Doc Searls pointed to a couple of interesting search tools. First, we have ZoomInfo, which is an engine that will summarize the content available on a particular person or subject and deliver it in easy to digest results - do a search for yourself and see whats out there:

ZoomInfo is a unique summarization search engine that finds, understands and extracts the latest online information about people and companies and instantly delivers it to you in concise and useful summaries

Secondly, we have MyDensity, which is a new service that is brought to us by Mitch Ratcliffe’s new venture, Persuadio. Check out MyDensity and type in a URL that you want to check out - the engine requires a java enabled browser to display an interconnected social map of sorts on any web URL you choose:

“What we hope to let you do with our tool is let you see where [on the Web] you are compared to all of these other kinds of interests and then measure how much value is somewhere and who you need to influence in order to get people to start paying attention to you.”

Pretty cool tools. In the future I believe we will begin to see more and more interesting apps come out that will allow for the analysis of the overall influence of social networks.

Here is a new use of the podcasting medium, soundseeing tours to go essentially Posted today on Podcastingnews.com:

PodGuides.net is a new site that offers free PodGuides, spoken audio tour guides, that you can listen to on a portable MP3 player.

A PodGuide is the combination of a map (PDF) of a certain place and a series of audio tracks (mp3) which you can download for your iPod or other media player. Stops on the map are marked with a dot indicating the related audio track.

As the site describes them, “Think of an audio tour in a museum, but not limited to just that. You could have a PodGuide about the 10 coolest pubs in London for example, or a PodGuide which shows you the most well-known historic buildings in Bruges.”

This just in from the Iconoculture newsletter:

Market Facts

71% of 6- to 17-year-olds say they “need” a vacation. Three-fourths of them say it should ideally be seven days or more.

I guess school must be real tough these days! Give me a break, wait until you get to the real world!

I wanted to write a quick note about Basecamp, the web based project management system that is offered by 37 Signals. Jason Fried, who has been getting amazing praises for his presentation at SXSW titled “How to Make Big Things Happen with Small Teams” is a founder of the company.

I signed my company up for the service last week. We are a 4 year old online marketing firm, and going through some healthy growing pains. Particularly the kind where there is SO much going on that its imperitive that all project and client communication be streamlined and deeper “processes” are being implemented to handle account management and workflow. In short, we have been looking for a solution like this.

What I can tell you about Basecamp from my own experience, is that the product has singlehandedly transformed the way my company manages its clients, projects and communication in less than 1 week. It’s an amazingly simple, yet powerful project management tool, packed with all of the logical features and customizable elements. Whats really cool though, is when you have employees who are raving about it to you and thanking you for putting such a system in place, there is something to be said for that. Basecamp is rocking for us and we are only 12-14 days into our free 30 day trial period, I think you guys just got yourself another $99/ month customer. Thanks for the great product.

I love watching the online space evolve. Tons happening, more companies are spending more money on online marketing, market segments are consolidating, and in a nutshell things are moving and shaking. I think we are only seeing the beginning of it this year. There will be so much more to come.

This week brings us Barry Diller picking up Ask Jeeves (w/ Bloglines included) for a cool $1.85 billion! NICE. Then late last week we get confirmation that Flickr solved their growing pains by selling to Yahoo! How cool, now they can really spread their wings and rock. Of course we are all waiting to hear just how much they got for Flickr. Also, HP has just acquired the popular photo site Snapfish, what a week! Whats next? No crystal ball here, but there are sure some interesting things out there.

Who will go after the next segment? Social networking sites, more blog networks, Feedburner? One thing is evident to me, and that is that as podcasting continues to rapidly evolve as a media format, we will no doubt see plenty of activity. Look out for the arrival of “big moves” in this space as things begin to launch and gain traction. I would watch, Odeo and Curry’s PodShow to name just a couple of more mainstream plays. However there are plenty of other cool things in the works.

Personally, I think Blugg is on to something with the simple web based blogcast player, and the upcoming Podbat, dig it

I was doing some food shopping at Whole Foods Market, as I do almost every Saturday, and while on the checkout line I scoped out Black Book magazine. Whole Foods is continuously stacking their check out lanes with all types of new and progressive perodicals. Black Book, which is a magazine all about Arts, Entertainment, Fashion & Lifestyle , dedicated their recent edition to “Diaries, Journals & Blogs.” I checked it out tonight and found it pretty interesting, the entire magazine layout is excerpts from various individual’s diaries and blogs, I dug the concept.

Responding to the spirit of the times, BlackBook invited a cross- section of the blazing talents and intellects in the culture to tear a page or two from their diaries or journals and give them to us: the result is a glimpse into the daily lives, concerns, and obsessions of some of the people who shape our world

Another cool element of the mag was the inclusion of their own little Black Book on great restaurants, bar, nightclub and hotel picks in NYC, LA and Montreal. Maybe they do this every edition, it was my first time checking the pub out. Check out this months if you get a chance. Peace.

Thanks to everyone for their patience during my transition to WordPress, and I am happy to say, WE’RE LIVE! and loving it. Thank you VERY MUCH to flipthedolphin who helped me install the WordPress platform, and thanks to Trevor for kicking out some new header graphic action. Thanks a TON for the help!

Outside of that its been a ton of tweaking, importing all of my previous Blogger posts (which was rather easy thanks to the Blogger to WordPress import script). Whats really taking time is going back and categorizing EVERY one of my posts into various topics. I am going month by month, I am caught up through November of last year. The only real snafu that sucks, is that I lost all of my comments from the Blogger version, but I knew that this came with the territory. So sorry about all of those great comment exchanges. Maybe there is something I can do with that, give me a little time

Looking forward to resuming “regular” blogging and producing another Trend Radio! Look out for some cool changes there as well. Peace!

I am getting pretty pumped up. WordPress is looking pretty good, lots of features. This is all still a foreign land to me, but I will keep playing. I am ready to replace my Blogger blog soon, just need to tweak a few more things and ask for some patience as I traverse the new world of WordPress. Lots of “little” stuff I need to figure out, like how to link my header graphic to the home page, etc simple stuff, but I am not there yet.

WordPress does take a little more technical know how than other platforms, just for those of you who are thinking about making the move. However if you can get a little assistance from a friend if needed my initial thoughts are that you won’t regret it at all

OK now back to work, I want this puppy live today!

This is pretty cool, Steve Ruble points to Preople, check your name out:

Preople explained,

Hola! Happy St Pat’s Day! posting late, but posting! Trend Radio #7 has finally arrived. I headed home from a long day and brought it all together. Today I ramble on the future of the Trend Junkie and its move to WordPress, LOTS of good stuff happening in regards to the music scene, artist Aaron Walter’s of Baltimore kicks a solo acoustic track, some thoughts on SXSW, and then a brief highlight on Sphinterine, one of the top “key word terms” that drives search traffic to thetrendjunkie.com

Download MP3 8.81 megs, 19:14

Show Links:

- Blogger
- WordPress
- The Crystal Method
- No link for Aaron Walters (Yet!)
- SXSW
- Sphincterine

Comments and email welcome, ping me at thetrendjunkie at gmail dot com. Peace!