Article source:
Mashable
Think you’re such a social media expert that you could tweet for a living? Well, President Obama is looking for an official social networks manager, and you might be just the tech whiz for the job.
According to President Obama’s website, The Democratic National Committee and Organizing for America is in the market for a new hire. According to the Wall Street Journal, Mia Cambronero, who currently holds the position, said, “[I] will be stepping down from my infamous role as ‘Barack Obama’s twitterer… We’re looking for someone who is available to start immediately.”
And what exactly are they looking for over at the White House? According to the job posting:
“The Social Networks Manager is responsible for maintaining the Democratic Party and Organizing for America accounts on all social networks (such as Facebook , Twitter and MySpace accounts, etc.) The Social Networks Manager works closely with the rest of the New Media department to execute grassroots campaigns to advance the President’s agenda for change.”
Said person must also be willing to work hard — “this isn’t a 9-5 job,” the posting said — and be “passionate about engaging millions of Americans in advancing President Obama’s agenda and changing the country.” Yeah, that’s not daunting at all.
Social media has been integral to President Obama’s career since the beginning. He launched his Twitter account back in 2007 (although he only really tweeted for the first time last month to support Haiti relief efforts after admitting back in November that he was too clumsy to use the microblogging tool), and recently used YouTube to engage with the nation after the State of the Union address.
Although both the Obama and White House Twitter feeds used to read like a stream of press releases, the tweets have become much more lively in the ensuing months. Whoever fills this new position will have to continue to up the ante when it comes to engaging with the American people. Will you apply?
Article Source:
THE CANADIAN PRESS
TORONTO – The Ontario Provincial Police force is the latest police agency to join the social media movement by opening a Twitter account.
Police forces in several Canadian cities, including Toronto, Calgary and Vancouver, along with the RCMP, have Twitter accounts. The Ontario force says its account (at www.twitter.com/OPP-News) will include news releases and other messages.
Some Canadian police forces have already used social network sites to help catch suspects.
Many have used YouTube to show crime scene surveillance tapes or to broadcast appeals to suspects to turn themselves in.
Last summer, Toronto police reportedly used Twitter to monitor chatter from Tamil protesters who shut down a major highway.
A U.S. social media consultant visited Canada last year to teach police how to make better use of social networking sites to fight crime, including setting up fake accounts on Facebook and Twitter to track sexual predators and gang members.
Lauri Stevens told the CBC during her visit that police “make connections that way (and) get inside that world, and go from there.”
Bored at work whilst waiting for the gap between Christmas and New Year’s to be bridged? Well, here’s a fun little tool to tide you over:
FirstFollower.com.
This program — designed by Russian developer Victor Babichev — allows users to see who their first follower on Twitter was, as well as those of other users. Omg, folks, get ready for some seriously stalkerish time-wastin’ fun.
According to ReadWriteWeb, it’s difficult to know if this service is accurate or not, given the fact that Twitter changed the way it listed its followers earlier this year. I’ve contacted Babichev for his thoughts on the matter, so we’ll see what he has to say.
The tool is really easy to use: Just enter the desired Twitter handle (minus the “@” sign and capitalized as needed — it’s case sensitive) and push “Wanna Know.” You’ll then be given the name of your number-one fan, along with a pre-generated Twitter message praising their allegiance to you (although the site doesn’t seem to pay attention to gender when spitting out these platitudes). I’ve probably wasted 20 precious seconds of your life explaining this, so I’m just gonna let you go play now.
In the meantime, here’s some fun facts I discovered via playing around with the tool:
Mashable’s first follower (@Mashable): @JoeDuck. Thanks, dude. This blogger has nearly 40,000 followers to his name.
Pitchfork Media’s first follower (@pitchforkmedia): @DudeAsInCool. He appears to like music. And tropical flora and fauna.
Oprah’s first follower (@Oprah): @joaniegalla1, who only has 27 followers of her own and protects her Tweets.
The Muppets’ first follower (@TheMuppetsStudio): @DigitalMike. He’s only got 58 followers, and also protects his tweets.
Trent Reznor’s first follower (@trent_reznor): @jaie. She’s an insomniac mother of three. Wonder when she jumped on the Reznor train — the singer has canceled and resurrected his account several times.
Article Source: Mashable
December 21, 2009
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Misc
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Article Source: ecanadanow.com
Milwaukee Bucks breakout star point guard Brandon Jennings was fined for using his Twitter account too soon after a game by the National Basketball Association. The fine was only seventy five hundred dollars. This happens to be a very small amount of money even for a guy like Jennings who is of course operating under a rookie contract. Jennings also made over one million dollars playing in the Italian League last year, so with big checks like that rolling in, small fines over Twitter are no big deal.
This is the second time a Milwaukee Bucks player has been fined for using Twitter while being on their roster. The player who was fined by Scott Skilles for using Twitter during half time now plays for the Pistons. Jennings was simply trying to express his excitement over the fact that his team had just beaten the Portland Trail Blazers in a very exciting contest. Jennings reportedly had no idea that it was too soon after the game to begin using Twitter. The fact that he was celebrating over a win in a non taunting way and still fined, has given some people in the NBA reason to worry that they are now working for a no fun league.
6S Marketing, a Vancouver-based Internet marketing firm conducted a survey to its database of over 10,000 people on their use of social media.
Here’s some interesting data from 6S Marketing,
- 70% of Canadians say they use social media.
- Facebook is the most popular social networking site with 70% of people surveyed currently having an account.
- 47% of Canadians use Twitter and the majority of users are 19 – 25 years of age.
- Only 20% of people surveyed currently use MySpace.
- YouTube & Flickr are the most popular social media sites with 38% & 29% (respectively) of people surveyed using the sites.
- 42% of Canadians do not blog, while 58% do blog.
- 74% of people who blog, do so for personal purposes, 57% blog for work and 35% blog for both.
- 9% of people surveyed have hired an employee online and 22% have received a job offer online. 69% have done neither.
- 61% of businesses said they track what people are saying about their brand online.
Article Source: princanada.com
Younger people are turning away from Facebook and instead embracing Twitter, according to a new US survey.
Research from the Pew Internet and America Life project shows that the average age of a Facebook user is 33, compared to Twitter´s 31.
In December 2008 the 18- to 24-year-old age group accounted for only 19 per cent of Twitter users.
But by September 2009 that figure has increased to 37 per cent, while use among 25- to 34-year-olds also grew from 20 per cent to 31 per cent.
The average age of MySpace users decreased from 27 to 26, while Linkedln fell from 40 to 39.
It was announced today that Twitter has begun rolling out Project Retweet, its official integration of retweet. The feature will allow users to easily forward an interesting tweet to their followers.
Source: Equi Media
A new face of the renowned social networking site has now surfaced, Twitter recently teamed up with Indian network carrier Airtel to introduce SMS tweets. The SMS service by means of Twitter was earlier launched in several countries including US, Canada, New Zealand and the UK.
According to the Official Twitter Blog, Airtel subscribers can now send tweets at standard rates and receive tweets for free. Apparently, the tie-up with Twitter would be exclusive just for four weeks, indicating that after that period, the service may also be offered by other service providers in India. Presently, the ‘tweeting’ service in India works only on a web or a WAP site.
Apparently, users can send tweets from their Airtel mobile phones just for Re. 1. Reportedly, Bharti Airtel is offering people in every city, village, remote taluk and even the smallest panchayat, the chance to connect to Twitter with no additional fees.
A year ago, Twitter SMS updates were available in India but later Twitter suspended the SMS updates because of the cost associated with them. Subscribers can check out the Twitter service by texting START to 53000 by means of their Airtel handset.
Article Source: Mobiletor.com
Article Source:
Telegraph.co.uk
Social networking site Twitter crashed on Friday as millions of users around the world joined the debate over Barack Obama being awarded the 2009 Nobel Peace Prize.
The site went into meltdown at lunchtime yesterday amid the sheer weight of people commenting on the news, which comes just ten months into his first term in power.
The problem was quickly identified and repaired, but Twitter fans experienced issues throughout the afternoon.
Obama was the most popular ‘trending topic’ – or subject of discussion – for much of yesterday.
Traffic to Twitter also increased after NASA’s LCROSS mission to the Moon ended with the rocket crashing into the surface of the satellite – and Mylie Cyrus’s decision to quit Twitter. >>>Continue Reading
Source: edmontonsun.com By SUN MEDIA NEWS SERVICES
ASHBURN, Va. — Now that he’s apologized for calling fans “dim-wits,” Washington Redskins rookie Robert Henson is apparently done with Twitter. Anyone clicking on Henson’s Twitter account yesterday got a message saying “Sorry, that page doesn’t exist!”
On Sunday night, Henson fired off many tweets at fans who booed the Redskins during their 9-7 win over the St. Louis Rams. Henson called the fans “dim wits” and asked how people who “work 9 to 5 at McDonald’s” could know what’s best for the team.
Henson apologized Monday during a brief session with reporters.
Dolphins staring at 0-2
DAVIE, Fla. — It didn’t matter that the Miami Dolphins had an overwhelming statistical advantage in their Monday night game against the Indianapolis Colts. Yesterday, they still found themselves in a familiar position — 0-2.
Dropping the first two games is becoming a bit of a tradition for the Dolphins, who did it for the fourth consecutive season.
The Dolphins couldn’t beat Indianapolis and Peyton Manning even though the Colts had the ball for less than 15 minutes. Miami converted 16 of 22 third- and fourth-down situations, rushed for 239 yards and still managed to lose.
“Nobody is world champion after two weeks,” linebacker Joey Porter said, “but we’re not good enough to give games away.”
Extra points …
Tampa Bay S Jermaine Phillips will miss the remainder of the season with a broken left thumb … San Diego has signed DT Alfonso Boone to help fill the void left when Jamal Williams was lost for the year with a triceps injury … Browns coach Eric Mangini waived another high draft pick of Cleveland’s previous regime — TE Martin Rucker, a 2008 fourth-rounder.
Movie, by Indy Mogul, is generating massive buzz, in no small part thanks to its creative soundtrack, “I Can Tweet,” from The Gregory Brothers. It’s a Twitter-inspired take on the Creep song in The Social Network trailer.
