First I should start off with the fact that this decision to go to Spain was one that was done quite quickly. So after posting onto Twitter that I had some vacation time to burn I received a response from @JoshuaNTaylor that Barcelona should be in my list of choices. And after a little back and forth with him and airfare sites the ticket was purchased.
That leads me to yesterday the 27th of March when I arrived to SLC International to a rather packed gate. Shortly after that, they announced they were looking for volunteers to take another flight due to overcrowding. At which I was hesitant, but after they sweetened the pot I took it (with a first class bump and a voucher). So here I sit, waiting to board the my standing on a couple of firsts. Its my first flight to Paris, and also for the first time boarding as first class.
I have a significant layover in Paris to the tune of 8 hours, intentionally, so that I may wonder around the city of lights for a time. Wish me luck that I make my flight to Barcelona and don’t end up on the wrong Train!

This video has virtually blanketed the internet today. I saw it on BuzzFeed this morning, which was pushed there by Reddit some 9 hours ago. Then I saw it on Laughing Squid followed thereafter by Gizmodo, and I hope a ton more.
I’m really look forward to seeing this guy landing a gig out of all this internet hullabaloo.

Watch it, then comment below on whether your think he has a shot.

Recently I was tapped by two separate organizations to begin revamping their social media efforts but months later I haven’t even begun the process. One is missing the point on brand, the other missing the mark on communication.

Social media is pointless if you either don’t have anything to say or don’t know what you are trying to say.

As I slowly peeled back the layers I instantly found in both circumstances gaping wounds that had been constantly bandaged by a new logo here or a kludge system hack there. If your company has issues with e-mail communication carefully consider whether or not you’d like to send out 140 character messages to the rest of the internet. If your company is missing any sort of mission statement or coherent message desired to put forward do you truly think that you’ll be able to communicate who you are to strangers in 140 characters or less?

So as I began the process of unfollowing and adding to lists I realized that this isn’t going to be a perfect system but nonetheless one that is necessary for the time being. I didn’t really follow any of the other approaches at unfollowing like JustUnFollow, or others that came before this. Near as I can tell, the only thing that I will lose is for those that I previously was following to DM me. Most of my usage happens at work, other than that I catch replies through my phone and the occasional scroll through as well on the phone. But I believe that now there is more engagement needed I could see access increase at home as well being that now I would be going to Twitter not just to see what was going on but now since I have to actively switch through lists, I find myself thinking about going to Twitter so that I may find out more about a particular subject or group (naming the lists appropriately to fill those buckets).

All of that being said I found myself considering ways in which Twitter could be improved through facilitation of what I’ve laid out here (the adding to lists to find out about specific topics).

The first deals not with the topic thing but instead with the realization that many people are receiving too much noise by following too many people.

• Follow on a trial basis: Allow the option to follow for on a set period of time, after which the person is unfollowed and added to a private list

And here are a few on how lists could work better

• I considered user curated lists but I haven’t even seen anyone using them on Facebook yet so…
• Integration with a service list WeFollow that allows you to assign yourself specific tags, so that users won’t be forced to create the list to add you to (UPDATE: Turns out that Twitter has begun doing this, albeit sneakily)
• More simple interface for lists, the thought here would be to present the user with those the follow (specifically if it could be more apparent that specific followee’s aren’t associated with a list.

I found people on Wikipedia using Urban Dictionary as a verifiable source for the rule. Then I found people on StraightDope linking it through hearsay that they thought it might’ve been a Muslim thingy or other. Best part as when Ben Franklin got pulled into it through the Farmers Almanac!

Needless to say, I did not find any scientific data purporting that this “rule” was scientifically verifiable, but oh you internet, you crack me up!

If you’d like to talk about Social Media or Twitter feel free to jump into the fray that is the comments, I thoroughly enjoy the discussion!

The breadth and scope for the team reaches quite far and wide, from outlining internal communication, communication within the membership and external communication. They’ve lined up an extraordinary team and I have have high hopes for what it is we’ve set out to do. My primary focus will be on Social Media Strategy, unsurprisingly. Some of the preliminary steps that we will be taking will be evaluating all of the aspects of communication that the church is using as well as simultaneously researching all of the tools available to churches for communication (most undoubtedly some may not even be targeted at churches). Also, and this is my primary reason for posting here is to ask you what your thoughts are on church communication, what tools you know of that are out there and what your churches communication strategies have consisted of and most importantly any online resources that could be provided to help guide and structure our communication strategies going forward.

Here are some of the sites/blogs I’ve found thus far that discuss this topic:
Be Deviant
Tim Schraeder
Church Marketing Sucks
The City

A little over two months ago I put forward a request at my place of employ for a change in title or more accurately what would be an addition for my title. (Suffice to say that meant me grabbing the graphic designer as he designed new business cards and having him change what my title.) The title I was requesting was “Software Developer & Social Media Strategist”. The “Software Developer” part was already there and the addition was “Social Media Strategist”.  I decided that this should be my title when I realized that all of the strategy regarding Social Media  when it came to the company were in the end ultimately in my domain of knowledge. I wouldn’t make the final decision but I would be involved in the decision and I was the gatekeeper if it needed to get to the next level in the company hierarchy so suffice to say, the strategy itself was left to me.

There are two aspects of the business that require decisions in social media. First there is, for brevity,what I’ll call marketing , pretty much anything that goes outside the company. Next you might say that I you haven’t heard of the company I work for in social media so I must be doing a poor job. Fair enough, but everything as far as marketing goes has been pretty much on hold until we determine the direction we desire to go in our branding strategy which although I can speak at length regarding ultimately isn’t my decision nor has my opinion been asked. The second aspect is development, and being a developer myself I very well have volumes I can speak to in this regard as well. However it has also been put on hold until we get a client that actually wants it since the development time won’t be allocated until we get that client (its really a backwards approach).

What are your thoughts?I believe there to be a very specialized skill set needed to accomplish this sort of work. That being said I’d like you to be gut-wrenchingly honest here. if you perceive such a role as fodder then say so.

Now I am contemplating passion. What is it? Do I have it? What is my passion?

I’ve begun playing in the arena of business and marketing in aspects of the company. My thought, a geek who is adept at business, marketing and technology could be very valuable. Do any of you have any thoughts? Feel free to comment.

As a member of the Utah tech community I hoped to find UtahPulse.com as a place to connect, learn & find fresh utah oriented content.  Unfortunately that is not what I have found.  I hope this feedback finds a reader who understands that this criticism may seem harsh on a beta site but without such feedback this site won’t make it out of beta.

What I have found has been a drab site with little content (forgivable as its in beta) and what content I have seen does not grab the reader in any way shape or form. What I have seen is a press release aggregator. Zions bank is a great member of the community, but the link & image at the top of the page is more than enough to advertise for them, no need to reproduce every tech related topic from them and make UtahPulse look like a shill for them.  Additionally, there are no images for a story therefore making the content seem dry, newswire-like.

Integrating yourself into a community like the tech community of Utah will take much work but I don’t believe that it will be hard.  You need to get people into the community not just a site.  If you are to join the tech community of Utah then you must /join/ the tech community of Utah.  What I mean by that is that you should be networking with the networkers & utilizing the technology talent that is readily at hand.  Get local bloggers to blog about UtahPulse, get involved in the worldwide discussion. Join & use tech that excited the tech members of the state you are trying to grab the attention of.  What about a fan page on Facebook?  Thats pretty mainstream.  How about organizing a meetup using Upcoming.org?  Or how about getting really crazy and utilizing the bleeding edge that we are using like Twitter? Or how about grab a Qik account and broadcast live online from a cell phone some of the pivotal tech events that occur on a weekly basis.

The conversation is waiting for you, are you ready for it?

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