Blogs | Social Signal

See if you recognize yourself here:

• Instead of locking antlers with the other young bucks or preparing for the fall migration, you were off trying to operate a Flip video camera with your hooves, type on a netbook without stomping it to pieces, and hold down a decent WiFi signal in the middle of the boreal forest.

...OR...

Frequent collaborator and Friend Of the Show Jason Mogus tells us about a fantastic-sounding event this Thursday, March 5 in Vancouver. Alex met the keynote speaker, Favianna Rodriguez, at Web of Change last year and was blown away; this is your chance to experience something amazing.

Here's the scoop, directly from Jason:

I'm writing this blog post with the assistance of Zemanta, a web service that claims to enrich your blog posts and emails by inserting links, related pictures, articles and tags. I thought I'd take it for a spin to see how it works here on SocialSignal.com.

Video genius Bruce Sharpe has just posted the video of my keynote from Feb. 21 at the Northern Voice blogging conference in Vancouver. It's my look at what makes the world of social media so damn funny. You'll laugh, you'll cry... and maybe you'll comment on it.

Graphic by Nancy White

Well, it's been a week since my first Northern Voice experience. I felt a bit like a new girlfriend attending my partner's family reunion: a little intimidated, but nonetheless welcomed with open arms. The amount of expertise and experience contained under one roof was truly inspiring.

Following with the threads of collaboration and freely sharing knowledge, sentiments Northern Voice embraces wholeheartedly, I'd like to share some of the helpful advice I acquired with regards to dealing with trolls and negative comments.

TripItGate has me thinking about how to make social network invitations more useful, less spammy, and less of a hassle.

Invitations are a standard part of social network signups and usage. When you join a social network, you're typically asked to connect with friends who are already using the same service. If you're willing to share your username and password on other systems -- like Gmail, AOL, MSN, Yahoo, Facebook and Twitter -- the network you've just joined can suck all your contacts in from your other networks, and tell you who you know on the network you've just joined.

Got to the Saturday session of Northern Voice just in time to hear Rob's ridiculously funny nerd stand-up routine. I had to get out my sketchbook and pen and start doodling...

Last weekend I added a search on "@robcottingham" to TweetDeck so that I could track the comments on Rob's Northern Voice keynote. (BTW, if you aren't using TweetDeck to keep track of your Twitter pals, I highly recommend it; like many people I know, Tweetdeck has transformed Twitter from being a tool I use occasionally to a vital part of my workflow and community.)

So far in this 10-part series, we've seen how blogs can help you give your organization a human voice, gain valuable feedback and create a communications alternative to news releases and advertising. Now we're going to look at how it can help you build relationships with your customers, your public and your team.