Categories
Funny Tech

Social media cushions (seriously)

I don’t know what’s worse. That they exist, or that I just bought the bottom 3.

You can buy them here if you think you’re as much of a nutter.

social-pillows

Categories
Twitter

Midlife chatterers show they like to keep it short and tweet

The following is an article written by Murad Ahmed, Technology Reporter and featured in the British newspaper, The Times, today (Monday, April 13th) so for those that didn’t see it or are over in the US and elsewhere this is for you. (I’ve added in a few Twitter cartoons just for fun..)

Twitter appears to be the embodiment of youth culture with tech-savvy and fast-thumbed teens firing off short updates filled with abbreviations about their lives. But it turns out that the keenest users are the greying brigades of the middle aged.

More mature users, led by famous tweeters such as Stephen Fry, Jonathan Ross and Sarah Brown, are the driving force behind the popularity of the site. New research shows that 45-54 years olds are 36 percent more likely than the average to visit the site, with figures from comScore, the internet market researchers, showing that the majority of the 10 million Twitter users worldwide are aged 35 or older.

Twitter Cartoon

Twitter is a social networking and “microblogging” site, where users post short updates – “tweets” of up to 140 characters via the website or a mobile phone. More than 3.5 million people signed up in the first two months of this year.

Celebrities such as Russell Brand and Jamie Oliver are avid users, while Barack Obama used it as a tool during last year’s presidential elections to talk directly and quickly to hundreds and thousands of followers.

Stephen Fry, 51, the actor and comedian whose tweets are followed by about 400,000 people, has become a leading advocate for the service. “I love how Twitter confirms all too often assaulted belief that most humans are kind, curious, knowledgeable, tolerant and funny” he wrote on his blog. (Is your Twitter page a blog in the traditional form? I’m not so sure)

Celebrity tweeters have pushed others towards the site “It’s the role model thing” said Richard Drake, 51, from London. “You see Stephen Fry and think, they’re doing it, so why can’t you?” You’re not teenagers, so you’re no longer following the crowd to the same degree perhaps. “But you think, well, he’s finding it interesting, there’s something happening there, and people my age are doing it.”

Twitter Cartoon
Other social networking websites, such as Facebook and MySpace have also seen an increase in the number of older people signing up in recent months. But the simplicity of Twitter has made it most popular with the golden oldies and 2o percent of all tweeters in Britain are over the age of 55, compared with 12 percent of all Facebook users.

However, it seems that the young are being put off by the increasing number of older users. “I do think there’s a feeling that, if your parents are doing it, suddenly it’s not cool any more” said Jamie Gavin, an analyst at comScore.

Ageing tweeters also said that whereas Facebook seemed to reveal every aspect of your life – something the young seem more at ease at doing – Twitter was less intrusive, and often is used by people at work. “I only Twitter professionally,” said Ian Williams, 41, an executive at a price comparison website. “For us, it’s just another communications tool. That’s the beauty of Twitter, if you decide something is not interesting or inane, you can stop following it. It’s just not invasive”Twitter Cartoon

Categories
Advertising Digital Music Social Media

Say Yes To Safe Sex with MTV, Spotify and The Body Shop

It’s been an exciting week at work, working with MTV’s HIV / Aids awareness charity in collaboration with Spotify, to promote safe sex through music. So far, some brilliant MTV presenters and music artists have taken part, including Gym Class Heroes, Stereophonics and V V Brown.

Other contributors include some of the best in the business online including the global celebrity gossip blogger Perez Hilton, the guys at Hecklerspray, TechFluff.TV host Hermione Way and Cate Sevilla from BitchBuzz. They have all created their very own ‘Play Safe’ playlists of ten tracks each – basically, music for loving! Many more are to come also, so keep checking back with the Yes Yes Yes blog. Tantalising Lip Butter

Why are we getting involved? For very good reasons. There are 33 million people living with AIDS and HIV, a number that is increasing each day. As part of the campaign MTV and The Body Shop are also joining forces to raise cash for the Staying Alive Foundation – a charity which raises money for health education and awareness projects in the UK and overseas. A new fundraising Tantalising Lip Butter (RRP: £5.00) is now on sale in The Body Shop stores internationally and online in the UK with nearly £4 per pot sold going to help fund sex education work and save lives.

It’s all being supported online with the official site Yestosafesex.com, a blog and pages on MySpace, Facebook, Twitter and Flickr. The good people at Spotify led by PR head Sophia Bendz have also kindly contributed ad inventory to the cause so keep an eye out for the related ads on the service!

Here’s the chance for you to get involved too

If you’ve got Spotify then you can simply email / DM the HTTP link to your ‘Play Safe’ playlist once you’ve done it. SpotifyDon’t worry if you haven’t got Spotify yet, you can either download it here or alternatively, simply email your 10 tracks for loving and we’ll do the rest! We’d love to see all your blog posts about why you chose the tracks you did!

My Spotify Play Safe Playlist looks a little like this.. LitmanLive Loves You!

(Clicking the link above will take you directly to Spotify, I’ll update this post with my entry when it gets uploaded to the Yes Yes Yes blog.)

EDIT – Here it is – Clicky

Love Gun – Kiss
Hounds of Love – Kate Bush
Baby Love – The Supremes
What Is Love – Haddaway
This Years Love – David Gray
Do You Love Me? – Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds
Digital Love – Daft Punk
Let Love Rule – Lenny Kravitz
Bleeding Love – The Wombats
Streets of Love – The Rolling Stones

What will yours look like?

I’m going to tag Chris, Jed, Tom, Lolly and Jaz, as I’d love to hear what their playlist would sound like.

Think you’ve got a great soundtrack for loving? Well, why not create it, blog it and share it with us!