Tumbr is quickly emerging as a major social media force. It’s being talked about in blogs, on other social media sites, and even by mainstream press.

Are you buying into the hype?

I really want to know. As an early adopter, I’ve always enjoyed Tumblr, but it was only in the past few months that it’s truly become part of our overall marketing efforts. So far, we’re seeing decent results, but it appears as if Tumblr is reaching a tipping point that is reminiscent of Twitter in late 2008.

Here’s one we created at TK Carsites.

What are your thoughts? We’re compiling a full feature post on Tumblr, but I really want to hear what you think. Do you have a tumblelog? Do you know of any that you visit often? Where is Tumblr going to be in 6 months? A year? 2 years?

Let me know and we will include your thoughts in our feature post.

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Learn more about social media on this social media blog.

*UPDATE 3* Nothing from Tumblr’s Twitter Account, but the sites appear to be up and stable.

*UPDATE 2* Tumblr’s Twitter Account:

“A faulty network switch is causing severe performance issues. We’re working with our datacenter to get it replaced as quickly as possible.”

*UPDATE* Approximately 40 minutes after going down, Tumblr posted the message below on their sites. In most situations, planned outages or “changes in infrastructure” will be announced and the “Be Back Soon” message would be posted immediately.

Just when they were starting to turn some heads and draw attention from masses of people and bigger companies, Tumblr went down.

Since around 2:15 am Pacific, all blogs hosted on the site went down and as of the time of this post are still down. Their backend user interface and staff blog is also down. There has been no word yet from the company Twitter account.

Tumblr has emerged as a rising star in social media offering more functionality than Twitter, an easier and more convenient posting method than blog platforms such as WordPress, and a community element similar to Vox and Ning. Other social media sites have survived extended downtimes (Twitter is notorious for downtime) but it will be interesting to see if there is any backlash with many active Tumblr users moving the bulk of their online communications and content to their “Tumblelog”.

In an effort to educate and entertain, the Nestat Brothers’ YouTube Channel posted this Facebook Movie. It’s not the one that everyone’s talking about coming out soon…

… or is it?

What Is Social Anxiety Disorder?

Social Anxiety Disorder can cause a person who suffers from it to feel an overwhelming sentiment of anxiety, a persistent and intense fear of being watched and judged by others and a trepidation of being around people to name a few. Social Anxiety, also known as a “Social Phobia” can be as debilitating to cause a person to retreat to being alone with the inability to work, go to school or being out in public.

There is a steady struggle between the people they “see” themselves as becoming and the “dark passenger” that rids them of anxiety and fear. This unrelenting fight usually occurs on a daily basis which can cause a person who endures SAD (Social Anxiety Disorder) unable to cope, yet fully aware of what is happening to them.

Social Anxiety Disorder invades more people than we are aware of, and although it is considered a Mental Health Disorder, the stigma usually wrapped in the “if we can’t see it, it doesn’t exist” mentality of our society, precedes to keep a perpetual cycle of silence.

Fortunately, there are ways of coping with this disorder. One of the most popular is cognitive behavioral therapy, which consists of the core, exposure therapy. This type of therapy helps the person to overcome what frightens them by exposing them to their fears through various stages. This is said to build confidence, coping techniques and to create constructive responses.

How Social Media May Help

Social Media is the interconnections of human beings from the comforts of their “safe zones”, whether it is work or home or where ever else we choose to interact online. Through this newest way of communication, people are in control unlike ever before.

Social Networks are birthed daily and those that have grown to see true popularity have surprised many people on how effective socializing online has become an important part of our culture. Social Media has even persuaded other mediums to take part in its expanding phenomenon.

Clearly, Social Media is no longer considered a fad and has intercepted the way we want to relate to other people and how we want to do it. Given that, we the people see how much we can manage the way we connect with other people while enabling us to feed our innate human behavior.

Since people who are diagnosed with Social Anxiety Disorder feel most comfortable alone, this does not imply that it is what they want. Rather, people who suffer from SAD, yearn to interact and to make friends.

Perhaps, Social Media can serve an even greater purpose by slowly integrating socializing online to a person with this type of unrest. We could even speculate that perhaps, one of the many reasons Social Media has become so popular is due to the massive amount of people plagued by this disorder. Besides its convenience and global reach, Social Media can also play an important role to help heal those who suffer from the silence of this all too common turmoil.

Ever since the beginning of time, people have gone in search of a sense of belonging and of other human interactions, it is abnormal for our species to want to be alone all of the time. We are social creatures after all.

Mixing Social Media and Social Anxiety Disorder could be a great start to begin a coping process that eases a person into forming connections with people; they would otherwise shy away from in offline situations. It could also help increase their feeling of hope, ease off the depression associated with SAD, and slowly build confidence by being in control of when they have the ability to socialize. Social Media could be the first step to lesson the feeling of loneliness and heighten their emotions of belonging or being “a part” of something. This could begin the demise of the “dark passenger” and contribute to gaining a sense of control over the person they deservingly see themselves to be.

Could Social Media play a role in helping those who suffer from Social Anxiety Disorder? Or do you think this is a recipe for disaster?

Here is an interesting Infograph with Facts and Stats about Social Anxiety Disorder

There are 50 new social media sites created every day. That’s not a fact based on anything factual, just  a fact based on the concept that the creation of new ones never cease.

To make a map of the social media landscape would be to create something that is likely outdated in a few months (weeks?) but that’s exactly what the folks over at Overdrive Interactive did. This tremendous resource might not be easy to read at first, but once you see the beauty of the organization and visualizations, you may realize it’s an invaluable tool.

Obviously, you’ll want to click on the image to enlarge it.

Not much news here. In fact, it’s almost to be expected.

Barack Obama is the second most popular human on Facebook.

Who is #1? The Dalai Lama? Nope. The Pope? Ya, right?

Perhaps its soccer sensation Cristiano Ronaldo, pop-culture phenomenon Justin Bieber, or everyone’s favorite Kanye West stupidity victim, Taylor Swift.

Wrong, wrong, and wrong.

If you live your life a quarter mile at a time, you already know the answer.

Ahead of Vin Diesel are 2 games (Texas Hold’em Poker and Mafia Wars), a television show (The Family Guy), and Facebook itself. The President of the United States, however, is just below him.

Anyone who believes that Facebook pages are a true indicator of popularity haven’t been on Facebook much lately.

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Read more Facebook Facts on this social media blog.

In lieu of getting into a debate about political analogies, I will make one clear statement: Digg has never been a true democracy and the new Digg does not change this.

What “The New Digg” does do is redistribute the power that is currently in the hands of hundreds of users and a couple dozen websites and divides that power to more websites and much, much fewer users.

“But wait! I thought the new Digg would make it to where everyone’s Digg is counted equally? I thought every user will have the power that was unlawfully taken from them by power users.”

On the contrary, the new Digg will make many current “power users” impotent while opening the doors for 2 new breeds of power users. I will detail them below by breaking them into the 3 branches of Digg government.

The Publishers Branch

Bigger is better in the new Digg. The old days of “build a website, put up viral content, find a Digg power user, and profit” are gone (for the most part). CNN, NYTimes, Mashable, HuffingtonPost — the giant news sources and blogs that currently do so well on Digg already will be exponentially empowered based upon sheer size and natural following.

The Old Power Users Branch

To the dismay of many, the old-school power users will retain much of the same power they had before, again based upon a carryover of following. Those who follow MrBabyMan today will still be following him when the new Digg rolls out. Rather than following his submissions, they will be presented with his Diggs. This is a key shift in that the power users will (should) no longer be digging 200 stories a day and submitting 1-3. Instead, they will (should) be Digging only the stories that they want their followers to see.

Their submissions will still be necessary for many sites, but it’s in how they curate their Diggs that the real juice pops in. Rather than have a ton of power over 1-3 stories, they will have a good amount of power over a couple dozen stories. They are the old-school tastemakers.

The New Digg Power Users Branch

When Twitter was an infant, the biggest users were names that most had never heard of before. It wasn’t until it attained mainstream attention that the celebrities and websites started taking over and shooting past the early adopters. The same will happen on Digg.

Tony Hawk. Leo Laporte. Pete Cashmore. These people will not only have power through their own content, but will now be able to guide content from others’ sites to be viewed by their followers. It’s a strange thing, but if Pete Cashmore Diggs a Techcrunch story, it will have exponentially more impact than it does today.

Who Gets Hurt?

1. Large websites who don’t do it right: if you are a large publisher and haven’t developed a Digg plan, you really should soon.
2. Small websites who don’t do it right: just because you’re not CNN doesn’t mean you’ll be left out in the cold.
3. Current Power Users who don’t get it: if you are still Digging 200+ stories a day when the new Digg rolls out, you won’t maintain much of a following for long.
4. Digg.com: in the long run, Digg is going to look back at this and think it was either the absolute best or absolute worst thing they’ve ever done. There is no in-between.

One thing and one thing only is certain about the new Digg: many will hate it and many will love it, but the company must go “all in” for them to make it through to 2011 and beyond. I’m very impressed with the guts they’ve demonstrated if nothing else. WTG Digg!

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Read more about the New Digg on this blog.

I learned how to drive 36 million pageviews to web properties through social media platforms by employing three levels of adoption. The Social Trinity is the foundation of a social media policy that allows you to use communication tools on digital networks for the purpose of building your own community. Once you gain an understanding of the true value of each contact feature on a digital network, you can adapt the use of social platforms, formulate your social media strategy, and communicate with your target communities and to make them part of your own community.

The Social Trinity

1. Identify all points of exposure for your digital assets.
2. Identify all points of private contact.
3. Study popular sections and past successful campaigns launched on the digital network.

For instance on Twitter, a point of exposure can be an @reply, hashtag, comment on a wall, link to external website over which you have control. Points have exposure leave your footprint on an action performed on a social network. When you @reply a person your conversation exchange is viewed by everybody who follows you and that person and people who find your conversation through a search engine query. Naturally, the more you @reply people the more you are exposed to their followings. Similarly, on Digg when you vote for content, you leave a link pointing back to your profile; thus the the more you Digg the more exposure you receive to your digital asset on Digg – your profile.

Points of private contact will allow you to work out collaborative arrangements with other users of the platform. Peripherally, you should also learn how the culture on the digital network shapes the way private means of contact are used. I know of many people with large followings that typically ignore direct messages; an alternative way of contact would be to follow the link in a Twitter user’s profile to load up a person’s blog or other website that may have an email or other point of contact to which a person may pay more attention. Some people more frequently use the Facebook private messaging system.

Some platforms have popular sections such as the Digg front page and Twitter trending topics. You could study these popular submissions and adapt your submissions to cater to the community members’ interests. When popular entries are hard to find, google terms such as ‘twitter case study’ or ‘[social network]‘ + ‘case study’ or ‘[popular tactic]‘ like ‘contests, sweepstakes, viral campaigns.’ Once you learn of popular and successful campaigns you can try a similar campaign adapted to cater to your target community; you use your points of exposure and points of private contact to communicate with other people on the platform required to execute your campaign.

Neal Rodriguez discusses social media marketing tactics he has executed to meet his and his clients’ business objectives on nealrodriguez.com. Subscribe to Neal’s feed to stay abreast of his updates.

After 5 years of sharing videos, YouTube is the undisputed heavy-weight champion of the LOL world. Everything from video marketing to funny personal videos make their rounds through YouTube at a breakneck pace on a second-by-second basis.

This infographic below compiled by Website Monitoring and found via Viral Blog puts all of the tremendous information that went along with building the site over five years into perspective.

Will YouTube be here for another 5 years? When it comes to the Internet, there’s never a notion of “too big to fail”. Just ask AOL or MySpace, two giants that are having to change their very fabric as a company despite nothing but blue skies at one point in their existence.

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Find more amazing data on this Social Media Blog.

The use of Social Media has become so common that it has been integrated into our Social Norm. Even the way we speak has changed and the English language is conforming to words such as unfriending, retweeting, and a wide range of other terminology that may surprise the unknowing anti-cyber space spectator.

We have come to accept that our mom and dad’s are using the same form of entertainment as us; and have watched the evolution of spaces, cluttered in glitter and auto-played tunes such as MySpace – to days of blue and white with an array of accessibilities and faces with the “you have no reason to leave” Facebook look.

In this new aged society that is ever populating itself online, us friendly humans have made a declaration of saving each other’s cattle in Farmville, conforming to 140 characters of “What should I have for breakfast? I am thinking eggs and bacon or some jelly on toast…no maybe some cereal or perhaps an English muffin ..Help!” and watching videos of a cat playing a keyboard.

For us salivating socialite’s we yearn for two way conversations – a way to be acknowledged of our online identity. Gone are the days of hiding under an alias and asking “a/s/l?” We have opened ourselves up to the notion that sharing is caring and are even making our offline worlds collide with our online ones.

It is an amazing transformation of communication that has aligned the world just so, that we can tolerate our neighbor, friend a person based on their personality and not on a picture and allow the Internet to invade our personal stash of information. Social Media has shown that kindness can be shared amongst a stranger in a tweet, possibly the same one which whom we would never speak to on the street. Celebrities will now interact with us common folk and other Media’s rush to earn their dollar while information on Social Network’s are given away free.

No longer do we fret over a friend updating their status while we eat, or fear that connecting with another human online soul will make us out to be a creepy old man wearing boxers in his mother’s basement. We are from all walks of life and have birthed a nation of conversationalists, which has taken a global effort, perhaps the only global collaboration we may see in our lifetime.

So I raise my mouse to yours and celebrate our ever-growing project of human interaction, to erasing unheard messages, liking shared wisdom and answering what I should have for breakfast. This is an intertwined love affair with Social Media, for no matter where we roam; we will have access to our online home.

Cheers to all you social savvy inventors who contribute to social networks of the Webisphere, you have taken the me out of Social Media and turned it upside down; and have arisen what I like to call, Social WEdia.