Time For A Comeback (I’m renewed, refreshed, and ready to blog)
September 1, 2008 by Jonathan · 1 Comment
It’s been way too long since I last posted to my blog here. For that, I apollogize. It seems (and I plan to analyze this a little more later this week) that the more I Twitter and micro-blog, the more my full blog suffers. I’ve effectually decided to put my site and blog on hold, because of the immense value I get out of Twitter.
We live in such a crazy world don’t we!? My lack of blogging on my blog-proper isn’t for lack of topics and interest, live has just been crazy after moving to a new state, taking on a new job (which I love) and all of the associated things needing my attention.
In the time since I last blogged, a lot has changed in technology and social media. I’m here to help guide you through that. Come back soon, to read what I have to say and be sure to subscribe to the RSS feed, or Feedburner Emails there in the sidebar of the blog.
PS: I recorded a little welcome back video today with my Flip camera.
How To Get Hired Using Social Media
June 22, 2008 by Jonathan · Leave a Comment
I was lucky enough to know and be on the bleeding edge of social-networking when it began several years ago. I also spent a lot of time cultivating and contributing to my online identity and making connections with people online. The good news is that you don’t have to be an early adopter, or an Internet wiz to get hired using social media.
Looking for a job isn’t easy, and it can be very frustrating. Social media can help, but it’s not a replacement for old fashioned phone calls, emails, and letters. When I graduated from the Missouri School of Journalism I had multiple job offers, and the best of those offers were ones that I came across or was a candidate for because of social media.
For some time, I had been Twittering, Facebooking, and Blogging. I spent money to make sure my blog looked good. I spent hours finding interesting people on Twitter. I stayed up late when I should have been doing other things honing in my online portfolio. And you know what? It all paid off.
One job offer came from a person who followed me on Twitter for two months and noticed that I was talking with increased frequency about finding a job. A couple phone calls and emails later, I was interviewing and had an offer before I got home from visiting.
The other job offer from social-media crossed platforms, I knew the person who knew about a job, but we follow each other on Twitter, and are Facebook friends. Again, my talking about finding a job was seen by this person and I got a Facebook message about openings where she worked. It just so happened that this job was a perfect fit, I got the offer, and took it.
In two paragraphs I just explained how I got a job using social media, but that’s not incredibly useful is it? To help with that, here are my tips and suggestions on finding a job using social-media.
- Put your portfolio and resume online. This is more important than you realize. You’ve just in an instant opened up your resume and portfolio of work to the millions of people online. Now you just need to help people find it.
- Sign up for Twitter and find some people with similar interests to tweet back and forth with. You’ll quickly understand by looking at some of the so called Twitterati how useful and powerful this service is. After you sign up for an account “follow” @chrisbrogan, @guykawasaki, and @scobleizer the three of them have thousands of followers already and actively tweet throughout the day and night. A lot can be learned by example.
- Start a blog. This is a GREAT way to show off your knowledge and skills. This doesn’t have to be complex, start it off on Blogger or Wordpress.com if you want (although I would highly suggest putting wherever you portfolio and resume is). Write one or twice a week at first about what you’re working on, what you’re thinking about (that relates to your job ambitions), and your goals. Some of the best job related feedback I got was on my blog by people emailing and commenting when I wrote a post about “My Ideal Job”.
- Drive traffic to your online portfolio and resume. Do this by putting links on your Facebook page, in your Twitter profile, putting it in big type at the top of your paper resume, and by having it on ALL correspondence online and off. You never know where emails or resumes may get forwarded, and if your online portfolio is linked right there for easy access it makes a world of difference.
- Make It Personal. This is your job hunt, and it’s not going to be easy, but by taking advantage of the basics of social-media your job hunt can expand beyond the traditional into the extraordinary. Social media doesn’t work unless you’re human and make it personal. Being professional and sharing ideas is going to increase your credibility, but not including personal moments will exclude you from the conversation.
links for 2008-04-26
April 26, 2008 by Jonathan · 1 Comment
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Is Twitter worth $150 million?
A Personal Update
April 19, 2008 by Jonathan · 1 Comment
Today’s post has two different themes, 1) a change in blog format and 2) my job search.
I wanted to start out by saying that I’ve changed the way things work on here a little. After getting several emails, I re-evaluated having my Twitter updates archive to my blog. I’ve decided that there isn’t very much value derived from having those posts reposted here.
This blog and my Tweets fill very different needs and have very different value. I have decided that while having a searchable archive of my Tweets here was nice for me, it really wasn’t providing very much value to you, my valued readers. I’ve disabled the cross-posting of Tweets on this blog until a better solution crops up.
In the meantime, be sure to Follow me on Twitter. About two weeks ago I hit 300 followers on Twitter and am now proud to be followed by nearly 350 people. Thank you so much for your support and I hope that you enjoy the insight and knowledge that I share with the community.
On another personal note, you may have noticed that my blogging has been inconsistent as of late. This is a short-term situation and I hope to resume normal daily posting very soon. As you know, I’ve been actively seeking full-time employment, and looking is nearly a full-time job. Normally I would be writing daily and scheduling posts a day or two ahead of schedule about ideas, thoughts, and conversations happening. However, I don’t want to jeopardize any of the opportunities coming down the pipe.
I’ve already had to make some tough decisions, and there will be no shortage of more difficult decisions for at least the next several weeks. As I make those decisions and finalize plans, I will post some information from the numerous conversations I’ve been having with wonderful people across the country on the future of information and knowledge distribution (formerly known as the news business).
If you haven’t already, I’d like to invite you to subscribe to my blog via email by using the form in the right-side column or by adding my RSS feed to your feed reader.
Jonathan’s Twitter Updates for 2008-04-08
April 8, 2008 by Jonathan · Leave a Comment
- Wishing I were blogging. #
- mmmm Google App Engine, I guess I have to learn Python now #
- Good Morning Twitterville, it’s rainy outside, but Google AppEngine is alive so that’s exciting! #
- @Chaitanya I prefer to be my own filter, that’s what I’m a Twitter/ semantic web in general fan. Makes it easy to filter your own content. #
- @vergil66 I have the Keurig machine and love it, do you like your Senseo? #
- It pains me that KU won last night, ugh #
- @mightykenny I thought that tasting was at noon? #
- @vergil66 I didn’t watch the game last night, but figured I ought to know today when I go in to work. #
- Alright, I’m headed to work Twitterati, ping ya later #
- @mcompton Usability research is a LOT of fun isn’t it? #
- I think it’s very funny that Comcast has the leaderboard ad on http://www.techcrunch.com this morning after this past weekend’s debacle #
- Seriously? People actually advocating that VHS gives you a superior personal brand over DVD/online? http://tinyurl.com/5nsc8k #
- Reading about Burlington, Vermont. Any of you in Twitterville know anything about it? #
- I’ll update my Google App Engine thoughts a little later this afternoon on my blog, so stay with me! #
- Just off the phone with Brad Robertson of the Burlington Free Press, had a great conversation. #
- Now joining a webinar on online journalism credibility sponsored by Poytner #
- Sorry for the spelling, Poynter #
- This just in: "web audiences trust our journalism more if they know about our personal ideas and commentaries" no kidding! ha! #
- My day is winding down, until my NAB/RTNDA meeting tonight at 8 #
Are Podcasts Dead?
April 7, 2008 by Jonathan · Leave a Comment
In case you didn’t know, I’ll be in Las Vegas Sunday-Wednesday for the NAB conference (National Association of Broadcasters). The Reynolds Journalism Institute at the Missouri School of Journalism is sponsoring my trip so that I can present Contributr to the masses. (Let’s hope Contributr is ready, more on that tomorrow!)
As I was looking through the available sessions trying to schedule myself into some I noticed a recurring theme, podcasting. Now I hate to rain on anybody’s parade but aren’t podcasts dead? Haven’t they been deemed not conversational enough?
I mean sure, we all are subscribed to a few in iTunes, but how often do you actually listen to one? Let alone actively look for more? I know I don’t. I’ve moved on, I’ve moved on to try to create and examine the semantic web. And podcasts just don’t fit into that strategy very well. They may not be static in location but they are certainly static in content. One you publish an episode to a podcast it just sits there… and people listen to it… but what else? What’s the extra step? … Well I just can’t seem to find it.
So you might imagine my disappointment when I am going through the NAB sessions schedule and see multiple sessions on podcasting each day, and only 2 or 3 sessions on ‘blogging’ total for the entire conference.
Is this where journalism is? Is this what the journalism folks think is hot? Haven’t they found Twitter, haven’t they found Facebook, haven’t they found that conversations are the latest and greatest things to hit the web?
Apparently not, and in my conversations with Jen Reeves it seems that the ‘industry’ is doomed to be 5-years behind as she puts it. Here I am creating wikis, blogging daily, coming up with user generated content solutions, enhancing new-media workflows, and creating conversations around my own life and here is the Journalism Industry just now trying to figure out podcasting.
There’s disconnect somewhere. That disconnect is what is holding back journalism and the news media in general, they’re not in touch with what consumers are using technology for.
As all of my recent blog posts do, I’ll link this one to my current job-search. There are quite a few journalism web content editor and producer jobs out there. Frankly, they’re almost a dime a dozen, news organizations realize they need to staff “the web” so staff “the web” they do. But where is the innovation? Where is the commitment?
Part of the struggle I have faced in my job search is that there’s plenty of work to be had out there, but very few newsrooms and very few news people “get it”. It takes more than just repurposing content from your printed newspaper or broadcast TV show onto the web anymore, that’s just not enough. People want to have conversations, they want to change, edit, manipulate, share, and copy your precious content. Are you willing to see what your public can do for you?
That’s the future of journalism. Don’t just talk to the public, let the public talk to you. If you “get it” email, call, IM, or @jdcoffman me. I’m listening, are you?
Jonathan’s Twitter Updates for 2008-04-01
April 1, 2008 by Jonathan · Leave a Comment
- Made it back to Columbia, now comes the hard part, unpacking! #
- @chrisbrogan you seem like an ideal candidate for GrandCentral actually #
- @xphilter welcome to the club! #
- @lavosby I encourage SL to further adopt Twitter posts as a great way to enhance the ‘community’ surrounding your services. #
- @kambei, the real magic is when you hand a youngster an iPhone and they ‘know’ how to use it - it’s that user friendly! - #
- Wow, Blockbuster has now spammed two of my email accounts with "it’s been a while since you’ve rented, come back and try Total Access again" #
- @csamuel what’s your first app going to be? I’m still waiting for my invite #
- @mightykenny I currently have Netflix and love it! #
- @mightykenny I hadn’t realized they did that with the high def content, I’ll have to investigate (although I’m not HD yet) #
- I just successfully upgraded my blog to WordPress 2.5 - It was mostly painless, took about 15 minutes total #
- Good late morning twitterville, whole slew of errands scheduled today #
- Reading up on the April 1 jokes by Google today #
- @jackieKazil I’m reading coverage of this year’s Jokes on TC: Build Your Very Own Google Airplane <http://tinyurl.com/2pkb4y> #
- ha! Google Calendar "I’m feeling lucky" button got me a date with Paris Hilton tonight… #
- @Scobleizer as does Kansas City International Airport, Free WiFi rocks! #
- @acafourek you mean there is sun in Missouri? or just ‘natural light’
# - Took care of my academic duties by getting a cap and gown for graduation today, only a few weeks late #
- I’m in a class that just had an ambush award of $10k for the professor by University top officials #
- It’s a great day when people who love their jobs and provide such a great public service are thanked in a public way #
- @chrisbrogan, I have to disagree, I vote to get rid of landlines altogether. I haven’t had one for 3.5 years now and won’t look back #
- Just back from going to the grocery store with a friend, I’ve some blogging I need to do tonight! #
- @cimota @chockenberry sure there is, hit the "shift" key twice and it illuminates blue, caps lock #
Journalists and Blogging
March 17, 2008 by Jonathan · Leave a Comment
“Blogging is only as good as you make it”
This statement couldn’t me more true, today when I find a truly engaging and interesting news story you know what format it’s in? a BLOG. A blog with personal insight and knowledge.
The reporters of the world all have knowledge of what they’re covering but they don’t share that knowledge with the readers in a print or broadcast form, with blogs they should be able to tell us the ‘truth’ of the matters related to the story, not just what their sources say is the truth. Share the knowledge!
This isn’t to say that filters and editing is bad, just that transparency is a very positive thing, especially since the web has democratized and freed information storage and retrieval.
“It isn’t the journalism of your cranky old city editor or your sainted j-school prof. Neither of those old farts would approve of blogging in any form, even though blogging is now part of the legitimate media mix.”
I quote this only because I have first hand knowledge of the way journalism is now being taught. And granted my experiences may not reflect that of the other students who aren’t as knowledgeable about the world surrounding the Internet, but nonetheless…
I know of several journalism professors who embrace blogs (and blog themselves), and many of the current classes at the Missouri School of Journalism require students to blog on a weekly basis, however what is often required is a reflection post on the work they did this week.
This could be taken as great practice for the young journalist, or a way to show how important it is to control what you say and how you say it. There are plenty of ‘cranky old city editors’ around in the real world, and in the Jschool world, and those are the people I think we really need to be careful about. They are the ones who wouldn’t trust a blog, wouldn’t trust a person’s opinions, and think grammar is the end-all be-all of “good news”.
That just isn’t the case anymore. Period.
Blogging is where journalists need to be writing and peddling their wares. The traditional newspaper is old news, and so is the traditional newspaper web site.
Content doesn’t have to free, but it does have to open and accessible.
links for 2008-03-16
March 16, 2008 by Jonathan · Leave a Comment
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I just joined this NING social network for journalists in the 21st Century.
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Beautiful, Beautiful fonts
100+ Useful Web Resources for Small Business and Non Profits | BlogWell
March 5, 2008 by Jonathan · 2 Comments
100+ Useful Web Resources for Small Business and Non Profits | BlogWell: “to”
(Via Blog Well.)
I just can’t compete with that site, they’ve compiled an EXCELLENT list of resources and other sites that can help your personally or professionally understand and take advantage of the web.
It’s geared toward small businesses, but I can’t find anything on there that wouldn’t apply to enterprise web operations as well. We all have a need for growth and development online and blog-well has some very helpful advice.
I haven’t read each of the 100 sites linked to from that post yet, but I am making my way through it and haven’t found a dud yet!
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OtherProfiles
