Pretty Special Stuff

Has it been a busy week for you, so far? Because it sure has been for us.

Our SEOgrams iOS app is back on the App Store after our recent transition to an Enterprise developer license; we completed and delivered a huge site map for a major university; and we’re busy wrapping up wireframes for two exciting new mobile projects. But that’s only half the story. Everything we do exists as part of the constantly evolving media landscape in which we operate, and was it ever busy out there this week.

For starters, SXSWi (the South By Southwest Interactive festival), wrapping up today in Austin, has produced an impressive amount of buzz as usual – this time thanks to a stunt that turned homeless people into mobile 4G hotspots.

Second, let’s talk about link citation. It used to be sufficient, when citing an online source, to link to its URL (as in the previous paragraph). No longer, though, if the folks behind curatorscode.org have their way. The site launched this week in an effort to enforce attribution standards for people who share things online. Sounds fine and dandy except – get this – they’re concerned that people who share things are missing out on hard-earned credit. Not the creators, but the sharers. Time to get the differences straight, between a via (ᔥ), a hat-tip (↬), and a good old-fashioned stomach heave.

Finally, in a move one could be forgiven for not having heard, Twitter announced a deal to buy also-ran Tumblr knockoff Posterous, in what pretty much everyone alive seems to agree is a talent acquisition. No time like the present to rethink your Posterous strategy – assuming you have the misfortune of having developed and pursued one.

And these, these three humongous things from our little corner of worldly concerns, these are but the tip of the iceberg. Any of these three developments could cause ripples throughout our industry. Controversy invites scrutiny. Change enlivens the mind.

This week, the waves of disruption emanated from Austin and led with nascent changes in the social media marketing landscape. Google routinely upends the rules with search algorithm changes. No sooner do we think we’ve fixed a thing in our sights, than it bursts into its next incarnation, and the hunt for understanding resumes.

This – this constant reconciling between our interior and the world – is perhaps my favorite part of what we do in this profession. We track change and hunt meaning. We ignore, subscribe, sort, like, and share our most prized finds. We examine life and its developments with curiosity and enthusiasm, turning it all inside out as we perpetually replenish that which keeps us connected with one another. It’s fun, it keeps us human, and its natural fruits are to help us do great work for inspiring organizations and people.

That’s pretty special stuff.