Here’s my first text-to-speech animation that I called “SOCIAL MISFIT”. It’s about how silly all this social media stuff can be sometimes when people take things too personally when complete strangers decide to unfollow you on a social network for no good reason.
Our personal lives have begun to merge and blend into our professional lives online thanks to the massive success of social networks like Twitter and Facebook. Our once separate virtual worlds have begun to collide, mixing friends with clients and coworkers with family members. It all reminds me of a hilarious episode on Seinfeld called “Independent George” where Jerry’s friend George became hysterical when his world’s started to collide and his fiancé started being friends with one of his friends from his other world.
I know it might seem silly to some. After all, we are who we are. We shouldn’t really keep anything secret and isolated, do we? Some will argue rather convincingly that it’s best to keep personal lives totally separate from professional lives while others have no problems mixing everything up into one online existence (as I do).
I must admit that everything does change once you break down that wall that kept your worlds apart. I think it has more to do with the level of anonymity that one kept more than anything else. For example, some start with their real name (i.e. ChrisBrogan, GuyKawasaki, etc.) so privacy was never a concern. However, others started out with some trepidation and used an alias (cough…cough). I think those that began with a cloak of privacy have the harder time of letting their worlds collide and thus might require a longer period of adjustment in order to fully accept this major change.
In any event, no matter how you decide to manage your worlds, one thing is certain: We must be as authentic and as honest as we can be, no matter which world we’re in. Everything we share online is documented forever for all the world to see.
10 Ways to Get fired on Twitter
30 ways to lose your job on Twitter
Don’t insult Client or their town on twitter!
How to get fired Facebook-style
Woman Killed by Husband because of Facebook status change
I’ve always thought that it would be so much fun if we could go to the movies online with a bunch of our social networking friends. We could watch a movie and chat while we watched it in real-time. I’ve actually sent the suggestion to Hulu, one of the best online video services available today but haven’t heard a peep or tweet from them yet.
Well, while researching another piece on HD video resources for Mashable, I stumbled across a new service from CBS called the CBS SocialRoom which delivers exactly what I’ve been looking for! I’ve only tried it a few times so I’m still not sure about all of its limitations such as how many people can it support in one room nor how it will scale as more people join a room. However, from what I have witnessed, it’s been rather fun and worth a look. 
The good news is that you don’t have to join yet another service because CBS allows anyone to jump into a room with a temporary nickname which was a smart move on their part. More sites should allow visitors to sample their services without requiring signing up.
Once in, you will see a good selection of TV shows to pick from. Obviously, they’re all CBS programs such as CSI, The Unit, Survivor, Amazing Race and others. In a clever move, they’ve also included some old shows too such as Star Trek, Twin Peaks and my personal favorite, The Twilight Zone. There are also some really crowd favorites such as The Love Boat and Dynasty which lends itself for great campy fun with online groups of friends.
Besides chatting, you can all take turns doing other things as well such as throwing tomatoes at the screen or other items like hearts, kisses or darts. If things get to be out of hand there’s an escape button that’ll let you go to your own private room to watch the movie which is a nice touch.
All this reminds me of Mystery Science Theater 3000 which had the host and his two robot sidekicks talking throughout a movie. Most of what they said was hilarious stuff which explains why it was on the air from 1988 to 1999. Of course, most of the conversations we will have won’t be nearly as clever as MST3K but I know there will be plenty of entertaining moments to make it all worthwhile.
CBS isn’t the first to attempt this type of social room service. Meebo, the universal instant messenger service released Meebo Rooms a while ago where groups of people can chat in the same room and watch the same videos that anyone could share by simply copying and pasting the video URL. However, the big difference with this service is the fact that everyone watches the videos at their own time and not as a group at the same time as CBS Social Room does. That’s a big difference because everyone needs to see the same portion of the video in order for all of the comments to make any sense at all. So, it’s a matter of close but no cigar to Meebo Rooms. Still, they were on the right track and came very close. They can easily add the ability to watch videos in real-time though as a group. We’ll see what happens there. Here’s a sample room I created called Film Lovers which has the entire “Pirates of Silicon Valley” playing 24/7.
I think this will become a very popular feature on many sites eventually. As mentioned earlier, I think Hulu would be the perfect place for watching movies with friends online. YouTube would be great too of course. It’s all part of the trend towards making browsing more social. New browsers such as Flock strive to bring co-browsing to the masses by integrating social networking sites with the browser. Others like SocialBrowse add a plugin to your existing browser so you can share links and stories. For more on co-browsing checkout “Collaborative Browsing”.
The future of the web involves real-time collaboration whether its for business (online presentations and meetings) or for pleasure (watching movies and chatting with friends).
Believe it or not, Microsoft can actually help you create the ultimate social media tool! If you use Microsoft Outlook 2007 as your email client then you have the basic foundation for creating a powerful social networking monster. Here’s how I use my most important communication tool on a daily basis.
Most organizations have Microsoft Windows networks with Exchange server which means most of corporate America is using Microsoft Outlook as their email client. At the heart of Outlook is the inbox, which is where you get all of your company related emails. It also manages everyone’s calendar and appoinments as well as tasks and notes. Not too shabby right out of the box.
However, with a few simple and free plugins and add-ons you can supercharge Outlook into an even more powerful web 2.0 communication tool with built-in social networking! Here are just some of the best services you can snap into Outlook.
Here’s view of my data center, Microsoft Outlook. Click image to enlarge.
Here’s a breakdown of each highlighted section of my Outlook:
1. Business Email: The inbox is grand central station for Outlook, the heart of your mailbox. All of my corporate emails go here.
2. Personal Email: Outlook allows you to add many other email accounts to your client so you can access your personal email accounts from services like Bellsouth, Earthlink and even web based services like GMail. Here’s an excellent tutorial on how to add gmail to outlook.
3. xobni: If you want extended information about the people that send you emails than checkout Xobni which has been covered on here before. Xobnix snaps inside Outlook and displays many new details about the senders and all of the emails that you’ve exchanged with them. They now connect directly to their LinkedIn account if they own one which opens a whole new world of possibilities.
4. OutTwit: If you want to use Twitter from inside Outlook then try this gem. OutTwit adds a tiny toolbar that lets you send new posts to twitter as well as read and reply. You can now use TinyURL and send direct messages to anyone. The beauty of it all is that it looks like your working but you’re actually goofing off with your twitter pals. You can have all new tweets appear in a folder called Tweets (if desired) just like email! It’s also firewall friendly. 
5. Plaxo with Pulse: The address book is very important and Outlook does a great book with managing our contacts. Adding Plaxo with pulse and its excellent Outlook toolbar turns your Outlook into a dynamic social network. In essence, it’s like having FriendFeed in your email client. Also, Plaxo will sync all of your contacts online with your local address book. The most powerful feature is the way Plaxo can manage all of your contacts from many different email systems such as gmail, yahoo mail, and more.
6. RSS feeds: Outlook can become an excellent way to keep up with all of your RSS feeds! While I still love Google Reader, I find myself using Outlook’s excellent RSS reader more and more because I am always in my email. I get notified of new blog posts instantly as they appear in my Outlook just like new emails. I’m hoping they will add the sharing capabilities that other readers have but other than that, Outlook RSS reader is a great time saver! Here’s how to add RSS feeds to your Outlook.
7. TimeBridge: One of the best features of Outlook is the ability to check everyone’s calendar for meeting availability times. The problem with that excellent feature is that it only worked inside the firewall within an organization’s private network. Well, that is no longer the case thanks to services like TimeBridge which understands how valuable this feature is to everyone. It also snaps into Outlook and allows you to share your calendar and availability to people outside of your firewall and local network! This is a powerful way to schedule appointments that will save enormous amounts of time and frustration. Here’s an excellent DemoGirl screencast.
But wait there’s more!
These are just some of the many cool tools you can use with Outlook. I also use other things that work with Outlook that aren’t as visible as these other tools. Tools such as McAfee anti-virus and c2c’s ArchiveOne for archiving older emails with attachments while leaving the headers in my mailbox giving the appearance as if everything were still there (double-clicking the email retrieves it from an archive on another server, saving tons of mailbox space). So, there’s far more than meets the eye when it comes to Outlook
Final Thoughts
Outlook is like the Swiss Army Knife of communications. Sure, it’s a master when it comes to managing your emails, tasks, contacts and calendar appointments, but as you have seen it can do far more than you ever imagined. The possibilities are endless as increasing numbers of new services are developed to work with Microsoft Outlook. Choosing the right tools can help you turn Outlook into an even more powerful communication tool.
Don’t look now but social media and social networking tools have begun its assault on the enterprise! They have successfully penetrated company firewalls and have started to infiltrate corporate email systems without anyone noticing yet!
How have they accomplished this impressive task despite all of the security measures that anti-social media administrators have set in place? Well, very simply and quietly via plug-ins such as the clever Outlook email service called XOBNI which has been covered on here previously.
The latest version of Xobni (inbox spelled backwards by the way) includes a hook into LinkedIn which means whenever you are viewing an email in Outlook you can now see their LinkedIn profile and information! This includes their photo, title, current emplorer details and much more! It might not look or sound like a big deal but trust me, this is a game-changer folks!
This is a major breakthrough for the future of the enterprise and incorporating the best of social media into the workplace. It is the shot heard round the world wide web. Ok, maybe it’s more of a small ripple in the ocean which ultimately becomes a tidal wave down the stream!
The concept of sneaking social media into the enterprise has been covered on here before but that process was far more obvious than this new stealth method. Talk about sneaky! Xobni has established a blueprint for all other web 2.0 services that want to go to work with corporate America and world wide for that matter. They just need to figure out how to present their service in a similar subtle and useful manner. Sometimes a whisper is far more powerful than a shout.
For the record, Xobni isn’t the first service to attempt this invasion of the enterprise, but they have come up with the best and most useful service. Some others have managed to scale the walls of IT defense. Here are a couple that come to mind that I used a great deal:
Breaking & Entering Innovators
Plaxo was actually the first service that I can recall that plugged into your Outlook client and connected you to your online account and all your contacts and friends. When they added their Pulse technology you then had your entire social network in your Outlook toolbar! Think FriendFeed for your email client. Here’s the Outlook plugin for Plaxo.
Outwit was another Outlook plugin that allowed you to read and post Twitter messages. It didn’t have all the bells and whistles of other Twitter clients such as Thwirl but it was and still is a very clever way to sneak in a web service that blended well with your existing business communication tool, in this case your email client.
Utterz 2.0 is now LIVE! The biggest change is the user interface of the home page. It is much cleaner, less cluttered and easier to use! Check it out here:
New Profile URL
User profile pages are also vastly improved and easier to remember. The URL is no longer this long and hideously cryptic address! Instead, it’s as simple as Pai. http://www.utterz.com/Paisano
Mobile Utterz
Using utterz on your mobile device is even better than ever! Call: 1-712-432-6666 *record, listen AND reply.
Look at all the new options available from your cell phone’s keypad! http://www.utterz.com/u/cli_doc.php
Go to m.utterz.com from your handset to browse and reply to friends’ messages
Sending a message to go@utterz.com or private@utterz.com within 10 minutes of recording matches up your photo, video, or text with the recording.
New Personal Email Address
Members now get their own personal email address for easier direct communication.
For example, send a message to paisano@utterz.com and it will get routed to me instantly.
Also, taking a queue from Twitter, You can now send an utter to someone’s inbox by including ‘@username’ anywhere in the text of your message!
Finding Friends
Adding your friends from your address book or other services such as Twitter has also become much better! Just login to your service and Utterz will show you which friends already belong to Utterz. Just click follow and you will be linked to them on Utterz. http://www.utterz.com/u/find_friends/network-twitter
Come check it out!
There are new social networks for just about everything so it makes perfect sense that there will be a great deal of focus now on our inboxes. Yes, expect tremendous changes to come with the way we use email. Whether it’s webmail on the big players (yahoo, gmail, hotmail) or even on your desktop client like Outlook, email will never be the same again.
Here are several new innovative email services that will give you a glimpse of the future of the inbox. Remember, this is only the tip of the iceberg. Expect an avalanche of email tools and services to roll down the social networking mountain very soon.
Xobni (inbox spelled backwards) actually works inside your Microsoft Outlook email client. It improves searching for emails, attachments and contacts. It also reveals a great deal of information about the people you correspond with via email. One of the best features is the way it creates threaded conversations from your email exchanges.
Even the head-honcho Bill Gates himself seems impressed with Xobni.
Seeing is believing so checkout this video demo.
xoopit does things a little differently. It works with your GMail account (other platforms coming down the road) and lets you easily view all the photos, videos, and files buried in your e-mail as attachments and sent to you as links from across the Web.
Zenbe takes yet another approach to managing email. It doesn’t plug into your existing webmail account or desktop email client but offers to host your email and an entirely different tabbed interface.
Tripit is an excellent example of new service that integrates extremely well with your email account. In this case, they are a service for travelers who direct all emails related to their trip to their tripit account which organizes all of the tedious details from those emails and presents the data in a more user-friendly manner. Look for all new services to understand the value of using email accounts of their members instead of trying to re-invent the wheel or adding yet another messaging system to manage.
Fuser is an email account aggregator that manages all of your different types of email accounts in one place. Add your gmail, yahoo, hotmail and pop accounts along with the messages you receive from social networks like MySpace and facebook. It also supports Twitter and includes a full client which means you can even send tweets from within Fuser.
For more details about Fuser, they were covered in Inbox 2.0 in an earlier post.
Final Thoughts
Everyone has an email account so it’s a great idea to try to offer services that work with existing accounts. Whether it’s a plug-in, add-on, or just a connection to your email system, services would be wise to offer ways to work with your existing email account. Eventually, we will be able to do everything from within our inbox.
At first, many of you will think Moonri.se is a silly and useless idea. Who would want a service that is basically a twitter for emotions and feelings? Can’t we just post how we feel already on Twitter, our blogs and other mediums? Sure, we can and we do, but Moonrise does it in a more powerful and compelling way. Most of all, it’s fun too.
There’ve been a couple of services that provided the ability to share your current emotional status, but none of them provided nearly as many different ways to convey your feelings as Moonrise does. It allows you to include other elements to reflect your current mood such as photographs, videos and even your favorite quote. This last option isn’t a surprise when you consider that the founder and architect behind this service is Amit Kothari, who also founded QuotationsBook, which is a social network for quotations and covered in “Quotations 2.0“.
Feelings 2.0
The most exciting part of all this is that there will be an API available soon to moonrise which means it will become a conduit for other apps and services to share feelings. They are also “developing a feature that lets you bookmark or post feelings about a URL via a small button you can put anywhere. This will be more meaningful than digg, and also a different way to bookmark links”.
Final Thoughts and feelings
I will admit that I’m a sucker for this kind of thing because I’ve always been a touchy-feely kinda guy. I believe words and emotions are powerful things. Why not use everything technology has to offer to share how we are feeling? Why not use photo’s, videos and quotes to reflect our emotions? Here’s some more information from Moonrise about why it’s a good thing to share our feelings. http://moonri.se/site/about.
As your list of friends grows on Twitter, the amount of messages that scroll across your screen increases exponentially. Pretty soon it becomes impossible to catch messages directed your way in real-time. Ultimately you have to resort to backtracking or using a search tool like TweetScan (R.I.P Terraminds!). Increasingly members of the Twitter community are demanding better ways to filter and group all of this information. One of the new solutions has been Twitter Hashtags and channels.
What are Hashtags?
Hashtags are a way to group twitter messages together according to subject matter, similar to the concept of Twitter groups or tagging. You follow @hashtags and then use the pound (#) symbol to tag the tweet, for example: #SXSW.
Here are the best blog posts about the history of twitter hashtags and channels:
Bublicious’ Tools for Monitoring Conversations in Twitter
FactoryJoe’s Groups for Twitter; or A Proposal for Twitter Tag Channels
Factory Joe’s Making the most out of hashtags
Twitter Fan Wiki on Hashtags
Important Hashtag Links & Information
Hashtag CheatSheet
follow #tag: subscribe to all updates tagged with #tagfollow username#tag: subscribe to all updates tagged with #tag from a specific userleave #tag: unsubscribe to a tag; you will still get updates with this tag from your friendsleave username#tag: unsubscribe to a specific from a specific userremove #tag: completely remove all incoming posts tagged with #tag, even from your friends#tag message: creates a status in the #tag channel#tag !message: creates a status that is only visible to people subscribed to channel tag #tagTwitter Tagging
I’ve always thought it would incredibly useful if we could tag our friends on twitter just as we tag blog posts or bookmarks so we could filter what we see at any given moment.
For example, I would tag some friends with Social Media, Utterz or Baseball. We could then filter all tweets according to these tags for any given moment.
It would also be useful if we could tag each of our tweets so that they could be indexed, searched and filtered just like our group tags. It would be invisible so it wouldn’t appear as ugly as Twitter hashtags with its # symbols spewed all over the place.
Twitter Groups
While hashtags and channels look and smell like twitter groups, they are not the same thing. They are like distant second cousins.
I still wish there was a way to create true groups for twitter that we can manage as well as public groups that we can join.
Obviously, it would be done thru the use of tagging.
In the mean time, here’s an early attempt at Groups for Twitter. I say close but no cigar at this point.
Excellent thread on twitter groups
Follow @TW_Groups
Cool Twitter Search Engines
These excellent search engines for Twitter work very well with hashtags and channels in addition to basic searches.
Final Thoughts:
I believe there will many new ways to filter and search our Twitter stream of data. Some of these are already being accepted by twitter members. Look for group tagging to make its way down the pyke soon!
What strange coincidence that the two largest social networks, FaceBook and MySpace, both make the news this week.
First, FaceBook CEO Zuckerberg’s interview disaster with journalist Sarah Lacy then the MySpace callgirl who had a hand (pardon the pun) in bringing down the New York governor Spitzer who resigned today. It inspired this comic and the start of a new series called “Anti-Social Behavior”
