Putting it in Contxt: March 4, 2011

You work hard trying to bring results and supporters to your cause. As much as you wish, you just don’t have the time to analyze what’s trending on Twitter or notice the new tools that are out. Let us keep the pulse on social media developments for nonprofits and organizations with a mission so you can avoid information burn out. Every week Social Contxt will wrap up the key social media news stories you might have missed, separate the important stuff from the fluff, and make it super easy for you to keep up to date and look like a social media rockstar.

Key Developments in Social Media:

Facebook updates “Like” button and comments plugin -- And the two new development out of Facebook recently? An updated “like” button that, when an article is liked on an external site using the Facebook plugin, instead of just appearing in a user’s profile as a text link will now look like any other shared link -- with an image and a blurb and room for comments. The previous share button will no longer be used, completely replaced by the “Like” button. This feature will do good for companies who are looking to get their message out through sharing. The comments plugin update brings with it a whole new suit of features -- threaded comments, best rated comment order, easy moderation, and the ability to share your comment back on Facebok. It also now brings up key public stats about a user, with company, school, mutual friends, and age all listed next to their name, though it may be debated if this type of context is completely necessary.

Social activism + digital design = MTV? -- Yes, you hear right. MTV is joining forces with NYC powerhouse design firm frog design to bring you “The Get Schooled College Affordability Challenge,” also sponsored by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. The challenge asks college and aspiring college students to, “imagine innovative digital tools to reimagine and simplify the financial aid process.” The winner receives $10,000 plus an additional $100,000 development budget. Three finalists got the chance to work with frog design to improve their design and concepts for the final round. Which project do you want to see win? Voting starts soon.

If you can’t beat ‘em or join ‘em... -- Rather than throw their hand in the game of daily deal creation (one that the The New York Times even just joined in), Bing recently decided to rise above the noise. With so many platforms launching on a seemingly weekly basis, and inboxes flooded with daily emails from each of these, Bing realized that it’s become a mad house for the consumer. Enter Bing Deals, the new daily deal aggregator mobile and desktop web app. Now search deals from all major deal programs by metro area, current location, key word -- then save it, claim it, or share it. Surprisingly, though: this program does not yet support Windows 7 operating systme. No comment.

Favorite Mashable Article of the Week:

Is the Personalization of the Web Making Us Dumber? -- Though it’s less an original article straight from Mashable, more a TED highlight, nevertheless a very interesting read. Mashable was live on the scene as Eli Pariser, the former executive director of MoveOn.org, discusses how the sophisticated filtering techniques now used by Facebook and Google maybe narrowing our sights just a little too far. As Pariser describes it, the repeated clicking of links, Facebook and Google are running us through an algorithm that “moves us to a world where the Internet shows us what it thinks we need to see, but not what we should see.”

Say What! Most Outrageous Development of the Week:

Charlie Sheen: less like a F-18, more like a violent supernova -- By now it's been hard to avoid news about the debacle that is Charlie Sheen, and his recent explosions this past week bashing his CBS program “Two and a Half Men” executive producer Chuck Lorre across begging to differ for years. This morning, stats were announced that he's hit the world record number of Twitter followers, gaining 60,000 followers in minutes of creating his account and hitting a million in under 26 hours. Why do we crave hearing the self-obsessed rantings of a man who's had numerous abuse charges and restraining orders brought against him? And more importantly, will cause-based organizations think to harness the power from this exploding supernova to draw support for violence against women campaigns through the same social media tools that are helping egg him on? And let me know in the comments, am I being unfair to Mr. Sheen?