We can only hope ‘This is It’
Ferrets, caskets, and Michael Jackson … this week on the social web.
Weird news on the social web this week — @rogerdooley shared an MSNBC report from Florida: “Guy arrested for assault with ferret concealed in pants.” No word on whether the ferret will be charged as an accomplice or companion.
From the bizarre to the macabre, @michaelallison shared a Vancouver Sun story “Wal-Mart selling caskets online” – apparently Costco USA already does so (Costco.ca asked me “Did you mean basket?” – um, no). Shipping not included. Some restrictions may apply.
Speaking of dead, apparently the oil sands is trying to get past the image of dead ducks, according to a story shared by @Christi_Millar on Marcel Coutu, CEO of Canadian Oil Sands. If oil sands companies don’t get their PR in order, they’ll be the dead ducks.
From the dead to the undead from @fullbodypuppets “Dancing with the Undead – Halloween pales next to Haiti’s annual voodoo holiday,” a fascinating account of a journalist’s experience on Haiti’s “Jour Des Morts”.
An undead topic trending this week was Michael Jackson’s new film “This Is It!” @oliverwaters tweeted ”The Michael Jackson film ‘This Is It’ earned $20.1m (£12.1m) at worldwide box offices in its first day!” The Twitterverse was chirping with Oscar talk amidst a cacophony of sycophantic Michael love. In the words of @channel4news “This Is It. Michael Jackson. Video. Words fail us”. Some of us are truly hoping this is it.
In other musical news, rapper Beanie Sigel trended on Twitter for dissing Jay-Z in his latest song. As @AmaniArk put it “depending how this goes we may have to put Beanie Sigel ‘s rap career in a Wal-Mart casket”.
Over on Digg.com readers were voting up the Guardian’s (guardian.co.uk) “Chinese Hymen” story where reporter Mohamed Al Rahhal couldn’t resist ordering the “virginity restoration product” that has outraged Egyptians. Shipping not included. Some restrictions may apply.
At NowPublic.com readers were voting up the “NWA Pilots’ Laptop Distraction ‘Clear violation’ Says Delta CEO” story – you know, where two pilots swear they weren’t asleep but were just busy looking at their laptops and thus overshot the runway by 150 miles. Probably installing Windows 7.
A little closer to home, DigitalJournal.com reported “Waits of three hours or more are common as high risk individuals seek protection from the second wave of the H1N1 pandemic influenza presently rippling across Ontario.” Albertans were waiting up to six hours in the first days of vaccination clinics, but that is slowly tapering off as the bottleneck clears and more resources are mobilized. Meanwhile Saskatchewanians are waiting for the vaccine to be made available.
In tech news, social media platforms rolled out their own changes this week.
Facebook introduced the “Live Feed”, which promptly befuddled most of us, as Facebook often does with their inscrutable UI design. As the Vancouver Sun’s @KirkLapointe said “The longer I contend with Live Feed and News Feed at Facebook, the more confused I feel. What was broken that needed to be fixed?”
And Twitter added the “lists” feature to mainly positive reviews and some perspiration:
Said @kaigani: “realising that lists aren’t just limited to your followers makes me break out in sweats – i have an urge to categorise the whole of twitter”
To wrap things up on this #followfriday, a little quote from @thequotemaster:
“Be nice to nerds. Chances are you’ll end up working for one – Bill Gates”
As usual, send your cards and letters with hashtag #RTWT on Twitter so I can highlight the weird and wonderful stuff you see on the social web, or tweet me at @dblacombe.
Doug Lacombe is president of communicatto.com, a digital marketing, investor and public relations agency.
About Doug Lacombe
As president of social media agency communicatto, Doug is a social media speaker, strategist and consultant. A 20 year media and marketing veteran, Doug was one of the first in North America to put a daily newspaper on the web in 1995. Prior to founding communicatto inc. in 2009, he held senior roles in the newspaper, software, wireless, and newswire industries. Speaking and working all over North America, Doug is based in beautiful Calgary, Alberta Canada where he lives with his wife of 24 years, Sandra, and a spoiled Mexican rescue dog named Bug.
Tags: Beanie Sigel, caskets, Chinese Hymen, digital, digitaljournal.com, facebook, ferret, H1N1, Jay-Z, Live Feed, Michael Jackson, News Feed, nowpublic.com, oilsands, pants, social, Social Media, social networks, social web, swine flu, Twitter, vaccination, vaccine, virginity restoration, Wal-Mart
