LinkedIn and Twitter: Like Peanut Butter and Chocolate?

The professional online networking service, LinkedIn announced yesterday that it will be integrating its services with the microblogging phenom, Twitter allowing users of both services to sync their tweets and “network updates” on LinkedIn. Users can further share information through a “tweet this” box that will post their LinkedIn updates to Twitter and while on Twitter, users can add the established hashtags of #in or #li to posts in order for their tweets to appear on their LinkedIn profiles. And if that wasn’t integration enough, a new app called Tweets, lets users put their Twitter stream on their LinkedIn profiles.

So what does this mean? According to Allen Blue, LinkedIn cofounder and vice-president of product strategy in a his blog post, the two services go together like peanut butter and chocolate. As discussed in this video, this integration further allows a user to amplify their professional identity and brand by broadcasting their messages via Twitter.

This also means that if you choose to participate in integrations like this, you must continue to “Think before you Tweet” and keep your personal and professional brand top of mind.

Ben Parr talks the future of Gaming and Socialization

Earlier today, video gaming giant Electronic Arts (EA) announced its blockbuster acquisition of the Facebook/social gaming company Playfish for between $300-400 million. It’s a major move by EA into the social gaming space and one that places a smart team and a set of top-rated social networking games (e.g. Pet Society ) into its control.

While it’s too early to understand the ramifications and implications of the Playfish acquisition, we do firmly believe that the potential impact of the EA/Playfish combo are enormous. This is the first time the social and video gaming realms have truly merged. In fact, it could prove to be a watershed moment for not only the social gaming industry, but for video games in general.

After thinking about the current state of gaming and how social gaming could affect, we’ve come up with a set of six predictions surrounding how social gaming could affect not only Electronic Arts, but the entire video gaming industry. Here are our predictions:

1. There will be more Social Gaming Acquisitions

Playfish will not be the last social gaming acquisition by a video gaming or entertainment company. Zynga and Playdom are potential targets, and even peripheral companies such as virtual currency platforms could become attractive. There are many smaller, independent social gaming companies that could be snatched up as well.

As to who will acquire them: the possibilities range from console and game makers (e.g. Nintendo and Microsoft) to online content kingpins (e.g. MySpace.).

2. EA Will Find New Ways to Monetize Social Gaming:

Over the last week or so, there has been a backlash against cost per action (CPA) and lead generation offers within social games. The result has been deceptive ad crackdowns and the pulling of these offers from platforms such as Zynga, where they account for a significant chunk of total revenues.

Yet we are not worried about the ability of social games to monetize, especially in light of today’s acquisition. EA knows how to turn a profit and will find unique ways to generate revenue from its newest addition. Subscriptions, console-based virtual purchases, and more prominent advertisers could (and probably will) all become part of the mix. It won’t need CPA ads to monetize.

3. Virtual Goods Will Become Even Bigger Business:

Related to prediction #2, we believe that there is huge upside for the virtual currency, gift, and goods market. It shocks us how big the virtual goods market has already become. The U.S. market alone is thought to be worth $1 billion and the Asian market to be worth around $7 billion.

The virtual goods market hasn’t come close to reaching its potential, though. As more and more users join social games such as FarmVille and become more comfortable spending their hard-earned cash on virtual seeds, that number will go up. Couple that with upcoming payment platforms from Facebook and PayPal, and you have a recipe for a high-growth emerging market.

4. You Will See a Wave of Social Gaming on the Console:

EA’s core competency is creating video games for consoles such as the Xbox, the Wii, and the PS3. Games such as Pet Society or Who Has The Biggest Brain will likely make their way onto the console, either in disc or downloadable form. It’s lucrative and people have proven their willingness to pay for the HD, console-based experience.

Other social gaming platforms will either be acquired or strike lucrative deals to bring their games to the console as well.

5. EA and Others Will Make Even Stronger Moves on Mobile:

As we wrote back in September, game console makers are feeling the heat from Apple. The iPhone has quickly become a powerhouse of a gaming platform, providing a new challenge to your standard handheld gaming device (e.g. the Nintendo DS and Sony PSP).

Social games are already on the iPhone and utilizing Facebook Connect to share scores and allow friends to compete. Zynga’s Live Poker and Playfish’s Biggest Brain are prime examples of social games turned iPhone apps. That trend will only increase exponentially as mobile (especially the iPhone and Android) become stronger gaming platforms.

UPDATE - Social Media: Fad or Revolution?

The Numbers Don’t Lie: Welcome to the Revolution
by Christine McNabb

For those of you that didn’t have time to watch the full video from OTD’s previous post this week, I wanted to highlight some of these amazing stats brought to you by Socialnomics:

96% of Gen Y has joined a social network

Social media has overtaken porn as the #1 activity on the Web.

1 out of 8 couples married in the US last year met via social media.

If Facebook were a country it would be the world’s 4th largest after China, India and then the United States

Ashton Kutcher and Ellen DeGeneres have more Twitter followers than the entire population of Ireland, Norway and Panama.

YouTube is the 2nd largest search engine in the world.

80% of companies are using LinkedIn as their primary tool to find employees.

If you were paid $1 for every time an article was posted on Wikipedia, you were earn $156.23 per hour.

78% of consumers trust peer recommendations, only 14% trust advertisements.

Hulu has grown from 63 million total streams in April 2008 to 373 million in April 2009.

25% of Americans in the past month said they watched a short video on their phone and 35% of book sales on Amazon are for the Kindle.

More than 1.5 million pieces of content (web links, news stories, blog posts, notes, photos, etc.) are shared on Facebook, DAILY.

Clearly, social media is not the fad or the fun past-time that many thought it was at one point. It has become a deeply embedded part of our lives, more than many of us might even realize, but the numbers don’t lie.

Social Media: Fad or Revolution?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sIFYPQjYhv8

Is Social Media flattening the Complexities that make us Human?

Chris Brogan’s recent post “All the Hats and Faces” reminds me of Erving Goffman’s influential work on interpersonal communication theory called “On Face Work” written over four decades ago. Chris is definitely onto something and it drives a point that I want to bring up: Is social media flattening the complexities that make us human?

Goffman’s work discusses how as individuals we negotiate “face” in our daily social interactions. What is face? Face is basically our self image within the bounds of what is appropriate within a given situation. Meaning, when we are at work we put on a “face” that fits the work environment which is different than what we may put on when with friends and family.

Chris goes on to list what he does to maintain these various faces. Goffman calls this “face-work”, behavior that helps maintain the “face” you put on. In Chris’ case, when he says he is a blogger, his face-work involves writing about what intrigues him.

This was only possible when these different environments could be kept separate. When Goffman wrote his piece, there were no BlackBerries or iPhones, Youtube, Twitter, Facebook, and on and on. This offered us to be “messy and complex” and at times contradictory. But in today’s connected world, barriers that once existed have melted away. What you say or write in a “personal” capacity on your “personal” blog or Twitter profile may have repercussions at work and various other situations. What may have been said off-hand by an executive that was completely unrelated to the business at hand can affect how business is done off-line. Was this a failure of the person or a failure of the reacting organization to recognize or understand how face plays into it?

Social media is creating enormous stresses in how we reconcile these different faces that we have in a medium that does not afford nuances that exist in reality. Are we having a generation growing up on Facebook and Twitter who do not understand such differences? Currently, as Chris suggests, our professional face is the dominant face online, risking that risks a whole host of other faces that we put on in other social circumstances. But we are more than our professional selves as Chris points out too. Is corporate culture ready to take this into account going forward knowing that future generations will continue to spill everything onto the medium unfiltered? Or will social media allow greater control to the user in how, when and by whom their communication can be viewed online?

All the Hats and Faces We Wear

From Chris Brogan: I’m asked often how I can keep the various roles in my world straight. The question baffles me, to be honest. But, for the sake of education, I’ll share what I believe are all my roles, and then I’ll tell you a bit about what this means to me, to the online space, and to my life in business so far.

First, Who I Am and Who I Am Not

-I am human. I most certainly conduct myself like one.
-I am a blogger. I write about what captures my attention.
-I am a business man. I run a company of marketers and business communicators.
-I am a marketer. I promote my clients, and help them gain more business.
-I am an author. I write books about things I feel are helpful.
-I am a father. I have two loving children I enjoy playing with.
-I am a husband. I have a supportive wife (who made the collage in this post).
-I am a speculator/future-thinker. I love thinking about what’s next.
-I am a community guy. I love people. I live in that world. I love community.
-I am a friend. I have lots of friends, and often wish I could give each of them more time.
-I am a fan. I love lots of things: hotels, media making, reading, scotch, liquor.
-I am a consumer. I buy and use products all the time. I have opinions.
-I am a publisher. I write a successful and well-ranked blog.
-I am NOT a journalist. Wish I had that training. I’m a reporter at times.
-I am NOT a PR or Marketing person by education. I’m a hack.
-I am NOT ever going to sell out my community for a dollar. (Though I would for $10 million.)

I could go on for a while. You get the picture. For some reason, people seem to think this is hard to keep straight. When I wrote the list, I didn’t have to think too hard about it. I just wrote down some things that I am and some things that I am not. I believe we know what we are and what we aren’t. I tend to like for my actions to prove what I am and what I am not.

Sometimes, that can get murky. I understand that. In my case, I disclose and report, and comment, and explore when those kinds of moments happen. I jump right in. If I feel I should, I apologize (though I receive many emails telling me that I apologize too much, so I can’t seem to win on that one).

The Future of Human-Shaped Business

Humans are messy and complex. They are non-linear. They don’t think in straight lines. They don’t act in clear-cut ways. They don’t fit into simple slots very easily. Thank the sweet *.deity for all that.

Business, however, tried really hard for many decades to push us into those slots. It still does for most of the world. Here’s the thing: factories aren’t here any more (for the most part). Industrial-age workers aren’t necessary. The entire US school system is built to educate children to take jobs as servants to the factory culture, when what the world needs most right now are entrepreneurial-minded individuals, who understand the importance of execution, and who can form and dissolve business to match their goals and objectives instead of as a means of sustaining the corporate construct.

Social media and social networks are just one signal that things are shifting. If you’re a publisher online, you are often in a shop of one, or two, or less than a dozen. That makes you sales and editorial. (Oh, there went that journalist’s wince.) That’s just one example. Business never was neat. Now, it’s downright frayed and smudgy and organic.

Ahhh, organic. Human.

I am fully and utterly embracing my facets. I make no apologies. Instead, I aim to educate, to build bridges and interfaces, and I intend to inject this human-shaped-business DNA back into the corporate culture until we all come back into alignment between our passions and our vocations, and have companies to fit those shapes.

And My Point?

Call me by whatever label suits you best. I’m making my own game. I’m bringing it to my networks. I’m spreading it with idea handles.

Sound familiar to any of you?

Cherry Picking the Social Media Books

Malcolm Gladwell has a new book "The Tipping Point" [of Social Media] that describes some new words on familiar social media marketing ideas. Some highlights:

The Law of the Few- The Law of the Few is surprisingly simple. Through studies and testimonials Gladwell found that a majority of people can usually be connected to one person. Like a “6 Degrees of Kevin Bacon Game” on steroids, Gladwell determined that there are three people that tend to connect others: Connectors, Mavens, and Salesmen. The connectors are the people that can quickly disseminate a message to many. Mavens are those who study certain things very carefully and can always help you out. And salesmen are persuasive, knowledgeable and want to help you. By knowing your trusted mavens, your ultra-connected connectors and your salesmen, your message can easily be shared. Will it be viral? Perhaps not, but at least you are giving it a chance.

The Stickiness Factor- When developing the show Seasme Street, creators saw that when a child was confused or bored they didn’t learn the lesson. It wasn’t sticky. In the same way your application/message/ iPhone app or whatever Web 2.0 tool you have need to make sure its sticky. If it isn’t then it won’t travel anywhere.

The Power of Context- In any situation where a message is being spread, context plays a huge factor. In The Tipping Point, Gladwell examines the context of large scale events like the crime on subways in New York. You don’t need to go to that scale, but if you want to spread a message, you do need to know the context. For example, is Twitter the best place for your brand or are you just trying to jump on the hottest technology?