A serious announcement on the funniest of days!

Today is April Fool's day, the day where people decide to play funny pranks on their friends and family members to get a really good laugh. Well apparently Twitter decided today would be a perfect day to launch their way into the wearable device world! Today they announced their new helmet  that will cover the whole head and allows for people to interact with the world through a special custom aviary interface. The device of course, also allows people to be able to tweet by using a simple pecking motion much like that of a bird. The device is set to come out in September at a surprising low price of $139.99 and will also include various items that are bird related.

I honestly am not at all sure if this is a very clever prank by the Twitter organization or not; but I don't know how many people would be interested in this product. It is a very cool idea but something still seems a bit sketchy to me about this all. The article from Mashable has pictures of the images of what this device will look like but each photo is captioned at the bottom saying " photos taken by secret source." I guess we will just have to see if more news comes out about this later down the road, but if you're interested check out the article here. Mashable

Read this before Tweeting or updating your next Facebook status

When traveling to a new community, it is important to be aware of cultural faux pas and general attitudes about certain topics. The online world functions similarly. From the land of LinkedIn to planet Pinterest, there is certain content that is not acceptable to be shared and can even be damaging to your own image.

If we're honest with ourselves, we've all violated at least one of the cardinal rules. Some of us may even be friends with constant offenders. Lida Citroen on socialmediatoday.com gives us a friendly reminder of information you should probably refrain from sharing on the internet.

I want to share just a few of my top favorites from her list, but for the complete article you can read it here.

This one was Lida's number 6 faux pas, but it's number 1 on my list. Do not post vague, self pitying comments that are a mystery to everyone. This never turns out well. You maybe disappointed when you're friends don't respond with the clearly wanted response of sympathy. Making your friends try to drag out the full context in which you post is based just screams "pay attention to me!"


This next one has effected some of my personal friends. Posting about your job. Specifically, posting about how much you hate your job, or how you are playing hooky for the day, or heaven forbid, personal thoughts on sensitive information about projects and/or clients. This is a sure fire way to find yourself without that job that you hated so much. I guess in firing you they were really doing you a favor.

The last one from Lida's list that really gets my goat is about watching what you say about others. On all platforms of social media, please don't say anything about someone that you wouldn't say to them in person. There is a difference between constructive criticism and cruelty. I have seen online battles of passive aggressiveness wage on for days. These kinds of posts can make you appear as a petty person who doesn't know how to effectively handle confrontation.

Social media has given us access to share our immediate thoughts and feelings. While this can be great in communicating efficiently, it's not always wise to post your first reactions. Think through the consequences of your posts, as you know, they can and will have far reach.

Pay for promotion? How a new app is "paying" users to promote their app.

Smug Messenger, the latest app from AppRedeem. Check out the article on TechCrunch! 

Imagine sending a link to your friends to download an app, and then earning points from it to turn into things with real value like Amazon gift cards, or bitcoins. It sounds like a way to make  quick buck, right? Well, it may be, but is this really the best way to get people to download an app? Shouldn't people download it because it offers them a great experience and it's worth downloading? 

This tactic of luring people into downloading something is what the company AppRedeem was built on. Their first app was an app called AppTrailers and let people watch videos trailers of upcoming apps to boost downloads. This worked for the company for a while, but this act of watching app trailers was not something people did on a regular basis, and the app stagnated. 

So will this new app work? The mobile messaging app market is already cluttered with too many apps like Snapchat, Whatsapp?, Kik Messenger, among many others. I personally think that this new app will not last long. When was the last time that you were thrilled to get yet another Candy Crush request? I don't think pushing people to download an app, especially one they may have lots of the same kind of is not the answer. The pay factor may be good motivation for people to send out requests, but it will not turn into more use. 

First March Madness, Now April Attack

Throughout last month, we have witnessed many incredible basketball games and potential NBA basketball players. These players not only gain our pride, but they also gain our respect. These players show up everyday to play the game they love and bring in money for their school. In regards to revenue, college sports and the NCAA highly unrecognized the real sources that help sky-rocket a school's financial lane: the actual players. The NCAA continues to ignore this fact that is staring them in the face.

Due to the failures of the NCAA for not rewarding their athletes enough, some football players from Northwestern University are gathering a union to gain power in regards to college athletics. Forming this union, these college football players are asking not for money, but for medical coverage for their futures. They want to make sure that a career-ending injury will not haunt them for the rest of their lives. If student-athletes are not being compensated for fiesta bowls, championships, or for the whole March Madness event, then they at least deserve a security blanket for their future. Think about it! Every NCAA college athlete performs approximately 40-60 hours a week in their sport, on top of their massive workloads.

As a college athlete, I believe the Northwestern football players along with every other NCAA college athlete should be secured under there school for injury purposes. We should see the NCAA start to protect their student athletes (source of income) more often then not. If the NCAA continues to ignore this union, then this might result in an April Attack month. If students attend a school to play a sport, then they represent that school. The school needs to protect all their representatives including their student-athletes. Due to the fact that the NCAA is a single organization, they will most likely ignore this union because if they permit their request, then the NCAA must make it permanent for everyone to earn medical coverage. Obviously, the NCAA does not want to fund that reward. Do you think the NCAA should cover any future medical concerns for NCAA athletes? What about the school? Or do you believe they just should be rewarded for a trophy or pat on the back for fighting their hearts out and bringing in revenue into their schools? For more information on this huge dilemma, please click on the following link.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/daviddavenport/2014/03/28/the-real-march-madness-unions-money-and-power-in-college-athletics/

Is "Glass Journalism" the New Face of Journalism?

A web-based journalism professor, Robert Hernandez, teaches at the University of Southern California. This year Hernandez created a new course for his journalism students, called "Glass Journalism." This course is the first of it's kind at USC, and challenges students to tell stories using Google Glass. So what was Hernandez's reason for creating this new course? To change journalists from followers to leaders by using this new platform. "As someone who hijacks technology for journalism, I want to be proactive about shaping what journalism will look like on this," said Hernandez.

The syllabus for this "Glass Journalism" course includes students creating apps for Google Glass to help enhance storytelling and story consumption.  However, this is not the first time Google Glass has been used at the university level. Syracuse and Northeastern University in Boston tasked their students to create Glass Apps relating to social media and healthcare.

Ernest James Wilson III, the dean of USC Annenberg School for Communication & Journalism realized the courses being taught needed an upgrade.  Wilson created a new strategy that would include updating curriculum to reflect emerging technologies and give students more holistic skill sets. Hernandez and Wilson hoped that this new course would fulfill the goals of the schools new strategy.

Photo retrieved from Mashable.com

This is just the beginning for the use of Google Glass in the classroom. I believe that once the product becomes more available it will spread like a wildfire. Although it has a hefty price tag of $1,500 it is extremely beneficial in the field of journalism. Google Glass would create new opportunities for journalists to record and take photos. Having experienced older methods of journalism involving bulky cameras, and endless cords, I truly appreciate the creation of this new platform.

Read the full story at Mashable.com

Introducing Flappy Bird...again

Photo taken from appadvice.com

It wasn’t until I saw all of the tweets going back and forth on our class blog about Flappy Bird that I decided to find out what all of the hype was about. It was after it was pulled from the market by the creator, Dong Nguyen, so it was a different version, but I was hooked. I just kept thinking that I could do better and “I almost made that one!” I am not as obsessive about this game as some others, which is why the creator decided to do what he did.

Not very long after this app was erased from the store, Nguyen has gone on record saying that there will be another Flappy Bird, even “better than the original”. You have to wonder why, with not much time having passed, has he decided to do this. Could it be that all of the fuss was purposely made to get more publicity for him? That this was his plan all along, to get people to want the app even more because it was gone? It just doesn’t make sense to me why someone would create a second version of something that seemingly caused him so much stress.

 I’m sure that many of us would like to see another “original” Flappy Bird, but only time will tell if people will respond to the up and coming app like they did the first one, and, if they do, then what? Will the creator pull this one like he did the first? However, the creator is quoted in the article as saying that, when and/ or if the game is released again, he will likely put a "warning" to, "please take a break." I don’t foresee people actually paying attention to this, however. The author states that Nguyen nearly disappeared on Twitter after the app was pulled, for what reason it doesn’t say, but it does make you wonder.

Article posted on mashable.com on March 20th, 2014

#Hashtag #Overuse #Causes #Users #To #Lose #Interest

Since the hashtag was introduced back in 2007, it has spread all over the most popular social media sites and networks from Facebook to Instagram to Vine. With the vast popularity, it can be unsurprising that social media advertisers have started using them to help sell their specific brand. That being said, it can also be unsurprising that overuse of these hashtags can lower engagement from users.

In data released by social media marketing company Socialbakers, it shows that the more hashtags used to sell a brand on Facebook, the fewer interactions users have with the post in question. As determined by Statista, a post containing one to two hashtags may receive interactions with 593 users, which decreases to as few as 188 users if the number of hashtags increases to 10 or more.

Chart illustrating how hashtag use affects user interaction

Data like this could cause someone to reconsider the use of hashtags in selling their own personal brand, as well. If overuse can cause users to lose interest, then it could create a negative image of someone’s personal brand that would hurt their opportunities in the long run.

Mashable article: http://on.mash.to/1fSSuvh

To read more: http://bit.ly/1nUodpS