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Having, proudly, made it this far, I figured it might behoove me to share links to my various locations on the web.
http://www.opinionatedpussycat.com/
https://www.facebook.com/KiriltheMadMacedonian
http://twitter.com/kgkundurazieff
WWBFD? That would be interesting to find out, wouldn’t it?
“In today’s world of e-mail and overnight express mail service, the idea of a letter taking two weeks to travel from New York to Philadelphia seems almost comical.
Postal service in the United States was greatly influenced by Benjamin Franklin who was appointed Postmaster of Philadelphia in 1737, Joint Postmaster General of the colonies for the Crown in 1753, and Postmaster for the United Colonies in 1775.”
Ben Franklin, Man of Letters – pbs.org
What would Ol’ Ben do and think about email?
In his long life, he wrote and received thousands of pieces of correspondence. Would Email mean he’d double or triple his output, and save every piece of correspondence he ever got, spam included?
How many email addresses would he have?
Don’t laugh, these are all valid questions.
Have you ever asked yourself “why am I doing this?”
I have 5 current email addresses and, until a few months ago 4 of them were stuffed with messages, read and saved, going back to 2009.
I am still getting used to the notion of reading and then deleting as necessary so as not to have hundreds of email going back 4 years, saved because either I was going to read them later, or there was something in them I wanted to copy down later. I went into my several email accounts, a couple of months ago and, um, well, the result was a massacre. It was a bloodbath, I tell ya! Deleted emails by the hundreds by the time I was through.
I still have too much email saved, but I am slowly working through the que.
Email is an essential social media tool that we can’t seem to live without.
I did a Google Search for “how many email addresses are too many?” and got a million hits back!
I even came across an essay purporting to explain “why you need at least 4 email addresses.”
A little obsessed over this question aren’t we people? Hee, hee!
Following up on my post from yesterday: http://tinyurl.com/co6qs25
In doing a Google search I came across a lot of articles on the subject of social media fears, related to both personal and business use of the internet.
Out of all that I discovered I chose 3 interesting articles, going back as far as 2009, and an interesting take on the subject of social media fear on the newest “big thing” out there, Pinterest.
In 2009, on Wired, Curtis Silver discussed “Fighting the Fear of Social Media”.
With regards to social media for personal use he believes that “there is a lot more to fear from Social Media on an individual level than on a corporation level.”
He spends time discussing a very important point:
“You are required to share nothing. Plain and simple. I think this fear of being forced to provide personal data just because you signed up comes from cell phones. You are only required to share as much information as you feel you should share.” Not even your real name.
Of course that may be fine, on Facebook, if you just have a personal page with no intent to use it to promote yourself for career purposes. His description of what he’d share on a business/career site like LinkedIn and why, might make you want to run to Walgreens and pick up a pack of Trojans.
With business users the fears are many, especially a fear of feedback, and he discusses the benefits to businesses who get over that.
There’s a lot more to this piece and it can be read here: http://tinyurl.com/lhxykw
In 2011, over at Velvet Chainsaw’s Midcourse Corrections, Jeff Hurt reveals “How Your Fear of Social Media Can Lead to Death in 10 Steps”.
Such a cheerful, hopeful, title to a story about social media fears!
Some doctor in Australia came up with these saying your fear of social media is due to your fear of death. Not sure if taking the word of some dude in the outback, down under, is a good thing or a bad thing, hee, hee!
Jeff discusses what the thought process for an association executive might be like, and links to the original story that reports on the same guy and imagines how the thought process for a senior official in a government agency might go.
http://jeffhurtblog.com/2011/06/24/how-your-fear-of-social-media-can-lead-death-10-steps/
2013 has barely begun and here you are freaking out over social media:
I don’t understand this stuff! I’m too old a dog to learn new tricks!
Where in the hell do I even begin? My God, there are hundreds of sites to choose from, for cryin’ out loud!
Who gives a hoot about what I have to say, anyway?
What about negative reactions to what I have to say by those among the unedumicated, ill-informed masses that come across my site? How do I deal with that?
How do I keep up? Programs getting updated, sites dying on the vine, while new ones become all the rage, almost monthly if not more frequently?
Last month, Milly, on the British site called Ronin, discusses all of the above in a piece called “5 Social Media Fears and How to overcome them”.
She ends her piece in a way that should provide ample food for thought:
“Fear is the greatest barrier to change. As the saying goes “if you do what you’ve always done you’ll get what you’ve always gotten.” Social media is no longer a luxury but an essential means of securing future growth and engaging the consumers and businesses of tomorrow. So lose your inhibitions, get a strategy and plan of action and embrace the world of social media.”
http://www.roninmarketing.co.uk/blog/2013/02/5-social-media-fears-and-how-to-overcome-them/
Slowly, but surely, I’m workin’ on it, Milly, I’m workin’ on it.
Learning how best to use social media and which ones has been a struggle for me, but I am learning that the best way to figure them out is to dive in and feel free to embarrass the hell out of yourself as you learn how not to.
Claire Axelrad is on Pinterest and has a lot of interesting boards, most related to social media in some way.
She bills herself as a “Lifelong learner, listener, lecturer, e’lucidator of philanthropy, phasion, phood and phun.”
The 47 pins on her “Social Media Fear” board are at once funny, serious, educational and thought provoking.
All are well worth a look.
Considering all the things I’ve learned to do the past year, in the realm of social media, one might ask…”Dude, what were you afraid of all these years?”
The short answer, I guess, is a combination of concern over not understanding a social media tool and being overwhelmed in the learning and using, time-wise.
The funny thing is… when I choose to “boldly go where” I’ve never gone before, like with performing at open mics, giving presentations in front of large audiences, attending film debuts and charity events I’ve been invited to, or learning to use various social media tools and sites, I find things easier than I thought.
Ever since I first went online, in 1998, my relationship with social media, not to mention familiar tools found on my computer has been a mixed.
I have learned to do so much in 14 years yet there were times where I tried to learn a new program, or join a writer’s community, but soon gave up, or discontinued membership, due to lack of understanding, lack of interaction from others, and/or a perceived lack of time to learn, or participate on my part.
Some programs, like various messenger apps, I stopped using because they were time wasters and spam attracters. I once contemplated podcasting, even bought the things needed to start, but nothing ever came of it for fear of not being able to learn, and not having the time or funds to keep it up once started.
Joining Facebook, then Twitter, as well as Yelp, and learning to make simple YouTube videos and a PowerPoint presentation, not to mention use Adobe PSE, have given me more confidence that I can learn to do things. Since last spring I’ve gotten more active in social media online, including starting a writer’s page on Facebook, a group on Facebook, using Pinterest, Google Plus, and now WordPress, as I have begun to look at my writing and blogging less from the point of view of a hobbyist and more as someone who is a writer in a more professional way. Looking at redesigning my blogs, building a platform to promote myself, and considering chapbooks and E-books as ways of publishing some of the best of my decade of blogging, and even new material, are all things I’ve overcome old fears and concerns, to do and consider doing.
In thinking about the question of social media fears I did a Google search, this evening, and found that the subject is quite popular, not just with ordinary bloggers, but businesses as well. That last makes sense because I can remember how, 3 years ago, when I began my cat blog, an effort to reach out to shelters and rescues, and other organizations, locally and nationally, by sending out over 80 flyers about the blog, by snail mail, met with utter silence.
You would think that, after 6 years of there being a pet blogging community that the national groups, especially, would be aware of the community, and at least be considering making connections, but no, at least not with me. That HAS changed in my case, since then, leading to several interesting, fun, and educational, interactions, even my being a runner-up in a Purina Cat Chow Pet Correspondent contest.
I have been going into pet stores and attending pet fairs and asking management, employees and others, if they were aware of pet bloggers and learning that many don’t know anything about blogs, period.
The success of the Blog Paws Social Media Conference (I’m going this year at last!), since its inception, in 2010, has begun to educate and inform, and connect, bloggers to each other, and to the industry, so there is real hope that a dent is being made in the ignorance and fear of using social media, found in the business world.
I found 3 interesting articles, going back as far as 2009, and an interesting take on the subject of social media fear on the newest “big thing” out there, Pinterest, and plan to discuss them tomorrow.
Day 18: Social Media Fears – A Popular Discussion Topic Online – Pt. 2
Until recently I hadn’t tried to do much with my Google Plus account. I’ve long been a Gmail user, but I had to talk myself into giving this new thing a whirl. Seeing fellow pet bloggers, and writer acquaintances join I decided to as well.
The about page was simple enough to fill out, and adding profile and page header photos was easy as well.
It took me a while to figure out other things, though.
I learned that having circles is a fine way to organize all those G+ users you know and follow into easily identifiable categories that you name yourself. You can share your status updates just with circle members or with the general public as well, thus making it easier for other G+ users to find and follow you.
Click on find people in the more menu and you can search for others in G+ you may know.
I found this very easy to do. You can search for people in your Gmail, co-workers at past or current jobs, and old classmates at all the schools you attended as long as they list these businesses and schools in the profile.
You can +1 the things around the web you like, agree with, or want to recommend to others. That is, if there is a little G+ button on the site or page. Your friends and contacts may search on Google, and they could see your +1 of something they are searching for.
If you are familiar with Yelp and like sharing reviews of places with the world on that site, then being able to do the same, via Google + and finding your review turning up in a Google Search where a place has been rated and all the reviews of it, including yours, are listed for others to read, will appeal to you.
■ Anyone who views your profile on Google+ can see the review.
■ Anyone who searches for places, if they’ve added you to their Google+ circles can see the review.
■ Anyone who views places you’ve reviewed can see the review.
This evening I posted variations of two reviews I did on Yelp using G+.
I’ve shared photos, but not videos, and I’ve not yet tried Google chat. Hangout requires a plugin, for this video chat tool, and I attended my first one, recently, but didn’t get much out of it because I may not have downloaded the plugin. I am not sure if the plugin is a one-time download or must be done each time it is used.
Google + can seem intimidating, at first, and though I’ve managed to learn to do more with it that I thought possible, there is probably still more to learn.
In the world of social media for animal lovers…it’s a zoo out there.
The internet and blogosphere have been taking notice since at least 2008.
The Social Media Menagerie – A Poem
When Google yahooed about the Cat Blogosphere and Dogster barked at Catster,
LinkedIn’s eyes flickered pinterestedly @Twitter, while Facebook befriended everybody.
BlogPaws petizens said, “Love my pets, my looney pets!” and YapStar said “date my pet!”
As an animal attraction took pets places where pet passions
Led to much pet boogaloo among my pet friends in Pet Lovers Paradise.
Meanwhile, at the Carnival of the Cats, weekend cat bloggers disembarked from the Friday Ark
Ready to engage in some bird boarding, and fun at the Aquaria,
Leading some to meet-up with the pet doc at Pet St. on Paw Mountain,
Who advised them, “Take an instagram of aspirin and call me in the morning”.
My Horse and I shared his thoughts on this in the pet’s area of YouTube, and ZoogleTube,
Where people n pets are amused by the cuteness on display
And the scuttlebutt and paw talk is that all of this will lead someone
To encourage his compatriots in pet blogging to
Share their thoughts on Social Media for Critter Bloggers for the entire world to see.
Articles referenced for this post: (39 social media sites made it into the poem!)
1. 16 Social Networks for Pet Lovers
http://socialtimes.com/16-social-networks-for-pet-lovers_b6456
2. 23 social networking sites for pet lovers
http://www.examiner.com/article/23-social-networking-sites-for-pet-lovers
3. 25 Awesome Social Networking Sites for Animal Lovers
4. Pet Friendly Social Media and Internet Marketing
http://www.verticalmeasures.com/social-media/pet-friendly-social-media-and-internet-marketing/
5. 18 Social Networks for Pet Lovers, Owners & Pets
http://socialmediapearls.com/18-social-networks-for-petlovers-owners-pets/
6. Pet Lovers Social Networks on Listly
SMFCB: A 365 Day Project 