The Age of Conversation & Youth: A Social Media Primer

“Social networks get things done,” says the narrator of this short video primer I found on Kim Klaver’s blog, who happens to be one of my co-contributors in The Age of Conversation. Wow, I’ll say. Today Drew and Gavin’s visionary book, The Age of Conversation comes alive! It's already featured in Social Computing Magazine here, the Ad Age … [Read more...]

Harry Potter Alliance Tackles the Darkness of Darfur

Let me get this straight. Media watchdogs deem the new Harry Potter film inappropriate for children, yet it’s being marketed to them heavily. Mainstream media mavens and reviewers debate the brooding adolescent depictions of an angry, angst-ridden Harry, deciding it’s gritty teen fare, on the cusp of its PG-13 rating. Gotcha. Meanwhile dark acts in the REAL world … [Read more...]

Cheaper Apple iPhone For 2008: Will They? Won’t They?

Will kids "bite the Apple" or will it prove to be media poison? First Reuters news reported that Apple Inc. plans to launch a cheaper version of the iPhone in the fourth quarter that could be based on the ultra-slim iPod Nano music player, according to a JP Morgan analyst based in Taiwan. NOW, JP Morgan has retracted. Gee, I'll bet analyst Kevin Chang's getting a ruler … [Read more...]

Coordinating Kids? Use Your Noodle To “Doodle” A Poll

Which weekend’s best for a slumber party? Who's carpooling to the game? What's your summer camp schedule? We all know how tedious it can be synchronizing different people's agendas to find a date that suits everybody. Doodle is a cool polling tool that's free, fast, and ‘idiot proof’ for people like me who can’t spare even a second to learn a new … [Read more...]

The Age of Conversation eBook: Shaping Youth for Children’s Charity

The birth of our Age of Conversation eBook coincides with the birth of my daughter, July 16th…wow, go figure, quite appropo! Happy ‘birth’day to all my co-authors, who generously participated in this global social media experiment to benefit Variety, The Children’s Charity! Next Monday, our eBook goes live, hot off the press, courtesy of creators Drew … [Read more...]