JibJab and Animoto are what I consider “Mashup” sites, combining different mediums to produce quality content. In the spirit of the “Social web” these sites make it easy and fun for everyone regardless of your technical “know-how”. You can quickly and easily create videos to share across your network of friends or embed in your own Blog or website.

JibJab helps you to create personalized video and images by superimposing your face onto their eCards and pre-made videos templates. They describe themselves as a service that:

“helps people share laughs. From viral political videos like “This Land” to Sendables eCards and personalized videos starring You!”

From doubles figure skating to leprechaun’s break dancing, they offer a good-sized catalog of video and images to choose from.

Take a look at my first attempt below:

Animto allows you to quickly and easily create video slideshows from video clips and pictures. There service allows a user to:

“automatically produce beautifully orchestrated, completely unique video pieces from your photos, video clips and music. Fast, free and shockingly easy.”

They offer a bit more customization then JibJab allowing you to add music or text. It also has a cool “remix” feature that re-creates your video randomly. Here is what I did for with for one of our clients using images from their photo contest.

There are a lot of reasons why I love my job, it’s challenging, it allows me to be creative everyday, and it keeps me on the edge of leading technology. Most importantly every once and awhile I get to play!

If know of any of cool social “time wasters” you think I should check out post a link in the comments and I’ll take a look.

One piece in particular stood out for me, the sculpture entitled “We”, created by internationally renowned artist and sculptor Jaume Plensa. It is located a few metres south of the intersection of Thurlow Street and Beach Avenue in English Bay, and was constructed as part of the Vancouver Biennale.

The Vancouver Biennale, which is a bi-annual event that celebrates art in public places, describes the sculpture as a celebration of “Vancouver’s linguistic and cultural diversity” which seemed quite fitting as Vancouver prepares to host the world later this week. The 16 feet tall aluminum piece combines a number of letters chosen from 8 different alphabets (Latin, Greek, Russian Cyrillic, Hebrew, Hindi, Japanese, Arabic, Chinese) to create a shape resembling a man sitting on the ground with his knees tucked into his chest. Lights have been placed in the floor of the “womb” created by the structure and light upwards through the white lettering to create a beautiful glowing effect.

I had the pleasure is of being introduced to Miriam Blume this week, who is the Director of Communications for The Vancouver Biennale. She was kind enough to describe to me the main of objective of the project and mention a few tips to make the experience more enjoyable.

Our objective is to situate art where people live, work and play, creating cultural experiences for people as they move about their daily lives. Our open-air museum includes some of the most renown artists from around the world and some new rising super stars that can’t be missed.

A downloadable map is available on our website, and we encourage people to hop on their bikes, or take the Canada Line or do a series of walks to see all of the sculptures during the exhibition.

During the Olympics, we invite the city to join us nightly at Sunset Beach Park to watch the Vectorial Elevation light show in and amongst some of the most spectacular Biennale sculptures. Completely free and family-friendly, it’s an incredible way to spend an evening. Watch for the Biennale team in bright yellow jackets giving away collector pins and postcards.

To find out more about the other sculptures and the artist behind them check out the Vancouver Biennale website or follow them on any of their social profiles Facebook, Twitter or Flickr.

Originally posted on the Metro Blenz News Squad Blog

As we start 2010 we all begin to make (or break) our annual attempt at new years resolutions. Following the bakers dozen worth of Mom’s Naniamo bars I devoured over the holidays its time to trim the fat. Offline I am starting Fitness February (earlier this year to accommodate the olympics I’m actually 2 weeks in):

The Rules of Fitness February

Rule # 1 DETOX – Live free of alcohol, smoking and other toxins.
Rule # 2 FITNESS – Weekly fitness goals increase in intensity.
Rule # 3 HEALTHY CHOICES – Eating less fatty foods adding more raw foods Consider Cleansing- another great option.
Rule # 4 CHEAT DAYS – In the past we allowed only 4 days of freedom where you will be allowed to indulge.

Pretty simple and easier when all the boys on your hockey team are doing the same. Less temptation for a pint after the skate.

However now a days a cleanse has to transcend our day to day to our digital life. More specifically its time to cleanse some of our social profiles.

Today I going to talk about some of the tools we use to maintain our Twitter accounts.

Trimming the Fat:

We are all being “spammed” on a daily basis and if you don’t stay on top of it your accounts can easily get out of control. I am talking about these disruptive “techniques” that usually contain tips on “teeth whiting”, “How To Make Money” or just want to chat like “I wanna talk with a cute guy”, “hey guys single chick”. This crap plagues all our accounts on a daily basis.

The two tools we use to maintain our accounts are Refollow and Twitsweeper. Both allow you to login using Twitter Oath. I wont use a tool unless it uses Oath for security purposes.

Although both these tools help with the cleansing my favorite tool for removing spam is Twitsweep. It allows you monitor and remove “spammey” followers based on a growing library of spam phrases. You have full control over who you remove and can chose from three levels of automation to do so. Fully automatic, automatic with delay,and manual confirmation. I used the manual setting initially to make sure I saw it was being marked for deletion and once I saw that it was targeting the spammers I have switched to the automatic with delay setting.
Refollow works a bit differently and is more of a hands on web based applications. “Refollow helps you discover, manage, and protect your Twitter social circle.” It allows a lot of flexibility with there very easy to use filtering system. There are 15+ pre-set filters that you can turn on and off with with a simple checkbox. A couple of the filters I use regularly are:

:“Tweeted in the last:(blank) days”, you can set the number of days by a drop-down.
:“Users who have mentioned me” combined with the “Im not following” filter checked”

It really comes down to what is your Twitter policy, Do you follow everyone that follows you? Do you only follow people who interact with you?, These questions will ultimately determine how you use this tool.

I hope these tools help you with your day-to-day Twitter management and helps you begin your cleanse. Are there any tool you use that you would recommend? I would love to here about them.

~ Adam Kambeitz

Warning: When using these tools please abide by Twitters Following Limits and Best Practices over “following” can result in account suspension.

Below are some screen shots of what you should expect to see when you login to your Twitter page.

When you click on the “Set your location” button above, the location choices, pictured below, will appear.

You can then select the city or countries trends you wish to follow. When you have clicked on your selection a green check mark will appear beside the area you will be following and the trends will update automatically.

Unfortunately with its intial launch Vancouver, which is considered a major hub for Social Media Conversationalists, Critics and Creators. was not on the list. In fact no major Canadian cities made the first cut, but what we can see is trending topics for Canada. I would find it hard to believe that Vancouver will not soon be on that list, especially with the Olympics, in our own backyard, only weeks away. Twitter claims that they “We’ll be improving this feature over time to provide more locations, languages”, hopefully they will make Vancouver a priority.

It will be interesting to see over the next few weeks how theses trends change on a day to day or hourly basis. I wonder how much effect the global trending topics will effect what is happening locally and what will it take for a local topics to break into the global realm. How will you use these trending topics?

While Vancouver may not be trending as of today,  this amazing video of our city is. This beautiful time-lapse of  video of Vancouver, which has made its way through my social networks and even into main stream media news, is a created by David and Dan Newcomb. Enjoy.

“Vancouver City” music video is an artistic collaboration between Innerlife Project and TimeLapseHD. Linda Ganzini’s beautiful and haunting vocals blend with the unique musical style of Serge Chubinski-Orlov who produced and wrote Vancouver City.

By Adam Kambeitz

It seems like social media is popping up and replacing all sorts of traditional ideals about marketing your company, from cook books to text books for college students, and even to completely reinventing the music business. One industry that has embraced social media in every way possible is the fashion world.

With the dying Fashion Magazine, many companies have moved their focus to online blogs, newsletters, and pictorials that appear on their websites rather than in print. Though some feel saddened about the drastic changes to the fashion industry, I personally feel like this is a natural progression, and a welcomed change. Now, I’ll still splurge for special issues, like the Vogue September issue, but for my every day reading, fashion blogs are the way to go. Not only do they let me find out what’s new in the industry the moment it happens, but I get a chance to read lots of different opinions in a matter of clicking my mouse.

Online Fashion Magazines benefit advertisers in ways that traditional print cannot; the difference between having a link to your website, and having a one page advertisement in a magazine is that online the consumer has the ability to click on the link, shop through all of the stores product, and in most cases, purchase whatever they want without having to leave their home. The problem with traditional ads is that, especially in high end fashion magazines, a lot of the designers being advertised don’t even have shops in most cities. Even if you do see an ad you like, it doesn’t mean you have access to the product without going online and ordering it from their website, which brings us back to why online ads are more effective than print.

I’m not the only one who has caught on to how social media can help the Fashion industry, earlier this year at New York Fashion Week Fall/Winter 2009, bloggers were given media passes and allowed into the tents with the traditional journalists. Not only that, but NY Fashion Week even had stations set up after the shows where attendees could blog their thoughts on the newest lines in real time, on laptops supplied on site.

Fashion is all about reinvention and staying relevant, so it’s really no surprise that they’ve adapted to the newest trend sweeping businesses across the globe. Social media has benefits to offer every industry, and as usual, the fashion world is ahead of the game and one of the firsts to hop on board. Which industry will social media help next?

- by Becky Caissie

Localization is great for finding information that is relevant to your area, but, when using it for personal use, there are dangers that come along with it that many users don’t consider. Without the right privacy settings on your profile, some users are unknowingly giving away information to online predators, saying where we are, where we’ll be later on that day, and who we’re with. It’s a caution that has been repeated to us over and over again, yet people are still being naïve, and getting themselves into trouble by giving away too much information online. Even if a user has their information only available to their “friends”, most of us are guilty of accepting friend requests from people that we hardly know or have only met a handful of times.

For businesses, having the chance to include your location is a great strategy for targeting specific markets both locally and internationally. By having your location attached to your posts, you can tailor your messaging, personalize the content and connect with your customers. This increases the agility of your online campaigns and leads to higher conversation potential.

Localization is definitely the most talked about newest trend to hit the social networking scene, and is an addition to the sites which will likely be embraced by most users. Like anything else, it has its benefits and its drawbacks, but for the most part, when used safely, localization makes your online experience more personal and tailored to suit your internet needs.

- by Becky Caissie

unfriend – verb – To remove someone as a ‘friend’ on a social networking site such as Facebook.

Twitter is the prime example of the dangers looming over communication; 140 characters is hardly enough to form a complete sentence, let alone describing what you’re up to, how you feel, and what’s on your mind.

The new generation of computer users have been online their entire lives, and using the digit 2 instead of the word, not only hurts their spelling ability, but it also creates huge problems with homophones.  And who can blame them? Without practicing to, too and two, how else would a person learn their different meanings and how to properly use them in a sentence? Especially when using the number 2, is shorter and perceived as being “cooler”.

There wouldn’t be a problem if this language wasn’t spilling into these users’ formal writing skills; however, more and more, we see these abbreviated words are creeping up.  We understand that the New Oxford American Dictionary is simply trying to shift its public perception from being old, to something that would appeal to younger generation, but they need to also consider the dangers of incorporating a new, online lingo, in their dictionary.

- by Becky Caissie

Now before you write letters of complaint to Mark Zuckerberg for seemingly complicating prize giveaways, consider the ways this helps the average Facebook user, like you and I. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve become a “fan” of a company or product on Facebook, only to unsubscribe days later after receiving tonnes of messages from said company trying to get me to join an online sweepstake, or to vote for something on their page.  In other words, without any regulation, these companies can legally send SPAM to your Facebook inbox, so long as you have signed up to be a “fan”. Not only is that annoying, but it can also present legal ramifications to Facebook as a company.

On the other hand, having contests on Facebook are easy for companies to create, and consumers to access. The amounts of people who submit entries on Facebook, are considerably higher than those who sign up through the company’s website. The reason is obvious; Facebook is easier. Usually a website insists you sign up before having the ability to enter the contest, whereas on Facebook you’re already a user. The more hoops a customer has to jump through, the less likely they are to participate.

Only time will tell if these new regulations will force companies to use other forms of social media to create online contests such as Twitter or Flickr, but with Facebook being undoubtedly the largest medium for social networking, this is definitely going to spark some change .

- by Becky Caissie

Well apparently there is a difference to VANOC and the COC. For example, fans at the games holding homemade posters to cheer on their favorite team or athlete will be forced to cover up any Official Olympic Symbols due to copy-write infringement. However, on the Official Olympic Facebook Fanpage, any one or any organization has the ability to link themselves to the games without being an Official Sponsor. When given the option to outline rules and regulations for the Official Olympic Facebook Fanpage regarding what can and cannot be said due to copy-write laws, it would appear that both VANOC and COC chose to allow all fan based content to appear on the page as is. No where on the page, is there any public information or guidelines about any policing of content. It seems like no big deal until companies begin to take advantage of this opportunity to post information about their cause, company, event or product. This allows them to be linked to the Olympics, without having to pay the high priced amount for being an official sponsor. Other sporting events, organizations and individuals selling service, which are in no way connected to the Olympics, are able to post links to their event on the page, and therefore are able to draw traffic to their own site, all of which is free of cost. There seems to be another hope that consumers will assume that these companies are Olympic Sponsors, and they can then link the company image to that of the Olympic brand.

The reason this is so surprising is because the Olympics have a long history of protecting their sponsors and heavily policing the use of their copy-written symbols. As mentioned above, stories have surfaced about how fans were treated at previous games with their homemade posters. All posters with the Olympic rings, or any copy-written Olympic words and symbols were covered with black tape supplied on site by the organizers. A fan has no financial gain by making a poster to support their team, but companies having their link on an Official Olympic page definitely do. So the question remains; are online fan site the last of the un-policed Olympic Licensing?

- by Becky Caissie

Auto DM’s are spam! I know this has been talked about on many occasions (Chris Brogan) but I need to vent. They are a constant barrage of pointless emails littering our Twitter and email inbox. They are impersonal, untargeted and fake responses that carry no meaning and are counteractive to social media and the two-way conversation. Its only purpose is to breathe life into interruptive marketing, which we have all become numb to and I wish would just die already.

Personally I don’t respond to a “DM auto-follows” and on a regular basis for a couple of reasons: I don’t really have the time (actually I haven’t set way some time to) and these auto Dm’s have left the terrible taste in mouth.

I believe this tool does have some legitimacy, when you used correctly, connecting two people on Twitter privately. Personally I have been contacted by non-profits, charities, and just recently by an individual who had just moved to Vancouver from Barcelona and was prospecting for employment.

On a side note, just when I thought all was lost, I actually received a manual DM last week. I would once again like to thank @terrinakamura for that.

I did a little poking around the inter-tubes today, as I was writing this, and have found a couple of tricks that the claim they will eliminate a majority of the those auto DM’s. The two main websites responsible for the auto DM pollution are SocialToo and TweetLater. Here are the details on how to disable these polluters via @JonDBishop

http://bit.ly/2orM8S

I have not tried these techniques but will be in the next day or so. Ill will keep you posted.

The bottom line is if you send an auto DM you don’t really care! Its an automated reflex, like a when your doctor hits your knee your leg kicks out uncontrollably or when Kanye sees someone other than Beyonce win Best Female video award. It’s not authentic and lacks real purpose or intent.

If you not contributing to the conversation your just adding to the noise.

Death to auto DM’s Long live #manualDM’s!