I got a nice little mention by Mari Smith today. She's kind of a big deal. My armpits are still a little sweaty from all the excitement.
5 Key Takeaways of the New Twitter Redesign and Brand Pages bit.ly/twiiTg by @shannopop on @radian6 [Cool!]
— Mari Smith ☃ (@MariSmith) December 13, 2011
Comedian Louis C.K. is never at a loss for strong opinions, and that holds true for social media. He hates it, and when he visited Conan O’Brien late last week, he made some strong points about the way people are squandering their lives by watching everything through three-inch screens and social media.
Is he right? I’ve noticed that any time a spectacular event is happening where a lot of people are gathered around, a large percentage of them are holding up smartphones to photograph the event, rather than directly experiencing it. Many others have their heads buried in their tiny screens, tweeting about it.
Are we missing real-world experiences so we can indulge in social media? Are we taking pictures and video of spectacular occurrences, instead of simply putting our smartphones and cameras in our pockets and diving into the real world with our own eyes and ears?
Maybe we need to rethink this. Discuss.
There's explosions and acrobats, but they're looking at it through a little three-inch screen!
Now this is some ad copy I can get into.
It's baked like so:
The result: me clicking "attending" + wanting to watch the show even more than I already did + sharing with the world my excitement to watch the premiere.
Do you plan to watch?
This whole distinction between sharing to Google Buzz and sharing to Google+ seems silly to me, primarily because it’s currently easier to share to Buzz than it is Google+. But hardly anyone uses Buzz, right? And if you do, all it’s doing is aggregating tweets and blog posts and other shared items you’ve told Buzz to aggregate. I get that having all that junk in your streams would make it messy, which is why I think “Posts” and “Buzz” are currently separated on a user’s profile. So maybe it’s fine that all the content and feeds your proliferating into the interwebz stays separate from what you choose to hand-craft for Google+.
But all the sharing and commenting functionality that’s supposed to happen in Gmail with your contacts as a part of Buzz (that I don’t know if anyone is actually using) should be integrated with Google+. Liking should become +1-ing. Your Groups should become Circles and your Circles should become Groups. And you should be able to email and chat with people in your Circles who also have you in Circles…as contacts…in Gmail. And then maybe someday we’ll get a “Share to Google+” button (not to be confused with the “+1” button).
If you watch the video introducing Buzz from February 2010, it’s prophetic of Google+ and intended for the same purpose: sharing and discovering how you choose. The only primary difference between Buzz and Google+ today that I see is Buzz’s close integration with Gmail. I’m emailing. I’m Plussing. But I’m not sharing/buzzing in Gmail. Are you? What’s your $0.02?
First things first: What the heck is a GP2X Wiz? And thanks for the heads up on this, @DRJedi!
Okay. Now here's an awesome example of a thriving social media community in action. The the genuine, passionate, let's-work-together-because-we-care kind.
How it started: ThinkGeek recieved this adorable letter from Simon (shown below). ThinkGeek then shared a photo of the letter with their Facebook fans, complete with playful, trigonomic geekery: "Dear Simon, Thank you for your letter! You should have your parents cosine it, though. (And the GP2X Wiz is actually on sale right now http://j.mp/iUVTtb but not sure we can get it down to $13.)"
ThinkGeek's Facebook fans loved it.
ThinkGeek listened: After all said and done, ThinkGeek agreed to buy Simon a Wiz and use the fundraised money to donate to charity. Action was initiated and change took place in less than a day. Pretty cool, huh?
By far my fave point by @mitchjoel at #social2011: When it comes to engaging in social media, ask 'why?' not 'what?' 'Why' makes you look at strategy, 'what' makes you focus on tactics.
They're hidden under the "Most Recent" News Feed setting.
You can filter by status update type, by friend group (ex: see all updates just from coworkers), etc. Maybe you're extra cool and knew this already, but I never noticed them until today.
Super clever. Kinda reminds me of the Google stories videos, but I think it does a good job of capturing how today's tools can help us keep on top of things.
