Thank you for all your votes (or how i found out people cared!)

Well.  How can i put this. I am number 15 on Iain Dale's top 20 Northern Irish blogs.

I really can't believe it.

And so i just want to say a big big thank you t you all.  It is weird, wonderful and cheesily humbling.

Weird

Although i keep 'self publishing' it always feels that because a blog can be so detached from real life and chatting face to face, i am almost holding a conversation in my head.  I am quite sure now most people reading this will be quite afraid about what goes on in my head.  With this feel of slight detachment, I always wonder really how many people truly read my meanderings.  Not only that, as i now kind of know with Google integrating its analytics with Blogger, but that people could actually think my blog is worth voting for.

Wonderful

It is absolutely wonderful that people felt interested and motivated enough to take time out to vote. And enough that it was not just a scrape in but landing me at number 15!!

Humbling

No matter where, when or how whenever something you create is recognised by your peers as something of worth, no matter how little or how much, it is a humbling thing.

All I want say then is 'Thank you'.  Thank you for reading.  Thank you for commenting. And thank you for voting. 

How real living gets in the way of online life

Help! My fingers are superglued to the keyboard

Having an online life is nice, if you have the time.  And inclination.  Many people still look at me in a weird way when i start raving and frothing at the mouth over the wonders of Facebook, Twitter and blogging.  Mind you people have looked at me in that strange 'are you a looper' way for a very long time now anyway.

A lot of people still do not want anything to do with the internet and social networking, or at least the social networking that entails having to switch on a computer first.  Real life social networking is more than enough to be getting on with thank you very much.

There is more and more pressure as well online to be different and catchy.  I enjoy funny blogs, as the heavy stuff bores me to tears after a paragraph or two (not totally true, but funny is easier to read and normally has a barb in the humour).  Tweets almost now need to be insanely insightful or amusing (or from already famous people).  Or of course you need to be controversial in order to get a response from others (and notoriety at times)

However, to be able to be a top notch online social media guru you need to be, well, online.  This can pose a problem.  I live in the real world where i can actually touch friends instead of poking them (stop that sniggering at the back!!)  I also have things to pay for like a mortgage, car, childcare, etc.  To cover these costs i have to get up in the morning and go to work, just like many others.  I have not yet hit it rich enough to spend all day on the web, keeping up with all the information flying around.

So this poses a problem, especially in the evenings which are getting more precious all the time, how often do people, just nipping online to quickly look at their favourite sites, expect change?  How often should a one-man/woman blog be updated? Is it a blanket expectation or does it relate to the subject matter of the blog?

What do you think?

I would encourage anyone unlucky enough to have read this far leave a wee note and add their comments.

Wave goodbye!!

Just hearing it on Mashable that Google is dropping Wave.

Wave, developed and supported by Google, was ........ well, i'm not quite sure exactly what it was.  It kind of was a, well, ....... erm....... a social thing.  To be honest i am not quite sure what it was, as it seemed to try to be a lot of things at once without actually being really good at a core function.  Friends did use it to collaborate with each other, but we are talking hardcore geeks and nerds.

Google described Wave as

Wave is equal parts conversation and document. People can communicate and work together with richly formatted text, photos, videos, maps, and more.  A wave is shared. Any participant can reply anywhere in the message, edit the content and add participants at any point in the process. Then playback lets anyone rewind the wave to see who said what and when.  A wave is live. With live transmission as you type, participants on a wave can have faster conversations, see edits and interact with extensions in real-time.

I got an invite to Wave and logged on late last year.  

I was totally flabbergasted by it.  It meant nothing to me. 

I am only one part geek/nerd, so the most of Wave was wasted on me as i struggled to come to terms with it.  It lacked an intuitive interface.

And so i gave up quite quickly on Wave.  And now it looks like so is Google.

Better luck next time guys.

Social media brand ambassadors

I just came across this little piece at Dennis Wolff's staffing and recruitment blog.   Although it is focussed on Canada and social media interaction there, it can be reflective of its use in Northern Ireland, the rest of the UK and Ireland.  

So what does it say and what does it tell us?

Well the piece is entitled, 'How to use social media participation to turn your employees into ambassadors for your own brand' which kind of gives it all away.

What any organisation really wants is for its employees to become advocates for its services or products. This is as true offline as it is online.

Dennis states that 

The lines between public and private, personal and professional have become more and more blurred; with Generation Y joining the workforce, this trend can only intensify.

Organisations need to learn to love the social media phenomenon or risk alienating their own employees who enjoy social networking.  If done right employees can become enthusiastic brand ambassadors and feel much more connected to their organisation.

Social media is one more platform for interaction and relationship building, one that is growing.  Facebook now has now hit 500 million.  

Facebook, Twitter, google buzz, NING, etc are all ways to help build relationships.  They should not be ignored as a fad.  At one stage telephones, then mobile phones and computers were fads.

Total Politics is looking for your vote!

You don't have to vote for me (though that would seriously massage my ego!) but i would encourage you to vote.  

Northern Ireland has a number of very solid political commentary blogs that sit right across the political and social spectrum.

They should be encouraged.  Open debate and ideas being flung at us from the comfort of a bloggers sofa is not to be sniffed at.

UPDATE
It has been kindly pointed out by  Dilettante that the poll has in fact closed. As off 31 July. 


I am a numpty who needs to read the rules more closely. Doh.