Art Career Experts » twitter

Do I really need Facebook?

ace — Fri, 03 Jun 2011 11:33:53 +0000

We can always use an extra laugh and I thought this funny email making the rounds pretty much said it all! Actually the “over 30″ remember life before it was controlled by electronics and it is always good to remember that we sent men into space without “how to” ebooks

Sent by an over 55 yr old……………..

When I bought my Blackberry, I thought about the 30-year business I ran with 1800 employees, all without a cell phone that plays music, takes videos, pictures and communicates with Facebook and Twitter.
I signed up under duress for Twitter and Facebook, so my seven kids, their spouses, 13 grand kids and 2 great grand kids could communicate with me in the modern way. I figured I could handle something as simple as Twitter with only 140 characters of space.

That was before one of my grand kids hooked me up for Tweeter, Tweetree, Twhirl, Twitterfon, Tweetie and Twittererific Tweetdeck, Twitpix and something that sends every message to my cell phone and every other program within the texting world..

My phone was beeping every three minutes with the details of everything except the bowel movements of the entire next generation. I am not ready to live like this. I keep my cell phone in the garage in my golf bag.

The kids bought me a GPS for my last birthday because they say I get lost every now and then going over to the grocery store or library. I keep that in a box under my tool bench with the Blue tooth [it's red] phone I am supposed to use when I drive. I wore it once and was standing in line at Barnes and Noble talking to my wife and everyone in the nearest 50 yards was glaring at me. I had to take my hearing aid out to use it, and I got a little loud.

I mean the GPS looked pretty smart on my dash board, but the lady inside that gadget was the most annoying, rudest person I had run into in a long time. Every 10 minutes, she would sarcastically say, “Re-calc-u-lating.” You would think that she could be nicer. It was like she could barely tolerate me. She would let go with a deep sigh and then tell me to make a U-turn at the next light. Then if I made a right turn instead. Well, it was not a good relationship.
When I get really lost now, I call my wife and tell her the name of the cross streets and while she is starting to develop the same tone as Gypsy, the GPS lady, at least she loves me.

To be perfectly frank, I am still trying to learn how to use the cordless phones in our house. We have had them for 4 years, but I still haven’t figured out how I can lose three phones all at once and have to run around digging under chair cushions and checking bathrooms and the dirty laundry baskets when the phone rings..

The world is just getting too complex for me. They even mess me up every time I go to the grocery store. You would think they could settle on something themselves but this sudden “Paper or Plastic?” every time I check out just knocks me for a loop. I bought some of those cloth reusable bags to avoid looking confused, but I never remember to take them in with me.

Now I toss it back to them. When they ask me, “Paper or Plastic?” I just say, “Doesn’t matter to me. I am bi-sacksual.” Then it’s their turn to stare at me with a blank look. I was recently asked if I tweet. I answered, no, but I do toot a lot.”

P.S. I know some of you are not over 50 . I sent it to you to allow you to forward it to those who are.
Us senior citizens don’t need anymore gadgets. The tv remote and the garage door remote are about all we can ha

Social media and AOL

theresa — Fri, 04 Sep 2009 11:49:02 +0000

This is a quick post as I have a show to set up for but I have become aware that AOL is constantly promoting Twitter. “Twitter your business” is a big catch phrase and anyone whose computer home page opens up to AOL sees it on an almost daily basis.
The point is that it makes Twitter seem like a huge deal bringing in income, recognition and income. Now I have researched social media extensively and I will be the first to tell you that no one is an expert! It changes as we breathe! And I also knew that statistically, there were less than 6 million people on Twitter and 175 million on Facebook. So why all the hype?
Money. AOL is being paid to promote Twitter. At first I did not see it. But then other factors came into play. A story about a rescue which inevitably led to the fact that it was all in a new book you could buy. An article about losing weight that led to another product and so on and so forth. I was disappointed that the “news media” was being bought.
And as I examined other home pages such as Yahoo, I noticed that Twitter was not being promoted to the same extent-meaning the articles were not so blatantly pro-twitter.
I am not alone in having to “hide” people on my facebook page whose twittering became excessive and overwhelming. It was all I was receiving. Facebook on the other hand, HAS produced some great contacts and renewed clients and prospects and I keep most of it art related because of that.

One post a day is plenty for FACEBOOK and Twitter users need to be aware of how annoying too many “tweets” are to the general populace.
Now there are people who will disagree with me but a general overall study will show that the average business person believes that people are “tweeting” far too much. Rather than achieve the desired results of communication it is accomplishing just the opposite.
Give it up? No need. Just be aware that busy businesses have specific people to follow and post tweets. You can follow many businesses that tweet if you want to know what is going on 3 times a day but they do not tweet more than that. As a working artist you might want to think about slowing down, give your prospects no reason to hide you or remove you from their files and move slowly. Do not become a Tweeter Spammer!
And be careful about AOL and its effusive praise of Twitter. IF you do not twitter, you are not alone. If you do twitter, show respect and do not inundate your prospects by too much information!

Controling the Internet overload and Studio time

theresa — Thu, 30 Apr 2009 14:51:42 +0000

There is such an information overload on the Internet these days that it’s a wonder that an artists gets anything done! TV shows, world news, local news, family emails, client emails, weird news,computer games, Facebook, Twitter……just to writ it all down is exhausting! To turn on your computer means you are lost for several hours!

Sometimes I wonder what we all did before the computer? I used to write in diary type journals and kept a garden journal complete with layouts and sketches. I would sit under the sycamore tree on a nice morning, coffee in hand, dogs at mt side and write quietly. When my children were very small, I got up an hour early and actually worked on cross stitch!

Now I still have coffee in hand in the morning. The dogs don’t lie next to me but wander around on the hardwood floors wondering if I’m going to feed them yet and I type away on my blog journal! Of course I have to check emails….and that may lead to the news, a joke, a forward, deleting junk mail and the next thing you know….2 hours are gone.

I usually have something to show for it. But I will not unless I plan!

So I have started getting up earlier and while the coffee splutters and computer is cranking up (broadband) , run up and down the outside length of stairs. A lot. Nothing like exercise to get the heart and lungs working! Plus I feel less guilty! Coffee ready, computer on, I quickly scan the email. If there is nothing of immediate urgency, I stop. Feed dogs. Get moving to studio and outdoors.

Any change in your daily routine is good if it gets you away from things that tap into your creativity and energy. Life is real and it happens and we cannot always control what happens but we might as well try to control SOME of the things.

An artist is different than most people. No matter how business like an artist may be or how focused, there are those moments where an artist MUST re-energize. It doesn’t take long. But one very simple method IS to move away from the computer! I do not have a Blackberry right now. Maybe later I will. But right now, when I am away from a computer, I want to be away

If an artist is not careful, then some of the online avenues designed to help him or her in actuality, become anchors to their careers! Just as we have seen friends become addicted to online computer games, so it can happen with Twitter, Facebook or any of the many many online social networks that occupy many people’s time. The computer takes away from studio time. It takes away from family time. It can take away creativity!

UNLESS you take steps to monitor you time and make the most of the time that you do spend on it! The computers will not go away. Use them to enhance your life and your career. But set your own limits just as you do with your art. So many hours here, so many areas there. I have actually made a list of what I need to check when I go online. It has worked well. Otherwise I get caught up with mundane topics that simply take up my time!

It does not work every day. I am not my usual disciplined self today BUT hey I am sharing this blog with you! The only time most of us use our computer time wisely is if we have a busy day planned or an appointment scheduled. But think of what you would accomplish if you had that attitude every day !

So run a test! Make a list of the areas that you HAVE to check and do it in a timely manner. Reply, post, lurk, etc. but then, walk away.

And as to that hand written journal that I used to keep…well maybe I’ll get into that journaling art everyone is mentioning…it’s nota new concept but maybe, just maybe, an early morning hands on project is good for the soul!