many.

Incidents like this only make me think that even though social media and networking sites are creating conversations, making the world smaller and joining people together, they can also be dangerous if the users do not take the necessary steps to protect their privacy. As the digital divide becomes narrower worldwide, more and more cases of this type might arise if the necessary actions are not set in place from the beginning.

We need to realize that even though social media is putting forward an unimaginable range of opportunities, it has also a dark side. I am not a pessimist, and I think it is a matter of increasing awareness of issues like this. Public knowledge, outreach, and action can be the most important deterrent. Thus, we have to be activists and learn how to use these tools for the greatest good and when something wrong along the way happens, we must voice it.

[Via http://humarpr.wordpress.com]

A Generation of Dumb

2010-03-13T05:38:00.000+02:00

From PostRejects.com

I fear we’re all getting a little dumber. Spend three minutes on textsfromlastnight.com and you’ll understand what I mean. Maybe it’s not actually that we’re becoming dumber, but we’re just more apt to share our idiocy with the world. It is very possible that people of the early 1800s got smashed and ended up naked in the back of their neighbors’ buggy covered in raspberry jam, but they weren’t posting Twitpics of it.

With that, here is a list of 5 dumb things that should be stopped:

5. Using symbols in place of letters.

Dear Ke$ha- what gives? A dollar sign is not an “s.” It will never, ever be an “s.” Please stop. It was fine when you were in middle school trying to fit in with the cool kids K8lyn and @shley and N!cole. But it’s 2010, you’re 23, and it’s not cute.

4. Twitpics of food.

If you have nothing interesting to say, get off Twitter. I don’t care how awesome your tofurkey burger with cranberry wasabi from McYuppies was, I don’t want to see it.

3. Starbucks.

Speaking of McYuppies…

2. Non-news stories being dressed up to look like news stories.

Lindsay Lohan is suing E*Trade for $100 million dollars over an advertisement where a character named Lindsay is described as a “milkoholic.” Ridiculous? Yes. More ridiculous? MSNBC reported on it. So did CNN. So did the New York Times.

1. Movies that cost more than it would take to feed an entire third world nation.

Thanks James Cameron. Avatar cost about $280 million according to Vanity Fair. It costs about 19 cents a day to feed a child in an impoverished nation. Avatar’s budget equates to 14,736,84,210.52 days worth of food.

I understand if you just think it’s way more fun to spell your name with a symbol or number that looks sort of like a letter or if you think you’re dinner just looks so yummy you want to share it with the world or if you love you’re tall skinny mocha latte with a double shot of espresso or you think Lindsay deserved an Oscar for Mean Girls and E*Trade is unfairly harassing her or you’ve gone into a state of depression upon the realization that Pandora doesn’t exist, but please keep it to yourself. When the history books come out and the 2000s are remembered as the “Facebook Years,” we’ll have no one to blame but ourselves.

[Via http://thechangingroomrotation.wordpress.com]

Can Nancy Pelosi Get the Votes?

2010-03-11T05:52:00.000+02:00

Wall Street Journal

Michael Barone

As I’ve put my credibility on the line on numerous postings. Politicians will always do what is in their own best interest, ergo, being getting re-elected. That being said, the only question remaining is who’s willing to ‘walk the plank for the skank,’ would you? Random thoughts while watching the house of cards begin to fall, J.C.

The Senate bill’s abortion language is not the House Speaker’s only problem.

Are there enough votes in the House to pass the Senate’s health-care bill? As of today, it’s clear there aren’t. House Democratic leaders have brushed aside White House calls to bring the bill forward by March 18, when President Barack Obama heads to Asia. Nevertheless, analysts close to the Democratic leadership tell me they’re confident the leadership will find some way to squeeze out the 216 votes needed for a majority.

Chad Crowe

Speaker Nancy Pelosi has indeed shown mastery at amassing majorities. But it’s hard to see how she’ll do so on this one. The arithmetic as I see it doesn’t add up.

The House passed its version of the health bill in November by 220-215. Of those 220, one was a Republican who now is a no. One Democrat who voted yes has died, two Democrats who voted yes have resigned, and one Democrat who voted no has resigned as well. So if everyone but the Republican votes the way they did four months ago, the score would be 216-215.

But not everyone is ready to vote that way. The House bill included an amendment prohibiting funding of abortions sponsored by Michigan Democrat Bart Stupak. The Senate bill did not. Mr. Stupak says he and 10 to 12 other members won’t vote for the Senate bill for that reason. Others have said the same, including Minnesota’s James Oberstar, chairman of the Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure, and Dan Lipinski, a product of the Chicago Democratic machine.

Mrs. Pelosi may have some votes in reserve—members who would have voted yes if she needed them in November and would do so again. But we can be pretty sure she doesn’t have more than 10, or she wouldn’t have allowed the Stupak amendment to come forward at the last minute the first time. She also might get one or two votes from members who voted no and later announced they were retiring.

[Via http://dancingczars.wordpress.com]

Is 'Social Media' the 2012 vehicle chosen for the 'shift' the Mayan prophecies announce?

2010-03-11T05:46:00.000+02:00

Is this new trend of Social Media (Facebook, Twitter, Linked-In, etc) the vehicle chosen to rise to a new level of consciousness, like the 2012 prophecies were announcing?

Last year I was kindly invited by the people of Huliq.com (Google’s News Dept.) to write an exclusive article for them. Being the fact that in those day I was observing quite a ‘run talk’ (I think I’ve just invented a new term) where everybody is talking and running ’scare’ about something which in this case was the December 2012 ’Dooming’ prophecies (the movie was about to come out, History Channel was running special shows on the subject, etc) I decided to give my personal input on the matter which I was studying and analyzing for a while… (you can read my original article HERE).

A few hours ago I participated in a conference call between Rich German and Gary Vaynerchuk. One of the last things shared by Gary about this new social media trend, was that is helping us connect a lot easier and a lot quicker between each other.

Certainly, it’s moving us toward doing business for the people, instead of using ‘money’ as the only motivation. We truly grow by cultivating relationships and by providing VALUE to all those involved, after all money is just a reward we receive for the service rendered. The greater the service, the bigger the reward, quite simple; 2+2=4 .

Why do you think you do what you do?

No, no; behind all those reasons you just thought about, the true answer can be found. You do what you do because of the emotion it will produce within you, nothing more, nothing less. We do and act as we do, seeking emotions. And the highest emotion of all is…yeap; you’ve got it, Love!

It’s funny, I’ve just realized that my previous post here, was about the exact opposite emotion to love, and that is Fear. You’ll do well to take a look at the video about Fear down below, very illustrating!

Fear is the energy which contracts, closes down, draws in, runs, hides, hoards, harms…Love is the energy which expands, opens up, sends out, stays, reveals, shares, heals…

Fear wraps our bodies in clothing, love allows us to stand naked. Fear clings to and clutches all that we have, love gives all that we have away. Fear holds close, love holds dear. Fear grasps, love lets go…

We do all that we do for the emotion we will feel in return. You drive the car you drive because of the way that ‘thing’ will make you feel. We truly are ‘emotion seekers’. After all, this is our only and true reason to be here in the first place, and the ONLY thing we’ll be allowed to take with us in that last-minute of that last breath…Like a dear parent asks his kid after his first birthday party: …’Did you have a good time’?

The 2012 prophecy truly talks about a ’shift’ in human consciousness, just the next step in our human evolution. To unite ourselves as a specie, a big human family. I don’t know what you think about it, but thinking in working for the people instead of doing it to covet cash seems a pretty good beginning to me.

I don’t think the Mayans would’ve known enough to predict the new evolution happening through Facebook, right?

Definitly, I think a lot of things are changing in the way we perceive some things, and it’s beginning to permeate into the way we even do business between ourselves. And these, my friend, are VERY good news for us all!

Enjoy the journey! All is well.

[Via http://lifeonharmony.wordpress.com]

Dear facebook...You Suck!

2010-03-09T05:42:00.000+02:00

Do you ever find yourself wondering what the heck happened to facebook? I remember a time when it was only college students that could get on. It was like a secret club, that all the high schoolers wish they could be in, and old people didn’t even know what in the world a facebook was. Now facebook is…how do I say this.. crowded with variety. Yea, I think that’s a good way of putting it.

I enjoy variety like most people, but when my supervisor is writing on my wall, it’s just wrong! What the hell happened facebook? This should not be happening, it should go back to how it use to be, but there is no way that’s going to happen. When small children that I don’t know are asking to be my friend, I get annoyed. Why? Why are they asking me to be their friend, we have nothing in common. You’re in like 9th grade and I just graduated from college, and your in Arizona, how the hell do you even know I exist. It’s just annoying.

As if letting everyone and their momma on facebook wasn’t bad enough, but they keep changing it. Every time I turn around they have changed something and they actually believe that they are making it better! They should really listen to the people, because I know for a fact that I am not the only person who feels like this. The recent straw for me was how they changed how to upload pictures…MOST INFURIATING IDEA EVER! It does not make my life easier, it just makes me not want to upload pictures.

Is it just me? Tell me what you think about the constant changes in facebook?

[Via http://gardnermediapro.wordpress.com]

A Life Without Facebook?

2010-03-09T05:26:00.000+02:00

Yes it’s true, it can be done. In fact I just did it!

I was a very late arrival in Facebook world. I didn’t feel the need to know what everyone was doing all the time. I mean really, do I not have enough stuff of my own going on? Then, when I sold Willow Farrington Bites Back to my publisher, they suggested I join…for publicity reasons. I was fine with the concept. I’m not a complete goon when it comes to technology and I don’t mind doing promotional stuff.

What I’ve noticed though, is that my FB friends were my own friends from real life. These are the people who know how to call me if they want something. They also know how to email and where I live. I don’t need FB to maintain a friendship with them. I also found myself getting emotionally entangled in other people’s worlds. You know how it goes. Some FB users keep it light, they post interesting, funny or fairly innocuous stuff. Others feel the need to tell everyone how life sucks, how angry/miserable or hurt they are. Others go in the opposite direction and tell everyone how great their life is, how the sun always shines on them and how happy they are to have their life. That’s great for them. I’m not sure what it does for the woman whose mother just had a lung removed, or the dad whose child is fighting leukemia…but I’m pretty sure it does as much for them as the whiney posts do for me. It’s not good.

I’ve also found that I’ve begun to use FB as a time-filler. Got nothing to do? Don’t read a book. Don’t dig in the garden or go for a walk. Hell no, sit on your butt in front of the computer and read what your friends are doing INSTEAD of inviting them round for coffee!

Why is a blog different then? Well, my blog lets me write. I use it to get into the swing of being productive. Also, I blog maybe once or twice a week, not whenever I have a free moment. My blog doesn’t require an emotional investment. Basically, it’s all the good bits of FB and none of the bad.

Before you all start yelling at me and defending FB, let me just say, I have nothing against it. I just know it’s not good for me! So, I’m returning to a non-FB life and I’m actually quite excited!

Stay tuned. This blog was supposed to be about Choosing A Publisher, but I’ll get to that next…after all, I’ll have more time on my hands now, won’t I?

[Via http://bloowillbooks.wordpress.com]

FarmVille Perfect

2010-03-07T13:49:00.000+02:00

FarmVille Perfect is the up-to-date FarmVille package on-line and it’s already marketing like hotcakes. Unlike nearly all of the past FarmVille bundles, FarmVille Perfect has been developed to display you how to function intelligent preferably than tricky, so you could construct your perfective farm more speedily and efficiently… the single you’ve probably been “slaving” hr to shape.

I couldn’t locate a large amount info about the dude who produced the product… I did understand that nearly 100 imitates have been traded so distant and at to the lowest degree single user has accomplished massive consequences utilizing the info incorporated in FarmVille Perfect (to the tune of 49,319,439 Farm Coins… seriously).

If you are a small bit lazy like me, you are genuinely gonna dig this: incorporated in the packet is a step-by-step “outline” or “framework” that shows you how single player went from point 1 to level 21 in roughly five sidereal days (about 4.2 stories per calendar day) without riding in advance of the computing machine for hours on purpose (or cheating!). This outline genuinely shows a few of the “speed systems” included in the package…

One more thing that’ll probable concern you (and every last FarmVille player) is the varying paths discussed to have Farm Wealth without paying with your serious wealth. The methods are entirely legal and legal. You probably already experience this but it turns away a abundant of FarmVille actors expend HUNDREDS of REAL dollars per year on the game… if they eternally see this data they’re definitely departing to feel foolish.

You will besides find out how to gain the most excellent neighbours in the shortest time doable, super-cool design and decoration schemes and a few last stuff…

FarmVille Perfect offers a money-back warranty that you can kind of “exploit”. What you do is purchase it and leave through/apply the info in the package – they give you 60 days to measure it. If you don’t have the farm you need after those 60 sidereal days, all you need to do is commit an electronic mail to their foundation (provided on their website, reaction generally within 48 hr) and they’ll hook you up with a flooded repayment (every penny, zero questions asked).

[Via http://farmperfect.wordpress.com]

A Queer bomb went off in my life. Aftermath, opening a new LBGT non profit on social media?

2010-03-07T13:45:00.000+02:00

In the last 21 days I did not know it until I woke up this morning that someone, a high power maybe had set a queer bomb to go off in my life. As I get ready to attend church (Detroit Metropolitan Gay UCC) for the first time since I left my parents church at age 17 due to the Roman Catholics being so fondly warm of gays, I thought I would say an bit of fun and if your read fully announcement.

1. 21 days no drinking

2. 19 days since I had a 6 hour energy drink, and only 2 red bulls

3. Withdrew from Grand Valley State Univeristy due to funding constraints

4. Applied to Wayne State University Graduate School of Social Work

5. Decided for my 22nd Birthday I am getting a tattoo to express serernity, diversity/equality

6. Started to learn to put the crackberry down at times

7. Started to learn to listen and act not to react

8. My amazing friends, have helped me through a hot mess and then some.

9. Moved from Lansing to Farmington Hills to live with a friend of co-worker in the Michigan Democratic Party LBGTA Caucus

10. Opening of the Office of @adamleben @progressivemich on Facebook Adam Equality Taylor, and blogs www.adamleben.wordpress.com and www.michdemslbgta.wordpress.com

When I got to step 10 a Queer bomb was denoted in my new home. The aftermath is as you can see in the following description and photos. From Between the Lines articles mounted to my desk, to OneKalamazoo yard signs, to Creating Change and conference name tags, National Equality March flags, HRC equality signs, Obama posters, to Trevor Project. Add in my Jed Foundation mental health activist of the year award, West Michigan Pride Advovacy Award and my BA in Political Science from Western Michigan Univerity, and Center for Progressive Leadership 2008.

The following photos show the horrors that are now the office of @adamleben on twitter, Adam Equality Taylor on Facebook, and www.adamleben.wordpress.com on blogs.

This room while I may relax in parts of it, read ands study soon for my Masters in Social Work I am applied to at Wayne State University, is the hub of all the tweets, blogs, and emails fighting not only for equality but LBGT services, heavily in the area of mental health. With it I am announcing that I am looking to explore opening/starting a new non profit dedicated to LBGT media, advocacy and aid in fundraising under-served and under-funded portions of our community. Before doing so I am seeking poll data from you all.

View This Poll

polling View This Poll

survey

[Via http://adamleben.wordpress.com]

Facebook is exploding - What lies in the Future

2010-03-06T05:32:00.000+02:00

First it was Friendster, then came Myspace, now Facebook has become one of the most used web sites on the web. Social networking has exploded over the past few years, and the future is bright for the likes of Facebook. Myspace as moved behind Facebook for the top social networking spot.

With the ability to connect via mobile with cellphones, PDA’s, and other devices that give people the ability to update on the run, Facebook has become an interesting player that may perhaps challenge Google as the most visited web site on the web. It seems that Facebook has especially connected with the older crowd as well as the young. They provide an easy way to stay connected, unlike most other Social Networks such as Myspace, which may seem complicated for those who are not all to familiar with the technology and tend to be bogged down due to the overloaded advertisements, graphics and scripts.

Facebook browsing tends to be less frustrating then their counterparts, and provide a simple way to explore, network, and connect like never before. The ceiling is truly undefined for what Facebook will do and will become. We are just seeing the beginning of something special.

[Via http://infoblitz.wordpress.com]

Friends

2010-03-06T05:30:00.000+02:00

I found another four friends today

But I don’t know a thing about them

I made another two yesterday

So I just had to add them

I couldn’t tell you what they like?

Or even which town where they reside

Of their Country I am suitably vague

If it’s this planet? I sure can’t say

I don’t know if they’re thin or tall

I don’t know if they’re fat or small

And should they even call?

I wouldn’t know their voice at all

I don’t know what clothes they wear

Or even the colour of their hair

Sure, I can see a photograph

But is it someone having a laugh?

A friend keeps sending jokes

and silly questions, like do I smoke?

I would have known If I was on fire

and I would smell my burnt attire

I wrote a comment the other day

I’m not sure If I wrote it right?

But who cares if night is day?

and who knows if black is white?

Behind a screen you do not know

what is going on out there

Are there still people in this world?

and does anyone really care?

We walk around with our heads chopped off

our thoughts spewed all over a screen

What I had for dinner, breakfast ,tea?

what sort of weather this night has seen?

We pass comment wherever we go

to lots of people we do not know

As if it really mattered at all?

what’s the state of my meatballs?

So I go into hospital today

will you send me flowers my way

they look lovely, but they don’t smell right?

the camera pictures far too bright.

Will you stop by my friends and call?

Spend some time,so I can see you all

Would even know who’s me?

That you’ve come to see?

Rod Macfarlane

[Via http://cewejimmy.wordpress.com]

Omniture + Facebook = Social Media Media Buying

2010-03-04T05:53:00.000+02:00

Although the companies chose to announce the partnership, the tools and the marketing guidance supported through Omniture’s consulting team will not become available until later this year.

Omniture and Facebook will announce a deal Wednesday that turns the social network into an online marketing channel, complete with technology tools, audience segments and best practices.

Initially, the two companies will focus on the ability to automate Facebook media buying and access analytics that measure customer engagement. The partnership builds on Facebook analytic features the companies announced last year to help marketers join the conversation, rather than interrupt the experience.

This alliance is intended to help companies integrate Facebook as a marketing channel, connecting to relevant conversations with the site’s more than 400 million active users.

More: http://www.mediapost.com/publications/?fa=Articles.showArticle&art_aid=123533

[Via http://willscullypower.wordpress.com]

The Director sent The Producer

2010-03-04T05:52:00.000+02:00

I had an epiphany twice the other day… SCRIPTURE- Let’s look at that word, taking into account the descriptive perspective. Doesn’t it seem that every person in life goes through stages? Stages of adolescence and then stages adulthood? Stages of anger and stages of happiness? This would suggest that we are forever changing, being moved from Glory to Glory. At the same time, it seems Life is a stage too, in the noun perspective. Everywhere we travel is a platform to perform for who we’re entertaining at the moment, working behind a desk or behind a customer service telephone number. Life has Acts. Life has situations where people ‘Enter Stage Right’ and others who ‘Exit Stage Left.’ Everything happens for a reason because it’s all a part of the ‘Plot.’ Destiny is God having Life already planned. There is a Script to follow and we must seek Him for acquisition. It is already written and we play out the scenes in His will. So enough with Scripts, examine the other part of that word which is True. U and R are transposed though. Why is that? If you put U first, that dismantles what is True: that we are called to Love our brothers as we Love ourselves. The more selfish we are, the more we are veering from our script. The word asks “How can you say that you love Me, whom you have never seen before, but hate your brother whom you see everyday?” We quarrel among those individuals we cannot fully appreciate, however this is not how the Producer explains how it should be. The Director gave us His son, so that we will come to understand our Scripts. Isn’t it astounding that history repeats itself (Ecclesiastes 1.9)? Well, God doesn’t change so this apparently was inevitable. Take 1 Kings 7 for example. These two men were debating if they should remain where they were, go back or go forward. When was the last time indecisiveness controlled your mobility? This would suggest that the saying is True: Same script different scene, same stuff different day, or same soup just reheated. Another cliche found on ‘Set’: “Let’s keep our fingers crossed” infers wishes for good luck, but what if we changed the words up to be more True? Apply this to the ‘Play’ if it applies to your heart- How about instead we say: “Let’s keep the Cross with our fingers.” This is more applicable for Christians because we don’t believe in luck… it is already written! All my hope and all my expectations are in The Cross. Anything less would be uncivilized

[Via http://heardgodswords.wordpress.com]

Jesus and World Progress

2010-03-02T05:55:00.000+02:00

From Facebook thread:

Gordon said:

But as a pastor why did [Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.] not say the hope of a secure and livable world lives in the hope of Jesus Christ and bringing the nations to the Cross?

William:

Even Jesus said somewhere “When I return shall I find faith” and “there will always be wars and rumors of war” and “the poor shall always be with you” (and if Jesus did not say all this then Paul said some of it.) This world was never meant to be “heaven on earth” otherwise Jesus would not have said “my kingdom is not of this world” and Revelation would not speak of “the heavens rolled up like a scroll.”

When Jesus said “no man comes unto me unless the Father draws him/her” I take that to mean that it is a very subjective thing between God and the individual. No one can “win souls” for Christ for the simple reason that God is perfectly capable of doing whatever He wants and can choose NOT to draw someone for reason that we shall never understand and it is not our business to understand. Jesus emphatically states that HAD he worked certain miracles in certain cities they would all have repented (but obviously for some reason Jesus chose NOT to.) And why is it that ten times God hardened Pharaoh’s heart yet God gave Saul “a NEW heart” and still Saul disappointed God.

I am not Roman Catholic but I have known literally thousands of RC laity and clergy in my life and not ONE has ever been an “in your face” type preaching at people or asking “are you saved.” I do not think anyone can know that he is “saved” otherwise why would Paul say “work out your salvation with fear and trembling” and similar other statements and what pray tell is the purpose of a “judgment day” if some people are guaranteed salvation because (as Charles Stanley and others suggest) they have muttered the “magic words” and once and for all gained “the eternal security” of salvation. I do find truth in statements like “the only problem with Christianity is Christians” and “the only problem with Christianity is that it has never been tried.” I once met a pastor of Protestant denomination, so I asked him if he is Baptist or Evangelical or Lutheran or some other denomination. He looked shocked and said “well I would hope I am Bible based.” I looked at him in shock and said “but consider all the denominations which consider themselves ‘Bible Based’ including the Pope, the head of the Mormons, the Jehovah’s Witnesses, etc.” He looked sheepish and acknowledged that I had a good point. If you really believe that God is all-wise and all-powerful then why do you seriously think that God needs you to give the gift of faith?

[Via http://williambuell.wordpress.com]

All it takes is focus...

2010-03-02T05:52:00.000+02:00

Good Afternoon, Social Rabbit here with your guide to the world of social media.

This bunny has today just finished reading The Accidental Billionaires which is the story of how Facebook started. The book is very easy reading, my key take-outs were how focused and passionate Mark Zuckerberg was about his website. He worked with a number of different people in the first year, but his focus on the website never faltered once. Every time there was a problem he found a way around it, either by utilising the people around him or by fixing it himself. His drive was all-consuming, with often very little sleep for a week in a mission to get some coding finished. For him it was never about the money, it was all about the user experience. But, it didn’t always make him the most popular guy…

Today I spoke to someone at the Australian Facebook offices trying to understand the reasons behind the Facebook Promotional Guidelines, having literally just finished the book about 2 hours before it was fantastic to hear that the reason for the guidelines is to ‘ensure a good user experience’. Facebook now has 1000 employees and yet the core values of the founder are intact, which I find impressive in a large organisation.

The focus of Mark in regards to Facebook has been the reason why is it the largest social networking site in the world, and his dedication to the user experience has won out above all else. He set himself huge targets, found the resources and made it happen – without compromising the user experience, all because he focused on what he wanted to achieve.

All this made me think, what is the one overall thing that we are dedicated to delivering at Social Rabbit? The answer is - to helping businesses achieve their goals through social media. As the Chief Rabbit I also have to consider if I am willing to sacrifice the bunnies that work for me to deliver it?

Questions to think about…

- Are you focused on your business/career?

- What are you dedicated to delivering to your customers?

- What are you willing to sacrifice (if anything) to deliver?

If you loved the blog become a fan of Social Rabbit on Facebook.

[Via http://larasolomon.wordpress.com]

My Life Acording to Hey Ocean [posted from FB]

2010-02-28T05:54:00.000+02:00

Using only song names from ONE ARTIST, cleverly answer these

questions. Pass it on to 15 people you like and include me.

You can’t use the band I used. Try not to repeat a song title.

It’s a lot harder than you think!

Repost as “my life according to (band name)”

*****************************************************************

Pick your Artist: Hey Ocean!

Are you a male or female? Female

Describe yourself: Terribly Stable

How do you feel: Alright

Describe where you currently live: Vagabond

If you could go anywhere, where would you go: One City

Your favorite form of transportation: Fish

Your best friend is: My Friends

You and your best friends are: Watcha Lookin For

What’s the weather like: Rainy Day

Favorite time of day: Turn up the Stars

If your life was a TV show, what would it be called: Last Mistake

What is life to you: Wise

Describe your most recent relationship: Beatboxer who Broke my Heart

Your fear: Liar

What is the best advice you have to give: Alleyways

Thought for the Day: Thank You Very Much

How I would like to die: Beg Your Pardon?

My soul’s present condition: A Song About California

Most Faithful Companion: Eskimo Kisses

My motto: Sun is Almost Down

CHECK EM OUT!!! [LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE]

[Via http://brittanyboughtin.wordpress.com]

7 4 U 3 4 Me

2010-02-28T05:41:00.000+02:00

Have you notice how much the business model for Facebook appears to be morphing into the “Walled Garden” Media App Stores employed by the Telcos and the handset manufacturers (e.g. Nokia, Apple and Blackberry)?

Today the Facebook economy is a mirror of the Mobile Phone Bling economy we examined months ago in More Eyeballs and More Revenues but is it the future of the mass media?

As we discovered in Media Platform or Fashion Statement? the bulk of the new media sales from the original “Walled Gardens” provided the customers with Music, Ringtones, Wall Papers and Games that enhanced or personalised the handset. Today we are seeing the same thing happening on Facebook.

“Virtual Goods: Insane, but insanely popular. The creation and selling of virtual goods and gifts makes absolutely no sense to people who just use the Internet as a basic communications tool. Try telling someone who isn’t really into Facebook that they could buy a virtual bouquet of flowers for 99 cents and send them to a friend — they’d look at you like you were mad.” – Web Daily Worker

The Facebook business model is morphing into the desktop version of owning the mobile phone network or handset. Own the network or the platform and you’re the new gatekeeper. Once you’re the gatekeeper then its 7 4 U 3 4 Me for anyone who wants access to your subscriber base.

“Today more than 500,000 applications exist on Facebook, and the virtual goods within those applications (particularly games) have become an increasingly valuable part of the user experience…The long-term goal of Facebook Credits is to provide a currency that makes purchasing virtual items across applications fast and simple. To make it easy to buy Facebook Credits we support several different credit cards, fifteen currencies, mobile payments, and now, PayPal.” – Facebook Developers

The “Facebook Credits” is a debit account system just like Apple’s iTunes store and the Telco’s original pre-paid mobile service. It allows Facebook it to build a virtual bank without actually having to deal with the regulatory problems of becoming a bank.

The reason why Mobile Bling and SMS translate into virtual goods, social games and twitter on the desktop web is very simple. It’s because the behaviour of people using Social Media platforms like Facebook and Twitter basically mirrors the behaviour of Mobile Phone subscribers. Sending messages (SMS) and playing games are the two most popular activities on both platforms.

That’s why in Japan Social Media and Mobile Media have morphed into a single Mobile Social Media platform.

The question is how sustainable is Facebook’s strategy once America and the Rest of the World catch up to Japan and embrace Mobile Social Media? Can Facebook still be the gatekeeper in a mobile world where the Telcos and the handset manufacturers already own the keys to profiting from the network and the handsets?

And what happens in the online world if Google decides it should also been in the business of “owning the platform” and introduces the Pay wall to end all Pay walls to allow Media Content Producers and Applications Developers to profit from Google’s web? After all isn’t Google in the business of having a little bit of Google in everybody’s transaction with the Internet? I can just see Google pitching the revolutionary idea to the online world.

That’s 9 4 U 1 4 G.

Imagine a world where you could buy a magazine article or a video clip for 10 cents and send it to a friend. Even if it’s 1 cent most content producers would make more money online with this model than what they will putting ads on the menu.

I guess you have to ask the question. If the object of the game is to amass the largest amount of traffic and then introducing a pay wall so developers and content owners can make a profit this “walled” traffic why hasn’t Google done it already?

After all Google could already be the biggest “Virtual” Banker in the world today if “Walled Gardens” really are the Past, Present and Future of online media.

[Via http://excapite.wordpress.com]

SPEAK THE TRUTH : 27 ways to talk directly to your loved ones on facebook (+ counting).

2010-02-27T05:52:00.000+02:00

Sometimes I have a hard time communicating on Facebook?

People think I’m serious when I’m not or vice versa.

When in doubt, I find it’s best to be direct.

And not to read too much into things.

It’s also good to get a good handle on the current lingo.

If you struggle like I do, feel free to use any of these

badges to let people know how you feel.

Also, let me know if you have any clever and/or useful

ideas I can add to the collection.

And, please be direct.

Thanks.

[Via http://brahmapura.wordpress.com]

What Didn't Get Said at the Summit

2010-02-27T05:33:00.000+02:00

American Spectator The Right Prescription

By William Tucker

February 10, 2010

About halfway through yesterday’s all-day healthcare summit, Democratic Congressman James Clyburn of South Carolina told another of the many insurance horror stories that peppered the proceedings:

A gentleman was called in and he was very, very emotional. He was getting ready to have transplant surgery. But he was told that because he’s on Medicare, his post-operative treatment is going to be limited to three years. After that, he’s going to have to find some way to pay. He was very, very emotional.

Think about that for a minute. The patient is about to receive a transplanted organ (the Congressman didn’t specify what it was) and the horror is the government is only going to continue to pay his medical bills for three years. If this is the worst we can say about American medicine, are we really in that bad shape after all?

Yesterday’s all-day event went much better than it might have. There was no shouting, no screaming, no name-calling. Despite the talk that Washington doesn’t work anymore, the dialogue was very civilized. Deliberation seems to be alive and well.

Except of course, for the fundamental difference, which remains the same — Republicans want to reform and improve health care without destroying its free-enterprise base, while Democrats would be very happy to see the entire thing absorbed into a government-controlled system, as half of it has been already through the extension of Medicare, Medicaid and other government programs.

What became most outstanding is that President Obama and his teammates still do not have any real understanding of how the current system works. Take for example the President’s constant insistence that the problem is the insurance pools in which very sick people must shop and that the solution is to “get everybody into those pools” so that risks can be shared. That’s a very good idea and a very simple principle of insurance — people who aren’t sick pay for those who are sick. But “getting everybody into those pools” is precisely what the current system is designed to avoid.

It's My Way or the Highway

Just as a guess, what percentage of the population do you think now buys their insurance individually on the open market? 15 percent? 20 percent? The answer is 6 percent. The figure has not changed for the last 15 years.

Only 6 percent of the population actually buys their own insurance. (And for this, we are painting the insurance companies as the villains of this melodrama?) Fourteen percent of the population is on Medicare, 14 percent on Medicaid. The other 66 percent do not have insurance but health benefits¸, which is not the same thing. Nine percent gets its benefits from government employment, 4 percent from the military and the remaining 43 percent get their benefits from private employment. The last 15 percent (there is some overlap) has no coverage at all.

President Obama kept talking about how it is these “large pools” in big companies that make insurance cheap, but that is not true. Large pools are only part of the equation. Equally important is that these employees are getting their benefits tax-free. This is a huge advantage not available to the uninsured population. Because the government is not getting its cut, employers are also eager to convey benefits to their employees instead of wage increases because they have more value. This is why, for many people, health benefits constitute the major reason for employment. Wages transfer easily from job to job but benefits do not.

Yet another advantage of company-run health benefits programs is that they are exempt from state regulations. There was a lot of talk at Blair House yesterday about monopolies and how many states are served by only one or two insurance companies. There was also talk about how the government must mandate minimum coverage or people will not realize their insurance doesn’t cover much. What no one said is that all these mandates are now being imposed at the state level and it is precisely this that limits competition and makes insurance so expensive.

Corporate benefit plans, on the other hand, are all exempt from state regulations under the Employees Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA), which pre-empts state regulation. This is why large corporations are able to provide insurance relatively cheaply — because they don’t have to comply with state mandates that insist that chiropractic, foot massage, alcoholic treatment and all kinds of marginal medical services be included. Companies can provide their employees with what they want — and it doesn’t take any government oversight to do it.

So Obama’s premise is wrong. We’re not going to be able to “get everybody into the pool” because doing that would mean breaking up the system of employment-based health benefits that is protected by ERISA. That 43 percent of the market is staying put. The only thing that could crack this wall of protection would be if benefits were highly taxed and the federal “insurance exchanges” were made so attractive that people were willing to give up their employment-based benefits in exchange. Those are the things that Obama has sworn won’t happen.

Instead, whatever “exchanges” are created will remain isolated, populated only by the very sick and people who can’t get coverage anywhere else. That’s what we have now. The only thing that can make the exchange more attractive is if it is highly subsidized. Several states tried this in the 1990s and found it impossibly expensive — as several Senators testified yesterday. It’s hard to believe the federal government will find it any different.

Because the President does not recognize what makes health benefits such a good deal for employees of large companies, he also refuses to do what Republicans have been suggesting all along — extend those same advantages to everyone else. Several times, Obama talked about the Senators’ and Congressmen’s own health plans — apparently thinking he was embarrassing them — and asked why we couldn’t extend the same benefits to everyone else? But of course that would mean everybody working for the government — which might eventually happen if the Democrats stay in power long enough.

Instead, these advantages could simply be identified and passed on to everyone else. Give people an allowance of tax-free money to spend on their own health benefits. Let them buy insurance that is not weighted down with government mandates. This is what health savings accounts do. Eight million people now have them (almost as many as are covered by the military) and they work very well.

Ah, but the President doesn’t like that, either. “All the data says that the people who have health savings account have a lot of disposable income,” he said yesterday. The implication is, of course, that HSA’s are a rich man’s game and will leave the poor to fend for themselves.

But then in the next minute he contradicts himself. The uninsured, he said, are not the poor. The poor are covered by Medicaid. The uninsured tend to be the self-employed and people working for smaller companies that cannot afford to provide benefits to their employees. Aren’t these precisely the people who could benefit from health savings accounts? But instead, the Democrats would prefer to mandate that these smaller businesses provide health insurance to their employees — even though they obviously can’t afford it. Could there be a more efficient way of killing job creation in this country?

The Republicans came off very well in yesterday’s summit. They drew a line in the sand — solve the problem by enhancing free markets — and stuck with it. If Democrats want to persist in pushing their reform bill on the American people, let them. Then let them stand by it in the November election.

[Via http://dancingczars.wordpress.com]

MY FRIDAY ! RAGE HATE DEATH BOILING OVER

2010-02-25T05:50:00.000+02:00

Well got home from work this morning from work to find out my 2nd PC is down for the count and its either going to be the mainboard or the PSU. So far it seems to be the PSU due to the fact that I can bypass the drives save for the hdd and it works then when you hit IE it crashes.

But then again this also started after dealing with some asshat names Jon Alto or otherwise known as Chili Palmer on MB2 Vendetta on Facebook of the AOD Mob started shit with me and after I retaliated he goes off on some hate spree so I blocked him. Then he starts posting and trying to start crap with me on other profiles. SO wtf am I supposed to do? But what I think is strange is the crap that started happening only started happening *AFTER* I had left the house for work yesterday.

The twink just doesn’t know when to stfu and just play the game properly or at least apologize for beating someone down for Xp. Its just proper game etiquette, just because the game can be barbaric at times does not mean you have to be a barbarian either. Most of the times it’s a show of maturity and that person will respect that and want to join up or extend a hand to have you join theirs.

Anyways, I have some upgrades here I can hopefully use to rebuild at least one machine and with the help of a buddy of mine I might be able to repair the 2nd unit too. I’ll be installing Windows 2k on a dell CPI finally tomorrow as well and getting that ready for my wife and her Girl Scout stuff. Besides being completely depressed and wanting to tear someone’s head I’ve never met off and using it for a soccer ball? Yea I’m fine…… NOT! I WANT MY COMPUTER BACK!

[Via http://madarameharunobu.wordpress.com]

The Social Media Explosion!

2010-02-25T05:48:00.000+02:00

It’s the BOMB.COM!!! Literally, it is. It’s the newest innovation in communication technology. Social media allows users to connect with friends, family, businesses, politicians, celebrities, and whomever else we want to connect with. Various social networking sites such as Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, MySpace, Linkedin, and many others, all help people to stay connected with people they choose to communicate with as well as get information and updates about certain businesses/organizations.

Facebook, Twitter, and MySpace allow users to keep in touch with their friends and family even if they’re thousands of miles away. Along with this, these sites allow users to follow their favorites sports team, celebrities, corporations, as well as politicians in order to remain up-to-date with information going on with the various entities they are following.

YouTube is a different kind of social networking site, but it basically offers the same communicative benefits as the ones previously listed. It allows users to completely communicate through videos and also by leaving comments on certain videos. This site allows people interested in certain channels to subscribe to those channels which display informative videos and/or videos on topics that interest them. Here is a very interesting YouTube video about social media!

Linkedin is another social networking site, but a little different from the others. Yes, it allows users to stay in contact with other users, but in a more professional manner. This site allows users to stay in contact with business professionals that they’ve encountered with throughout their educational and professional careers. It allows job seekers and employers to see an online resumé of various people who they’ve encountered and/or who they may work with in the future.

With all this said, there are so many sites to join in order to socially network. Over the years, the expansion of social media has drastically increased and so many people are joining the social media revolution. What started out as a fad has turned into a permanent transformation within the aspects of communication. And with the steady rise of social media continuing to increase, more and more people are deciding to join a network and/or participate in the developments of the revolution. The article The exploding PR frontier of social networking by Michael McCord discusses how social networking is massively changing the innovative ways people get their news and how social media is transforming the realm of PR.

Whether it be for professional reasons or casual conversation, there is a social networking site for everyone!

[Via http://tiffanytalks.wordpress.com]

Build a Facebook Landing Page for Your Business

2010-02-23T05:32:00.000+02:00

This post originally appeared on the American Express OPEN Forum, where Mashable regularly contributes articles about leveraging social media and technology in small business.

Facebook (Facebook) is known for its uniformity. You can post all sorts of content, but the actual design and layout of your profile is the same as everyone else’s

[Via http://lmd308.wordpress.com]

Library Lunacy

2010-02-23T05:18:00.000+02:00

I thought coming to the library would help me to buckle down and study but that is obviously not the case because I am blogging, listening to Celine Dion, tweeting, and surfing facebook. I really want to run around and collect books about medicine, psychology case studies, and ballet. I love the smell of old books, especially ones that have not been read in about 50 years. The library I am in right now has books from as long ago as the 1400s. That is old! I have had to sit myself next to the mass communication section otherwise I would not even get minutes of work in tonight.

I am never going to get anything done. I guess since it is the Winter Olympics I should listen to “The Power of the Dream” and watch skiing. I would watch skiing or figure skating…if they would ever quit covering curling. How is that even a sport? It’s like watching shuffle board! Come on…lets show Apollo now!

You would think that since the games were in Canada this year, then Celine would have been part of the opening ceremony. Maybe she will sing at the closing. I saw her new movie and it was absolutely fabulous! It was like being on tour with her and experiencing the concert all over again! That’s right…I saw the Taking Chances tour and got lost in New Orleans trying to get back to my hotel. You have to remember that I did not live here at that point. On a good note, I will never get lost leaving the arena ever again! Here are a few pics from the best night of my life so far!

Going to see Celine with Nana!

Deep within each heart

There lies a magic spark

That lights the fire of our imagination

And since the dawn of man

The strenght of just “I can”

Has brought together people of all nations

There’s nothing ordinary

In the living of each day

There’s a special part

Every one of us will play

Feel the flame forever burn

Teaching lessons we must learn

To bring us closer to the power of the dream

As the world gives us its best

To stand apart from all the rest

It is the power of the dream that brings us here

Your mind will take you far

The rest is just pure heart

You’ll find your fate is all your own creation

Every boy and girl

As they come into this world

They bring the gift of hope and inspiration

Feel the flame forever burn

Teaching lessons we must learn

To bring us closer to the power of the dream

The world unites in hope and peace

We pray that it will always be

It is the power of the dream that brings us here

Singing "My Heart Will Go On"

There’s so much strength in all of us

Every woman child and man

It’s the moment that you think you can’t

You’ll discover that you can

The power of the dream

The faith in things unseen

The courage to embrace your fear

No matter where you are

Belting out "It's a Man's World" cover

To reach for your own star

To realize the power of the dream

To realize the power of the dream

I really have to finish this homework! I am going to get back to sining Celine songs in my head and working in this biology lab report. Go see “Celine Through the Eyes of the World” and enjoy! Ooo! Unison just started playing! Taking it back to the early 90s!

[Via http://thoughtsandstories.wordpress.com]

Facebook Is Twice as Fast as Just Six Months Ago

2010-02-21T05:51:00.000+02:00

Kelihatannya seperti Google bukanlah satu-satunya perusahaan web dengan kebutuhan untuk kecepatan. Sementara upaya perbatasan pada obsesi, lain berbasis di Silicon Valley startup berpaling raksasa internet mulai menjadi pesaing untuk judul, yang dengan cepat menjadi musuh utama Google. Facebook telah menangkap kecepatan bug dan tampaknya serius. Beberapa minggu yang lalu, jaringan sosial insinyur memamerkan teknologi, HipHop, yang mengurangi penggunaan CPU server hingga 50 persen pada beberapa kasus dan sekarang Facebook membual bahwa hal itu berhasil membuat situs dua kali lebih cepat hanya dalam waktu enam bulan berkat berat optimasi dan front end.

“Dari awal 2008 sampai pertengahan 2009, kami menghabiskan banyak waktu mengikuti praktek-praktek terbaik ditetapkan oleh pionir dalam bidang kinerja web untuk mencoba dan meningkatkan TTI [Sisa untuk Berinteraksi],” software engineer Facebook Jason Sobel menulis.

“Pada bulan Juni 2009, kami telah melakukan perbaikan signifikan, pemotongan rata-rata waktu render setengah untuk pengguna di Amerika Serikat … Kami memutuskan untuk mengukur TTI di persentil 75 untuk semua pengguna sebagai cara yang lebih baik untuk mewakili seberapa cepat situs rasakan. Setelah melihat data, kami menetapkan tujuan ambisius untuk mengurangi separuh pengukuran ini pada tahun 2010, kami memiliki sekitar enam bulan untuk membuat Facebook dua kali lebih cepat, “ia menjelaskan.

“Saya senang untuk mengatakan bahwa pada 22 Desember sebagai hasil dari upaya ini dan lainnya, kami mengumumkan kemenangan pada tujuan kami untuk membuat situs dua kali lebih cepat. Kami bahkan sudah 9 hari penuh untuk cadangan!” Sobel mengumumkan.

Facebook itu terutama senang dengan kinerja dari infrastruktur, tetapi merasa bahwa waktu pembukaan halaman bisa lebih pendek. Signifikan lebih pendek, sebenarnya. Tim berfokus pada beberapa aspek, yang dapat menghasilkan kecepatan loading lebih cepat bagi kebanyakan orang. Salah satu cara yang jelas untuk melakukan hal ini, meski lebih mudah dikatakan daripada dilakukan, adalah untuk mengurangi ukuran file yang harus diambil untuk situs yang akan dijalankan dalam browser.

Para insinyur mampu mengurangi ukuran rata-rata kue-kue yang digunakan oleh situs oleh 42 persen dan itu sebelum mengompresi file. Bidang lain yang ditingkatkan adalah dalam cara berbagai halaman di Facebook berbagi Common kode HTML dan CSS. Sebelumnya, setiap page loaded kode kustom sendiri meskipun elemen-elemen yang sama pada berbagai halaman. Sekarang, Facebook menggunakan kode bersama untuk beberapa halaman, yang berarti bahwa setelah pengguna men-download sekali, kode akan digunakan kembali oleh halaman Facebook lain mereka beban. Ini memungkinkan Facebook untuk mengurangi ukuran file CSS diambil untuk setiap halaman dengan 19 persen, dan kompresi dari hmtl yang sebesar 44 persen.

Satu daerah terakhir kode yang diperlukan adalah mengoptimalkan beberapa JavaScript. Sebagai tempat tumbuh dan menambahkan lebih banyak fitur, kode basis yang diperlukan untuk tumbuh juga. Tapi setelah menganalisis berbagai kode JavaScript yang digunakan pada situs, Facebook insinyur menyadari bahwa banyak fitur yang dapat menggunakan kode umum untuk mencapai banyak dari apa yang mereka dibutuhkan. Facebook menciptakan sebuah perpustakaan dasar baru itu disebut Primer, yang digunakan kembali oleh berbagai fitur di situs. Hal ini mengakibatkan penurunan 40 persen ukuran file JavaScript download per halaman.

Akhirnya, Facebook memutuskan untuk berpisah elemen pada halaman, sehingga mereka beban secara terpisah. “Kami menyebut seluruh sistem BigPipe dan memungkinkan kita untuk memecah halaman web kami di blok logis isi, yang disebut Pagelets, dan pipa generasi dan membuat Pagelets ini. Melihat di halaman rumah, misalnya, memikirkan newsfeed sebagai salah satu Pagelet, maka kotak Saran lain, dan iklan lain, “Sobel mengungkapkan. Idenya adalah browser memberikan sesuatu untuk dilakukan sementara komponen lainnya masih sedang diproses. Hal ini juga membuat segalanya tampak lebih cepat bagi pengguna bahkan jika beban kali adalah sama dengan hanya menampilkan semuanya dalam satu push besar.

[Via http://anandasevma.wordpress.com]

Tips:3 cara jitu membuka situs yang diblok

2010-02-21T05:48:00.000+02:00

Baru-baru ini pemerintah memperketat akses internet,terutama yang bersifat situs porno atau situs yang dirasa dapat menggangu dalam hal pendidikan anak-anak. Cara mereka adalah dengan bekerja sama dengan provider untuk melakukan block/tidak boleh akses pada situs yang telah ditentukan. Jaringan internet kantor juga seringkali melakukan blok kepada beberapa situs seperti facebook, maupun situs downloader. Permasalahannya terkadang situs yang diblok bukan merupakan situs porno atau downloader berbahaya dan kita sangat butuh untuk mengaksesnya, misalnya situs download update anti virus.

Berikut ini adalah tips dan trik untuk membuka situs-situs yang terkena blok (komputer tidak bisa membuka situs tertentu karena akses yang ditolak) :

1. Akses/buka situs dengan alamat IP nya langsung.

Internet Protocol (IP) adalah metode atau protokol untuk mengirimkan data ke Internet. Setiap komputer dalam internet setidaknya harus mempunyai sebuah alamat IP yang unik yang mengidentifikasikan komputer tersebut terhadap komputer yang lainnya.

Bagaimana caranya mengetahui IP Address/alamat IP dari suatu situs? Sebagai acuan standart jika menggunakan OS Windows XP

Klik pada Menu Start > Run, kemudian ketikkan perintah “ping www.nama-suatudomain.com -t” (tanpa tanda petik dalam mengetikkan), lalu tekan ok

Setelah itu akan ditampilkan alamat IP Address dengan mode DOS Prompt

Setelah anda mengetahui IP Address situs tersebut,maka ketikkan ip tersebut pada browser bar sebagai pengganti alamat situs

2. Gunakan proxy pada browser

Alternatif cara lainnya untuk mengakses situs yang diblok adalah dengan menggunakan proxy server. Apa yang dimaksud dengan Proxy ? Secara umum proxy merupakan IP (Internet Protocol) atau alamat perantara yang dapat berfungsi sebagai media penghubung koneksi dengan ISP. Salah satu fungsi Proxy adalah dapat merubah identitas komputer kita ( IP ) dengan IP yang berbeda. Berikut ini adalah tips mengganti IP dengan proxy (tutorial kali ini kita akan menggunakan browser Mozilla Firefox).

Langkah pertama kita cek alamat IP Address kita (sebelum menggunakan Proxy Server) melalui what is my ip (situs http://www.hariesdesign.com/tools/what-is-my-ip) terlihat IP dan lokasi server sebagai berikut (IP sengaja dikaburkan untuk alasan privacy) :

setelah dimasukkan proxy akan terlihat sebagai berikut :

Semua identitas akan berganti dengan memasukkan alamat proxy.

Ikuti langkah berikut untuk memasukkan alamat Proxy Server (untuk merubah IP Address):

Pada Browser tekan Tools > Options, maka akan muncul kotak konfigurasi sebagai berikut

Kemudian pilih Advance > Network > Setting , akan muncul sebagai berikut :

isikan HTTP Proxy dengan Proxy anda, untuk contoh ini saya menggunakan data IP : 89.97.232.161 Port : 80 (Country : Italy)

Kemudian tekan tombol OK untuk mengakhiri. Anda dapat mengetahui IP baru komputer anda dengan tool what is my IP.

Sedangkan untuk mendapatkan beberapa proxy yang dapat anda gunakan silakan download Proxy disini beberapa proxy juga bisa dilihat antara lain disini (http://www.proxy4free.com/page1.html), misalnya menggunakan service dari server: http://www.proxoin.com/

Selamat mencoba !

3. Bypass/jalan pintas melalui Situs penerjemah (Translation)

Contoh Situs penerjemah antara lain : AltaVista BabelFish, Google Translate

Silakan coba http://babelfish.yahoo.com/ maupun http://translate.google.com/#

sumber: http://tipsntrick.net/tips-and-trick/umum/836-3-cara-alternatif-yang-jitu-untuk-dapat-membuka-situs-yang-telah-di-block?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=facebook dan http://www.hariesdesign.com/tools/what-is-my-ip

[Via http://raggne.wordpress.com]

Two weeks on Buzz

2010-02-20T05:51:00.000+02:00

Two weeks ago Google broke into the social networking game with Buzz, the new Google tool that allows people to microblog through the Google interface. Rather than signing into your twitter or facebook accounts, Google suspects that your Google portal or G-portal, will eventually replace the need for twitter/facebook. Odds are that for a lot of people, Google is right. After using this for two weeks, I can totally understand why a reluctant social networker might totally give in to Buzz. The Buzz application streamlines the complex universe of social networking. It’s pretty basic, you can see pictures, post little thoughts on your g-wall, and as with other networking tools, whatever others post on your g-wall is public to the other Google users who are following you on Buzz.

But something doesn’t feel right about Buzz, and after watching the progress with other uses, I’m not sure how great this is. Granted, it’s only been two weeks, but nobody I know seems too eager to post a lot of stuff on their buzz walls. And it’s probably beacause of the same reason I don’t feel like posting. Email just isn’t the place for social networking. Yes G-chat is kind of cool, but really, doesn’t it get kind of awkward when you can see when your email associates are online or not? It breaks down certain walls that must remain up between email users. After all, email accounts are often vehicles for very bad news, or private correspondences, surely the combination of the buzz wall and the G chat features are sort of invasive. Even our email accounts no longer belong to us privately.

Maybe I’m too old fashioned, but I do think it’s a little different with Myspace, Facebook, and Twitter, which are applications designed specifically for social networking. Do I really want my accountant or my lawyer or some other private online cohort following me on Buzz?

[Via http://lamppostgroup.wordpress.com]

The Year was 1993

2010-02-20T05:35:00.000+02:00

The year was 1993 and all was right in the world. MTV was blasting Smells Like Teen Spirit non-stop but the tone of my 28.8 baud modem was almost drowning it out. I remember chucking a Pepsi Clear across the room after 6 failed attempts to log into AOL. They were having growth issues and was at my wits end. Thinking, should have signed up for Compuserve

Today as I sit here and think back, how different are things really?

- The iPad is cool and all but in 1993 I had an Apple Newton. It had hand recognition, looked cool as hell and even had hand recognition.

- Today we have blue tooth, wifi, 3G networks, GPS, AGPS and some other things I won’t pretend to even understand. We’ll in 1993 I had a pager the size of a pack of cigarettes and a car phone the size of a PS3 still in the box. People could get in touch with me anywhere. Ok, we’ll anywhere might be a bit of an exaggeration. If the car phone wasn’t turned on or out of range, I had my beeper as backup. Find a payphone was never a problem in 1993. Do they even have payphones anymore?

- We had our browser wars. They were between Netscape & Mosaic. – What ever happened to those two companies did they finally self implode or kill each other off.

- We had Twitter, Facebook and buzz. It was just called IRC, Newsgroups and BBS’s. It was a little less real time, but real-time is overrated anyway.)

- Hell we even had video chat with a program called CUSEEME. That’s where I saw my first live internet naked girl. At least I think she was naked and I think it was a girl. Hard to tell with all those pixels missing.

facebook pandemic

2010-02-18T05:42:00.000+02:00

I have a question to anyone who may read this blog entry … I am not exactly sure who of you follow my blog, but I am curious to know when did people become so obsessed with FACEBOOK? I mean seriously …. what ever happened to the days when this social network didn’t have affect on the entire human population? I have friends ask me why I don’t have a facebook account and I guess all I can say is ” I just don’t “. To people I have lost contact with … if we are ment to connect again .. we will. If not, then well I guess our time is done. To people who would like to know how I am … this is my blog. If you are interested to know what I am about, visit my website. A good evening to all. Let us expand our horizons and step out of the box.

[Via http://mariaeusebio.wordpress.com]

The Amy Baumann Fan Club: A social media experiment gone very right

2010-02-18T05:36:00.000+02:00

After years of claiming to be Amy Baumann’s #1 fan, I finally proved it.

I chose Amy as my brand for our social media project. While she’s been my best friend since the age of seven, she’s also an incredible singer. Amy has training in both classical and musical theater performance, and went to college at the Manhattan School of Music.

While my entire hometown knows how amazing Amy is, the woman really needs to start marketing herself – which is where I come in. I asked Amy if she would be alright with me making a Facebook fan page for her and a Twitter account. She was a bit timid about it, but I totally ignored that and bugged her for her résumé, photos and songs. As an artist in a sea of other artists over in New York City, I hope she’ll stick with it to let everyone else discover her at home – not just in auditions.

Here’s the breakdown:

Facebook

The name of the site I made is pretty straight forward; it’s called The Amy Baumann Fan Club. The main photo is a professional headshot and it’s pretty sexy, if I do say so myself. I added one photo album of the other headshots she gave me and asked for other members to add photos of her performing if they wanted.

I have posted ten links/status updates, but I’ll be adding more and more. Besides, I want to encourage Amy to keep the site, and she seemed to look at the site as a motivating factor for going to more auditions and starting new performance projects.

Every time a fan comments on the site, I make sure to comment back. While it’s true that one of the commenters is my mom, I still want people to see that they’ll receive feedback with just a light amount of effort on their part. Also, it’s nice that Amy herself commented, making the site more personal. That way, if someone doesn’t know too much about Amy and stumbles upon the site, they’ll be able to see that she stays close to her fans.

I invited an embarrassing amount of people to be fans of The Amy Baumann Fan Club, and it worked like a charm – after a mere 24 hours, the site has 73 fans, some of whom I’m not friends with on Facebook. Of course, it helps that she’s such an impressive singer.

I filled out the info tab using clips of Amy’s résumé and some quick information she sent me. After I filled that out, I had most of the site finished, I made Amy an administrator and asked her to load some recordings of her singing on the site. I moved the songs to the main Wall instead of another tab to make them more visible.

To get more fans, I’ll keep the fan club in my personal Facebook profile statuses frequently and keep asking people to join. I think I’ll also have Amy ask people to join, since she seems more comfortable with the idea now and sees it as a marketing project, which it is, instead of a popularity contest or something of that nature. She also knows a lot more people in the music world. I’ll also try to find more Facebook groups related to her and try to promote them there.

Twitter

Amy’s Twitter account is also pretty self-explanatory: it’s Amy_Baumann. On the site, I added the same profile picture as the one on the Facebook profile. A short bio lists her school, general location (New York) and the singing styles she studied.

I do think it would make sense for me to tweak the design of the page, but as of now, I’m not sure how to do that. I’d love to design some sort of background for it to make it more visually stunning and perhaps add another picture of her performing.

I have posted 10 messages and plan on adding more. I’ve been sending messages to those that follow, both thanking them and asking them if they’re music fans. I have sought out several people who do not follow the account and am currently following 26 people and have 9 followers.

From here…

As long as Amy is ok with it, I hope the fan club and Twitter account keeps growing. I’ll keep looking up links relevant to Amy and encouraging her to put up videos, audio and anything else she might want someone to see or hear. As she auditions, I’ll put up the audition dates. As she develops concerts, I’ll promote them. She’ll be giving me plenty to work with just by being the artist she is.

[Via http://dindata.wordpress.com]

Facebook Lite: Alternatif Untuk Koneksi Internet Lambat

2010-02-16T05:55:00.000+02:00

Facebook mengumumkan layanan terbarunya yang diberi nama Facebook Lite. Layanan tersebut merupakan bentuk sederhana dari Facebook yang biasa digunakan.

Kendati kemampuannya disederhanakan, namun Facebook Lite ini memiliki kemampuan yang tidak biasa dibanding dengan Facebook terdahulu.

Beralamat di Lite.facebook.com. layanan ini memang diluncurkan perdana di Amerika Serikat dan India. Namun, pengguna di Indonesia dapat pula memanfaatkan situs ini, walaupun tanpa tambahan fungsi bahasa Indonesia. Di tampilan awal saat akan memasuki ke Facebook Lite, perubahan sudah terlihat.

Ada gambar balon udara yang disisipkan logo ‘F’ Facebook, yang mungkin menjadi trade mark Facebook Lite nanti. Setelah masuk ke dalam Facebook Lite, Anda mungkin tidak akan terlalu kaget dan masih tetap familiar dengan tampilan layanan anyar ini dengan Facebook yang biasanya.

Misalnya, halaman depan yang masih terlihat fitur profile dan inbox yang ditempatkan pada baris paling atas. Yang terbaru, adalah fitur events, yang biasanya tidak disematkan di Facebook Full di baris teratas.

Melanjutkan ke bagian bawah, tentunya ini menjadi menu utama yang disajikan di Facebook Lite, lihat saja dengan tampilan yang bersih, bahkan boleh dibilang sangat bersih dari fitur-fitur Facebook yang menyesaki sebelumnya.

Di baris utama ini, Anda hanya disajikan full status dan aktivitas yang dilakukan oleh akun Facebook teman kita yang lain. Ini tentu saja, membuat bermain-main di status menjadi lebih familar.

Tampilan ini tentu saja sesuai dengan tujuan situs besuatan Mark Zuckbereg itu, yang pada dasarnya merupakan streamlined ‘feed’ version yang berfungsi sebagai stream update. Apalagi, jika melihat tampilannya, Facebook Lite memang mirip dengan layanan Twitter.

Di mana terdapat linear stream status update teman Facebook yang mendominasi halaman. Hal ini semakin memperkuat persaingan antara Twitter dengan Facebook. Selain fitur meng-update yang menarik, fitur lain tetap dihadirkan oleh Facebook untuk semakin memikat Facebook Lite.

Di antara yang dihadirkan adalah, fitur mengunggah foto dan video. Tampilan notification juga menarik, tidak hadir di kanan bawah melainkan muncul di kanan atas. Dengan laman khusus yang dihadirkan, tentu menjadi agak membingungkan di awal-awalnya. Namun lambat laun, pengguna akan terbiasa dengan layanan baru ini.

Karena sifatnya yang disederhanakan agar dapat memangkas bandwith yang digunakan, tentunya ada beberapa fitur yang harus dihilangkan. Yang paling terasa tentu saja fitur chatting dengan sesama pengguna Facebook, yang sebetulnya juga menjadi fitur andalan.

Hilangnya fitur chatting ini sangat disesalkan, sebab fitur iklan yang biasa nongol di samping kanan tetap ada, padahal tampilan iklan cukup mengganggu di situs Facebook yang versi penuh.

Berikut adalah beberapa aplikiasi yang dihadirkan di Facebook Lite:

1. Update status

2. Unggah foto dan video

3. Notification

4. People You May Know

5. Kreasi event

Beberapa aplikasi yang dihilangkan diantaranya adalah:

1. Fitur chatting

2. Notes

3. Unggah link di status

Namun demikian, fitur-fitur tersebut kemungkinan besar masih akan berubah-ubah. Hal ini dikarenakan Facebook terus mengembangkannya demi menghadirkan kepuasan dan kenyamanan bagi para pengguna yang memakainya. (tyo)

sumber : okezone.com

[Via http://trinidy.wordpress.com]

I don’t care about your pony

2010-02-16T05:32:00.000+02:00

USA Today reports that people are walking away from their social media networks. In fact, you can now pay for services that will scrub your identity from the internet. Freedom for the Mac will disconnect you for up to 8 hours at a time.

According to the USA article by della Cava, the common theme for the exodus is “the nagging sense that a time-sucking habit was sucking the ‘real’ out of life.” She quotes Leanna Fry who says, “I’ve discovered I don’t need to know what hundreds of people are doing. Now I have time for the people who really matter in my life.”

Personally I use Twitter to keep up with some of those people who really matter, and to share relevant links about advertising and journalism with current and former students. And I announce new entries on my blog. But Twitter itself is becoming one big spam machine. I have over 1000 followers on my professional account, mostly people trying to sell things to people who are trying to sell things to them.

On Facebook the problem is clutter. An old college friend told me he was about to quit because of all the people who wanted help on their farm. I explained how he could “hide” certain applications and he went home to get rid of all the Farm, Aquarium and Mafia requests.

Other people take different approaches to this overload problem. One of my sons has 72 unanswered friend requests. And I know lots of people who are “defriending” distant or unnecessary friends.

Checking Facebook less often is another approach. A woman in our church has a sister-in-law who is quite upset when she doesn’t respond to her on Facebook immediately, which is difficult since she now only checks it once a month. I update my status with Twitter but often look at Facebook just once or twice a week, although I am notified if someone writes on my wall.

The clutter recently spawned a “I don’t care about your pony” fan page, which had 4 million fans in just a few days, at one point picking up 40 new fans a second. Actually I had a draft of this post, with this title, two weeks ago, before the fan page started. The gist of it? Seriously, folks, it’s not a real pony.

But not only do I not care about your pony I don’t care about your “I don’t care about your pony” fan page. I tend to ignore all requests, both for games and causes, the same I way I ignore forwarded emails. And if someone is particularly annoying I “hide” them.

Life is short and I can’t be a part of every cause, and just accepting an invitation is no way to solve actual problems. Real problems require real solutions, real causes require real sacrifices, and real ponies require real work.

Community can exist online, but it’s not a game. It requires shared values and thoughtful communication. Even a little restraint. Here’s how Proverbs 25:17 puts it:

Let your foot be seldom in your neighbor’s house,

lest he have his fill of you and hate you.

This is true, even if it’s a virtual foot. And especially if it’s a virtual pony.

[Via http://blog.thedaysman.com]

Building Buzz: Microblogging, Learning, and Atlantic Monthly (Part 1 of 2)

2010-02-14T05:51:00.000+02:00

Being the pseudo-troglodyte that I am, I have not joined Facebook, Twitter, or any number of social networking services that friends and colleagues enjoy on a daily basis. On the other hand, I’ve found LinkedIn, Ning, and a few other tools to be tremendously effective for what I value: using online tools as tools rather than letting them demand minutes and hours I simply don’t have time to spare.

Google, this week, shifted my thinking a bit by pushing a new free and easy-to-use add-on into my Gmail account: Google Buzz. It turns out to be an interesting variation on the theme of microblogging a la Twitter and LinkedIn updates by allowing participants to connect to each other very easily through the posting of short messages back and forth over a shared network.

What really drew me to experiment with Buzz over the first few days of its existence was the realization that I could view—or not view—Buzz entries as time and desire allowed. Friends who use Twitter tell me that if I don’t want to check for updates frequently and respond rapidly, there’s really no point in using Twitter; Buzz, on the other hand, approaches me as I love being approached: it’s available, but not demanding.

Twitter, on its own website, bills itself as “a real-time information network powered by people all over the world that lets you share and discover what’s happening now…[w]hether it’s breaking news, a local traffic jam, a deal at your favorite shop or a funny pick-me-up from a friend.” The result is that users post an overwhelming amount of personal information which can quickly drown readers in minutiae.

Facebook clearly provides a playfully social gathering place for people looking for the online equivalent of the “third place” away from home and work that Ray Oldenburg described so well in The Great Good Place: Cafés, Coffee Shops, Bookstores, Bars, Hair Salons and Other Hangouts at the Heart of a Community more than 20 years ago. With the online Facebook community comes an expectation that responses from community members will be swift and plentiful.

LinkedIn offers a relatively unobtrusive business- and career-oriented variation on the theme, serving as a way to “find, be introduced to, and collaborate with qualified professionals that you need to work with to accomplish your goals.” Controlling the flow of incoming information is easy to manage, which is one of its most attractive features for me.

And now we reach Buzz, which attempts to provide a way to “start conversations about the things you find interesting,” according to the introductory video posted by Google. It’s already clear that much of the information overload seen through other microblogging tools is possible, and it’s equally clear that its success as a valuable information source depends on how we all use it.

While it’s far too soon to know how it will play out, I have to admit that I’ve already been delighted with a few of the results. While several people are posting exactly the sort of personal ephemeral updates which keep me away from Twitter and Facebook, a few are exploring the possibilities of sharing useful resources along the lines of meeting notices and professional print and online resources we might otherwise overlook.

UC Berkeley E-Learning Librarian Char Booth, for example, posted a link providing information on her forthcoming book, Reflective Teaching, Effective Learning: Instructional Literacy for Library Educators right at a time when I had been exploring and writing about the need for more reflection in learning. Writer-instructor-librarian Meredith Farkas initiated an exchange soliciting recommendations for “a really good book (or books) with concrete suggestions for engaging library instruction activities.” And ALA Learning colleague and co-writer Lori Reed posted a link to “How a New Jobless Era Will Transform America” in the March 2010 issue of The Atlantic, a fascinating article with interesting repercussions for all of us involved in training-teaching-learning.

So I’ve been Buzzed. And I’ve already absorbed that wonderful article from The Atlantic. And am now ready to Buzz others with thoughts about what that article suggests to the trainer-teacher-learners among us.

Next: What the Atlantic Article Suggests for Trainer-Teacher-Learners

[Via http://buildingcreativebridges.wordpress.com]

Siswa Di-DO dari Sekolah Karena Facebook Shock

2010-02-14T05:47:00.000+02:00

Tanjungpinang – Edy Trisno Arifin mengaku anaknya terpukul akibat dikeluarkan dari sekolah, setelah berkomentar di jejaring sosial Facebook bersama tiga orang temannya yang dituduh menghina salah seorang guru.

“Anak saya sampai saat ini masih terpukul akibat kejadian itu,” kata Edy di kediamannya Jalan Brigjend Katamso, Tanjungpinang.

Edy merupakan orang tua dari salah seorang siswa SMA 4 Tanjungpinang, Provinsi Kepulauan Riau (Kepri), yang dikeluarkan dari sekolah karena dituduh menghina salah seorang guru perempuan dengan kata-kata kotor.

Dia menuturkan, anaknya AN bersama tiga orang temannya MA, AR dan YK sudah berusaha meminta maaf kepada guru yang bersangkutan dan kepada pihak sekolah.

“Sampai tengah malam mereka dibantu teman-temannya berusaha mendatangi guru-guru di SMA 4 untuk meminta maaf, bahkan mereka mau bersimpuh di hadapan guru-guru tersebut meminta maaf dan menyatakan penyesalan, namun hanya sebagian guru yang bisa ditemui.” ujarnya bersedih.

Yang lebih menyedihkan menurut dia, di saat dia dan istrinya melihat anak mereka hanya duduk di lantai depan kelas karena tidak diizinkan mengikuti pelajaran oleh wali kelas.

“Saya bersama ibu AN menangis di sekolah tersebut melihat anak saya tidak boleh belajar dan hanya duduk di depan teras ruang kelasnya,” ujarnya sambil mengusap air mata yang menetes di pipinya.

“Kami juga kecewa kenapa pihak sekolah tidak memberikan sanksi lain selain dikembalikan kepada orang tua, bukan kami membenarkan tindakan anak kami, karena guru adalah orang tua siswa di sekolah,” katanya.

Edy mengaku masih trauma mengingat kejadian yang menimpa anaknya tersebut, namun merasa bersyukur anaknya masih diterima di salah satu SMA negeri di Tanjungpinang.

“Kami merasa bersyukur masih diterima di sekolah lain, karena sebelumnya salah seorang teman AN sempat ditolak oleh sekolah itu karena sekolah tersebut sudah mendapat laporan dari SMA 4 kalau anak-anak kami melakukan perbuatan itu,” ujarnya.

Edy mengaku anaknya tersebut juga aktif di sekolah dan pernah menjadi utusan sekolah mengikuti lomba “grafity” tingkat SMA di Kabupaten Bintan dan mendapat juara pertama.

“Dia juga tercatat sebagai anggota Paskibraka Kota Tanjungpinang tahun 2009,” ujarnya.

Dia berharap, guru-guru di sekolah proaktif dalam memberikan pengetahuan kepada siswa mengenai kerugian, bahaya maupun keuntungan dari jejaring sosial Facebook tersebut, agar siswa dapat memahami.

“Sebagai orang tua di sekolah, hendaknya guru memberikan pemahaman kepada siswa mengenai bahaya maupun manfaat dari jejaring sosial Facebook ataupun mengenai pengetahuan dalam mengakses dunia maya tersebut,” harapnya

sumber: inilah.com

[Via http://mariatulqibti.wordpress.com]

On Why I Don't Call People

2010-02-13T05:21:00.000+02:00

Historically, I’ve been a recluse of sorts. I tend to keep to myself and only call a select few people regularly to talk. I talk to myself more often than not, and recently I decided I’d address why I don’t really call people to talk much. I’ll text you, but call and talk? Nah, won’t do that too much. It could be due to the heavy level of psychoanalysis I’ve been receiving in class combined with my natural introspective prowess, but I thought I’d try to figure out why I don’t really communicate with many people.

If I went back to my childhood, I’d find that I kept to myself then – but I really only knew my family. It was kind of how we grew up; very “clannish,” as my grandmother told my mom once. You might know the folks in your neighborhoods, but you rode with your family. Even now, my cousins stick tightly and the cousins my age are a deep part of my rideout crew. But when phones got introduced to me and I learned phone numbers, I don’t remember calling people to talk. I played with my action figures, read Calvin & Hobbes, and tended to keep to myself. I had friends at school, and I’d go to their houses and stuff, but no, I don’t really remember talking on the phone to people much. Then came middle and high school, and something happened – I did talk to people on the phone. But I think those experiences might have shaped my phone use now.

I only called people if I wanted to talk to them or felt like I should call them for some reason or another. So I’d call aunts, cousins, friends to either keep up with them or because I had a question. But alas, enter the female into the equation. Phone conversations became something…more important all of a sudden. They gained an extra meaning. No longer was I calling to see how you were doing; now I called to flirt and show interest and the like. When I called my friends (this is prior to the text message), we would shoot the breeze and whatnot. But when I called girls, everything flipped. Words had to be chosen carefully. Conversations needed to be interesting. Always a salesman. I can remember once having a buddy of mine on the 3 way on mute while I talked to this girl I liked and every so often I’d tell her, “Hold on,” mute her and quickly talk to him to see how I was doing. Perhaps all of this just expresses my sheer awkwardness as a teen, but there’s something about those phone conversations. The nervousness of it all. The fear of saying the wrong thing. You’ve really got to be comfortable to just TALK on the phone.

So high school happens, and my phone conversations become less and less. I still really call my family and then my close friends…but talking? No, there’s usually a reason to call somebody, right? And at that point in time the instant messaging systems were REALLY booming, also lessening my need to open my mouth and use my voice to communicate. Alas, this problem has only gotten worse with the advent of as many ways possible to NOT call people. As the ability to text grew, along with social networking sites like Facebook, the need to call people lessened and lessened. Still, the only constants were my family and close friends were the ones I called and who called me mostly – if someone else called, it was usually for a quick question or a meeting up or something along those lines. As I write this, it dawns on me just how socially awkward I was (and probably still am). Nevertheless, this little reflective piece is designed for information, and information indeed I am gaining.

So I get to college and the wonderful world of texting and Facebooking and instant messaging really hits. I called now to contact people, not to communicate with people. And the more phone calls became for contacting and not communicating, the bigger my personal thing with phone calls became. It’s like an obsolete technology, reserved for emergencies or necessity. But if people had their druthers, they’d just as soon text you/tweet you/Skype you…everything but call you. I feel weird calling the vast majority of the people in my phone, because I don’t have anything to say to them. Now, as I live alone, I find that those few people I call tend to get more phone calls than before. But in college, I still had no real reason to call people unless there was a “conversation” to be had.

And there it is – conversation. The only reason I would engage in a phone call is for a conversation. But perhaps I’m not as confident in my conversational abilities, so I resort to the text. But the phone call is designed for two people to converse now. At least, my conception of the phone call is such that we talk. Not like the obvious (if you use the phone, clearly you’ll be talking), but more like there’s a purpose to a phone call. You can mass text people to see what’s going on on a larger scale, but if you want to see what’s happening with this one person, you give them a phone call. It shows a type of intentionality. You’ve expressed, by dialing their number or pulling it up out of your phonebook, that YOU want to talk to THIS SPECIFIC PERSON at that specific time. The downside is…

I tell stories. I firmly believe all conversations are nothing more than stories, and the good storytellers make great conversations. I’m not the best storyteller though, because I ramble incessently while I talk, generally. One story reminds me of another story so I jump to that story but end up forgetting why I jumped to that story…and many times I just don’t want to waste people’s time with my rambling. I’ve been home for a couple of hours now and the only words that have come out of my mouth were the ones I left on a voicemail because I just needed to tell somebody something important. Either way, many times I don’t value my phone call unless it goes to a close friend or a family member. I’ve got friends who I should have called but now, I feel like I’m imposing on them if I do call them.

In the end, my reluctance to call people shows up even now – when trying to let someone know something I text much quicker than I think to pick up the phone. Perhaps I’ve been caught up in the “now, now, now” action of the 21st century. Either way, I’ll still be calling my family and close friends. This was a fun reflection to do. Maybe you all should try it.

[Via http://mrphilosopher.wordpress.com]

Valentines Day Advice

2010-02-13T05:02:00.000+02:00

I have never been a fan of holidays, especially romantic ones.

Suddenly on your birthday, you get 10,000 people writing on your wall. People you forgot were even alive, suddenly saw your name pop up on the right side of their Facebook homepage and they have to write on your wall. The 364 days of the year, they don’t even know you exist.

I’d rather they treat my birthday like every other day of the year, because frankly I find this sudden interest insulting.

The same can be said for Valentines Day. All year around, these men and women treat each other awful; cheating, fighting, hitting, and everything else that couples do today. Every other day you hear the guy calling his girlfriend another name, and the two of them breaking up for the 3rd time that week. BUT THEN COMES VALENTINES DAY! And suddenly the roses, chocolate, and teddy bears come out. The couples wear their “sunday clothes” and go out for dinner. He may pull out a ring, and she’ll cry (loudly, because everyone in the restaurant has to know how much they love each other).

And then it never fails – February 15 they will be right back at it again! The ring, only a day old on the girls finger, will be thrown in a fight! Mr Perfect, who gave you the chocolate and poems, will be home late and have an unsaved number in his phone.

Listen, do yourselves a favor – this year, make everyday Valentines Day. Make everyday that person’s Birthday. Put back the heart full of chocolates … save the ring for when you are both truly ready … and open your heart, mind and self to that person. Truly love each other, each and everyday.

Roses will die, chocolates will go bad. With the right amount of attention, and love, your relationship can truly be enjoyable everyday.

[Via http://lionedpaper.wordpress.com]

What If God Were a Blogger?

2010-02-11T05:47:00.000+02:00

We live in a strange time. Remember a couple of years ago when the whole country was up in arms about federal wiretapping for the sake of national security? It seemed as if everyone had something to hide. What were we scared of, the government finding out Aunt Judy’s secret pancake recipe?

Now, only two years later, we are posting every little detail of our life on Facebook. I’ve got people on my “friend list” sharing pictures of their breakfasts. Someone is telling me (and the world) that their flight has been delayed for two hours due to the snowstorms in the mid-Atlantic region. Another thought we needed to know they are watching the latest episode of “Lost” on their DVR. I know what my friends are eating, when they will be vulnerable in the air, and what they watch on television after their work day. For a nation consumed with their right to privacy (which, incidentally, is one of those things that is not mentioned, even in passing, in the Constitution), we are sharing an awful lot of personal stuff with the world at large.

But the people who annoy me most on Facebook are the ones who solicit prayer, or otherwise plug their God to me. A good number (I’d estimate about 10%) of the status updates I see when I log in have something to do with religion. Someone asked me and the rest of their friend list to pray for the people of Haiti a few weeks ago. I don’t pray. I never have, and I don’t plan to start. It’s hard enough for me to quit cigarettes. I don’t need another habit.

When you bring God into a conversation, you can only count on about 5% of your audience to agree with you. The other 95% are either nonreligious or otherwise dissimilar to your personal belief system. There are so many flavors of religion that it is irresponsible to use it as leverage in any conversation.

I have no problem with religious people. I think without religion, a lot of people would be completely lost in this world. It has helped many people get off drugs, get out of gangs, and get their life back on track. I respect that. That said, I expect the same respect from them. Do not ever try to convert me to your belief system. I have lived 32 years as a generally good person without ever asking for help from God. I do not need religion. If you’re worried about my soul (whatever your definition of that may be), stop it. I’m taking care of it the best way I know how: by being a good person and trying not to step on too many toes. Shouldn’t the well-being of my soul be my responsibility? It’s mine. I own it. Like my car. Unless you are going to pay to fix my driver’s side power window, which keeps coming off the track and falling into the door, don’t refer me to your church as a repair shop for my soul.

Don’t get the wrong impression of me: I do believe in God. And I choose to express that belief in my own way. I don’t blame God for my weaknesses or failures. Nor do I thank God for my successes. I own them all. They make me who I am. I thank myself for them.

[Via http://djhurder.wordpress.com]

God Needs To Start Blogging

2010-02-11T05:44:00.000+02:00

James Wright’s “Speak” is a plea by the narrator for God to show himself. It is written in a familiar, almost conversational tone for the majority of the first four stanzas, but changes to a very biblical form in the fifth stanza.

The poem is written in five, eight-line stanzas of rhymed verse with the scheme A-B-A-B-C-D-C-D. Only a few of the lines are in perfect rhyme; 16 of the 20 lines are in near rhyme, and one line is not rhymed at all.

Wright’s poem begins somberly: “To speak in a flat voice / Is all that I can do” (1090; lines 1-2). The reader can presume from the tone of these lines that the speaker is dejected or unhappy. The lines also set a sort of slow, dark rhythm for the poem: it would be difficult to read the remaining lines aloud in a singsong voice or a lively rhythm.

In the next lines, Wright reveals the poem is directed at a specific person: “I have gone every place / Asking for you” (3-4). The narrator continues by wondering where the search will end, but does not reveal who it is he is searching for. Wright employs perfect end rhyme in lines 2 and 4 with the words “do” and “you,” but lines 1 and 3 are in near rhyme: “voice” and “place” depend on the consonance of the “s” sound at the end of each word. The first stanza ends with four more lines in near rhyme: “turn” is rhymed with “spin” and “end” is rhymed with “blind.” Wright brings forth an image of an urban landscape with the lines, “And the last streetlight spin / Above me blind” (7-8).

The second stanza concerns the narrator’s return from his search:

Then I returned rebuffed

And saw under the sun

The race not to the swift

Nor the battle won. (9-12)

Still, the identity of the person for whom he is searching is not revealed. However, the biblical paraphrase in lines 10-12 gives a clue as to whom he is seeking. This change in vocabulary and structure seems out of place in comparison to the colloquial tone set by the first stanza.

Wright returns to a more informal tone in the following lines: “Liston dives in the tank / Lord, in Lewiston, Maine” (13-14). The natural rhythm of the lines sounds almost like that of an excited sports announcer, finally imparting some liveliness to a poem which thus far has been dreary and somber. However, another way of reading these lines could make it sound like a dejected sports fan using the word “dive” derogatorily, accusing Liston of purposely losing his iconic fight with Muhammad Ali. Regardless of the mood in which the line is spoken, Wright deliberately calls attention to the word “Lord” by putting it on a new line; the word seems more naturally related to the first line than the second. Breaking the line between “tank” and “Lord” makes the reader acutely aware of the narrator’s call to God.

Besides enjambment, Wright also uses alliteration to call attention to the word “Lord,” as it begins with the same sound as the words “Liston” and “Lewiston.” This is also the first time the narrator makes a direct claim to a specific person. It can now be assumed that the “person” he has been searching for is God.

Wright also refers to a person named Ernie Doty, who has taken his own fall: “And Ernie Doty’s drunk / In hell again” (15-16). As the poem progresses, Wright introduces characters who have fallen from grace.

The third stanza introduces a female figure:

And Jenny, oh my Jenny

Whom I love, rhyme be damned,

Has broken her spare beauty

In a whorehouse old. (17-20)

Jenny seems to be an old flame of the narrator’s, but has, like Liston and Doty in the stanza before, fallen from grace. Lines 18 and 20 introduce a form of meta-poetry to the poem by warning the reader that the narrator has no ambition of making a rhyme. It gives the passage a feeling of sincerity; in lieu of conforming to the self-imposed structure of the poem, the poet speaks frankly about his feelings for the girl he once knew and loved, but has become a prostitute.

Line 20 also uses a bit of hyperbaton: instead of writing “In an old whorehouse,” Wright prefers to say “In a whorehouse old.” The effect of this switch in word order is a line that ends without a falling rhythm, propelling the remainder of the stanza:

She left her new baby

In a bus-station can,

And sprightly danced away

Through Jacksontown. (21-24)

Besides continuing the story of Jenny, these four lines add a sense of incongruity: the dark subject matter of a woman who literally threw away a newborn baby is presented in a rhythm that sounds quite a bit like a child’s jump-rope rhyme. This juxtaposition serves to make the subject matter even darker by revealing the narrator’s indifference to the situation.

In the fourth stanza, the narrator speaks of his own defeat. He refers again to Jacksontown:

Which is a place I know,

One where I got picked up

A few shrunk years ago

By a good cop.

Believe it, Lord, or not. (25-29)

The speaker now puts himself in the same group as Jenny, Liston and Ernie Doty; all have fallen from grace. He also speaks directly to God for the second time. Wright again draws attention to the communication with God by continuing a thought on the fifth line, which until stanza four has been reserved for introducing a new thought for the final four lines of each stanza.

The speaker once again places himself in the company of the other characters in the poem in the fifth stanza:

I have gone forward with

Some, few lonely some.

They have fallen to death.

I die with them. (33-36)

Clearly, the narrator feels he is no better than Jenny, Liston, or Ernie Doty. He likens their falls and defeats to death, and says his defeat is much like theirs.

The final four lines are a direct plea to God to show himself:

Lord, I have loved thy cursed,

The beauty of thy house:

Come down, Come down. Why dost

Thou hide thy face? (37-40)

Wright draws more attention to the fact the narrator is speaking to God by writing in biblical verse for the final four lines of “Speak.” Besides adding a sense of desperation, the lines come across as a reverent plea. The speaker is asking for reciprocation from God. He tells God that he loved the cursed people mentioned in earlier stanzas, as well as the earth He created. As a reward, he asks God to show himself on Earth.

In “Speak,” Wright uses alliteration, rhythm and rhyme to paint a picture of a man who has searched for God and watched the demise of the people he loves, all the while descending himself. By employing biblical verse, a constant rhyme scheme, and occasional incongruous rhythm, Wright has written a desperate plea to his God.

[Via http://djhurder.wordpress.com]

Hati-hati Facebook

2010-02-09T05:46:00.000+02:00

Beberapa Hari yang lalu, seorang remaja melarikan teman dekatnya yang dikenalnya melalui situs jejaring facebook, tentu saja hal ini berakibat buruk khususnya bagi keluarganya. Kluarganya tidak tau apakah anak mereka sengaja dibawa atau dilarikan atau justru karena suka sama suka. Terlepas dari itu, yang menjadi pokok permasalahan adalah Facebook yang merupakan media awal mreka berkenalan. Muncul pertanyaan, Apakah menurut anda Facebook berguna bagi usernya??

View This Poll

online surveys

[Via http://julianusginting.wordpress.com]

Keep in touch: Join us on Facebook!

2010-02-09T05:42:00.000+02:00

AFRICA LIGHT / GRAY ZONE Facebook Page

Additionally to the “Infos” chapter on this website, we published a Facebook page proclaiming all relevant information. Keep in touch with us! Stay up to date! We will let you know about our latest appointments, public screenings, terrific articles, stunning images and all background informations. We are looking forward for your visit!

Africa Light / Gray Zone on Facebook

[Via http://africalight.wordpress.com]

Social Media "Expert"

2010-02-07T05:16:00.000+02:00

I dont claim to be a “Social Media Expert” – but I should mention have been working in the social media field since I started my career. While catching up on a few of my favorite social media blogs I happened to find the following error:

I’m not sure that “Taditional” marketing clarifies anything, but what’s ironic is that I’ve also seen quite a few posts recently about how today’s students are seeing poorer English grades because the prevalence of sites such as Facebook and Twitter. I guess we all have spelling mistakes from time to time, even if we are considered the “experts.”

[Via http://itsmisspelled.wordpress.com]

Facebook Groupthink

2010-02-07T05:05:00.000+02:00

I hate to keep writing about similar topics, but I just read an article from Time.com by Dan Fletcher, “Facebook’s Doppelganger Week Is Viral Groupthink,” and I had to pass it along.

The article talks about the recent Facebook fad of posting your celebrity lookalike as your profile picture, the January craze of posting your bra color as your Facebook status, and the infamous 25 things you didn’t know about me notes that swept the site last year.

If you use Facebook, I think you’ll find the article a worthy read.

[Via http://myeh.wordpress.com]

Tampilan Facebook lebih Fresh

2010-02-06T05:09:00.000+02:00

Ga sengaja pagi-pagi buka facebook, eh tampilannya home nya udah baru sekarang,walaupun tampilan profile masih seperti yang dulu…

ada beberapa tambahan kolom di sebelah kiri.. untuk melihat sapa aja yang OL ada di kolom sebelah kiri.. menu Home/Profile/Account ada di sudut kanan atas….

untuk melihat message juga baru, tiggal lihat di kolom sebelah kiri aja…

tapi ada beberapa yang saya kurang ’srek melihatnya.. notification nya ada diatas sebelah kiri tapi popup nya muncul di bawah sebelah kiri…

untuk menu Chat juga… temen2 yang OL ada di kiri.. tapi klo ingin melihat semua yang OL malah pindah ke kanan bawah.. jadi repot untuk menggerakkan mouse dari kiri ke kanan… yah walaupun itu simple masalah nya yapi gara2 pergerakkan mouse yang sia-sia itu saya pernah di bantai ama dosen IMK waktu presentasi tugas besar untuk membuat tampilan sebuah website.. katanya pergerakan mouse itu di perhitungkan juga….

ini ada printscreen-an dari tampilan Home Faceebook saya…

klik aja untuk memperbesar gambar….

Tampilan Facebook

[Via http://amynote.wordpress.com]

CSU Snowriders helps skiers and snowboarders alike get to the slopes

2010-02-06T05:03:00.000+02:00

So, you know where to go skiing, but how do you get there? How do you meet other people that like to ski or snowboard and might like to go with you? Oh, and don’t forget about those high gas prices, maybe there’s a way to catch a shuttle or carpool to the mountain to cut gas costs? If you find yourself asking those questions, then you might be interested in finding a group or club near you that focuses on helping snow riding enthusiasts connect and get to the mountain.

Snowriders is a Colorado State University Student Organization that is focused on connecting students across campus who love to ski and snowboard. The club is open to everyone who wants to go, no matter their experience or level, as long as they want to have fun.

Snowriders offers a multitude of opportunities and benefits as soon as you join. Club members get to enjoy a t-shirt, discounts from local ski shops and club sponsors, as well as “giveaways” at each meeting like gear or lift tickets to local mountains; all this with the annual member fee of twenty-five dollars. Members also get to enjoy discounted shuttle rides to the mountains each week, special events, and out of state trips.

Thought it’s usually about getting to the mountain, there is a lot of work that goes on behind the scenes of Snowriders. To really understand the passion that goes into the club, I caught up with the two Co-Presidents of Snowriders, Robert Mahoney, Communication Studies major, and Brian Vanderpool, senior Natural Resources and Sociology major.

Check out the Snowriders on Facebook, at the Rocky Mountain Collegian , CSU website, and at the official Snowriders website.Interview with Vanderpool and Mahoney

If you can’t find a specifically geared ski/snowboard club near you, don’t worry. You might want to check out the local Recreation Center newsletter or website for trips, outdoor clubs and lessons. Or try an online search for a club or try MapMuse to locate a local ski club.

[Via http://kmaixner2.wordpress.com]

A Nostalgic Look at Marketing

2010-02-04T05:49:00.000+02:00

The marketing department has changed dramatically over the last 10 years or so. Before the Internet and social media, we never felt like we had enough customer information to make informed decisions. Getting the right information was expensive and time consuming. And it always seems like decisions need to be made right now – not 60 days from now. Small businesses have almost always been closer to their customers and seem to make decisions qualitatively based on that relationship – the cost of traditional market research is out of reach for many of them anyway. However, even very small B2C companies have trouble keeping up an ongoing conversation with their customers.

Now it is not that we don’t have enough information. To the contrary, we have so much information coming to us via email, Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn that it overwhelms our ability read it and respond. Since consumers do most of the talking, they now hold much of the control over what others hear about our company. Outbound advertising and promotions still have a place in your marketing mix, but conversations have taken a much larger roll.

More about that and some solutions tomorrow.

[Via http://relevancematters.com]

Baldi Mcmillan

2010-02-04T05:38:00.000+02:00

Baldi Mcmillan

Proof of Avatar Existence: http://world.secondlife.com/resident/4762b09a-d599-4a55-beca-c0ed3ac0bc8c

Paste: This person is using a fake avatar name from Second Life. Please see proof at http://world.secondlife.com/resident/4762b09a-d599-4a55-beca-c0ed3ac0bc8c Please uphold your TOS and remove this fake profile that is not using a real name.

How to Report

[Via http://banfakefacebookprofiles.wordpress.com]

Am I Justified?

2010-02-02T05:39:00.000+02:00

Today was a big day for my son. He started his first day of preschool. He looked so happy when he let me take his picture on his way into school today.

Tonight my sister called. She was upset that our family posted pictures on Facebook. Unfortunately, I heard and chose to do what I did…keep them up. End of discussion.

Why am I so pissed? I feel pissed about my sister not calling/seeing me for weeks, and the reason she decides to call is to tell us to take down pictures on FB. Uhm, where was, “hello, how are you.” The next sister made me upset by her calling my therapist, psychiatrist and case manager when she felt the need to tell them that I “plan to pay for her to watch my son,” and I am “moving.” Bullshit. When she walked out on my son and me over me being a “psychotic bitch” I decided then I would never allow her back in my life. It disgusts me that she could say something so horrible like that. I am sick of her telling everyone I am mentally ill. My psychiatrist says I am “highly functioning, non pschotic presenting individual.” I am so sick of C and M that I want to cut them out of my life.

I am so tired of being hurt over what they say and feeling like shit when I am in contact with them. I feel so fucking pissed that I want to scream. Yet, I can’t scream because it is 10:30pm at night. My son is sleeping. Yes, I feel like I can beat the shit out of something, but that is just a thought and I have never felt homicidal. What I am feeling is hurt, angered and disgusted.

So, what I chose to focus on is….

Tomorrow begins my first day in Dialectal Behavior Therapy (DBT) Skills Group. I am kind of anxious about it. I feel like I need to call my counselor tomorrow to ask her whether or not I need to bring my dbt diary card or what.

What I can do this moment is write about what I am feeling. I can play Farmville on Facebook. I can listen to soothing music. I can notice the urge to self-harm, and use my hands and thoughts for good. I can focus on wanting to be touched gently rather than treated like a piece of shit. I do deserve kindness and love. I can attain those from the loved one in my life. I don’t have to feel upset that DBT Skills is really just me using what I do all ready. Yes, I feel like my mental illness is something I deal with but it isn’t an indicator of how I value my life. I don’t know what the fuck I am saying, so I am going to stop. I promise not to polish off the tray of fucking hot chocolate chip with walnut cookies sitting on top of the stove off.

[Via http://lilliesloves.wordpress.com]

'Where do I go if it rains?'

2010-02-02T05:32:00.000+02:00

The sign held by a man atop the Haiti rubble says in Creole: “Where do I go if it rains?” And Pastor Shaun King, a man whose heart burns for the people who suffered the quake of biblical proportions answered the question before even seeing this photo of the Haitian man posted today on the Web. Shaun’s answer is in the tents he’ll help provide.

Before we get to the tents, a little about Shaun. He writes in the “About Shaun” section of his blog:

Hello! I’m Shaun King – a 30 year old husband, father, pastor, and grad student (in that order) in downtown Atlanta. I am the Lead Pastor of The Courageous Church – a brand new, diverse, exciting community of faith that just launched on January 11th, 2009! Before I put on my SuperSuit and go live out my call in the city, I fix my five kids a bowl of cereal, change diapers, pack lunches, and give my wife a kiss. This blog is all about the tight rope that I walk between Courage & Corn Pops.

So, today, Shaun does what I know him best for, posting a call for help on Twitter. You see, I only know Shaun a few days now … and it’s only through Twitter and Facebook … but I know he has a heart that’s at least as big as cyberspace must be.

Shaun King wants to get 10,000 tents shipped to Haiti this week. He’s got a cargo ship booked … he’s gotta a day it sets sail (Thursday) … and he has a whole bunch of people already buying tents to be shipped to a Miami port.

This I know about Shaun … his heart is big and chances are that in the time between Monday and Thursday of this week, Shaun will have made sure 10,000 tents are on there way to Haiti.

[Via http://outreachnewmedia.wordpress.com]

Mind-boggled by Social Media?

2010-01-31T05:53:00.000+02:00

Social media sites are becoming a fact of life. Just like the use of computers, cell phones and video gaming devices, they’re here to stay and are setting out to make an impact. The question is not of when the sites will die out, but rather, when will you give in?

I have been a Facebook user for some time now; probably over a year. I can navigate it pretty well, create fan pages, send status updates, tag pictures and the like. And although Facebook is a high-powered medium, I feel that I will not get the full benefit of a social media experience unless I finally break down and acquaint myself with Twitter.

Walking through OfficeMax the other night, I saw a self help book that familiarizes people with Twitter. It was even equipped with screen shots so that people could be walked through the process of setting up an account and a navigating it. I thought twice about buying the book, but eventually rested it back on the shelf. I am just not ready to make that kind of commitment (with my busy schedule and all).

The next day at work, one of my wonderful co-workers who seems to be a computer genius, told me about a site that I thought I needed to share with all of you interested in learning about Twitter as a marketing tool for not only you, but for a business as well. The site is www.mashable.com. It is also updated frequently, probably more so than my potential book purchase.

On this Web site you can learn all about Twitter, Facebook, MySpace, Google and YouTube through personalized guidebooks. Now, I have to admit that I have yet to undertake that feat, but I plan to. I am going to need some support from you, I’m sure, to get me started.

Another interesting site for those of you involved with social media or looking to get involved is http://seesmic.com/seesmic_desktop/. This site leads you to a desktop download that is completely free! The download will allow you to manage MULTIPLE Facebook accounts and Twitter accounts (and I am sure even more) at THE SAME TIME! Now, this is not as huge for individuals as it is for companies, but I mean, this is officially the best site ever! Now you don’t have to log out of one account to check another. Everything pops up at once. You can even search on a menu bar for something and the search will cover all of your accounts until it finds the information you are seeking. This is definitely going to be a powerful tool for anyone in the public relations, advertising or journalism field.

On a side note, I have been doing quite a bit of research on how to track Web sites. I use the Web site below to help me find the number of visitors or clicks on a particular site. This is very helpful for me at work, but think of ways this could benefit you. What if you are researching one car insurance over the other? One restaurant over the other? One potential job site over the other? Hey, hey now, popularity isn’t everything, but I am sure you can find a way to make this site useful to you.

http://www.compete.com/

And, if you are wondering what the heck SEO (Search Engine Optimization) is, I will explain that too. The concept of SEO is based on the belief that some Web sites get more “hits” or “clicks” if the certain words appear on their page. This is why when you search for specific things on Google, you can usually find them on the first or second page-they have done this intentionally. Figuring out how to optimize your page used to be a long and involved process, but now, it is simple. Check out: http://www.google.com/insights/search/. Type in a specific word and see how many people are searching for that phrases including that particular word. This can help you word things better on your Web site in order to generate more interest.

Ok, now that I have covered social media tips and tips for Web sites, I think I’ll head to bed. This is a late post for me.

Goodnight all, I hope I have helped you in some significant way through this posting.

-Jen2010

[Via http://jen2010.wordpress.com]

Community

2010-01-31T05:32:00.000+02:00

I know someone who has aspergers (mild form of autism) who in person is difficult to talk to, sometimes awkward and has the ability to ignore you for days on end. In all fairness, sometimes that is just the person. Here, thanks to wikipedia (not a general primary source but hey this isn’t a college paper) is a quick description:

Asperger syndrome is an autism spectrum disorder, and people with it therefore show significant difficulties in social interaction, along with restricted and repetitive patterns of behavior and interests. It differs from other autism spectrum disorders by its relative preservation oflinguistic and cognitive development. Although not required for diagnosis, physical clumsiness and atypical use of language are frequently reported.[1][2]

Now what I noticed about this person, was their ability to communicate via facebook. I love facebook but I am aware that it creates a false sense of a community and intimacy. However, I have read more from this person than I probably have ever heard out of their mouth. Amazing. Facebook helps this person interact with a world that they would generally have no interest in. It breaks a barrier.

So for those of us who do not have some sort of medical term to define our social interactions, why are we so heavily reliant on Facebook, tweets, texts, email, etc. Have we lost our ability to be with people. Is community something to strive for but never attain. I’m the last person that wants to be hugged but it does feel good to let people in.

I was watching NCIS online tonight. (lover of cop shows) I know that most shows now have boards that you can post to but it is called Community. The word is getting as overused as LOVE.

A definition.. as taken from dictionary.com

–noun, plural -ties. 1. a social group of any size whose members reside in a specific locality, share government, and often have a common cultural and historical heritage. 2. a locality inhabited by such a group. 3. a social, religious, occupational, or other group sharing common characteristics or interests and perceived or perceiving itself as distinct in some respect from the larger society within which it exists (usually prec. by the): the business community; the community of scholars. 4. a group of associated nations sharing common interests or a common heritage: the community of Western Europe. 5. Ecclesiastical. a group of men or women leading a common life according to a rule. 6. Ecology. an assemblage of interacting populations occupying a given area. 7. joint possession, enjoyment, liability, etc.: community of property. 8. similar character; agreement; identity: community of interests.

They all involve interaction. Common. Interests. Living. I think community is the idea that we have things to share. But the more we do it away from each other, we loose connection to who we are and who we are communicating to. We start to loose a little of ourselves, no matter how many of our favorite books and movies we type in.

So will I get rid of my facebook, probably not. I like an easy way to contact people. It just won’t be a replacement for actually seeing them or spending long distance time on the phone. After all, I did just move 2.5 hours away- there are a lot of people to miss. I like tweeting– probably because I like instant gratification. And I like texting. But I must strive to have community with people in real time, perhaps at Starbucks, sounds good right now.

I’m looking forward to getting to know the people at Grace, the people that work at my local coffee shop, the people in my neighborhood, the people at the gym. I’m looking forward to summer farmer’s markets and dog parks and everything in between. Sometimes you have to look a little for community but it is worth it. We were not created to do this life alone or sitting behind a computer screen.

[Via http://gwynethinprogress.wordpress.com]

(Social) Networking and the Freelancer

2010-01-30T05:41:00.000+02:00

When I first got started in freelance writing, I got so tired of people talking about “networking.” By networking I don’t mean computer networks, which as a geek I find interesting, and without which we wouldn’t have lovely vehicles like the Internet with which to find, deliver, show off our work. I mean the kind where you imagine standing around in stuffy clothes and uncomfortable shoes, talking to people you don’t know and trying to find out what they can do for you while they try to find out what you can do for them. Sounds about as appetizing as the rubber chicken you’ll probably be eating at the dinner later.

You can learn networking skills many places. The first place I formally did so was at a local Society for Technical Communication chapter meeting. We were taught conversation starters, things to keep in mind (kind of like talking points), and generally how to work a room without feeling or looking like some kind of self-absorbed robot. I highly recommend that anyone take advantage of a chance to learn networking skills through their professional organizations or any other place they can, as they’re invaluable in countless walks of life outside of politics and high finance. Whenever you need to find some new clients, a full-time job, a trustworthy contractor to build your deck, a babysitter, or even just the best place in town to spend a day with the kids, having a network is invaluable.

Don’t fall into the trap of thinking that today’s click-and-friend social networking craze takes the place of real networking. If the only way you know a person was from clicking Yes to a friend request and slightly reading their profile, you really have little reason to help them, and they have little reason to help you. Networking requires genuine human interaction. You might even make some actual friends. Who knows? I know I have.

Now, once you have met and managed real conversations with people, social networking tools can be an invaluable way to keep in touch. You have to know your particular peers and where they spend their time to know which places to focus on. Personally, I’m not interested in existing on every site people send me invitations to join. I don’t have the patience, time, or focus to check a dozen sites on a regular basis. Instead, I have my lovely blog that you’re reading right now–which doesn’t really count as social networking I suppose unless you’re on the same service and we’ve added each other to our respective Neighborhoods–along with a presence on Facebook and LinkedIn. There are also some professional email discussion lists I belong to (I know, how quaint, but I like them) around topics like technology journalists and computer book writers.

I suppose I should say here that I’m not necessarily the poster girl for social awareness and m@d s0cial skillz. That said, I do try, and apparently I manage to fool people that I have a clue on a semi-regular basis.

Anyway, along with knowing where your peers are hanging out, it’s important to understand the dynamics of each place. Facebook, for example, I treat somewhat loosely. I don’t really friend people that I don’t know at all, but I’ll friend people I know from personal settings, work settings, or even fairly vaguely. Facebook I consider kind of a big casual party with general chatter. I don’t censor myself particularly much–though I am aware that people I know through work are reading. I take the opportunity to interact with people there that I don’t necessarily get to talk to otherwise. On LinkedIn, however, LinkedIn is more like a corporate or professional organization gathering. I keep it professional. I don’t ask people to link to me that I don’t know. I keep it up to date, and consider my LinkedIn profile to be essentially an online business card. If you’re going to be self-employed, or really even career-minded, you have to at some level be able to think of your business self not so much as a brand as many people like to push, but at the very least as business.

Now, with all of this talk about who can help whom, the last thing I want to advocate is being fake. At a networking event, everyone knows why they’re there, you don’t need any real pretext to ask them what they do and whatnot. Even there, though, it’s possible to go overboard into the arena of crass self-absorbed nut. Ultimately all networking is a conversation, and like any conversation, there’s a give and take, and making a real connection as human beings is the true goal online or in person. Not only will they remember you better and be more likely to call you if they have something interesting, but you might come out of there feeling a bit better about yourself and genuinely wanting to call a few people you met just for lunch. No business chat or rubber chicken required.

[Via http://freelancesurvivor.wordpress.com]

The President and Rick Astley

2010-01-30T05:34:00.000+02:00

Facebook has a funny way of putting you back on memory lane. The fact is when I see all those people that I know but no longer in touch with. It validates that I really don’t have anything in common with them. They used to know me, I used to know them but other than that, I feel that they were lucky enough to be around me. I’m having a bit of a vain moment… just let me be

I was watching MSNBC at the gym a few hours ago and there was this really interesting question to the president. A lot of it actually was more like statements or assumptions that this current administration had increased the unemployment rate from the last year. The president had responded in a very comprehensive way. I’m not really big on politics, but if you’re going to ask a question, make sure you don’t embarrass yourself on national television. I have also been tweeting a lot about this whole Democrat Republican business. I personally think they should just all get along and solve this ridiculous crisis. Enough with the … well your stimulus plan didn’t work so try ours. Really? I thought you guys were all smarter than a bag of chips.

So I did mention I got some tapes from Goodwill and I picked up a Rick Astley album. Why do people dislike him? I don’t think his songs were that bad hahaha. I remember it was such a big hit when I was in 6th grade, or maybe 5th. I always sing along when I hear this song.

[Via http://jesuismrvampland.wordpress.com]

Auf Wiedersehen

2010-01-28T05:41:00.000+02:00

So recently, I decided to “clear” my facebook. I would ask the question:

1) Do I know you?

2) Do I talk to you?

3) do I care about you?

If I answered “no” to all, I would hit the “x” and call it a day.

After reducing my list by 100+ people, I began getting “refriended” by those people that I determined that I DID NOT KNOW.

So my question is…when you have the balls to request me as a friend again why do you bother putting “I thought we were connected….hope things are going well with you “

LISTEN GIRL, we aren’t connected. I BROKE THE CONNECTION.

P.S. Breaking the connection on facebook also means you shouldn’t stalk me on LinkedIn and “connect to my network” because you ain’t in this network. Thanks.

Freckles. BB

[Via http://wangali08.wordpress.com]

Turning Points

2010-01-28T05:26:00.000+02:00

I was just reading my friend’s blog today and having a lengthy (oh… let’s say… 3 hour?) conversation with her. I was telling her how great it was that she experienced a “turning point” in her life… experiences that has changed how she viewed the world. All of us at one point has to change and we are forever changing with every experience or moment that passes. Whether something is big or small, it impacts our lives so ever-little that we barely notice until it accumulates to a noticeable point. Given that she just recently started her new blog, I was quite impressed with the articles she has put up already.

Katie’s entry was all about friendship, something that although readily available in our daily lives, we should take the time to evaluate ourselves and our friends on a daily basis. I don’t mean “evaluate” as in testing them or seeing if they’re “worthy” – but more-or-less, whether they really are friends or just ‘friends’. The most prominent scenario of this are social networking sites, especially Facebook. For most people, I would say there are many individuals who show up on Facebook as “friends” who really aren’t someone you’d “call upon” on a regular basis. Not withstanding, I am definitely guilty of having people on my list who I would never talk to or really associate with… perhaps I just knew them from “somewhere” or either returned the favour of adding them. I have 10 categories on my Facebook, all separated with different areas of access and being an I.T guy, my permissions are set extremely granular based on which groups are assigned to a specific user.

With that said, back on topic, is the fact many of us KNOW many people who we may or may have at one point, considered our friend. However, I would dare say that many of us are likely to have many friends… we may “know a lot of people” – acquaintances, your hang-out group, or whatever, but how many of them truly have your back when the going gets tough? Growing up, I’ve always been very accepting of the fact that I knew a lot of people, but only a select-few I’d really give them the label as “friends.” I do have a very high expectation of friends, because they are my inner-circle, the people who I can trust and KNOW I can rely on no matter the situation. I can go to them when I need good advice or a chest that I can punch until my anger is vented out. With the world of Facebook nowdays, it is very common for people to “outdo” each other… “Hey, look, I have 500 friends!” … “Ya well, guess what? I have 600!” I wonder how many of those people that person truly talks to or really knows well. It is so common to meet someone in a restaurant these days and then end up on each others Facebook.

I have this really bad habit about going on a tangent, haha.. anyways, so the point is that throughout my life, I’ve experienced a lot of turning points like Katie has. I remember acutely going through another similar “friendship reevaluation” just this summer. This summer, someone I knew from high school sent me a request on Facebook (known as FB herein) which I accepted. I thought it was rather weird since we’d never really talk to each other with the odd exception when we needed to do a project. A few days later, he sent me a message asking me to go for lunch. I’m a pretty social person so I said sure and we set a date/time. I expected perhaps that he’d duck-out last minute, but sure enough, we met each other punctually at that location, date and time we initially planned – very cool! We talked as if we were “long lost friends” covering almost all major topics within our short 1 1/2 hour lunch, but it was great. This guy, who I barely talked to in high school would take the initiative and bothered to meet up and have a very casual meet-up. It was a great feeling seeing how much people have changed in high school. On that note though, I recall feeling at one point that it was almost like, “The people who I knew well in high school, talked to daily, hung out with seem to be ‘worse’ than the ones who were more distant then, but ‘closer’ now” I commented to my mom one day with a similar notion about how friends that I used to not get along with seem even more friendly now but those who I knew “well” seem to not recognize our previous friendship… worse was the fact some people who I was very close with even ignored my FB-friend request. My mom with her worldly experience said, “Son, it is because as people grow up, they mature and learn to treat people right.” and with that, it shocked me into a whole new world!

Daily, I grow and mature a bit more and gain insight into humanity and the world based on experiences I endure. My cousin who I care for deeply came to me and apologized for the past 4 years that she’s been in Canada and hasn’t really bothered connecting with me. For the past 4 years, I would often check up on her, help her move, do paperwork for her, etc. and she has always kept her distance. In the past year, she experienced great changes and eye-opening experiences in her life which changed the values of which she held family and friends alike. It was very very touching to see my cousin change like that. It wasn’t an apology which made everything right, it was the fact she expressed to me that she realized what she did was inconsiderate and she took time to appreciate the people around her. I was ecstatic and very proud of her! Likewise, I went through and still go through these life-changing things and I hope the people around me take time to reevaluate their lives, take time to reconsider and appreciate the true friends who are around you.

I think it is true we tend to be ignorant of our friends who actually mean a lot to us. Perhaps we consider them to be such good friends to us that we don’t feel an obligation. However, I’m a believer that with ANY relationship, whether just regular friends, best friends or even an intimate one takes time to nurture and upkeep – nothing is free in this world! I hope everyone after reading this takes a bit of time to think about how their friends have changed over their lifetime and how many times in our lives have we had to reevaluate who/what we considered as friendships. I understand this is something that comes with age and experience because a conversation with my god-sister just this evening made me furious. Alas, I cannot expect a 16 year-old to understand concepts such as these because they just haven’t experienced enough to FEEL these things deep in the heart. Changes can’t simply be “forced” … sometimes they will simply happy in time!

[Via http://meninmenstruation.wordpress.com]

Demographic Measurement in Mobile Media

2010-01-26T05:49:00.000+02:00

As mobile devices continue to advance technologically, so do the marketing opportunities for audiences that use them. A quick internet search produced a long list of organizations specializing in the term, “Online demographic measurement and design solutions.”

Founded in 1999, Comscore began by measuring trends in e-commerce. The company expanded by launching a U.S. database in 2000 followed by the company’s commercial launch in 2001. Today their website lists dozens of products and services ranging from Cross Media Measurement and Technology Tracking . They also provide products like Mobilens an informational tool on mobile trends and user behavior. Comscore supports industry specific databases ranging from consumer-packaged goods to gaming.

Another company that is not new to digital research is eMarketer . Founded in 1996, eMarketer provides business information services such as data aggregation, filtering and organization. eMarketer gathers research data from more than 4,000 sources worldwide.

A quick review of the resource list revealed the popular social media sites Facebook and YouTube. Search engines Google and Yahoo! also made the list.

eMarketer ‘s approach to research is to put together content from many different resources and then evaluate the information. This research is compiled into blogs, reports and research articles. eMarketer’s provides clients market estimates and projections from segments like mobile internet users to digital TV.

Why is all of the information about research important to understand? If you get annoyed with the requests for your age, gender etc… on entering a new site, remember this data tells businesses like Amazon what kinds of books you like so they can continue personalizing the ads directly for you.

[Via http://anitamedia.wordpress.com]

Penguin Place Now On Facebook

2010-01-26T05:19:00.000+02:00

As if you didn’t have enough penguins in your life, now you can sign up to be a fan of Penguin Place on our new Facebook page. Well, it’s not actually a new page as we set it up in the Fall, but we ( I ) never really got around to making anything of it since the launch. Been too busy packing my kids school lunches, blogging, ice fishing and taking care of other important penguin related activities to get around to the Penguin Place Facebook Fan Page. But, there’s nothing like a real rainy January day to motivate you to catch up on things you’ve ( I’ve ) been meaning to do, and this was one of them. So, go sign up so I can see what you look like and perhaps what witty penguin comments you have to make.

A Rare Photo Of Young Penguins Ice Fishing In Western Mass

[Via http://penguinplacepost.wordpress.com]

Stop Looking Back and Start Getting Stronger

2010-01-24T05:51:00.000+02:00

So I’ve thought a lot lately about how much life changes you. It’s obvious, we all know that we’re going to grow and move on. I was looking back on old relationships (friends, lovers, etc) and laughed. I found an ex-boyfriend and friended him on Facebook. Eeek. Yes I did the horrible deed. What happened surprised me though. Instead of the normal nostalgia of past love, I was disgusted. Here this person I spent years loving, taking care of, encouraging, nurturing, crying over is a jerk. I mean, a really big jerk. He’s all cocky now, and he has NOTHING to be proud of. He’s exactly the person I would never ever dream of being with. He still thinks it is cool to have lame jobs, goes to shows, plays his music, but ::gasp:: he now thinks he is cooler than everyone else. He enjoys putting other people down, making fun of those who are not in his circle, and is vegetarian. If you knew the context, you’d be shocked. After two years of dating he had his first salad after me pestering him. He only at chicken fingers! Now he’s so into himself and his life, he actually appears to be obsessed with…himself. This is not the type of self-love we ladies like to encourage and strive to have. We’re talking about an all out love-fest for being an ass. Eww. I wasted that much time on him? Yet I felt some satisfaction, I admit, at realizing I was too good for him and ending that relationship was one of the most brilliant moves on my part. Where would I be if I was still with Jerkface? That’s a scary thought.

Already my life is a complete change. I began to think about how much further I am to reaching my goals than many other people I have moved past. Although I’m still a mess (you really don’t want to see my bedroom), not able to do everything on my own (hey, I cook…the boyfriend should have to clean right? I mean, I have the right to be lazy on that front!), I do take care of myself and others well (I think). I make ends meet, and I’m moving towards a healthy life. I have the most amazing family, boyfriend, dog, and even my work is pretty great.

So why is it that we fall for these guys when we are young and really believe that our love is going to change them? That they will suddenly just realize out of the blue that they want the same life as you, have the same goals, will want to make you happy until the day you die, can keep up a home, marry you and bring you the children you’ve always dreamed of? Are we trying to fail ourselves? Maybe. I really believe we are all pretty idealistic, hoping for something that we might not ever get. The point is, we all have a male in our past that we can look back and say ‘What the hell was that all about?’ and whether we can laugh about it does not matter. We got ourselves out and we feel encouraged to move forward with what will truly fulfill us.

I believe that this makes us women strong. Not the kind of strength that most men would consider important or even, possibly, call a strength. We have the ability to really look back and absorb the truths of our life. We might make mistakes like meeting that random dude from online at a coffee shop who looks about 100lbs heavier than in his photo and after realizing it was indeed him, deciding to be the nice person and sit and talk to him just to have him take one look at your body and tell you “You’re not my type. I like my girls thinner.” while you almost choke on your Venti Caramel Macchiato. Yes, Mr. 400lb Man just told me, a curvy girl who had an honest picture up and at least has a pretty face and a strong mind, that I was not good enough for him because apparently I’m fat! At any rate a woman’s strength is knowing where to put her love and energy. We are gifted with a lot of intuition. We instinctively know what we need and want in life, and as long as we can keep on the path with the least amount of detours we get stronger in our beliefs. Whether that be our goals, or our real values, we become a lot more mindful of our decisions. We stick up for them and believe in them.

The book that may change everything.

I got a recommendation for a book called Strength’s Finder 2.0 which you can purchase at Amazon for $10. Instead of talking about what we’re not good at, and what we struggle to do, this book tells you what you are actually good at. As a woman, I think way too much about what I should be doing, could be doing, wish I was better at, etc. It’s really not helpful. I mean, I’m never going to like washing dishes. I’m never going to be an athlete. I’m really bad about procrastinating even things I like to do. I get stressed out about things that make absolutely no sense. You probably don’t want me to be the one making decisions about what is worth keeping when sorting through the house. I will be the one saying ‘oh but that’s so cute’ and not thinking about how functional it is to keep cards from my 4th grade. Do we get further by worrying and obsessing about a life we don’t have? Not really. It generally just makes miserable – not a very strong point for woman-kind. What this book does is explain that instead of working on ourselves constantly to be better at things we are not that great at, we should be looking at our strengths and improving them. If we spent more time thinking about all the positives in life, we would certainly be more content! Why wouldn’t we want to learn what makes us special and helpful to the world? We should! We should make what we’re good at great! If we worked on what our strong points are, we could improve our lifestyles monetarily, emotionally, physically and spiritually.

Tonight I’m going to take the test. Oh yes, it has a test. Nice thing is we can’t get a bad grade! There are 5 things that our strengths in this book, and I’m going to find out what exactly mine are. This is my step towards becoming an even stronger female. I encourage you to do the same! $10 to make me realize a better way to deal with life, give me a pick up that is not java induced (speaking of which, this is only costing me 2 of my Starbucks drinks), and maybe teach me on how to improve those…well that’s totally worth it.

[Via http://lessonsinladylalaland.wordpress.com]

Enhance Your Facebook Fan Page

2010-01-24T05:27:00.000+02:00

Facebook fan pages are a great way to jump in on the social networks. You can create a profile for your brand and your employees, customers and friends can become fans of your brand. When you have a new product, an event or any announcement you can use your Facebook fan page to send an alert to all your fans. Beyond the normal features that come with a fan page, there are a variety of applications you can add to the fan page to make it more fun and more search-engine friendly.

Facebook pages are now being given SEO friendly URL’s which means fan pages are being indexed by Google more frequently. If you put a link to your main site from your Facebook fan page, that link is “nofollow”. However, if you add the RSS feed application to your page and start pulling in posts from your blog and press releases, those links will provide a kickback. The keywords from the RSS feed will start enhancing your fan page’s searchability and subsequently give you more exposure. Other great Facebook applications include quizzes, photostreams, video applications and more. Have fun and add value to your page, and your visitors will follow.

www.industrialsearchenginemarketing.com

[Via http://mindmapsza.wordpress.com]

Welcome to Wordpress MBC

2010-01-23T05:52:00.000+02:00

We live in what is called the Information Age. Just one generation ago, Americans found out about what happened in the world around them by tuning in to a 30 minute televised news broadcast at 6:30 each evening. Walter Cronkite, who only recently passed away, was the very first news anchor. Today, with broadband mobile devices and public access to high speed Internet, we are never more than a few seconds removed from breaking news that happens anywhere on the globe. There are of course those people that Tweet each individual item they put into their shopping cart, resulting in what the kids call TMI (too much information).

The point is that any data can be accessed instantaneously, and to overlook the potential to share the Gospel would be foolish. I wish to welcome Manchester Baptist Church in Manchester, KY to WordPress. They tried a website a year or two ago, but I am now pleased to see them here. Earlier this evening, The Master’s Table saw it’s 100,000th visitor since it’s inception in May of 2008. While most readers are somewhere in the United States, even I have been surprised to see some of the countries that show up on the visitor map. I may never visit New Zealand, but I’ve had nine readers from there in the past ten days. This is a vehicle to transmit any piece of information across the street or around the world. A sermon I preached last Easter may be read by someone seeking Christ tomorrow. As an increasing number of people are connected to blogs, Facebook and Twitter, it would be an epic failure of the Great Commission to not put the Word of God out there using those tools.

MBC will most likely use their posts to convey announcements, schedule changes, list prayer requests and remind us to attend Sunday School. But sooner or later someone will write an e-mail from some place like India, or a former Soviet state, to say that they listened to Bro. Ken’s Sunday sermon and got saved. The promise of scripture holds true: the Word will not return void.

[Via http://themasterstable.wordpress.com]

The Ongoing Price of Internet Scams

2010-01-23T05:27:00.000+02:00

The response to our first blog post on Internet Scams was overwhelmingly positive. The post is popping up all over the net and is being forwarded like crazy! What this means is that people are protecting others who may be vulnerable to a scammer’s finely polished con game.

With all the contact MIDNIGHT IN CHICAGO has with Federal, Provincial and municipal government employees, representatives, and policy makers in both the US and Canada, as well as ties to autism and disability organizations worldwide, one of our main objectives it to continue to provide useful and factually correct information to those who follow us online be it on our blog, via social networks or elsewhere on the Internet.

As we said in our previous blog entry, we have quite a bit to say about internet scams and the high price people pay when they do not perform the DUE DILLIGENCE necessary regarding the causes to which they donate. This post will provide supplementary information on a very important subject, the basics of which were covered in our first post.

Again we remind you that people on the Autism spectrum are particularly vulnerable to internet scams, internet bullying, threats, and intimidation. We’ve even heard of cases where people on the spectrum were threatened with blackmail by individuals involved in fundraising if the Spectrumite continued to ask questions and investigate the cause and the persons and/or organizations in charge of the fundraising.

In such circumstances, we recommend contacting your own legal representative to see if it warrants discussing the matter further with law enforcement officials with the intent of filing charges.

Now getting back to the main topic …

We believe it was important to tell our readers a little bit more about what the Federal Trade Commission says about Charitable Scams, and we will continue to use the Haiti disaster as an example since so many Internet scams have sprung up since the horrible tragedy occured earlier this month.

We’ll begin by saying that the people in Haiti are hurting very badly and they absolutely need as much assistance as can be provided to them. In our last blog post, we listed out three of the many ways that people can donate safely to the cause, knowing that, in all good conscience, the money is definitely going to help the Haitians in their time of great need. There are certainly other safe ways to donate than the ones we listed and we encourage people to conduct Due Diligence once they have found an organization that fits with your beliefs.

The following information comes directly from the United States Federal Trade Commission website. The FTC is the American consumer protection agency for those who are unfamiliar with the organization. Unless otherwise noted by MIDNIGHT IN CHICAGO, all of the information excerpted herein is strictly that of the FTC.

When you are considering donating your money, services or products to a charity or a cause, the most obvious warning signs include, but are not limited to, the following:

1) the organization or individual refuses to provide written information about its identity, its mission, its costs, and how the donation will be used;

2) the organization or individual will not provide proof that a contribution is tax deductible;

3) the organization or individual uses a name that closely resembles that of a better-known, reputable organization;

4) the organization or individual thanks a potential donor for a pledge the person doesn’t remember making;

5) the organization or individual asks a potential contributor for bank account or credit card information before the person has reviewed the organization’s information and agreed to contribute;

6) the organization or individual uses high-pressure tactics to secure a donation before the potential donor has had a chance to make an informed decision about giving;

7) the organization or individual asks for donations in cash;

8) the organization or individual offers to send a courier or overnight delivery service to collect the donation immediately; and/or

9) the organization or individual guarantees sweepstakes winnings in exchange for a contribution.

MIDNIGHT IN CHICAGO adds that if you observe people representing a cause or a charitable organization try to obscure, obliterate, or spam off the net, etc., any questions or complaints about the cause or the organizers’ tactics, the charity itself or the cause ought to be regarded with suspicion. For instance, in reviewing blogs, message boards, et al associated with a cause, look for deleted posts about the charity or cause while glowing comments from the people working towards the success of the fundraiser still stand.

To continue with what the FTC says on the subject:

All reputable charitable organizations and organizers of fundraisers are known for what is termed ”good practices.” Whether you are contacted by telephone, mail, online, via social networks, or in person, the employees — be they volunteers or professional fundraisers — will answer any and all of your questions to your satisfaction or they will put you in contact with someone within the organization or cause who can provide you with the correct and factual information.

While current events and disasters make a compelling case for soliciting your money, be wary of organizers that seem to come up out of nowhere. While some may be reputable, it’s doubtful that they have the infrastructure to get the donations to the affected area or people. Still others are defintely disreputable, and they will disappear as quickly with your money as they appeared on the scene when the current event or disaster occurred.

Always ask for physical contact information including the name of the contact person, physical address, and telephone number where any and all questions can be answered to your satisfaction.

Check to see if the charity or fundraiser must be registered in your area by contacting the office that regulates charitable organizations and charitable solicitations. If so, check to see if the company you’re talking to is registered. For a list of state offices, visit the National Association of State Charity Officials at www.nasconet.org/agencies.

Your state office also can verify how much of your donation goes to the charity, and how much goes to fund raising and management expenses. You also can check out charities with the Better Business Bureau’s (BBB) Wise Giving Alliance and GuideStar.

Don’t be shy about asking who wants your money. Some charities hire professional fundraisers for large-scale mailings, telephone drives, and other solicitations, rather than their own staff or volunteers. They use a portion of the donations to pay the fundraiser’s fees.

If you’re solicited for a donation, ask if the caller is a paid fundraiser, who they work for, and the percentage of your donation that will go to the charity and to the fundraiser. If you don’t get a clear answer -— or if you don’t like the answer you get -— strongly consider donating to a different organization.

Contact the organization or research — via reputable newspaper articles – any individual who is to benefit from your donation. Confirm that the recipient is aware of the solicitation and, in the case of an organization, that it has authorized the use of its name when soliciting funds. If not, you may be dealing with a scam artist.

Watch out for similar sounding names. Some phony charities use names that sound a lot like those of legitimate, reputable organizations. For example, if you are contacted by someone claiming to be raising funds for the “Red Crosses” rather than the “Red Cross” there is intent to mislead on the part of the fundraiser. If you notice a small difference from the name of the charity you intend to deal with, call the organization and alert them to this problem. They have legal representatives who can, and will, take on the phony charity.

Make a note on your desk or wall calendar when you donate. That way, if and when a fundraiser contacts you again, you have easy access to the date of your last donation. If you recently donated to an organization, and you are being asked to donate again, use common sense to determine if this is merely a mix up in contact lists or if you are being scammed by a con artist alleging to work on behalf of the organization.

Additionally, sometimes callers may try to trick you by thanking you for a pledge you didn’t make. If you don’t remember making the donation or don’t have a record of your pledge, resist the pressure to give.

Be cautious of promises of guaranteed sweepstakes winnings in exchange for a contribution or payment of a “fee” to cover legal expenses, taxes, or any other associated costs. According to U.S. and Canadian law, you never have to give a donation nor do you have to pay a “fee” in order to be eligible to collect your sweepstakes winnings.

Be wary of charities offering to send a courier or overnight delivery service to collect your donation immediately.

For those who tend to be naive, discuss the donation being considered with a trusted family member or friend before committing the funds. The time to talk about it is BEFORE you donate. If, however, you have been duped, talking with a trusted family member or friend means you may be able to recoup your money by involving the local authorities.

Know the difference between “tax exempt” and “tax deductible.” Tax exempt means the organization doesn’t have to pay taxes. Tax deductible means you can deduct your contribution on your federal income tax return.

Do not send or give cash donations. Cash can be lost or stolen. If you are being scammed, a cash donation cannot be accounted for or traced. If it cannot be accounted for or traced, it also cannot be recovered. For security and tax record purposes, it’s always best to pay by check and for the check to be made payable to the charity ONLY.

Unless you have a long standing business relationship with the organization, it is best to keep your credit card in your wallet. Once you have given out your credit card number to a scammer, you may find a number of unexpected purchases and cash advances charged to your account.

Take your time. Resist the urge to “act now.” Most any offer that is good today will be good tomorrow. If you miss out on an offer because it truly is only good today, accept that this offer — as with all offers — will be offered again at a later date.

Rate the risks. Every potentially high-profit investment is a high-risk investment. That means you could lose your investment — all of it.

Read the small print. Get all promises in writing and read all paperwork before making any payments or signing any contracts. Pay special attention to the small print.

“Free” means free. Throw out any offer that says you have to pay to get a gift or a “free” gift. If something is free or a gift, you don’t have to pay for it. Period.

Report fraud. If you think you’ve been a victim of fraud, report it. It’s one way to get even with a scam artist who cheated you. By reporting your complaint to 1-877-FTC-HELP or ftc.gov, you are providing important information to help law enforcement officials track down scam artists and stop them!

And finally, we would like to thank the many people who have supported us by forwarding “The Price of Internet Scams” via Twitter, Blogger, WordPress, MySpace, Facebook, and other reputable social networks as well as via websites such as The Netted Web, Tap Canada Blog, Alimustikasari, and the U.S. Major League Soccer website.

If you believe an organization may not be operating for charitable purposes, or is making misleading solicitations, contact your state Attorney General or your local consumer protection agency. You can get the phone numbers for these organizations in your phone book, through directory assistance, or through Web directories.

The FTC works for the consumer to prevent fraudulent, deceptive, and unfair business practices in the marketplace and to provide information to help consumers spot, stop, and avoid them.

To file a complaint or to get free information on consumer issues, visit ftc.gov or call toll-free, 1-877-FTC-HELP (1-877-382-4357); TTY: 1-866-653-4261. The FTC enters consumer complaints into the Consumer Sentinel Network, a secure online database and investigative tool used by hundreds of civil and criminal law enforcement agencies in the U.S. and abroad.

We have been told by many that it is indeed in the interest of people on the spectrum to pass this information along in order to put as many people as possible in the know about Internet Scams. Many people on the autism spectrum fall prey to these scams because of a natural inability to successfully navigate the social maze; their own naivete and honesty creates a mindset where it is virtually impossible for these spectrumites to ferret out duplicity when it presents itself.

MIDNIGHT IN CHICAGO therefore invites bloggers and website owners to re-post any of our blog entries provided that MIDNIGHT IN CHICAGO, Thomas Taylor, and Elyse Bruce are credited with the authorship along with a link back to the original blog entry. If you read a blog written by someone on the spectrum, be sure to ask them to copy and paste this blog entry as well as “The Price of Internet Scams.”

We would like to thank WrongPlanet.net for spearheading the way in this endeavor. MIDNIGHT IN CHICAGO was pleased when we discovered that WrongPlanet.net twittered The Price of Internet Scams. When we last checked, WrongPlanet.net had over 30,000 subscribers.

MIDNIGHT IN CHICAGO adds that if people try to compel you to share with them your password to e-mail accounts, bank accounts, or other personal accounts, these people are not acting in your best interest and may be involved in unscrupulous practices. Some of them will do so under the guise of being your ‘friend’ in order to gain your trust so they can achieve their goal of securing your private and confidential personal information. Refuse to co-operatie and be sure to report them to the authorities.

There is a significant amount of crime on the internet. Be wary, and surf safely. The price of unscrupulous internet solicitations is high.

Pass it on!

[Via http://midnightinchicago.wordpress.com]

Haiti from my living room

2010-01-21T05:42:00.000+02:00

The amount of information, detail and horror is astounding. In just a few clicks I can watch video interviews with Haitian people who survived the earthquake and are now living among rotting corpses, with no food and unsanitary living conditions. And thanks to new media, I can see the devastation in high definition – instantly.

As off-putting as watching all of this makes me feel, the changes in media have made so many good things possible. People are tweeting updates, posting information about missing and found loved ones, and donating money to relief efforts by dialing a few numbers on their cell phones.

So here I sit in my living room, scanning through photos posted five days ago – only a few days after the earthquake. The photos showed dead bodies covered in cloth, people crying, destroyed buildings. But perhaps the most gruesome image I saw was the image of a dump truck pouring bodies into a mass grave. It leaves me wondering how people like me are supposed to feel knowing that we have the ability and comfort to watch this tragedy happen while so many suffer.

But I’ll take a step back and examine the good things that new media has done to help us in the wake of such a tragedy. New media and the numerous capabilities of the internet have allowed us to do many things to help those who are suffering. The donations via text messaging is just one form. After the earthquake wreaked havoc on so many families in Haiti, websites sprung up for people to sponsor Haitian children. These websites allow people to donate to specific types of relief such as funding for clean water and food.

Though technology was advanced enough that I was able to watch the 9/11 terrorist attack live in 2001, new media was still in beginning stages. One of the main differences that we see today is how new technology has taken us into the moment from the perspectives of people who experienced both the before and after. When journalists went in after the 9/11 attacks, we saw a lot of the tragedy from the perspective of journalists and news media. The situation with Hurricane Katrina was very similar in that sense. Yes, we were able to get journalists in the area to report on what was important to the people who experienced the tragedy. The difference now is that those people who are experiencing the tragedy in Haiti are sharing that experience more directly with the online and mobile audience. Because of the new media abilities, we are receiving information from people without the interference of a middleman.

I first learned about the earthquake from the NPR application on my iPod Touch the same day it happened. To have instant access to information in the palm of my hand – literally – is an enormous turnaround in the way that we send and receive information. Now that we have this ability, it might be a good time to consider pulling traditional journalists out of Haiti so that they aren’t using what few resources are available. We’ll still get coverage about what’s going on without adding to the problem. There will be room for more traditional journalism coverage later.

[Via http://sabrinarblack.wordpress.com]

Facebook Get's a TON of Eyeballs!

2010-01-21T05:36:00.000+02:00

by Lance Rios

@beinglatino

http://www.facebook.com/beinglatino

After a minor upgrade to Facebook’s insight application for Fan pages, Facebook now can show the administrator of fan pages total impressions by post. For those that do not live in the media marketing/advertising world, impressions show how many people actually are seeing whatever content that is put out there… often referred to as “total eyeballs”. This may not seem like a big deal for some, but for others, this can offer a HUGE opportunity to be more creative with their company and/or other companies to show a reach to a niche audience.

Facebook’s newly implemented “Impressions” are factored by total clicks, comments and also include likes. Major move up for fan pages on Facebook to differentiate themselves from other social networking tools that can reach the masses.

Being Latino is in a great place! And Zuckerberg — you’re a friggin’ genius!

[Via http://lancerios.wordpress.com]

Facebook - Better Than Twitter for Marketing?

2010-01-19T13:42:00.000+02:00

By Amy Porterfield

Published January 18, 2010

The team at Social Media Examiner recently received a real gold mine of social media insight. It’s a mega report recently released by MarketingProfs called, “The State of Social Media Marketing.” This massive report highlights social media usage, strategy and predictions for 2010. And this article will bring you a small look at some of the findings from this content-rich report.

By the way, MarketingProfs used a three-tiered approach to craft this study, including consulting with a panel of social media experts, surveying more than 5,000 MarketingProfs readers and asking comScore to mine its panel data. This approach adds greater integrity and scope to the overall results.

#1: What’s “Normal” in Social Media Usage?

How often are marketers posting on some of the most popular social sites such as Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn? Here’s a snapshot of the frequency of posts: … read more on the Social Media Examiner blog;

http://www.socialmediaexaminer.com/new-study-reveals-facebook-better-than-twitter-for-marketers/

[Via http://karinconway.wordpress.com]

Afro-Squad Fans on Facebook???

2010-01-19T13:34:00.000+02:00

The Afro-Squad Army is pretty large. We have members out in Texas, Florida, Alabama, Georgia, Michigan, and even Europe. In fact, we seem to have members that we don’t even know. (I once heard of a Yukon Afro-Squad, led by a much colder SnowMan.)

As an example of a member that we don’t know, somebody started an Afro-Squad Facebook page. We are not sure who started it, but good for them.

http://www.facebook.com/home.php?#/group.php?gid=48518595678&ref=search&sid=1169912232.808606722..1

I don’t know if they plan to update the page, but hopefully they will proliferate the funky beat for which the Afro-Squad Army marches to.

The SnowMan

PS – That page is not necessarily approved by the Afro-Squad.

[Via http://afrosquad.wordpress.com]

Tweakin' out...

2010-01-17T05:31:00.000+02:00

I don’t know what day it is, but I’m starting to have some urges. I have controlled them, but I find myself unconsciously thinking of status updates that I can post, people whose pictures I want to see, etc etc.

I’ve started to run into complications with birthdays too, as in my ex-roommate’s (not one of the three crazy bitches, obvs) birthday is tomorrow and I didn’t know, and ANOTHER ex-roommate’s (I lived in her breakfast nook – I guess I should get writing about that someday) birthday was the week before. I feel bad for not knowing, but it does expose how much of a crutch facebook had turned into for me. I have resolved to collect the birthdays of those in my contact lists (god help me if I kill this blackberry like I did the last one) to make sure I’m not such a jackass friend being like “oh hai, I know your bday is soon, but I’m not quite sure when… happy birthday!?”.

Replying to events is getting trickier too. A friend of mine is having a dinner for his birthday next week and I’m going, but I’m not on facebook so he’s desperate for me to respond to him either by RSVP’ing to the event or sending him a message. On facebook. My S.O. is going, and he’s RSVP’d, so I just told him to count us as two instead of one.

I think I might have to login soon just to make sure I haven’t missed any birthdays. Don’t want to though. We’ll see how long I can last! So far I’ve just replaced FB with Jezebel (& TV) and have made no headway on reading more or going through my recipe books. Perhaps that can be my project for a lazy Sunday tomorrow.

[Via http://runningwithavagina.wordpress.com]

Let's Talk About Social Media Sites

2010-01-17T05:29:00.000+02:00

Social media sites are becoming more and more popular each year. Don’t believe me……then read along.

The journey on social media started late 1990s and early 2000s but in the last few years, it has really caught up. Let’s check a few stats that would make it interesting. In in 2008 ( informations do not include December 2008). The most popular social media video site was Blogger (222 million), Facebook (200 million), MySpace (126 million), WordPress (114 million).

End of 2009, Facebook has more than 350 million active users, 50% of our active users log on to Facebook in any given day, more than 35 million users update their status each day.

Popularity of Twitter is also growing.

In 2008 there were 6 million (3.8% of all adult internet users), in 2009 : 18 million (11.1%), and for the year 2010 it’s predicted that there will be 26 million (15.5%) users.

Then there is YouTube which had 13 % of increase in views of videos to year 2007.It definitely dominated the market in the number of videos and number of visitors. In November 2009, 128.1 million viewers watched more than 12 billion videos on YouTube.com (94.3 videos per viewer).

The best month for video industry was December 2008, when, according to the research done by ComScore, videos were watched by over 30milion users, clips were watched by 4 billion times.

In November 2009 -

Google Sites had 129 million unique viewers ,

Yahoo Sites were on the second place with more than 55 million viewers (8.5 videos per viewer),

Fox Interactive Media with 50 million viewers (8.9 videos per viewer)),

Viacom Digital,Microsoft Sites, Time Warner-Excl AOL, AOL LLC, Disney Online, ESPN and CBS Corporation.

From video ad networks, in November 2009,Tremor Media,.took the first place with a potential reach of 85 million viewers, (49.8 percent of the total viewing audience). Advertising.com Video Network was on the second place with a potential reach of 80 million viewers (47.1 percent ), third is YuMe Video Network with 73 million viewers (43.0 percent).Other notable findings from November 2009 include:

Here are some more statistical informations from ComScore for November 2009:.

The average online video viewer watched 12.2 hours of video.

38.6 million viewers watched 333.4 million videos on MySpace.com (8.6 videos per viewer).
The average Hulu viewer watched 21.1 videos, totaling 2.1 hours of videos per viewer.
The duration of the average online video was 4.0 minutes.

So, as statistics shows , importance of social media and their popularity, not just for entertainment but also for business purposes, is constantly growing and this tendency will inevitably continue.

So, what are you thinking join the bandwagon.

[Via http://sociallycharged.wordpress.com]

Aid to Haiti

2010-01-16T05:08:00.000+02:00

As death rates rise and aid continues to pour into Haiti post earthquake, it cannot come fast enough. There are no words to adequately describe this tragedy, and my thoughts are with those suffering and toiling. This post will outline resources available to donate to nonprofits working there.

The International Red Cross is a White House recommended organization. Donations are made here and fund medical aid and efforts to reunite families separated by this tragedy. Donations of $10 can also be made and charged to your cell phone bill by texting “HAITI” to 90999.

UNICEF has issued a call for $120 million to support relief efforts through its post in Port-Au-Prince. Donations support the children affected by this disaster and are made here.

CARE, mentioned in the Worldly Nonprofit here, is looking for donations to address the immediate needs of people affected by the earthquake, especially women and children. Donations are made here.

The sustainable development nonprofit in Cap Haitien, Konbit Sante, mentioned in an earlier post has set up an earthquake response fund to address the immediate needs of the country. Already contributing $25,000 from its reserves, monies contributed will go to the now air-lifted patients of Justinian hospital. Donations are made here.

Mercy Corps, a Portland, OR-based nonprofit mentioned here and here in the Worldly Nonprofit, is aggressively seeking donations to offer immediate humanitarian aid as well as offer psychological support and job infrastructure long-term. Donations are made here and by starting a fundraising page.

Doctors Without Borders is currently hoping to expand their surgical capacity and seek donations for their Emergency Relief Fund. Donations are made here.

Informationally, The American Red Cross has a good update-style blog. The White House blog contains timely informations about US efforts in Haiti. Included in the blog is a link for the Center for International Disaster Information. Mark Turner, former Financial Times journalist, writes from within Haiti in his Blog, Dispatches From a Fragile Island. The Charity Water website has a great blog with information photos and links to their partner organizations, Partners in Health and Concern Worldwide. Finally, the Facebook page, Global Disaster Relief is a tool for donation, connection and news updates.

Here is Obama’s statement yesterday after his call with President Preval of Haiti:

[Via http://sarahkassel.com]

New Media, Day 1

2010-01-16T04:56:00.000+02:00

Tuesday is New Media day.

The first day of any class is always interesting. Tuesday’s first day of new media was actually really interesting. Not like I was expecting a crappy class or anything, but the topics covered were essentially on the forefront of what is going on in the ad world. So what did we talk about? Social Media – Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn.

Social Media is what it’s all about. Don’t believe me? Well, you most likely used some version of Social Media to get here. Arguably, this is essentially Social Media as it is.

Don’t believe that Facebook is important in business? Check this out: http://www.socialmediaexaminer.com/11-mind-blowing-reasons-your-business-needs-facebook/

Highlights include “Average Facebook User Spends 55 Minutes PER DAY on Facebook”. 55 minutes?!? Literally, almost an hour. Reflecting on that stat, I realize that it’s pretty dang true.

The great thing to see is that it really doesn’t matter if you “just have a page”. You need to INVOLVE your people. Involving fans of your brand is key. They are the zealots, let them spread your word. Example? Burger King’s de-friend campaign. Essentially, Burger King said if you de-friend 10 friends, they’d give you a free cheeseburger. Sacrificing your friends for food? Yeah why not. It’s effect? Facebook essentially gave them a “stop it now ’cause we want people to have friends here” letter.

The big three currently? Facebook (leader in socializing among friends, family and random hook-ups), Twitter (leader in attempts to create successful one-liners in 140 characters or less), and LinkedIn (leader in attempting to legitimize socializing for work purposes and getting a new job that’s better than your current one). Some will argue MySpace. During class, we discussed how yes, MySpace has a place, but at the same time it’s a more closed in terms of its audience.

Is your business on The Big Three? It should be, but only if you know what you’re up to. Don’t waste your time if you aren’t ready to fully dive into the world of Social Media. Your fans will know if you’re just there to be there – have a purpose so they continue to care.

[Via http://thebraincokid.wordpress.com]

Social Media To The Rescue

2010-01-14T05:48:00.000+02:00

Dear Reader,

Chaos. Panic. Helpless. Everyone in the world experienced one of these feelings today.

The day after the new decade’s first catastrophe has been buzzing with action to say the least. Phone calls from relief agencies, government officials, and concerned family members and friends, the excessive click-clack of keyboards and phone buttons providing real-time updates of the situation in Haiti worldwide, the New-Age ticker (tweets) incessantly updating itself every half-second, and the broadcast of pictures and raw videos from the scene in Haiti–all of this demonstrated the evolution of social media and its impact on real-time information distribution, journalism, relief efforts, and overall support.

Today was a test for social media’s significance in our society, and it passed with flying colors.

The New York Times reported earlier today that a campaign to collect donations for relief efforts in Haiti–spearheaded by the company mGive and the State Department–in brought in $1.2 million. Yes that’s right. Thanks to the text-to-donate initiative or “mobile giving,” as Tony Aiello, chief executive of mGive calls it the public rallied in what could be the swiftest, most efficient way to collect funds for a cause. Read more about the mGive and the initiative HERE .

In other media outlets, social networking sites Twitter and Facebook gave the world a view of the devastation in Haiti–in real-time. Facebook groups such as “Pray for Haiti” were growing in membership by the hour, while Twitter churned out hundreds of tweets before the blink of an eye. Organizations such as the Red Cross, the UN, and government agencies took to online social media to mobilize. ABC reports on the use of social media throughout the day HERE.

Though this is only the beginning, I can say for sure that today’s technology has helped tremendously. I replay the magnitude of support that was obtained from those outside of Haiti today in mind over and over again; and it is almost unfathomable to think of the speed in which it came.

But it is far from over. Pray for Haiti

[Via http://npintern.wordpress.com]

Too Much Information?

2010-01-14T05:36:00.000+02:00

Facebook has been recently been under fire after making changes to their privacy settings. This change made some user info public and some claim that Facebook is trying to bank on making that content the public. Also, founder Mark Zuckerburg, claims that he knows what consumers want – and it’s NOT privacy.

I came across another article that made me question Facebook’s policies. Basically, in their vast databases, Facebook is keeping track of who you “stalk”. Scary or expected? And it is accessible through a “master” password? Wonder if this is fact or fiction…

Speaking of things to expect (or not expect), I was just browsing Mashable and I was NOT logged into my Facebook/Mashable account. I found myself on their little badge. Not sure how it happened but scary nonetheless.

[Via http://amindfullofblanks.wordpress.com]

NEW HOME TRENDS: Towel Warmer Rack Radiator - ladder style radiators Bosporus by Aeon

2010-01-12T05:49:00.000+02:00

A towel warmer rack is definitely up there on our list of bathroom luxuries. The Bosporus ladder style radiators by Aeon wrap you in a toasty towel after your shower of bath, so cozy comfort is always within reach. This minimalist radiator design by Saffet Kalender is as lovely to look at as it is to touch. The modern, stainless steel towel warmer radiator boasts a five-rung design that increases in depth from the base to the top, forming an airing shelf with plenty storage for a stack of rolled or folded towels. At the base, a pair of rails offers easy access and extra storage. Cranking up the heat a notch or two, the Bosporus Z is an enhanced design with a rear radiator for added warmth. The Bosporus has a heat output of 630W, and the Bosporus Z gives off 1272W. Check out these towel warmer racks at Aeon.

[Via http://erniearrizza.wordpress.com]

dose of OMGs...

2010-01-12T05:42:00.000+02:00

deep fried cupcakes?!

this is why you don’t add your parents, aunts and uncles as your fb friends! with the exception of me why? because i am cool like that!

obviously the techies behind google are male chauvinist and maniacs!

hahahha! FAIL!

[Via http://villavilla.wordpress.com]

2010-01-10T05:29:00.000+02:00

Some man is stumbling down the street outside yelling something incomprehensible at the top of his lungs over and over. It makes me wonder how people get that crazy. And it makes me happy, that after all of the looney stuff I have been through I am still in one piece. I’m not the smartest, most beautiful, most eccentric, most talented, and charming person in the world. But I’m not too bad. I’m pretty damn good actually.

I still spend most of my time alone. Maybe this is what really irked me when J took me off of facebook, because I’m normally the one to do something so paranoid and unsociable. I’m used to drawing away and hiding in a corner, being pulled out to play, and communicate. But this I suppose is changing as I find my niche, and feel less bad about dropping the people and things that have in the past misunderstood and misused me. Tomorrow I have the day off. I will be walking around in a zone listening to my ipod, stretching my legs, imagining what possibilities await me in the future. Life really is not bad. I hope Aunt D won’t be too offended or too aware of the fact I exed her from my Facebook. I thought, oh what the hell, I’m going to just take a load of people off. J thought I was too nosy maybe. Well maybe I am. My dad got paid to be undercover and nosy. I just do it for free. All the time. I naturally snoop. That’s why I suppose I don’t mind other people’s snoopiness, I just may take you off my page if you leave me a billion mundane comments about the weather, and misspelled too.

Tomorrow I have to finish the Solitaire Mystery. And maybe I’ll take myself to see Avatar. Or maybe I’ll just wander like I said, like a nomad, like a viking, like a pirate…

If only AH were here to help me steal ketchup from the university cafeteria. Lol, we we’re completely out of our minds and it was perfectly normal and fine =)

I miss it.

I wish certain people would move to Pandora with me, I already know I would prefer it.

[Via http://blueeyecloud.wordpress.com]

Morning adventures

2010-01-10T05:17:00.000+02:00

I have this strange routine that I follow each morning. When I get out of bed the first thing I do is pick up my iPhone to check my face book. I follow this by opening the blinds and staring at the world for good 5 minutes. I don’t know why I do the latter; without this routine I feel like I am missing something. It’s like I mentally prepare myself to tackle the obstacles the day might have for me; or something like that. This routine is usually very uninteresting. All I see is snow, neighbors leaving for work, cars skidding and sliding on the street – you know the usual stuff.

However, this morning I came across something very “new.” I was taking in the view when suddenly a man on skis entered the frame. Yes you heard me; I asked myself is this real? That guy actually skiing on the street? Na, this has to be a dream. He skied down the street and waved at my neighbor. The “WTF” look on my neighbor’s face confirmed the realness and weirdness of this situation. For the next few minutes I sat there, trying to figure out what had really happened.

Also, I regret I couldn’t capture this moment on film.

I am KudiPunjaban and I..oh whatever man..that dude was really skiing on the street. Share similar stories if you have any.

[Via http://kudipunjaban.wordpress.com]

Youtube - Has Internet Killed Television?

2010-01-09T13:42:00.000+02:00

I have to say that over the past year or so Youtube has become a part of my daily internet experience.

I find that I am watching more and more content online rather than on Television.

The way that a lot of “Youtubers” (people that upload videos to Youtube) are keeping audiences varies.

Although the one main tactic is consistency and social networking and interaction.(ie. Twitter, Facebook, Personal Webpages)

Yes the Youtubers are getting paid by Google to upload videos, they are “Partners” and share in revenue from advertisements

The below is stolen straight from Youtube:

As a YouTube partner, you will be able to share in revenue-generating opportunities.

* Share revenue from relevant InVideo ads overlaid on your videos and banner ads running next to your videos to earn money

* Participate in co-marketing & branded entertainment opportunities with top brand advertisers.

* Utilize your own sales to sell your own ads.

So clearly the incentive to upload videos is there but really, how many videos can someone make before they run out of things to talk about?

Well that is where the Vlog (video blog) comes in.

I know of two Youtubers/Partners that utilize the vlog for their YouTube channels – CharlesTrippy and ShayCarl

They both video their everyday lives EVERYDAY.

Charles Trippy and Ali Speed do a daily Vlog, they include nearly every aspect of their lives for the Youtube viewers.

From weddings, engagements and international travel to a LOT of rollercoasters they record it all.

They same goes for Youtuber ShayCarl and the ShayTards – he also records his daily life, I have to say he is quite entertaining.

Charles, Alli and Shay must be doing something right – the daily videos normally clock well over the 100,000 views per day.

Besides the daily Vlogs there are also music channels, comedy and skit channels and a huge amount of unsigned or undiscovered talent hanging around on YouTube.

Taking some time and trawling through the videos will certainly cement in your mind that over at Youtube, someone is doing something right.

Let me know in the comments who your favorite Youtube uploaders or “stars” are!

[Via http://nzblogger.wordpress.com]

Social Networking Redux

2010-01-09T05:14:00.000+02:00

Social networking evolution has been swift and is accelerating, with no end immediately in sight. It is merging with messaging and collaboration on the one hand, as well as becoming increasingly international and developing into niche areas. Defining what falls into this range is becoming increasingly difficult as new sites reach out into peripheral areas. The development pattern has been based around community creation first, then meeting the social and communications needs of those communities through site features and apps.

Over the past two years, there have been a number of important changes in social networking applications, some of which are of particular importance to business. Among these are increasing development of mobile social networks and links to mobile social networks; integration of content and access between networking sites, as between Facebook, WordPress and Twitter; and greater use of social networks by advertising and marketing.

Consolidation has been particularly important. Social networking sites are now linked to wikis, blogs, and instant messaging, effectively making older applications that simply provided these collaborative features somewhat redundant. Microsoft’s Sharepoint application remains strong in the enterprise space, but it is being used for document management and limited document-oriented collaboration rather than for more flexible social networking.

Concepts are still being defined, and social networking heavily overlaps with enterprise collaboration, Web 2.0 and Enterprise 2.0. Many of the same facilities are on offer, though branded differently aimed at different audiences. Different ways to present material are also being explored. Social networking sites are used to build community, to interact with associates, and to share material of interest that can be placed in digital form. They permit people to expand personal networks through broadcast messages (personal status, public comments, shared material, etc.) that provide personal social information in between direct contacts.

Social Networking is creating fundamental new ways of communication. While the providers struggle with ways to make it profitable, it is important to consider the impact on business. Changing the way people communicate has enormous implications both for how people work and for what products can be sold to consumers.

This is the subject of a recent Executive Update that I wrote for Cutter Consortium. It can be found at http://cutter.com.

[Via http://bjdooley.wordpress.com]

Our New Website Finally Has Content!

2010-01-07T05:35:00.000+02:00

Hi Everyone!

Great news =-) Our new website -http://www.justthegoods.net – finally has some content on it! Whooo!

What makes it different than our Etsy Shop?

Well, for starters, we’re offering a few different products ranging from items that are too awkward to ship (i.e. vegan oil immersed salt and sugar scrubs in canning jars) or are sooooooooo affordable we wanna treat our local friends and fans, first (i.e. lip balms/tints and vegan aromatic bath salts).

But, besides wanting to offer a few different products locally, we also wanted to help local shoppers navigate through the admitted maze that is our shop, blog, Flikr page, Twitter account, Facebook Fan Page, etc. etc. etc.

Say you just want to know which lip balms are available in Winnipeg, how much they cost and where you can pick them up? http://www.justthegoods.net will be your one-stop destination.

Easy? Easy!

So, click on by n’ check it out!

Oh! And, um, yeah… we know our site is lightweight as far as 21st century new media stuff goes. How lucky are we that we’re focused on Just the Goods? Seriously, I think this non-branding branding thing gets to be more useful for us every day And look at it this way, if we had to hire an awesome web designer, our stuff would probably have to cost more… and that wouldn’t be much fun, would it? Ha ha ha!!

Thanks so much for supporting us, everyone! You’re ALL awesome!!

See you again soon!

[Via http://justthegoods.wordpress.com]

I don't care about...

2010-01-07T05:33:00.000+02:00

Shashi Tharoor’s Tweets

Controversy over 3 idiots

Who is willing what in reality shows

anything that Shabana Azmi has to say

whether trains are crowded or not. If anyone has such an aversion to crowds they have no business being in Mumbai

what hollywood is upto.

What bollywood is upto. Except maybe click a picture if i spot them at a mall.

If a place is too far away, if its worth it.

not having a bike and losing 10-20% more girls that I could have pataoed just coz I have a bike.

Arundhati Roy

Telangana

TV reviews or any reviews on Indian channels. The one about gadgets on an NDTV channel is hilarious. We sit and have a great laugh at how they invite celebrities and have them give reviews like “Mere line main aisa hain ki i have to take pics and blah blah blah….. and company sponsored inserts and copy pasted tech specs”

Whether the social fabric/culture/tradition of our country will be destroyed/insulted/damaged by Richard Kissing Shilpa, 3 idiots highlighting suicides, Defaming public figures, item girls’ pelvic thrusts (worried that KUA ma gir jaungi), someone kissing someone “on the lips”, someone backless

The Khans, The Roshans or The Bachchans (well except Amitabh maybe) and what they eat, do, when they sleep, who are there in their family tree, who they slept with, who they didnt sleep with, how much they charged for weddings, how they exercise, how they poop spit and basically exist on this planet.

Who gatecrashed at the while house party? Who was a bonafide invitee to the party? The party itself.

Orkut. Facebook will soon be deleted soon.

[Via http://mywriterkeeda.wordpress.com]

A weally weally creative blog

2010-01-05T05:30:00.000+02:00

Okay, in light of the last (lengthy) post I subjected you to, I will keep this one brief and totally to the point.

Just go check out http://krishashok.wordpress.com/2007/11/29/facebook-mahabharatha/

Love how creative this is! And if you have more than a few minutes to spare, do spend some time hanging around this blog – you’re sure to find interesting gems of wit & good humor. I know I did.

Just for the record, I am not being paid to do this. But I deserve to be, don’t you agree?

[Via http://thoughtshopindia.wordpress.com]

Facebook

2010-01-05T05:14:00.000+02:00

What do you think of Facebook?

Facebook is raw material, like iron, it’s neither inherently good or bad.

Iron, huh?

Sure. Like it can be a tank that runs over you and destroys others or a skyscraper opening up new vistas.

Which is it for you?

Was. It was a bear trap that snapped shut around my ankle and kept me tethered to one spot, slowly bleeding out.

But you’re here now.

I am.

How did you get free?

I hacked off my foot and that iron trap with the blunt force of my clear thinking.

Does it still hurt?

Not anymore. But the limp reminds me that it ain’t no skyscraper for me. And it makes me wonder how many more are out there, bloody and walking in circles.

[Via http://mistergrizz.wordpress.com]

Trading Terrorist Rights for American Lives

2010-01-03T05:04:00.000+02:00

OBAMA’S TERROR FRIENDLY ADMINISTRATION IS A “SYSTEMATIC FAILURE”

The Post & E-Mail

News Summary & Analysis by JB Williams

(Jan. 2, 2010) — On Christmas Day, 2009, the first of many terror chickens to come, came home to roost when a Nigerian member of Al Qaeda climbed aboard a US commercial flight headed from Amsterdam to Detroit and attempted to set off a chemical bomb mid-flight.

Once again, civilians found themselves in the position of having to provide for their own safety and security as the folks whose primary purpose is to provide for the common defense of the people, came up sorely lacking.

Had it not been for a handful of brave patriots willing to take matters into their own hands, Flight 253 could have ended the futures of everyone on board.

This is what we should expect in a nation that puts its soldiers on trial for taking their oath seriously in the war on terror abroad, while the Obama administration offers known enemy combatants civil rights in criminal courts, by no means designed to handle the complexities of war.

In fact, when the administration sees patriotic American citizens and former military personnel as “potential domestic terrorists” – and known terrorists as mere “criminals,” this is the best outcome we can hope for…

Predictably, Obama was quick on the trigger when taking aim at the agencies responsible for securing commercial flights. As Jim Meyers reports at Newsmax, Obama told reporters: “A systemic failure has occurred, and I consider that totally unacceptable.”

Referring to the early signals, he said: “Had this critical information been shared, it could have been compiled with other intelligence and a fuller, clearer picture of the suspect would have emerged. The warning signs would have triggered red flags, and the suspect would have never been allowed to board that plane for America.”

Obama is the “systemic failure.” He and his terror-friendly administration, including US Attorney General Eric Holder, who was engaged in the legal defense on known terrorists before being named the head of the US Justice system by Barack Obama, have great difficulty separating “acts of war” from “criminal behaviors” – and – terrorists from US soldiers or even average American citizens for that matter.

As Meyers points out in his Newsmax report based upon a story in the liberal New York Times, “two federal officials told the paper that U.S. intelligence was aware that a Nigerian Muslim was preparing an attack, yet officials did nothing to give warning of such an attack.”

The paper reported Wednesday: “Two officials said the government had intelligence from Yemen before Friday that leaders of a branch of Al Qaeda were talking about ‘a Nigerian’ being prepared for a terrorist attack.” – “But despite those signals, the administration never raised a terror alert, and would-be bomber Abdulmutallab was allowed to board a plane bound for the United States.”

Gee… I wonder why an administration that sees average citizens as “potential terrorists” and actual terrorists as “common criminals” would hesitate to warn the people of the impending danger that lurks within a nation not at all serious about an enemy just as committed to death and destruction today as they were on September 11, 2001.

We are talking about the same folks who still refuse to admit that our nation is at war with extreme Islam around the globe – that we have numerous terror training facilities right here on American soil – or that the Jihadist in Ft. Hood was in fact an Al Qaeda operative in regular contact with known Al Qaeda cells in Yemen, up until he shouted “Allah Akbar” before killing a dozen unarmed soldiers at Ft. Hood.

Despite the fact that Americans in part, elected Obama on the false belief that Bush and Cheney made America “less safe” by their semi-aggressive “war on terror,” the Washington Times now reports that 85% of Americans now expect terrorist attacks to be successful on American soil in 2010. That’s a cheerful thought full of “hope” for the New Year, huh…

For a “change,” I agree with 85% of Americans…

Still, one is compelled to ask why those responsible for making certain that someone like Abdulmutallab is unable to climb aboard a US commercial flight, chose not to do so?

This is the real point isn’t it? Someone “in-the-know” chose NOT to share that information with people who could have and allegedly would have stopped Abdulmutallab from climbing aboard Flight 253. It was NOT an “intelligence failure” like 9/11/01… The guy’s own father reported his son MIA after making direct threats against the west.

He reported it to the US Embassy in Yemen, and there was plenty of time to react, had that information been shared with the appropriate agencies. Why wasn’t it?

While we’re at it, why is our federal government treating American soldiers like “enemy combatants” in military courts while offering civilians criminal courts and US Civil Rights to known enemy combatants captured on the battle field?

And here’s the biggest question of all – Why aren’t American citizens demanding answers to these and many more obvious questions?

As Democrat John F. Kennedy said so well – “A nation that is afraid to let its people judge the truth and falsehood in an open market is a nation that is afraid of its people.”

In October of 2008, I wrote a column titled Terrorists, Terrorism and Obama and nobody listened. Voters had been convinced by the leftist lame stream press that even a nobody with life-long ties to terrorists, communists and third world thugs, would be “better than Bush.”

I even asked in a column, Who is باراك حسين أوباما ? – Copy and paste this into your Google translator software. If you still don’t know who and what we elected, there may be no hope for you or the future of this once free and prosperous nation.

It didn’t take a Harvard grad to see it coming, but still, few listened. Obama’s entire past remains in hiding almost a year into his unconstitutional presidency.

A year and countless unconstitutional anti-American administrative decisions later, most Americans still aren’t listening and as a result, their future looks grim so long as they fail to ask the right questions and demand truthful answers.

Forget about where Obama may or may not have been born. This is a side show aimed at misdirecting public attention and allowing the global left to pass off all dissenters as nothing more than crackpot conspiracy theorists, while the real conspiracy continues to unfold right under our noses.

Obama is unconstitutional by bloodline. The issue of natural born Citizen is a statement of bloodline, under natural law, not birth place under common law. Obama’s father was at no time a citizen of the United States. Obama inherited his name, his religion and his citizenship from his father.

So ask again – Why are Obama & Co. friendlier towards known terrorists than towards average American citizens simply upset by the current destruction of their free republic?

If you understand that you are asking this question of an Arab-Muslim, not an African-Christian, then you can probably figure out the correct answer all on your own. Obama was born and raised Muslim, not Christian. His so-called “Christian church” in Chicago is actually a “Black Nationalist Church,” which explains the racist rants of his life-long pastor, Rev. Wright.

But if you still think you are dealing with some new age Marxist Messiah planning to unite the world with American assets, then I challenge you to come up with a single acceptable answer to the obvious questions posed in this column.

Only one more reasonable question remains… How insane does it have to get before the American people wake up, take note and take action?

Since 85% of Americans expect successful terror attacks on USA soil in 2010, it’s clear that 85% of Americans understand that we are indeed, still at war with international Islamic terror. So, why did they elect leaders hell-bent upon helping those terrorists succeed?

Now most Americans are able to see the anti-American Marxist “change” Obama had in mind for America. So, at what point do the people awake and arise in defense of this great nation?

I worry that JFK was right about something else – “Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable.”

Cut off from legislators, ignored by the White House, denied access to the courts and mocked by the leftist press, all peaceful solutions are quickly vanishing. When all peaceful means of redress are exhausted, only violent remedies will remain. Those who have denied the people a peaceful solution will be responsible for the violent solution that follows. I don’t call for it, but anyone who knows Americans well could predict it.

85% of the people are right. We will see successful terror strikes on US soil in 2010 and that’s because the current leadership in Washington DC is committed to that end. Their reaction to the events of 12-25-09 was also predictable.

“It’s becoming clear that the system that has been in place for years now is not sufficiently up to date to take full advantage of the information we collect and the knowledge we have.” - Obama

No… the system Bush had in place prevented a second, third and fourth wave of terror attacks on US soil and took the fight to the enemy abroad. That system did indeed stop any further attacks on US soil for the seven years that followed 9/11/01.

It’s the new system of terror appeasements and support, both here and abroad, put in place by Obama, Holder and Napolitano which has made terror attacks on US soil inevitable again.

The attempted bombing on Flight 253 from Amsterdam to Detroit has touched off partisan squabbling in Washington. Republicans were sharply critical of Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano after she declared on Sunday that “the system worked,” even though the bombing was thwarted only when Abdulmutallab’s device failed to detonate. (from the Newsmax column)

The Napolitano system failed and citizens were left to defend themselves on Flight 253.

In the days following the Flight 253 event, Al Qaeda leaders warned of 300 more bombers coming and counter-terrorism experts around the globe have placed the risk of massive nuclear, biological or chemical attacks on US soil at a 100% certainty. Only the hour and level of devastation are unknown.

This is what the American people voted for in 2008. 52% were dead wrong in November 2008, but 85% are dead right now. It will get worse before it can get any better.

The policies that allowed Abdulmutallab to board Flight 253 will allow countless others to advance their attacks on the US. The Obama military “Rules of Engagement” will cost many more American soldiers their lives, senselessly. Eric Holder’s Civil Rights for Terrorists campaign will set many known enemies of our nation free to kill again… and Americans will die to learn this lesson the hard way.

At the end of the day, you can’t win a war by refusing to acknowledge its existence. You can’t defeat extreme Islam by aiding and abetting Jihadists, and you can’t end the war on terror by refusing to fight the war on terror. You can only get more innocent people killed with such policies.

This is what we can look forward to in 2010. 85% of Americans know it and thanks to the 15% who don’t, all Americans will pay a heavy price for the decision of the 52% who put these folks in unbridled power.

Is it all just an accident, or does it all serve a “greater good?” You decide how the evidence adds up, but decide soon. The clock is ticking…

[Via http://socialismisnottheanswer.wordpress.com]

Television Advertising With a FREE BONUS!!!

2010-01-03T04:53:00.000+02:00

Television Advertising With a FREE BONUS!!!

Harness the power of Television and Internet video Advertising! On Your Budget!

Take advantage of this headache FREE opportunity!

Here are a few benefits:

Cost effective production

- we’ll give you 3 options of cost effective production for your budget. We’ll produce your 30-second commercial with your vision as the heart of production.

Absolute control

- you’ll choose the When & Where your commercials will air. Tell us your target audience. Details like this will be explored in our pre-production consultation.

Month-To–Month Cycle

- Our TV Ads run on a basis. We’ll run your ad based on your monthly budget. Simply pay as you go. No long term contract.

THE FREE BONUS

- we will post your commercial on 2 Internet video/social sites for FREE with All of our production packages. Why? So you wont have to!!! Friends/family and clients will be able to access the commercial as they wish. Great for the word of mouth exposure. ”Oh you didn’t catch the commercial on TV? Just go here…”

The combination of television advertising & Internet video marketing as a supplement (for free!) Will drive your ROI potential “off the charts”.

All Commercials undergo a free consultation. During which we will learn all about YOU and we’ll discuss which package best suits your needs! How about over lunch?

Here’s a sample of our economy package commercial

For More examples Click here

For More information please contact us

Here’s our youtube channel

- John Gaston President & CEO

Tampa Bay Multimedia Inc.

4705 Alt US 19

Palm Harbor, FL

Cell-727-480-0215

Studio-727-945-7577

JohnG@TampaBayMultimedia.com

www.TampaBayMultimedia.com

William Thompson, CEO

TV Inc.

4705 Alt US 19

Palm Harbor, FL

800-326-5661

bill@tvinc.com

www.tvinc.com

[Via http://tampabaymultimedia.wordpress.com]

Now Jukebox Heroines New URL!

2010-01-02T05:20:00.000+02:00

Emily’s Vital Vinyl Records is now Jukebox Heroines!

The new web address is: http://www.jukeboxheroines.com as well as, http://www.jukeboxheroines.wordpress.com.

Also, I am on twitter and have a new facebook page for everything as well!

Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/jukeboxheroines

Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Jukebox-Heroines/230461188514

I’ll leave the old address working for a bit until everyone can update. Thanks so much! Rock on!

[Via http://emilysvitalvinylrecords.wordpress.com]

My photography page on Facebook!

2010-01-02T05:16:00.000+02:00

While it’s not perfect, Facebook does have a pretty decent way to get your work out there to people you actually know! It’s (sadly) probably the best collection of my work yet, and I’m enjoying trying to “datamine” the “Insights” that they provide to page holders!

Please feel free to become a Fan, or just poke around in there!

PS- Happy New Year!

[Via http://iamericanartist.wordpress.com]

New Decade – New Way of Life

2009-12-31T05:43:00.000+02:00

It is time to say goodbye to first decade of twenty-first century and welcome a new decade that looks like bringing a drastic change in how we live a life or spend our time. You may be surprised, by the word drastic instead of big or huge, used in the statement. In the first decade of twenty-first century we witness two big things that jolt our beliefs. On one hand we witness terrorism that is encroaching our way of living by spreading fear and on the other hand digital revolution expands our circle beyond the boundaries of culture and country.

In first decade of this century, we saw the demise of telegram; encouraged the snail mail to become an obsolete; and challenge newspapers to fight for their life. In this new decade we are going to see that we are living more in virtual world and not in real world. If anyone has doubt, please remember that it is already initiated in this bygone decade. Marriage of Otaku and “Nene Anegasaki” is still young.

Now we accept it or challenge it but virtual communities will be the reality at the end of the welcome decade. We are going to see less physical interaction and more virtual interaction by and through electronic media. However, there is a sliver lining in it for environment lobby. Virtual world may translate into less bio fuel consumption by way of reducing number of vehicles on the road.

People, who either challenge this transition or not able to accept this change, will be ready to be a part of new community that will replace the caveman. It is not far away when GEICO may advertise like “so easy a real world person can do it”.

[Via http://umeshbajaj.wordpress.com]

Putting up the pieces together

2009-12-31T05:23:00.000+02:00

Last night, I invited 2 of my friends to have dinner at my house cos I cooked Caldereta, a sumptuous beef recipe with thick sauce made from tomatoes and some carrots and potatoes. I bought some fried chicken as well to combine with this dish. After dinner, on a regular hang-out session, either we watch some DVD movie, eat some more, have a bit of drinking session or rent a computer altogether and play endless Facebook Apps.

Last night was different. Since I bought some puzzles in a local fair near my place, I encouraged them to help me build the puzzle pieces together. The picture is that of various Coke bottles and cans which I’ve posted here. Finally, after 3 hours of struggling to make all ends meet, we are able to create a masterpiece!

Life is like puzzle pieces. Sometimes, it is difficult to find the right match. You keep on searching where you will fit in. Be it about job, friendship, relationship or even personal satisfaction. At the end, we can find where we belong.

However, building a life is not as easy as making the puzzle. Sometimes, no matter how hard we tried to fit in, we really cannot push ourselves to be in that group, place or situation.

On a positive note, as we are looking forward to a new year in a few hours time, let us put the broken pieces together again. What we can repair let us try to fix for once. Let us leave all the bad memories of the year that past be left behind.

Personally, I’ve had a lot of ups and down this 2009. I’ve gained some and along the way, I lost some as well. I’m wishing I can look forward to a better year ahead.

May all of us have a blessed and bountiful New Year! Be safe while we celebrate the coming year.

God bless us all!

[Via http://kikomatching.wordpress.com]

2009 – The Year in Status, Part II: Welcome to Buffalo

2009-12-29T05:48:00.000+02:00

If nothing else, 2009 was the year of the zinger. A popular place to toss off snappy, witty one-liners is the Facebook Status Update. Over the next few posts, we’ll present to you the very best. Feel free to add your own below …

March 1 is tomorrow. Also known as Buffalonian New Year.

Almost everyone I find intelligent are people who don’t live here.

I just heard the Great Lakes referred to as the “Redneck Riviera.” It’s funny because it’s true.

I am going down to the First Ward to guzzle Guinness and punch a stranger in the jaw. It’s the Irish thing to do.

Memo to Cheektowaga drivers: Rotaries are put in place to AVOID a bottlenecked four-way stop. Those are yield signs.

It always amazes me that panhandlers choose a place like mid-Elmwood to scrounge for spare change. Dude … there’s thousands of spoiled college kids by Buff State, South Campus or on Chippewa. Location, location, location.

Trying to find enduring love at a bar in Buffalo on Saturday night is like trying to find a Lexus at a Ford dealership.

Buffalo: Urban Blight Done Right!!!

[Via http://endlessparade.com]

2009 - The Year in Status, Part I: People, Places and Things

2009-12-29T05:38:00.000+02:00

Because a world where we can’t poke fun at paranoia and food poisoning is not a world I plan to create for my children.

Overheard: “I wonder if she sucks dick like she eats carrots.” Classic.

I think Wal-Mart, Target and Ikea are to retail what Journey, REO Speedwagon and Kansas were to rock. Discuss.

Listening to my guilty pleasure band …. Huey Lewis and the News. They’re the Pringles of rock-and-roll.

Arizona Jeans. Come for the stonewash … stay for the paralyzing fit.

My mailman talks to my cat when she’s in the window. Maybe he wouldn’t if he knew she was a diabolical alien mastermind with a penchant for clawing humans into 700 pieces. *HISS*

You know who I want to meet? Another Western New Yorker who prefers Dunkin Donuts to Tim Horton’s. My blood type’s Boston Creme.

Do you think Bill O’Reilly staggers home at night, pops on his DVR of Glenn Beck and says to himself, “Man, that sicko is a totally unhinged douchebag!”?

Delaware: The Wyoming of the Eastern Seaboard.

The Chinese will often say to me, “Your Chinese food here isn’t real Chinese food.” Listen … it’s delicious! Why don’t you just lie and take credit for it? Why must you destroy my gastronomical fantasy of a Szechuan Wok lining the streets of every city from Shanghai to Beijing?

Chinese restaurants could build a skyscraper made from prime rib and it’d still be ready in less than 10 minutes. How they’re not involved in our space program yet is a shocking mystery.

Seriously, when did the names of beer become more complex than metal band names? I swear I just drank something called Blueberry Deathbox Black Light Chernobyl Ale.

I wonder how call girls prepare their resumes to apply for openings at high-class escort services … “Relevant Work Experience: Wall Street (2002-2006), Blow jobs for day traders in exchange for stock tips.” or “Awards and Accolades: ‘Best I ever had.’ Eliot Spitzer, 2007.” Puzzling.

Cracked Rear View is the Breyer’s Vanilla of rock-and-roll. Bland as hell but ever so delicious.

Adoring cat needs home. New owner must be tolerant of: abandonment issues, language barrier, unprovoked domestic abuse, agoraphobia, spiral notebook fetish, hunger for human flesh.

MS Access: for when Spreadsheets just aren’t OCD enough.

It’s official, folks. Chicago: Paradise for people who love New York but hate New Yorkers.

Magic Hat Roxy Rolles is back in stores. I haven’t been this excited for winter since I was 14 and had backstage tickets to the Rockettes Holiday Spectacular.

Westchester County Winter Bingo: Black North Face fleece, Uggz, Black High-end model SUV, Venti nonfat Peppermint Latte, fake tan.

I’ll tell you, for my money, there’s no finer candy bar than the Twix. Just when you’re mourning the fact that you finished the savory chocolate, caramel and nougat … look in the wrapper! There’s always another one waiting in the wings for you.

Just got around to watching it (online!) but ‘Jersey Shore’ is inarguably the Sargeant Pepper of Reality Television.

All Time Low might be the most nauseating band of the decade.

jersey shore marathon. haven’t seen that many dysfunctional guidos since … wait … I’m in Da U. it’s been 20 minutes.

[Via http://endlessparade.com]

Why I Write About Sarah Palin’s Facebook Posts

2009-12-27T05:38:00.000+02:00

Dave Weigel wrote a somewhat irrelevant post on December 23 stating why he does not write about Sarah Palin’s Facebook posts, so I thought I would just give him something to think about.

The phrase Sarah Palin used to define the mandatory end-of-life counseling services was “death panel.” She used this phrase not only in this instance but also to indicate the panel that was called a committee who would determine what health care was available under certain circumstances. I agree completely with her description and with her choice of words to describe the exact meaning underlying the phrases used in writing the health care bill under discussion at that time.

I also think the words “death panel” would fit in well with the Harry Reid Socialistic Health Care for a Socialistic America plan. It concerns abortions. Are you aware that States can “opt-out” of abortion coverage? If an “opt-out” clause is required, it must mean that there is authorization allowing and/or supporting abortion. In other words, I would describe a group of people known as a planned parenthood society as a death panel on an unborn life. So, not only was the phrase right the first time, it is right in this instance as well.

As Mrs. Palin writes on her Facebook post of December 22, 2009, “Americans don’t want this bill. Americans don’t like this bill. Washington has stopped listening to us. But we’re paying attention, and 2010 is coming.”

Weigel states that “Palin has put the political press in a submissive position, one in which the only information it prints about her comes from prepared statements or from Q&As with friendly interviewers.” Why is that, I wonder?

Could it be that Governor Palin was tired of her words not being listened to by the lamestream media? Could it be that she was misquoted and misinterpreted so many times she found it necessary to correct the problems herself since the media did not show any sign of trying to correct their ignorance? How can it possibly be correct to state that she is allowed to shape the public debate without actually engaging in it?

When people in the lamestream media start asking the same questions of liberals that they have asked of Sarah Palin, when they criticize any other politician the same way they have criticized her, when they quote her as correctly and explicitly as they quote liberal America haters, then I suspect the media including Mr. Weigel will find themselves able to engage her directly instead of having to rely on her Facebook posts.

Mr. Weigel cites an imagined feud Governor Palin has with former vice president and air polluter extraordinaire, Al Gore. Had either Mr. Gore or Mr. Weigel read the post that Sarah Palin made on her Facebook page, they would have noticed that she never denied the global warming issue. All she said was that there is a happy medium between being conservationally concerned and at the same time respecting the land and the right of citizens to use the land for full benefit.

Scare tactics work on many American people who either don’t have access or don’t have the desire to do their own investigating into an issue as complicated as global warming. I personally have come to the conclusion that the entire global warming issue is made up using the solid scientific fact that the earth is moving continuously and steadily closer to the sun. Being a planet of unimaginable heat, it seems very natural to me that the sun’s heat would be more intensely heating our earth. There may indeed be other truths included in arguments to the contrary, but this one truth remains a constant.

I am well aware that my viewpoint does not agree entirely with Sarah Palin’s viewpoint, and I think that is as it should be. If we all held the same viewpoint without any differences in opinion we would be no better than the liberals who continually attack her.

If Mr. Weigel’s reference to “the media’s indulgence of Palin’s strategy” means that she writes then the media writes, I think he may be very correct. As for his suggestion that it cannot be proven that she does indeed do her own writing on her Facebook posts, I would merely suggest that he put the number of his readership alongside hers and compare the two. I believe he might be rather surprised at what he would learn.

That brings me to my final point. So many of us read every word Sarah Palin writes on Facebook or in her book, “Going Rogue: An American Life”, because we know we can believe what she says. We respect the fact that she is knowledgeable in the topics she addresses. She cites references that we can read ourselves to see that she used them correctly and quoted them correctly. That is something the lamestream media, another of Governor Palin’s coined phrases, could take lessons doing themselves.

It keeps her from being misquoted when she does that. I like that idea.

[Via http://marieacole.wordpress.com]

Bumble Reviews A Christmas Eve Candlelight Service

2009-12-27T05:33:00.000+02:00

Sometimes ideas for blog posts just come to Bumble, others are thrust upon him.

As per custom, Bumble attended Christmas Eve service with the in-laws. This was year 10 of Bumble attending a Methodist church on Christmas Eve. No, the church does not fall down! Death to you! Ahem… anyway, Bumble digresses.

The annual service at this particular church culminates with the congregation lighting candles and singing Silent Night. It is moving and sounds almost ethereal. That of course is the highlight and finale of the evening. Prior to that, there is an hour and a half of singing, readings, the sermon, collection, and finally communion. No, Bumble does not partake of the Sacrament, but Methodist communion is open to everyone. In theory they are open to giving communion to angry Persian Islamic cats. Bumble still opted not to put theory into practice. Maybe next year.

Bumble is a veteran Christmas Christian now, with a decade attending service at the same church. With that experience comes a natural tendency to compare this year’s service to the previous years’. There was one highlight this year for Bumble, which was probably a low point for everyone else, but that didn’t come until halfway through the night.

Bumble’s first impression was set when the pastor made his appearance. He was wearing a wireless microphone headset similar to something Justin Timberlake might wear to perform! Bumble honestly thought that was a good sign. I mean, this is the BIG show for the church. Christmas is money time, and Christmas Eve is the Wrestlemania and SuperBowl of Christianity. In short, it doesn’t get any bigger than this! That’s right, Bumble called Christmas Eve the Wreslemania of Christianity!

Ok, maybe not THAT halftime show...

Time to bring the A game, convert some Christmas Christians to weekly attendees and set the foundation for next year’s bake sales. Granted this was a small church that seated about 400 people. Bumble didn’t expect fireworks, celebrity appearances and guest singers. Still, somewhere in Bumble’s egg nog soaked noggin a spark of hope ignited. Maybe this year would be the spectacle worthy of the church’s equivalent of a Super Bowl halftime show!

The service began with a prayer and then right into the initial hymn. Just a side note, Methodists sing every verse for better or worse. Sadly that last sentence had more rhythm than the congregation. The choir was fine, but the “flock” literally sounded like bleating sheep. Even with the hymnals it seemed nobody knew the words. Bumble kept looking around for Simon Cowell, but tragically the beat went on. It may have helped if the chosen hymns were a little less obscure. Bumble is just sending that out there for next year. Star Child? Really?

Pie-tie? Pity? ummm

After that debacle a teenager wearing ripped jeans and doing his best to look like Edward Cullen did a reading from Luke. Apparently he went to the George W. Bush School of public speaking, because this was painful. He mispronounced piety. Again, this is the SUPERBOWL for you guys right? Maybe someone should have practiced a bit with the kid? Bumble is sure he was nervous, but it truly seemed like there wasn’t even a rehearsal ahead of time. Maybe (hopefully) he was filling in admirably for someone at the last minute. Bumble remains skeptical and judgmental.

Finally, on to the homily. That’s when the Pastor gets his fifteen minutes of fame to pontificate on the season. A good oratory here would at least breath some life into the congregation. In all fairness, Bumble actually enjoyed it. This would be Bumble’s high point, and again the low point for everyone else.

In a rather unconventional start, the pastor used FaceBook as a point of departure. No, really! Bumble wouldn’t go as far as to say FaceBook is bigger than Jesus, but the pastor did suggest Jesus is on FaceBook. The pastor began by explaining FaceBook to the congregation. He briefly described how you can accept or ignore someone with the click of a button. Bumble has to give him credit for trying, but he seemed to lose at least half of the audience. The average age had to be 50.

Then in what can only be described as “a stretch”, he explained accepting Jesus in your life through the context of FaceBook. Bumble really can’t add much to this. Instead we’ll end with Bumble passing along this new chestnut from Christmas Eve, along with the image that formed in Bumble’s head when he heard it. Merry Christmas to all and to all a good night.

Pastor: “This holiday season if you get a chance to friend Jesus, don’t click ignore.”

ooof, this is awkward... he'll probably know if I ignore him... but we were never that close in high school...

[Via http://infidelnation.com]