Retweet vs email forward

Awhile ago, Anil Dash (http://twitter.com/anildash) tweeted..

"It's an interesting accident of history that we consider sharing tweets "retweeting" instead of "forwarding", like in email. RT = FWD?"

This annoyed me on two levels:

• It made me think
• I disagreed, but couldn't pin down why

Upon further reflection (to the degree I can execute that) I still do not think they are the same thing. Why? Well, best I can come up with so far is:

• There is a stronger validation with a retweet than a forward
• My email address book and Twitter follower lists are not identical, and there is a reason for that
• The act of retweeting is more public - those beyond my lists (followers or email) can be exposed to the content I resurface
  

25 Redesigned Logos of 2009

I had no idea 2009 was such a busy year for logos. Check out 25 Redesigned Logos of 2009. I think Chicken Now traded up the most. But kinda a low bar to start with.

35 Smart Logos With Second Thought To Make You look Twice | Graphic and Web Design Blog -Resources And Tutorials

Some pretty clever logos here...

35 Smart Logos With Second Thought To Make You look Twice | Graphic and Web Design Blog -Resources And Tutorials

Blue Oyster Cult: The Siege & Investiture of Baron Von Frankenstein's Castle at Weisseria

The Siege & Investiture of Baron Von Frankenstein's Castle at Weisseria - a song worthy of the title

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Access

I have tended to view my desktop as the only option for my blog updates. Since 80% of my web access now occurs via wifi/iTouch, updates fall in the "not so much" category. So, testing out an iTouch update today. Keyboard form factor is not great, no spelling help, but at least I now have cut and paste for links and such.

Could work, but now I need to actually have something useful to say. Will hope to address that next post.

Cheating on my blog with Twitter

I have resolved to get back to posting to a couple of blogs that I have neglected lately.

Trying to understand how I got there.

Was I lazy? Sure, always a bit, but that is not it.

Did I run out of things to say? Unlikely.

I blame Twitter.

Now, I am no 7x24 mad tweeter, but I have had several people mention lately... "Are you on Twitter ALL the time???"

I am not, but I also NEVER had a similar question asked of me regarding blogs.

So, why? Here are some initial thoughts...

• Twitter is easy and quick. I love easy and quick
• Twitter is short. I find most of my insight can indeed be executed in 140 characters
• Twitter seems to connect me to others better - I have more regular tweet readers than blog readers
  

That being said, this was kinda nice. Got to use multiple sentences... spell check... even bullets!!

Worthwhile considering this in a business context. You want people with good thoughts in them to share them. They might be willing to do that, but will want the easiest path. It is probably not and either/or thing, but matching the right person to the right tool could help you succeed.

Kelly
(@kthul on Twitter)

Twitter - FollowFriday

I remain, at best, a Twitter minor leaguer, but thought I would share a few things I learn along the way.

I have not found Twitter's help particularly insightful, so I thought I'd take a shot once in awhile. For many of you it will appear to be the basics, but for the few it is not - hope this helps some.

So, for today, it is FollowFriday. The hash tag #followfriday (maybe more on hash tags later) is basically a way for you to recommend people you like to follow to people following you.

This article recaps the history, growing abuses, and intended use quite well.

So, I'll shut up and let you read ;)

Razorfunfish update

So, the razorfunfish thing is catching on - more info on razorfunfish

Razorfunfish - is it word

Of course it is not, but there is an experiment to see how quickly a word, in this case razorfunfish, can climb in search engine rankings - and what moves it there.

So, I ask my legions of blog readers (all 5 of you) to repost, retweet, and otherwise spread the word (literally).

Oh, sometime tonight would be best :)

Spontaneous order

Been trying to align Twitter to some economic theory. I a dug around, I came across "Spontaneous order".

First of all - WAY cool concept...

"Spontaneous order is the spontaneous emergence of order out of seeming chaos; the emergence of various kinds of social order from a combination of self-interested individuals who are not intentionally trying to create order." (Wikipedia)

Second, seems to have roots in the Scottish Enlightenment, my FAVORITE enlightenment of all time.

Third, seems to be a good match to what happens in Twitter, but I need to mull it over more.

Need 4 more Fantasy Baseball teams to join league

Well, MLB totally messed up the league features this year and I can't simply convert my private league to a public one to fill the last 4 spots of a 12 team league.

So this presents me with a chance to do a little test and see what tool works better to fill these last four spots... Twitter, my blog, Facebook, or the MLB message board.

Here is how to join:
http://tinyurl.com/c6o2ga
League ID: 16833
League Password: need4more.

15 most disturbing movies

With the noticeable absence of the High School Musical series, this list does pretty much capture a strong list of contenders for the 15 most disturbing movies ever.

Audition... yikes.

Skittles

Ok, so Skittles has had their website based on Twitter, Facebook, and Wikipedia in rapid succession. I have to wonder - what is the point? To add insult to injury, they bundled these with some of the most annoying (and persistant) pop ups I have ever seen.

Each version has augered into the ground. Just showing you are aware of these tools and and turn them on is meaningless to me.

There Twitter-base version rapidly pointed out what happens when you stride in with self-serving intentions and a desire to be "cool" - and then let anyone respond.

And respond they did.

Pun 2.0

I guess puns are considered the dregs of humor because, in the end, the wit required to execute one is minimal. I wonder if the same is true for quirky uses of social media for grins. There have been many early adopter humorists out there for each new "hot" technology....

Blogs spawned... Vader's blog

Facebook spawned... a Civil war page

Twitter offers.. history, Batman, and a mime.

I have to admit, each of these made me smile when I first saw them, but wonder how they will age. Vader's blog holds up the best for me right now, but that is one part clever writing by the author and one part I am a hopeless geek.

Email data points

After getting to update data on 79 of the 312 homes in our subdivision (I am the homeowners' association's web/email/newsletter/database guy), thought I would share some insights on our small slice of the world...

- 86% of the homeowners provided an email address
- 50% wrote them so I could read them
- Gmail and Yahoo are the most popular web mail addresses. Live & msn are barely present
- AOL is the Jason of email. Several still out there and they just don't die

And for the gang trumpeting the death of blogs (hope not) and email (I wish); while Twitter is cool and along with Facebook gets first attention from me when I am online - pretty darn sure I am going to need to count on emails verses tweets to engage the gang online for some time.

Parable 1: Scarcity

Cow's in the barn
Eating all the hay
Hay's all gone
The cow run away

credit: Erik Messamore

BTW, he and I did a killer rendition of this in song with dueling acoustic guitars

Stimulus package

So, it is probably a good thing that we can get deeper insight into what makes up the stimulus package, but much like I have avoided meat processing facilities to maintain my love of hamburgers... sometimes knowing more is unpleasant.

NASA $600 million
Digital TV coupons $605 million
Broadband 6 billion

(House version)

Think I need a trip to Mickey Ds.

Matrix runs on Windows

Operating System humor. One level below puns, but I liked it....

Bubba Nosferatu

Oh, I so hope this is true... Bubba Nosferatu in 2011!!! Thanks for Amy for sharing.

Kosmix search

Be playing a little with the Kosmix search tool. Pretty cool, and anything declared "beta-ish" is totally deserving of a little time.

A little Hulu, Twitter, blogs, Yahoo, etc... all in the mix. If you have not played with it - I recommend a look see.

My Amiga was MUCH easier to work with

Finally spent some time trying to better connect my Twitter account, blog, Facebook, cellphone, iTouch, YouTube, blender, spare socks.....

Some progress, and deeper understanding that these are not things I am gifted in managing.

However, if you are in need of some low resolution animations in Deluxe Paint 2 - I am SO a candidate :)

Very cool social networking tool

Thanks to Janice for sharing this gem...

http://www.usernamecheck.com/

Great way to seen were your user name, or your company's name is registered. I have only come across a few "false positives".

Also not a bad tool to gauge your depth of involvement in social computing as well as flagging a few site worth looking into.

Happiness is hacking Twitter

If you use a simple password on Twitter, Facebook, MySpace, etc... might want to read this cautionary tale of a Twitter admin who clearly had a positive attitude at least.

For you iGoogle users out there...

...I highly recommend the "Fractals" theme. Very cool.

IE, Firefox, or Chrome

So IE still has over 65% of the browser market share, but Google appears to want to change that. This article deserves sharing simple due to the use of the term "microsoft-esque".

For me at home it is still Firefox and the use of their IE tab when needed. From some reason I think I would be cooler (low bar) if I used Chrome, but just not clicking for me yet.

Fembots and the geeks who love them

Regarding the subject line of this post - just following one of the tips in this pithy little recap on growing blog traffic via fairly legit methods. Some good insights to start out 2009