Tweet Revenge

In this wired world of ours, it is amazing how freely we give our information. As my friend Danny over at Digital Dirt can attest, once you put it out there it is pretty hard to take it back. Yet practically on a daily basis I see people posting up on Facebook how much they hate their jobs, how bored they are or even worse, what they are spending their time doing while they are clearly writing from the office. While I have never dissed my job on a social network I am certainly guilty of posting during working hours as well. But at least I try to keep it to a minimum, only putting up vitally important things like weekend plans...so, um, what was my point?

Oh yeah, so back to lamenting your job to the masses - people, if that random girl you vaguely remember who sat next to you in Algebra I (oh so many years ago) can see your post about how you wish you could tell your boss exactly what he can do with his TPS reports, then guess what? Your boss can probably see it too. Awkward.

And if not your boss, then how about your HR department? What do you think all of those people are doing now that the recession has caused so many companies to implement hiring freezes? They are looking for fat to trim, so don't be the bacon!

Clearly, I am no expert. I mean, I joined Twitter along with the other members of my poker group last December so we could keep tabs on each other during a trial run at the Master Cleanse. If you are familiar with it, I am sure you can imagine the lovely posts we were sending out into the Twitterverse about "salt water bathing." I don't think it even occurred to me at that point that other acquaintances might be on as well.

Perhaps "theconnor" another Twitter user thought the same thing when he sent out the following tweet:

Cisco just offered me a job! Now I have to weigh the utility of a fatty paycheck against the daily commute to San Jose and hating the work.

I read about this on Switched.com, and as much as I love schadenfreude (and by the way I overheard some high-schoolers use that word last weekend and I was utterly amazed, but then skeptical that they might have learned about it from "Avenue Q") I felt bad for the person who, of course, got a response from a Cisco employee. This is nothing new, of course. There are countless other stories of people losing jobs, relationships and even court cases from foolish posts. Let's try harder to keep a few things to ourselves, shall we?

I for one just want to say how much I love my job and the people I work with...for no particular reason, I just like to say it.

Buggy Backward Bebo

All of my social networking in one place? Yes please! Having to deal with AOL to do it? No thank you.

From my experience with Real Simple a few posts back, I learned that women sure are into organizing. Even I occasionally get the bug, so when I recently read that AOL had launched their Lifestream information aggregation tool by way of their Bebo social networking site, I was definitely intrigued. In a nutshell, this service takes all your updates, pictures, emails, etc. from sites like Flickr, Facebook, Gmail, AIM, Del.icio.us and Twitter and (in theory) lets you view them all on one handy-dandy dashboard. Cool idea - if it actually works.

I created my Bebo account using my old, clunky, no longer in use AIM handle and found (surprise, surprise) that none of my old AIM contacts were using Bebo. I would have to import contacts from other avenues like my Gmail address book. I wasn't about to drag others into this thing before I knew what I was dealing with.

After an oversimplified sign-in to add my major social networks, I found that the only feed I was seeing within my Lifestream, sad little existence that it was, were my tweets. Aggregator indeed. Facebook was completely MIA. I even tried updating my status there to see if anything showed up, but that didn't work. Now of course, something probably went wrong with my initial sign-up, but an exaustive, time-consuming search of the site left me with no idea how I could fix it.

At any rate, this is what it is supposed to look like:



So I was left with a fairly empty profile page needing to be built from scratch. There were all kinds of tools and apps available to build that page, but why should I be reinventing the wheel when I already have other social networks that fill my needs? I think my biggest reluctance to embrace Bebo is from my perception of AOL. I left AOL years and years ago, never looking back. They would have to do something major to win me over, and sadly for them, this isn't it.

Moving Beyond the TV, Part 1

I had the pleasure of interviewing Kirstin Knezevich, a manager in branded digital platforms at the premium cable channel where I work. Kirstin, a California native, graduated from USC where she focused on business marketing. Intending to work in advertising and print, she found her way to new media when she first came to our company, starting first with its On Demand offering. She then branched out to brand strategy before moving to her current role.

So what exactly are branded digital platforms?

My group is charged with getting the brand out on various platforms, trying to reach non-subscribers and engage people making them more familiar with the brand. We differ from program promotions in that we aren’t advertising premieres or selling full length shows (though we will release full length shows occasionally if it makes sense as a sampling strategy). Instead, the platforms leverage clips from shows, buzz segments and other extra content.

What do you work on primarily?

I have been working specifically on creating a hub on MySpace which recently launched.

Tell me more about the other areas that your group focuses on.

My team is divided into three areas: internet video (You Tube, podcast and other potential opportunities), social networking (MySpace, Facebook and other partners) and mobile. Social networking is my area, and I find it to be such an interesting way to communicate with fans and subscribers in a relatively inexpensive way. It is a vehicle that everyone is playing with and one that will help us to get the brand out.

Do you use social networking sites?

I have both Facebook and MySpace personal pages, but prefer Facebook because of its template structure. It is a more organized way of communicating with people. They are also great about opening up the applications and making them adaptable to your needs.

MySpace is still a force in music especially, but You Tube is also huge for video and iTunes is a driver for entertainment – people are getting content now from lots of places. MySpace is more for entertainment and Facebook is for connecting with friends.

What do you think about brands on these platforms?

Brands are doing well on Facebook, but no one has really hit it out of the park, and it is very hard to measure success in social networking. The question I hear at every conference I go to is, “How do you measure ROI in social media?” You can say that a page has 100,000 friends or a video had this many views, but if it is really just brand engagement, I don’t know if you can measure it in any monetary way. You can get a sense of success from word-of-mouth; there was quite a bit of buzz on one of my brand strategy campaigns. Still, there is no real way to relate dollars spent to word-of-mouth.

Do you Twitter?

I signed up for a Twitter account, but don’t really use it.

Do you think our company should be on Twitter?

As it is right now, brands are using it more as a customer service tool. Twitter blurs the lines between marketing and PR. It would be great for a production blog or as a tool for a huge star to engage the audience. With every platform we have to evaluate what makes sense for the brand.

More to come...

Moms on Facebook

(sung to the tune of Duran Duran's "Girls On Film")

See them uploading albums of their kids all through the night
Making friends with their children's friends might not always be so right
But finding old connections really takes them back
Especially after a maternity leave, it can get their job search on track
And I sense as she keeps poking me that everything is fine

Moms on Facebook
Moms on Facebook
Moms on Facebook
Moms on Facebook

Tons of apps all over her page as she's connecting
As she keeps posting old awkward pictures of me I despise
She's gotta come up for air once she joins six degrees of Jewish separation
And she wonders how she ever signed up for so many random groups

Moms on Facebook (every five minutes)
Moms on Facebook
Moms on Facebook (yes, I got your picture)
Moms on Facebook

Send another smiling baby picture you just made a new friend
Please don't send me another snow globe again!
One more look at your news feed for the last status updates of the night,
I'm tapping my foot, getting annoyed, trying to hold tight
Your AOL finally says "Goodbye" and we're off like a shooting star

Moms on Facebook (she's not an old lady)
Moms on Facebook
Moms on Facebook (back on two minutes later)
Moms on Facebook
Moms on Facebook (she's got more friends than I do)
Moms on Facebook
Moms on Facebook (IM with you later)
Moms on Facebook
Moms on Facebook (please take down that picture)
Moms on Facebook