I started my new job with advertising/interactive agency Red Tettemer 5 days ago. Prior to that, I took a few days to decompress and rest up, which included leaving my computer behind. Just my handheld for contact, I checked in with Twitter and text and otherwise unplugged. Not surprisingly, my carpel tunnel faded and I was able to sleep well at length.

My first week at RT has exceeded my expectations, the agency is an even more seemless fit for how I work than I anticipated. The staff is enormously creative and strategic, which makes work days even more fun as we cook up new ways for our clients to connect with customers.

When I get a chance, I have a few social media items to discuss here. For now, I just want to plug Twitter Karma, the tool many of us on Twitter have been eagerly asking/waiting for! This service shows you who u follow and who follows you or more importantly, who you don't follow and who doesn't follow you! Very helpful, if like me, you view Twitter as a dialogue platform.

Oh! I can't believe I almost forgot this! I'm on the cover of PRWeek this week with my esteemed GPTMC colleagues for our work with new/social media & uwishunu to promote Philly. Very exciting stuff. PRWeek has always been the bible for my industry and it's a thrill for our work to be recognized by the publication and so prominently.

Some very cool social media news created by my absolute FAVORITE band:

SIGUR ROS
YouTube Global Takeover
Friday March 7

Sigur Ros and YouTube make a little bit of history this Friday (Mar 7) with the band taking over the entire front page of the site around the world for a whole day, becoming the first group to ever have a feature-length music DVD streamed on the channel, with their acclaimed 'Heima' documentary shown in its complete 97-minute glory.

All 12 available slots on YouTube's home page will be devoted to the Icelandic quartet for a full 24-hours, putting them before a global audience of hundreds of millions. The link-up follows the success of 'Minn Heima', a competition hosted by YouTube (http://www.youtube.com/group/MinnHeima) for fans of the band to create their own little version of 'Heima', using audio and video clips posted online. The 10 best entries, as judged by the band, will be featured on the home page, alongside the film itself, as well as a special message from the band, taking time off from recording their new album in Reykjavik.

YouTube has only previously hosted a handful of long form presentations, none for music DVDs. It is the first ever UK home page 'takeover' since the launch of http://uk.youtube.com - the localized home page that allows for country-specific video rankings and comments.
Simultaneous with the YouTube promotion, the band will launch www.sigurros.com, giving away a free audio-visual download clip of the song 'Ny Batteri' filmed live in Reykjavik in the summer of 2006 as part of the Heima tour. 'Ny Batteri' is just one of a dozen additional songs not featured in the film that the band are intending to make available via the site in the near future. Information about the forthcoming album will also be revealed via www.sigurros.com…
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Now the question is, can I view uk.youtube???

Any designers out there looking for a simple project that will get in-community play/attention? Dave Coustan is seeking a designer to create a cool domain placeholder design. Help him out!

I have some news.

I've decided to make a change professionally; I will be leaving Greater Philadelphia Tourism Marketing Corp and joining Red Tettemer in a similar social media position.

This move offers the best of both worlds to me; RT is an advertising agency of record for GPTMC and as such, I will still have opportunity to work on the Philadelphia "brand" that I am passionate about, including our insider-y Philadelphia campaign that includes the community blog uwishunu. I'll just be working on them from 3 blocks away.

I'll also have the pleasure of working with a collection of many of the most creative people I've had the pleasure of meeting. These are the people who brought you iMate just a few weeks ago, just for fun, and yes, those are their REAL employees.

It's been an educational and exciting year and a half working for GPTMC, the only non-profit organization I've known that is so teeming with talent and smarts that they are marketing on the same high level of Fortune 500 companies with 10x the budget.

I'll be at GPTMC for another week and then I'm taking some time off before joining RT on March 13th. Expect to see big things from Red Tettemer in the near future. I am going in with social media gunz a-blazing and we are going to make a lot of noise in the SM space.

BTW, I've been playing around with some ideas for my new title. Digital Revolutionary (Viva La Revolucion!)? Connections Strategist? Or Community Evangelist? I'm open to ideas! Bring it!

Officially, my favorite new widget, the Snoop Dogg "Shizzolate Your Twitters"! I am worshiping at the altar of Snoop's marketing team right now. Fo' shizzle, bizzle!

Hats off today to Doritos for taking a big leap of faith and into social media stardom by showing their sense of humor and supporting this "artist". Who woulda thunk Frito Lay could be so cool?

*Video may be NSFW.*

I'll be speaking here again soon. In the meantime, watch the attached video. This was my favorite show as a kid and I would sit indian-style in front of the tv everyday and stare up, enraptured with Carole and Paula and the chucklepatch. I loved the chucklepatch but my very favorite part of the "The Magic Garden" was singing along to this song at the end. In fact, to this day I often find myself singing it in my head when I'm walking around by myself.

My officemate suspects they may have indoctrinated me into a cult as a child via this program. I say thank God for being a child of the 70's. We need more flower power these days. Three cheers for nostalgia on the internet!