This article has been removed from our system for violating our Terms of Use.

Fair enough.  It was inflammatory and while it may have been a sounding board for disgruntled users, it did not offer a lot of value to the site.  Soon after, an article titled “Propeller. Fail.” was posted and has been the top story on the front page of the site for some time.  Not a lot of value again other than as a eulogy for the original story that was removed, but still, the point was made.  At the time of this article, it has 227 comments.

The question must now be asked: 2 days, several complaints, several poor reviews, and a disgruntled user-base that is expressing itself by keeping these stories at the top — what does Propeller do now?

Should they say “OOPS, nevermind!” and put the old version back up?  Should they just weather the storm that always seems to come when something warm and familiar is changed?  Should they defend their position that this new format is better?

or…

Should they re-market themselves, allowing those who don’t like the new version to leave while pushing for a newer brand of Propeller users?

I hope they do not select the last option.  This is a site that I have enjoyed and defended over the last few months and I would hate to see all of that effort go to waste.  Here is a screenshot of the current front page as well as a screenshot of last night’s front page.

Above is now.  Below is last night’s.

There really isn’t anything else to say about it.  The people have spoken loud and clear.

It really could just take some getting used to, but I already miss the old, clunky version.

Reviewing (well, testing) Tweetsnap.

This seems like a pretty interesting idea for bloggers who are embedded in their twitter but hate messing with the downtime issues. We’ll see how it plays out.

Soshable has picked up corporate sponsorship and will be adding some authors. The usual suspects are still on board, but there will also be an infusion of fresh perspectives added to this blog. Rather than welcome them here, I will let them post directly themselves so as to not “spoil the fun”.

With corporate sponsorship comes room for added talent as well. If you have an understanding of social media, social networking, marketing, or anything on the Internet in general, please feel free to drop us a line. We are excited to get as much quality content as possible to fill our hallowed pages.

I will be posting my first formal post in almost a month this weekend, so keep watching! You will also be able to find us on popFAIL, Noozeez, and Social News Watch.

I’ve mentioned a few times on this blog that I believe the “Web 3.0″ revolution will be ushered in by Social Hybrids. We are starting to see large Web 2.0 companies getting eaten up by the larger Internet powerhouses — AOL/Bebo, eBay/StumbleUpon, Yahoo/del.icio.us, etc — but there hasn’t been a true consolidation of web properties that combines social media with social networking.

Are we seeing the Genesis of it now? (more…)

This list of 10 (plus 4 dishonorable mentions) includes excellent domain names with great type-in traffic (at least they did back in the day when people still relied on type-in traffic) that just don’t give you anything that you can use.

Our personal favorite: Hot.com takes you to a campaign video for Dennis Kucinich.  Not all that hot anymore, if he ever was hot.

10 Great URLs.

The Digg Town Hall Meetings so far have been like bad sex in a bad relationship. There’s too much time in between causing a buildup that has to be released. When the climax finally comes, it’s too short and completely disappointing.

Mashable.com, who hosted a live blog with the help of The Drill Down crew, put it very eloquently when they summarized the event:

If you were to sum up what we learned from Digg Townhall #02, I would have to say it was… er… well… Jay Adelson really, REALLY loves Vernors Ginger Soda.

They keep saying it’s coming. The changes are coming. Listening to the community is coming. In the meantime, the promotion algorithm seems to be in a regular state of flux — sometimes active members can’t hit the homepage with 200 diggs, other times they’re hitting 10+ times in a day.

(more…)

As many blogs have stated, the rumor that Microsoft is pursuing Facebook is, well, just a rumor. Still, things like these don’t just pop up randomly (very often) without some credibility, especially when it makes sense as a ploy to pressure Yahoo. With that said, I still feel the need to point out why this won’t work. Call it abuse of the hypothetical, but blogs are made to explore the possibilities.

Many, perhaps most, Facebook users do not want Microsoft. They were a little upset when they purchased under 3% of the company. If that becomes 50+%, we will likely see a large-scale exodus. Sadly, it would happen right after Facebook passed MySpace on Alexa. (more…)

“Did you get her number?” I asked.

“No, but I got her Twitter.  That’s even better!” he replied.

Wow.  What a world we live in.

(more…)

(more…)

In social media, “friendship” is more of a way to get votes for your submissions than to interact with others.  There are certainly those who make real friends through social media.  Some of the people I interact with on a daily basis were people I met on social media sites.  Still, the bottom line in social media friendship is “vote for my submissions and I’ll vote for yours.”

There is something skewed about this concept, but we’ll ignore it for this article.  Instead, we’ll accept the fact that most social media friends aren’t really friends and focus on how to be a good one, as well as finding other good ones. (more…)