INDECENT EXPOSURE IN FACESPACE: WHEN YOUR STATUS SAYS TOO MUCH
Facebook Infomercial Parody
Are you a senior executive at your company?
Are you on Facebook/MySpace/etc?
Are your employees ALSO on these social networking sites?
In fact, are they linked to you as your friends on these sites?
Answer yes to all of these questions?
Well then, my friend, this next edition of Indecent Exposure in Facespace is for you. Yes, these rules apply to junior executives as well. That said, when you find yourself in a senior position at a well respected company, you have more to lose from the perils of social networking than those living at the bottom.
If you’re still confused about what qualifies as inappropriate as shared between your friends and the rest of your company, here are some general rules of thumb:
Never refer to any part of your sexual anatomy.
We’re all sexual beings. I’m just guessing not everyone at your company needs to know about your. . .sexual being.
Never refer to any night of serious drinking.
Yeah, we all saw you getting wasted last night. In fact, we just saw you in a meeting 15 minutes ago. That’s why the status, John is struggling to get over a god forsaken hang-over, may not be appropriate for the time being.
Do not post precious moments of your vacation in the Caribbean (as your status) only to follow up with a message from your BlackBerry requesting an urgent report.
Yup, we all need vacations. It’s just hard to react quickly to that report request while envisioning you lounging away on a beach with a Corona in hand.
Never refer to your multiple cocktail hours at CES [cough cough], I mean, that conference you’re at.
We all know conferences are 1 part work and 3 parts cocktail. We just don’t need to see it posted in the sanctuary that is social networking land.
And finally. . .
Never post misgivings about your company as communicated through your status, EVEN IF, you were recently let go.
The status should not be a tool of your discontent and don’t we all know NOT to burn bridges?
As of November 15th, Facebook removed the “is” from their status field unlocking a realm of inappropriate status messages previously unimaginable. Keep it light kids. Remember, HR likes to social network too.
Best status of all time:
Marauder is an enigma, wrapped in a riddle, nestled in a sesame seed bun of mystery. (Thanks Jon Stewart)
Closely followed by:
Marauder is better than Ezra. That one would be even better as used by my friend Ezra.
The Writers Guild of America says it will picket the Golden Globe Awards, rejecting a call by the show’s owners to let a scripted show air on Jan. 13 without protests. The Golden Globes will likely struggle to attract Hollywood stars, since many actors won’t cross the picket line. (http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601109&sid=atlwsTvrhUtw 1/2)
Television’s late-night comedy kings returned to the air Wednesday after a forced two-month hiatus, expressing support for the striking writers even though several of the hosts crossed the picket line to resume their shows. “I’m on the side of the writers,” declared Jay Leno. (http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-strike3jan03,1,4573698.story?ctrack=1&cset=true 1/3)
On Conan O’Brien’s first show post-strike last night, he spoke about the writers’ strike and that thing growing on his face, which is supposedly there to show allegiance with the writers. Now, I’m not a writer, but going I’m going to go out on a limb anyway. Conan, show some allegiance with something that looks mildly attractive. A new tie perhaps?! Anything. Just please, for the love of late night, shave that insidious thing off your face.
Conan O’Brien Show Jan
The Nickelodeon series “Zoey 101,” which stars Britney Spears’ pregnant little sister, is being axed, according to a show source. Jamie Lynn, 16, plays the lead in the teen drama, which is aimed at kids aged 9 to 14. “It looks like it has been canned,” the source says. (http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/showbiz/tv/article643480.ece 1/3)
The Weather Channel, one of the last privately owned cable channels, is being put up for sale and could fetch more than $5 billion. The channel and its rapidly growing Web site, weather.com, are already attracting interest from NBC, News Corp. and Comcast. (http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/03/business/media/03weather.html?_r=1&oref=slogin 1/3)
Just when you thought the country had seen it all from Tila Tequila and her seemingly endless quest for love, MTV announced it would bring back the MySpace pinup for another season. Season 2 of “A Shot at Love With Tila Tequila” is expected to debut sometime this spring. (Orlando Sentinel (Fla.)/Associated Press 1/2)
E! has approved a second season for late-night talk show “Chelsea Lately.” The show, which features stand-up comedian Chelsea Handler, premiered July 16 and has seen its ratings rise 23% since then. (Variety 1/2)
Lifetime today was scheduled to kick-start its biggest promotional campaign ever for new reality series “How To Look Good Naked” with a parade of 160 women, clad in bathrobes sporting the show’s logo, appearing on New York subways and buses and marching through the streets. The multiplatform push also includes print ads, TV and cable spots, radio and online elements. (Multichannel News 1/2)
Pundits continue to say that Yahoo is ripe for acquisition. But many analysts see a deal as unlikely. The major media players — Time Warner, News Corp., Viacom — are eager to build out their online media businesses, “but probably not to the tune of $33.5 billion.” (http://blog.wired.com/business/2008/01/who-on-earth-wo.html 1/2)
Online and DVD-by-mail service Netflixis partnering withLG Electronics to develop a broadband enabled set-top box that will deliver HD movies from the PC to the TV. While similar devices made manufacturers such as Apple and Vudu have failed to catch on, none have had such a large and dedicated subscriber base to market to. Netflix has 7 million subscribers who have collectively watched more than 10 million movies and TV shows via its “Watch Instantly” online feature. The service has cataloged more than 6,000 titles in its streaming library so far. (http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/03/technology/03netflix.html?_r=1&ref=media&oref=slogin 1/3, http://online.wsj.com/article/SB119932745411164105.html?mod=dist_smartbrief&apl=y&r=403402 1/3)
Online video service CinemaNowannounced a major integration effort withMacrovision‘s Connected Platform technology to make video downloads swappable across multiple platforms and devices. The latest effort to try and solve the “last 10 feet” problem of getting video content from the PC to the TV will focus on developing seamless integration between multiple software and hardware solutions. Having CinemaNow as a partner – which distributes content from many of the Hollywood majors – should help Macrovision attract device makers to join the platform in the coming months, according to Richard Bullwinkle, Chief Evangelist of Macrovision.
Plaxo, an early social-networking site that helps people keep their address books updated, is said to be up for auction, seeking as much as $100 million. Plaxo, which has been overtaken by rivals like Linked In and Facebook, aggregates data from other social networking sites. (http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/03/technology/03plaxo.html 1/3)
Plaxo 3.0 Instructional Video
After months of talk and a few weeks of invitation-only testing, Wikia Search is to open to the general public next week. Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales says his goal is to let volunteers improve search technology collectively. The new service “won’t dethrone Google — at least not soon.” (http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5iVpozoN4SEv7fIbj-dSXBPinksWAD8TTR2T00 1/2)
Google took a strike at Wikipedia with Knol (still unreleased). Wikipedia strikes back with Wikia Search. How I do love a good online death match war.
Today, video Website Veoh.com is adding more videos from traditional TV networks, including NBC (The A-Team, The Office, Heroes), Fox (The Simpsons, Family Guy, 24), the Sci-Fi Channel (Battlestar Galactica), the USA Network (Monk), and FX (Damages). All of this new content comes from Hulu, the NBC-Fox joint venture. CBS content was already on the site through a previous deal, but now all videos from traditional TV networks can be found under a new “TV Shows” tab on its main page today, which replaces the “Series” tab. (Video series can now be found in the “Channels” tab). (http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/01/03/veoh-adds-videos-from-hulu 1/3)
Rich Skrenta, co-founder of news aggregator Topix.com, is developing a startup called Blekko, and plans to make a run at the search engine world with it. “Google and its copy-tition were designed 10 years ago,” says Skrenta. “Google was built to index a Web that no longer exists.” (http://www.webpronews.com/topnews/2008/01/03/topix-co-founder-taking-on-google 1/3)
JPMorgan Internet analyst Imran Khan and his team are releasing a report that paints a bullish picture for the major Internet stocks — Google, Amazon, eBay, and others. Search advertising “will continue to dominate, rising from $22 billion globally last year to $50 billion in 2010.” (http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/01/02/jpmorgan-predicts-2008-will-be-nothing-but-net 1/2)
MTV Networks Music Group says it delivered more than 1.2 billion video streams in 2007 via MTV.com, VH1.com and CMT.com, a 30% increase from 2006. Videos accounted for nearly half of its video streams. Britney Spears’ live performance of “Gimme More” was the most viewed clip.
Freemusiczilla is desktop based software that basically lets you download any song you can stream on the Internet. There are lots of services like it, but none are as easy to use, or work as well, as Freemusiczilla did in Techcrunch’s testing. The software is Windows only. One you’ve downloaded it, any song that plays on a site (MySpace, imeem, Pandora, Last.fm, Skreemr, Seeqpod, etc.) is noted by the program. Click a button and the song is downloaded to your hard drive. (http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/01/02/freemusiczilla-best-music-downloader-ive-tested 1/2)
Former rap star MC Hammer is choreographing a new career as co-founder of Menlo Park-based DanceJam.com. The Web site, scheduled to debut in mid-January, will try to upstage YouTube and become the Internet’s hub for sharing and watching dance videos, supported by advertising. (http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5jYc89LbHVlAfFlEBGfmGRexIcj1gD8TTHUBG0 1/2)
Hold on. Just HOLD on for a second. This is MC Hammer’s return to fame? Were all the other D-list celebrity slots taken in reality TV land? Good look “upstaging” YouTube.
Lifetime Networks and MyLifetime.com are partnering with Paltalk, a video-based community, to produce a show for the social network’s video platform. Titled “Why Hasn’t He Called?,” the series will feature relationship expert Matt Titus and his wife, journalist Tamsen Fadal. (http://www.worldscreen.com/newscurrent.php?filename=lifetime010208.htm 1/2)
The U.K. in 2009 will become the first major economy to seeadvertisers spend more on the Internet than on television advertising, according to media buying agency Group M. But this will not mean the demise of TV as a major ad medium: “Most of the growth is coming from search ads.” (http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2008/jan/03/advertising.digitalmedia 1/3)
The CBS News blog PublicEye, once described as a “de facto ombudsman,” is ceasing operation. CBS Interactive cut several staff members last month, including Matthew Felling, the editor of the site. A spokesperson says: “We weren’t able to find a sustainable business model.” (http://www.mediabistro.com/tvnewser/cbs/cbs_blinks_publiceye_goes_dormant__74075.asp 1/2)
Nintendo reportedly may soon allow DS customers to download full versions of gaming titles using the company’s popular Wii console. Nintendo officials have expressed such plans in the past, although no specific date or additional information have been provided. (GameDaily BIZ 1/2)
A number of Nintendo Wii titles are capitalizing on the device’s Zapper accessory, which allows gamers to transform their Wii’s remote-and-nunchaku combo into a two-handed firearm. Titles such as “Medal of Honor Heroes 2″ let gamers move along a predetermined path while gunning down enemies. (Boston Herald/Associated Press 1/2)
