NetSquared, an initiative of TechSoup.org - twitter

We're suckers for anthropomorphism.

alexsteed — Mon, 01 Dec 2008 09:19:40 -0500

I was just revisiting some conversations I had with Robin Parker, blog master / communications specialist at the Oregon Trail Chapter of the American Red Cross, while I was in Portland, Oregon. I flipped through her blog and found one of the most sticky posts I have read in a long, long while. It's an interview with Portland Rain. That's right - an interview with weather. But first, some background:

Random [Digital] Public Acts of Gratitude

alexsteed — Fri, 28 Nov 2008 12:41:52 -0500

While sitting down to copious piles of stuffing yesterday, I actually did take some time and thought about the things for which I am thankful (my girlfriend’s endless patience, the music of Will Oldham, wine and family holidays). To be honest, I feel a little 1.0, if you wiil, for not yet having made that public.

Everything I learned [this weekend], I gleaned from Twitter

alexsteed — Mon, 17 Nov 2008 00:31:24 -0500

I almost got suckered into believing all of the naysaying about Twitter "just being a waste of time."

In order to doublecheck my insecurities, I flipped through the past 24 hours of tweets so that I could audit whether or not I am actually learning anything from the time I spend there.

Social Media Toolkit Updated: RSS, Twitter, SiteMaps, SimplePie et al.

reifman — Fri, 07 Nov 2008 04:48:18 -0500

I've updated the Social Media Toolkit to v0.11 with a number of features taken from the NewsCloud platform:

Robin Parker, Oregon Red Cross Communications Specialist, talks shop.

alexsteed — Mon, 03 Nov 2008 11:10:55 -0500

Briefly, a poetic Tweet-of-truth brought to us by NetSquared family member Joe Solomon:

"Everybody's a social media strategist; the web needs social media soldiers too."

Now! Onto the meat.

Noone Likes [What/Who] Appears To Be a Friend-Whore

alexsteed — Wed, 24 Sep 2008 11:21:43 -0400

Warning: The following inadvertently turned into something of a rant. The point, in the end, is that it is unwise to build a virtual social net without giving people context as to why you're trying to connect with them. In the end, it turned out to be slightly tainted with distain for social network whoredom. I'll be interested to hear about your take on the subject.

Ike slams us... into calling for donors via social media tools

cmartin82 — Sun, 21 Sep 2008 23:30:24 -0400

Our organization has been in an unusual position since Hurricane Ike slammed us a week and some change ago. Houston is just now reverting to normalcy... though a complete recovery is months away, if at all possible. The Blood Center shut down its operations for four days in response to Ike and began collecting again last Tuesday, calling for the public to give blood and replenish the supply.

Subversion! Using YouTube, Photoshop, Excel and Twitter for things they weren’t meant to do. Like fundraising!

Channing — Thu, 18 Sep 2008 11:59:51 -0400

We are all guilty. You too.

We have all used Excel as a database, even though it’s really not a database program. Real database programs take training - Excel, however, can make you that call list in the blink of an eye. So you use it. There’s more: many of us have used Photoshop for making pamphlets and posters, even though it’s not actually meant to do either. Worse, we’ve made pamphlets in Word.

The mind reels! Or maybe it doesn’t, because frankly tech tools are made to be subverted. Especially by non-profit staff who are on a grant deadline, and just need a way to get this poster done, fast.

So you can imagine how happy I was to discover ways that people are subverting our new best friends - Youtube, Twitter and Facebook - for fun and non-profit.

Tu Diabetes has Success with Twitter

amysampleward — Wed, 03 Sep 2008 17:26:46 -0400

Tu Diabetes is an online community where members help each other out, educate themslves and share the steps taken every day to stay healthy while living with this very serious condition. Tu Diabetes employs a gamut of web tools in its process of reaching out to new community members, keeping the community informed, and educating the public.

How to run an online fundraiser

Channing — Fri, 29 Aug 2008 05:37:59 -0400

I will give you some actual nuts and bolts, but let me first say this: all good online fundraisers have two basic directions they work in - in and out. ‘In’ is a webpage, where people visit you. ‘Out’ is as in reaching out, through emails, smsing, MySpace, Twitter, Facebook etc etc etc. You are aiming for flow between the two directions. Because - just like all really successful fundraising - this is not so much about asking a bunch of people for money. Actually, it’s about a personal exchange - exactly what the internet was made for. Hold that thought, here come the nuts and bolts…

(to read the rest of this post, click here!)