On the move ...

After hosting our blog here on blogger for almost 2 years, we've now decided to integrate the blog and website into one platform on wordpress. As such this blog is now on the move to www.picklejarcommunications.com/blog. Bear with us as we update the website over there. We've already migrated all of our old blog posts from here over to there though so you won't be missing anything.

If you subscribe to our RSS feed, you'll now need to use http://www.picklejarcommunications.com/feed/ to subscribe to latest updates.

Top 100 websites students visit

In response to an enquiry by London Business School, Hitwise has produced a list of the top 100 websites visited by students in May 2009. Quite a useful list for those of us working in Higher Education communications. It's available to view here.

Comments about your brand might be found in the unlikeliest of places

Yesterday I presented at the CASE Europe Beyond the Hype conference. You can see my presentation in the previous blog post. The focus of the session was really to talk about making the internal 'sell' for time and resource to support social media. I always say that before you do anything with social media (or all online media for that matter), and even if ultimately you do nothing else, the first thing you must do, and the one thing you must maintain is listening. Monitoring conversations about your brand online is critical to:

• Monitor your reputation and understand what others really think of you
  
• Spot ambassadors for your brand whom you may nurture and encourage
  
• Identify potential crises in the making
  
• Spot opportunities for product or service developments
  
• Spot when the moment is right to enter an online conversation and engage.
  

As such, we were discussing the tools available out there for monitoring brands online. Here are a few that I suggested delegates take a look at:

• Google alerts
  
• blogsearch.google.com
  
• technorati.com
  
• www.whostalkin.com
  
• search.twitter.com
  
• www.perspctv.com
  
• www.sm2.techrigy.com
  

One of the participants pointed out that they have found students who have used the review feature on Amazon to post comments about their university courses through the book pages of course books that they have to read on that particular course. A novel place to critique a course, but an interesting example of how you should look in even some of the more unlikely places to check out what people are saying about your brand!

CASE Beyond the Hype

I presented yesterday at the CASE Europe Beyond the Hype conference. I try to use slides as a way to enhance presentations rather than include all the content on them, so they won't make as much sense without me talking over them, but here they are nevertheless. If I find time soon I may turn them into a short slidecast. One of the best things about this session was the contributions from delegates, so sadly even if I do slidecast this I won't be capturing that, but I guess that just goes to show the value of actually attending an event. Here are the slides anyway though:

Tips and Tracks: measuring, demonstrating ROI and persuading your managers

View more presentations from Tracy Playle.

Social media is helping me to grieve

This is one of the hardest blog posts that I have composed. Writing this is part of my grieving process. But there is a serious message here of the value that social media really can bring to our lives, particularly in times of personal need or sorrow.

Yesterday one of my house rabbits very suddenly and unexpectedly passed away. He was only five years old and full of life until less than a day before he died. To many people who read this blog, and particularly those who know me personally, you'll understand how heartbreaking this is for me. My house rabbits are my family. They live and run freely in my house. They keep me company in the office when I am working (the photo below is of Herbie helping me to decorate the Pickle Jar office back in 2007 when I set up the business). I feed them, care for them and play with them every day. I love them like children.

Herbie was a rescue rabbit. He had been dumped in a cardboard box at a rabbit rescue centre with no note to even tell what his name was. He was a lively chap, clearly still a baby, and we're convinced that when we called in to visit the rescue centre four and a half years ago that he chose us. I think he knew he was on to a good thing - space to run around, fresh vegetables to eat every day, lots of hay, an abundance of toys, and two big sisters to keep him company.

On Wednesday evening we noticed he wasn't his usual self. He didn't come bounding over to the treat bowl, and just sat hunched up looking sad. So, on Thursday morning I booked him in to see the vet. I took him in that afternoon and she couldn't see anything obviously wrong with him. The only problem was that his back teeth were looking a little long and could have been causing him discomfort. So, I left him there for the afternoon so they could put him under a general anaesthetic and file down his teeth. The vet called at 3.30 to say he was absolutely fine, had woken up, and that we could pick him up at 6.30. We arrived on time and sat waiting to be called through looking forward to seeing our boy and hoping that he'd just be looking forward to having his treats that night.

The vet called us in. No Herbie. She had some bad news. As they were getting him ready for us to bring him home he collapsed. I didn't realise at first that she was saying he had died, but the news soon dawned on me. His teeth weren't the problem afterall, but we think some form of organ failure. He died very suddenly. We spent 20 minutes saying our farewells to the little fella, and headed home with an empty carry case in floods of tears. I haven't really stopped crying since.

The point of writing this post though is two-fold. Firstly, being able to publicly express my grief in this way is helpful to me. It gives me a place to record my thoughts and pour out my heart as I sit in an otherwise silent office. Secondly, though, is to make a point about social media. Despite our constant tears, both Nathan and I almost immediately tweeted about what had happened. We felt moved to update our facebook status, and we were able to chat to some understanding friends via instant messenger. Talking on the phone has been too hard, but at least typing is manageable. Losing a pet is not like losing a family member. There isn't really a system of people phoning each other people to share the news. That just isn't how it's done. But social media has given us a platform from which to share our grief and to receive back an enormous 'virtual' hug (we've had some real ones too of course, including with Scotch and Macy - our other two rabbits).

Social media comes under so much criticism for revealing so much about our lives in a public forum, and for voyeurism. Yet lately I have seen several friends share sad news through social media platforms and receive an overwhelming response. There are times when that sense of community, albeit a virtual community in some cases, is really needed. Right now, I'm no good for going outside and seeing lots of people, but through the power of social media, text messaging and instant messaging, lots of people have been able to come to me and offer their support. Nathan even had a tweet from the Times Higher Education - from someone he's never even met - offering their sympathies.

This is one of those times when, through all the concerns and negative press, social media has really come into its own.

Evolving the press release: online and social media communications for press and media relations

I'm currently involved in organising (and will be speaking at) the following conference. We'll be looking and press and media relations for the education sector and how social media and virtual news rooms are revolutionising the way in which we 'do' PR.

Conference speaking this Spring/Summer

Just for the hell of it I thought I might share here information about a number of conferences that I am due to/likely to be speaking at this coming Spring and Summer, with details of the sessions being delivered. I'll try as far as possible to post slides here after each of the sessions.

Listening to your stakeholders online
Thursday 23 April, Manchester Metropolitan University

This conference is being organised by the CIPR's Education and Skills sector group. At this conference I'll be delivering a session looking at some of the tools for engaging audiences through your website, and for monitoring the buzz about your brand through social media. Email me if you're interested in booking a place at this conference and I'll put you in touch with the organisers.

Beyond the hype: getting the most from your web presence
Thursday 14 May, London

Alison Wildish from the University of Bath has kindly asked if I'll run a session at this conference she is putting together for CASE Europe with Pamela Agar of Imperial College. My session at this conference is likely to be on demonstrating results from using social media to enhance your web presence and preparing for the internal 'sell' to present the business case. You can book to attend this conference here.

Virtual PR: maximising your press and media relations through online activities
Friday 22 May, London

I'm currently leading a research project on behalf of the CIPR's Education and Skills sector group looking at how universities and colleges use online resources and activities to enhance their press and media relations. My session at this conference will present initial findings of this research. Contact me if you're interested in attending this event as I'm on the organising committee for this one. To participate in the research, follow this link to our online survey which is still open for responses.

EUPRIO Conference
Saturday 27 June, Aveiro, Portugal

I'll be presenting two workshops at the European Universities PR and Information Officers (EUPRIO) annual conference in Portugal on Saturday 27 June. My session is titled 'Learning new tricks: how social media is revolutionising the role of the PR professional'. You can view further details of the conference and book to attend through the conference website here.

CASE Europe Annual Conference
24-28 August, Liverpool

We also have a session proposal out for the CASE Europe annual conference this year. I'm just finalising my details with them and will update this post when I have a little more to say on this one. Registration for the conference is now open here.

Audioboo - the potential

It's been far too long since my last blog post. I spend so much of my time preaching to people about blogging and the need to do it regularly, that I really must practice what I preach. However, I've got so many exciting projects on the go at the moment for various clients that it's all a bit crazy. Here's something to share though...

Around mid-March, so really very recently, a 4IP funding iPhone app was launched - AudioBoo, developed by BestBefore media. Described by some as 'audio twitter', AudioBoo enables you through a simple iPhone app to record a short burst of audio, attach a photo, tag it, and pretty much instantly have it online with the photo, audio file, and the location of the recording marked on a google map (thanks to the power of GPS). You can set it up so that every new 'Boo' you post is tweeted about through your twitter account, and you can also embed the file into another web page using the emded code provided. Very very simple and easy.

I came across it for the first time at an event I was involved with for Becta, who were supporting a DIUS event hosted by Channel 4. The guys from BestBefore did a live demonstration of the technology, which worked seamlessly. So, in true flattery, I decided to copy their exercise at a social media training session I was running last week. Worked perfectly, and certainly got the creative juices of my 'trainees' flowing, particularly thinking about potential for gathering customer feedback and quick testimonials. From a personal point of view, I know it's also going to be great for gathering quick soundbites at events (from delegates and speakers) and I might also use it to help gather some anecdotes for some research I'm conducting for the CIPR Education and Skills sector group at the moment too.

The guys at 4IP have been blogging about some of the uses they've seen for it. And that's one of the things that so staggering about this. BestBefore and 4IP could see the potential for this technology, but they really had no idea how people would use it. I can't see it replacing Twitter because, let's face it, who wants to have to trawl through audio clips of each of the individuals they follow (I find it hard enough just keep up with written tweets), but the real gem of this story is how the technology has bee pushed out, and the community out there have decided how to use it rather than being told what it's for. This is a great example of how social media is actually all about the content, and not about the technology. The technology just makes it happen, but it's the content that really drives it and encourages interest.

For a little taste, here's me just mucking around with it:

And here's the link to the actual AudioBoo page so you can see the photo and map too.

A little about me

My good friend Ellie Lovell has 'tagged' me in an activity where I am now expected to reveal 25 things that you didn't know about me, just a pile of random facts. As it's Saturday, I thought I'd have a go for fun:

1. I am a an Essex girl, having been born and raised in Harlow and I am proud to own a pair of white stilettos
2. I was blond for the first three years of my life
3. When I was 15 I owned a pair of white pvc trousers – classy!
4. In 1998 I appeared on This Morning. Richard Madeley told me on live national TV that I have great eyes!
5. I have three house rabbits – Herbie, Scotch and Macy. Herbie was a rescue rabbit. He was dumped in a cardboard box on someone’s doorstep
6. One of my ambitions is to cage dive with great white sharks
7. In 2007 I ran the Great North Run half marathon for the Stroke Association because my mother had a stroke in her early thirties. I too have high blood pressure and I keep the photo of me after the race pinned in front of my desk to remind myself of the elation at finishing the race, and the ongoing need to manage my own health
8. I have a fat photo of myself on the fridge door to try to help me with my ongoing battle to lose a little weight and be a slim bride next year
9. My guilty pleasure is having a cleaner
10. If I could choose to live anywhere in the UK, I would live in Edinburgh
11. I own a hardback signed first edition of Toni Morrison’s Beloved (the book widely acknowledged to have won her the Nobel Prize for literature). It was my graduation present from my parents and one of my most treasured possessions as her work played such a big part in both of my degrees
12. Despite being a straight-A student at school, I have never managed to learn a foreign language and this irritates me
13. I play with my ear lobes. It’s a habit I have had since a baby and is my ‘comfort blanket’. It also often makes work colleagues think I am on the phone!
14. As children my sister and I once drank quite a lot from our parents’ booze cupboard while they were out of the house. When they found out (we left the cap off the whiskey!) we both blamed it on our friend and never owned up
15. I used to swim competitively. I always enjoyed the ‘tough’ events, and was once ranked as the 37th fastest woman in the UK at 200m butterfly (quite an achievement when you’re as short and stumpy as I am!)
16. When I was 14 I had a dodgy perm and was so embarrassed that I refused to go swimming training that night. My dad told me off for being so daft and I ran away from home in response (I actually only got about 30m up the road to my friends house, and only stayed for about an hour – a pathetic attempt)
17. My first pet was a budgie called Gismo. My second pet was a hamster called Rambo
18. I am addicted to my blackberry
19. I am the happiest I have ever been right now at this point in my life
20. I love skiing and scuba diving and wish I had discovered both passions when younger
21. Despite being almost 30, I am lucky enough to still have a full set of grandparents, though I don’t see any of them enough because I am a bad granddaughter
22. I don’t believe in work-life balance. I do believe in doing a job that you enjoy so much that work-life balance becomes irrelevant
23. My dad calls me Angela – it’s my middle name. My fiancé calls me ‘Goat’.
24. When I was little I drew a picture of a blue whale and sent it to Greenpeace. I still have the certificate that they sent me somewhere
25. My surname allegedly can be traced back either to a French piano maker or a German mass murderer. I know which I prefer!

This blog features as B2B Centre's case study on blogging

Colleagues at the National B2B Centre have kindly included the Pickle Jar Communications blog as a case study on blogging for business on their website. We're rather flattered to be profiled in this way, and thought we might follow that up with a little extra support of our own. So, if you've arrived at this blog because you've read about it through the B2B Centre's e-newsletter or website, you might also find our handy guide to corporate blogging slidecast useful if you're thinking of engaging with bloggers as part of your PR activity or thinking of setting up your own.

So why should I follow you?

As many of you know, I'm a big Twitter fan and manage three profiles: @tracyplayle @picklejar and @hecomms. Each serve a very different purpose for me. @tracyplayle is where I post my more personal tweets – the kind of daily ramblings that really only my mates would probably want to hear (though it seems many others also want to listen in – that's fine, but I don't understand why!). Then there's @picklejar: this is the account I use to tweet about anything business-related or relevant to social media, PR and communications. I try to retain a 'human' voice in this and keep my personality coming through, but its primary function for me is professionally-orientated. Finally @hecomms looks after itself by provided updates direct from the RSS feed from www.he-comms.co.uk – the social network that I run for communicators and marketers working in the UK HE sector.

Work has been somewhat crazy recently so while I've continued to tweet away I've noticed a consistent stream of new followers whom I just haven't had the time to check out and follow back. This morning, I decided to have a run through my inbox and start checking out all the new followers and determine who I might like to start following in return.

I generally work on the following principles:

• If you're following me it's probably because we have something in common and therefore I may wish to follow you back
  
• If you are taking the time to read my ramblings, then you deserve the courtesy of me at least taking a look to see if I would like to read yours
  
• Twitter is one of my key sources of new information regarding social media, and therefore you might be tweeting about stuff of interest and relevance to me.
  

So with those in mind, I have spent a couple of hours this morning checking new followers of @picklejar out. Not all of you made the cut and received a return follow, so I thought it might make an interesting blog post to show my thought process when deciding whether to follow someone back or not.

• If you're an education organisation's account I will probably follow you back without thinking twice as my key clientele is the education sector so it's important that I monitor how the sector is using Twitter
  
• If your twitter name is the same name as someone I know, I will be more likely to follow you back without further thought
  
• If your twitter name is unfamiliar to me, then I'm more likely to be interested in you if you are set up as a human being in your profile and not just a company name (for example, I am @picklejar, but my profile tells you that I am Tracy Playle – one of the earliest lessons I learned on Twitter was to be myself and not try to be a 'corporate voice' as it just doesn't work)
  
• Likewise, if your @name (and worse still if your profile name) is full of random letters and numbers, I will not follow you back – some of them I won't even check out in the first place
  
• If you pass the @name and profile test, then I delve a little deeper into what else you say about yourself in your profile. If it includes something that is of direct interest to my professional interests, then you pass the next test
  
• The next step is then to look at your previous tweets. Even if say you work in social media marketing or communications, but your tweets are all just personal stuff – what you made for breakfast etc – and nothing else that helps me in my professional life, then I tend not to follow back.
  

So, in summary, I tend to follow-back people I know and have an existing relationship with and people who are 'above board' and provide interesting and useful information through their tweets. Above all, though, I place emphasis on the fact that I prefer following people, and not organisations (there are one or two in there, but most don't make the cut).

Birmingham Twestival, sponsored by Pickle Jar Communications

I wouldn't ordinarily post a press release here as it isn't the most appropriate format for a blog. However, as we are sponsoring the Birmingham Twestival, I thought I'd indulge myself a little and include the press release here:

BIRMINGHAM TO JOIN 100 CITIES ACROSS THE WORLD IN FUNDRAISING ‘TWESTIVAL‘

On February 12th 2009 Birmingham is joining with over 175 cities around the world to host the Midland’s biggest ‘Twestival’, a volunteer-run fundraising event for people who use the micro-blogging service Twitter. BrumTwestival will be held at Poppyred in the Arcadian Centre from 7.30pm, and will see Birmingham join over 175 confirmed cities world-wide in a night of fundraising. The global event, described as “a ‘tweet up’ with a social conscience” will be raising money to support charity:water a not-for-profit bringing clean water to people in developing nations.

With members including Barak Obama, Stephen Fry and Jonathon Ross, Twitter is quickly growing to become a world-wide online phenomenon. The network allows users to update other members who are ‘following’ them online with details of what they are doing in 140 characters or less. As Twitter’s user network has grown, the community has also been the first to publish breaking news online, with members ‘twittering’ updates on unfolding events before journalists have reported on them.

Birmingham’s Twestival will give twitterers across the West Midlands the opportunity to come together in the spirit of fun, change, charity and global communication. Over 100 guests have confirmed their attendance at the event, and more tickets are to be released shortly to meet demand. Birmingham has a very active social media community and this has grown through Twitter to include users from a variety of backgrounds including politicians, University staff, artists and bloggers.

Birmingham Twestival has been organised by volunteer Twitter members who work for a wide range of local businesses. John Newbold, creative director of 383 Project and one of the Twestival organisers commented: “Twitter has grown across the West Midlands to become a really exciting community. It has enabled me to connect with a network of other users from with a variety of backgrounds and occupations within the city and get to know people I may not have met otherwise. Twestival is not only a great opportunity to bring the online community together offline, but unites Birmingham with other participating cities across the world in a common aim. Twitter will allow us to join other cities throughout the day with live updates and coverage of the events.

“As social and business networks grow, online communities are becoming increasingly popular ways to stay in touch and up-to-date. It is rare for people who engage online to have the opportunity to meet face-to-face, and I’m delighted that Twestival will make this possible for so many local users.”

Birmingham Twestival is sponsored by Pickle Jar Communications, the Coventry-based communications consultancy specialising in new and broadcast media, and Bostin, original t-shirt producers and promoters of pride in Birmingham, the Black Country and beyond. Tracy Playle, Director of Pickle Jar Communications commented: “I’ve been using Twitter for personal and business use now for several months. The power to build communities through social media, such as Twitter, is significant and important for small and large businesses alike. We spend a lot of time advising others on how to use tools like Twitter to build communities of interest, and possible business opportunities, so it only seems fitting that we would want to support the biggest Twestival in the Midlands.”

Managing director of Bostin, Donato Esposito added: “Twestival is a fantastic development to Twitter, and I welcomed the opportunity to support such an important charity.”

As well as raising money through ticket sales and donations, a range of raffle prizes donated by local businesses and Twitter members will be auctioned at the event. All guests will also be automatically entered into a main prize draw to win a Nintendo Wii.

The event will begin at 7.30pm. A limited number of remaining tickets are available at www.birmingham.twestival.com

Animoto and istockphoto join forces

I received an email earlier this week from animoto alerting customers that they've just entered an agreement with istockphoto.

For quite some time now I've been showing clients animoto, particularly when I'm out and about doing social media training, as it's a wonderful way of creating high-impact videos for your site without the costs normally associated with video production. I always suggest that clients use istockphoto to download good quality images, so I'm delighted to see the two companies pair up at last. See the animoto blog post for further information.

Monitoring social media

There are some good social media monitoring services out there offering comprehensive monitoring solutions, such as Radian 6. I've had a demo of Radian 6 and it really is very impressive, but this does come at a price. I'm therefore always on the look out for good search services and monitoring services available for free.

I often recommend perspctv to clients. It searches blogs, microblogs and news sites, but it also allows you to search more than one search term, enabling you to benchmark online profile of one term against another. See, for example, this widget that profiles the relative online coverage of the brands 'university of warwick' and 'university of birmingham'



Social mention doesn't appear to have the same benchmarking potential, but it does provide RSS feeds of given search terms, meaning that you don't have to keep visiting the site everytime you want to check out the latest mentions of your brandon social media sites. The other benefit to social mention is that it covers a wide range of media: text, audio and video. Very clever.

Great example of how to create a slidecast

I thought just share this really useful slidecast on how to create a slidecast.

Slidecasting 101

View more presentations from Jonathan Boutelle. (tags: propaganda slideshare)

Online PR is a marriage, not an affair

I occassionally browse online sites where people post projects that they require freelance support for. This morning one caught my eye because it's right up my street - a small company wanting support to boost their online PR. Great! A small company thinking along the right lines. Many don't even yet understand the benefits of online PR, so fantastic to see one that not only understands the benefits, but realises that support is potentially needed.

Then, this line in the description of their requirements:

'We estimate approx 4 days, 2 days for each website should suffice.'

Not so great. 2 days work, then nada, for online PR for a website? Online PR isn't a 'project' that can be done and dusted in 2 days. It has to be a sustained effort, ongoing, nurtured and loved. Otherwise it is doomed to failure! Sure, in two days you can do enough to improve your SEO in the short-term, but for real online PR, companies should be dedicating much more time and resource to supporting an ongoing campaign. Think of online PR as a relationship - it interests you, yet you begin with caution at first, then you get carried away in the rush of excitement and can't tear yourself away, then you settle down into a nice comfortable routine - at ease, dedicated, devoted even - with the odd pleasant surprise but otherwise a nice routine of committment and sustained effort. Online PR is a marriage, not an affair!

Planning for a video production - thoughts and considerations

Tomorrow I'm helping out at a session at the University of Warwick introducing students to communicating through video. During the three hour session they will be tasked with filming and editing their own short video. I'm being drafted in to help advise them on planning a video production. I thought it might be worth sharing here the various stages that I'll be talking them through:

What are you trying to communicate and why?
What are your objectives?
What are your key messages?

Who are you trying to communicate with?
Define your audience
Understand what your audience likes (a particular style of video?)
Why will your target audience be interested in this?

Where is your audience? How will you reach them?
Where will your video be broadcast?
On a website?
At an event (big screen, small screen?)
How long do you have to grab your audiences’ attention?

Is video really the best means of communication?
Does video appeal to your audience?
Can it communicate everything you need to communicate?
Is your subject visual enough?

How will you structure your video?
Prepare a storyboard
Think about key messages and statements
Be prepared for your structure to change
How will you ‘join up’ sections of your video?
Do you require a voiceover? What kind of voice should this be?

What shots/interviews etc do you require?
Do you need cutaway shots to illustrate a point?
Do you need cutaway shots to make editing look seamless?
What access requirements/permissions might you need for filming?

Who will you interview?
Do you need a release form?
Are you working with children?
Who is going to ‘work’ well on camera?
Does your interviewee(s) have media experience?
Why are you interviewing them?

Where will you interview them?
Is there a location relevant to the interview?
Think about light
Think about noise and other distractions
Do you need special permissions to film there?

What will they wear?
Avoid bright colours (and too much white)
Avoid too much make-up
Avoid fussy patterns
Be comfortable

What will they say?
Preparing interview questions
Planting key messages
Asking provoking questions
Will you require additional cutaway shots after the interview?

Testing out Word 2007 blog publisher

Anyone using Microsoft Word 2007 might have noticed that it has a blog post option on it, so I thought I'd give it a go for my blog. I'm travelling on the train at the moment so even with 3G card in laptop, connection is a little flakey so this could be a useful alternative for drafting blog posts while in transit. I like the theory behind it – just open Word, click new and select blog post. I seem to have configured it to send to my blog without any problems (just a matter of username, password then selecting which of my blogger blogs I wanted to add). So here goes, time to see if the post actually works!

Is there a benefit to be an 'older' person signing up to Facebook

I've been reading this blog this morning by Samuel Bradley giving tips to college students on using Twitter (though the tips could extend beyond that audience). Bradley advises:

Don’t simply link to your Facebook bio if there’s anything on your profile that you wouldn’t show in front of the class. Rule of thumb: If a link leads in any way to photos of you throwing up after consuming too much alcohol, omit it!

This got me pondering, are those of us that signed up to Facebook in our post-university days in an advantageous position? Okay, so the photos of us throwing up after drinking too much probably still exist, and perhaps they even exist in a digital format (though I'm old enough that most of my uni photos are from good old fashioned film so exist only in hard copy). I would like, at this point, to point out that I am not what you might call a dinosaur. I am 28 years old, so was only a few years out of University before signing up to Facebook, but I just can't help thinking that the photographs of student antics that we enjoyed at university, but might haunt us in our professional lives, are far less likely to find their way onto Facebook. Finally an advantage to hurtling my way to 30!

This argument isn't fully thought through, just my musings, but I wonder, if there is any truth in this, if it could spell an interesting phase for Facebook. I'm perfectly happy for potential clients, employers, and anyone else in my professional life to check me out on Facebook. There are plenty of silly photos of me, but that just shows me being me. There's nothing to worry about. However, for younger folks not yet into their professional lives, I wonder if there might suddenly be a move to close their Facebook accounts down as they start searching for jobs, for fear of what potential employers might see. Dare I say it, could Facebook become the realm of the 'older' generation (I lose that term very loosely indeed!)? It probably will anyway in as much as the 'kids' will have something diffent to amuse themselves, and Facebook will be 'old hat', but for those already on it, could younger antics spell the end of individuals Facebook accounts as they strive to protect their employment prospects.

Online video is getting quicker and quicker

I've been playing around quite nicely with my new flipvideo camera recently, mostly for personal use though I'm sure it won't be long before it's put to good business use too.

Last week I attended a close friend's wedding in Ireland. I took the flipvideo camera along and within 12 hours of stumbling to bed after the festivities of an Irish wedding (I hit the sack at 3am and the bride, groom and Irish family were all still up singing in the bar), I had an edited version of the video online on facebook thanks to the excellent built-in software on the camera, instant usb connectivity and free wifi in the hotel.

I thought that was quick! Then this morning I received the latest updates from animoto and learn that they've now created an iPhone app so you can create animoto videos on your iPhone (or touch iPod) whilst still on the move. I haven't tested it yet (might steal my partner's touch iPod later to have a play around), but in theory this is a very cool idea and just speeds up even more the ability to go from a photo (or in the case of flipvideo a video clip) to a fairly polished looking video online in a matter of minutes - and at hardly any expense at all.