Everything Social Networking
STEVEKHART.COM
You’ll find all kinds of stuff posted at my blog, so keep checking back. You’ll find a lot of information related to social networking, Facebook, Twitter, Search Engine Optimization (SEO), just cool internet tools and technologies.
Bio:
Name: Steve Hart
Job: Interactive Development Director for a large media communications company.
Interest: Everything Social Networks, SEO, Blogs, and Media Publishing.
Seven 2009 Predictions by eMarketer
Geoff Ramsey, CEO of Co-Founder, shares his 2009 eMarketing predictions.
1) No doubt about it, marketers will be cutting back on advertising spending this year.
2) Among traditional media, newspapers, radio and magazines will see the worst declines.
3) Advertisers’ pull-back in overall marketing spending, coupled with a serious re-examination of traditional media, will set in motion a series of permanent changes that will affect how media is planned and measured, as well as the media mix itself.
4) Throughout all this economic shrinkage, the Internet will continue to grow, though at a far more constrained pace. eMarketer projects online ad spending will rise 8.9% in 2009, after an already ratcheted-down rate of 11.3% in 2008.
5) Despite the general consensus that online will ride out the storm, expect to see a growing contingent of bearish forecasters disparaging its prospects.
6) Growth in online display advertising will languish—but only in terms of absolute-dollar spending, and the effects will be temporary.
7) E-commerce, already hammered in 2008, will see growth slip even further, from 7.2% in 2008 to a measly 4.1% in 2009.
Read the full article here.
Tags: news
Your Ringtone Tells How Old You Are
Next time a cell phone rings, look around and see if you can match the ringtone to the owner.
Under 11: Just Dance by Lady GaGa
11-14: Catchphrases from Little Britain
14-20: Mosquito, AKA Teen Buzz
20-25: CTU chirp
25-30: Nickelback’s Rockstar
30-40: Mission: Impossible theme
40-50: Nokia tune
50-65: Old-fashioned telephone ring
65+: A terrible impression of Victor Meldrew saying: “I don’t believe it!
Read the full article here
Read my prior blog post on Free Ringtones
Time Warner Cable Sucks…for the last time.
We’ll, I’ve decide to terminate my long term relationship with Time Warner Cable (TWC).
We’ve been together close to 18 years. I wish I could say”it’s not you(TWC), it’s me”, but I would be lying. The beginning of the end started with a new TV last 2 years ago.
Back in 2007, I went down to the local TWC office and picked up what I thought was a new HD DVR cable box. Come to find out later, nobody gets a new box. Of course, the box didn’t work after I got it home and hooked up. A day later and quite a few customer support calls, I was able to get the service working. If I remember correctly, this was the same experience I had setting up prior cable boxes with TWC.
Now to the current year, another TV and another cable box. As before, my first attempt resulted in the same experience. I was pissed but got over it shortly. Fast forward two months. The cable box just stops working, I get basic cable but it’s like TWC doesn’t know the box exists. Yet another call to support with the result of scheduling a tech to come out or taking another trip to the local TWC office. I decide to go back to the TWC office. Bad choice.
Before I signed off with the support rep, I asked for some type of discount or credit for my troubles. She was kind enough to offer a week credit on the box. This sounded good and I would have been please until…the rep said it wasn’t much, only $1.98. What? I asked how much it cost to send a tech to my house. $100? She said, ”no, much more”. Now I’m fired up. I’m saving TWC over $100+ dollars by not having a tech come out and they are so thankful they give me $1.98. #?!# Oh, and she put me on hold for another 5 minutes while processing the $1.98 credit.
Now start the thoughts of changing to ATT U-Verse.
I go the the TWC office and get another (not new, not even clean) box. I asked “are you sure this one will work?” My mistake. I got home and hooked it up let it sit for one hour as instructed before turning it on. An hour later, I pressed the power button. You guessed it, it won’t turn on.
Now I’m really pissed. Calmly I called the local TWC office, only to get a call center somewhere out of state (but on-shore). I was instructed the local office has no phones…r-i-g-h-t…. Now I need to go back to the TWC office…pissed off.
Luckily, I was car-less (another post later). I had some time to call ATT and check out their offering. ATT quoted me a price cheaper than TWC for the same service. They also provide another $150 in cash back and gift cards. I inked the deal.
A calm came over me. No longer would I have to deal with the poor service of Time Warner. I have a new relationship to nourish. Goodbye Time Warner, hello ATT!
I’ll let you know what I think of the ATT U-Verse service after a few months.
Tags: Customer Service
Cooking Sites Worth a Look
Rouxbe delivers personal instructional cooking videos – via the Internet – to home cooks: people like you, who love food and are looking to expand their culinary repertoire and improve their skills in the kitchen.
What I like about Rouxbe.com is its clean layout organized content. They didn’t over kill the site color. This is a great example of less is more. Additionally, they have great content.
Another food recipe site is foodtube.net. FoodTube is a user generate content site from a community of cooks and food fanatics. You never know what quaility of a recipe you’re going to get.
I’m not overly thrilled with their site design, but they do have a lot of content.
6 New Blackberry Apps
A friend (the other Steve) sent me an article about some new Blackberry applications.
- Socialscope (Alpha) -Twitter app for Blackberry...yet another Twitter/Facebook app.
- SlingPlayer Mobile for Blackberry - lets you watch and control your home TV and DVR via your Slingbox™
- Unity4Life - turns your Blackberry into a garage remote control or TV remote…my favorite
- Slacker Radio - Listen to all of your favorite personalized Slacker stations
- BeanReader - a PDF reader application…Been there done that
- StockStream Mobile – streaming real time market data...isn’t Google financial good enough?
You have to be a real geek to need this one:
- Zeemote - bluetooth-enabled controller for improved smartphone gaming
Read the full article here.
Tags: technology
See If You Qualify for a Discount on Your Cell Phone Bill
Here’s an article on on to save some money on your cell phone bill.
Try these:
How to score a discount on your monthly cellular bill [jkOnTheRun]
Just find your carrier (links are all provided) and figure out if you are eligible.
I gave it a try, we’ll see if the discount actually show’s up.

2009 International Consumer Electronics Show
(from Networkworld.com)
The tech-world’s epicenter shifts to Las Vegas this week as the 2009 International Consumer Electronics Show kicks off. Over the next week expect a parade of shiny, tiny, and wireless gadgets from CES exhibitors–including a 3G watch-phone from LG Electronics, a wafer-thin TV from Samsung that’s 6.5-millimeters thick, and an emphasis on emerging technology such as environmentally friendly green technologies and Wi-Tricity, a technology that allows wire-free power charging of small devices.
A major trend at CES this year is the merging of content delivery and hardware. LG will be showing off several LCD and plasma TVs with the built-in ability to stream Netflix online movies – no PC required. Yahoo and Intel will be showing prototype TVs with “widgets” that stream video from YouTube, Hulu, and display pictures from Flickr. Samsung will show one with Yahoo widgets – we’re still waiting to hear from Samsung on whether it will support YouTube and Hulu streaming.
Even Blu-ray players will get juiced with extra content. Expect to see Blu-ray players from Samsung and LG that stream not only Netflix movies but also content from Hulu, CinemaNow and other Internet-based content.
Network vendors also continue to encroach on traditional consumer electronics turf: Linksys, for example, will be announcing a digital stereo system capable of playing music all over the home (a la Sonos).
Mobile is Always Hot at CES
Mobile gear at CES will steal a lot of limelight this year.
It’s expected Palm will be unveiling its Nova smartphone operating system on new hardware, a project three years in the works. We’ve also heard there will be some new handsets (including a smartphone) from an unnamed but up-and-coming manufacturer, as well some from Motorola and Samsung.
The growing mobile projector category will get a bump this year with some new pico projectors. Microvision, which demoed its pico projector last year will be showing an updated version of its pico projector; will also be showing a pico projector, the palm-sized LCOS micro projector, the Z10. You can connect these projectors to your smartphone and project content.
PowerBeam will show off a wireless power system that uses a form of Wi-Tricity to power a set of small wireless speakers. PowerMat is expected to show off digital picture frames powered by Wi-Tricity.
ResizeImage – Online Image Cropping And Resizing
For you non-techies, here’s a quick and easy online image resizing tool (site).
Not sure why you would use it, but if you needed to resize an image and have nothing to use…resizeimage.org
Give it a try: www.resizeimage.org
Tags: Free, technology
Apple's New Laptop With No Keyboard
You have to love a good Apple joke…have you seen their other new product – The Flea
XOBNI.com – Whole new look at your Outlook email
The name Xobni, is the word “inbox” spelled backwards. Xobni is the Outlook plug-in that saves time finding email conversations, contacts and attachments.
The Xobni toolbar appears in Outlook and your Outlook information becomes easier to manage. When a new email arrives, the sender’s full communication history appears in the Xobni sidebar, including past conversations, attachments and contact details. Xobni also includes a blazing fast email search tool.
I’ve been using this tool for the past year and swear by it’s usefulness. The tracking of attachments by contact is my favorite feature. It does require a bit of memory, so if your computer is at the minimum specs it won’t live up to it’s reputation.
If you are an avid Outlook user, this is a must have.
Tags: Free, technology
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