We need to bring ‘er up again.  Or something.

When I read this article here about how the “legal shield” protecting website owners over content posted by their users was being chipped away at I had a great big pit in my stomach start to build.  Being the owner of a couple of social media websites (and not to mention a host of blogs) which encourage user engagement and interaction without hinderance, this particular article got me going.

It’ll be interesting to see how it pans out, but I’m one for keeping the owners of the websites safe from their users offensive content.  But, it is what it is.

I upped my friend count on Facebook today because I found this amazingly annoying-but-neat little feature on the right side of my screen:

By the time I had refreshed the “see all” button a number of times without finding anyone that I wanted to “add to friends” I had invited about 50-60 more people to my network.

I feel special.  But, I’m still not beating Sue.  She has more friends than me.  Sad.

It seems that Roenne picks up new words nearly every day.  The coolest surprises (at least for now) is when she says something that I know I’ve never taught her.  Shock and awe baby…  But one of the neatest things is when she sings; the most random noises come out but it all seems to make sense.  I can’t explain it, but, I love it.

So when I was passed this link, it touched my heart.  Pretty much the cutest thing ever, besides my daughter.  That’s because that’s what my daughter’s going to be like in a year from now.

Yup.  LinkedIn pwned me with an uber-facemelt.

Now, before I get started, I want to say that I’m a fan of LinkedIn.  And I have been for many years, as my registration date attests, even though there are a number of things that I would certainly improve and put on that product roadmap of theirs… nevertheless, I like you. So please O please gods of LinkedIn, don’t close down my account (especially since I can’t seem to do it myself anyways…)

=)

Anywho, I was served hard by LinkedIn’s legal services regarding a website that I had launched literally 1 week ago and some change: theLIgamer.com.

The website, in a very quick nutshell, served a very simple purpose: To connect likeminded gaming enthusiasts who had a profile on LinkedIn.

It all started because of a harmless Q/A to the rest of the LI community seeing if there was any interested peoples to start a group.  The response was overwhelming, and within 24 hours I had enough support backing me to motivate me to spend an entire night building a site to cater to the LI gamers needs.  It had multiple blog authoring, forums, a job board, and more.  My development wasn’t blind either; I got in contact with a few video game industry experts, like the executive director of IDGA, and spoke with a few Editorial gaming experts including the Editor in Chief of GameRiot.com, to name a few.

What’s so funny is that all these email and phone conversations I had were all enabled by LinkedIn (I pay a premium $200/year for the ability to directly contact others thru “inmail”).  There’s a strange irony to all of this, but, I’ll leave that up to the readers.

So, the short of it is that I did my research, got some great advice from some industry leaders, spent far too much time developing it out, and then launched it.

Within the first couple days I had more members sign up than I knew what to do with, a couple of great guest posts, and the traffic spike was great.  Lots of personal emails and pings affirming me what I had already known, that we “needed something like this” and “LI doesn’t provide this type of interactivity, thanks!” and “wow, how do I get involved and help make this site world class” and on and on and on.  The future looked bright for LinkedIn video gamers every where!

That was until today.

I thought it was great April Fool’s joke, because it certainly put a pit in my stomach for a sec.  But, no.  It wasn’t a joke.  It was real.  Take a look at the full claim here:

Make of it what you will.  Some of it is rather amusing, but, the bottom line was that I had to respond.   Some quick discussions with legal counsel and a pretty thorough gut-check moved me to comply 101%.  The site’s only been up for barely more than a week.  I didn’t make a dime off of the site (I instead lost money for hosting costs, registration, etc) and advertising was free for members.

So, I hit the big delete button and packed it up.

It’s unfortunate, really, since I had already drafted up a great logo-design contest with the winner receiving *gasp* a $200 dollar gift certificate for a premium membership package to LinkedIn!  The site gathered too much attention too fast… and I suppose the LinkedIn legal department didn’t have enough to do.

So, theLIgamer.com is officially retired.  Dead, actually.  I’ve got a wife and a very cute daughter who I’d love to one day go to college… so, I need to save as much money as possible and not spend my hard earned green on crazy claims like these.

Thanks for all the support for those who gave a shoutout and remember… LinkedIn is all about being professional… none of this unprofessional business of providing services which enhance their member’s user-experience and build deeper brand loyalty without costing them a dime, ya hear?!?

…

Oh, and before I forget… don’t use their logo, they hate that.

Everyone needs a fresh start at times.  I certainly do.  But the neat thing is that I’ve managed to actually do it.

I’ve signed up for nearly every social network thingy that I’ve ever come across since I entered the wide world of the internet back decades ago…  I’ve blogged in a countless number of mediums, using tons of different services, and have had multiple accounts using those services as well.

It was time to start over.  Really start over.

And the great thing was that it hasn’t been that difficult of a decision!  It’s been a bit cathartic, perhaps.  I’ve started a new Digg account, a new Del.icio.us account, a new Pownce, Technorati, a new Blog with a new look for heaven’s sake.  Now, I’ve kept the old Facebook and LinkedIn… but of the rest, entirely new.

And I haven’t even started filling them in yet…

And what’s even more crazy is that I’ve also cleaned up house a bit as well in this process.  Social media fatigue… that’s what had gotten me.  Too many, too fast, too hard to keep up with them all.  Choose a few, I thought… and stick with ‘em.

So, that’s what I’ve done.

Now, for some, I can imagine this would be entirely impossible.  It would be like throwing away old friends (and it sure did feel that way for a few of them)… but, it is what it is.  Sometimes you’ve gotta start fresh.  For the better.

So here’s to some new beginnings.

Part of what makes social media campaigns so effective is when they can speak their audiences language the best and in the most fluid and simple fashion.  It seems pretty obvious, but, it doesn’t happen that way nearly enough.  And what really gets me is the amount of time, money, resources, and bullcrap that gets thrown around at the corporate level debating how to use the VOC (Voice of the Customer).

Now, since I live and receive a paycheck from the corporate monster, I have to play nice.  I understand the difficulty of moving a program and initiative through the gates of political turmoil, especially when the ship is loaded with large budgets with even larger egos navigating them.  Eh.  It is what it is.

That’s why when I saw this video it was a pleasant breath of fresh air.

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