New Twitter Features

Beyond Social Media - New Twitter Features - Episode 307

Episode 307: BL and David discuss Twitter’s new moderation tool and potential new features for business profiles; Google’s podcast analytics; Google’s Web Vitals metrics; Facebook’s oversight board; Ryan Reynold’s Mint Mobile commercial; Wendy’s online scavenger hunt; Progressive Insurance works from home; Amazon’s new show, Upload; augmented reality that copy and pastes from real life; Google Lens’ new copy to desktop feature; Jimmy Kimmel’s screw up; 28,000 GoDaddy hosting accounts compromised;..and much, much more.

Read More

Great COVID-19 Unfluencing

Beyond Social Media - The Great COVID-19 Unfluencing - Episode 306

BL and David discuss the effect COVID-19 has had on the Influencer economy; the leaders weighing in on #PressFreedomDay; how the NFL conducted its first-ever virtual draft; New York City’s Stay The F*ck Home festival; Budweiser’s coronavirus-inspired sequel to the notorious Whassup Super Bowl commercial; the Verification Handbook is now free for all; Apple TV+’s new docuseries Home; billboards saluting doctors; successful email signature signoffs; meet Google Meet, now available to everyone; what honest Zoom meetings would look like; unemployed special effects; Frankestein Live; the coming voice tech explosion; the definition of small- and medium-sized businesses; the coming burn-in catastrophe; daytime streaming statistics;..and much, much more.

Read More

Coronavirus Visuals

Beyond Social Media - Coronavirus Visuals - Episode 305

Episode 305: BL and David discuss Twitter’s new COVID-19 misinformation protection measures; free Google Shopping Listings; Google’s new identity verification requirements for advertisers; a clever tactic for retaining unsubscribing customers; an app that will broadcast family videos for tech-averse elders; COVID Nursery Rhymes; alternatives to “unprecedented”; free resources for marketers; vintage pandemic posters; TV show posters reimagined for COVID-19; a Coronavirus Rhapsody; MinneAnalytics Monday; two-faced Facebook; mobile voting efforts; dangerous Amazon working conditions; the public companies taking small business loans;…and much, much more.

Read More

Alexa’s Brand Voices

Beyond Social Media - Alexa Brand Voices - Episode 296

Episode 296: BL and David discuss Google’s Project Witness that uses virtual reality to generate empathy for jailed children; Amazon’s program to create actual brand voices to play on its Echo smart speaker; ASCII art of refugee programmers; tech titans’ efforts to combat coronavirus misinformation; augmented reality Google Maps; Facebook’s bug bounty program; Chrome’s website security deadline; reviews in Google Search Console; a glaring user experience fail in Adobe Acrobat; Target’s Minnesota Badgers miscue; …and much, much more..

Read More

Vindictive Valentines

Beyond Social Media - Vindictive Valentines - Episode 295

Episode 295: BL and David discuss “Cry Me A Cockroach” vindictive Valentines via San Antonio Zoo; social media savvy Astronaut Christina returns to earth; Seventh Generation’s brilliant State of the Union ad; Spotify’s podcast expansion; flirting with Tinder bots; how Netflix gets to the Oscars; Twitter squashes student’s parody, then apologizes; Planters Baby Nut banned; best and worst Super Bowl LIV ads; the Iowa Caucus debacle; hacking Google Maps; world’s worst job ad and world’s funniest resume; Clearview AI slapped with cease-and-decists; Celebrity Cruises’ clueless commercial; 2020 election disinformation wars; Edelman Trust Barometer…and much, much more.

Read More

LEGO Creativity

Beyond Social Media - LEGO Creativity - Episode 281

Episode 281: Co-hosts BL Ochman and David Erickson discuss the creativity of the world’s largest display of LEGO art in New York City as well as LEGO’s new Rebuild The World campaign; the five hundred new words that were added to the dictionary; Google’s new in this video search results; John Batelle’s new Daily Recount summary of the day’s political news; the city of Grand Rapids, Minnesota’s 3D crosswalks; Descript podcasting software that lets you deep fake yourself; fears of Chinese propaganda via TikTok; the pros and cons of Echo Auto; Facebook Watch TV watching you; creating a digital will; political contributions via Amazon Echo; Facebook’s app problem;…and much, much more.

Read More

Portraits & Programmers & Writers, AI!

Beyond Social Media - Artificial Intelligence - Episode 277

Episode 277: BL and David discuss the hacked presidential seal that satirizing 45 as a Russian puppet during a recent speech; a brilliantly creative LinkedIn post that illustrates the power of breaking expectations; OpenAI’s technology that is too dangerous to release; the Washington Post’s securing and publishing of the DEA database that tracks prescription opioid shipments; an AI app that turns your photo into a Renaissance portrait; the emerging career of audio book narration; MailChimp and Vice teaming up on Second Acts; illustrations imagining high tech brands as retro technology; House Wine and Cheez-Its in a box; Influencer scamming; Representative Tulsi Gabbard’s Google Gimmick; and much, much more.

Read More

Everything Amazon Owns

Beyond Social Media - What Amazon Owns - Episode 275

Episode 275: BL and David discuss the astounding array of businesses Amazon owns; the Area 51 search for aliens joke that 400,000 people have signed up for; major updates to Google My Business; how Pittsburgh helped power the first US Moon Landing; Pinterest adds videos; Shoelace is Google’s latest attempt at building a social network; a hilarious parody influencer apology video; Ikea’s new Soffa Sans typeface; using text messages to solicit local reviews; dangerous dongles and much, much more.

Read More

The Deep Fakes Edition

Beyond Social Media - Deep Fakes Edition - Episode 273

Episode 273: BL and David discuss the Pakistani press conference that was filtered with cat ears; 3D objects and augmented reality in Google search; YouTube’s augmented advertising; Cracker Barrel’s moral stand; a robobullying parody video of Boston Scientific robots; museums installing ‘braille art’ touchable recreations of exhibits; Spotify’s Daily Drive podcast playlist and the company’s new podcast-targeted advertising; the announcement of Facebook’s Libra cryptocurrency; an AI-generated Russian spy infiltrates LinkedIn; a deep fake Rasputin sings Beyonce; deep fake videos that are as easy to create as editing text; an algorithm that can generate an accurate portrait of a speaker based only on a sample of that speaker’s voice; Google Photos goes Driveless;…and much, much more.

Read More