Are you all a-twitter about Twitter? Is your face on Facebook? Are you linked into LinkedIn? Is there space on your MySpace? Are you a-gog about blogs?

I’ve just come back from a publishing conference where a major topic of discussion was the use of social media, like those mentioned above, to help form communities. The feeling is that social media is super-important in today’s world.

At SD Times, we believe in social media – or at least, some of us believe do. Some of us are enthusiastic about social media. I’m one of those: I have pages on Facebook and LinkedIn, and am an active blogger and Twitterer .

However, others on our team are skeptical about social media as a concept. Some think that it’s a fad hyped by the more mainstream general media itself, who get all hung up on Oprah’s first tweet, or the explosion in Facebook subscribers. In other words, it’s a great story.

In that context, it’s unclear how to respond to stories that say that 60% of new Twitter subscribers don’t last a month. Does that mean that the service is a failure? That it’s not for everyone? Or that those individuals might come back later? Certainly my experience suggests the latter interpretation: I signed up for Twitter a long time ago, went dormant for many months, but then came back to it later.

Of course, our use of social media isn’t just personal. For example, we have an SD Times Facebook page and a Twitter account, which we use to tell you about newly posted stories, and also a blog where our editors share their thoughts and comments.

What do you think about social media? How important is it to you? How do you use it? How can we use social media to better serve your needs? Please leave a comment!

This scam spam — sent to one of our info@ mailboxes — was too precious not to share. Enjoy! (And as always, don’t respond, don’t be fooled, if you receive such messages.)

From: Anahita Mailbox

Subject: TRUST

Attention: Dearest Beloved

Sir/Madam

I came across your contact via international personal research profile in my earnest search for a trustworthy and honest person to handle my business and I apologize if the content hereunder are contrary to your moral ethics, but I had to reach you through this medium.

As you read this, I do not want you to feel sorry for me; because, I believe everyone will die someday. I am Lt. Leo Sura-Anahita (Retired) a Fire arm dealership around Eastern Europe/Asia and parts of Africa and I’m a widower and my late wife.

We (deceased wife and I) have accumulated a fortune for ourselves but never to enjoy peace and love of Children. Our only child died 2 years ago from the barrel of the gun which we sell and my beloved wife departed this World on the 24th of August this year from a plane crash in Kyrgyzstan’s capital, Bishkek on an Itek Air Boeing 737 that was to take her to Iran on some business proposition and here i am dying from Cancer. I come to believe God is paying us back for all the pain and suffering our dealings must have caused to countries Gorilla fighters we sold arms to. I have been diagnosed with esophageal cancer.

It has defied all forms of medical treatment and right now I have only about a few months to live, according to medical experts. I have not particularly live my life so well, as I never really cared for anyone (not even myself) but my business. Though I was rich, I was never generous; I was always hostile to people and only focused on my business as that was the only thing I cared for. But now I regret all this as I now know that there is more to life than just wanting to have or make all the money in the world. I believe when God gives me a second chance to come to this world I would live my life a different way from how I have lived it.

Now that I have willed and given most of my property and assets to my immediate and extended family members as well as a few close friends. I want Our creator to be merciful to me and also accept my soul, hence, I have decided to give alms to charity organizations and less privileged Homes across the world, as I want this to be one of the last good deeds I do on earth.

Note: I will appreciate your utmost confidentiality in this matter until the task is accomplished, as I don’t want anything that will Jeopardize my last wish, due to the fact that I do not want the Devil standing in the way of my last wish.

Now my questions are:-

1. Can you handle this project?
2. Can I give you this trust?

If yes, consider this and get back to me as soon as Possible. Upon the receipt of this mail message, feel free to respond with your taught and ideas.

VERY IMPORTANT: CONTACT ME ONLY VIA THE BELOW SECURED EMAIL CONTACT.

Thank you
Lt. Leo Sura-Anahita (Retired)
Secured E-mail: (address deleted)

I hope the little boy is okay.

While I was sitting at the gate for my San Francisco -> Denver flight yesterday, a woman comes over and sits, a few rows away, pushing a stroller and carrying a crying boy. She’s a young woman, pretty, Asian, in her late 20s. The little boy is adorable, and looks about 18 months. He’s dressed all cute, with a little preppy sweater. He’s really howling.

A few minutes after she sits down, a couple of airport police come over to her, and start talking… and then paramedics arrive. And more paramedics. Soon there are two San Francisco police officers and six airport paramedics, all crowded around the young woman and her son.

It soon became clear that the little boy hurt his eye — whether he fell down, or got hit in the face with something, I don’t know. One of the paramedics fetched a water bottle, and they started washing the boy’s eye.

He’s really howling, and trying to push them away. The mother starts crying too. She’s very young and very scared.

One of the paramedics said that she should bring the boy to the hospital, there’s something in his eye. The mother said no, she just wants to get home and take him to the doctor there. Some of the paramedics leave after a while, but others stay, to keep her company. We’re about 15 minutes from boarding. The paramedics keep washing the boy’s face, and looking in his eye. They’re very gentle and calm. The boy keeps crying. A lot of people are watching.

One of the paramedics said, ma’am, he really should go to the hospital. The woman says no again, she just wants to get home, but then her phone rings. Maybe it’s her husband. She’s telling him that the paramedics want the boy to go to the hospital. She doesn’t want to miss the flight, she wants to get home. What does he think?

Meanwhile, one of the policeman comes back from talking to the gate agent, and says that they can rebook the family onto the next flight, which is in about six hours. The officer offered to accompany the family to the hospital, stay with them, then bring them back to the airport. The boy is crying, the woman is crying into the phone. It’s really sad.

The gate agent called for boarding, and I got onto the plane. The mother and child didn’t board the flight. I hope they went to the hospital, and that the little boy is okay.

LinkedIn has great customer service, but needs to fix its software.

I’m a heavy LinkedIn user, finding it invaluable for tracking down people when I don’t have their current contact information. In our industry, people move around a lot!

Every couple of months, something gets screwed up in LinkedIn-Land, and my address book disappears.

Each time, I report the same problem, they send me back the same workaround, and then a few days later, they fix the problem. (I’ve just compared the responses they’ve sent each time, and it’s the same workaround.)

Oddly, this workaround doesn’t seem to be in their user-searchable knowledge-base. I’m guessing that the “nojs” at the end of the URL means “no JavaScript.”

I’m sharing this in the hopes that it’s helpful for you. By the way, kudos to their customer support team: They responded in less an hour.

Today’s problem report:

Hi, folks,

For the past several days, attempting to look at my contacts brings up the error message:

We are sorry, the address book is unavailable. Please try again later.

Can you please fix it? (This problem occurs frequently in my account.)

Thanks! -A

Today’s reply:

Dear Alan,

Thank you for contacting LinkedIn Customer Support. We apologize for the inconvenience you have experienced. We are aware of the issue you are currently experiencing and we are working diligently to resolve it. In the mean time, please use the following link to access your connections and contact list: http://www.linkedin.com/connectionsnojs.

We appreciate your patience.

Thank you for being a valued member of our LinkedIn community!

Regards,

Donne
LinkedIn Customer Support

The common “419” scams generally try to help you smuggle money out of a foreign country, in exchange for a hefty percentage. The writer often pretends to be the wife of a former dictator, a military officer, or a rogue bank executive looking to cash in on a huge pile of loot. A popular variation is where you are “identified” as the next of kin for a deceased relative, and the scammer offers to help you recover your inheritance.

This scam is different, because it pretends to be an official bank document. It even embedded a Bank of America logo. However, it’s a 100% scam. It is not from Bank of America. Don’t reply, don’t be fooled!

(I love the reference to the Telex department, how the author seems confused about the difference between Bank of America and Citibank, and the fact that the email originated at Polish host, onet.pl.)

Subject: CONTRACT SETTLEMENT

FOR THE KIND ATTENTION OF: THE BENEFICIARY

RFE: CONTRACT SETTLEMENT BY ELECTRONIC TRANSFER SYSTEM

This is to confirm the remittance advice received from the Federal Government of Nigeria (FGN) through the Citibank Nigeria (CBN), Foreign Remittance Department to Debit the Federal Government Account and Credit your Account with your Contract Entitlement. This is in line with our verifications and auditing exercise carried out by the TELEX DEPARTMENT of the Bank of America. It has been brought to the knowledge of the TELEX DEPARTMENT that your outstanding payment is presently On-Hold in our International Financial Instrument Facilities.

In order to release the fund and credit your bank account, you are hereby advice to contact the Citibank Nigeria, REMITTANCE DEPARTMENT DIRECTOR (MR. KALU E. KALU) on Telephone No: +234-805-9769414 Fax: 234-1-7592514. On your contact with the Citibank Nigeria, you should request them to issue you the RELEASE SOFT CODE of your transfer and also to reconfirm your receiving Bank Account to avoid Miss-Accreditation of your funds.

The Bank of America will not be responsible for any consequences arising from the inability of the Beneficiary to contact the CITIBANK REMITTANCE DEPARTMENT DIRECTOR. More so, we are convinced beyond all reasonable doubt that you are the rightful Beneficiary of the amount as witnessed in the Telex Instruction. The liabilities, which the BANK OF AMERICA may incur, are hereby lawfully limited and we therefore reserves the right to cancel funds if the receiver refuses or delay to contact the Ordering Customer (CITIBANK REMITTANCE DEPARTMENT).

The above request detail should be forwarded to this office within 24 hours upon the confirmation of receipt of this message.

We count on your co-operation and understanding

Yours faithfully,

CHRISTIAN SMITH, JR.
VICE CHAIRMAN AND CHIEF FINANCIAL OFFICER (F.C.M.)

I’m delighted that Smalltalk is still thriving. Back “in the day,” I experimented with Smalltalk, both in college and then later as the editor of AI Expert. Sadly, I never had the opportunity to build a production system using the platform. Too bad.

The news of the day is that Instantiations has updated VAST, its Smalltalk IDE, described below. If you’re not familiar with Smalltalk, visit Smalltalk.org or the Wikipedia.

The balloon is from the April 1981 issue of Byte devoted to the language. I was a subscriber in those days. Wish I’d kept my back issues, but they were tossed during a cross-country move.

If you find Instantiations’ Smalltalk a little pricey for experimentation, check out Squeak, a free, portable implementation.

Instantiations Releases VA Smalltalk Version 8.0

Incorporates new features and support for the latest Smalltalk technologies; modernizes the IDE; adds web services enhancements; new documentation; much more

Portland, Ore. —April 21, 2009 — Instantiations, Inc., a leading provider of software development and productivity solutions, today released VA Smalltalk™ Version 8.0. Updates in V8.0 include new, high-performance web application development functionality for Seaside Core 2.9, IDE enhancements including tabbed browsers and a new documentation delivery system, and enhanced support for industry-standard communications features such as web services to communicate with .NET and other non-Smalltalk-based systems.

“The new features in version 8.0 represent a major step forward in demonstrating Instantiations’ commitment to Smalltalk, and the team has done an excellent job in producing a very high quality and reliable product,” said Louis Andriese, Information Manager, Nationaal Spaarfonds (Delta Lloyd/Aviva PLC). “We are especially excited about the integration of Seaside. We have already developed a web application using v 8.0, and I was delighted to see the amount of functionality we could deliver within a short time. When it comes to serious enterprise development, VA Smalltalk provides the best balance between productivity, reliability and integration in today’s enterprise IT-landscape.”

VA Smalltalk V8.0 is a modern, high-productivity software development environment that is 100% IBM VisualAge® Smalltalk compatible. VA Smalltalk enables software engineers to quickly construct high quality software applications that are portable, high-performance, scalable, and simple to maintain. VA Smalltalk applications fit easily into existing infrastructures and support the latest web application, database and operating system technologies.

“Our customers are running mission critical systems on VA Smalltalk, and they demand world-class support and development to keep their applications operating at peak performance,” said Mike Taylor, Instantiations CEO and co-founder. “We frequently poll our customer base to understand their needs and they continue to tell us that their Smalltalk systems will be in production for years to come. Instantiations will be there to support their needs with continued innovation and strong support.”

Learn more about VA Smalltalk, and see interesting customer case studies during the 2009 VA Smalltalk Summit, a free web event going on today and tomorrow (April 21 – 22, 2009). See www.instantiations.com/VAST/more/st-news+events.html for more details and to register. Session recordings will also be available online after the conference.

New Features in VA Smalltalk V8.0

• Support for Seaside — Support for the current Seaside 2.9 open source web application framework Core, including jQuery, Scriptaculous, RSS and development tools.
• Enhanced IDE — Includes tabbed browsers, use of native Windows widgets, inspector improvements and more.
• Expanded web services support — includes Document/literal wrapped WSDL style and a new web services “Cookbook.”
• New documentation delivery system (web and local) with improved navigation, search, formatting and updated content.
• Much more — VAST libraries have been updated to work with current IT industry technologies (such as Windows Vista®). The latest versions of popular mission-critical databases, such as Oracle 11 and DB2 9, are now supported.

Pricing and Availability

The price per developer for a new license of VA Smalltalk V8.0 is $6,995 and includes one year of support, maintenance, and new releases. Annual support renewals are $1,695 per license. Product upgrades are available at no cost to customers with current support agreements. For additional information and pricing please contact our sales department at (800) 808-3737 or +1-503-598-4900 (outside North America) or by email at email hidden; JavaScript is required. More information can be found on the company’s web site at www.instantiations.com/vast.

Sometimes a comment comes in that makes you feel good.

I’ve been asked by friends, “why do you keep blogging about spam?” Occasionally I wonder about that myself. After all, it’s not always very interesting (although it is often very funny).

Stephen from Maui posted a comment on my post “Domain scammers keep on scamming” that makes it all worthwhile:

Aloha Alan:

I received this e-mail today. Instead of responding I “Googled” it and saw your posting. As suggested I just trashed the e-mail. I never trust an e-mail that starts with the “Nigerian scam international greeting” of Dear Sir/Madam but since I have protected my domain name for many years I thought I would check.

Your posting validated my skepticism. There are good things happening on the internet!

Mahalo (thank you) for your vigilance & sense of community service.

Stephen
Maui, HI

Mahalo nui loa, Stephen.

Cable News Network believes that a Twitter contest constitutes important “breaking news” worthy of a special e-mail alert.

This is what journalism has devolved into? Stupid, stupid.

From: “CNN Breaking News”
Date: April 16, 2009 11:20:46 PM PDT
To: email hidden; JavaScript is required
Subject: CNN Breaking News

— Ashton Kutcher is first to reach 1 million followers in Twitter contest with CNN.

+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=
CNN’s Dr. Sanjay Gupta follows a mother, a son, a daughter and a
husband — each an addict — on a journey through recovery and
relapse. Watch “Addiction: Life on the Edge,” Saturday and Sunday
8 p.m. ET, only on CNN. http://www.cnn.com/onair
+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=

One CNN Center Atlanta, GA 30303
(c) & (r) 2009 Cable News Network@mail.cnn.com>

We’re going to see a number of new desktop, server and hosted applications coming through from Microsoft in the next 14 months:

• Exchange Server 2010 entered public beta today, and should ship in 2H 2009.

• Office 2010, including SharePoint 2010, Visio 2010 and Project 2010, should enter a “technical preview” period in 3Q 2009, and should “release to manufacturing” in 1H 2010.

Read the official press release about the Exchange Server 2010 public beta.

Also read an Office backgrounder Q&A with Chris Capossela, SVP of Microsoft’s Information Worker Product Management Group (pictured).

Oh, and there’s no more MOSS: The next rev of Microsoft Office SharePoint Server — code-named SharePoint 14 — is just SharePoint Server 2010. See the SharePoint Team Blog for the explanation.

Here’s the latest research from Evans. I’d say “Duh!” but of course it’s valuable to have primary research to back up the conventional wisdom.

SANTA CRUZ, CA – April 8, 2009 – Three-quarters of all software developers belong to at least one social network and two-thirds belong to multiple networks, according to the results of Evans Data’s Developer Relations Program Annual survey.

The survey of over 400 software developers was released to subscribers April 3 and examined the dynamics of evolving program sites for software developers.

“This latest research shows that developers are like most active Internet users in terms of having a very healthy interest in social networks,” said John Andrews, President and CEO of Evans Data. “Consistent with this the primary motivations for joining a social network is the desire to locate old friends and the need for general communications.”

Additionally, the top three things developers look for in a social network are profiles, an active community and high quality content. Tagging and access from mobile phones were the least important attributes of a social networking site.

Other highlights from this in-depth survey include:

· Over 90 percent of developers look at blogs at least some time, and seventy percent feel that blogs are credible sources of information,

· Microsoft has the best developers website according to 27.4% of developers, followed by Sun with 12%. IBM and Google tie for third place with less than ten percent of developers mentioning their site as the best developer website.

· Developers prefer community moderated forums to vendor moderated ones, and 88% think that community moderated forums are important in a community website.

The report can be accessed here: http://evansdata.com/reports/viewRelease.php?reportID=11

It’s nice to know that the “Checking Department” is looking out for me. This is a scam: If you respond, they’ll hit you up for money to “protect” your domain. Just ignore them. Don’t be fooled!

Subj: Domain Dispute and Registration

Dear Sir/Madam 2009-4-13

We are a domain name registration service company in Asia,

Last week we received a formal application submited by Yadu Investment Co.,Ltd. which wanted to use the keyword “_____” to register the Internet Brand and with suffix such as .cn /.com.cn /.net.cn/.hk/ .asia/ domain names.

After our initial examination, we found that these domain names to be applied for registration are same as your domain name and trademark. We aren’t sure whether you have any relation with this company. Because these domain names would produce possible dispute, now we have hold down this registration, but if we do not get your company’s an reply in the next 5 working days, we will approve his application

In order to handle this issue better, Please contact us by Fax ,Telephone or Email as soon as possible.

Yours sincerely

Tina
Checking Department
Tel: 86 513 8532 2060
Fax: 86 513 8532 2065
Email:[email protected]
Website: www.js-wifi.cn
Mail No.:1299807

Hey, everybody, United Airlines is inviting its customers to “treat yourself to a first class seat.”

Sounds like a great deal. The offer says, in big text, “Experience first class, fares from $189* each way.”

Uh oh. There’s a little footnote marker. Read the fine print. Golly, this wonderful offer makes me want to rush out and buy a first-class ticket for the 360-mile flight between Chicago and Minneapolis. Not.

Terms and conditions
*Fare is based on one segment between Chicago and Minneapolis. Fares are each way based on required roundtrip purchase for United First® travel on United Airlines®, and United Express® carriers. For tickets purchased through United reservation offices or at airport ticket counters, additional reservation fees will apply: $25 for United reservation office bookings and $30 for airport ticket counter bookings. No reservation fees are added for tickets purchased at united.com. Fees are subject to change without notice. Other restrictions may apply. Fares purchased through other distribution channels may also be higher. When purchasing from United, always go to united.com to find United’s lowest fares. Seats are limited and may not be available on all flights/dates.

Additional Taxes/Fees: U.S./Puerto Rico/U.S. Virgin Islands fares do not include a $3.60 per flight segment tax. A flight segment is defined as one takeoff and one landing. Fares do not include the September 11th Security Fee of $2.50 per enplanement at a U.S. airport or Passenger Facility Charges of up to $18.00, which may be collected depending on the itinerary. Fares for Hawaii and Alaska do not include a $8.00 (each way) departure tax. For travel from Canada, fares do not include U.S. Inspection fees of $7, taxes/fees imposed by the Canadian government of up to $19.50, and a $32.20 international departure and arrival tax if outside of the 225 mile buffer zone. All international fares are subject to U.S. arrival and departure taxes and agricultural, immigrations and customs fees of up to $50. For travel to some countries, additional airport, transportation, embarkation, security, and passenger service taxes/surcharges of up to $250 (each way) will apply depending on destination. For return travel from some countries, fares do not include airport and/or departure taxes of up to $45, which may be collected by the foreign government. See complete terms and conditions.

This just in from BZ Media World Headquarters, in Huntington, N.Y.: The lunchroom fridge/freezer needs defrosting. You think?

I don’t know what’s more amusing, the iced-up freezer or the Official Memo sent to the staff this afternoon:

Subj: Important — Fridge!

Hey, gang,

The freezer has become inoperable due to ice buildup (take a look at it — actually pretty funny looking).

Stacy is going to defrost it over the weekend but this is a heavy duty job and requires that we EMPTY it Friday afternoon!!!!

Then we will leave it unplugged over the weekend — we’ll plug it back in Monday AM.

Please take note and help us out by throwing away your stuff. If you have any highly cherished condiments, take ’em home over the weekend.

As they say in the ads, “Everything Must Go!”

Unnecessary email wastes time and productivity. We all know this. What are we doing about it? According to Folio’s Dylan Stableford, publishing giant Nielsen disabled Outlook’s “Reply to All” functionality to “eliminate bureaucracy and inefficiency.”

Read the e-mail message, sent out by Nielsen’s CIO, Andrew Cawood — and then read the scathing comments. Fascinating. What do you think about this?

By the way, at our company, we have the opposite problem. Too often, employees inappropriately use “Reply” instead of “Reply to All,” and suddenly cut their team or committee out of an important discussion thread, leaving everyone wondering what’s going on, if an action was taken, etc.