Just recently I was in an interesting meeting discussing the ubiquitous topic of social media. In the advent of millions of people using Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter it’s interesting to hear what’social media means to people and their interpretation of its value. My interpretation of value in social media is the opportunity for technology to expose the interesting details of our day to day lives which are commonly hidden to others because we are at work, traveling, or any other situation where traditional or personal communication doesn’t readily keep us connected.  By no means is my interpretation ground breaking but does serve as a segue to an interesting question.

What is the best to expose the interesting details of our lives or organization and create a sense of connectedness; what should those details be?  For me it’s this blog because I can controll the format, content, and have ownership. Sure I use Flickr and Facebook but only for a point of contact and things I have no problem with existing and living in a public domain.

As a slight tangent … I’m definitely a fan of CommonCraft and their style of presentation; they’ve basically built a small media company based on the Back of the Napkin style of presentation. Staying with the topic of social media they’ve done a nice clip about Twitter in their ‘plain english’ format.  It’s mostly about the service itself but really describes the value point of social media I previously mentioned.

To go with my current Facebook status … “Jon misses the sweet smells of VHT, leaded race fuel, smoked tires, and the 1320″

Social media is amazing. Whats even more amazing is when artists give raw content to a community and begin to see the community shape and mold the content on its own.  If you have not already, give a listen to NIN.REMIX.COM.

The rockband stage kit (smoke machine and lights) doesn’t exactly know when to stop. Its either on or off so be prepared to have a fan for ventilation.

Now …. LET THERE BE ROCK !!!

Just recently I mentioned to some friends the Buckeye Traffic website and they were totally surprised such a service existed.  Its a State of Ohio, Department of Transportation website which overlays the state’s traffic cameras on a Microsoft visual Earth map.  Its not pictured below but there are a series of options to select various areas of the state, zoom in and out, select warnings and notifications, but most importantly open a link to a live feed (image snapshots) from specific cameras on the state’s highways.  This is what is pictured below. Clicking on a purple camera icon will open a dialogue box with the most recent picture from that camera. At times it can be hard to tell the orientation of the camera, which cardinal direction its pointing but a quick observation of where the sun’s position is should be a good indicator.  So far on a day  like today, where OSU is closed and most of the city is on a delay or shutdown its a totally handy tool.

Now its time to go shovel the driveway. :(

Recently I received an excellent recommendation that I should listen to a band called ‘Fleet Foxes’. As my tastes in music lean a little more towards the folk genre right now this is a very welcomed listening experience. Their Wikipedia page says the band describes their music as “baroque harmonic pop jams”. Being from Seattle I would expect Fleet Foxes to have a bit more ‘pop’ after listening to ‘Sun Giant’ yesterday. But rather than typing on and on you should scroll down a little further and press play.

I’ve listened to this song previously but just found a video was made for it. To me its a relaxing song and interesting video to watch. Samuel Beam uses a lot of imagery in his folk music; not something I’m heavily into bit a nice departure from other forms of musical entertainment.

Marketing is ubiquitous. You and every single person you meet at some point is a marketer ranging from managing their personal brand to the profession of marketing the world’s most recognizable corporate images.

Its interesting to note that in the world of ‘tech’ there has been a huge marketing shift in the making among the industry’s two major brands, Apple and Microsoft. Philip Schiller replaces Steve Jobs at MacWorld and Steve Ballmer replaces Bill Gates at CES as their leading corporate front-men. Now that they’re here lets see what they talked about:

Philip Schiller, Apple

• New 17 inch Mac book with prices and a general release date for Jan ‘09
• iTunes gets new pricing and goes DRM free with pricing for an upgrade in April ‘09
• iLife ‘09 with pricing and specific features such as facial recognition in Jan ‘09
• iWork ‘09 with new productivity features and milti-pricing levels available now
• iWork.com launches in beta 

Steve Ballmer, Microsoft

• Ballmer speaks about Windows7, best windows OS to come
• Ballmer speaks about Windows7 have touch functionality
• Release of Windows7 in beta on 1/9/2002 (alredy leaked in Dec ‘08)
• Next game in the Halo series coming in Feb ‘09
• Announced partnership with Dell for Windows Live

Its keynote season for a lot of companies and these are two of the best; but looking at how they both use their marketing opportunities.  Its no wonder Apple fanatics are lining up around the corners of the retail stores to purchase what they just heard about from the man at the top.  

It really begs a simple question…

So now that everyone is a marketer, are you a news maker?

Of the many times of year this is one of my favorites. Having long lived on the north end of Columbus I’ve always been around large neighborhoods with their many lighted streets. With the close proximity of these neighborhoods, Polaris mall, and the great cloud cover this time of year offers there is a night-time reflection of lights in the sky. It makes for a nice glow, almost like summer time with a full moon lighting the sky.

One of my favorite bands, songs, and videos. This fall it was amazing to see this performed live again in Columbus; can’t wait for the next NIN tour.  If you havn’t checked it out NIN has a concert DVD from their last tour. When exercising at home I’ll put this on the big screen and crank the speakers.

edit: google video removed the video, replaced from one with youtube

Note: song gets NWS at 2:24