No longer satisfied to be consumers of content, today’s audience creates content as well, and is uploading photographs, audio, and video to the cloud by the billions. Producing, commenting, and classifying these media have become just as important as the more passive tasks of searching, reading, watching, and listening. Sites like Flickr, Odeo, YouTube, Google Video, and Ourmedia make it easy to find images, videos, and audio clips, but the real value of these sites lies in the way that users can classify, evaluate, comment upon, and add to the content that is there. Using simple interfaces, visitors can build shared collections of resources, whether they be links, photos, videos, documents, or almost any other kind of media. They can find and comment on items in other people’s lists, sharing not only the resources themselves but information and descriptive details about them.

As a result, over the past few years, the ways we produce, use and even think about our media have undergone a profound transformation. Literally billions of videos, podcasts, and other forms of social media are just a click away for any Internet-connected user. As the numbers and quality of user-produced clips have increased, our notions of what constitutes useful or engaging media have been redefined — and more and more, it is a two- to three-minute piece designed for viewing inside a browser or on a mobile phone.

Don’t do social media on accident — follow marketingsavant.com and do it “on purpose”…

Interesting post, but they missed my three favorites sorted from free to $$$: Google Reader, SocialMention.com and Jive. What about you? Follow the ‘via’ link to go to the source…

You know your business can’t just wing it on Twitter (), you need a strategy. But how do you get there? A lot of social media advice revolves around confusing, high-concept buzzwords: There are only so many times you can be told to “listen” and “engage.” Concrete advice can be hard to come by, and while this guide won’t tell you what you need to tweet, it will provide you with the real questions you need to ask in order to craft a Twitter strategy for your business.

Building up a business network isn’t easy, but it is essential if you intend to succeed anywhere in the world of business. This is especially true of small businesses without the track records of larger, more established organizations. Personal connections can mean all the difference between profitability and bankruptcy.

In a previous article, I wrote about ways to reignite your existing network online. In this post, I want to focus on how to use the web to make actual, lasting connections that will help you achieve your goals.

Many businesspeople don’t think of the web as a place to make connections, but rather to communicate with them. This isn’t true anymore, and in fact social media tools can be more effective than in-person meetings, especially when you’re trying to build an international network.

Most of the negative experiences that brands have had with Social Media happen because they are trying to broadcast and/or advertise in the channel. They are, essentially, trying to spam the network, lie to it, or pull a fast one over it. Those games won’t work on this playing field. Social Media is about real interactions between real human beings, and most brands do not have the Marketing culture and organization to transcend, so they use their old tactics in this new channel with failed efforts. This is where the fundamental struggle lies. Brands that are helpful, transparent and active do thrive in Social Media and – much like humans – are more than fine with the occasional mistake, foible and fumble (we all make them).

Kudos, Mitch — best title of the day! Follow the ‘via’ link to go to the source…