There have been a couple of times that I was alarmed by what people are capable of thinking or doing.  A few years ago I started getting anonymous comments on various videos of my children, asking me to pose them in certain ways or have them do certain things.  Naturally I deleted all traces of the videos online (yes it is possible) and became very aware of what I was posting after that.  Although I was always careful to never name them or reveal the location of my children even before this incident, I became very protective after that and have been quite conscious of what I would and would not publish.  Over the years I have become more widely known because of my marketing and social media work, and although I’m certainly a small fish in a big pond, I do have a lot of connections with people that I’ve never met face to face.

Don’t get me wrong, I wouldn’t trade my social media life.  I’ve turned so many of my digital-first relationships into real-life relationships, and I love social media and the way it connects the world. But, and there is always a but…

I’m closing up my personal Facebook profile, restricting it to only people I know in real life.

I was going to post this earlier in the week, but as I was proofing the draft, I skipped over to my blog reader and was quite surprised to see that one of the greats in social media, Darren Rowse the ProBlogger, announced pretty much the same thing.  It’s an excellent article, you can read it here, but it left me thinking that this was the right move for me.  Darren has a much larger audience than I do (and he deserves it!), so pointing people over to his Facebook Fan Page yielded some pretty good results.  The very next day on Twitter I saw that my friend Jessica Gottlieb was doing the same thing…purging Facebook.

Honestly, the announcement of my personal Facebook page going private isn’t big news.  I’m writing this because I am looking at this as perhaps more of a renewing of the line between public and private lives globally.  The pendulum tends to swing in trends…we went from very private (no internet access) to very public (ChatRoulette) and I think we’re going to start seeing a swing back to the private.  It’s not going to go back to total segregation however…I see a hybrid emerging, especially for social media professionals.

I’m closing up my Facebook profile and unfriending people that I don’t personally know…but honestly encouraging them to join me on my fan page.  And yes, I hate the term fan page…who am I that somebody would become a fan? I wish it were worded differently.  But it’s not, so that is what I will develop over time.  I had a conversation with somebody about this today, and they initially said something along the lines of “nice knowing you”, meaning that our digital connection was being cut.  On the contrary, I replied…I really think I’ll be engaging people a lot more with this move. My current Facebook status is automatically updated from my Twitter feed, so it’s actually not all that personal to begin with.  Twitter is still probably the best way to connect with me, but I’m not going to send it over to Facebook anymore; not to my personal or my public page.  We’ll see how it goes.

Hopefully now the separation of worlds will make more sense.  When my Aunt writes on my wall and asks how my mom is, half of my friends won’t wonder what she’s talking about.  When an online friend starts talking to me about HTML5 vs. Flash, half of my friends won’t wonder what he’s talking about.  And out of all of it, I think I can start putting up pictures of my children, and my friends from high school can comment on what good looking kids they are….because they really are good looking kids!

Thanks for understanding! I would love it if you would join me on my public Facebook page (I’m going to be careful to not call it a fan page), and if you have been thinking about this separation of public and private lives, I would love to hear about it in the comments or on Twitter. Or even on my new f** page.  ;)

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Bathroom photo used under Creative Commons from Brymo

I have recently signed on as the Senior Director of Social Media Strategy with M80, the Los Angeles based leading provider of social media marketing and digital publicity services to Fortune 500 brands.  That’s a mouthful, isn’t it?  Simply put, I work with some of the most amazing companies from around the globe, helping them to reach out, listen to and engage their current and future customers.

I’m humbled and excited to be in this role.  The staff of M80 consists of some of the brightest and most forward-thinking men and women that I have had the privilege to work with, and what we have been able to accomplish together in just the last few weeks in amazing to me.  Although I probably won’t get into granular detail with what we are doing (need to keep some of the wizard behind the curtain stuff behind the curtain still…) I will continue to write about how social media and technology impacts both brands and consumers.  I actually hope to be writing more now, as I’m spending so much time on airplanes.

Me and my Zune HD

I am working with some amazing global brands like Microsoft, LG, Dr Pepper, and Volkswagon.  All of our projects are incredibly interesting and exciting, and if you have been following me for some time you know that I am really passionate about one in particular: Zune.  In the interest of full disclosure, I do advise the truly delightful people at Zune, but my enthusiasm should come as no surprise to anybody that has been reading this blog for any amount of time.  I wrote my first Zune post in July 2006, and did the math about why Zune is superior in this June 2008 article (boy did I get blasted by the fanboys in the comments!) I’ll keep blogging, tweeting and Facebooking about them and our other clients, but now I can do it as a loyal consumer and an industry insider!

As usual, I will continue to use social media to make personal connections with people, both digitally and in the real world.  Twitter is my daily hotbed of activity, but I would also love to connect with you on LinkedIn and Facebook. If you want to subscribe to this blog, the feed is here.

I would love it if you would also start tracking M80 in the usual places like Twitter and our blog.  We’ll be striving to provide value to you, information that you can use (like this article) within your company or just for your own personal satisfaction.

Thank you so much for being a part of this community!

As he writes, “…relationships are what make great and unique pictures. That’s why I love documenting people, their families, and their celebrations and sincerely enjoy developing a working friendship with my clients.” That was exactly the attitude I was hoping to find, and I wasn’t disappointed when we met Matthias a few Saturdays ago.  In fact, he greatly exceeded my expectations.

Part of the deal that I advertised was that I would write a post about the photographer, pointing to their site, and then put up several tweets about it.  What I didn’t expect is that the experience would be so incredible and perfect that I would want to write more than just an obligatory “go visit this person’s site”.  Spending that day with my children was such a personal experience and one that I wanted to remember with pictures, and Matthias didn’t just take a lot of pictures that will help with that (although honestly I would have been happy with that level of service), he truly captured the mood and the feel of our adventure together, and so perfectly caught the kids’ personalities in his images.

When he sent me a link to the photos I was excited, but when I started looking through them I was just blown away.  He caught the playfulness and bond of my two youngest, the beauty and joy of my oldest daughter and the pensive introspection and kindness of my oldest son.  I was mesmerized by the images, and they brought back the joy and excitement of that day immediately.  As I write this and look back over those pictures again, I’m just stricken by how well they turned out.

Beyond the amazing photography, our day with Matthias was a true joy.  He was with us during very personal times, and also exploring and heading in every direction in a sea of people at a popular tourist destination.  My kids felt comfortable with him right away and in a very short time they seemed to forget that he was taking pictures of us.  He laughed with us, he saw the world through the eyes of a child at times and as such was able to anticipate and capture the moments that he saw coming.  We had such an amazing time with him, and Matthias made everything comfortable, easy and memorable.

If you are in the San Francisco Bay Area and are in need of a photographer for your personal moments, like a wedding, an engagement or something unique like a day at Alcatraz Island, I can honestly and enthusiastically recommend Matthias Giezendanner.  He is professional, attentive, unassuming, gentle and artistic.  Please go visit his site, look at his work, then get in touch with him.  I have no doubt that, like me, you will look forward to another time that you will be able to work with him.  Thank you Matthias for all that you did, you perfectly captured a very special day to me.

The Gig

On Saturday, September 5th I’m going to be hitting some cool points of interest in San Francisco with my four kids.  I would really like to capture it all with pictures, but I’m getting tired of lunking my own camera around everywhere, and frankly it’s a little challenging to get in any of the pictures with them.  We’re going to be going to Alcatraz Island around noon, and after all of that we’ll go for a quick hike/exploration in The Presidio, ending up at an old gun battery pretty near the base of the Golden Gate Bridge.  I’m not really wanting posed photos (although a few would be nice), but rather would have candid shots of the experience…me and my kids, them doing things that kids do…the good and craziness of life with four kids in San Francisco.  The total time commitment for this would be from 11am to about 6pm (maybe a little earlier).

What You’ll Give Me

My requirements really are very few.

• You don’t have to be a full-time photographer by any means, but you must be pursuing it as more than a point-and-click enthusiast. You need to have a website/blog that showcases your work.  This is less about me checking you out and more about me being able to point people in your direction
• You have to enjoy the company of kids.  I have four, ranging from 4-11.  They’re great, but if you don’t like kids, hanging out with 4 of them all day gets tiring.
• You need decent equipment.  Honestly, I don’t expect you do carry around 100 lbs of gear, but a decent SLR and some lenses would be great.  That shows me that you dig what you’re doing!

What I’ll Give You

This isn’t a photo shoot that is going to pay any cash, but it should pay off big time for those that need some publicity.

• I will write up one blog post about you and your work, and feature a few pics from the day.  I’ll send as many people to your site as I can, my blog gets thousands of daily hits.
• I will tweet about you 10 times a week for four weeks.  I have just a little over 25,000 followers, with retweets I usually have around 100,000 impressions.  That means you will get a lot of attention.
• I will write about you on Facebook.  This is my smallest area of influence, but I still have about 800 friends here.
• You’ll get a free trip to Alcatraz!  You have to let me know about this soon, I have to buy you a ticket before they are sold out.
• You’ll get lunch and dinner.  Hey, in this recessive economy, every meal counts!

That’s it!  I want to hear from you ASAP so we can get it figured out.  I’m very relaxed, very easy to work with, so I’m looking for somebody with the same attitude.  Please email me (matt at mattsingley dot com) or call my office at 323-774-1269 to get this set up.  Thanks, I’m looking forward to meeting you!

I woke up this morning to the incredibly devastating news that one of my best friends, Scott, had died last night in a plane crash.  He loved to fly and was an incredible pilot who was happiest at about 10,000 feet in his favorite little plane,  November Four Yankee Hotel.  Although I moved out of Oregon a couple of years ago and haven’t had much face time with him, I saw him just a week ago when he made a surprise visit and stood with me on Malibu beach.  We stood barefoot in the sand, laughed, talked and caught up.  That time will now be burned in my memory.

I do not personally know most of my readers, but just want to ask that if you are the praying type, please pray for his wife and children.

I’ve been staring at this video, watching :45 of Scott and I flying back from Northern Washington together, over gorgeous Mt. Adams nears Sunset, loving life and each other, if you have a Facebook account, click on the link below.

Scott & Matt Singley Flying Over Mt. Adams

UPDATE:  KATU, a Portland, OR TVstation, did a short story about Scott and interviewed me by phone after reading this post, you can see the 1:00 video here. 

Scott and I used to go to Mexico together to build homes for people that lived in cars, tents and boxes (I, along with others, called him “Skilly” because he was so skilled at so many things).  This :30 video shows him at his best…funny, happy, full of life and just glad to be helping others.  I miss you, Scott.