DISQUS

Snow - yes I remember him and the song. Apparently, at 36 I'm freaking Miss Ellie here (that's an 80s reference so no one will likely get it).
I was a waitress in a restaurant that turned into a night-clubish thing after 10 p.m. and that bloody Informer song played every Friday and Saturday for over 6 months.
Not too happy with you Johnny for bringing that up.

And speaking of bringing up - while I agree with showing people who you are and being interesting. Something about "personal brand" makes me throw up in a mouth a little.
Just be yourself for fuck's sake. And if you're not interesting in person, I think it's really hard to make yourself seem so online.

Now, I know the words "personal brand" never made it in this post and for that I'm grateful.

Gotta love Havi's word invention - so awesome.
You've inspired me to think of words that feel *right* for me as I really don't like the word business either.

What a great idea Danny! And thanks to you Jacki for writing this because you definitely represent a much larger chunk of our society than do Social Media/PR people.
Most of my friends and family look at me like I'm from Mars when I talk about the stuff I do online - as you say, I'm using a different language.
Now I will definitely be more aware of just letting people know the information that might be of interest vs. how I found it or who told me.

<abbr>Lynn Crymble´s last blog post..Where's the Love for Canadian Internet Users?</abbr>

I completely agree that citizen journalism is a process, not an event. What a wonderful opportunity it is to be able to question something openly and have others share their opinion and deny or verify items.
banane's point about our propensity to believe that what we see in traditional media is fact is a good one. This is not always the case, not on purpose but it happens. People need to decide for themselves how they will take in any information.
In the end, I don't think that your Twitter message was at all misleading or bad. It's something you saw, found interesting and shared - thanks.

This is so awesome Nathalie! It is unfortunate that one of the things we lose from childhood is self-esteem - perhaps this is really what people see when they speak of a loss of innocence as well. When we no longer see the world with untainted eyes, we start to also see why we might not measure up (in our minds) to what's out there.

I do disagree with one small point you made:
"But developing self-esteem is harder than you might imagine, because it means battling your inner demons."
It's definitely one of the toughest things to do but it's not about "battling your inner demons", it's about acknowledging your fears (shout out to Havi Brooks on this from TheFluentSelf.com). There's something much more loving and friendly about letting our fears come through, and trying to figure out what they have to tell us.
Once we do that, we can get onto loving ourselves unconditionally.

About 3 months ago, I stopped buying women's magazines (I used to buy 1 or 2 a month) and that small change alone has been a great step toward increasing my self-esteem. So, I wholeheartedly support your advice on removing yourself from advertising and minimizing unrealistic comparisons to others.

Thanks for your thoughtful words!

Thanks for this Doug. I re-tweeted your original tweet because I like it so much. I played with Wordle for a few hours a while back and came up with 3 different clouds that I posted on my wall at work.
Now, I think there might be a number of other cool ways to use these.
When we think of graphics - we rarely consider the power of words as the foundation for what is usually image-based.
A picture may be worth a thousand words but a word cloud may be worth more than you could say in the small space of a business card!

I'm so happy you wrote this Douglas! I work in marketing but have been finding myself more and more at odds with the way it's being approached and the way I think it should be.
The reason I love social media is because it connects and re-connects us to our social needs.
Marketing (the 4 p's view) no longer works as it has in the past. People just aren't willing to be told and passive anymore, we were never meant to live this way - we are social animals!
Some might argue that digital formats are not personal and don't invite 'real-world' participation but I believe the opposite is true.
The more you learn, collaborate, participate in the digital world, the stronger your desire to do so with 'real people.
Thanks for this.