First, go check out Twitterfall. Then, take a look at this video, and see the immediate impact it has on Gmail going down today.

Gmail Fail on Twitterfall from Iain Tait on Vimeo.

This goes to show just how transparent the effects of social media can cause your company to become. Thanks to Iain Tait for the video and Sampad Swain for some more information on today’s events.

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I’ve had a thought that I’ve been bouncing around in my head for a while now and I just need to get it out there.

I think that the next big step in internet evolution–for lack of a better term, “web 3.0″–will revolve around social media and the use of open-source content management systems, such as Wordpress, Typepad and Blogger.

Social media is still very much in the infant stages of its life, but its potential is enormous. And, for me at least, it seems that the best way for social media to grow is through the widespread use of CMS.

New ways to share content and ideas, are being developed all the time for these open-source content management systems by the very people who use them on a regular basis. This fits so perfectly together; and could be the most important factor in the growth of social media. For example, someone develops a new technology to share his or her ideas and use it on his or her website where he or she already shares his or her ideas with other people who also have websites where they share their ideas. Nothing could be more instant, more viral, more…social.

So what does this mean for business?

If you’re a business owner, get on board with social media, it’s not going to go away any time soon. Check out things like Facebook fan pages and using twitter for your business. Also, consider rebuilding your web presence with a CMS and begin to implement social media strategies to get involved in the conversations that are already going on about your business. Believe me, people are talking about you.

To the employee, find a new way for the company you work for to utilize social media. What aspects of social media could you present to your management to improve visibility, cut costs, reach new audiences in better ways? Taking this proactive step will bode very well for you in the future. Here’s a post that will help you get started thinking about it.

For the job seeker, find a way to make yourself marketable in this emerging technological trend. Emerse yourself in and learn about the social aspects of the internet. Maybe even learn how to use, design or program CMS as a new skill to add to your resume. At the very least, getting involved will help increase your visibility as a job seeker. And as a bonus, being able to speak intelligently about the what social media can do for a business will probably be a great way to distinguish yourself in an interview.

What does this mean for the average everyday internet user?

Content management systems, such as Wordpress and Blogger, are so easy to use and they are an amazing way to stay in touch with friends and family.

You can easily create your own web page, for free, and everytime you have something new that you want to share–thoughts, photos, videos, information–put it on your page. Then just let people know you have new content and let them go see it whenever they want. It’s so easy, and as technology advances, it will get even easier.

So, my advice is to get involved now if you are not already. Web 3.0 will be a very social, easy to use and dynamic internet revolving around relationships and conversation. Who would not want to get on board with that?

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There are a few new features on the LEVEL website I just finished a week ago. Since it’s initial release, I have added several flash slideshows that feature the employees of LEVEL. The photos were taken by myself and the CEO, John Foley.

The slideshows operate as part of the Faust structure of the website. If you have flash player, you see the slideshow. If you don’t, you see a static image. Either way, you are getting some content. And underneath it all is the HTML code that search engines need to index the content and images.

Check it out! www.levelbrand.com

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LevelBrand.com is a brand new redesigned website I just finished for my current employer, LEVEL. This site has been a while in the making and has kept me very busy, which is the main reason my blog has been a little bare recently. LEVEL is a brand and reputation agency in Minneapolis, and I have been there for almost a year working as Interactive Designer.

This new site was a very big undertaking, but I enjoyed every minute of it. And I am excited to share a couple techniques that add to it’s clean design and universally accessibility. The first is sIFR (scalable Inman flash replacement). This technique allows for headlines to be replaced with more interesting fonts that everyone with flash player installed can see. If you do not have flash or javascript enabled, you still see standard web fonts for headlines, so no information is lost. This technique helps to enhance the design of the site, while still allowing those headlines to be coded in HTML to be crawled by search engines for SEO purposes.

The second technique is called Faust (flash augmenting standards). The basic principle of this technique is to create your website using building blocks. First, you start as basic as possible using standards based HTML so all your content is out there for SEO. Second and third, add CSS for styling and javascript to enhance user interaction. And finally, display rich interactive flash content over top of your static HTML for those users who can see it. This technique can be seen in the work section of the site. If you have flash player installed you will see a fade between images as you click through the thumbnails. If you do not have flash, but you do have javascript enabled, you will get the same flip between images only without the fade. This is javascript controlling the transition instead of flash. If you have neither of these, you will be redirected to a new page which will display the larger image. Anyway you look at it, the viewer is seeing content. This is good news for anyone concerned with having a website that is universally accessible. And, all the image and alt tag code is written out in the HTML so search engines can read it as well.

My role in this project included everything besides writing copy. I designed, art directed, and programmed the site. I also took my first hack at developing the site specifically for SEO. The website also features some of my photography from a previous post, and some from around LEVEL’s office space.

Check out the site! www.levelbrand.com

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Many of us are familiar with Twitter. The idea started out as a 140-character blurb about, “What are you doing right now?” A few short months later, it has evolved into one of the biggest ways for people across the world to communicate about life in real time. Twitter is no longer a monologue, it’s a conversation. You could say the idea has evolved into, “What are you doing right now, and how will I respond?” People share ideas, blogs, information and simply talk about what’s going on around them. This is a perfect example of how the tools of social media are not always used for their originally intended purpose. People realized that Twitter could become the vehicle they were looking for to hold a conversation with anyone, anywhere, anytime.

Lewis Green got me thinking about how this might affect business conversation in the future. He writes, in Age of Conversation 2, “The biggest downside of effective business collaboration is geography, as employees often are in different towns and cities, states and provinces, and countries and continents. An expanded, closed-circuit Twitter-like application could change all that.”

The benefits, as he describes them:

• No matter where you live or work, you can share ideas 24/7
• You can drop in and out of conversation as necessary to go about your daily work, without missing the flow of conversation
• You will always have a complete and accurate record of each conversation
• This could even be expanded into customer feedback where operators are standing by to receive and respond to customer comments, stories and ideas

Imagine the possibilities for real-time conversation and sharing in business. Anytime, anywhere, you could join in your company’s ongoing conversation of how to improve your business, how to solve a problem or, when creativity strikes, share the idea before it’s gone.

I see the lines of the “40-hour, 9-5 work week” blurring just a little more.

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I saw this video and had to post it. This is a beautiful way to create the experience of the Wii on the internet. Well done.

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