Social media-related reads

Every morning I go through the list of Mashable and Read Write Web articles that appear in my inbox. I read about one-fourth of the links, and here are a few of my favorite over the last few weeks:

Source: Catchfire Media

• 10 Historical Events Affected by Social Media (Mashable): This is a slideshow showing photos and tweets from events, such as the Japanese earthquake in March and the Haiti earthquake in January. It poses the question, what would other major events have looked like, such as Katrina and Sept. 11, 2001, if social media had existed as it does today.
• Facebook Timeline Designs (Mashable): Also a slideshow, this article is all about inspiration. While we experimented and discussed early on the implementation of Facebook’s Timeline on users’ profiles, these 10 images really take the timeline to the next level.
• Here’s How People Look at Your Facebook Profile (Mashable): Do you ever wonder what people take away when they glance at your Facebook profile? Is it your cute profile picture, the number of friends you have, your latest status update? This article discusses a study that captured where participants’ eyes lingered and the order in which the page was scanned. Sounds like an old study done for advertising firms on what catches people’s eyes, but it is interesting and worth a look.
• Drug Cartel Murders Another Blogger (Read Write Web): It’s a scary time to be a blogger or a journalist in Mexico and in areas of the Middle East. Following attacks on free speech is an important part in protecting democracy and our ideals. I’m glad these stories are being followed and written about by sites with large audiences.
• High School Student Punished for Joking Tweet about Gov. Brownback (Forbes.com): Speaking of free speech, this 18-year-old high school senior was disciplined by her school after sending out a tweet critical of the governor during a visit to the Kansas state Capitol. What ensued was Twitter stardom for the teen and some really bad press for the governor and his staff.

Enjoy reading and please share any of your favorite social media stories!

Pondering the Top Twitter Moments of 2011

I love Twitter. The more I use it, the more I love it. It’s the first thing I turn to in the morning, like perhaps how my parents turned to the newspaper over their breakfast.

Mashable just released the top 10 remarkable Twitter stories of 2011, and I have to say, some of them truly are remarkable in how they show the power of social media. I mean, really, try to imagine how much longer it would have taken the world to find out about Osama bin Laden’s assassination?

Some of the stories are truly amazing, like the trio of Londoners who used Twitter to recruit volunteers to help clean up after the summer riots in that city. And there’s a photo that went viral taken by a passenger on an airplane who saw the space shuttle’s return to earth from her window seat on her way to Palm Beach, Fla.

While this top 10 list is certainly worth a look, and about 10 minutes of your time, it also provides an opportunity to reflect on your own social media moments of the year.

Here’s my top 10 social media moments in order of impact on my life:

1. Landing in the Detroit airport on 9/11/11, I tweeted about police coming aboard to take me and my row mates into detention
2. Following the beginnings of the Occupy Wall Street movement on Twitter in September and October.
3. Saying goodbye to Iowa through Facebook uploads as I drove from Des Moines to our new house and life  in Ohio.
4. Finally getting a smartphone and connecting to my social media sites from anywhere at any time.
5. My husband, after much caterwauling, joined Facebook in the summer. He still has no idea what Twitter is.
6. In April I had my first opportunity to live Tweet from an event for work and even created our own hashtag! It was as exciting as waking up on my birthday to cake and ice cream.
7. To ward off the winter blues in January and February, I created Ridiculous Outfit Monday with blog posts and Facebook posts.
8. As part of my late winter boredom, I posed a diversity survey to my Facebook friends, trying to see if my FB social circle was as diverse as I thought it would be.
9. As news of Steve Jobs death spread over the Twitterverse, it affected me more deeply than I thought it would.
10. The introduction of Google+ sparked interest in late spring, and the new network continues to confound me.

What are your top social media events of the year?

Feeling depressed? Blame it in part on your modern life

As I sit here typing this, I am growing increasingly depressed. I long for physical activity and the feel of a fresh breeze on my cheek. Instead I am sedentarily positioned in a deserted corner of an office under artificial lights with my face shoved up to a computer monitor.

The downward spiral I experience each day as I sit all day at my desk tweeting, facebooking, surfing the net, (and of course doing my writing job), isn’t just in my imagination.

In a recent article in Newsweek, Dr. Andrew Weil, author of the book Spontaneous Happiness, explains that those who are living in industrialized nations in this Internet age are actually at higher risk for depression than those in poorer, less modern environments. He says we are experiencing a “nature-defecit,” and that as society immerses itself more and more in technology and other socially isolating activities, we are creating a fertile ground for depression.

When you think about it, even supposed “social” networking is many ways a form of social isolation. Sending tweets and commenting on Facebook posts is by no means as stimulating as actually going out and spending real time with a person.

The brains and bodies of humans — who evolved to thrive in nature and bond with others — are just not equipped for 21st Century life, says Weil.

More and more of us are sedentary, spending most of our time indoors. We eat industrial food much altered from its natural sources … We are deluged by an unprecedented overload of information and stimulation in this age of the Internet, email, mobile phones, and multimedia, all of which favor social isolation and certainly affect our emotional (and physical) health. Behaviors strongly associated with depression—reduced physical activity and human contact, overconsumption of processed food, seeking endless distraction—are the very behaviors that more and more people now can do, are even forced to do by the nature of their sedentary, indoor jobs.

To create a better balance, Dr. Weil recommends: “Increasing aerobic exercise, improving sleep, spending more time in the sun, eating more fish to boost intake of omega-3 fatty acids, socializing more, and not dwelling on negative thoughts.”

I for one am determined to try his suggestions (and here are a few of my own). But since I have no choice to be stuck in front of a computer for the next 8 hours, I think I’ll start small, by setting a photo of a sunny beach as my desktop wallpaper. If that doesn’t work, I’m totally taking a nap.

More on the topic:
Log Off. Reboot: A break from modern technology is good for your health