Tuesday, March 31, 2009

Getting Real with Delicious - an advanced guide to social bookmarking by John McElhenney


Delicious [used to be del.icio.us before Yahoo bought them and paid for the real domain] is a powerful social bookmarking tool that's great for organizing your bookmarks and making them available online from any computer. But its functionality goes well beyond what you would normally call bookmarking; Delicious can provide an unequaled collaborative research tool for business, and as a social networking tool, the service uses tagging to make it easy to find bookmarks that others have saved. The following is advanced guide to getting the most out of Delicious.

Please contribute to the discussion by adding your own tips to the comments. From the Delicious home page you use the search window to find other pages that users have tagged. And the results are ranked by number of times the page has been tagged. So on a term like "facebook virus" Delicious returns 336 results.

facebook virus on delicious

 

However unlike Google, these results are handpicked pages from other Delicious users. The top listing was tagged by 51 other users. And from that one result you have a lot of options beyond clicking the link. Clicking on the 51 returns a list of all of the people who tagged that page. Clicking on any of the tags in the listing repeats the search on Delicious for that tag. And there is a "save" option to add the page to your bookmarks. And finally, the user name of the first person to tag the page is also clickable to view that person's main page.

Google search on the other hand returns 10,100,000 results. While the top results might be useful, the sheer number of results and the known gaming and SEO techniques used to drive listings to the top of the search pages might not necessarily give you the most useful results. If you think of Delicious as a filtered search result, 336 actual listings were tagged by actual people with the tag "facebook virus." It's like a hand-human selected search engine. And often the information on the delicious pages are more useful.

google on "facebook virus" search

Notice ReadWriteWeb is the #1 listing on Delicious. You can bet that RWW has a well-researched deep discussion of the topic as opposed to PCWorld or CNET [no offense guys] that are covering the topic as a media event not as a real-world issue requiring solutions. The Google top results are written by journalists who are hoping to attract your eyeballs and sell you some anti-virus software, as opposed to working-solutions-writers for RWW who are hoping to attact your eyeballs and sell you some anti-virus software.

The difference is that on Delicious your peers thought the RWW article was worth bookmarking. On Google, some SEO folks and some media conglomerate folks decided to jockey their "Facebook Virus" story up to attact your attention.

In the simplest terms, you can use Delicious any time you would use your browser to bookmark a site. Delicious provides buttons for Firefox and Internet Explorer that allow you to access the bookmarking info page remaining on the site you are interested in. Clicking on the "tag" button pops up a window over the open page and allows you to add a Title (pre-filled with the page title information), a description and any tags that make sense to you. There is also a check box "Do Not Share" that allows you to keep any of your bookmarks private. Clicking on the TAG button brings up the following screen.

delicious bookmark popover

You can see there are also Recommended Tags (tags that you have used previously), Network Tags (a simple way to share the link with others in your network) and Popular Tags (tags that others on Delicious have used on this page). So in simple terms I can bookmark a site using Delicious in the same ways I would use the browser to bookmark the page. But there are a lot of other things I can do now that I've added a piece of content to my Delicious site.

  1. Bookmark and share the link and your description and tags with others. [You can even set Delicious to post your links to Twitter or Friendfeed.]
  2. Find everyone else on Delicious who has bookmarked the same page.
  3. Send your bookmark to a network of other "trusted" Delicious friends. [I can send a technical link to my dev friends and not to my entire Delicious network.]
  4. Make a tag for a specific brand or product I am interested in and see what everyone else is bookmarking with that same tag.
  5. Create an RSS feed of my links and tags to be read by others or used by me in a different program, like FriendFeed.

So having used Delicious since SXSWi 06 I have developed a large number of links. [949 953 1046 as of this article.]

my delicious page header

 

And it is hard to even imaging what that number of links might look like if I pulled down my bookmarks menu in FireFox. I don't know but something tells me it might choke. But with Delicious I have a bunch of ways to access, sort and retrieve my collection of links. [I sometimes refer to my Delicious site as "my brain on the internet" because if it's of major importance to me I will either blog about it or add it to my Delicious page and come back to it later.]

  1. I can view my links as various tag clouds. [Tag clouds were just gaining popularity when Delicious was launched. Here is a post I recently wrote explaining Cloud Navigation as opposed to Cloud Computing]
  2. I can "bundle" or create groups of links using their tags.

An example: I might have an educational website that I am interested in for both my kids to learn from but also from a programming or interface aspect. Using tags and bundles Delicious allows me to create a flexible and dynamic taxonomy of my links as I'm going along. So I collect "links" as I roam the web and easily add tags like "UI" and "education" and "math" to the pages so I can find them later. And then with bundles I can add the example page to both my "developer" bundle and my "kids" bundle.

tag cloud examples from delicious

A lot of the value of Delicious to me is using it as a capture and retrieval system. And I occasionally go into my account and clean up old tags, outdated pages and reorganize bundles and tags. And when I am done, I have a dynamic database of "my hand-selected information" that I can use myself or share with others. And finally, Delicious as a whole is an amazingly powerful search engine for any topic that you are interested in. So rather than worry about "your" bookmarks, you can jump on Delicious and type in random tags like: "iPod, software, reset, troubleshooting" and Delicious will bring back results that actual humans spent time cataloging and creating. So the usefulness of the results are often much more accurate than a Google search, for example. And the search results are ranked by how many times a certain page was actually hand bookmarked by others using Delicious.

twitter vs facebook search on delicious

And that is the power of Delicious for crowd sourcing, dynamic information gathering and retrieval, and leaving a trail of bookmarks behind you as you travel the web in search of what's next. And the search engine within Delicious might have a good handle on "what's next too!

@jmacofearth
permalink on uber.la: http://bit.ly/real-delicious

Additional Information: Getting Real is about getting your work done, having fun and doing it with as little extraneous effort as possible. A tip of the hat to Scott Berkun, GTD, 37 signals and 43 Folders. Without your pathfinding, where would I be? 

  • Getting Real with Twitter is the forthcoming book on Twitter Business and Twitter Etiquette and Keeping It Real on Twitter
  • Getting Webwork Done is a process I am documenting about finding tools and techniques to get the internet done more efficiently. See also Speed-the-web and Twittertools tags. 
  • Seeking the Uber App was the initial quest into efficiency and getting things done with an ultra SocialMedia-eCommerce-Browser app.

Posted via web from jmacofearth's posterous

Getting Real with Delicious - an advanced guide to social bookmarking by John McElhenney


Delicious [used to be del.icio.us before Yahoo bought them and paid for the real domain] is a powerful social bookmarking tool that's great for organizing your bookmarks and making them available online from any computer. But its functionality goes well beyond what you would normally call bookmarking; Delicious can provide an unequaled collaborative research tool for business, and as a social networking tool, the service uses tagging to make it easy to find bookmarks that others have saved. The following is advanced guide to getting the most out of Delicious.

Please contribute to the discussion by adding your own tips to the comments. From the Delicious home page you use the search window to find other pages that users have tagged. And the results are ranked by number of times the page has been tagged. So on a term like "facebook virus" Delicious returns 336 results.

facebook virus on delicious

 

However unlike Google, these results are handpicked pages from other Delicious users. The top listing was tagged by 51 other users. And from that one result you have a lot of options beyond clicking the link. Clicking on the 51 returns a list of all of the people who tagged that page. Clicking on any of the tags in the listing repeats the search on Delicious for that tag. And there is a "save" option to add the page to your bookmarks. And finally, the user name of the first person to tag the page is also clickable to view that person's main page.

Google search on the other hand returns 10,100,000 results. While the top results might be useful, the sheer number of results and the known gaming and SEO techniques used to drive listings to the top of the search pages might not necessarily give you the most useful results. If you think of Delicious as a filtered search result, 336 actual listings were tagged by actual people with the tag "facebook virus." It's like a hand-human selected search engine. And often the information on the delicious pages are more useful.

google on "facebook virus" search

Notice ReadWriteWeb is the #1 listing on Delicious. You can bet that RWW has a well-researched deep discussion of the topic as opposed to PCWorld or CNET [no offense guys] that are covering the topic as a media event not as a real-world issue requiring solutions. The Google top results are written by journalists who are hoping to attract your eyeballs and sell you some anti-virus software, as opposed to working-solutions-writers for RWW who are hoping to attact your eyeballs and sell you some anti-virus software.

The difference is that on Delicious your peers thought the RWW article was worth bookmarking. On Google, some SEO folks and some media conglomerate folks decided to jockey their "Facebook Virus" story up to attact your attention.

In the simplest terms, you can use Delicious any time you would use your browser to bookmark a site. Delicious provides buttons for Firefox and Internet Explorer that allow you to access the bookmarking info page remaining on the site you are interested in. Clicking on the "tag" button pops up a window over the open page and allows you to add a Title (pre-filled with the page title information), a description and any tags that make sense to you. There is also a check box "Do Not Share" that allows you to keep any of your bookmarks private. Clicking on the TAG button brings up the following screen.

delicious bookmark popover

You can see there are also Recommended Tags (tags that you have used previously), Network Tags (a simple way to share the link with others in your network) and Popular Tags (tags that others on Delicious have used on this page). So in simple terms I can bookmark a site using Delicious in the same ways I would use the browser to bookmark the page. But there are a lot of other things I can do now that I've added a piece of content to my Delicious site.

  1. Bookmark and share the link and your description and tags with others. [You can even set Delicious to post your links to Twitter or Friendfeed.]
  2. Find everyone else on Delicious who has bookmarked the same page.
  3. Send your bookmark to a network of other "trusted" Delicious friends. [I can send a technical link to my dev friends and not to my entire Delicious network.]
  4. Make a tag for a specific brand or product I am interested in and see what everyone else is bookmarking with that same tag.
  5. Create an RSS feed of my links and tags to be read by others or used by me in a different program, like FriendFeed.

So having used Delicious since SXSWi 06 I have developed a large number of links. [949 953 1046 as of this article.]

my delicious page header

 

And it is hard to even imaging what that number of links might look like if I pulled down my bookmarks menu in FireFox. I don't know but something tells me it might choke. But with Delicious I have a bunch of ways to access, sort and retrieve my collection of links. [I sometimes refer to my Delicious site as "my brain on the internet" because if it's of major importance to me I will either blog about it or add it to my Delicious page and come back to it later.]

  1. I can view my links as various tag clouds. [Tag clouds were just gaining popularity when Delicious was launched. Here is a post I recently wrote explaining Cloud Navigation as opposed to Cloud Computing]
  2. I can "bundle" or create groups of links using their tags.

An example: I might have an educational website that I am interested in for both my kids to learn from but also from a programming or interface aspect. Using tags and bundles Delicious allows me to create a flexible and dynamic taxonomy of my links as I'm going along. So I collect "links" as I roam the web and easily add tags like "UI" and "education" and "math" to the pages so I can find them later. And then with bundles I can add the example page to both my "developer" bundle and my "kids" bundle.

tag cloud examples from delicious

A lot of the value of Delicious to me is using it as a capture and retrieval system. And I occasionally go into my account and clean up old tags, outdated pages and reorganize bundles and tags. And when I am done, I have a dynamic database of "my hand-selected information" that I can use myself or share with others. And finally, Delicious as a whole is an amazingly powerful search engine for any topic that you are interested in. So rather than worry about "your" bookmarks, you can jump on Delicious and type in random tags like: "iPod, software, reset, troubleshooting" and Delicious will bring back results that actual humans spent time cataloging and creating. So the usefulness of the results are often much more accurate than a Google search, for example. And the search results are ranked by how many times a certain page was actually hand bookmarked by others using Delicious.

twitter vs facebook search on delicious

And that is the power of Delicious for crowd sourcing, dynamic information gathering and retrieval, and leaving a trail of bookmarks behind you as you travel the web in search of what's next. And the search engine within Delicious might have a good handle on "what's next too!

@jmacofearth
permalink on uber.la: http://bit.ly/real-delicious

Additional Information: Getting Real is about getting your work done, having fun and doing it with as little extraneous effort as possible. A tip of the hat to Scott Berkun, GTD, 37 signals and 43 Folders. Without your pathfinding, where would I be? 

  • Getting Real with Twitter is the forthcoming book on Twitter Business and Twitter Etiquette and Keeping It Real on Twitter
  • Getting Webwork Done is a process I am documenting about finding tools and techniques to get the internet done more efficiently. See also Speed-the-web and Twittertools tags. 
  • Seeking the Uber App was the initial quest into efficiency and getting things done with an ultra SocialMedia-eCommerce-Browser app.

Posted via web from jmacofearth's posterous

Wednesday, March 25, 2009

Tag Cloud Computing? - Categories, Keywords, SEO, Tags, Getting to Simplicity


The tag cloud is dead.

Cloud computing is merely a new marketing term for web services and support.

How can we simplify our web experience so that what we are paying attention to is what is important in our lives. And how do we filter out the tags (blow away the dark clouds and fog) are obscuring our goals. What exactly should we be paying attention to? It is a question we need to ask ourselves much more often these days. Or we find ourselves looking back on the day and into the night with a lot of work still to get done before we can sleep.

So one of my objectives for 2009 is to Simplify my Tag Cloud. I mean this both physically, mentally and spiritually. Because where the brain and mind are foggy so is our self, so is our core person. And by eliminating the noisy distractions of tweets, tags, feeds and emails, tv shows and advertisements for the better life, news and propaganda about global wars and warming, the better we are at eliminating the clutter of our online data stream, the more effective we will be an accomplishing our tasks and goals.

And in the long run, accomplishing more of your goals is a big deal.

So let me share my uber-tags first. These are not often written down, but in a drawing I did the other day, trying to explain what I am doing to simplify my priorities, I came up with a pretty good short list; TOP TAGS if you will.

  1. work
  2. family
  3. play/creativity
  4. health/exercise
  5. spiritual practice

Now let me compare that with my current "category nav" from this website.

uber.la categories as navigation

I think I have them all pretty well slotted with my TOP TAGS. I might need to add a "husband" category of some sort, or a better title than "ho-dad parenting" to cover the entire "family" spectrum. But I pretty much leave my personal work, relationship work, out of my writing. On the blog any way. ;-) And I might add tennis as it is my main "fun" and "exercise" activity. But it is actually caught in my "about" and "contact" pages. So I need to add my top-of-the-page nav as well.

 

uber.la's top nav as a tag cloud of life

And so with these added in as cross-tag meta categories I do cover all of my TOP TAGS. But now, for comparison, let me show you some of the tag cloud structures that I have elsewhere.

 

delicious top 10 tags for john32mac

And here is the larger list from delicious. The bolder tags have more pages associated with them.

500+ tags on delicious

And one more from delicious that I really like. On this one, you get to see my entire 560 tags (as of 3-25-09) in order of priority. And as the number of links decreases the type is not only smaller but lighter in color as well.

 

delicious tag cloud of all tags in descending order

 

And of course I could not fit all 560 tags onto a single screen shot, but you get the idea. And the image links to my delicious pages so you can go see for yourself, if you are interested. Okay, so here is a cloud of my Twitter tags.

 

my Tweet-cloud

Oh boy, I need to get something to talk about besides ME! Gosh!

 

And last example, a random cloud from a blog I frequent.

a tag cloud of mess in my opinion

[Okay, so now I need a big wrap.]

Clouds are dead except for specific uses. But most clouds just do not work in the business space. Because someone would need to go back and clean up the tags on a regular basis. Cause what I call "web 2.0" you call "web2" and the next guy calls "social media." And most sites, business and friendship, do not do any tag cleanup.

In our personal lives tag clean up, and refocus on the BIG TAGS is essential.

Here is something David Foster Wallace said about his writing. "I received 500,000 discrete bits of information today," he once said, "of which maybe 25 are important. My job is to make some sense of it."

And that is our task, dear reader, to filter down the noise from our lives and pay attention to the TOP TAGS. Or as Covey put it in his matrix, the Not-Urgent but Important quadrant.

@jmacofearth
permalink on uber.la: http://bit.ly/big-tags

See Also: Rolling Stone's bio of David Foster Wallace

Posted via web from jmacofearth's posterous

Tag Cloud Computing? - Categories, Keywords, SEO, Tags, Getting to Simplicity


The tag cloud is dead.

Cloud computing is merely a new marketing term for web services and support.

How can we simplify our web experience so that what we are paying attention to is what is important in our lives. And how do we filter out the tags (blow away the dark clouds and fog) are obscuring our goals. What exactly should we be paying attention to? It is a question we need to ask ourselves much more often these days. Or we find ourselves looking back on the day and into the night with a lot of work still to get done before we can sleep.

So one of my objectives for 2009 is to Simplify my Tag Cloud. I mean this both physically, mentally and spiritually. Because where the brain and mind are foggy so is our self, so is our core person. And by eliminating the noisy distractions of tweets, tags, feeds and emails, tv shows and advertisements for the better life, news and propaganda about global wars and warming, the better we are at eliminating the clutter of our online data stream, the more effective we will be an accomplishing our tasks and goals.

And in the long run, accomplishing more of your goals is a big deal.

So let me share my uber-tags first. These are not often written down, but in a drawing I did the other day, trying to explain what I am doing to simplify my priorities, I came up with a pretty good short list; TOP TAGS if you will.

  1. work
  2. family
  3. play/creativity
  4. health/exercise
  5. spiritual practice

Now let me compare that with my current "category nav" from this website.

uber.la categories as navigation

I think I have them all pretty well slotted with my TOP TAGS. I might need to add a "husband" category of some sort, or a better title than "ho-dad parenting" to cover the entire "family" spectrum. But I pretty much leave my personal work, relationship work, out of my writing. On the blog any way. ;-) And I might add tennis as it is my main "fun" and "exercise" activity. But it is actually caught in my "about" and "contact" pages. So I need to add my top-of-the-page nav as well.

 

uber.la's top nav as a tag cloud of life

And so with these added in as cross-tag meta categories I do cover all of my TOP TAGS. But now, for comparison, let me show you some of the tag cloud structures that I have elsewhere.

 

delicious top 10 tags for john32mac

And here is the larger list from delicious. The bolder tags have more pages associated with them.

500+ tags on delicious

And one more from delicious that I really like. On this one, you get to see my entire 560 tags (as of 3-25-09) in order of priority. And as the number of links decreases the type is not only smaller but lighter in color as well.

 

delicious tag cloud of all tags in descending order

 

And of course I could not fit all 560 tags onto a single screen shot, but you get the idea. And the image links to my delicious pages so you can go see for yourself, if you are interested. Okay, so here is a cloud of my Twitter tags.

 

my Tweet-cloud

Oh boy, I need to get something to talk about besides ME! Gosh!

 

And last example, a random cloud from a blog I frequent.

a tag cloud of mess in my opinion

[Okay, so now I need a big wrap.]

Clouds are dead except for specific uses. But most clouds just do not work in the business space. Because someone would need to go back and clean up the tags on a regular basis. Cause what I call "web 2.0" you call "web2" and the next guy calls "social media." And most sites, business and friendship, do not do any tag cleanup.

In our personal lives tag clean up, and refocus on the BIG TAGS is essential.

Here is something David Foster Wallace said about his writing. "I received 500,000 discrete bits of information today," he once said, "of which maybe 25 are important. My job is to make some sense of it."

And that is our task, dear reader, to filter down the noise from our lives and pay attention to the TOP TAGS. Or as Covey put it in his matrix, the Not-Urgent but Important quadrant.

@jmacofearth
permalink on uber.la: http://bit.ly/big-tags

See Also: Rolling Stone's bio of David Foster Wallace

Posted via web from jmacofearth's posterous

Tuesday, March 24, 2009

Keep Your Twits About You - Taking Charge of the MicroWeb


I had a disconnect with a very savvy web worker the other day when I showed her my Tweetdeck layout. "It's too overwhelming," she said. "So how do you manage the people you are following?" I asked. She looked at me as if I had spoken in a foreign language. And one that she did not understand at all.

We were having breakfast at El Sol y Luna the kickoff morning of SXSW Interactive. There was another very smart web worker who also seemed confused by the "twitter control deck" across my screen. Okay, no worries. Let's see how to dissect this.

"And do you leave your Twitter window open during the day?" she followed on, trying to be helpful. "So you don't miss anything?"

[Holy cr**!]

Neither of these web savants had figured out what Twitter was about. But more so, they did not have any concept of how to control or filter the flow of information pouring through the Twitter stream.

Now the other woman spoke up, "And how do you follow more than about 20 people? That's about all I can handle before I get overwhelmed." I worked to contain my surprise and reminded myself, I'd been Twitter-literate for almost a year. And Twitter-aware since SXSWi 06 when it was the BIG thing.

Oh, and it was the BIG THING at SXSW again this year. In a different way, but with the same misunderstanding about what we do with Twitter. [This year's questions: 1. How do we "monetize" twitter? 2. What's the ROI on your enterprise Twitter team?]

So here's my observation of Twitter and my experience of it.

1. Twitter is like IM broadcasting. Calling it microblogging is confusing. (I recommend distancing yourself from that term less you get confused with how and when to use Twitter.)

2. Twitter is not something you leave open and follow. If you did you might just go crazy. Even with today's twittertools, twitter is a stream to dip your ladle into and hopefully pull out some nuggets of gold. It is not a river to dive into. You will be swept downstream. You might lose your self in the endless curiosity, the discovery that is inherent in the stream, and you might enjoy the refreshing dip into Social Media. BUT: more than likely you will wind up gasping for air and wondering how you misplaced your afternoon and got behind on your projects.

3. In order to effective in "working Twitter" you have to manage the stream of Tweets. And there are lots of tools to help you do this. I have written an extensive review of Tweetdeck and how I manage my Followers and Followees. Tools like Tweetdeck and PeopleBrowsr can help. Plugins for Firefox or stand alone apps like Twirl can help. But you have to do something besides use http://twitter.com

Because trying to keep track of, and manage Twitter in a single column of data that continuously updates before you very eyes, is like trying to drink from the proverbial fire hose. It never stops. It never slows down. And if you follow enough people, global folks, it NEVER sleeps. So how in the world would I be able to make ANY SENSE of the Twitterverse if I am trying to watch and use any of the data streaming by on my twitter.com page? Honestly, I can't.

I do use the Twitter.com page occasionally. It is the main place you can Follow and Unfollow people. And also, as a catalyst, I occasionally watch the mono-stream tweets as they pass by, because I may find some nugget, or see someone I follow but do not have in my "close" or "pro" lists.

I can understand the desire to watch the stream. It's like the green wall of data in the Matrix. I can even see how, if my two friends imagined my Tweetdeck stream as a continuous flow of data but now in multiple columns, that it would seem overwhelming. BUT when you take control of the stream whole worlds of possibilities open up to you.

But be careful to watch the edge of the stream less you slip and go down the falls roaring nearby.

And the first part of managing Twitter is getting your streams in order.

@jmacofearth permalink: http://bit.ly/takecharge

Related Posts: Uber.la’s 1-2-3 Guide To Twitter: GETTING REAL with TWITTER

New Development: TwitterDestroyer.com (TwitterJoker.com readys a new app for launch)

Posted via web from jmacofearth's posterous

Keep Your Twits About You - Taking Charge of the MicroWeb


I had a disconnect with a very savvy web worker the other day when I showed her my Tweetdeck layout. "It's too overwhelming," she said. "So how do you manage the people you are following?" I asked. She looked at me as if I had spoken in a foreign language. And one that she did not understand at all.

We were having breakfast at El Sol y Luna the kickoff morning of SXSW Interactive. There was another very smart web worker who also seemed confused by the "twitter control deck" across my screen. Okay, no worries. Let's see how to dissect this.

"And do you leave your Twitter window open during the day?" she followed on, trying to be helpful. "So you don't miss anything?"

[Holy cr**!]

Neither of these web savants had figured out what Twitter was about. But more so, they did not have any concept of how to control or filter the flow of information pouring through the Twitter stream.

Now the other woman spoke up, "And how do you follow more than about 20 people? That's about all I can handle before I get overwhelmed." I worked to contain my surprise and reminded myself, I'd been Twitter-literate for almost a year. And Twitter-aware since SXSWi 06 when it was the BIG thing.

Oh, and it was the BIG THING at SXSW again this year. In a different way, but with the same misunderstanding about what we do with Twitter. [This year's questions: 1. How do we "monetize" twitter? 2. What's the ROI on your enterprise Twitter team?]

So here's my observation of Twitter and my experience of it.

1. Twitter is like IM broadcasting. Calling it microblogging is confusing. (I recommend distancing yourself from that term less you get confused with how and when to use Twitter.)

2. Twitter is not something you leave open and follow. If you did you might just go crazy. Even with today's twittertools, twitter is a stream to dip your ladle into and hopefully pull out some nuggets of gold. It is not a river to dive into. You will be swept downstream. You might lose your self in the endless curiosity, the discovery that is inherent in the stream, and you might enjoy the refreshing dip into Social Media. BUT: more than likely you will wind up gasping for air and wondering how you misplaced your afternoon and got behind on your projects.

3. In order to effective in "working Twitter" you have to manage the stream of Tweets. And there are lots of tools to help you do this. I have written an extensive review of Tweetdeck and how I manage my Followers and Followees. Tools like Tweetdeck and PeopleBrowsr can help. Plugins for Firefox or stand alone apps like Twirl can help. But you have to do something besides use http://twitter.com

Because trying to keep track of, and manage Twitter in a single column of data that continuously updates before you very eyes, is like trying to drink from the proverbial fire hose. It never stops. It never slows down. And if you follow enough people, global folks, it NEVER sleeps. So how in the world would I be able to make ANY SENSE of the Twitterverse if I am trying to watch and use any of the data streaming by on my twitter.com page? Honestly, I can't.

I do use the Twitter.com page occasionally. It is the main place you can Follow and Unfollow people. And also, as a catalyst, I occasionally watch the mono-stream tweets as they pass by, because I may find some nugget, or see someone I follow but do not have in my "close" or "pro" lists.

I can understand the desire to watch the stream. It's like the green wall of data in the Matrix. I can even see how, if my two friends imagined my Tweetdeck stream as a continuous flow of data but now in multiple columns, that it would seem overwhelming. BUT when you take control of the stream whole worlds of possibilities open up to you.

But be careful to watch the edge of the stream less you slip and go down the falls roaring nearby.

And the first part of managing Twitter is getting your streams in order.

@jmacofearth permalink: http://bit.ly/takecharge

Related Posts: Uber.la’s 1-2-3 Guide To Twitter: GETTING REAL with TWITTER

New Development: TwitterDestroyer.com (TwitterJoker.com readys a new app for launch)

Posted via web from jmacofearth's posterous

Sunday, March 22, 2009

What Do We Lead About? - What Makes Up Participation vs Lurking vs Flair?


The owner of inSocialMedia.com made me a guest admin on Friday night.

Why did I accept? What did it mean?

inSocialMedia

How would I participate, or ADMIN? Below is the first discussion thread I created as an admin, where I created a "leadership" group and proposed the following questions to the growing group of 4.

  1. What is inSM to each of us?
  2. Why are we part of it?
  3. What do we get from being a member?
  4. If we were a guiding leader of inSM what would we do to make it better?

And then it was my turn to answer my own questions as a conversation starter.

1. inSM to me is a collection of folks working in SM who want to communicate and build discussions around making our SocialMedia interactions better. To me it is not about business or making money or reputation at being a part of it. It might be for others, I don't pretend to know.

2. I want to be a part of things that are larger than myself. I am an avid community participant. I love Posterious and inSM as my 2 adjunct communities that add more conversation to my own rantings.

3. What I get as being part of inSM is the connection with other SM professionals. Notice I don't use the term experts, cause if I'm an expert today, I am certianly not an expert tomorrow. Too much is changing for any of us to be experts. We are students and teachers, leaders and followers.

4. Engage a group of people in leading the community. Add additional tools or groups as needed. Begin actual dialogues on inSM, unlike the vacant "groups" and "affinities" of Facebook. Where we all join and nothing happens.

So if inSM is more like LinkedIN than Facebook we have done a good job. If we use inSM as part of our reputation validation then we have done a good job. If we build relationships and a level of TRUST on inSM for the discussions to be honest and challenging, then we have begun to build something of value for all of us.

We have begun to build a community.

@jmacofearth
permalink to the uber.la post: http://bit.ly/inSM

Posted via web from jmacofearth's posterous

What Do We Lead About? - What Makes Up Participation vs Lurking vs Flair?


The owner of inSocialMedia.com made me a guest admin on Friday night.

Why did I accept? What did it mean?

inSocialMedia

How would I participate, or ADMIN? Below is the first discussion thread I created as an admin, where I created a "leadership" group and proposed the following questions to the growing group of 4.

  1. What is inSM to each of us?
  2. Why are we part of it?
  3. What do we get from being a member?
  4. If we were a guiding leader of inSM what would we do to make it better?

And then it was my turn to answer my own questions as a conversation starter.

1. inSM to me is a collection of folks working in SM who want to communicate and build discussions around making our SocialMedia interactions better. To me it is not about business or making money or reputation at being a part of it. It might be for others, I don't pretend to know.

2. I want to be a part of things that are larger than myself. I am an avid community participant. I love Posterious and inSM as my 2 adjunct communities that add more conversation to my own rantings.

3. What I get as being part of inSM is the connection with other SM professionals. Notice I don't use the term experts, cause if I'm an expert today, I am certianly not an expert tomorrow. Too much is changing for any of us to be experts. We are students and teachers, leaders and followers.

4. Engage a group of people in leading the community. Add additional tools or groups as needed. Begin actual dialogues on inSM, unlike the vacant "groups" and "affinities" of Facebook. Where we all join and nothing happens.

So if inSM is more like LinkedIN than Facebook we have done a good job. If we use inSM as part of our reputation validation then we have done a good job. If we build relationships and a level of TRUST on inSM for the discussions to be honest and challenging, then we have begun to build something of value for all of us.

We have begun to build a community.

@jmacofearth
permalink to the uber.la post: http://bit.ly/inSM

Posted via web from jmacofearth's posterous

Saturday, March 21, 2009

Twitter Rules: What's Wrong With: #AutoDM, #AutoTWEET, #TweetLater - Everything Is Wrong With Them!


Do you leave an out-of-office reply on your email account when you are gone for more than a few days? And what about when you are in the office? Do you leave your auto-reply emails turned on?

Okay so how do you feel when you call the bank on the phone and they say, "Your call is important to us." Do you believe them? Do you believe them AFTER you've had to call back to the voice-navigation system three times because you keep getting routed down the rabbit hole?

How about direct mail? Do those credit card apps offering you some "guilt free" money make you feel any more confident in the economy? Do they make you feel like the banks are finally ready to start bringing the economy back on line? Do you feel like they are trying to make contact with you, or sell you? Or even worse, scam you?

So here's the connection: On twitter when you decide for whatever reason (cool picture, cool name, random click, recommended by a friend) to follow someone, it is a pretty simple and trivial event. "Click." Okay, so far so good. In some people's Twitter etiquette the next thing you get is a DM from the new "friend" with some happy words of greeting. Or worse, a sales pitch for how you can increase your twitter audience by a 1,000 followers a day. WTH?

Is there any good case for Auto-DMing followers? Is there any good reason to leave your auto-responder ON when you are in the offie. Well, perhaps if you are trying to fake a friendly "Howdy, friend, let's have lots of great chats now that we're friend." I find it more likely that you are faking that intimate connection that comes from an actual response and re-follow.

Imagine these two responses I got after following someone who looked interesting.

Response 1: "@jmacofearth if you like that, you might enjoy also in absentia (blackest eyes) and fear of a black planet (way out of herefear of...)" fr: Tapatia

Response 2: "Thanks for the follow. I hope we get to tweet a lot and rule the world." fr: name redacted.

So I asked Mr. 50k what the heck he was doing training businesses to do this Auto-Bot responder. I guess to him it was like an answering machine. But I think he missed the point and of course now he's blocked me from harassing him any more. When confronted, Mr. 50k responded that he auto-followed and auto-DM'd so he could invite the new "friends" to connect with him on Facebook or his website. Oh boy!

But wait a minute. What are you doing when you ping me back with a sales pitch? A sales pitch of any kind? Like, "Hey, John McElhenney, thanks for the follow. Be sure and check out my Facebook page HERE and get a copy of my free ebook "Winning Twitter and Influencing Tweeps," HERE." So Mr. 50k says it's only because he wants to be able to DM you and for you to be able to DM him. And I asked him, "So what if you took the 30 seconds to look at the persons page and made a determination if you were interested in having a conversation with them?" "When you get 1,000 followers a day come talk to me about that 30 seconds." So Mr. 50k was at about 32k followers when we had this exchange. Let's check in on him and see how he's doing in his mega-twitt quest.

mr 50k as himself

Yep, he's gained 16,000+ new followers so far in the 21 days of March, so he's well on track for becoming a regular Guy Kawasaki or perhaps even an Obama. But wait, let's see what Mr. 50k has to say in those, perhaps he has an important message. Uh, nope.

There is this awesome blurb in his bio, "He believes that education is important, but not essential to becoming a successful entrepreneur." Okay, but don't quit your dayjob. The good news is that Mr. 50k is using his new found popularity and has launched "a social media marketing company, which specializes in training large companies how to engage their customers by using social media." I'm not sure he knows what the meaning of the word "contrived" is, but so be it. (adjective, obviously planned or forced; artificial; strained: a contrived story)

So maybe he can help you. Maybe I'm getting all riled up about nothing. But if I left my out-of-office email reply on (also called an auto-responder) with a pithy welcome statement, my guess is you would feel less welcome and more like a customer.

Main advice. Don't join the Borg, don't be an Auto-Bot. Be REAL and in REAL TIME.

@jmacofearth permalink: http://bit.ly/mr-50k

Related Post
Getting Real with Twitter: http://bit.ly/twitter-1-2-3

Posted via web from jmacofearth's posterous

Twitter Rules: What's Wrong With: #AutoDM, #AutoTWEET, #TweetLater - Everything Is Wrong With Them!


Do you leave an out-of-office reply on your email account when you are gone for more than a few days? And what about when you are in the office? Do you leave your auto-reply emails turned on?

Okay so how do you feel when you call the bank on the phone and they say, "Your call is important to us." Do you believe them? Do you believe them AFTER you've had to call back to the voice-navigation system three times because you keep getting routed down the rabbit hole?

How about direct mail? Do those credit card apps offering you some "guilt free" money make you feel any more confident in the economy? Do they make you feel like the banks are finally ready to start bringing the economy back on line? Do you feel like they are trying to make contact with you, or sell you? Or even worse, scam you?

So here's the connection: On twitter when you decide for whatever reason (cool picture, cool name, random click, recommended by a friend) to follow someone, it is a pretty simple and trivial event. "Click." Okay, so far so good. In some people's Twitter etiquette the next thing you get is a DM from the new "friend" with some happy words of greeting. Or worse, a sales pitch for how you can increase your twitter audience by a 1,000 followers a day. WTH?

Is there any good case for Auto-DMing followers? Is there any good reason to leave your auto-responder ON when you are in the offie. Well, perhaps if you are trying to fake a friendly "Howdy, friend, let's have lots of great chats now that we're friend." I find it more likely that you are faking that intimate connection that comes from an actual response and re-follow.

Imagine these two responses I got after following someone who looked interesting.

Response 1: "@jmacofearth if you like that, you might enjoy also in absentia (blackest eyes) and fear of a black planet (way out of herefear of...)" fr: Tapatia

Response 2: "Thanks for the follow. I hope we get to tweet a lot and rule the world." fr: name redacted.

So I asked Mr. 50k what the heck he was doing training businesses to do this Auto-Bot responder. I guess to him it was like an answering machine. But I think he missed the point and of course now he's blocked me from harassing him any more. When confronted, Mr. 50k responded that he auto-followed and auto-DM'd so he could invite the new "friends" to connect with him on Facebook or his website. Oh boy!

But wait a minute. What are you doing when you ping me back with a sales pitch? A sales pitch of any kind? Like, "Hey, John McElhenney, thanks for the follow. Be sure and check out my Facebook page HERE and get a copy of my free ebook "Winning Twitter and Influencing Tweeps," HERE." So Mr. 50k says it's only because he wants to be able to DM you and for you to be able to DM him. And I asked him, "So what if you took the 30 seconds to look at the persons page and made a determination if you were interested in having a conversation with them?" "When you get 1,000 followers a day come talk to me about that 30 seconds." So Mr. 50k was at about 32k followers when we had this exchange. Let's check in on him and see how he's doing in his mega-twitt quest.

mr 50k as himself

Yep, he's gained 16,000+ new followers so far in the 21 days of March, so he's well on track for becoming a regular Guy Kawasaki or perhaps even an Obama. But wait, let's see what Mr. 50k has to say in those, perhaps he has an important message. Uh, nope.

There is this awesome blurb in his bio, "He believes that education is important, but not essential to becoming a successful entrepreneur." Okay, but don't quit your dayjob. The good news is that Mr. 50k is using his new found popularity and has launched "a social media marketing company, which specializes in training large companies how to engage their customers by using social media." I'm not sure he knows what the meaning of the word "contrived" is, but so be it. (adjective, obviously planned or forced; artificial; strained: a contrived story)

So maybe he can help you. Maybe I'm getting all riled up about nothing. But if I left my out-of-office email reply on (also called an auto-responder) with a pithy welcome statement, my guess is you would feel less welcome and more like a customer.

Main advice. Don't join the Borg, don't be an Auto-Bot. Be REAL and in REAL TIME.

@jmacofearth permalink: http://bit.ly/mr-50k

Related Post
Getting Real with Twitter: http://bit.ly/twitter-1-2-3

Posted via web from jmacofearth's posterous

Thursday, March 19, 2009

The Destroyer Readies for Launch - The TwitterJoker Strikes Again! #sxsw


Twitter Destroyer is the ultimate countermeasure twitter app to swat off those annoying auto-bots, twitter virus peddlers, twitter porn purveyors, and basic twitter jerks.

twitterdestroyer

Part of the TwitterJoker empire, the Destroyer app will annilate all auto-following followers from you profile. And if you alert the Destroyer here on this site of an Auto-Bot or Twitter Spam/Scam artist, we will send the Destoryer API to ping them until they submit.

Because being real on twitter is the only way to go, the Twitter Destroyer was created in response to the rising tide of flotsum and jetsom clogging the free flow of REAL HUMAN connection and REAL TIME conversations on Twitter.

So Mr. 50k, Mr. GET-a-free-Notebook, or get Ms. 1,000-Followers-a-Day, beware. We are on to you. And the joker never rests. Never. http://twitterjoker.com/files/2009/03/trillion-joker-badge.gif" alt="Trillion Followers Badge" /> Also available as a layered PSD file adn PPT PNG. Just ask.

 

@jmacofearth permalink: http://bit.ly/twitter-destroyer

Related Posts: Twitter Rules - Get Real
Uber.la’s 1-2-3 Guide To Twitter: GETTING REAL with TWITTER

Posted via web from jmacofearth's posterous

The Destroyer Readies for Launch - The TwitterJoker Strikes Again! #sxsw


Twitter Destroyer is the ultimate countermeasure twitter app to swat off those annoying auto-bots, twitter virus peddlers, twitter porn purveyors, and basic twitter jerks.

twitterdestroyer

Part of the TwitterJoker empire, the Destroyer app will annilate all auto-following followers from you profile. And if you alert the Destroyer here on this site of an Auto-Bot or Twitter Spam/Scam artist, we will send the Destoryer API to ping them until they submit.

Because being real on twitter is the only way to go, the Twitter Destroyer was created in response to the rising tide of flotsum and jetsom clogging the free flow of REAL HUMAN connection and REAL TIME conversations on Twitter.

So Mr. 50k, Mr. GET-a-free-Notebook, or get Ms. 1,000-Followers-a-Day, beware. We are on to you. And the joker never rests. Never. http://twitterjoker.com/files/2009/03/trillion-joker-badge.gif" alt="Trillion Followers Badge" /> Also available as a layered PSD file adn PPT PNG. Just ask.

 

@jmacofearth permalink: http://bit.ly/twitter-destroyer

Related Posts: Twitter Rules - Get Real
Uber.la’s 1-2-3 Guide To Twitter: GETTING REAL with TWITTER

Posted via web from jmacofearth's posterous

Wednesday, March 18, 2009

Next Year at SXSW Interactive 2010 - #SXSW Let's Build Something Together


So we talked, we tweeted, we sat side by side and blogged our asses off. And SXSWi has now passed into the past. And I am officially behind on my self-defined deadline for a consulting project I started the WED before the conference began. To those I met and those I merely admired from a distance... Here's to you.

here's to you - happy st. patty's day 09

 

Two things I would like to leave you with.

1. Don't go home sad and lonely go home and reconnect with those you connected with this week. What we have here at SXSWi is REAL.

2. Let's DO SOMETHING Next Time. We talked a lot, we had a lot of "start up" chatter and new t-shirts. But next year I'm proposing we have a panel, or a panel a day (sprint style) to create a business or non-profit during the conference. There is SO MUCH talent here in the convention center, perhaps we could get that fulcrum to work from here and move the planet.

A final thank you to Jon Lebkowski and his SocialWebStrategies for inviting me to be on the Sustainability panel this year. It was an honor. And to Jodee and Pricilla from Peoplebrowsr.com who have given me a challenge of a lifetime. So yes, do go home. Travel safely.

But don't forget that this experience we had was REAL. Don't forget and get complacent back in your previous state of affairs.

Do something.

@jmacofearth permalink: http://bit.ly/sxsw-aloha

 

 

the sun and spirit shines on you my friend

 

Now resting without you - aloha folks - yall come back

namaste

Posted via web from jmacofearth's posterous

Monday, March 16, 2009

#SXSW Social Media and Sustainability Meltdown #SMFS - Can't We Agree?


Reduce Reuse Recycle RE-Tweet

 

"Reduce, Reuse, Recycle, ReTweet!" -- JMacofearth. "If sustainability is the goal, then social media will be an enabling technology."

 

sxsw 09 - green presentation - click to download

 

The panel included myself and Jon Lebkowsky, Emily Gertz, and Rob Reed.

Emily Gertz got the best response when she asked, "Where are the LOL cats of sustainability?"

Hot Topic of the Discussion Greenwashing: The practice of companies disingenuously spinning their products and policies as environmentally friendly, such as by presenting cost cuts as reductions in use of resources. Examples: FLEX Ready designation of Suburbans and Hummers, Clorox's Green Products are not in recyclable bottles, Margarine was better for you until they found out it was badder for you.

@jmacofearth
permalink: http://bit.ly/sxsw-smfs

Posted via web from jmacofearth's posterous

#SXSW Social Media and Sustainability Meltdown #SMFS - Can't We Agree?


Reduce Reuse Recycle RE-Tweet

 

"Reduce, Reuse, Recycle, ReTweet!" -- JMacofearth. "If sustainability is the goal, then social media will be an enabling technology."

 

sxsw 09 - green presentation - click to download

 

The panel included myself and Jon Lebkowsky, Emily Gertz, and Rob Reed.

Emily Gertz got the best response when she asked, "Where are the LOL cats of sustainability?"

Hot Topic of the Discussion Greenwashing: The practice of companies disingenuously spinning their products and policies as environmentally friendly, such as by presenting cost cuts as reductions in use of resources. Examples: FLEX Ready designation of Suburbans and Hummers, Clorox's Green Products are not in recyclable bottles, Margarine was better for you until they found out it was badder for you.

@jmacofearth
permalink: http://bit.ly/sxsw-smfs

Posted via web from jmacofearth's posterous

Wednesday, March 11, 2009

Felix Culpa Unleashes Hits from our Past - Progressive Rock Austin Texas 1990's


Before we were FC we were Johnny Rocket
Blue Landing Strip Patterns - J and J from the Bridal Path Treehouse in Austin, Texas
Hey Mama - J and J from the Bridal Path Treehouse in Austin, Texas
Changes In My Life - J and J from the Bridal Path Treehouse in Austin, Texas
In The Beginning - J and J Live from Mt. Bonnell in Austin, Texas
Poems of the Past - J and J from the Bridal Path Treehouse in Austin, Texas
We Can All Be Friends
- J and J from the Bridal Path Treehouse in Austin, Texas
Just Might Be
- J and J from the Bridal Path Treehouse in Austin, Texas

    Felix Culpa at Brainstorm Studios with Ron the Man!
Recurring Dream - Live from Brainstorm Studios in Austin, Texas (the first FC song EVER!)
Discovery
- Live from Brainstorm Studios in Austin, Texas
Interface - Live from Brainstorm Studios in Austin, Texas
East of Eden
- Live from Brainstorm Studios in Austin, Texas
Foolish Again
- Live from Brainstorm Studios in Austin, Texas
Time Is Running Out
- Live from Brainstorm Studios in Austin, Texas
You Will Find It
- Live from Brainstorm Studios in Austin, Texas

 

As Close to Austin City Limits As We Could Get
Hey Girl
- Caught Live at the University of Texas | City Limits Studios
Music Is The Magic
- Caught Live at the University of Texas | City Limits Studios
Set Me Free
- Caught Live at the University of Texas | City Limits Studios

 

Less Than 15 Minutes of Fame - But What a Rush
Local Licks Live Intro - Jodi Denburg
Caught You In A Feeling
(rough demo)
As You Like It
Holding Back the Night (JMac demo)
Lifeline - (JMac demo of FC Song)
Not Alone Again
(JMac Demo)
Clear Designs
(JMac Demo of FC song)

 

We Give It Away, Give It Away, Give It Away Now!
Permalink: http://bit.ly/felixculpa-playbacks

Posted via web from music as fuel

Felix Culpa Unleashes Hits from our Past - Progressive Rock Austin Texas 1990's


Before we were FC we were Johnny Rocket
Blue Landing Strip Patterns - J and J from the Bridal Path Treehouse in Austin, Texas
Hey Mama - J and J from the Bridal Path Treehouse in Austin, Texas
Changes In My Life - J and J from the Bridal Path Treehouse in Austin, Texas
In The Beginning - J and J Live from Mt. Bonnell in Austin, Texas
Poems of the Past - J and J from the Bridal Path Treehouse in Austin, Texas
We Can All Be Friends
- J and J from the Bridal Path Treehouse in Austin, Texas
Just Might Be
- J and J from the Bridal Path Treehouse in Austin, Texas

    Felix Culpa at Brainstorm Studios with Ron the Man!
Recurring Dream - Live from Brainstorm Studios in Austin, Texas (the first FC song EVER!)
Discovery
- Live from Brainstorm Studios in Austin, Texas
Interface - Live from Brainstorm Studios in Austin, Texas
East of Eden
- Live from Brainstorm Studios in Austin, Texas
Foolish Again
- Live from Brainstorm Studios in Austin, Texas
Time Is Running Out
- Live from Brainstorm Studios in Austin, Texas
You Will Find It
- Live from Brainstorm Studios in Austin, Texas

 

As Close to Austin City Limits As We Could Get
Hey Girl
- Caught Live at the University of Texas | City Limits Studios
Music Is The Magic
- Caught Live at the University of Texas | City Limits Studios
Set Me Free
- Caught Live at the University of Texas | City Limits Studios

 

Less Than 15 Minutes of Fame - But What a Rush
Local Licks Live Intro - Jodi Denburg
Caught You In A Feeling
(rough demo)
As You Like It
Holding Back the Night (JMac demo)
Lifeline - (JMac demo of FC Song)
Not Alone Again
(JMac Demo)
Clear Designs
(JMac Demo of FC song)

 

We Give It Away, Give It Away, Give It Away Now!
Permalink: http://bit.ly/felixculpa-playbacks

Posted via web from music as fuel

AdAge Power150 Blog Ranking - "The name isn't STRICTLY accurate..." OR IS IT FALSE?!


So when I first came across the Power150 and saw a blog that claimed to be ranked #197 I was amused. Power150 and ranked #197

But now, even the blogs are having to disclaim the title. The Power150, is really the Power-More-Than-500, but that wouldn't have sounded very good. Here's more:

 

oh, so it's more than 500 then?

 

Seems kinda messed up to me. If it's your top 10 books of all-time and you list 50, well you didn't stay with the program now did you? So Power150 sounds pretty good, yep, Top 150 in my field, but wait... I'm a Top 150 ranked #487? Seems to me they are squeezing in a few more "top" performers to broaden their "reach" perhaps. Oh, and of course they don't have to abide by the rules, they created them. But can you at least admit it is a scam? It's the Power500-Or-So! So call it that.

Somebody else has to think this is bonk! Where in the review process did someone say, "Oh heck, we can't limit the POWER150 to 150!" And everyone else in the room nodded, "Yep, yep, good idea, why not? Sounds good to me." Where did this conversation take place? And how often does it take place in advertising meetings today? And how many people in the meeting, when the question was asked, said nothing. Or worse, agreed. It makes me laugh, but somewhere it makes me mad too. Because it's not honest. I guess that's why I'm venting. Gosh! If the name "isn't strictly accurate," then what is it? Or how do we make it STRICTLY ACCURATE?

Or Power More-Than-500-Or-So

It could be worse. They could just take the rank off the badge all together and we could all be Power150 Bloggers. wOOt!

Now we don't care how many we give out!

 

@jmacofearth
permalink: http://bit.ly/AdAge-500-or-so

Posted via web from jmacofearth's posterous

AdAge Power150 Blog Ranking - "The name isn't STRICTLY accurate..." OR IS IT FALSE?!


So when I first came across the Power150 and saw a blog that claimed to be ranked #197 I was amused. Power150 and ranked #197

But now, even the blogs are having to disclaim the title. The Power150, is really the Power-More-Than-500, but that wouldn't have sounded very good. Here's more:

 

oh, so it's more than 500 then?

 

Seems kinda messed up to me. If it's your top 10 books of all-time and you list 50, well you didn't stay with the program now did you? So Power150 sounds pretty good, yep, Top 150 in my field, but wait... I'm a Top 150 ranked #487? Seems to me they are squeezing in a few more "top" performers to broaden their "reach" perhaps. Oh, and of course they don't have to abide by the rules, they created them. But can you at least admit it is a scam? It's the Power500-Or-So! So call it that.

Somebody else has to think this is bonk! Where in the review process did someone say, "Oh heck, we can't limit the POWER150 to 150!" And everyone else in the room nodded, "Yep, yep, good idea, why not? Sounds good to me." Where did this conversation take place? And how often does it take place in advertising meetings today? And how many people in the meeting, when the question was asked, said nothing. Or worse, agreed. It makes me laugh, but somewhere it makes me mad too. Because it's not honest. I guess that's why I'm venting. Gosh! If the name "isn't strictly accurate," then what is it? Or how do we make it STRICTLY ACCURATE?

Or Power More-Than-500-Or-So

It could be worse. They could just take the rank off the badge all together and we could all be Power150 Bloggers. wOOt!

Now we don't care how many we give out!

 

@jmacofearth
permalink: http://bit.ly/AdAge-500-or-so

Posted via web from jmacofearth's posterous

Sunday, March 8, 2009

TOP 21 WordPress Apps - Workin WordPress for All It's Worth


[this is an edited cross posting, see the full post at fluentsearch.com]

And here is the first pass (there have been beta passes that are unpublished) at my essential wordpress plugin features and the ONE plugin per feature that I recommend. BOLD are REQUIRED! Italics are Amazing but not essential.

  1. Spam Killer - reCaptcha
  2. Commenting System - Disqus Comment System
  3. Delicious for WP - cause if you're trying to do it all without Delicious you're working too hard
  4. Google Sitemaps - Google XML Sitemaps
  5. Google Analytics addon - Google Analyticator
  6. All In One SEO Pack - free and good enough
  7. Lifestream (twitter, rss, blogs, etc.. syndicate yourself back to yourself and to everyone else)
  8. Quanticast Quantifier - cause you can't depend 100% on Google for everything
  9. OpenID Integration - You gotta get with the program on this one
  10. Traffic and Online User Info - WassUP (this one will blow your mind)
  11. Who's Online - a simple variant of wassup, but useful as well
  12. 404 Redirects - Smart 404
  13. A Simple LinkedIN Badge
  14. Caching Wordpress for Speed - WP Super Cache
  15. Really Simple Sitemap - gathers all your post titles and links to one page (awesome)
  16. Tag Suggest Thing - another mindblower and must have
  17. Badges and link/fav/forward this tool - Sociable
  18. New User Introductions - New User Email
  19. MP3 Player Integration -1-Bit Audio Player (it can't get any simpler than this)
  20. Backup Wordpress - the name says it all, good scheduling abilities
  21. Feed Statistics - if you don't use Feedburner or IceRocket or other tool

Still under review
Google Adsense and Adwords Integration
Self-driven advertising tools

Wish-it worked better cause I liked it a lot
CommentLUV - started breaking my upload image options

@jmacofearth permalink: http://bit.ly/wordpress-top21

Posted via web from jmacofearth's posterous