A Columbus Social Media Summer

As the Summer of 2008 draws near its end, I can safely describe the last few months as A Columbus Social Media Summer.

The momentum started last year as WOSU started engaging the blog community in Columbus with the Social Media Cafe. This, of course, occurred following the great success of Columbus Underground in building a loyal community.

But it seems to have just exploded over the last few months with the community of individuals and organizations embracing the Social Media movement.

Perhaps is was the visit by Doc in May thanks to Resource Interactive that real kicked the momentum into high gear because that was followed by PodCamp Ohio, Tweetups, Meetups, and Startup Weekend Columbus (see the article below), and BarCampOhio. Comfest has embraced Social Media has have many in our local media --- particularly by our friends at NBC4 with its strong Twitter presence (of course WOSU has had a Twitter presence for more than a year!).

As we move from summer to fall, I expect the energy to continue to move forward quickly. This past week, my friend Andrew Miller put together a meeting to share his vision of Convergence Columbus that was embraced by many diverse sectors in the Columbus community.

It's examples like this, where one or two people come forward with an idea, that the power of social media takes hold. It was Alvin for StartUp Weekend, Angelo for PodCampOhio, and Andrew for Comfest.

I have come to appreciate living in an area where individuals - particularly individuals who do not necessarily sit in the traditional positions of power within the community - are able to bring about positive change that makes our region better better. This is what the power of social media is by giving influence to the individual, no matter who they are and where they come from if the idea they have resonates with others.

Here's hoping there's a lot more of this to come to Columbus in the coming months.

Columbus Monthly SWC 2008 article - Upload a Document to Scribd

Read this document on Scribd: Columbus Monthly SWC 2008 article

Tonight's Columbus Social Media Cafe

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How to begin?

I'm still exploring ideas of encouraging new thinking regarding the Enterprise at my organization and I really like the specific detail that has gone into this meme courtesy of Prakash Muralidharan. Is this the place to begin the conversation or is it the ending point?

The services 2.0 meme

Jaiku

I just discovered a Twitter-like site that takes the Twitter concept much further by allowing members to import in blogs,photos, and (even) Twitter feeds into page.

It's call Jaiko and it's developed by a bunch of Fins in Helsinki -- it's pretty cool. The nice thing is that you can write your Twitter comment and it imports it right in.

The one thing that I do see a need for them to adjust is to set up a time zone option as it's showing me doing things tomorrow -- a bit of a time warp thing.

It's fun -- although the name isn't as much fun as Twitter!