Why You Should Blog

Chad Levitt recently wrote a post about the importance of having a blog. Throughout the semester it has been time consuming to blog on a weekly basis, and I will be the first to admit that I have simply forgotten a few times. Mainly because I had too much on my plate from my other classes and my internship. After reading the article, I feel guilty for not blogging on a regular basis.

Here is a list as to why blogging is important to building your personal brand:

1. Search engines love blogs
2. Blogs are link sticky
3. You are creating an enduring asset you own
4. Increase your opportunities to get found
5. It's all about eyeballs

My personal learning project this semester covered personal branding. As a senior who is graduating in two weeks and has yet to figure out where I will be heading after graduation, it is important that I build a brand for myself. One of my goals for my PLP was to have my website appear on the first page of search results. I was successful in making it the first result, but my blog isn't even on the first page. Instead, the first page results include my website, facebook page, linked in, and then blog comments from others in my class. Had I have spent more time updating my blog, it would pop up on the first page of results.

Levitt's fourth reason as to why one should blog was important to me.

Think of every one of your blog posts as a lottery ticket; the more lottery tickets you have the more opportunities you have to win. Winning the lottery can mean getting the job you want, making more money, or just being seen as a thought leader in your space. Whatever your lottery is, each blog post you own is another chance at winning your lottery.

Here's to hoping my blog holds the winning ticket to a career after graudation.

The Completion of MikkaylaGuillett.com

After months of trying different layouts, site builders, and fonts my website is finally complete. My Social Media for Public Relations class allowed us to pick a semester long project of our choice. I thought it would be interesting to learn about Personal Branding. Branding expert Dan Schawbel defines personal branding as "how we market ourselves to others." It was important to me to choose a topic that would be relevant after graduation. What better way than a website that will help me market myself to potential employers.

My website is not flashy and should not be compared to those of famous people who have disposable funds to pay people to build their websites. Instead, it is simple but gets my message across. It contains an abundance of information about myself that will help employers learn more about me than what is simply written on my resume. Instead the words written on my resume transform in to samples of my work that are displayed under my portfolio page. If you have time, I recommend taking a few minutes out of your day to check out my website. I am open to suggestions and would love to hear your feedback.

Problems with creating Mikkayla Guillett.com

Though JustHost provides a free website builder, I still ran in to several problems along the way. For starters uploading my resume took a long time. All the words that were supposed to be bold had a different colored background. After messing with the code for 20 minutes I decided not to use bold text, and instead opted for italics.

Another problem I came across was locating an appropriate picture. I searched through the 400 + pictures on my computer and I did not find any. Something was wrong with every picture whether it was because someone else was in the picture or because I was not wearing business attire. In the end I decided to use a photo from my senior portraits.

Uploading my portfolio also gave me problems. Luckily I saved all my hard copies of papers so that was helfpul after my laptop was stolen. I was unable to locate hard copies of my video clips.

The process was very time consuming, but in the end very worth it. I believe it was very beneficial to me to create a website. Personal websites are becoming a necessity in order to stand out. It allows potential employers to view your work without requesting it via email. With companies having the opportunity to choose between someone straight out of college or a person with 10+ years of experience, it is important to show them you have what it takes to get the job done.

Baseball on the Hilltop

In honor of St. Edward's 125th Anniversary, I thought it would be fitting to cover a major component of Topper Athletics. Since my arrival on the Hilltop, the baseball team has been Heartland Conference Champions twice. During those two seasons, they have posted 40+ win seasons. The arrival of Head Coach Rob Penders has helped the Toppers improve their record. Prior to coaching for SEU, Penders was the first-base coach for the University of Texas Longhorns.

With St. Edward's being such a small school compared to it's neighbor located a few miles north (UT for those of you who are geographically challenged) the game day atmosphere is drastically different from Divison I participants. For starters baseball games are free and fans are allowed to sit where they please. This includes putting your chairs up against the fence behind home plate, watching from picnic tables, or on the grassy bleachers. Those who choose to enjoy a hot dog or a bag of sunflower seeds will be pleased to know that the concession stand does not have an item over $5. A drastic difference from the concession stands at UFCU Disch-Falk Field, where a drink and a dog can easily cost $10.

On Good Friday St. Edward's hosted St. Mary's for a double-header. At the end of the day both teams collected a win. The Legand of Taylor Johnson captures the Hilltoppers come back against Heartland Conference rivals St. Mary's Rattlers.

Social Media Press Releases

Tom Foremski's widely talked about social media press has become a hot topic in the past week among twitter as well as our class. His release has helped set the foundation for press releases in a web 2.0 world.

According to Foremski," press releases are nearly useless." As an intern who sends out as well as receives a lot of basketball related releases, the text in a release is often overwhelming. It is easy to see why many releases often go unread and end up in one's trash.

Foremski's proposal to deconstruct the press release to make it user friendly is one of those hey why didn't I think of that products. By providing different sections of the release, it is likely that all of the information will be taken in by the reader. This format also allows for valid information to be correctly phrased in newspapers, magazines, and blogs. Writers will be able to spend less time looking for information on the internet.

When readers don't understand something in a release they do one of two things: continue to read the release in hopes of figuring it out or they search what ti is. It's likely to be the first choice because people are lazy.

I think it might take some getting used to, but with time it could very well become the norm in the PR world. Just like every new product, the social media press release is bound to change a few times before people are completely satisfied. What are your thoughts on the social media press release?

Video Editing

As the semester progresses and one project turns into another, it has become helpful to find websites that are user-friendly for these projects. Our latest project, a web video highlighting the 125th Anniversary of St. Edward's, requires shooting video and then editing it down to a three minute video. Previous to this project I had become familiar with Final Cut Pro and iMovie, however since my Macbook was stolen in October, editing footage would be difficult on my PC. Sure the computer labs on campus have both programs, but as a senior down the home stretch of my last semester trying to juggle school, an internship, and work, the last thing I want to do is spend several hours in a computer lab. Fortunately for me my professor provided a list of cloud applications that would allow us to edit footage regardless of the type of computer we were working on. The site that seems to be the most helpful for this project is JayCut. JayCut's layout is somewhere between iMovie and Final Cut Pro. The site allows users to upload, edit, and share video footage anywhere in the world. Check back next week for the final product.

Get Snookied

After reading about memes that have generated negative publicity for corporations, I decided to check out what kind of memes are currently circulating the internet. Thanks to the greatness of Google, I was able to locate a website that documents memes and other interesting phenomena that has popped up on the internet relatively quickly. While browsing through the site, I stumbled across SnookieShop. According to Know Your Meme

"Snookieshop is a single topic blog featuring a series of photoshopped exploitables based on a cutout image of Nicole "Snooki" Polizzi, a cast member from MTV's reality series Jersey Shore. In the span of two weeks in February 2010, the Snookieshop phenomenon has spawned nearly 1000 user-contributed images, all of which have been self-archieved by the blog."

Jersey Shore has become a guilty pleasure of mine, so of course I had to check out Snookieshop. After spending close to 30 minutes on the blog, I was able to come across numerous images that literally made me laugh out loud. If you need to kill some time I highly recommend you check out the blog or create your own Snookieshop photo.

The dirty secret about the iPod that's no longer a secret

In Citizen Marketers the authors discuss the success of memes and how they have helped get people's frustrations out into cyber space. McConnell and Huba define a meme as. "a cultural transmitter that distinguishes an idea from the billions of others that float in the primordial soup of daily human existence." A better definition is given by Richard Dawkins, the creater of the term, "Just as genes propagate themselves in the gene pool by leaping from body to body via sperms or eggs, so memes propagate themselves in the meme pool by leaping from brain to brain via a process, which, in the broad sense, can be called imitation." The book discusses Apple's "iPod's Dirty Secret" which grew after Apple told Casey Neistat that it would cost him $255 plus a mail-in fee to replace the battery on his 18-month old ipod.

I remember this story from when it first broke in 2002. I was begging my mother for an ipod for Christmas, however she refused to spend that kind of money on a gadget that may not last longer than a year-and-a-half. Surprisingly it's a fond memory of my middle-school years. We were walking my dog around the neighborhood and I remember telling her I wanted an ipod so that I could listen to music while walking the dog or riding the bus to school without having to transport a cd player around with. She firmly told me no because she had read a story in the Washington Post about how ipod's were just expensive gadgets that became garbage after the battery died. After pouting to my father about how my mother refused to buy me the latest must have, he finally bought me an mp3 player. Unfortunately for me it was a Nike mp3 player that only held 30 songs at a time.

Since then, I have gone through three ipods (and will be purchasing my fourth in the next two weeks) because of battery related problems/ screen cracking. All three of my ipods have obtained cracked screens that slowly spread to where I am unable to view what songs I am listening to. Has anyone else had problems with their ipod's breaking on them and then getting suckered in to buying a new one?

The Roy Mac and James Show

In this episode of the Roy Mac and James show we interview Mike Sullivan, a key figure to the success of the St. Edward’s Theatre Program. Sullivan explains how he ended up on the Hilltop, the opening of Mary Moody Northen Theatre, and gives advice to aspiring performers.

With the Theater Arts program being as popular as it is at St. Edward's University, we decided to take a closer look as to how it all began.

Updating MikkaylaGuillett.com

While most students were busy working on their tans and taking inebriated pictures to post on Facebook during Spring Break, I was too busy dealing with a reality shock. What seemed like it would never come, is now around the corner... yes I'm talking about graduation.

Though I was able to enjoy a weekend get away that resulted in me getting engaged and a possible post graduation job with the Dallas Mavericks, I spent my spring break job hunting and updating my website. My first step actually occurred right before spring break. I made an appointment with Career Services on campus to update my resume. Prior to my appointment I was under the impression that my resume was fairly decent, however that was not the exact case. After my hour long meeting my resume was well laid out so that it would be appealing to the reader and would stand out over my peers' resumes.

I was also able to update my website, in hopes of helping land a job. Unfortunately my website is still in the works. I am still without a heads shot and without an online portfolio. I was able to add a contact box, which I found online for free. The addition of the contact box makes my website look more professional. It is also more user friendly than having to cut and past my email address in to an email.

Another step in the right direction was cleaning up my Facebook account. The encouragement came from Gayle Howard, a master resume writer and personal branding strategist. After spending 30 minutes cleaning up my Facebook I untagged over 75 pictures that I would not want future employers to see.

For those who are graduating in May and are job hunting, I suggest you follow these experts on twitter.

• @DanSchawbel
• @GayleHoward
• @WilliamArruda

 They offer free advice and are very tweet happy.

The Roy Mac and James Show

In this episode of the Roy Mac and James show we interview Mike Sullivan, a key figure to the success of the St. Edward’s Theatre Arts Program. Sullivan explains how he ended up on the Hilltop, the opening of Mary Moody Northen Theatre, and gives advice to aspiring performers.

This year St. Edward's University is celebrating their 125 anniversary, and in honor of the celebration, the show decided to dedicate an episode to the Theatre Program.

A run down of the show:
:20 Background Information
1:00 Beginning of Mike Sullivans interview
1:40 How Sullivan ended up on the Hilltop
3:00 Who helped start the theatre program
3:45 Arena theatre experience
4:35 First show at St. Edward's featuring William Shatner
6:00 Favorite shows on campus
7:15 Challenges with the shows
9:00 Closing of the show

April 3, 2010... A Day to Avoid Shopping Centers Containing an Apple Store

For those who are counting down the days until it's release (28 if you cared) the news from Apple on Friday helped kick off their weekend on a high note. Antsy buyers will be able to pre-order the 9.7-inch gadget next Friday (March 12). Prices start at $499 for a 16 GB Wi-Fi iPad and go up to $820 for a 64 GB Wi-Fi +3G iPad. Lets not forget to add the $29.99 (plus taxes) monthly plan for 3G coverage from AT&T.

Though the commercials make the iPad look like a necessity, in all honesty a lot of people could get away without purchasing one. The commercial claims that the iPad provides "the best web surfing experience, the best email experience, the best photo and movie watching experience. It's going to change the way we do things every day." I highly doubt any of this is true. Sure with its sleek design it looks as hot as Gerard Butler surrendering in Law Abiding Citizen, but what are the chances that it provides the best experiences? People who are unfamiliar with touch screens will have to get used to it in order to email others. How time consuming and frustrating for those who are not used to a touch screen.

As a Mac owner I understand the amazingness of the company, but do you really need to carry around an iPhone to make calls, a macbook to get work done, an iPod for your tunes, and now an iPad for the best experience possible? Anyone remember what a pain the first generation iPods were, or how many problems the first generation iPhones had? Over the years Apple has made tremendous changes to the iPod, making them cheaper, more user friendly, and easier to carry around.

So next Friday I will be doing more important things (like starting my last college spring break) while all the techies are pre-ordering their iPads from the Apple website. I will make a note about the iPad release on April 3, but only so that I remember to avoid the Domain on that day so that I can avoid the crowds. For those who are interested in purchasing an iPad I ask that you please be patient and at least wait a few months before making the big purchase. As with all of their products, the iPad price tag will likely go down shortly after its big release. Wouldn't you feel better about your safe saving a little extra cash?

Popular Videos on YouTube Often One hit wonders

In Fang Wu and Bernardo Huberman's A Persistence Paradox YouTube is analyzed to see if individual who upload videos on a regular basis gain more views than people who upload videos sparingly. Users who produced videos more frequently produced a better quality over time, but they did not always gain more views for their hard work. It's not a shock to me because it seems as if all the popular videos are one hit wonders on the video sharing website. Top videos on the site include Charlie bit my finger-again!, Evolution of Dance, and Achmed the Dead Terrorist.

With the exception of artists who have uploaded multiple music videos, I don't see anyone gaining popularity as their series of videos continues. Lady Gaga for example became popular almost over night and is constantly releasing hit singles, often only a few weeks after the hit before. As a result of her popularity, her fans tune in to check out her latest video as well as previous videos that they enjoy. Beyonce is also an example of an artist gaining additional views as more videos are posted. One of her most popular videos Single Ladies came several videos after her first solo hit Work It.

With over 100 million views a day users are constantly trying to out do each other in hopes of gaining the most views. Unfortunately for the young Beyonce fan that has just learned the Single Ladies dance, few strangers will watch her video because hers is just another in a stack of hundreds. That stack lists the most popular (often the first ones made) first and then descends down to the least popular. Keep trying little girl... maybe one day your dream of having one of the most viewed videos on YouTube will happen after you learn some other cool dance.

Podcasting Tips

In the SXSW Podcasting Tips podcast that was posted, several key points were made about having a successful podcast. The podcast features Steve Mack and Jose Castillo who are responsible for The Lame Podcast. Both of them have a large amount of experience in podcasting as well as digital media. According to them the number one tip for making your podcast listable is to know your audience. Of course this seems like a simple step, but it's often over looked. For instance, if you're making a sports podcast there is no need to mention gas prices, the weather, or any other topic that does not pertain to the sport that is being mentioned. In order to connect with your audience it is important that a blog is linked to your podcast, so that people can leave comments about the show. Mack and Castillo believe it is vital to connect with your audience so that you're not lame.

After checking out their website I liked their motivation for the site

Don’t be lame.

Simple words… but something we live by. We have all been involved in lame projects but we want to fight the urge to be mediocre. Our collective knowledge of what to do (and a lot of what not to do) is something we want to share with you. So if you are building a podcast, resist the urge to be boring. Check out our stories and learn from our lameness (and others).

Trust your gut, you know when something is lame - don’t do it!

If more people listened to their gut about something being lame when it came to podcasting I might actually listen to podcasts on a regular basis. I have attempted to listen to podcasts in the past and I have yet to listen to the same podcast more than twice. They have either been too long, off topic, or just plain bad. There's nothing more irritating than listening to someone ramble about nothing with constant umm's and hmm's throughout the podcast.

Creation of MikkaylaGuillett.com

When deciding what site to buy my domain from as well as to host my website, I was a bit overwhelmed. The first company that came to mind was GoDaddy.com. Sure the commercials are cheesy and racy, but obviously the company has done a good job with the campaign if Go Daddy comes to mind when buying a website. Go Daddy was the first site I checked out, but after itemizing everything I need (domain, host, 6 + pages, a site builder, etc.) it became clear that Go Daddy was not made for me.

So then I googled top 10 web hosts and several top 10 lists appeared.This list was the most helpful. From there I was able to compare several hosts with Just Host being the winner. Just Host seemed to be the most budget friendly for what I needed. For $41.23 I was able to get my website up and running for a full year. Several sites advertised $3.50/month, however to get that rate you had to pay for 2-3 years of service at once, resulting in a large amount. This is not the case with Just Host. With a one-time payment I received account setup, instant activation, domain registration, $250 in marketing credits for Google/ Yahoo, as well as a free site builder. Go Daddy on the other hand wanted to charge per month for the site builder depending on how many pages I wanted to have on my website.

I suggest that once you decide who to host your site with to attempt to exit out of the browser, because most web host sites will offer a coupon to stay and do business with them. Just Host received my business after a 50% off coupon. Other sites offered to waive sign up fees, 20% off, or a free domain for life.

Free Pancakes

The annual national pancake day at IHOP received extra buzz this year, due to the company's ability to spread the word using social media. This year the event was pushed back a week, but that did not stop the masses from venturing out for a free short stack. The International House of Pancakes offered three of their delicious buttermilk pancakes and encouraged diners to donate to The Children's Miracle Network. The pancake house hopes to raise $1.75 million this year to reach their $5 million goal in five years since the first annual pancake day.

Word spread through ihoppancakeday.com as well as Twitter, Myspace, and Facebook. Multiple groups and events were created for the fundraiser on Facebook, all with the same memo... come get some free pancakes while giving back to your community.

One invite that I personally received on Facebook had invited over 160,000 people with over 38,000 choosing to attend. I'm no mathematician but if everyone that attends the event donates $2-$3 the amount of money raised could make a huge difference.

In the past seven minutes that I have been writing this post, over 2450 tweets mentioned IHOP.

Several of the tweets are the same

It's National Pancake Day! Head over to IHOP and get your free short stack (and contribute to Children's Miracle Network via donation).

The company in my opinion, was able to create a large amount of publicity without spending a large amount of money on advertising. Through the help of citizen marketers the message was delivered to people all across the country.

For those of you who are interested in getting a free short stack, some IHOPs will be offering free short stacks until 10 p.m. even though the national campaign was only supposed to run from 7 a.m. to 10 a.m.

Upset Facebookers Vent on Twitter

This past weekend while most of us were enjoying the lovely weather in Austin, a number of Facebook users were experiencing issues Saturday. Users that were effected were unable to login, upload pictures, and experienced slow connections. The United States experienced the most problems, but other countries including the United Kingdom, Thailand, and Mexico had difficulties with the site.

Those that were upset took out their frustration on Twitter.

One upset user wrote “I mean, come on! Don’t waste my time-wasting time!”

Another later in the day tweeted "Facebook account is disabled for reasons not explained to me. :( ."

As a result, upset users were successful in creating a twitter storm for the social media site. Facebook responded to the complaints by issuing a tweet

Some people are having trouble accessing Facebook and site features because of an isolated server issue. We are working to fix this ASAP.12:35 PM Feb 20th from web

Fortunately for myself, I was not one of these people that experienced problems, but I did notice Facebook as a trending topic on my home page.
Several media sites have reported that there were isolated server problems, which led to only a small percentage of users experiencing problems. With close to 400 million users, a small percentage is still a large number of upset facebookers.
By Saturday afternoon the problem was fixed and Facebook users rejoiced everywhere, because their favorite time-wasting website was glitch free.

Web 2.0

This week's reading of Citizen Marketers covered the evolution of the Internet. Since it was first developed, the internet has transformed in many ways. The number of users has grown exponentially, especially since the 1990's. The internet has evolved from boring static pages to pages that are updated often and are more appealing to the eyes. This change has been referred to as Web 2.0. McConnell and Huba define Web 2.0 as, "creating collaborative Web experiences when information is shared multilaterally... Web 2.0 is a multiple-way communication between Web-site owner and visitor, and visitors with other visitors" (57). Web 2.0 has become very user friendly and has led to an abundance of information being dispersed over the World Wide Web.

Web 2.0 and XML have led to the creation of Mashups. Mashups occur when two or more data sources are combined. Yelp and City Search are two popular mashups that operate on user content. Both websites provide a map and reader reviews for whatever company someone searches for. If someone searches for a spa on Yelp, the site provides them with the spa they searched as well as other spas located near that spa. Yelp has helped successful companies generate business as a result of positive reviews. The user reviews has helped prevent people from wasting their money on places that receive negative reviews. Without the development of Web 2.0 and the creation of sites like Yelp and City Search, dare I say it... people might actually still be using phone books.

Word of Mouth Becoming a Reliable Source

In Citizen Marketers the authors claim "People are the message when people say "word of mouth" is the most influential form of media on their decision making" (26). As a college student who is often on a budget, I am an advocate of word of mouth advice. This includes my newest guilty pleasure Bump It. At first I used to laugh at the ridiculous infomercials, but then one of my friend's bought it for New Year's Eve. The woman now swears by this product and wears it at least four or five times a week. After seeing it in person and how simple it was to use, I decided to buy one. In the past three weeks I have developed a love for my Bump It and now I am trying to con all my friends in to buying one as well. I love the simplicity of the product, because it allows me to do something different with my hair in less than five minutes. Had Bump It have hired some celebrity to endorse the product, I highly doubt I would have purchased one. It seems that commercials with celebrities attempting to sell the product are becoming harder and harder to believe. Especially when it is a beauty related product, because we all know they had hair and make-up people to make them look like that. Companies forget that the majority of us are on the go and often need to beautify ourselves for the world on our own in a short amount of time.

Chapter one also mentions that "more than half of Americans avoid anything from a company that overwhelms them with advertising" (26). Can somebody please send Geico a memo that running commercials at least once a commercial break during my favorite shows is not going to convince me to give them a try. Instead it makes me cringe when I think about them and would rather go without car insurance if they were the last car company on the planet! Their current campaign with the money that is watching you has sent me over the edge and encourages me to change the channel whenever I hear the song being played.

Google Creating More Negative Buzz Than Expected

On Tuesday Google introduced their new service, Buzz, in hopes of coming one step closer to taking over the Internet. Google seemed to fight back against Facebook and Twitter with Buzz, but unfortunately for Google according to a Twitter search, there are more negative comments about Buzz than positive.

In an attempt to make Buzz more user friendly, Google automatically set up their users with a network of connections that they have interacted with before through their email and chat services (Gmail and Gchat). These connections are displayed in one's Google public profile. This has raised concerns over privacy as many people did not want their contacts out in the open.

Michael Helft of the New York Times on Friday wrote about the concerns of privacy:

"E-mail, it turns out, can hold many secrets, from the names of personal physicians and illicit lovers to the identities of whistle-blowers and antigovernment activists. And Google, so recently a hero to many people for threatening to leave China after hacking attempts against the Gmail accounts of human rights activists, now finds itself being pilloried as a clumsy violator of privacy"

Google has responded to the criticism by creating an easier to find button to allow users to edit who they follow and who is able to follow them. When Buzz was first launched, users were only able to block followers if they had a public profile. Now, they will be able to block anyone from following them. Google is also making changes to allow users to control which connections appear in their public profile.

It seems that in the past week, with this new tool introduced many people are almost unwilling to try Buzz. It's not the identical twin of their Facebook and Twitter, so why bother to learn a new social media tool that has the potential to make one's life easier. I believe that if Google is able to fix the general Google public's concerns about Buzz in the next month, that with time more people will be willing to use the service.

I myself have yet to find time to play with the service. After attempting to become a Google Wave user with no success, I am not motivated to take on Buzz. Once all the kinks are out of the system I may revisit Buzz, but until then I shall stay in my Web 1.5 (Yes I know 1.5 doesn't exactly exist) stage where I am stuck between having mastered Facebook and still learning how to tweet.

Social bookmarking making life more accessible

As someone who is relatively new to social media outside of blogging for previous classes and Facebook, the how-to guide has been helpful. Until social bookmarking had been brought up in class, I had no idea such a thing existed.

Deltina Hay puts it in simplest terms and defines social bookmarking as, " a way for you to save your favorite blogs and websites in a public space the same way you might save them using your own web browser" (177).

The idea of using the bookmarking sites, as a yelp-version of google is pure genius. Often people only view the first few pages of google results before giving up. This limits them to popular websites that may not always have the information that they are looking for. However, this new technology allows uses to look at other sites that google may not have offered them in the first few pages.

Hay defines folksonomy as being able to, "not only see the comments other people have made on a particular site, you also get the additional terms they used to tag it" (179). This would be very helpful for people who are trying to research a topic but have hit a dead end. Often this is the case for students who are unaware of synonyms associated with their topic. By searching these additional terms, users are able to find more information that could be useful without wasting a large amount of time.

After setting up an account with delicious, I became addicted within half an hour of navigating through the site. It seems that the site could be very beneficial to me and students everywhere, who often feel like research for projects and papers can be overwhelming. Social bookmarking allows us to complete our homework at multiple locations without having to print out our sources, which can run up to 40 pages just to provide us with a few quotes for our papers. With this technology, there is no longer a need to spend unwanted hours in the library working on papers that could easily be finished at home.

OCNN launched for Super Bowl festivities. Reputable News Organizations Say Child Please

"Ochocinco News Network. Where news is given and you can kiss the baby, and if you don't like us, child please." -Chad Ochocinco

For those that do not follow football or follow Mr. Ochocinco on twitter, that quote leaves you puzzled. For those of us who created a spot for Chad Ochocinco (formally Chad Johnson) in our hearts after following him on the popular HBO series Hardknocks in 2009, it's just another crazy saying out of the Bengals receiver's mouth.

Determined to find a way to connect with his fans, Ochocinco began tweeting about his daily life and all the hard work he puts in to getting ready for games. Previous to Hardknocks, he had 17,000 followers in July 2009 and has since increased his following to 736,267 (as of 02/06/10). His popularity among twitter and Facebook has made him very marketable, which is why Motorola has teamed up with the Bengals wide receiver to promote OCNN.

According to OCNN's Facebook company overview:

"OCNN is the brainchild of the NFL's reigning king of social networking and his partners at Motorola. With the Motorola Cliq phone in hand, powered by MOTOBLUR technology, Ocho Cinco is transformed 'into a one-man social news network. OCNN brings you all the news you need from on and off the field, from the most exciting mind in the NFL."

Motorola has chosen Ochocinco to help promote Motoblur, a social media software that allows users to view their social networking sites all at once, while at the Super Bowl. Ochocinco is not alone as Redskins Chris Cooley, Ravens Ray Rice, and Cardinals Darnell Dockett are also part of the OCNN campaign. The three other reporters chosen are also popular on twitter, and interact with their fans on social media sites on a regular basis. Throughout the week leading up to the game the four OCNN reporters will tweet, update the OCNN website, and add to the OCNN Facebook.

OCNN will cover media day for both teams as well as the hottest parties hosted in the week before the game. Motoblur will allow the news crew to update their social media sites simultaneously while providing fans with the latest news in Miami. OCNN plans to ask questions that fans wouldn't get from any other news source, including asking Colts DE Dwight Freeney to "give it to him real" about his injured ankle. Ray Rice continued to get the real story by asking Colts DE Robert Mathis "why did ya'll have to hit me so hard during that game" (referring to Week 19 where the Colts beat the Baltimore Ravens 20-3).

ESPN did a story on the OCNN network while at media day, and it was entertaining to watch Ochocinco to be treated like a media personnel who was forced to wait in line to ask questions, as well as being limited in the number of questions asked. OCNN however did not air this footage, but instead opted to run footage of all four reporters interviewing key players from both teams.

Photo courtesy of OCNN's facebook.