The Language of Social Media

Facebook post: "Panda Express needs to get in my mouth"
Translation - "I'm hungry for some good food."

Facebook post: "This."
Translation: "I'm speechless" or "My vocabulary is not adequate enough to convey the emotion behind what I'm posting, so just click the link below to read an article or watch a video."

Facebook post: "That is all."
Translation: "."

Facebook post: "I wish there was a dislike button"
Translation: "I hate this, but I nervously laughed a little"

Facebook post: "I literally died."
Translation: "This was pretty funny, but I'm still alive."

Facebook post: "WTH"
Translation: "Here's something that happened that I find hard to believe; and also, in case you didn't know, I don't like to use extreme profanity."

Facebook post: "no comments please"
Translation: "I'm voicing my opinion about an issue that will make people upset, but I don't want to hear what you think, and I don't know how to disable comments on this post."

In the interest of a social study please feel free to add to this list or make any corrections to my observations

Your Digital Estate

Log In information. Usernames and Passwords. Trillions of them flooding cyberspace on a daily basis. We all have them. I almost have too many to remember now. Financial accounts, social media accounts, business accounts, hobbyist accounts, online retailer accounts, email accounts, smartphone accounts, and the list goes on.

I can't tell you how many times I've been locked out of one of my accounts because I can't get the right username and password combination. It's almost like trying to crack a safe that's sitting at the bottom of the ocean guarded by a troll-like mermaid firing phosphorus flames from her flippers.
Accessing a piece of my digital life shouldn't be that cumbersome. But it is, and it doesn't help that my online footprint is everywhere, from Facebook and GoDaddy to the DMV and the NRA. And once in a while I have to go on that epic online journey in search of the ever elusive "Contact Us" link to get a hold of someone that knows who I am, because I haven't got a clue.
 
There it is! "Contact Us" buried in the smallest font imaginable under the "play video games for life" ad. I luck out. This actually has an 800 number and not some obscure texting rigmarole.
"Beep Boop Beep Beep Boop Boop Beep Beep Boop Boop."
"Ringtone...Ringtone...Ringtone...Ringto..."
"Halo, This is Raji, from tech support for Hot Pink Pajamas dot com, can I help you?"
"Umm...I can't seem to remember my password?"
"What eese your username, sir."
"Umm...I can't remember."
Stupified by my stupidity, Raji says, "Ummmm...," which completely unmasks his ethnicity, because on the other end of the phone line I picture him cross-legged with his eyes closed transcending time and space. "Let me transfer you to phone call purgatory and see what they can do for you."
"Thank you, but no. Is there anyway YOU can help me?"
"What eese your social security number?"
"Nice try, Bucko. Go chase yourself."
"Very well, if dere's nothing else I can help you with, have a nice day." *Click*
AUGHHHHH!
Other than a feeling of ineptitude, a slight twinge of rage, a pinch of vulnerability and a tablespoon of shame, my personhood is intact.

Believe it or not, this happens more than you might think. Keeping your cyber life organized is only about as difficult as balancing a checkbook or slaying a mammoth, depending on how you look at it. Here are a few ways you can turn this veritable bucket of chum into a well crafted German automobile.
Option One: Put together a list or spreadsheet with five headings: Company, Username, Password, Secret Question, Secret Answer, then fill in the blanks for all your digital accounts. You can do this on a Word Document, Legal Pad, or piece of papyrus. Then store said information in a safe place. However, not so safe you yourself will forget where it is, Mr. Griswold.
Option Two: Make all usernames match. Make all passwords match. Make all secret answers match, no matter what the secret question is. Don't make it to easy, you wanna make it easy on yourself, but as difficult as possible for identity thieves.
and finally,
Option Three: Send me all your usernames, passwords, secret questions and answers. I'll organize them, make a photocopy and give them back. End of story.

Each option has it pros and cons, which you have to measure carefully. Whatever you end up doing the goal is to inevitably make you easier to be around, because if you are constantly talking to tech support or reading emails about how to reset passwords and usernames then you are probably not the epitome of frivolity and pleasure.
The second reason you need to do this if for your loved ones. In the unlikely event of your untimely death or relocation as a result of the witness protection program, your loved ones will need an easy way to successfully secure your digital estate. (Yep, that's right I'm makin' it super real up in heya!)
While your making your way to the pearly gates, your friends and family are trying to figure out how to stop that weekly subscription to Fancy Cats or those automatic location updates to your social media profile.
"5 minutes ago at the Hospital." / "10 minutes ago at the City Morgue." / "6 minutes ago at Finnigan's Bar." Whoops!
Fun Bobby "likes" this.

It's tough enough in this world when someone passes; why not try to make it a little easier on everybody. Organize your digital estate and make it manageable. Tell someone you love and trust where all your information is, so some unsuspecting family member doesn't get a call from the Jane Fonda Fan Club trying to find out why you haven't been attending the online meetings.

In death and in life, your property is your property. Whether virtual or actual, you own it, and you decide who gets it when you're gone. And although Raji may seem like he's happy to hear from us, he's not, which might have something to do with that clandestine "Contact Us" button he doesn't want us to find. If we have that much trouble trying to get our own log in information, imagine getting it for someone else. Raji doesn't want to hear from us because he knows he'll just make us angry. He'd rather just play solitaire. I'd rather just blog about it.

For more information about what Digital Estates click on the following links:
http://cupofjoepowell.blogspot.com/2011/01/your-digital-afterlife.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_estate
http://www.cnbc.com/id/46750736/Facebook_May_Become_Part_of_Your_Digital_Estate
(This is a crazy story about a woman's son who died and Facebook wouldn't allow her to access his Facebook profile)
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/businesstechnology/2017171847_pfdigitalestates08.html

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***This blog post is dedicated to my friend and fellow artist Andrew Todd, who passed away last week. He showed me how to pursue my dreams by pursuing his at all costs. He helped get me my first job in media and mentored me through the mine field of mass communications. I will forever be grateful for his kindness and friendship. Here's to you Andy.***

Confessions of a Facebookaholic

I hope this day finds you all well. Today's topic is a sensitive one, and I thought it best to let someone who understands the subject a little better to delve into it's horrors. I secede to my new friend Larry the Talking Bird. Watch his video below.  (Transcript of the video is written out below.)

(if you have trouble viewing the video, click here)

Transcript of the Above Video:
Facebook. Facebook has taken the world by storm and right now someone somewhere is pretending not to be on it.  Hello, everyone, my name is Larry and today's blog is entitled "Confessions of a Facebookaholic" The Polar Bear has given me the task of bringing you today's blog Via Skype from my perch, high above the world. I would like to begin today's post by proposing we make an addendum to our old High School English Textbooks. A new part of speech called the proper verb. Definition: the class of words used to identify an action associated with a unique person, place thing or idea. Although mostly used as a proper noun, the word "Facebook" is also a proper verb. Example: "I'll Facebook you, after I finish building this rocket launcher." 

Well, I guess it's confession time, so here we go. I'm Larry the Bird and I'm a Facebookaholic. I stay up all night my eyes bloodshot, my bladder swollen, my tiny bird claw glued to my mouse "liking" everything that regurgitates over my glossy computer screen. I comment like there's no tomorrow. Commenting on status updates like there's no tomorrow, trying my best to get as many comments back as possible. Sometimes I can get a little crazy looking for an available computer to use. After taking down that adorable yet persistent 8-year-old girl at the public library for a chance to get on that infernal computer I realized I had a problem. After doing a little research I realized I wasn't the only one with a problem. There's others out there that spend half their afternoons spying on their ex-girlfriends, new boyfriend.

According to a study done in August of 2011 the average person spends almost 8 hours a month on Facebook, 2 hours more than a August 2010. That's 4 times the amount spent on Google. Wow! That actually may sound low to more than half of you. Remember though, these are averages. Here are some other averages in descending order: AOL - 2 hours 53 minutes/month, Yahoo 2 hours 12 minutes/month, Google - 1 hour 46 minutes/month, and Youtube - 1 hour 41 minutes/month. Think of all the diseases we could be curing or the celebrities we could be stalking... or the money we could be making...

Time is money, you know, and Facebook is stealing our time like a dairy farmer steals milk from the utters of lonely heifer. We are that lonely heifer. For years now, we've been getting owned by Facebook. Not anymore, it's time Facebook got owned by us. Apparently, Mark Zuckerberg, creator of Facebook agrees. Mr. Anti-Social, himself, has ironically, opened his social network to John Q. Public. Facebook has filed for a chance to be publicly traded on the stock market. Come April or May-ish you too can own Facebook.  All you have to do is buy one share. It's a statistical coin flip on whether you'll make some dough or not, but when the time comes the proverbial bathrobe will be open and you'll be able to judge alongside your peers whether Facebook will be worth it or not. I'm not saying its a good or a bad investment, I'm just saying you CAN invest.
Just to give you some perspective on this interesting venture, when Google went public it offered 19,605,052 shares at a price of $85 per share, with 271 million shares still under the control of Google employees. This means that at the time Google was worth 23 billion dollars. Facebook is said to be worth more than 4 times that at 100 billion dollars. Can someone say, "Dollar, Dollar Bills, ya'll, rainin' up in here! Cha-Ching!"?
So, here's the long and short of it, folks, I love Facebook like I love sunflower seeds and I am absolutely nuts about the fact that I will soon be able to own a piece of Facebook. So the next time your boss catches you updating your timeline instead of running analytics, just tell him it's okay, your working on an investment.
Larry the Bird says, "Get off this stinkin' computer and go buy yourself a piece of Facebook."