To Pandora or To Spotify

A few months ago I tried to “Spotify”.  I still haven’t been able to do so successfully and I pride myself as “that chic” that can figure anything out without ever opening a manual.  I “Pandora” quite nicely for some time now.  Then recently I came across this article from Mashable (http://mashable.com/2012/02/07/pandora-spotify/) and wondered… (I’m  wondering) what would be the future of Pandora? And will I have to eventually learn to Spotify??  I am still a PC gal, and as the article puts its, I guess I’m Microsoft to Apple – (egads) Am I a dinosaur for liking what comes easy to me?

So…What will come of my easy to use, easy to understand, doesn’t require a whole lot of time creating “lists” sacred Pandora?  While my inner close circuit of US Weekly and People & OK magazine reading girlfriends are concerned about the next pair of Jimmy Choo vs. Christian Louboutin – I am worked up over the future of Pandora… Apparently they are loosing millions of dollars in operating costs… How can we solve this?  I would rather have the leaders that be figure out how to make Pandora profitable first then deal with the crisis in Greece.  LOL. I am a dinosaur I guess, let the dinosaurs eat their damn cake and like it.  #ImJustSaying

Year of the Dragon

So, wouldn’t you know… After all that’s going on in the world, it is the Year of the Dragon… According to tradition, this should be an incredibly auspicious year, the most fortunate of all.  The Dragon year is associated with good luck, money, accomplishment, celebrations, longevity, success.  Looking forward to all of that and a bag of donuts, err carrot sticks.

And to All A Good Night

Wishing You A Very Joyous and Wonderful Holiday

As Christmas nears, and good times cheer, I am so thankful for TMMG’s debut this year.

T’was the night before Christmas and all through the city, me and my home girls were all looking pretty. With holiday party’s night after night, it was time to think about something just right…

Was it music I wanted or maybe some fashion, at the end of the
day its all about passion. Our passion for colors, our passion for work, our
passion for somebody’s special little smirk… But what in my mind stood out
the most, was it watches, or jewelry or even a host…(Ryan Seacrest maybe?? just kidding)

Never did I imagine those thoughts that I had, they clouded my mind, my heart, and my bed (dreaming people, I’m dreaming). Ankle Straps, Ballerina Flats, Clogs, d’Orsay Pumps… Espadrilles, French Heels, Galoshes, Can I Jump? Jump for joy for Huarache Sandals, Kitten Heels, Loafers, or maybe some Mary Janes, Mules, or do I need a Chauffer… I want Oxfords, Platforms, Slide Sandals, and T-Straps, I’ll take some Peep Toes, Stillettos, Stacked Heels, and some Sling Backs.

Give me Jimmy and Christian all day and night long, who wouldn’t dare wear Vivienne and Salvatore to many affair. Guiseppe and Louie we love just as much, Gucci and Pucci are never enough… With this I leave you, so many to choose from, so many to wear, Merry Christmas to all and to all a great pair of shoes…

Dedicated to MB! Peace Out.

Trees

Part of the whole idea of social  media is to have a VOICE and share what’s on your mind.  I have often been misunderstood and find myself at a loss of words explaining what I “really” meant… In this journey, I intended to SPEAK MY MIND, share my THOUGHTS and serve those around me.  As a social agency, (social online and offline) we intend to have our clients SPEAK their mind, share their THOUGHTS and serve those who want to be served.

Photo by Michelle A Diaz, Long Island New York November 2011

What does that have to do with trees??? I’m SHARING what’s on my mind!  As far back as I can recall, I’ve had a thing for TREES… Lately I’ve been obsessing over them and can’t seem to get them out of my mind. TREES talk to us every day. They’re inherit shapes and branches SCREAM hundreds and thousands of stories when you look at their journey…Standing in the same place for years enduring seasonal changes and the like.  I mean think about it… Watching children grow, leave, come back with their own children.  Over and Over and Over.  That saying if these walls could talk… Well how about if these tress could talk. I love trees… Tree this!

Assored Images of Trees from Central Park NYC

Adult Use of Social Media Soars (from the WSJ)

Growth over the past year came from Americans over the age of 30… That’s exactly what I mean

By Sarah E. Needleman

If your small business doesn’t yet have a Facebook  page, LinkedIn profile or Twitter feed, a recent study may persuade you to  finally join the social-media bandwagon.

Sixty-five percent of all U.S. adults now use  social-networking sites, up from 61% a year ago and just 5% in 2005, reports Pew  Research Center. The findings are based on telephone interviews conducted in  April and May by Princeton Survey Research Associates International.  Most of the growth over the past year came from
Americans over the age of 30, with seniors accounting for the bulk of it.
One-third of adults ages 65 and older say they now use social-networking sites,
compared with 26% who said this a year ago. Still, young folks between 18 and 29
years old remain the overall biggest group tapping social networks today,
accounting for 83% of the total.  On a typical day, 43% of U.S. adults said they visit
sites like Facebook and Twitter, up from 38% a year ago, the survey finds. Among
just Internet users ages 50 to 64, social-networking usage on a typical day
increased to 32% from 20%. Compared with other online activities, respondents
overall said they only use email and search engines more frequently than social
networks.

Readers, if you don’t use social media for your business, what’s holding you back? If you do, how much effort do you put into it  and has it been paying off?

….. Thus the birth of theMADMEDIAGROUP… Helllllllo

Frank P. Diaz Furniture opens Digital Doors

In 1939 my grandfather Frank Polanco Diaz from the Dominican Republic opened the doors of what has been know for over 70 years as Frank P. Diaz Furniture Store located at 818 Westchester Avenue.  Ever since I can remember, my dad had always worked at FPD.  After gramps passed in 2008 and some other life stuff happened, we closed our doors in August 2009…

Today, 2011, my dad and I have decided to OPEN our Digital Doors. We jointly agreed that bringing his “old” school charm and salesmanship, mixed with my “new” school social media management and even production experience to the 4th generation clients that our family serviced for 70 years was the right  thing to do…

So here we are… Merging OLD and NEW across a broader platform with a great story to share.

Check it out. www.frankpdiazfurniture.com – still a work in progress….

Rock of Changes

Chris Bahara, my heart goes out to your dedication and vision.

Chris Bahara, President of TenThousandMeans, along with Michelle Diaz, President of theMADMEDIAGROUP organizing Rock of Changes, a concert benefit, at Joe’s Pub on October 19 at 9:30 p.m. benefitting Love 146 an organization that works toward the abolition of child sex slavery and exploitation through prevention and aftercare. Rock of Changes was a musical inspired journey with the following cast of the Broadway musical Rock of Ages; Rebecca Faulkenberry, MiG Ayesa, Dan Domenech and Michele ‘Maisey’ Mais.

Love146 was founded in 2002 and has grown immensely since its first few months. Love146 has safe homes, survivor reintegration programs, training as part of the aftercare and aftercare research and many other programs in Asia, Europe, and in the United States. According to Love146 reports “Across the globe, 2 children are sold every 1 minute.”

One of the most core beliefs Love146 stands for is that after being rescued from child sex slavery the victim needs a safe place to live while recovering. Love146 Round Home is one of the many powerful efforts made possible through donations and proceeds from their benefits. The Round Home is not only a safe shelter for the newly liberated, but also a place of hope, love and an opportunity to be reborn into a new life.

Love146 has a Certificate Training Program in Aftercare (CTPA) where caregivers are trained on the basic restoration processes for the child sex slavery victims. In order to keep the CTPA up and running Love146 needs a total of $30,000 per year and for the Round Home a colossal $306,800 per year.

Love146 has benefits all year round. However, Rock of Changes is a unique musical journey with several prominent Broadway stars. The concert benefit is brought through the joint production of TenThousandMeans and theMADMEDIAGROUP. Both businesses have sought to emphasize on the truly beautiful results that charity benefits can produce. Rock of Changes is backed by the strong belief that modern slavery is an abomination.

A Tribute to Steve Jobs Flood SoMe Platforms

I must confess, I am a PC gal… I love my PC and its crashes and most of all my right CLICK – however, I am in LOVE with my ipod… I don’t have an iPad, or IPhone, but I have so much RESPECT for the vision, determination, resilient world Mr. Steve Jobs lived. He not only believed in himself, he believed in those around him and made part of his world.  It is a great loss for us all.  I believe in Apple Inc., and truly believe that Apple Inc. will not only continue to innovate, but will continue to change the world bigger and better than before.

FROM THE NY TIMES October 6, 2011, 9:36 pm

Tributes to Steve Jobs Flood Social Media Platforms

The tributes to Steve Jobs continued to flood social media platforms from around the world on Thursday with millions of 140-character messages on Twitter, more than 3,000 videos uploaded onto YouTube and tens of thousands of people sharing news links and making comments on Facebook.

A video of the commencement address that Mr. Jobs, a co-founder of Apple, delivered at Stanford in 2005 drew more than 1.5 million views on YouTube starting shortly after his death was announced Wednesday night and into Thursday afternoon, a spokesman for YouTube said. Already the most viewed graduation speech on YouTube, it now has more than five million views.

By noon on Thursday, people had uploaded more than 3,000 videos tagged “Steve Jobs” onto YouTube. In many of the videos, people are solemnly sharing their sadness and reflections about Mr. Jobs.

Others are proudly displaying the Apple products they love and use.

There were also multiple mash-up videos, where people combined music, video and photos as tributes to Mr. Jobs and the impact his work has had on their lives.

At 8 p.m. Eastern on Wednesday, shortly after news broke about the death of Mr. Jobs, Twitter counted 6,049 posts per second, making it one of the most discussed news events ever on the micro-blogging platform, exceeding the 5,008 posts per second recorded moments after President Obama announced the death of Osama Bin Laden on May 1. But the volume did not break the record set for conversation last August during the MTV Video Music Awards, when there were 8,868 posts per second recorded, according to a Twitter spokesman.

Here’s a link to a collection of Twitter posts gathered Wednesday night from @nytimes users with people sharing their thoughts about Mr. Jobs and the contributions he made to the personal computer world.

Crimson Hexagon, a social media analytics firm, counted almost five million posts on Twitter from Wednesday night until 5 p.m. on Thursday. Its analysis showed there were more than seven million posts from the time that Mr. Obama made the Bin Laden announcement on a Sunday night through the following day.

To show how the conversation spiked about Mr. Jobs, there were 50,016 mentions of him on Wednesday, rising to more than 879,000 on Thursday, which was the single largest volume of conversation about him since he resigned as Apple’s chief executive, according to General Sentiment, another firm specializing in social media analytics.

On Facebook, some people changed their profile picture to the Apple logo as a tribute. Others found their way to this official Steve Jobs Facebook page that now has more than one million fans with more 7,000 people posting comments and sharing items on the wall.

Many memorial pages were created for Mr. Jobs on Facebook and what appeared to be a record number of people were sharing news links and making tributes.

Web Weaving…From the Big O

Ask anyone who knows me, I have NEVER been affected by the “O” factor.  (Not yet at least) and “O” as in Oprah, not Obama… HOWEVER, I am no ‘dumb dumb’ or as the recently ousted Yahoo exec Carol Bartz referenced, DOOFUS.  I do know this, when Oprah talks people listen.  Now in the case, because my passion is all about social media, I’m listening… And once again, what I hear is that Social Media as in Facebook was used to address her fans… Way to go FACEBOOK… Love it… With that said, read on – take notes – learn the way of the future.

Peace out.

‘O’ weaves Web
In hour-long Facebook chat, Winfrey is back

By MAXINE SHEN
Last Updated: 10:08 AM, September 9, 2011
Posted: 12:23 AM, September 9, 2011

Oprah Winfrey returned to the couch yesterday for the first time since her famed TV show ended last May.  The former talk show queen appeared for an hour on Facebook with a vintage performance that included Winfrey’s advocacy of daily meditation, what her legacy might be (too soon to tell) and the one interview she’s desperate to do.  For the record, it’s OJ Simpson. “I just want to hear him say he did it and I’ll be happy,” she said.  At least as important as the interview is where it took place — online.   The decision to appear on Facebook, instead of TV, to spread her positive energy message appears to be a way for Winfrey to increase her profile among social media users and to draw people to her new cable network, OWN, and her flagging Web site, Oprah.com.

REUTERS

SOCIAL NETWORK: Oprah shunned TV for her first appearance in four months and went online.

The Web site has taken a downturn in visitor traffic since her afternoon TV show ended — with unique user hits falling by about half, from 5.1 million last January to 2.4 million in July, according to comScore.  Her popular site — which drew hits from cross-promotion on “Oprah” — was her big contribution to the fledgling OWN Network.  Discovery Communications, a 50/50 partner with Oprah, put up the channel — the former Discovery Health — and most of the start-up money for OWN.  Oprah had been invited to yesterday’s show by Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg, dubbed the most powerful woman in Silicon Valley.  The wide-ranging live chat was conducted by Sandberg at the company’s Palo Alto, Calif. headquarters.  In the interview, Winfrey also addressed the topic of fear, saying that she “never had fear until I started [OWN].”  She added that part of her fear, in finding shows that “come from a space of truth and a space of light,” stems from “the fear of whether or not I’m ahead of my time,” she said, given the popularity of “lowest common denominator.”  “I fundamentally believe that people are yearning for something more,” she said.  “But if you look at what’s on television right now, it doesn’t look that way. The fear is, I hope I’m right.” As for being CEO of OWN, she said, “I’m very familiar with myself and what I can do, it’s very different choosing other shows and trying to feel, ‘Will this work?’  “It’s a lot harder than I ever imagined. If anybody asks if you want a network, think about that.”  Winfrey took questions from Facebook staffers as well as users.  She  also engaged in a lightning round of things that she prefers, picking tea over coffee, tequila over wine, the journey over the destination and thin crust over deep dish pizza.

Managing Social Media

A little take from the experts @NYTIMES… All tools we like to use too! Wahoo

Peace out.