Mark Davidson

I’ve only been using Empire Avenue for 10 days and I’m still learning my way around the interface. For those who are as new to the service as I am, I’ve found the following to be extremely helpful and allows me to interact better with others using the site.

Notifications —> Notification Settings - click one of the 13 notification filters

The notifications can be a bit overwhelming. Initially, I was trying to respond to Shouts by clicking each individual email that landed in my Gmail account. (It only seemed polite to reply to Shouts and to thank people for investing in MARKD.)

Unfortunately, this method was time-consuming and not very enjoyable. (Not to mention oftentimes being overwhelming, cluttered and confusing.)

The team at Empire Avenue did a great job of providing tools for us to use. It just takes a little time to get used to the complexity of the site. (Somewhere between using Twitter and Facebook’s privacy and notification settings.)

The Notification filters I find most useful are Share Buys, Replies and Comments, Mentioned and Shout Outs.

By using these filters, it’s helping me to increase my engagement on EA and doing so in less time.

You also may have noticed that I’ve begun to link to the user who I’m shouting to. To link to a user’s profile, you simply put an ‘e’ in parenthesis next to the user’s name. For example: (e)MARKD. This will hotlink the Shout to the user’s EA profile.

Also, if you are trying to figure out how other people are able to purchase more than 200 shares of a single person, it’s an upgrade. Upgrades are one of the ways that EA is monetizing its service. 

https://www.empireavenue.com/shop/upgrades#buy_more

I’ll post more updates as I progress through the game. For people who have been playing Empire Avenue for awhile, I’m sure that the information I’ve provided in this note seems obvious. For me, the discovery of the filters weren’t. It took me 10 days. Now that I’m aware of this feature, boy what a time saver and a great feature to help me to engage better and more consistently with others.

Mark Davidson

I finally figured out a legitimate use for my Tumblr account. I can archive my TwitPic stories here. I’ve been creating TwitPic stories for years on Twitter. In the past, using photos on Twitter to tell a story in real time has been well received and have generated hundreds of @replies/@mentions and RT’s. (Actually, probably more like thousands but I haven’t actually counted.) It’s also a lot of fun for me to do as well.

The set of photos below were originally created approximately between 11:00 AM and 12:00 PM on Tuesday, June 28th, 2011.

There’s always an element of silliness to my TwitPic stories and the value I intend to provide with them is to either amuse or entertain. 

Having the photos statically placed on Tumblr is not quite the same as revealing each story with a 140 character comment, one photo at a time, in real time but I had been meaning to archive these stories for years. Please enjoy.

Mark Davidson

As near as I can tell… From this point down/back most of these status updates were sent using Ping.fm. The status updates that are bold and in the headline font were sent from something called Quub. Quub was a great idea but way too far ahead of its time. 

I thought about deleting them. When I first started using Tumblr, it was not the popular microblogging service that it is now. I have many, far too many social networking accounts. I don’t use most of them but to stay informed, I felt compelled to at least open all these various different accounts, know how to use them and monitor how other people were using them.

There are quite a few social networking services that had great communities of users that are no longer serving pages. Some make it. Some just don’t. In fact some of the better services never quite found their way. Rejaw, Kwippy, Jaiku, Utterli and Pip.io immediately come to mind. Natural selection. Sometimes the most beautiful gazelle is maladapted for an abrupt climate change or an already fickle and socially overloaded audience.

In the future, I don’t think I will aggregate too many status updates to my Tumblr. I’m trying to be a lot more selective these days about how and where I post. I find that this helps to create a unique value for my various individual social network accounts. How much value? I’m not sure. Maybe only valuable to me. Hopefully of value to others as well. Thank you.

Here’s a blog link for the Logitech Touch Mouse http://bit.ly/cGsKBi. You need to install the software on your Mac or PC and iPhone.

I just installed Logitech’s Touch Mouse for the iPhone and it is AWESOME! I’m typing this from my iPhone to my PC! Great for Hulu!

Does anyone else remember when YouTube didn’t have commercials at the beginning of a video?

HAPPY NEW YEAR! :p (I hope every one of you are safe, got to wear a silly hat, and had a great time tonight.)

I’m out out of room on my 8 GB iPhone. Time to start deleting movies; Batman: The Dark Knight and Revolver… I’ll miss you both!

Question… As I’m sitting on the panel, should I really be aggregating my status? I say, “Yes!”

Plus, working from bed or while sitting outside under the shade of a tree is made of win. :-)

Devices such as a netbook, iPhone, and Nokia Nseries, are all great social media tools for remotely publishing content to our SM services.

A key to creating interesting social media content is to be able to create and publish content quickly and easily from anywhere.

BTW, I’m using Pingle to aggregate my status updates on my iPhone. I can also filter by blog and microblog services depending on content.

I’m commenting the heck out of FriendFeed. I love my “Professional” feed filter. Easiest way to find personally relevant social media posts.-

I think the late night Starbucks is finally wearing off. Time to hit the coffin. The sun is rising over the horizon and I don’t want to ash.

Reminder: The Tuesday Night Social Media Open Call with me and @lindawyatt, is again tonight at 6:30 PDT. 218-339-2626 #209061

@brotherpaul I don’t think social media success is measured by our follower count but rather by the quality of our relationships.

@nicholaswyoung I think blogging is a process similar to sculpting. We slowly uncover what we want by removing the clay we don’t need.

@robainbinder I’m also selective about which of my Twitter @replies I choose to aggregate. In this case, I choose to respond using Ping.fm.

@robainbinder For example, my @replies to you went to all my microblogs but not LinkedIn, Facebook, Bebo, or Hi5. Strategery! :-)

@robainbinder So it’s easy to create noise. I choose to be selective about what content I post and where, rather than a shotgun approach.

@robainbinder Of all the SM accounts I have, Facebook is the most fickle. We have fewer friends, who update less frequently on FB.

Rather than making long-form blog posts, I prefer to demonstrate and then explain what I do, how I do it, and why; within the medium itself.

These posts also serve the double-duty of serving as positiong statements to define, demonstrate, and reinforce my “personal” brand.

The result is a more readable FriendFeed account with much of the same content. The same is true of my Facebook and other SM accounts.

I also removed my Twitter feed from my FriendFeed and use Ping.fm instead. This was intentional to remove my @replies and reduce noise.

I also tend to use my micro-blog sites as my blog but I recognize that I need to change that. We all need a hub for our online presence.

So hopefully people enjoy what I post and find value in it, whether it’s a chuckle, good information, or strategy. (Or even a topical rant.)

Showmanship is important. Even when what I’m posting seems to be all about me, I’m always thinking about the value I’m providing to others.

I make time to see what other people are doing, thinking, and working on. I also promote others when I like something and find value.

Whether I’m posting pictures with funny comments or posting about technology, tools, and SM strategy, I try to provide value to my readers.

A big part of creating and maintaining an Internet presence means being present and approachable. It means interacting and responding.

I also use Ping.fm to broadcast my messages across multiple accounts but I monitor comments on each account and respond. I actively engage.

1. Create content of value, whether it’s entertainment, information, or my thoughts; 2. Follow up with my Subscribers, Friends, & Followers.

For me, it’s important to follow up with people’s comments and/or @replies after I broadcast a series of posts. This is how I use Twitter.

Whether it’s entertainment, thoughts, ideas, or tech & social media advice; I’m always trying to create value with my posts.