Andrea Weckerle

It’s pretty sad when you feel guilty for not having posted on your own blog for a while. I have a decent excuse though — for client work and upcoming projects, I’ve been spending a lot of time on MySpace, on Flickr and in Second Life. So in case you think I’ve gone AWOL, well, I’ve just been hanging out elsewhere for a bit.

Some comments as I get caught up:

• This past Monday the Social Media Club’s first D.C. get-together took place. Chris Heuer facilitated a great round table discussion between people from a diverse range of backgrounds. In attendance were quite a few PR professionals, other communications professionals, advertising folks, and entrepreneurs. The discussion was still going strong when the two hours scheduled for the meeting were over, so the fact that a good number of us continued talking afterwords over dinner and pool at Buffalo Billiards enabled us to delve deeper into some of the points raised earlier. Chris hopes to have the audio of the evening, as well as previous SMC events, up soon.
• There are several conferences and events I wasn’t able to attend (see last bullet point, darn) this year, but really wish I could have. An important one was this week’s Society for New Communications Research Inaugural Research Symposium Awards Gala in Boston. Congratulations to the 2006 Awards Winners, many of whom can be seen on Flickr.
• The Le Web 3 conference (I’m hoping it’ll be a memorable trip for me on many levels) has created a Planet LeWeb3 page that lists all of the registrants’ recent blog posts. Pretty neat.
• Sometimes even the best laid plans fall by the wayside, and one of the worse times this can happen is during a live interview. Read how Shel Israel successfully dealt with what could have been a disaster on Italy’s Sky TV. (Oh, and remember the many variations of the joke that starts with, "A priest walked into a bar and said…"? Well, here’s Shel’s version with nuns.)
• John Wagner posts a refresher on blogging terminology.
• Allan Jenkins points to Microsoft’s Ms. Dewey, a search engine receptionist with attitude. I typed in the word "avatar" and Ms. Dewey commented, "Between you and me, virtual reality creeps me out. I mean, talking to someone who isn’t real…" Heh.
• And here’s a cool new blog to check out, Lucas Mast’s Sneaker Blogger and corresponding Flickr pictures. I first met Lucas back in May at Third Thursday and learned there are two things he has a real fondness for, dessert and shoes. I’m definitely willing to trust the opinion of someone to whom time zones mean nothing when he’s trying to buy the latest fashionable footwear.
• Finally, if you’re not in San Francisco tonight attending the Vloggies Awards, they’ll be podcast through PodTech.net and iTunes.