What the [BLEEP] Did I Do This Year? 2011 Edition
No, there are no editions for 2008-10 (holy crap, this thing spans four years?). I’m trying something new.
It’s that time of year when the majority of the world is either looking back and/or forward, and the rest are drinking themselves so stupid that they can’t remember which is which. I’m impressionable, so of course I eventually started to wonder what the heck I did this year.
Blog more. Yes, I think it’s safe to say I managed to do that in 2011, compared to the, what, five?, posts I wrote in 2010. Still not up to a post a week, but I’m working on it. Speaking of blogging, I began contributing to RaceTalk, my agency’s blog about media, communications and PR. It’s off to a slow start, but hey, it’s a work-in-progress. I’m still most proud of my Twitter-sourced interview with @BostonTweet (thanks again, Tom!), and would like to do at least one more similarly formatted interview in 2012 with another Tweeter (maybe two?). Other blogs that saw inaugural postings from yours, truly, include Health Care 3.0 (health care trends with a social media twist) and Girls Pint Out (women with a love for craft beer – my people, if you will).
I changed the name of my blog. The weblog formerly known as And Here, We Have My Musings is now what we all fondly refer to as bmfalc: Beyond 140. The goal of the name-change was to move away from some random college student’s blog and to tie it to my stronger online presence in the Twittersphere. Beyond 140 serves to cover the stuff I tweet about in, well, a few more than 140 characters. Like my tweets? Then there’s a chance you may find my blog amusing, or at least interesting.
Brittany Falconer, assistant account executive. Yup, celebrated my one-year anniversary at Racepoint Group and got promoted. It would appear that I’m doing something right over there. Weird, right?
Smartphone-equipped, at last. No longer dependent on a phone with special needs, I have joined the ranks of those who will never get lost again, have the potential to work 24/7 (I’m fighting it though), and lose hours of their lives to Angry Birds (I didn’t fight that so much). I did not, however, jump on the Apple bandwagon and purchase an iSomethingorother (Sorry, Siri). Instead I’m rocking the Samsung Infuse, which has a screen the size of my face. Its size is the perfect setup for a plethora of “That’s what she said” comments.
Joined the gym, quit the gym. There really isn’t more to that story.
Started running, wanted to quit running, ran 5K instead. After the failure at the gym, I knew I would eventually grow to the size of a small U-Haul if I didn’t do something to pace my beer and bacon calories. On a whim, I ran my first mile – slowly – late in the summer. Once the feeling of seemingly imminent death eventually passed, I very gradually worked my way up to running a mile and a half, two miles, two and a half miles, and, as of yesterday, just enough more than three miles to discover that I could survive a 5K. Given my distaste for running, this is a huge accomplishment for me, and I’m actually looking forward to registering for my first race in 2012 – mostly just to prove to myself that I can do it, but whatever.
Won the lottery, received an honorary degree from Harvard, cured cancer. Okay, maybe not, but there’s always next year, right?
Best wishes to all for a happy and healthy new year!
Now’s Your Chance to #AskBostonTweet
I recently started writing for my agency‘s blog, RaceTalk. Following my first post not too long ago, I eagerly sent my mother a link to show her that yes, my college degree wasn’t going to waste. She Emailed me a short while later to say that she learned a lot from my post, and oh, by the way, she found a typo.
Thanks, Mom!
I haven’t been discouraged from contributing to RaceTalk, though. Rather, I figured I’d just work around my flawed typographical skills, and switch to a new media platform: video. Onto the meat of this post.
Many of you who read my blog are active on Twitter, or are at least familiar with it. Either way, there’s a good chance you’ve heard of Tom O’Keefe, or more likely his Twitter persona, @BostonTweet.
BostonTweet was created […] as a way to create awareness for local business in a down economy.
Tom developed BostonTweet in November 2008 when the financial markets were at a precipitous decline and his two former startups had become worthless after the crash. Fearing that Boston would become a 1929 ghost town, O’Keefe created BostonTweet to make sure everyone knew that our favorite restaurants and bars were still open and needed our business for survival. Needing a very economical platform to promote local business, Twitter was hands down the best application to talk about everything Boston.
— Gotta love “About” pages, right?
Anyhoo, over the last couple of years, @BostonTweet has developed into somewhat of a hyper-local Twitterlebrity, with almost 30,000 folks following him on Twitter for updates on Boston goings-on, including special events, Boston city-living, food and drink deals, burritos, and his whereabouts. While we have oodles of social media gurus telling us how businesses can benefit from social media, we’ve got a guy in Boston who is demonstrating it before our very eyes.
Now, if you’re at all like me, you may have a couple of questions for this guy: how was the idea of @BostonTweet conceived (why not Facebook, or a blog or forum), and what made it take off the way it did? Can a man truly live on burritos and beer alone? What’s next for social media-fueled citizen journalism? And seriously, what’s with the burritos?
I have wonderful news for you: the man, myth and legend behind BostonTweet has agreed to a video interview (see, there was a point to the beginning of this post) on Thursday evening, April 7. Between now and then, tweet your questions for BostonTweet using the hashtag #AskBostonTweet. We’ll pick out a few gems to answer on Thursday evening, then post his answers to your questions – and a couple of mine – on Friday, April 8. Start tweeting!
Name Change: “Musings” Is Now “bmfalc: Beyond 140”
Hey kids,
Starting the incredibly gradual transition to BrittanyFalconer.com. Part of that transition includes a change in name for the blog, which used to be known as “And Here We Have My Musings” (or perhaps in your minds, “Brittany’s Blog”). Say hello to “bmfalc: Beyond 140.” The hope is to focus a bit more on social media, PR and other profession-related material – flavoured with all that other stuff I yammer on about.
Other things to look out for include new categories and eventually a new layout. I’ll keep you all posted.
Cheers! Brittany
I’m on a Bus!
… Okay, so it’s not as cool as being on a boat, but we can’t have everything, right? That, and if I was on a boat, do you really think I’d be blogging?
Wait, I did that for a week, didn’t I. My bad!
I don’t actually have anything exciting to contribute this afternoon, but I really do need to get back into this blogging thing. Now, that’s not to say that nothing exciting is going on in my life – I just scored my first client placement while at PN yesterday, I’m moving to another part of Beantown any week now, I’ll be checking out Cirque du Soleil’s OVO next week, my birthday’s just days away and I am on a Greyhound right now – but those of you who actually know me more or less know all that, and those of you who don’t know me likely don’t care.
Although, now that I think of it, I do owe a couple posts. For those of you who enjoy reading books – are there any of you left out there? – the ruthlessly abrasive (yet all-around good guy) Gary Vaynerchuk published a book not too long ago, Crush It!, which is a great read for anybody who has a a drive to monetise his or her passion. I finished chapter 2 and announced via Twitter that I couldn’t wait to blog about it. Life got busy, and I never did. Gary, I have not forgotten about you! I swear I will re-read your book and tell the blogosphere about how awesome it is.
Another blog topic I’ve been putting off is something I’ve enjoyed far more recently: seafood. More specifically, Atlantic Fish Co. seafood. And not just the seafood, but . . . well, why spoil the post? Here we go!
New York Times: Still Pro-Blogger
Last January, The New York Times took a bold step: announcing the plan to charge frequent readers of its online edition beginning in January 2011. 
Site visitors will be able to view X number of articles monthly (“X” having yet to be determined) before NYT asks that they subscribe in order to read more. Folks who subscribe to the printed paper automatically enjoy full access to the site.
WebProNews recently highlighted one particular concern: being one of the four most linked-to sites by bloggers, how would this decision affect blog-based inbound links for the news source?
Folks who find their way over to NYT via blogs more often than not are in luck. As it turns out, that method of reading NYT articles doesn’t go against the monthly allotted article credits. According to a spokesman, “The pay model will be designed so readers that are referred from third party sites such as blogs will be able to access that content without hitting their limit, enabling NYTimes.com to continue being a part of the open web.” Not only would a casual reader be more likely to go elsewhere for his news if he had to pay to read the article, but bloggers also don’t like linking people to things they have to pay for (outside of product endorsements, but that’s different). Smart move, NYT.
That’s all fine and good for the lovely people who read our blogs, but what about us actual bloggers? If we’re driving traffic to the site, shouldn’t we receive some kind of credit? Granted, The Times has several months before it will implement this new strategy, and I think they have a good idea so far. A thought regarding the bloggers: if one can determine how many times one computer has accessed NYTimes.com, I imagine that computer can also get linked to a blog. Suppose for each link back to the site, the reader/blogger regains one article credit. Again, The Times has a long way to go, and I am not the one to determine the mechanics, but I bet it’s doable.
Today’s Tunes
“So What,” Miles Davis
“In the Waiting Line,” Zero 7
Stuff I Still Need to Blog
North End Dining – in process!
Hartford Dining
Regrets of a Senior (for BU’s Dean Elmore, hopefully)
The Job Hunt, A.K.A., The World’s Most Mind-Numbing Scavenger Hunt
Wine Riot
–And How I Got Those Tickets
Beers with Professors!
I recognise that this post was of essentially no relevance to you, unless you actually follow my blog actively, and for that . . . what, you want me to apologise? I’ve just told you what to expect between now and the end of the weekend! Deal with it!
Right! And I keep forgetting that I have real homework, too. I may never sleep again, so I’d better enjoy my 40 winks tonight!
Tonight’s Distraction
The Sandman. He won’t stop calling me. Rather rude, really.
