My September highlight was Ben & Jerry’s announcement of Schweddy Balls ice cream, which I still haven’t tried yet by the way. Why is this the best thing that happened to me this month? Well, I was a pretty diehard SNL fan back in the day – arguably when SNL had its more talented cast members – and the Schweddy Balls skit was one of my all time favs. In what I’m sure was incredibly annoying for our teachers, my friends and I would reenact sketches from SNL, including Schweddy Balls, during class. The joke also became part of my comedy routine for family and friends. I’m sure my parents really appreciated their 14 year old daughter making schweddy ball jokes at our Christmas parties. Not my fault rum balls were part of the family tradition. So, Ben & Jerry’s new flavor is like a blast from the past and a whole new opportunity to make schweddy ball jokes, while actually eating real, schweddy ball ice cream.
As for October, well, I’m looking forward to Halloween because mine sucked schweddy balls last year. Ask me why if you really want to know.
Anyway, that’s it from Finland. What was the highlight of your September? Anything exciting coming up in October? Have you tried Schweddy Balls yet? Make me laugh. I dare you.
I had the pleasure of talking with Pelpina from WebBeat.TV about the new Facebook makeover. You can check out our chat in the video above. Thanks again for inviting me on the show and a special thanks to Ross LaRocco who introduced us on Twitter!
Here are a few more of my thoughts on Facebook’s new features…at least at this point in time. I may have to write a follow up once I get to play with all the changes. This is sort of a stream of consciousness post, so bear with me.
I do think Facebook is “doing it right”. They are obviously thinking about the future of the company and how to stay relevant as new competition comes out (G+) and people’s behaviors and attitudes change. There is a ridiculous amount of users on Facebook: 800,000,000 (July 2011) and counting worldwide. That’s about 16x’s the population of Finland. I think they understand the psychology of people and target our best and worst qualities at the same time: our need for belonging, to have influence, and to express ourselves…they are professionals at getting us to spend a lot of time on their site. Having 800 million people on the same website is extremely valuable, however, to people and companies who are trying to reach their target audience. This is why marketing and advertising on Facebook is a great investment for individuals and brands – both big and small. I don’t know about you, but I usually hear about things first on Facebook. It’s a very interesting site to study and pay close attention to as a communications geek.
The Timeline – I think this will be a pretty cool feature, but I’ll probably be going in and making things private or deleting them altogether. Someone referred to Facebook’s new format as a “scrapbook on steroids”. However, I think you can all agree with me that there are some moments you don’t put into scrapbooks and many scrapbooks end up in attics and basements for good reason. People will want to have some control over just how much of their past is put out there for others to explore. Most people probably didn’t imagine that something they wrote 4 years ago in anger or a drunken stupor would be so easily searchable today. For the younger generations and for those who have just gotten on Facebook, they will have more control about the Timeline because they’re just starting out and can be a little more thoughtful about what they’re sharing. But, for the rest of us who signed on back in 2004 or so, well, we may have to spend some time cleaning up Memory Lane.
As usual, there are pros and cons about any new feature and there are always going to be people who love it and hate it. I won’t be surprised to see people leave or unfriend a lot of people when these new features roll out – a lot of drama could unfold. Nostalgia is great, but can also be overwhelming. It’s cool to remember things from the past now and then, but there’s a reason we forget, as well. Also, people are probably going to freak out about how much of their lives are so public and searchable (though this is really nothing new, it’s just going to be more obvious).
Some people are going to be worried about how awesome their Timeline is in comparison to others. One thing is for sure, productivity levels are going to plummet when this rolls out and everyone is obsessively going through their own – and other people’s – Timelines. You have to go in and manually delete or hide past posts in the Timeline. That could take awhile.
On a side note, the new layout is helping me see much more clearly what I don’t have in common with people and I am getting closer to appropriately organizing everyone. I’m very interested to see where all of these things we’re concerned about today will be 5 – 10 years down the road. I’ve been on Facebook since 2008, so 3 years of content is not hard to manage, but obviously Facebook is planning on sticking around for awhile – unlike AOL chats from back in the ’90s – so some people will have their entire lives documented on Facebook.
The Ticker – happy to see these sort of updates (likes, comments, etc) move over to the sidelines, which helps keep the most recent/news updates more relevant.
Who Unfriended You – There’s a “trick” to see who has unfriended you in the new Timeline. Watch the video with Pelpina above to learn how. I’m really not that into creating drama, so I see no need to get upset over an unfriending on Facebook. Besides, if I’m only discovering it on the Timeline and didn’t realize they were missing from my life before hand, then they probably weren’t a real friend anyway. There are so many different ways to connect with people online, so it’s really important for everyone to remember that “unfriending” is not the end of the world and your social status. We need to keep a healthy, realistic perspective on all of our social networks, media and technology and remember that our real-life relationships are the most important ones anyway.
What do you think about the new features on Facebook? Share your thoughts here!
Using Vimeo is such a nice experience. I fall into a zen-like trance while browsing through their amazing collections of (usually) high quality videos, whereas on YouTube I often feel like I’m trapped in the chaotic mind of a 14 year old. Anyway, all I wanted to say is that they’ve added a music store, so finding the right track for your video projects is super easy. Watch below to see how it works. Awesome.
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