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I've left behind a resume filled with preppy retail (Structure and Eddie Bauer) and almost a decade in journalism to embrace my inner geek.

I've been blessed with an incredible wife and two gorgeous children. We live in beautiful Port Royal, S.C.

Entries in Facebook (13)

Thursday
Aug192010

How do you plan for what you can't see?

The Interwebs are abuzz this week about Facebook rolling out its location-based tagging feature.

I’m not going to really get into the workings of that, there are enough resources out there that can explain it better than I.

Here are some links:

http://mashable.com/2010/08/19/facebook-places-guide/

http://www.allfacebook.com/facebook-places-privacy-2010-08

http://blog.hubspot.com/blog/tabid/6307/bid/6450/Facebook-Places-Launches-Allows-Businesses-To-Check-In.aspx 

Instead, I want to discuss how those in social media are being asked, and forced, to plan for what they can’t see.

Click to read more ...

Wednesday
Aug112010

Facebook makes changes to page layouts, actually gives admins notice

So Facebook this week announced that it's made changes to the layouts for fan pages or "liger" pages as I call them.

You can read about the changes at All Facebook or at Facebook's Developer Blog.

The biggest change is that custom tabs now will be narrowed to 520 pixels. So all of you admins out there will have to go back and tweak your images and tabs. The changes will take effect the week of Aug. 23, but currently are in preview mode for page admins.

That being said, at least Facebook gave some notice this time.

A few months back Facebook tweaked the maximum pixel width for custom tabs without giving admins notice, leaving many pages with blank landing tabs. (well they sorta gave notice but not to the extent that they're doing now. Live and learn I suppose) The outcry from that led Facebook to go back to its 760 pixel width.

 

 

Thursday
Jul222010

Facebook hits 500 Million

So Facebook hit its 500 Million-fan mark this week, and yet I feel no different.

All I know is Mark Zuckerberg completely creeps me out, but I suppose all the geniuses do, don't they?

Below is the trailer for the upcoming Facebook movie.

 


Monday
Jul192010

Raising a Fan Page

I'm looking forward to presenting tonight at the Savannah Social Media Club's Summer Camp session on Facebook.

I'll be talking about "Raising a Fan Page," sorta like raising a kid, or two in my case.

Click to read more ...

Thursday
Jun172010

Those ‘ligers’ are back at it

Do you ever wonder if the people at Facebook have one of those tacky, neon bar signs in their office with ‘LIKE’ spelled out?

They seem obsessed with this ‘like’ thing, don’t they?

Well the latest iteration of the like function was released this week. You now can like individual comments in a stream of comments.

Click to read more ...

Thursday
May202010

Goodbye landing pages

Facebook has taken away the ability for fan pages to push "nonfans" or those not logged in to customized landing tabs.

Now, only authenticated pages or those with more than 10,000 fans can push people to those landing tabs. Instead, you now only can push fans to your wall or the info tab.

Read more on the announcement here.

Many small businesses are lamenting this change, as they say the landing tabs are the only way they can recruit new fans without paying for an ad campaign. 

Others don't think the change will make that much of a difference.

I, for one, have made significant use of the landing tabs, and don't like this change. But it's not in our control, so you adapt and move on.

Click to read more ...

Monday
May172010

BP Fail

So, I don't know why, but I sort of feel like the country isn't enraged enough by what has happened down in the Gulf with the oil spill and BP.

I was 9 years old when the Exxon Valdez oil spill occurred, yet I remember it like it was yesterday. I remember the outrage and photo after photo after photo of birds and other oil-caked animals.

Where is all of that today?

Is it because our media is so saturated that we can't stick with a story long enough to actually do it justice, even if that story has to do with day after day of watching thousands of barrels of oil being dumped into the Gulf, destroying our precious resources?

Where is the outrage? Or has the outrage become so cookie-cutter that we don't even recognize it? After all, a Senate hearing aimed at chastising BP and others associated with this disaster really shouldn't look the same as a Senate hearing intended to quiz Major League Baseball about steroid use: But it did!

So what, Ian? So what are you going to do? You're a social media geek, what can you do, Ian?

Well about a week ago I posted to my Facebook status that I wouldn't join any "I hate BP" Facbeook fan pages. I don't like when people make political statements on Facebook, and I honestly don't see what they achieve. People join these fan pages with goofy names and the pages tend to go stagnant, really not accomplishing anything. If you want to tell me how you stand politically, then jot that down in your info section, I'll respect that more.

Instead of joining a fan page, I said I'd simply boycott BP (there are two within 2 miles of my home.)

Click to read more ...