Joseph is an interaction designer, strategist and founding partner behind ventures like .extendr. We get the scoop on his latest project, LocateMyDeal

Lisa is the Digital PR Specialist at Mall of America (@MallofAmerica) and a frequent contributor to the podcast. She recently blogged about her experience as a first time SXSWi attendee and shares her takeaways with us.

We also cover some upcoming SMBMSP events and activities.

http://smbmsp.org/resources/podcasts/smbmsp-listenup-march-2011.mp3

Listen and download past episodes at smbmsp.org or via itunes.

In this month’s episode, my co-host Rick Mahn and I discuss the current state of publishing. This also happens to be the topic of the next Social Media Breakfast – Minneapolis/St. Paul.

Our guest is Pamela Muldoon (@PamelaMuldoon). Pamela is the owner/host/producer at Next Stage Business Radio Network and our moderator for SMBMSP#33.

http://smbmsp.org/resources/podcasts/smbmsp-listenup-january-2011.mp3

Listen and download past episodes at smbmsp.org or via itunes.

In this special holiday episode, my co-host Rick Mahn and I discuss social good, using social media to benefit nonprofit organizations. Our guests include:

• Jesse Stremcha, ePhilanthropy Specialist for Children’s Hospitals and Clinics of Minnesota
• Randy Bunker, Web Strategy and Communication Manager at Children’s Hospitals and Clinics of Minnesota
• Nicole Harrison, Digital Strategist and Social Media Consultant at SocialNicole, LLC and creator of #NPTalk

http://smbmsp.org/resources/podcasts/smbmsp-listenup-december-2010.mp3

Listen and download past episodes at smbmsp.org or via itunes.

While I’m a strong supporter of occasional social “friend” trimming, I’m not sure the new holiday will catch on. For those with sizable lists of friends, it’s a time-consuming process to manage. Multiply that by all the other social networks you may be active on and you can quickly be engulfed by a mountain of followers, contacts, connections and tweeps.

What do you think? How often, if ever, do you edit your list of Facebook friends? What does someone have to do to be unfriended by you?

Millions will be hitting the polls in the US today. Many will be spreading the word on the social web. It’s never been easier. Here are a few ways you can share your vote.

Get started with Google
Before you can spread the word you have to vote. Need help learning how and where? Google makes it easy by including a polling place finder in certain search results that links to a customized page powered by their Election Center.

Shout it out on Foursquare
Foursquare has been busy adding many polling places as venues and including them in as special category that shows up in your nearby places view. They are tracking check-ins in real-time nationwide at their shiny new site elections.foursquare.com.

Of course they are also offering a limited edition badge. Just check in with #ivoted  in the shout out to get yours.

Declare your vote on Facebook
Your Facebook home page includes a widget that lets you share your vote and has a running total of how many other users, including your friends, have voted.

Facebook also has an official U.S. polictics app that includes a polling place finder and will stream live video coverage starting later this afternoon.

Pimp out your profile with “I voted” avatar images
You can spread the word (and pile on the peer pressure) to all the social networks you belong to by changing your avatar photo. I’ve created some options below. They’re free for personal use. Click on each for a  larger version. Right-click (PC) or control-click (Mac) to grab the image.

Have you come across any other fun or creative ways to share your vote online?

Nearly 1 billion people don’t have access to something we take for granted — clean, safe drinking water. Unsafe water and lack of basic sanitation cause 80% of diseases and kill more people every year than all forms of violence, including war. Children are especially vulnerable. Every week, nearly 38,000 children under the age of 5 die as a direct result of these conditions. The United Nations declared access to clean water and sanitation a human right in 2009.

I believe this is a crisis the rest of the world has a responsibility to address. Unlike so many challenges of our time, this is one that money can solve. All it takes to give one person water for 20 years is $20!  We can build wells, treatment plants, irrigation systems and infrastructure. The social web has given us the tools to mobilize the planet, to focus global conversation and collaborate on a massive scale. We can fix this. We just need to make it a priority to do so.

Bloggers across the globe will unite today for Blog Action Day. As of this writing, participants include 4,896 blogs in 136 countries with 37,867,698 readers. The goal of this annual event is to raise awareness and incite discussion about important issues that affect us all. Having so many write about the same issue on the same day is an elegant and dramatic method of accomplishing this. Focus in the past has been placed on the environment and poverty. The issue this year is water.

The art of maximizing social activism and online fundraising for this issue has been mastered by charity:water. Although their simple mission (to bring clean and safe drinking water to people in developing nations) has attracted the attention of celebrities and the media, I’m more impressed by their outreach to individuals. They provide powerful web tools that make it ridiculously easy to for anyone to make a substantial difference. Most notably, the first Twestival (Twitter Festival, get it?) used social media to raise almost half a million dollars for them in 2009.

I’d like to highlight two Minnesota friends whose inspirational efforts have made a big difference. TV producer and photographer Erica Meyer gave up her 29th birthday to raise $10K for charity:water. She wound up bringing in $11,111 and making clean water a reality for 111 families in two communities in need. Not to mention the impact of putting the issue in front of countless others online.

Another tireless advocate for the cause is writer/editor Kevin Hendricks. A portion of the proceeds of his latest book, Addition by Adoption, raised more than $5,700 to build a well in Ethiopia. Previously he held a Bald Birthday Benefit to provide 30 people with clean water in the 30 days before his 30th birthday. He vowed to shave his head if the goal was achieved. It only took six days before he had to put the razor to work. A clean shave for clean water.

Kevin created the short video below which quite literally brought the issue home for me. In it, he carries five gallons of water (weighing 40 pounds) from the Mississippi River two miles to his house. African women walk over 40 billion hours each year carrying similar vessels to gather water, which is usually still not safe to drink.

In the time it takes for another child to die without clean water, you could take just a moment to spread the word:

• Tweet about Blog Action Day or retweet others, use the
• Read, share or comment on Blog Action Day posts from around the web (lists of featured and recent posts)
• Embed the Blog Action Day video on your blog
• Mention it in a Facebook status update
• Start a conversation about the issue with a coworker
• Bring it up with your family at the dinner table this evening

If you’d like to go further you can make even more of a difference.

• Sign the petition to support the UN’s efforts to bring clean, safe water to millions globally
• Fundraise for charity:water or donate to water.org
• Take time to learn more about this crisis and share what you learn

Thank you.

I was lucky enough to take in an advanced screening for SMBMSP members earlier in the month have had some time to let the experience sink in. I still stand by my initial under 140 character review on Twitter:

My main takeaway was just how darn enjoyable the film was on virtually every level. Casting, script and score (by Trent Reznor!) were all worthy of note. The characters, even minor players, were complex and anything but the stereotypes they could have been. Some may not be a fan of reverse storytelling via flashbacks, but I think it worked well in this case. Watching the birth of Facebook unfold through small private moments while being so familiar with the current version of the site in full glare of the the public eye creates a marvelous tension for the viewer.

It’s far too limiting to say it’s a just movie about a social network. It’s about those rare moments in history when a person, an idea and and a culture converge to create something infinitely bigger. It’s really about the birth of a movement. The main difference here is how quickly it caught on and the incredible scale it achieved.

So my rating should be no surprise:
one pixelated thumb up. (Sorry, I couldn’t resist)

It’s easy to discount the “best movie ever” praise oozing from every corner of cyberspace, but this movie is something special. Here are more reviews from some of my peeps:

• Cydney Wuerffel on Idea Peepshow
• Judy Grundstrom on JustJudyJudyJudy
• Kay Roseland on Shareology
• Katie Little on the SMBMSP Blog

Some related videos…

My favorite “official” trailer
While it doesn’t appear in the film, the chorale-like version of “Creep”
backing this preview really sets the mood.

Mark Zuckerberg’s version of ‘The Social Network’
Even funnier after you’ve seen the film. Be patient, this player shows
an advertisement before the clip. (via Bombi(llo))

Greatest Hits of Zach Galifianakis’s Between Two Ferns
Recut As the Social Network Trailer
I had to include this. The parody features clips from Galifianakis’s hilarious
Funny or Die web series. (via Vulture)

Animated News of the Day: The plot of The Social Network
summed up in (just over) one minute
Taiwan’s premiere animated tabloid by Next Media Animation. This is definitely
funnier after seeing the film. The subtitles are epic.

It’s about time someone did.