Mediaphyter – A Communications Cocktail


Quick’n’Dirty Social Media Podcast: Episode 2 Recap

qnd_logoThe second episode of Quick’n'Dirty Social Media Podcast (#qnd) went off without a… OK, OK, there was a hitch. Or a glitch, rather. Someone whose name rhymes with Baron Rout accidentally set the show up for 15 minutes so we didn’t live stream the entire time.

The good news, however, is that the show recorded in it’s entirety (you can even hear me questioning whether or not we were still recording) and you can download or listen here. Why should you? Here’s what we discussed:

  1. Case Study: We had a brief discussion around how technology provider AMD is leveraging social media monitoring and measurement platform Radian6 to listen to its customers. The company created a ‘war room’ earlier this year at CES and tracked conversations around the show on various social networks using Radian6. It was so successful that the platform is being used throughout the company.
  2. Special Guest: Brian Halligan, CEO of HubSpot, came on to talk about the recently issued “State of the Twittersphere” report. Halligan discussed the methodology behind the report, the results, Twitter usage stats and Twitter growth.
  3. Point / Counterpoint: Last week Squarespace started a Twitter giveaway of 30 iPhones over 30 days. People are supposted to tweet with #squarespace once a day for a chance to win. I contended that it creates mostly noise and doesn’t tie value back to the company or for the users. Aaron feels that name recognition is good marketing and that there is value for the company. Hear us, um, square off about it.
  4. Executive on Twitter: Nancy Duarte, CEO of Duarte Designs, has a compelling Twitter presence. She shares valuable information with her readers while also heavily engaging with them, and showing a personal and entertaining side of herself.  Definitely worth a follow.
  5. Giveaway: We gave away an iPhone! Or, rather, a $199 gift certificate for an Apple product. In response to the Squarespace giveaway, I offered my Twitter followers a chance to win their own iPhone if they came up with a more creative giveaway idea. Jim Lodico was our winner. We discuss why.

We didn’t get a chance to discuss a new social network this week (Glue was on the roster) so we’ll talk about it next week. Also next week we’ll have Mike Murray of Foreground Security on to discuss true social engineering in social networking / social media. Aaron will also do an almost real-time update and overview of Jeff Pulver’s 140 Characters Conference.

Listen live or download archived podcasts here.



Can I have $1? No, really…

n1019213512_164764_7437Two years ago I raised $3K for the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society through participating in Nike Women’s Marathon.

Last year I raised $9K but could not complete the event due to my heart condition rearing its ugly head .

This year I am hellbent on completing 26.2 miles and meeting in the middle and raising about $5K.

As I wrote on my donation page, I’m not a hero. I’m a woman who wants to get in shape and support a good cause. I’m trying to leverage the power of my large online network and ask each of you guys to donate $1. Yes, just $1 (more is appreciated but not necessary). I figure if 1/3 of you donate $1 I will more than reach my goal, which is awesome.

And when I say I’d like $1, I really mean that. It’s not some lure to get you to donate hundreds. While some have donated more than that, and it’s appreciated, if all you want to give is $1 I will be just as appreciative!

What do you say? You can donate here.

Oh, and I’m doing this in honor of my cousin, Joe Gugliotta.



Quick’n'Dirty Social Media Podcast: Episode 1 Recap

I might be slightly biased but I think that the first episode of Quick’n'Dirty Social Media (#qnd) podcast went very well. Me and my co-host, Aaron Strout, gave it a good test run. While we determined some kinks we need to work out, I’m also pretty pleased that we had so many listeners for our first show and we really had fun doing it. A quick recap:

  1. Social Network: We talked about Foursquare, of which Aaron has been a fan for a while, and I signed up for only a few weeks ago. It’s a cool geolocational social network (developed by Dodgeball creator Dennis Crowley) in which you can track your friends’ adventures in a protected environment, but also create to do lists of exciting stuff, and even earn points for the adventures you rack up. I suggested that Crowley try to monetize by creating authenticated sections for conferences that would pay a premium rate for their users to track each other on site (a great alternative to cluttered Twitter feeds and it almost creates an on-site social network).
  2. Point / Counterpoint: Spymaster, the interactive social network game that is all the rage on Twitter. Aaron believes that to some degree Spymaster helps bring new users into Twitter and helps people better engage and better understand the service. I compared it to Mafia Wars and other ridiculous time wasters on Facebook and explained my “unfollow policy” when it comes to people DMing me and trying to recruit me to the game.
  3. Executive on Twitter: Aaron told the story of Padmsree Warrior, CTO of Cisco, and how she’s grown her Twitter network to nearly half a million followers. However, he also noted that she’s only following back 66 people out of that nearly half a million. That’s a pretty poor ratio, and while it’s true that you don’t need to follow everyone in order to engage, following 66 people is pretty minimal. I also asked the question, would she have so many followers if she was not Cisco’s CTO since she may not fully engage?
  4. Case Study: Monsanto and social media. Aaron shared his experience hearing Glynn Young from the agri-business goliath present about how the company has used social media to turn some of its negative perceptions into opportunity. Aaron has a full recap of the case study here.

In the future we will have a special guest (we didn’t want to make a poor soul suffer from our trial run) and we will also issue some sort of challenge to our listeners. We haven’t figured out how that is going to work yet, so ideas are welcome. Also, if you listened in today, feel free to ping either one of us with feedback. We want this to be quick, snappy, fun and not long and drawn out. This podcast isn’t about us — it’s about you guys.

Finally, huge thanks again to Intel, Seagate, ScateIgnite and EuSecWest for sponsoring our logo design contest!



Quick’n'Dirty social media podcast launches today

qnd_logoThe Quick’n'Dirty Social Media Podcast kicks off today at 3 p.m. PT / 6 p.m. ET. As I wrote a couple weeks ago, this project is a joint one with Aaron Strout, and it came about after a dinner debate in San Francisco. We’ll be doing all kinds of fun stuff — point / counterpoint, case studies, highlighting lesser known social networks, spotlighting cool members of the social media community, and we’ll even have regular guests. Our first show is going to be a little less formal since we want a chance to play with the format and get some feedback, so we won’t have a guest this week. But we will have other fun stuff.

Speaking of fun stuff, we’d also hosted a two-week long logo design contest. Well, you see the logo above. We love it! Big thanks to Kenneth Lim who designed the winning logo. He went above and beyond and gave us several options, and the design was so clean and fun that we had to go with it. Kenneth has won the following:

I am sure we will do other giveaways and prize incentives in the future, so be sure to listen to the podcast. The BlogTalkRadio link is here. Will you join us?



Quick’n'Dirty Podcast: Logo design contest

As Aaron Strout announced yesterday, we’re doing a podcast together. The Quick’n'Dirty Social Media podcast will launch on Thursday, June 4, and will run every week at 3 p.m. PT / 6 p.m. ET for your listening pleasure.

Why are we doing this podcast? Aaron summed it up pretty well in his post:

What do you get when you combine a year plus Twitter relationship, numerous collaborative efforts including a social media charity auction, guest blog posts and losts of link love with a dinner argument over the merit of celebrities joining Twitter? A weekly podcast show with a good friend and kindred spirit, that’s what.

Aaron was one of the first people I “met” when I jumped into this social media world and we seem to have been in lockstep ever since. After finally meeting face-to-face last month at a Hubspot tweet-up — and having a friendly yet fierce debate over celebrities on Twitter — I realized that Aaron’s expertise and persona complements mine very well. Not to mention, we both like to have fun and we both have a certain edge to us. It was a perfect podcast fit.

However, while we have a great name, we don’t have a logo. So we’ve pulled together some fantastic sponsors who have contributed to a prize package for the best Quick’n'Dirty podcast logo:

Want to win all of those prizes? Simply enter the contest. Some guidelines:

  1. Aaron and I know the name is edgy but this is still a family friendly podcast. He has a wife and kids and I have… well… he has a wife and kids!
  2. Our tagline is “Because social media doesn’t have to be complicated.”
  3. Our format includes some head to head point / counterpoint, a weekly challenge to listeners, digging into unknown social networks, and highlighting up and coming social media rockstars
  4. We’re fun but we’re serious about what we do. So fun but professional would be a good tone.

Submissions should be uploaded to Flickr or a comparable site and the link (not the attachment) should be emailed to mediaphyter gmail com.

Deadline: Friday, May 29. We want to have this up and on our BlogTalkRadio page before we kick off on June 4.

Let’s see what ya got!



What do Office Space, A.J. Liebling and enterprise tech have in common?
Mar 9 09, 10:54 am
Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: , , , ,

Me!

It seems like I get so carried off by other things (that day job and that pesky ZDNet blog!) that I barely get to write here. And when I do write here, it’s about other people writing about me. How self-involved can I get?

Quite, it appears.

Mr. Aaron Strout, aka “one of my favorite people on the Internet”, kindly included me in his “45 in 45″ series, in which he interviews 45 social media-type experts in 45 days and asks them the same questions. Now I am certainly no expert but I do prattle on about such things over at ZDNet, so I always have something to say.

If you want to know more about what I am thinking (since I am failing you over here on this blog) take a look at Aaron’s five questions and my answers. He asks some good ones — and he gives me a chance to ramble about social media consultants who know nothing about enterprise technology. This is one of my favorite topics.

Also, did you know I love my laundry soap? Mmhmm.



Five questions with… me!
Feb 17 09, 11:50 am
Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: , ,

Craig Sutton aka “The Bit Boss” posted a quick interview he did with yours truly over on his uber cool blog. If you’re frustrated with me for not writing more here or wonder more about why I got my tattoo, what my favorite bands are, and what it is I do all day at work, that’s a good place to start.

I’ll also take this moment to say I am really excited to be speaking at this year’s Learn About Web conference, for which Sutton is the chair, on the topic of social media and security.

You can check out the five questions here. And if you have more, feel free to ask. Chances are I’ve already blurted it out on Twitter anyway.



Being the Brand aka “My First Tattoo”

I got my first tattoo today. It was a long time coming. Literally, we’re talking 14 years of consideration, here. While I spent a good portion of my late 20s getting a bevy of different piercings, I never wanted to get a tattoo until I was as sure as possible I would want it for the rest of my life. Last week it hit me that I did know what I wanted — and was sure it would continue to be a part of me for a very long time.

img007581As you’ll know if you’re, well, on my site, “Mediaphyter” is the name of my blog and my name on Twitter. I first want to dispel any rumors that I got this tattoo due to my Twitter popularity or obsession with the microblogging site. I’ve been using the moniker “Mediaphyter” for about 10 years at a mimimum, either as an online name and a silly nickname between some PR pals. It doesn’t identify me but I identify with it. (More pictures of the whole process are available on my Facebook page.)

What is a “Mediaphyter?” In my silly definition, me. Me as a newfound journalist when I was 19 years old. A “mediaphyte” to me was a play off of  “neophyte.” However, “mediaphyte” was taken and since I’m known to have a bit of a petulant personality, “Mediaphyter” was born. It was made even more appropriate when I dove into PR after leaving the journalism world. Then I truly was fighting the media.

So why brand myself ? Remember that “Seinfeld” episode in which George Costanza used to fear his “worlds colliding?” I lived my life like that for many years. I had my professional friends, my personal friends, my drinking buddies and my other random friends associated with a variety of interests. I always felt the need to control and protect and to keep the worlds separate, as if once they collided my world would implode.

Simply put, that just ain’t possible if you’re knee-deep in social media. I live my life in a somewhat transparent fashion, for the good and the bad. I try to keep my personal and family life very personal and sometimes that works, sometimes it doesn’t. What’s important about this — and how this relates to the tattoo — is that I am celebrating the removal of my fear to allow my worlds to overlap and collide. I have stopped fighting the fact that I sometimes live in different worlds. I have made it all one big, open, collaborative world. It might seem odd to some as it comes very natural to them. Considering I spent most of my adult life afraid of just that, it’s a feat for me. Transparency is no longer terrifying.

Why now? It’s just that time.

I am not suggesting that everyone who is battling with the same social media versus private life concerns go out and tattoo their user names on their bodies. Actually, please don’t.

Oh, and why back of my neck? I haven’t had short hair since I was six years old. I can show it off and hide it with ease.

More pictures of the whole process are available on my Facebook page. Are we friends?

Special thanks to Maeve Naughton for the moral support and the nice people at Pierce / Ink in San Jose — especially Zack the tattoo artist.



January = Mediaphyter friend appreciation month
Jan 5 09, 9:49 pm
Filed under: Random, Social Media, community

Starting 2009 I realized that I am so fortunate. I have a job that I love, friends that I cherish, a cat that is very cute, and a bunch of fantastic opportunities laid out in front of me. I realize that I wouldn’t be here without my awesome friends — and being a cynic I recognize that anything can change at a moment’s notice.

Therefore, January 2009 is hereby going to be known as my month of friend appreciation, during which I will call out one Facebook friend via status message and say why I appreciate them. Is it silly? Maybe. But if people can update their statuses to talk about drunken debauchery or firing up the grill to make shrimp for dinner, I can do this.

It will range from personal appreciaton to professional appreciation. I won’t do it at a specific time of day and it will stay up for at least a handful of hours. I figure, though, if I know some great people, aren’t I being selfish by not sharing the wealth?

That said: Are we Facebook friends?

P.S. Also consider this a social networking experiment, which I will likely blog about over at ZDNet in February.



Happy holidays, friends!
Dec 24 08, 10:46 am
Filed under: community | Tags: , ,

Whichever holiday you celebrate, may it be joyous and filled with the love of family and friends. Thanks to those of you who have meant so much to me — personally and professionally — in 2008. As for the rest of you, I look forward to many new friendships in 2009.

That is, if you can get this image out of your mind:

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Happy holidays!!

Image courtesy of OfficeMax “Elf Yourself” – Make Your Own!