Monday, May 18, 2009

The Round-Up Volume 1, Issue 24: The All Twitter Round Up (Twitter Style)

Twitter appears to be dominating the landscape of the media discussion these days, and that’s no easy task given everything that’s going on out there, but with close to 1100% growth year over year you can’t blame it. In just the last week I noticed Twitter being written about it Sports Illustrated and Time magazine and every major news channel now has a Twitter promotion on TV, driving people to follow them online. Celebrities and academics alike are using the platform to connect with their audience and even brands are starting to do interesting things with the platform. So, in honor of Twitter, this week’s Round Up from the Digital Influentials is a Twitter-centric edition, with all of the reviews in Twitter format, of course!

If you manage multiple Twitter accounts, check TWHIRL (http://www.twhirl.org/)- Simple desktop app- Simple solution for complex management.

TWEETSCAN (http://www.tweetscan.com/)-simple Twitter search, since search on Twitter isn’t so simple. See a search cloud for research, too.

Share files on Twitter with TWEETCUBE (http://www.tweetcube.com/). Excel, PPT, Word or whatever you desire can now be shared via microblog.

Want to postpone your pithy posts? Use TWEETLATER (http://www.tweetlater.com/)- build a queue of tweets to post later (like the name says).

Use TWEETBEEP (http://tweetbeep.com/) to receive alerts when your key words are being tweeted. Like Google Alerts, only Twitter-focused.

To graph the popularity of terms in the twitter-verse, check out TWEET VOLUME (http://www.tweetvolume.com/). Compare 5 terms to see stats!

Want to know who you should be following on Twitter, check out WHO SHOULD I FOLLOW (http://www.whoshouldifollow.com/). ‘Nuff said.

Writing a blog and want to auto-post to Twitter? Check out TWITTERFEED (http://twitterfeed.com/). Multiple platforms made easy.

As you can see, there’s no shortage of Twitter tools that can be used for any purpose in this dynamically evolving environment. Of course, part of what makes Twitter so interesting is the way that it merges mobile and the web, with so many people updating their Tweets from their phones. So for the iPhone crowd, check out:

TWITTERTREND shows you what everyone else is doing on Twitter. TWITTERRIFIC is a popular Twitter client, but I use TWITTELATOR. TWITTERPICS allows you to search for pictures in Twitter.

Now go and have fun with the Twitter, and tell them the Digital Influentials sent ya!

Friday, May 8, 2009

Please Welcome Our Little Baby Boy!


Mason Gabriel Ka'eo Treffiletti!

Tuesday, May 5, 2009

Spend Spend Spend In A Recession

Some interesting nuggets from Business Week and an article about whether you should spend in a recession. The idea gets printed quite often, and i am one of the people that do the printing, but not everyone hears it. Check it out.

Monday, May 4, 2009

The Round-Up Volume 1, Issue 25: New and Cool in the Round Up!

This week my theme in all my writing is “the next big thing”. I write tongue in cheek this week because everyone always asks me what is “the next big thing” and in my Mediapost column I responded that the next big thing is nothing big, it’s just a series of little things which continue to evolve. That being said, this edition of the Digital Influential’s Round Up is all about finding the next “cool” things.

It can be hard to identify the next cool thing because being cool is very much a subjective concept. Remember The Fonz (Happy Days for all you young folks)? He was cool, apparently. I think marketing is pretty cool, does that count? Cool is subjective, so for this week I spent some time trying to uncover what I thought was new and “cool”. Let’s see what you think!

Are you constantly searching for a cool way to do a presentation? If so, check out PREZI (http://prezi.com/). Prezi provides a tool for creating “zoom in” presentations. They’re a flash based version of a map-like model for creating presentations and you can drill down into specific areas for detail. Web-based and pretty easy to use, it’s another way of creating a new presentation interface. Oh, and don’t worry that most of the examples are in Italian.

I know that Twitter is apparently cool and is growing by leaps and bounds every day, but if you were wondering what you can do to better understand Twitter and the impact it has, check out TWITTERATR (http://twitrratr.com/). This simple interface gives you a quick snapshot of the positive and negative sentiment around your query through the Twitter-verse. Most brands pay thousands of dollars for this kind of real-world focus group info, but here it’s yours for free and delivered in seconds.

I did mention that I think marketing is cool, so I have to point your attention to Joe Jaffe’s newest incarnation, JAFFE JUICE TV (http://www.jaffejuice.com/jaffejuicetv/). Joe is a friend and is consistently a thought leader in marketing, so I like to see what he says. It’s also a great way to stay on top of what’s cool in fashion by seeing what shirt Joe has on that day, and he’s a snappy dresser!

Watching TV online can be a very solo experience, but CBS recently started using a tool called ClipSync to create engaging, interactive experiences in their CBS SOCIAL-ROOM (http://www.cbs.com/socialroom/). I do need to disclose that I have done some work with ClipSync, but I also need to disclose that they create some cool features for social engagement around video. I think it’s cool that I get to work with such cool companies. Now, that’s cool! What CBS is unique, too – I have been a fan of their interactive efforts for many years and they continue to push it forward.

On a personal note, I want to highlight what I think is one of the coolest Pearl Jam related sites online; THE SKY I SCRAPE (http://www.theskyiscrape.com/). If you’re a Pearl Jam fan, you already go there all the time for news, but if you’re just a casual fan, you may not know about it. Since I personally believe that Pearl Jam is cool, and its clear they are about to have a new album and tour, I thought I’d point out the site for your viewing pleasure!

And you know what else is cool? Any day now our little baby boy will be born! Now THAT’S cool!

As for iPhone apps: check out AWESOME BALL as a cool way to waste some time and check out YOWZA as another to save money and gather valuable coupons. In a time of economic recession, saving money is cool!

That’s it for this week!

Thanks!

Sunday, May 3, 2009

Sunday, Sunday, Sunday

Nothing new to report on a sunday afternoon. Our baby is still waiting to come out and a 50-1 longshot won the Kentucky Derby. It's been an interesting weekend, to say the least :-)