Stand Back TweetPo.st; SupaSync is the better Facebook-Twitter App

So it has been since October 5, 2009 since I wrote my last blog post, and it's with good reason. With planning a church concert, "The GTCC Praise Party feat. national recording artist G.I.," which was a great success, I didn't have much time to devote to social media. After October 24th after the event was over, (Thank God) I was ready to start back to blogging and sharing my news feeds from Google Reader, but there was a huge problem; after disabling my Tweetpo.st account, I wasn't allowed to re-enable it. Bummer!

Tweetpo.st, introduced to me by Damond Nollan, was the best application to use to update your Facebook status via Twitter. Tweetpo.st also automatically posted your tweet that contained a link into your wall instead of a FaceBook status. A link in my Facebook status seemed dirty to me and other people view it as a potential security risk. But for months I was in a limbo, because I could not re-enable my account. It seemed that I had to create a new account, however it seems Tweetpo.st can't accept new users at the moment because of API issues. To this day, according to their twitter account, Tweetpo.st is working on a new update with "cool new features." They've been saying that for more than a month. After a while, my patience runs thin and I can't wait any longer; I must find another solution.

Here I introduce to some, SupaSync. This is my alternative to Tweetpo.st until they get their act together. However, it seems SupaSync does everything Tweetpo.st does and more! Tweetpo.st and SupaSync both respectfully ignore @replies and posts links to walls. But SupaSync alone ignores Retweets (something irrelevant to FaceBook), strips hashtags and via [text] (with user input of course), they skip tweets that have @mentions (with user input), and you can choose your own keywords, i.e. #fb to send an update to Facebook. The only thing that SuperSync doesn't do that Tweetpo.st does is change @mentions to real names, but that's petty.

Right now, SupaSync tops Tweetpo.st, but I look forward to see what the new Tweetpo.st update is going to bring to the table. Try SupaSync, you won't be disappointed.

On Twitter

@SupaSync

@Tweetpo.st

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BlackBerry Messenger 5.0 to be Pushed Out October 7th

In a past post, Stay Away from the BlackBerry Messenger 5.0 Beta, I griped and complained about the leaked release of the newest version of the beloved BlackBerry Messenger. Well, in 2 days, it seems RIM is pushing out the official release of the app. Hopefully every kink and bug that was in the leaked version has been corrected in the new official version.

According to CrackBerry.com, the new release will have these features:

• Enhanced SMS -Allows for a conversational chat-like user experience with a single contact list for the most personal mobile-to-mobile communications
  
  
  
  • Note: BlackBerry® Device Software 5.0 and later is required for the SMS functionality.
  
  
• Avatars - Users can choose a picture from the BlackBerry Smartphone gallery and save it as their personal avatar, which will be seen by their contacts. They can also view other avatars in the contact list and zoom in on the avatars of contacts participating in a conversation by selecting "View participants."


• Large Media File Transfer - Users can send/receive large file transfers up to 6 megabytes for pictures, files and audio.
  
  
  
  • Note: BlackBerry Device Software 5.0 is required to receive large media files.
  
  
• Enhanced Group Functionality - Allows for the ability to update, share & communicate with a subset community.


• Bar-code Identity - A user can add a contact to the BlackBerry Messenger contact list by displaying a 2-dimensional bar code that invitees can capture with their device cameras.


• Reliable Contact Backup and Restore - Contacts are backed-up on a server and do not require the need for BlackBerry® Desktop Manager.

I wonder whether or not this will be a forced OTA download. We'll see what will happen on October 7th. What do you think?

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RIM vs. UberTwitter

If UberTwitter hasn't heard, which I'm sure they have, they should know that the word on the street is that RIM is developing their own Twitter app for BlackBerry devices. What they probably don't know yet... that date is approaching sooner than they think. Try November 16th.

According to BlackBerryRocks, the features in this new app is the same like any other Twitter app for BlackBerry except for a couple of major new features: Address book integration and automatic refreshes. If UberTwitter isn't crapping in their pants they should be. Here are other features mentioned on BBNews.pl:

• Notification of number of new tweets on the home screen with icon, like text messages
  
• Main app opens friends timeline
• Ability to view followers
• Follow/unfollow functions
• Create direct messages, replies and new tweets
• Keyword search and saved results
• Tweet photos directly from camera or memory card
• View photos from other tweets
• View trending topics
• Address book integration

One thing I haven't heard mentioned yet is the integration of the GPS functionality in to RIM's proposed app. So far UberTwitter has the edge over that feature and over a period of many updates, they've enhanced it to users' liking. Where UberTwitter has been lacking is their delay in refreshing tweets according to the user's option. With RIM's enormous resources, they have the ability for users to receive new tweets in real-time.

RIM should also look into implementing Twitter's new Lists feature that should be out any day now. No BlackBerry tweeting application to date has this feature that will put members into groups. As soon as this feature becomes more popular in Twitter, my hopes is that RIM will capitalize on this.

With RIM being the parent company to BlackBerry, they have a major advantage of UberTwitter, which in the end, UberTwitter can say that, "It was fun while it lasted."

What's your take on this latest news?

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Cut Your Time In Half: Use These Shortcuts in Google Reader

There are days that I have a hard time trying to keep up with what's hot in Google Reader. For those that don't know, Google Reader is an excellent tool used to keep your RSS feeds all in one place. Instead of going to individual blogs and sites to read up on updated daily content, they can go right into Google Reader and it's there for you to read.

Sometimes, life can have you so busy that you either forget or don't have anytime to check Google Reader on a daily basis. After a day or two, you return only to find that you have 1000+ plus items to read through. Yikes! Before, I spent countless hours going through my items in Google Reader scrolling down each item with my mouse until I was finished. This is surely time consuming. But then I find out there is hope... something called "shortcuts".

While reading Damond Nollan's blog post entitled, "A Day in the Life of an IT Manager: Staying Connected," he listed key keyboard shortcuts that I could use while navigating through Google Reader.

• J/K - Toggles up or down through the list of items
• Space Bar - Pages down
• S - Star (favorite)
• Shift-S - Shares item
• Shift-D - Shares item with a note

With these shortcuts you can cut your time in half or more, especially for those articles that you're not interested in reading, the J/K keys will help out tremendously. I hope this helps someone.

There are is a full list of shortcuts in Google Reader's Help page, although the ones listed are the most necessary.

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UberTwitter: Your End May Be Near

Today, rumors have been swarming that RIM, BlackBerry's parent company, could be developing their own Twitter client for BlackBerry users. Indeed, this is a smart idea. While BlackBerry has been able to capitalize in the Instant Messaging world and even social media apps like Facebook and Myspace, RIM were missing out on a key demographic that they could've easily targeted earlier: CrackBerry addicts who tweet. If the rumors deem to be true, RIM could loosen the strangle that UberTwitter has on other BlackBerry tweeting clients.

Earlier this summer, UberTwitter was able to gain attention from Orangatame's TwitterBerry with great reviews. While TwitterBerry seemed like a great solution for users to tweet, at the time, they were lacking great features that UberTwitter had plus, it was a memory hog. BlackBerry users quickly jumped ship to UberTwitter, an app that didn't use up as much memory, that had excellent GPS features, notifcation features, followers and following count, intergration with Google Maps, a list of the Trending Topics and on top of all of that, the refresh rate was exceptionally remarkable. Although the app had its tiny flaws that were fixed with many updates, users were willing to ignore them.

Then came the DDOS attack this past summer that had Twitter on its knees. UberTwitter's API issues came where the refresh rate to receive and send out Tweets lagged. Since then, the UberTwitter experience changed and unfortunately for UberTwitter, with possibly no fault of their own (according to them,) they jumped the shark. But still even, UberTwitter happened to be the best temporary solution for BlackBerry users. You were either forced to stick with UberTwitter or just wait until you logged on to the web or desktop client.

Now we wait for the war to begin. Will UberTwitter become diligent and begin to improve on the issues that users complain to them about and fight head on with RIM or will they become less popular like TwitterBerry and let RIM become the premier client for BlackBerry? At any rate, this should make UberTwitter sweat and have the looming concern over their heads that their end could possibly be near.

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Bill Joy and the 10,000 Hour Rule. Could That Be You Too?

Image via Wikipedia

For the past couple of weeks, I have been a reading a book called Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell. In the book, Gladwell discusses how one's success could be measured by their birthdate, their genes, their birthplace etc. In the chapter called The 10,000 Hour Rule, Gladwell explains that in order for one to be excellent at what they do, it requires 10,000 hours of practice. He furthers his thesis by bringing in a gentleman by the name of William Nelson Joy better known as Bill Joy.

So why am I talking about Bill Joy today? Well the story goes like this. Joy, being a 16 year old from Detroit, Michigan decided to further his studies at the University of Michigan in 1971. According to Gladwell, the school had an advanced state of the art, single computer that stood tall in a room that used punch cards for programming (Think the 1970s). Being an excellent mathematician, it wasn't until he went to the school and saw the giant computer that he decided he going to study Computer Science become a computer programmer.

After getting a job with his professor at the time, Bill spent numerous hours programming. When asked how long did it take for him to be good at programming, his response was 10,000 hours. He calculated the times he spent in that room on that big computer and the times he spent on the terminal he had at home while attending Berkley for his masters. There were days he stayed up until 3 o'clock in the morning or falling asleep at his keyboard.

So again you ask, what's so special about Bill Joy? Bill Joy is credited with rewriting UNIX, cofounding Sun Microsystems, Inc., best known for the Java language and helping develop the "software that allows you to access the Internet" (Gladwell, 36). Cool huh? It took him 10,000 hours to become proficient in programming to lead him into a prosperous, yet tedious career.

Today, President Obama presented his "controversial speech" to students across America. In the speech, he encouraged students to study, do well and practice so they can be like the founders of Google, Twitter etc. Bill Joy is a perfect example. His dedication to studying and practice helped him to get to what he is today; think Bill Gates, sorta.

I take this and ask myself, "What must I do to be like Bill Joy?" The answer is simple. Strive for those 10,000 hours. Are you now striving for those 10,000 hours? I would love to hear from you.

1. Gladwell, Malcolm. Outliers. New York: Little,Brown, 2008.

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Facebook Chat: "A MAJOR FAIL!"

I just want to rant for a few. How annoying it is when you're having a great conversation with your Facebook buddy and the message either doesn't go through or your friend is logged off quickly when they're actually logged on. Welcome to the Facebook Chat feature: the worse feature on Facebook to date.

Take Facebook Chat and compare it with Gmail Talk on Gmail. Gmail wins hands down. While browsing emails, you can converse with your email buddies and you don't have to worry about your chat not being processed or your friends being kicked off constantly.

On the other hand you have Facebook chat. It's not guaranteed your friend will get your message and at times it takes maybe up to 3 minutes before your friend receives the message. There are even times when you think Facebook has on size 14 Timbalands because you can be booted from chat and not even know it.

As Facebook continues to find better ways to make their site more interactive, I think they are neglecting their chat feature and they're losing to Gmail Talk. Perhaps, Facebook will poach employees from Gmail and develop a much more better and effective chat feature. Who knows. However, at the rate that they're going, Facebook chat will continue to be a "MAJOR FAIL!!!"

I'm done venting now. What can Facebook do to improve their chat feature? I'd like to hear from you.

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Celebrities: Do they help your tweeting experience?

You know we are very nosy people; that's no question. Even though we, ourselves, would hate the paparazzi harassing us, we're either at the supermarket looking at the latest issue of Us magazine thumbing through trying to see which celebrity is having a baby, or which celebrity is dating whom, or even which celebrity is walking out of the bathroom to take a number 2 (Did you know Paris Hilton even takes a number 2? Wow!). Social media sites, like Twitter, have taken it to another level by letting you know what the celebrity is doing directy, as long as you're following them. Nothing wrong with following with that, but when is celebrity tweeting too much?

From my experience of following celebrities from John McCain to Wyclef Jean to P. Diddy, I realized something: are they helping or hindering my tweeting experience?

The more I read celebrity tweets, I've come to the conclusion that they may hinder my tweeting experience. There are few ones that I follow that I enjoy but there are others that I stay away from.

A key point that helps me:

Follow those celebrities that are informative
Diddy is releasing "Last Train to Paris." The point is, I would like to follow a celebrity that has news about what they're doing professionally in order to keep me abreast. If all they're going to do is rant and rave about ridiculousness, I don't want any part of it; I have my own problems. If you want to know about your favorite author's book release, the Cd release of your favorite musician or to see what fascinating project, follow them. For all of the others, simply leave them be.

Here a few celebrities that I enjoy following:

• Anderson Cooper


• P. Diddy


• Lil' Mo, R&B artist


• Dwele, Neo- Soul Artist


• Eric Roberson, Neo-Soul Artist


• John Forte, musician


• Matt Mullenweg, WordPress


• Maxwell


• John Legend

*Honorable mentions:

• John Mayer. The guy happens to be one of my favorite artists and a natural comedian.

If you notice, my celebrity list is a tad bit smaller than others. Who are great celebrities that help your tweeting experience? I'd love to hear from you.

The Star Jones tweet above represent celebrity tweets that I do not care about.

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Google's gift to the King of Pop

Today is the late Michael Jackson's birthday. What better way for Google to show a perfect tribute to the King of Pop by dedicating their homepage to the legend who forever changed the game in music and entertainment. Jackson who died on June 25, 2009 would've been 51 today.

In the meantime, his primary doctor Conrad Murray is being investigated for manslaughter and the L.A. coroner is ruling Michael's death a homicide.

The dedicated image links to an automatic search page for Michael Jackson.

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The Storm

My wife sent these photos to me while she was running errands. Thought I'd share.
Sent from my BlackBerry Smartphone provided by Alltel

See and download the full gallery on posterous

Posted via email from In my Lifetime

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Unfollow Them! (Twitter Ettiquette)

As I get more into blogging and trying to figure out the advantages of how social media will affect me professionally, I came to a startling realization; I may have to unfollow a lot of my friends (who I'm following). I told myself that I should, "Be cautious to who I follow on Twitter." This sure is easier said than done, however as I further pondered this, some points came to mind that I thought was interesting as to why I should consider cleaning my Following list on Twitter.

1. How are the people that you follow furthering you professionally?

I tend to follow people that are knowledgeable in the areas that interest me. I love technology and I love my guitar. Befriending people that are up on technology and some that play guitar fluently helps me to stay abreast on what's hot. This indeed is a plus for me.


2. Stay away from Negativity

Where should I begin? Tweets that are depressing can sometimes in turn depress you. Stay away from them. Why follow someone that picks fights with other tweeters or will tell you the day is cloudy even though you see sunshine. I recall one Gospel guitarist, tweeting about being in church and saying a worship service sucked. Not amusing at all and it's certainly not encouraging.


3. Trending Topics

Social Media connoisseur Wayne Sutton once said something that rings true. "Partaking in Trending Topics may be fun, but think before you tweet." Sometimes those you follow participate in topics that are entertaining. However many are crass and if you yourself have fun with it, people who are trying to take you seriously, won't. I say this to point out that sometimes your "friends" can drag you into these topics that may get you in trouble in the long run. Be very cautious.


4. You're not following me, Why am I following you?

They have nothing informative to say except they woke up in the morning, eating frosted flakes and watching the BET Awards on Tivo instead of working. Yet they have 30,000 followers and following merely 500 people. (Most of their follows are celebs and they're most likely not following them back.) This certainly is not helping you. Unfollow them!


5. Celebrities are just like you

The only difference is that they have lots of money and are very popular. That's all they have. Following them won't further your networking, especially if they're not there to help you get you to where you need to be.

I challenge those that are looking for Twitter to help them further them in their prospective careers to ask themselves these questions. I'm curious to know any more factors that should be looked at when following and unfollowing people. Do you know any? I'd love to hear from you.

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Will users pay for an Ad-Free ÜberTwitter?

Last week, the famed Twitter client for BlackBerrys, ÜberTwitter, rolled out its latest update to the liking and dismay of BlackBerry and Twitter users alike. While an update was definitely needed, ÜberTwitter, faced much scrutiny for rolling out their ads feature with their Beta-4 release. While this shouldn't have came as a surprise, the TwitterBerry crusher never explained how they would roll out the ads and "bam" just like that, they showed up. However, after many complaints, ÜberTwitter heard the call and got rid of the annoying ads, that showed up at the of the tweet timeline.

Today, ÜberTwitter releases this announcement:

While the idea may be understandable, it may not be a smart one? Since Twitter's DDOS a couple of weeks, ÜberTwitter has been encountering many API issues with no fault of their own. Tweets ingoing and outgoing have been delayed despite user settings. Not to mention, there are still a few bugs that the developers have to fix before they consider a paid option.

My 2 cents to ÜberTwitter
Let's not jump the gun too soon yet. You may be jumping the shark here and I would advice you to hold off a while before you make a decision that may cost you down the line.

What are your thoughts? Would you pay money for an Ads Free ÜberTwitter, would you remain loyal to ÜberTwitter and go with the Ads, or will you find another client? I would love to hear from you.

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The C3 Church: Awesome Place of Worship

My friend and I used to always argue about church. Every time I invited him to come and worship at my church he constantly refused. I recall us arguing for hours and hours about why he didn't attend church and why I thought he needed to. It finally got to a point where we would "agreed to disagree." It wasn't that he wasn't a Christian, that he was, but I always wondered why he would rather sit at home, turn on the TV and send his tithes without the real fellowship. It wasn't until he moved away and he began to tweet more, he would start attending a church that he felt welcomed and obligated to join some kind of ministry.

After repeated tweets about this church my friend joined, I kept asking to myself, "What church made him get his tail out of bed, out of the house and into a sanctuary of worship." Today, I finally got that answer: The C3 Church.

The C3 Church, or Connecting Communities to Christ Church, truly lives up to its name. Breaking the boundaries of traditional worship, this church with their friendly and loving members believe in a true cause: Sending souls to Christ, and it shows. When my wife and I walked in for the 11:30 service (they also have a 9:30 service), we automatically felt welcomed. Funny thing is we felt so overdressed. To me when you say casual wear, I think of jeans, a nice button up and some nice shoes. This church is truly a come as you are church. People with shorts, sandals and t-shirts dominate the membership of this House of Worship.

Smiling faces and gestures of warmth, the C3 Church make it their priority to make you feel as comfortable as possible. The nursery that they run is safe and secure. The awesome bookstore is there for your needs. But what got me the most is the C3 café with, get this a Starbucks franchise!! On top of that, you are more than welcome to drink your coffee and pastry in the sanctuary as you worship and hear the word of God. That is way too cool to me.

Also, Mega churches always seem to have a certain stereotype about them. Primary example: the pastor doesn't have the time to fellowship with his members. Not so with this church. Matt Fry, the pastor, took the time to meet with guests by the beautiful water fountain outside of the church and seems to be easily accessible. Pastor Matt's delivery of the Word is nothing but gospel truth. Feeding your spirit with the truth, he backs them up with Scripture. It is no wonder that they were able to grow from a small congregation at an Elementary school to over 2,000 members at the state of the art facility they have today.

By accident, I forgot to bring my Bible before I left town. At C3 church, they help you out by providing the scriptures that Pastor Matt is deriving his message from (Don't make this a habit though, if you have a Bible, I would advise you to bring it *winks*). Also with their awesome Technical team, you're able to follow along with Praise & Worship, because the words are right there on the screen.

Whenever you're in Clayton, NC through a Sunday, check out the C3 Church. I promise, you will be amazed at their hospitality and of their mission to worship Christ.

Pastor Matt said during his sermon today, "We are a Rock & Roll church..." I say to him and the rest of the members at C3 Church, "KEEP ROCKIN' FOR CHRIST! And I will be back!"

On the web
C3 Church
Matt Fry

On Twitter
@C3_Church
@mattfry

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Hello. I'm a Saggitarius and I Tweet (Why Twitter)

Image by Matt Hamm via Flickr

In June of this year, I had a pleasure of attending Word Camp 2009 in Raleigh, NC. Being fairly new to Twitter at the time, I was amazed at the amount of people who I encountered that actually tweets. As I approached people at the convention I introduced myself with general conversation and then asked, "Do you tweet?" As I left the convention, I left with Twitter handles like phone numbers (Fellas try asking a potential date for her Twitter handle in lieu of her number. I kid, I kid).

I tell that story to bring an importance of tweeting and networking. While many non-tweeters call people that do tweet "tweetaholics," they can't seem to grasp the potential that using Twitter may have.

Everyone is not on Twitter, but EVERYONE is on Twitter
Minu what are you talking about? Allow me to explain: You may not be on Twitter, but everyone else may be. Yes, you don't want to go with the "status quo," but in this case it may be behoove you to do so. From Pastors to Entertainers to Professors to even Neo-Soul singer's Dwele's pet puggle Rockstar, everyone is on Twitter. It's interesting to read how these people (or animals) spend their time daily.

Tweeting is a major business booster
Yeah, you can have a website. You can do FaceBook. You can even attempt to use Myspace, though I wouldn't advise you to. But you'd be surprised at the amount of traffic your business could encounter if you tweeted. Everyday, people are looking for the who's who on Twitter. What if you have a great restaurant and someone (like me) tweets on how great it is. Someone is going to want to go on your Twitter page to see what you're all about and any key announcements that you may have. With people using mobile apps to tweet these days, they can use their device to read what's going on with your business if their not close to a computer.

Man!!! I didn't know Larry King had another baby!!!
You would've easily heard about this if you tweeted. Either Larry King would've announced it himself, or you'd read about it in the Trending Topics section. Twitter is known for the "what's hot, what's not." You want to know what's people are saying about a TV show you're watching, or what's the big deal with Google Voice? Try twitter and you'll easily get your answer.

Personally, I use Twitter for the sole purpose of networking, but it's always cool to goof off every once in a while. Especially now that I have a blog, it's a great tool to announce a new post so folks can go and quickly and deeply read what else is on my mind. Go on meet new people and don't be scared to ask for their twitter handle, trust me, they'd want to keep up with you if they don't have the time to pick up the phone to call you.

Do you or do you not Tweet? What do you think about it? I would love to hear from you.

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Will Facebook become the Microsoft of Social Media?

The big news yesterday, taking the tech world by storm, "Facebook Acquires FriendFeed." This news totally trumped the previous technology news when it was announced that bit.ly was interested in acquiring tr.im who were ending their operation of shortening URLs. As Facebook becomes ahead of the Social Media game, nearly killing defeated MySpace in battle and taking FriendFeed's hand in friendship, or marriage for that matter, one has to ask: will Facebook continue to dominate the social media world?

I was introduced to FriendFeed just a few months ago and I admit, I wasn't comprehending the full capabilities of the site. It wasn't until recently that I got chance to use the site and get ultra excited about its effectiveness. See with FriendFeed, or FF, you stay connected with several media outlets and all of your feeds can be embedded into your profile. With FF, I was able to feed my various networks without missing a beat. Everyone of course has their networks set up differently. With mine, I was able to update FF via Youtube, Google Reader, Del.i.cious, and Twitter. With my permissions, FF would update my Google Talk status as well as Twitter and then when the feed hits my Twitter Status, Tweetpo.st (a great tool!) would then in turn post my FF feed to my Facebook. Are you still with me? I hope so.

With this latest acquisition, the game has definitely changed.

Am I upset about this? I can't give you a definite answer. I am definitely concerned about a potential Facebook monopoly. Mind you, unless they have already, Facebook hasn't announced their future plans for FriendFeed. We're not sure whether it will continue to run as a stand alone site or merge with FaceBook's site. I am sincerely hoping though that FaceBook would begin the works of allowing FriendFeed to have a mobile app, preferrably for BlackBerry (in the event that it's stand alone site).

The news is indeed surprising and I doubt anyone saw this coming; I know I didn't. But this indeed gives the rest of the Social World something to be worried about. Facebook has the resources and the power to be a force to be reckoned with. According to reports

What are your thoughts on this latest news? I'd love to hear from you.

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To be or not to be (A Jack of All Trades); that is the Question.

Ever since I was a young lad I wanted to be an astronaut. No a doctor. No a lawyer. No an entertainer. I sounded confused huh? It wasn't until I got ready to go into college was when I decided that I wanted to pursue a career in the music business. When I got there, I studied voice and was already a drummer, but then I wanted to be an actor. So I got heavily involved into plays. Then my favorite professor Billy C. Hines, director of my university choir, said something to me that stuck and I'm sure stuck with many other students that crossed his path: "You have to focus on just one thing and do it exceptionally well in order for you to succeed." What?!? What does that mean?!?

By 2003 I picked up the guitar as my primary instrument while partially abandoning voice and fully abandoning the drums.

As I got further into my studies, I then realized that I no longer wanted to study about the music business as me along with my fellow constituents felt that we had no support from our own faculty to make it in the business. So then I abandoned studying the music business, but held on to the guitar, but had no options for a career. It wasn't until a good friend introduced to me into his profession of Technology, primarily web design and development. As I continued to grow in the field (I'm still learning), this was something that I felt that I could do and then I became interested in Technology all together.

Now married, a guitarist, a web designer/developer, a future business owner, a future producer, a future piano player, a future concert organizer, who wants to start playing the drums again, who wants to go back to being in plays, become a database administrator full time, own an incorporated business and... *whew* the list goes on. It seems I paid no attention to Professor Hines' words of wisdom.

As I meet people daily, I find that there are those just like me. Perhaps my list is not as extensive as theirs, but like me they find themselves torn between doing just one thing and fulfilling their dreams of doing everything and as the intelligent mouse once said, "Taking over the world."

Are you in this same exact predicament? Are you a Jack-of-all-trades? Seems like the guy above is juggling with just one.

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Myspace claims responsibilty for Twitter and Facebook DDOS attack

Early yesterday afternoon, Twitter had issues with connectivity. Twitter members can attest that they were going bonkers when service was down for 2 hours. 2 hours? You're not asleep and you can't send a tweet for 2 hours? Either we're serious addicts or we're just serious addicts. It wasn't until the infamous Mashable blog announced that Twitter and Facebook were under heavy attack by the dreaded DDOS.

So what the heck is a DDOS attack? Well according to Wikipedia, "A denial-of-service attack (DoS attack) or distributed denial-of-service attack (DDoS attack) is an attempt to make a computer resource unavailable to its intended users." In lamens terms, when a site receives a DDOS attack, you, the web surfer, can't surf the attacked site. Pretty ironic seeing that around the same week, we hear reports that Myspace's popularity has dwindled and that their cutting about 30% of its workforce. Bummer. So what better way to stay in the race by stealing the traffic from Twitter and Facebook and give users an alternative. Makes sense right? Let's be honest, of course Myspace wouldn't really take responsibility for the attack, but wouldn't it be funny if disgruntled Myspace employees, including Tom himself, attacked the "pop sites" to make their employment seem useful?

Let's go a little deeper. I'm sure like TV shows, sites at times jump the shark and then they are considered obsolete and unpopular. What was Myspace's reason? Was it when they were sold to News Corp for $327 million? The same parent company to conservative news channel Fox News. Maybe people were just annoyed by Tom; I know I was.

Whatever the case may be, Myspace as reckoning force is over. Users are now finding other ways to connect to people rather than spend time building Myspace pages for people to leave comments. With Twitter, FriendFeed, Facebook and even Youtube (MySpace's video nemisis) becoming more interactive, Myspace honestly doesn't stand a chance of survival.

In conclusion, applications like TweetDeck, UberTwitter and URL shortner bit.ly may be having API issues with Twitter since the attack, and Twitter itself is staggering like a boxer that gets up at the 9th count before being K.O.'ed. But unless News Corp. CEO Rupert Murdoch decides to liquidate his asset and sell Myspace to a dominating web powerhouse like Google, these dominant social media outlets will continue to be popular; or will they soon to jump the shark too? Only time will tell...

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Stay away from the BlackBerry Messenger 5.0 Beta

RIM (Research In Motion, LTD.) needs to be proactive and fire the person that "leaked" their product that's still in development. Never have I seen so many BlackBerry fanatics excite themselves by downloading the latest "leak" that hit the OTA (I'm also speaking about myself). But with the issues that I have seen and read about, this app, if it was a leak at all, has more issues than Orangatame's TwitterBerry. The fact that in the applications list the alias for the program is "BBM 5.0" is a bit suspect, but I digress. There are some awesome features that BBM 5.0 has that will put them ahead of the game, but a very sincere warning for you: STAY AWAY FROM BLACKBERRY MESSENGER 5.0 (BETA)!

When I first ran across BlackBerry Messenger (4.5) for the first time, I fell in love with it's professional features. Very simple and easy to use, I wanted everyone, that I knew that possessed a BlackBerry, to give me their PIN so I can stay in contact with them via Messenger. Yes, the version probably needed some upgrading, but I would've been content with keeping it the same, with it's simple layout. (Compare with the pic above.) The new version, 5.0 has a totally different look to it; perhaps to appeal more to people who own the BlackBerry Storm or even the newly released Tour that are both only available to Verizon customers. Not a very bad look, but maybe I'm just old fashioned.

While the features on the proposed release are astonishing, there are a lot of issues and risks that you may go through messing with this leaked beta release.

The Positives

• You can add contacts by scanning your friend's Barcode with your device.
• You're able to Broadcast a message to multiple contacts.
• Avatars are now enabled
• Backing up your contact list is now made possible by saving them on to your media card. So, if you switch devices or have to wipe it clean, you wouldn't have to worry about re-adding all of your messenger contacts
  
• Friends can have access to your GPS location
• Stored on your Media Card, chat history can be accessed.

The Negatives

• Although it gives you the option to enable it, when Pinged, the device doesn't vibrate
• The smileys do not look at all 3 Dimensional as it did in the previous release. Pretty cheesy.
• Messages are not delivered at times or there is a long delay. Usually this is solved by restarting your device by battery pull or LShift+RShift+Del. This gets rather annoying.
• Careful, it was brought to my attention that some of your messages will be sent to someone else rather than your intended recipient
• It has the tendency of showing some friends as "unreachable" but they really aren't

(More will be added later)

When RIM finishes with his software, it will have the potential of beating the leading mobile versions of Yahoo and Google Talk into being a top notch mobile messenger. But who knows when they'll be done developing, testing and fixing bugs. If you're stuck with this app like me, the only way to restore the previous version is to reinstall your OS on your device. For those that are thinking about installing the app, don't risk it. The bugs are way too tremendous and you'll be crying with agonizing pain. Maybe I was a bit too harsh in calling for the termination of the RIM employed App Leaker, however, fix the bugs!

There are all sorts of snapshots of this app on the web. Check out BlackBerryRocks for examples.

Ciao...

P.S. What do you think about this app? Love it? Hate it? I would love to hear from you.

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Introduction: Mbote na Bino (Hello Everyone)

I'm surprised I'm actually blogging; never thought I would. But I'm here so hello to everyone. After taking nearly a week to finally finding the right template and to do some tweaking I was wondering what my first post would be about. So I guess what I should really consider doing is to introduce myself to my readers. That would be the smart thing to do right?

Who I am:
My name is Minu. I'm a musician in his mid-20s that loves technology. I have a lovely wife with no kids and I work at Elizabeth City State University as a Student HelpDesk operator. I'm also an aspiring web developer who hopes to open his own business in the future called Obsidian Web Services. If you see me with no BlackBerry, then there's an issue; I frickin' love my BlackBerry. :-) I have 2 younger brothers and I'm the son of Congolese immigrants. I guess you can say I'm an authentic African-American. My favorite pastime is playing my Fender Stratocaster and yes, I play for church. I love all sorts of music, but I prefer gospel, jazz, neo-soul and rumba. To sum it all up, I'm just an average guy!

About this blog:
I named this blog "Mokili ya Minu" or "The World of Minu" (in the Lingala language) because my world involves many different things. You will be reading about mostly generally topics but mainly topics of my interests. I'm very excited about this blog because I will be having guest bloggers on here from time to time for your enjoyment and also awareness. I hope that you will find this read very enjoyable and I also like constructive critism, so if there's something that I can do to make this blog more interesting, by all means, enlighten me: There are no bad ideas. ;-)

To sum it all up, Welcome to My World. Enjoy and I look forward to hearing from all of you.

*ignore the corny picture of me. lol*

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