The Infographic is by Milo (@miloshopping). Enlarge it.
See more writing tips posters at My Modern Met.
In TIME magazine (@TIME), Katy Steinmetz (@katysteinmetz) reports, “In recent years, several neologisms have achieved widespread usage thanks to technology and social media.” Consider:
hat tip, n.: in online contexts, used as an acknowledgement that someone has brought a piece of information to the writer’s attention
tweeps, pl. n.: a person’s followers on the social networking site Twitter
lolz, pl. n.: an expression of fun, laughter, or amusement; used especially online.
All three of these are now found in the Oxford Dictionaries Online (@OxfordWords). Other additions highlight trends that have become widespread, such as photobombing–spoiling a photograph by suddenly appearing in the camera’s field of view as the picture is taken….
Our modern taste for word-shortening is also on display, with additions such as ridic, an abbreviation for ridiculous, and UI, an abbreviation for user interface. And the ODO gives those maniacally laughing villains the recognition they’ve sought these many years, with mwahahaha finally getting a nod.
Contact Somersault (@smrsault) to help you select the right words in your writing craft and to connect you with readers.
And be sure to bookmark and use daily the SomersaultNOW online dashboard, created especially for publishing and marketing professionals.
In Fast Company (@FastCompany), leadership experts Ken Blanchard (@kenblanchard & @LeaderChat) (blog) and Scott Blanchard write, “There is a big difference between identifying the cause of a negative outcome and looking for someone to blame it on. Identifying the cause of a negative outcome is productive. You can use that information to avoid the situation in the future and also help people take responsibility for fixing it and moving on.”
Finding fault and assigning blame, on the other hand, creates a situation where people become stuck and paralyzed. It’s a negative approach that assumes neglect or malfeasance that requires punishment. This type of attitude produces a risk-averse organization where people play it safe instead of stepping out and trying new ideas.
Now your organization takes on a culture similar to the classic arcade game, Whac-A-Mole, where most employees keep their head down except for the unsuspecting novice who pops his head up only to have the oversized mallet pound him or her back down if their initiative fails. Once an organization develops that type of culture, it is very difficult for innovation to take hold.
Holding to the value of leadership and innovation, Somersault (@smrsault) is here to help you identify blue ocean strategy for your brand.
Be sure to bookmark and use daily the SomersaultNOW online dashboard; especially the Leadership and Innovation tabs.
Above Image: Education Consulting Coaches
Knowledge@Wharton (@knowledgwharton) says, “Our current multi-channel, multi-screen, ‘always on’ world is giving rise to a new form of storytelling, dubbed ‘transmedia,’ that unfolds a narrative across multiple media channels.”
A single story may present some elements through a television series or a motion picture with additional narrative threads explored in comic books, video games, or a collection of websites and Twitter feeds. Depending on their level of interest, fans can engage in selection of these story elements or follow all of them to fully immerse themselves in the world of the story.
Andrea Phillips, author of A Creator's Guide to Transmedia Storytelling: How to Captivate and Engage Audiences across Multiple Platforms, offers her observations on the current shift happening in marketing, including stealth advertising across media:
It has to do with experience. There's a point where you enjoy ambiguity. The problem is that that point is a little bit different for everyone. And the audience wants to be in control of knowing where that line is. When you present yourself as real, you open yourself to creating problems for people.
Assuming that your audience can't possibly know it's fictional is ridiculous on the face of it…. The idea that admitting that something was fictional would ruin the whole thing winds up being a non-starter. An audience is a little more robust than that. They're not so fragile that when they can find out that it's not real, it will ruin it….
There's a myth that if you make something interesting and you tell a couple of people, it will spread virally across the Internet. That is, by and large, a terrible, terrible lie. It is not true that the cream rises to the top on the Internet.
When you launch something, don't just send someone a mysterious box. Send them a mysterious box if you have to, but also send them a letter with a URL telling them what you're doing. Send out a press release. Make sure people know what it is you're going to do, and make sure that they know before it's almost done or nobody will look at it.
These things do have to be marketed and promoted exactly the same way that every other entertainment medium does. It's frustrating to see campaigns start with no concept of a marketing budget, no concept of how they're going to spread the word beyond, "Well, people will know because it's cool."
...There's a lot of talk about the attention economy, where we're in a flat-out war for attention. Marketers have cottoned to the idea that people aren't going to look at marketing just because you put it in front of them. People simply don't notice banner ads. Calling [the impact of a banner ad] an ‘impression’ is a terrible lie, because it isn't making an impression on anybody. You just tune it out. It might as well not exist.
Marketers have started to realize they need to create content people will seek out because it has value to them, independent of the value to the marketer. You're seeing things like the Old Spice guy, which has tremendous entertainment value — partly because it's really funny and partly because Isaiah Mustafa is extremely beautiful to look at — and people seek that out because there's something there that they want. And the marketing comes in subtly.
Contact Somersault (@smrsault) to help you cover all the bases in your marketing strategy.
And be sure to bookmark and use daily the SomersaultNOW online dashboard.
Seminary professor, theologian and bestselling Christian author Calvin A. Miller died Aug. 19 of complications following open heart surgery. He was 75.
A former Southern Baptist pastor and professor at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Fort Worth, Texas, Miller had served from 1999-2007 at Samford University's Beeson Divinity School, most recently as professor of preaching and pastoral ministry. He was the founding pastor (1966) of Westside Church (@WestsideOmaha), Omaha, NE.
The author of more than 40 books, including fiction, non-fiction, and poetry, he was described as a writer of love letters to the Lord. Among his work is The Singer Trilogy, published by InterVarsity Press (@ivpress), and his latest book, Letters to Heaven, published by Worthy Publishing (@WorthyPub).
· Dr. Calvin Miller tribute page by Westside Church.
· Facebook page of Westside Church.
· Facebook page of Calvin Miller.
· In Memoriam by Ed Stetzer (@edstetzer).
The publishing strategy and services agency Somersault Group (http://somersaultgroup.com), headquartered in Grand Rapids, MI, USA, is now conducting business in the British Isles and Europe with its international office in St. Andrews (@VisitStAndrews), Scotland, (@VisitScotland) established by Somersault’s general manager, John Topliff, DMin (Fuller Theological Seminary).
“The world is flat, as author Thomas Friedman says, and Somersault is eager to serve publishers, authors, non-profit organizations, and other content providers without the constraints of geographical boundaries,” Topliff says. “In today’s fast-changing environment of book publishing, our objective is to strategically connect authors with readers at any stage in the publishing spectrum, from concept to distribution, taking advantage of right-now technology and providing old-fashioned personal care.”
This expanded opportunity for Somersault is the result of Topliff encouraging his wife to interact with scholars working at the creative intersection of the disciplines of theology, imagination, and art. Debby Topliff, a poet, novelist, Bible teacher, and painter, is pursuing the masters in literature studying at St. Mary’s College, the divinity school at the University of St. Andrews (@univofstandrews).
John Topliff’s contact information is jtopliff@somersaultgroup.com and phone number 07713-183363 (from the USA dial 011-44-7713-183363).
With Topliff in Scotland, Somersault (@smrsault) announces the appointment of project management veteran Marianne Filary as office manager. Filary, vice-president of National Printing Services, joins Somersault most recently from Zondervan, where she was director of events – planning and executing such large gatherings as the National Pastors Convention.
In 25 years of national retailer, advertising agency, and publishing experience, Filary has managed countless marketing related projects and events, including executive team activities, celebrity dinners, grand openings, product launches, press conferences, cause-related gatherings, film screenings, author/speaker tours, and sales conferences.
“We’re thrilled to be able to use Internet technology to maximize the time differences and stay in close communication between Michigan and Great Britain to best serve Somersault clients,” Filary says.
Somersault’s USA office contact information is hello@somersaultgroup.com and 1-616-551-1539.
Along with Topliff, Somersault’s managing partners are Dave Lambert, editorial director, Jeannette Taylor, research and product development architect, Jonathan Petersen, social media marketing and PR evangelist, and John Sawyer, brand and marketing strategist.
Somersault Group™ (Somersault™) is a partner-managed LLC with offices in downtown Grand Rapids, MI, USA, and St. Andrews, Scotland. The company’s purpose is to enable publishers, agents, ministries, organizations, and Christian authors to quickly leverage rapid changes in communication technology, emphasize excellence in branding and marketing communication for an author’s business development, and extend the highest editorial standards to achieve the goal of helping people experience God’s kingdom. Somersault’s mission is to change lives by connecting inspirational content creators with readers using exceptional creativity, right-now technology, and old-fashioned personal care. Its online dashboard SomersaultNOW (http://netvibes.com/somersault) is a resource of information for marketing and publishing professionals. For more information about Somersault, visit somersaultgroup.com (@smrsault).
Bottlenose (@bottlenoseapp) is a new real-time social search engine. All Things D (@allthingsd) senior editor Mike Isaac (@MikeIsaac) says:
It is essentially described as a Google for the social Web, using public API inputs from the largest social networks out there: Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and Google+, as well as photo-sharing sites like Instagram. Enter a search query, and Bottlenose scans each of the networks for the most relevant, current information, depending on trends across networks and the influence of the people sharing the content.
It’s likely most relevant to marketers and social strategists who want to keep an eye on the pulse of whatever their clients follow. Without the search algorithm, the dashboard is especially close to a HootSuite-like analytics product. The free version is advertising-based — like Google — while the upgraded paid versions give better access to the Twitter firehose, along with additional feature upgrades.
Bottlenose is included in our (@smrsault) SomersaultNOW online dashboard in the “Research” and “Monitor Your Brand” tabs. Bookmark our dashboard and use it every day.
Floatingsheep.org (@floating_sheep), a website that maps the geographies of user-generated online content, has created the pdf booklet “Geographies of the World’s Knowledge,” a joint venture between Convoco and the Oxford Internet Institute (@oiioxford). Through creative maps, it visualizes the distribution of the world’s knowledge through 10 categories
1. Literacy and Gender
2. Internet Penetration
3. The World’s Newspapers
4. The Location of Academic Knowledge
5. Academic Knowledge and Language
6. Academic Knowledge and Publishers
7. Mapping Flickr
8. The Distribution of all Wikipedia Articles
9. Time-series of the Distribution of Biographies on Wikipedia over the Last Five Centuries
10. User-generated Content in Google
Data, evaluated in an unprecedented way, shows the current distribution of knowledge in the different parts of the globe. Some of the implications of this are surprising, others are worrying. The maps visualize where the foci of knowledge — and, thus, the forces of innovation and economic growth — are located. Thanks to this scientific visualization the most important factors involved can be grasped at a glance.
The booklet is also available in interactive format for iPads.
Consider how this information should influence your publishing strategy.
Contact Somersault (@smrsault) to help you plan, execute, and analyze market research for your brand.
And be sure to bookmark and use daily the SomersaultNOW online dashboard; especially the Research tab.
Image: Book Genome Project
On Mashable (@mashable), technology journalist Peter Pachal (@petepachal) writes, “In a scientific first, Harvard University researches successfully transformed a 53,426-word book into DNA, the same substance that provides the genetic template for all living things. The achievement could eventually lead to the mass adoption of DNA as a long-term storage medium.”
Published Thursday in the journal Science, the experiment aimed to demonstrate the viability of storing large amounts of data on DNA molecules. Since the data is recorded on individual nucleobase pairs in the DNA strand (those adenine-guanine/cytosine-thymine pairs you may be straining to remember from high school biology), DNA can actually store more information per cubic millimeter than flash memory or even some experimental storage techs, IEEE Spectrum reports.
Also see TechNewsWorld's (@technewsworld) "DNA Could Become the Next Big Data Warehouse."
Contact Somersault (@smrsault) to help you take advantage of right-now technology in the communication of your brand message and content.
And be sure to bookmark and use daily the SomersaultNOW online dashboard.