W. Davd Phillips » Social Media

Getting Fluid with the Mac

David Phillips — Thu, 29 Apr 2010 14:08:29 +0000

In the past few months, I have attempted to simplify my life. We live in such a consumption culture that life is very overwhelming. Letting go of the unnecessary is important, but difficult. And that does not even take into account the increasing popularity of social media.

Part of my process has been to severely limit my time with email, facebook, twitter, and other social media platforms. That even includes blogging. To accomplish this, I wrote an applescript to open and close my email client and Seesmic, a twitter/facebook desktop client. Those scripts are scheduled by the power of iCal and have been wonderful in limiting my distractions.

While like some features of Seesmic, I really prefer the features of hootsuite.com. Unfortunately, they do not have a true desktop application. Neither does Facebook. So in the past, I had to be disciplined to close my facebook tab on my google chrome browser, as well as the google reader tab. With ADD, however, I often just forgot to close those tabs and found myself perusing those too much.

Yesterday, however, I found an application for the Mac called Fluid. Fluid allows you to turn any website into a Mac desktop application. So I turned hootsuite.com into the hootsuite app. Facebook.com has become an app for my Mac. The same for google reader. Now in my open/close script, I just add those apps to the script and they are scheduled as well. That gives me just less than 3 hours per day to spend time on email, social media, and reading blogs.

The program is incredibly easy. You put in the url, give the app a name, tell Fluid where you want to have the app created, and what icon you want to use for it. Click a button and almost immediately you get a notice that the app has been created. It also asks if you want to open it. Log in if necessary, and your facebook.app is there for you to use.

Best of all, Fluid is a free download.

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A LAMP, a WAMP and a website

David Phillips — Tue, 19 Jan 2010 22:02:51 +0000

WAMP Server

For many of us, websites are a necessity – an evil one sometimes – of life. We have a blog or two along with our church sites. We have a twitter account in addition to our facebook account. But have you ever wanted to run a website locally, meaning that you don’t need to have a web hosting account? Maybe you would like to put up a WIKI or maybe even a development blog so you could customize it offline and then upload the files. Here’s how you can do it.

Most blogging software, at least the most popular blogging software, runs on a code base called PHP. PHP is a widely used, general-purpose scripting language that was originally designed for web development to produce dynamic web pages. PHP code is embedded into the HTML source document and interpreted by a web server with a PHP module, which generates the web page document. If you see a web page with the file extension php, that page uses, most likely, php code to generate html which is interpreted by your browser.

PHP was originally created by Rasmus Lerdorf in 1995 and has been in continuous development ever since. I first encountered php in 1997 working for a internet startup in Florida. It runs most efficiently on a linux platform, which also includes the mac which is based on FreeBSD, a unix/linux operating system first developed by AT&T. PHP makes use of many of the features of linux and its default web server software called Apache. However, it will run on windows, both on their server platforms and their home versions.

Since most people run the windows platform (for what reason, I do not know) I want to talk with you about setting up a windows server implementation so that you could run a php website on your own laptop, a home network, or an internal corporate network (usually called an intranet). Why would you want to do this, you ask? Maybe you want to run an internal project management program. Several are out there (and I will give you a good one to use next week) that are web-based and can be set up to run on an internal server application. Another reason you might want to set up an internal server is to use an opensource Customer Resource Management (CRM) package to keep track of your church members. Instead of a high-priced software package, you may be able to use a free web-based version. There are many reasons to want an internal server.

Setting this up is really very easy on a windows computer. The only thing you need to run PHP on a windows computer is WAMP. WAMP stands for Windows – Apache – MySql – PHP. It is a the windows version of LAMP: Linux – Apache – MySQL – PHP. This is an implementation for windows of the Apache webserver, the php modules for processing php code, and the database software MySQL, the most used opensource database software on the market. To install all of these, you simply go to wampserver.com, download the free install program, and install the software on the computer. The install will put an icon in the lower right corner of your windows installation (down near the clock) which will allow you to start/stop its services and gain access to the server settings. It also includes the web software phpmyadmin, a web interface for the MySQL database server.

From there, you can download the software you want to install, place it in the appropriate folder on your computer, make sure the services are started, and then run the install part of the software you downloaded. Get the ip address of that computer, and as long and that computer is on a network, you can access the website from any computer on the network.

If are interested in this, and need more help, contact me or leave a comment.

Finding images and giving proper credit

David Phillips — Tue, 05 Jan 2010 12:09:58 +0000

When I was a programmer, there was always new software coming my way. I always had access to the latest and greatest tools. Often, friends would want to borrow the discs and license and install that software on their computers. I admit to doing that when I was younger, but when you start producing software yourself, you want to your due for all your hard work. You may be willing to give away copies, but you know what it took to create that software. I didn’t give in to the request to let others borrow the software very often.

On the disturbing things I found, and still run across today, is that before Microsoft put into place their activation codes, churches would buy one copy of software and install it on every computer. My wife was on staff at a church and they blatantly did that. The pastor didn’t like me for pressing the issue and he never bought the appropriate licenses and kept all the computers from being upgraded so they didn’t have to get the appropriate licenses. I almost turned them in to the software piracy group.

Now as a blogger I try to find images that complement my posts. In the past I would go to one of two places for images: sxc.hu or google images. sxc.hu is a free stock photo site and google images searches for images all over the web. The negative thing about google images is that you never know where those images come from. Some of them are digital images of paintings that have a copyright, some are photographs that are copyrighted, etc. I would often feel a little guilty for using some images on my blog because I never knew if I was stealing or pirating content that someone felt they should get paid for.

New image search

Sprixi
Along comes a new image search engine called Sprixi. Sprixi is owned by Thirsty Minds Pty Ltd, an Australian company. The inspiration for the name “Sprixi” came from the words “picture” and “wiki” according to their FAQ’s.

Sprixi helps you choose and use an image fast. To get started enter a word or two that best describes the image you’re looking for. Click search. Browse the images shown and choose an image you want. You can scroll down to see more images. Use the image by downloading it or copy the link to it.

For most images you will need to give credit to the author. Sprixi can do this automatically for you if the image is large enough, otherwise you will need to copy the credit and paste it where you are using the image. It actually puts the proper credit at the very bottom of the image. Sprixi is “purpose built” to help you choose and use an image quickly and easily. Sprixi is not about tagging or commenting on images, and it is not about browsing a million photos. Sprixi is about finding an image that is useful to you. Sprixi tries to sort images by usefulness – how useful you find an image for that topic.
Images are sorted automatically just by people using Sprixi. Images you click on, rate, use, download or upload are given a usefulness rating. You can also vote for the usefulness of images by clicking on the yes, maybe and no buttons. Votes from registered users are given a heavier weighting.
For new topics, all images are unsorted. Over time, more useful images will work their way to the top.

Currently Sprixi searches Flickr, OpenClipArt.org and the images you upload to Sprixi. Sprixi tries to only show public domain and commercial-friendly Creative Commons licences.

If you are looking for images for your blog, a presentation, and book or any other creative endeavor, let me suggest that you try Sprixi first and give credit where credit is due.

How social media can make history

David Phillips — Tue, 25 Aug 2009 22:22:25 +0000

About the Talk
While news from Iran streams to the world, Clay Shirky shows how Facebook, Twitter and TXTs help citizens in repressive regimes to report on real news, bypassing censors (however briefly). The end of top-down control of news is changing the nature of politics.

About the Speaker
Clay Shirky’s consulting focuses on the rising usefulness of decentralized technologies such as peer-to-peer, wireless networks, social software and open-source development. New technologies are enabling new kinds of cooperative structures to flourish as a way of getting things done in business, science, the arts and elsewhere, as an alternative to centralized and institutional structures, which he sees as self-limiting. In his writings and speeches he has argued that “a group is its own worst enemy.” His clients have included Nokia, the Library of Congress and the BBC. Shirky is an adjunct professor in New York University’s graduate Interactive Telecommunications Program, where he teaches course named “Social Weather.”

Communicating for change: what blogging taught me

David Phillips — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 15:02:18 +0000

For the past three months, I have engaged in an experiment. The question I wanted to answer was this: What is the best way to drive traffic to one particular link. I used social media to accomplish this, including blogs, facebook, and twitter. I also used a particular set of events to answer this question. In June, during the Southern Baptist Convention, and last week after NAMB dismissed Geoff Hammond and the GCR task force held a meeting in Atlanta.

Over the three months, here is what I discovered.

First, provocative titles hook people. The two most visited links on my blog during this period were, “The GCR is all about politics”, and “Dismantling NAMB”. The first occurred shortly after the SBC convention meeting in Louisville toward the end of June. The second just last weekend. The first post almost tripled the amount of traffic I normally get. The second post tripled the amount of traffic I normally get on the weekends. The title got people to the link. What caused them to read it was the content.

Second, provocative content creates viral traffic. What I saw almost immediately from these two posts was traffic coming from web-based email systems. In addition, I saw traffic coming from Baptist state conventions. What really intrigued me was when I saw traffic coming from newspapers. I then knew the post had created a stir, good or bad, within a certain segment of the internet, and at particularly provocative points in time.

In one post, I saw these two principles expressed apart from a time element. I did a post entitled “Images, Pornography, and Ministry”. This drew a good bit of traffic and got some discussion on at least one other blog. The title was certainly provocative, combining pornography and ministry. The content was also interesting. There was nothing really time-oriented about the post, though I admit I wrote trying to draw traffic via search engine traffic about a sex tape that had just hit the internet and was at the top of Google trends. However, there was not really any traffic coming from those searches; it mainly came from twitter, facebook and a couple of other blogs.

Third, interesting titles and/or content will draw those who are window shopping. If it is not what they are interested in, they won’t stay. My main focus in this blog is to see how multiple disciplines can be integrated, along with theology, to develop missional thinking and a missional lifestyle. I generally write for myself; it’s a way to process what is in my head. Traffic I get through searches focus primarily on three themes: missional theology, depression in ministry, lonely pastor. Recently, with the posts I put up about the SBC, GCR task force was a major traffic draw as well. Some get the feed reader, some are looking for images, and some just go away. I really want to be known for the non-provocative, integrative material I write. Some people are interested. But certainly, it doesn’t get the traffic a provocative post will attract.

Finally, if you don’t post about what people are interested in, you get no traffic. You need to either write about what people are interested in, or get people interested in what you are writing about.

My conclusion, then is the following: The easiest way to draw blog traffic is to go provocative both in title and content.

If the two extremes are provocative and getting traffic or uninteresting content resulting in no traffic, then what is the middle? Interesting, non-provocative traffic and/or the ability to get people interested in what you are writing.

Does this have anything to do with our communication processes in the church? I think it does. First, you can go all provocative and draw a crowd. However, what happens when the titles and content aren’t as interesting? What happens when the creativity wains? This really does create a scenario where you have to continue to be provocative and über creative because you have conditioned the audience this way. Second, if you communicate something that is completely uninteresting to people, no one will show up. Another option is to communicate content some people are interested in, eventually communicating content that at some point has interested everyone at some point. Finally, you can work hard so that on most occasions, you can create interest in your content.

I saw a tweet over the weekend noting that someone popular said “Consumers don’t become disciples.” That is a big statement (an one right now I agree with). This is the real issue; it is one that even Jesus faced. When the discussion moved to taking up a cross and following Jesus, the crowd got thin. Only disciples followed that content, and as Peter said, “Where would we go if we did leave you Jesus?”

Here is the big question I hope to address in future post: How do you get people interested in what you are talking about? Jesus did. You too, I believe, can do it.

New writing opportunity at Examiner.com

David Phillips — Wed, 19 Aug 2009 00:34:22 +0000

Examiner.com is a new growing online news presence that utilizes local people who write based on their particular areas of interest or expertise. I first noticed it coming through my Google News feeder just under articles from the Washington Post, LA Times or Baptist Press.

Out of sheer curiosity I checked out their writing opportunities and decided to apply. You are now reading the ranting of the “Wilmington, Del Southern Baptist Examiner,” since I was approved this week. I’ll be contributing between 2-4 articles a week that will automatically feed into the Wilmington, Del. region of the Examiner.

I do get paid for this. While it isn’t much, I do get a little for every page view. Payment is affected by the number of “subscribers” to my articles and the number of comments, since an active comment section means that more people are looking at the pages and staying longer, which affects the ad rates on my pages.

If you have a few seconds and want to help a friend (yes, that would be me), then go to my page and subscribe to my articles. By subscribing, you will get an email alert when I submit a new article. You can delete the email or check out the article (which helps me because it counts as a page view even if you don’t read the entire thing). You can also make me a “Fav” examiner if you are so inclined.

I hope to build readership both locally and nationally since news readers pick up the feeds outside Examiner.com’s local region. That will take a little time, but it will happen.

If you are a writer and decide to check it out for yourself, please contact me before you sign up. There is a referral program and I can get some extra money if you name me when you apply. I am committing that some of that money will go to support entrepreneurs through kiva.org or clean water efforts overseas.

The Uplifting Impact of Social Media

David Phillips — Tue, 07 Jul 2009 16:49:07 +0000

Just a Few Social Media Tools

I am an extrovert by nature. I also exhibit characteristics of someone with ADHD according to my pastoral coach. For me, I need to be around people like some folks need to breathe. Relationships energize me and drive me forward through life. A day without a phone call or video chat or lunch makes me grumpy. Even a text chat via IM is better than nothing!

When I worked for 3 Internet start-ups in Florida, one of the things I hated was sitting around a computer all day. The computer couldn’t talk back to me. It blinked a few things on the screen, but social interaction was truly impossible.

When Twitter and Facebook arrived on the scene, I was skeptical. I really didn’t use them much. There weren’t many people on these social media platforms and so though I had an account, I didn’t participate much. It was an additional energy drain because there was very little interaction.

Slowly, as these platforms have grown, I have fallen in love with them as interactive media where I can have discussions, interactive chats, catch up with old friends, and get to know people I’ve never met. As a people person, I’m finding that it is a way to really enjoy people wherever I am whether it’s by myself in my home office, another state or in the middle of Panera Bread. More and more of my time is spent there; it really is an energizing discipline for me. Now don’t think I don’t get work done. I actually am more productive, creative and energized through this. It’s the nature of my personality.

A few months ago, it really was driven home to me how uplifting for me social media can be when I mentioned via twitter that I wasPraying with Twitter!

" width="197" height="147" /> having a bad day. My twitter account is connected to my facebook account, so when I twitter something, it shows up on facebook. I made that tweet in the late afternoon in May. That evening, I had prayers tweeted on twitter for me from people I did not know. On facebook, I had several folks ask and pray about what was going on. I even had a text message from a high school friend whom I still chat with from time to time. I was blown away.

In March of this year, I had to defend my dissertation. When I tweeted that I had passed and would graduate, friends from high school, college and from other walks of life congratulated me. I turned 40 in June, and I had so many birthday wishes on facebook, I couldn’t count them. I even got a birthday wish from Margaret Feinberg, whose books I absolutely adore but whom I’ve never met. My major professor sent me a birthday tweet which teaching a class! Again, I was amazed.

Kim's got a great smile!

A few weeks ago, I was on facebook and was checking out who was in the chat area. I noticed that a high school friend, Kim Denson Cook, was online so I started a conversation with her. She makes handmade items, and I knew of a website where people could sell their handmade wares and I wanted to make sure she knew of it. In fact, I was hoping to see some items because I thought my wife or mother might like something from her collection. During the course of that conversation, Kim asked me how my workouts were going. She hadn’t seen me mention those recently and was just asking.

I have a Wii and a program called “My Fitness Coach” which is a great workout program that develops a specific plan for you. Maya is the fitness coach and she’s tough. In the afternoons I would often tweet that I was about to spend time with Maya. Kim noticed that I had not made those posts in a while and called me on it!

This really impacted me. Kim and I didn’t hang out much. My junior and senior years of high school, I video taped the basketball games and ending up riding on the bus with the basketball team to away games. Kim was a cheerleader, a year below me and she rode on those same buses. She was (and still is) a great person with a great smile. However, we didn’t really run in the same circles. I was a brainy nerd type (some say still am) who was involved in everything and knew everybody but only hung out with a close set of friends. She was a popular cheerleader. Those two groups of folks didn’t tend to hang out together. So it made an impression on me when she was concerned and interested enough in me to not only ask me that question, but to cheer me on when I did note how I had started working out again. I think of her asking that question every afternoon around 3:00, which is when I usually tweeted my time with Maya.

Those instances have me examining my tweets and facebook messages even more intently. In the past week, a friend whom I met through the blogs tweeted that he was having a bad day. I lifted up a prayer for him on twitter – nothing long, just a short prayer that he could see that someone was interested in him and his needs. I’ve done that on several occasions and hope to do it more frequently.

In USAmerican, the cry of the heart is for relationships. We are an incredibly lonely nation. People need others to celebrate with them, to cry with them, to pray for them, to encourage them and to understand them. A colleague told me recently that he and his staff do more and effective pastoring via facebook and twitter than they ever have in the past. People are able to stay in communication at work quickly and quietly and church members are encouraged, provoked and ministered to. He has embraced social media (and whatever comes next) as the means to pastor to a new generation of people.

I don’t know how much you participate in social media, but your ministry and you as a pastor need to participate. You can move crowds and congregations with these tools. I actually think these are transitional tools to a more virtual church methodology. It’s going to be interesting to see how this all works out. I for one am anxious to find out!

W. Davd Phillips » Social Media

Getting Fluid with the Mac

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