the intersection of life and grace

You may have heard that Facebook is improving things again. This time, it isn’t a re-design of your home page; it’s a re-design of your privacy.  I’m not an expert, and I’m certainly not shy about sharing who I am and what I’m about, but I think, this time, Facebook has it wrong.  Why? Two reasons:

1. Facebook didn’t give users an option to protect their information – it’s connect on their terms or delete at least some of your information.
2. Facebook didn’t make a key new change, called “Instant Personalization”, an opt-in feature. Meaning, unless you change the setting yourself, your profile information is available to sites outside Facebook in order to allow them to serve you their own content based on your interests (as presented on Facebook by your likes, connections, personal data, etc.).

In the latest version, Facebook is helping us be more social by sharing the information we each added to our “Info” tab fields with others who have the same information. You may have no objection to this because you added that information to share with your Facebook Friends. It is the premise behind social networking, after all, isn’t it? Find people with whom we have common interests and get to know one another. I think Facebook’s intention is to enhance the social experience, and I agree there may be networking value there but I don’t want it forced on me.

With this update, Facebook is making connections for us by connecting everyone who lists a band, a movie, a book, a school, a town, a workplace, and so on, to one another by default.  Not as a Friend, but through Pages. If it hasn’t happened yet, you’ll likely soon be greeted with a request to convert your profile. It isn’t optional, but you can choose with which pages you’d like to connect. Be aware, the ones you choose to omit with have their corresponding entry deleted from your profile. In addition, there are instances wherein community pages for an entry will be created, but the concept isn’t fully fleshed out. Read Facebook’s description of these connections here.

For example, my “Work” entry stated I’m the owner of Verbitude, which is my DBA name for my writing, coaching and speaking work. When Facebook connected me based on the word Verbitude, it made me wonder, since I concocted it a while back and Google returned 0 results for it at the time.  There are no other employees, so I clicked to find out what happened. The connection? A spoken word and slam poetry event. Really, Facebook, you couldn’t have done better with that? Fun with keywords 101.

Instant Personalization could  seem like a natural extension of the existing “Facebook Connect” feature which allows websites outside Facebook to let you log-in to their site to comment, for example, without creating a site-specific username.  However, Facebook is now making specific sites privy to your information and interactions unless you opt out. There are only a few now, but I expect that to increase since it has huge marketing upside. I don’t mind a website technology that uses my information wisely. I do mind my information being given away without my choosing to do so.

What did I do? I allowed most of my information to be deleted, and will add back those details as I better understand how that works “in everyday use”. It needed updating anyway, most of that info has been there since I joined the site years ago.

There is a lot about the internet many people don’t understand; in my opinion, these changes take advantage of that. My recommendation? Don’t connect online beyond your understanding and comfort level. Take some time to read Facebook’s Terms of Service (you had to agree to them to join, but they change and maybe you didn’t read them in the first place). After that, go to your Facebook account menu, click on privacy, and go through each section to ensure that your information is being used and displayed in a manner you choose.

Following months of deliberation by the Federal Trade Commission and rumors throughout the social media marketing world, the FTC this week released it’s “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising” to much buzz.  And, a little panic, I think, for bloggers, twitterers and facebookers who like to talk about their favorite goods and services, wondering what this all might mean for them.

It’s an 81-page document, in rather complex legal-governmental language.  You can read it by clicking here if you like [opens PDF document in a new window].

First, because I’ve fielded a few questions about this from the reviewers I work with on content for clients, I want to define what the new regulations say about bloggers – as I understand it. Disclaimer:  I’m not a lawyer, this isn’t legal advice, and if I learn something new about it, I’ll update this post.

Disclosure

If a company gives you product or money or any other kind of award or compensation in return for your posting about them or their product on your blog, Twitter, Facebook, or any other social networking site, you (the blogger) need to say so clearly.  The consequence for not doing so includes potentially hefty fines, but the report does not delineate what to expect for certain infractions, nor how specifically it will be enforced.

Now, if you review books, resources or music for another outlet, such as YMX, and repost your work on your blog with link attribution (as that site has permitted), you need only be clear that you were given the resource to review for that outlet.  It is pretty clear that product is given to media outlets to review, and you’re (in the case of YMX) reprinting with permission with link attribution.  If you link to your work on another commercial site from your  personal Twitter/Facebook, etc, it seems clear to me that you got something in return for the work (product or  some other consideration).

If you are an affiliate marketer – say for amazon, or referral link prizes, and the like – you need to say so under these new rules.  If you make money on it, you need to say so more clearly than ever.  Here is a good overview of the new guidelines from the corporate marketing point of view.

About this blog

Most reviews on this blog are reprints of my work for hire, primarily at YS/YMX. Those include links back to the original publication page.

A few times publishers or companies have given me books to review, or something to give away. While it was clear enough at the time, I will be more specific about that going forward.  I have never been paid cash for any post on this blog, or anything I’ve posted on my personal social networking accounts.  I intend to add a disclosure page to this blog to acknowledge affiliate relationships so there is no confusion.

All very formal, but I have no problem disclosing this if it prevents confusion on the part of others. Clarity is good, and assuring readers that my thoughts and opinions are my own even if I got a free book is something I’m happy to do.  It’s necessary to help people who research purchases on the internet tell the difference between advertising and customer opinion, because the line had become blurry. Ethics are important.

Now, if we could just get the same kind of clear public disclosure from politicians and lobbyists, I’d be thrilled.

I wasn’t going to blog about this, but I’m changing my mind under the influence of so very many complaints about the most recent changes on Facebook.  If you aren’t a Facebook user, you’re in a minority of webizens, and I won’t be offended if you skip this post.

Yes, the latest change was a big one.  It took all of the information you and all your connections are producing – all of which was already displayed on the homepage – standardized its appearance and combined it into one stream of information.  All of this information was already public, but placed differently.  Like it, love it, hate it, the responsibility for the now-all-equally-valued information was put into the hands of each individual user.  Previously, I could “vote up” or “vote out” certain types of information.  Now, I have to count on my connected Facebook Friends to control their output.

A few questions to ask yourself, as a Facebook user:

1. Do I want all my friends to see on their home page that I sent an Egg/Plant/Poke to or threw a cyber-sheep (or, my personal fav a barrel full of monkeys) at  [fill in name of other friend here]?
2. Do I want all my friends to see what I wrote on our mutual friend’s wall?
3. Do I want all my friends to see what I wrote on a poll or group discussion?
4. Are there some  people I’m connected with I’d like to check on first, before I scan the whole news feed for the rest of what’s going on?
5. Have I ever reviewed what applications I’ve authorized access to my information?
6. Do I get email from Facebook I don’t want?

Depending upon your answers to the above, you may be thinking you’d like to fix what you’re floating into the Facebook information stream, and take some control over your Facebook life.  Here’s how, from your logged in Facebook account:

Applications

If you want to amuse yourself with myriad apps, sending gifts and so on, that’s great.  You may not want everyone to have to read about it (in fact, most people probably don’t want to know, for the most part).

• On the top of your Facebook, there’s a blue bar.
• Find SETTINGS > APPLICATION SETTINGS which will return a list of your most recently used applications.
• In the menu above the list, select AUTHORIZED to see all the apps you’ve ever given permission to access your profile.
• Next to each there is a link EDIT SETTINGS from which you can select “Never publish any stories from [name of app]” or “Prompt me before publishing any stories from [name of app]“.
• Note, you can also click the X at the end of the line for each app to delete it if you don’t use it.  Think of it as spring cleaning for your Facebook profile.

Wall posts

• From that blue menu bar at the top of the page,
• SETTINGS > PRIVACY SETTINGS
• NEWS FEED & WALL
• Returns a list of check boxes where you can choose which actions you want to appear on your wall, and therefore appear in the global news feed on the homepage.
• This is a great time to check your PROFILE privacy settings, too.

Emails

• SETTINGS > ACCOUNT SETTINGS
• NOTIFICATIONS
• Select which events you want emails about.

Friend Groups

Want to see updates from certain folks sorted out of the general home page stream?  This is the coolest new use of an existing Facebook feature!

• Blue bar again… FRIENDS
• Left side, MAKE A NEW LIST, follow the prompts to create your group.
• You can have as many as you want, and you can put friends in more than one group.

Yes, it will take a little time, but you’ll be so much happier with the results!  Happy Facebooking!

Believers, Christ-followers of any denominational and doctrinal stripe – I’m talking to you. And me.  Stop it. The whining.  The complaining.  Really.  Before you speak, or type, another word about:

• a devotional practice or church tradition you have never participated in and therefore believe it must be specifically prohibited by scripture
• a politician or government policy, or the President, with clearly ill-considered sarcasm and disrespect  and nary an ounce of constructive thought (much less action)
• you get the idea, right?

I see a lot of facebook status updates (and their attendant comments), and twitter updates, and blog comments, and forum comments over the course of a week.  I have to say, a lot of them are whining or complaining.  The rest are fine – running commentary on life.

I’m only talking about the sort that fling sarcastic, unhappy criticism out into the cyber world and are never followed up with contstructive action thereafter.  Think – there are a lot of people who can see what you’ve said on the internet, people who may not be your direct “friends” on a particular social network.  They may not all be as smart, enlightened, mature, or skilled in discerning satire as are you.  And, in the written word, that discernment is mighty difficult because 85% of communication is non-verbal.  Words are evocative, and 100% open to interpretation.  [Public service announcement pause to tell you that I am completely calm, not angry, and not kidding about the subject of this post.]

Therefore, before you or I type another sarcastic, caustic, crushing word on your blog,  a disucssion forum, facebook or twitter status… stop.  Are you representing Christ accurately? Are you doing more than throwing words into air?  If not, why not?

What do the scriptures say about tearing each other down?

How about tearing down those who do not believe?

Maybe, even if you don’t practice the penitential season of Lent, you could just try, for the next 7 weeks, to:

“[S]et an example for the believers in speech, in life, in love, in faith and in purity. Until I come, devote yourself to the public reading of Scripture, to preaching and to teaching. Do not neglect your gift, which was given you through a prophetic message when the body of elders laid their hands on you.

Be diligent in these matters; give yourself wholly to them, so that everyone may see your progress. Watch your life and doctrine closely. Persevere in them, because if you do, you will save both yourself and your hearers.” [1 Timothy 4:12b-16]

And:

“You, my brothers, were called to be free. But do not use your freedom to indulge the sinful nature; rather, serve one another in love. The entire law is summed up in a single command: “Love your neighbor as yourself.” If you keep on biting and devouring each other, watch out or you will be destroyed by each other” [Galatians 5:13-15]

We can communicate more clearly, more effectively, if we first heeding Paul’s teaching about his message (that of Christ) to the Corinthians in written and personally-spoken form:

“You are looking only on the surface of things. If anyone is confident that he belongs to Christ, he should consider again that we belong to Christ just as much as he. For even if I boast somewhat freely about the authority the Lord gave us for building you up rather than pulling you down, I will not be ashamed of it. I do not want to seem to be trying to frighten you with my letters. For some say, “His letters are weighty and forceful, but in person he is unimpressive and his speaking amounts to nothing.” Such people should realize that what we are in our letters when we are absent, we will be in our actions when we are present” [2 Corinthians 10:7-11]

Don’t hide behind your computer screen if you aren’t going to act on the words in real life.

As sometimes happens during the day, I was chatting on instant messenger about youth ministry with Adam yesterday.  We were talking about a mutual interest, something he was planning out a blog post on – discipleship.  As the conversation rambled around some ideas, my interest was grabbed by a particular facet (or tangent, lol) about the same time as Adam updated his twitter account.  The following exchange grew from there (non-twitter users should keep in mind that twitter is a timeline of posts in which @ means ‘reply to’; I’ve tried to arrange them in a more conversational order):

mclanea Have a fun theology of discipleship conversation with @pattigibbons. Booyah!   about 23 hours ago from web

MarkMatlock @pattigibbons I’ll take you up on that conversation! Got some notes to share?
about 23 hours ago from web in reply to pattigibbons

mclanea @MarkMatlock I took notes. I’m working on a video post for my blog. @pattigibbons totally just schooled my hypothesis!  about 23 hours ago from web in reply to MarkMatlock

pattigibbons @MarkMatlock we’re hunting for the place where the disciple car got disconnected from family and hooked up to church   about 23 hours ago from web  in reply to MarkMatlock

CoffeeWithChris @pattigibbons hmmm, what are you thinking? I was on the Industrial Revolution & start of Sunday school track?   about 23 hours ago from web  in reply to pattigibbons

pattigibbons @CoffeeWithChris I think that’s a spot, but it may go back even further   about 23 hours ago from web  in reply to CoffeeWithChris

pattigibbons @CoffeeWithChris I think that’s an important spot, and the most contemporary, but I’m wondering about the days of church as primary educator   about 22 hours ago from web  in reply to CoffeeWithChris

CoffeeWithChris @pattigibbons just went and talked to one of the other pastors on staff here, first place he went to was Constantine & the Empire…   about 23 hours ago from web  in reply to pattigibbons

pattigibbons @CoffeeWithChris I’d have to hear more to blame Constantine for this one (he did plenty, but I’m not sure originated this disconnect)   about 22 hours ago from web  in reply to CoffeeWithChris

MarkMatlock @CoffeeWithChris My feeling is that the church is putting the blame for it’s failure on parents without offering much in the way of example.   about 19 hours ago from web  in reply to CoffeeWithChris

MarkMatlock @pattigibbons Hmmm..the Great Commission wasn’t given to families. The call was for disciples to make disciples. I’d love your thoughts.   about 22 hours ago from web  in reply to pattigibbons

CoffeeWithChris @MarkMatlock true but that doesn’t imply the institutional church either, right? Deuteronomy says for parents to teach their children…   about 22 hours ago from web  in reply to MarkMatlock

pattigibbons @MarkMatlock if parents are disciples, and if the OT instr to teach your children are both in effect, there should be cooperation on that   about 21 hours ago from web  in reply to MarkMatlock

MarkMatlock @coffeewithchris @pattigibbons I’m just shooting from the hip here btw. I like this conversation.   about 19 hours ago from web  in reply to CoffeeWithChris

MarkMatlock @pattigibbons I do agree with you, but feel the real problem came when we separated disciple making and evangelism.   about 19 hours ago from web  in reply to pattigibbons

pattigibbons @MarkMatlock we agree on that as well. I’m of the strong opinion that the best evangelism is Christians being truly Christian in real life.   about 19 hours ago from web  in reply to MarkMatlock

MarkMatlock @CoffeeWithChris I agree, but the OT context is specific under a theocratic culture. Still relevant, but church has responsibility.   about 19 hours ago from web  in reply to CoffeeWithChris

CoffeeWithChris @MarkMatlock totally agree, it has to be “both/and” instead of “either/or”   about 19 hours ago from web  in reply to MarkMatlock

So, a little theological discussion 140 characters at a time, and it’s still on my mind! Do you have ideas about discipleship, the family and the church? Would love to hear it, and the comments here accept more than 140 characters!  Please feel free to chime in.

Adam posted his thoughts about discipleship in youth ministry in a video called Open Ended Discipleship [click here to go to that post].  A different facet of the conversation, but an important related question for youth ministry.

Those of you who visit the blog in person may have already noticed the little box under the subscription options titled “What Should I Write About?”  It’s a virtual suggestion box, with a social twist.  Make a suggestion, yes, please do!  You can also vote on the suggestions others have made for a little social suggesting.

If you’re reading via a feed reader or email, you can make and vote on suggestions, too, by clicking here.

Why am I doing this?  I want to know what you’d like to read about!  What burning questions do you have?  What do you want to know about me, my work, my experience, my faith… ask away!

Our 2 days of Parent Orientation were full of seminars designed to answer the “burning questions” asked by lots of parents who are sending their kids to Saint Rose.  Many of the questions were about navigating Saint Rose systems like finances, safety systems, schedules, academic help, dorm rules, and meal plans.  Pretty routine items, all of which are also covered in the handy-dandy parent handbook they put in our lemon yellow bags of orientation info.

One of the most interesting “non-handbook” seminars was on internet security and privacy issues.  This was a parents only seminar (the students were elsewhere talking about diversity, drugs & alcohol and playing rock-paper-scissors).  I was floored at the real lack of understanding among fellow parents of how the internet works, what social networking is, and how it can impact a person.  The seminar was helpful for most, I think, because it opened the parents’ eyes to the existence of social networks, and gave insight into facebook in particular.  I have to say, though, I was left with a sinking feeling about many of the people in the room’s understanding of the presence their kids have on the web – it means they aren’t overseeing their kids’ internet use and safety; they were analog parents in a digital world.  The scariest part of that realization for me was that as they’re sending kids off to college is really too late to seriously influence their teenagers’ behavior on a technology they know far more about than their parents.

Parents: How are you involved in your teenagers’ cyber-life? What are resources you’ve found helpful in learning about internet issues, both the pluses and the minuses of the web’s social world? Are you communicating with your teenagers about those pluses and minuses?

Youth workers: We tend to be more involved online with the youth in our groups than most parents are.  How are you resourcing students, parents and families, if at all, about how social sites work, and the good and bad aspects of using them?

If you’re a youth worker and you use twitter, like I am, there are a few special-to-ym twitterers I’ve added, and thought you might want to follow, too.

Youth Specialties: http://twitter.com/ys_scoop
Simply Youth Ministry: http://twitter.com/simplyinsider
Lifeway: http://twitter.com/studentministry
Youth Ministry Exchange: http://twitter.com/ymx
PlanetWisdom: http://twitter.com/planetwisdom
YouthMinistry.com: http://twitter.com/youthministry
Youth Ministry TV: http://twitter.com/YMTV

Have you found others that are specifically youth ministry related? Share them in the comments. If you use twitter, add me or let me know, I’d love to add you.

Not sure what twitter is? Watch the video below for some help.

[youtube:http://youtube.com/watch?v=ddO9idmax0o]

I came across this website thanks to my twitter habit – it’s the home of a goal setting challenge called 101 things in 1001.  From their getting started page:

The Mission:
Complete 101 preset tasks in a period of 1001 days.

The Criteria:
Tasks must be specific (ie. no ambiguity in the wording) with a result that is either measurable or clearly defined. Tasks must also be realistic and stretching (ie. represent some amount of work on my part).

Why 1001 Days?
Many people have created lists in the past – frequently simple goals such as New Year’s resolutions. The key to beating procrastination is to set a deadline that is realistic. 1001 Days (about 2.75 years) is a better period of time than a year, because it allows you several seasons to complete the tasks, which is better for organising and timing some tasks such as overseas trips or outdoor activities.

I am a huge fan of long-term goal setting.  Although recent life experiences have required me to shorten my sights for the sake of my family, this may in fact be the challenge I need to get my ‘Inner planner’ on track with my present reality in view.

Are any of you doing this?  I’d love to know, and hear about your experiences.

I’ve been using feedburner to syndicate posts on this blog since it moved to pattigibbons.com, and honestly, it’s a great idea inconsistently executed.  First, the issue was the service taking a l-o-n-g time to send posts out to subscribers’ feed readers.  Then, email subscribers weren’t getting all the posts.  Lately, the number of subscribers fluctuates wildly, so I have no idea if the number is accurate.  Of course, feedburner is now part of google, but that hasn’t seemed to improve things (and I’m a google apps fan!).  I guess I’m just not a happy customer.

Does anyone know of/use another RSS service?  If so, please leave a comment and let me know your preference.