ME!A friend recently brought it to my attention that my personal Facebook page was a lot of pictures of myself, taken by myself, in various stages of hair styling. I jokingly responded, "Well, I have a bit of a narcissist streak."
But for serious, I have a bit of a narcissist streak.
;)
Click to (heh heh) ENLARGE.
During the 2008, then Sen. Hillary Clinton was severely lacking in online buzz and coolness. After all, then Sen. Barack Obama was sucking up all the memes and hype with things like "Obama Girl" and "I got this" and hilarious Obama themed folk art that ranged from awe inspiring to hilarious to delicious to vomit inducing. So, poor Hillary. She didn't get to have any of the coolness fun.
Then came these incredible pictures of the now Secretary of State, doing her thing in the cargo hold of a plane as she heads off around the world to represent the US of A ... holding a cell phone, rocking a pair of sunglass.
Live by the tweet. Die by the tweet.Nothing is private on the Internet. Except sometimes it's easy to get a false security of it.
Like you share photos with your Facebook friends or friends on Twitter. Maybe only your closest friends actually comment or care. But maybe you have more than just your "personal" friends following you on Facebook or Twitter. And maybe some of those people wouldn't think all that much of sharing your "private" messages and photos with the very "public" world. For most of us, our anonymity, in that we are not well-known, on television or famous in our respective fields will protect us a little from ourselves. A little. (But not really.) But if you're Roland Martin you can't really take that for granted.
Danielle Belton | 5 Comments | Share Article | Email Article | Print Article | tagged CNN, media, roland martin, social media, social networking, the snob, twitter 
On The Root today Patrice J. Williams tackled the uneasiness some feel about "black Twitter" and its love of trending topics. Black Twitter, for those who don't know, is just regular ol' Twitter, only with a focus on how the black folks are communicating with each other via social networking. It's a great time to do some pop culture navel gazing. Most people use Twitter as an act of communication. Others use it as an expression of their worsening narcissism. Some people want to make whatever rap person Lil Duval tweets some variation a trending topic everyday. Other folks want to know #liesmentell. Some of those people are black people.
While I can understand the tendency as a black person who doesn't know who Lil Duval is and doesn't use Twitter to discuss the various ways women cheat on their man-friends to be all "OMG! LOOK HOW IGNORANT THOSE PEOPLE ARE BEING ON TWITTER!" This is one of those situations where I'm like, is this really a problem? And if this is a problem ... why?
By all accounts, I was born old. Like Benjamin Button. Only I looked like a normal baby and somewhat acted like a normal baby (being pre-verbal, the crying, the pooping, the eating, the sleeping, etc.), but for the most part of my youth I was unnervingly serious to the point of sometimes being morose. Sure, I had some normal kid emotions. It was really easy to make me cry. I had a ton of phobias. (Loud noises, camera flashes, the dark, dogs, insects, heights, etc.) But I was ... how can I put this? Not fun.
Grace Jones as a Twitter Bird. The greatest of all the #BrownTwitterBirds. I love it. I want to marry it. It is that funny. (Via @iamthenublack)I don't think this is what Slate.com had in mind when they wrote their story about people who use Twitter who also happen to be black. But we, in Blackland, took an annoying slight from an article that seemed hopelessly lame and turned it into #BrownTwitterBird Christmas. It's all Alicia at InnyVinny.com's fault, as she was the one who took the original bird, illustrated by Alex Eben Meyer for Slate, and turned something cute but slightly offensive into a glorious, multifaceted display of the many diverse aspects of things you use in Dozens jokes.
What was the result?
This was the image Slate ran with the story. So many wrong things. So. Many. Wrong. Things.Are you a black person? Do you use the internet? Do you like social networking? OMG! Are you on "The Twitter?!?!" One of the downsides about being a minority is that when you do something everyone else gawks and stares at you as they never really think about you that much anyway, hence they can't believe that you would talk about something on the Twitter "they" wouldn't be talking about. Or that there would be enough of you chatting on the Twitter to make trending topics. Yet! There you are! Making trending topics! How on Earth did this happen? The Awl was the first site I noticed to stand and gawk at something they called "Black People's Twitter," which I always thought was "bored teenagers up late at night on their smart phones, talking shit." But, you know, a lot of those teenagers are black and they manage to get trending topics going so THIS IS A THING! And apparently it needs to be discussed and we need to understand "why." Our friends at Slate.com (and their over-sized baseball cap wearing, black Twitter bird*) are on the case!
Danielle Belton | 38 Comments | Share Article | Email Article | Print Article | tagged Slate.com, race, social media, social networking, technology, twitter 
On Thursday all of Twitter was a buzz about a video purportedly featuring former child actress Maia Campbell in disarray. I didn't post anything about it here because the gossip was just too mean spirited and low and I didn't want to be a part of it, but Robin Caldwell wrote a beautiful piece for BlackWeb 2.0 on Campbell and why people should not be using this video clip to poke fun or relish in someone's downfall, but to come to a better understanding about mental illness. Here is what Caldwell had to say.
TJ Holmes interviewing singer Fantasia.From the Prince of West Memphis, the man who is not my husband (unfortunately), Mr. T.J. Holmes, on why he doesn't respond to your tweets and Facebook inquires:
Need twitter/Facebook help. Some of y'all giving me hell for not responding to questions. How do I do that from my PDA without spamming all?
There! There! He reads your tweets! (And my blog!) Leave my little Reese's Peanut Butter Cup of the TV News alone!
(Also, confused. Why are people wishing TJ a happy birthday on his Facebook page TODAY when it says his birthday in on the 19th. Which is Wednesday? Very odd.)
Danielle Belton | 10 Comments | Share Article | Email Article | Print Article | tagged Google Stalking, TJ Holmes, media, social media 
