Whatever is real cannot be threatened;
Whatever is not both mobile and social does not exist.

By “mobile,” I mean “able to be both accessed and interacted with, by means of an app on a mobile device like an iPhone, Droid, etc.” An instance of this is the Powerline Mobile App, mentioned in February 2010.

John Hinderaker writes:

We’ve designed mobile applications that allow you to access Power Line directly on your iPhone or Blackberry, specially formatted for the small screen. Now you can read PL posts wherever you go. Our mobile app includes, along with our own posts, a breaking news feed from Breitbart.com, so, wherever you might be, you can always stay up to date on the latest news.

I’m here to tell you that the next blogging platform will have a mobile-app-constructor, where you will decide what kinds of things should be included in your blog’s mobile app (news feeds, cool blog feeds, social media feeds, etc.). Like the Powerline app, the blog mobile app of the future will be available on multiple platforms (iPhone, Blackberry, Android, Windows Mobile). If you don’t like this, or find it too complicated, you had better get used to having a relatively small influence in the world.

By “social,” I mean “leveraging social media to sell one’s products, make the case for one’s ideas, or advocate for one’s causes”

By “leveraging,” I mean “Skillfully taking advantage of existing networks of relationships and communities.”

By “social media,” I mean “any platform that allows people to quickly build relationships based on common interests.” There are quite a few social media platforms out there, but a “Big Four” seems to have emerged (Twitter, Facebook, MySpace and YouTube), and anyone who is not using all of these sites is leaving influence on the table.

After some rummaging around, I have discovered that the Minnesota Organization of Blogs (MOB) prefers Twitter as a social media platform. I’m not particularly shocked by this. Twitter fits the MOB demographic. I found all of 3 MOB members of Facebook. When I was doing the rummaging, I was only looking for Twitter accounts, but on further, review, I should have looked at all of the Big Four. If you want to be influential, you have to get over your social media preferences.

Here is the MOB on Twitter, as of March 2010.

@echozoe – έχω ζωη
@toni100 – Bear Creek Ledger
@mrclm – Because I Said So
@bradley0569 – Brad Carlson
@Anokaflash – Centrisity
@conradzero – Conrad Zero
@douglasbass – Crossword Bebop
@PainterPancakes – Faithmouse
@ChadTheElder – Fraters Libertas
@bspward – Brian “Saint Paul” Ward, Fraters Libertas
@Atomizer77 – Atomizer, Fraters Libertas
@Sisyphus_in_GP – Sisyphus, Fraters Libertas (also at Nihilist In Golf Pants)
@Nihilist_in_GP – Nihilist, Fraters Libertas (also at Nihilist In Golf Pants)
@DerekBrigham – Freedom Dogs
@FreschFisch – Fresch Fisch
@GOPMommy – GOP Mommy
@EdMorrissey – Hot Air
@LadyLogician – Ladies Logic
@marketpowerblog – Market Power
@martyandrade – Marty Andrade
@MplsCrime – Minneapolis Crime Watch
@MDETweets – Minnesota Democrats Exposed
@Nihilist_in_GP – Nihilist In Golf Pants, (also at Fraters Libertas)
@LearnedFoot – Learned Foot, Nihilist In Golf Pants
@Sisyphus_in_GP – Sisyphus, Nihilist In Golf Pants (also at Fraters Libertas)
@DavidStrom – David Strom, Our House
@mmarteen – Margaret Martin, Our House
@plar – Peace Like A River
@dirtymushroom – Rambling Rhodes
@AAARF – Residual Forces
@scsuscholars – King Banaian, SCSU Scholars
@mitchpberg – Shot In The Dark
@LookTrueNorth – True North
@truthvmachine – Truth v. The Machine
@davegj – Uncommon Sense

Where was I? Oh, yes. By “does not exist,” I mean “has no discernable cultural influence.” You may not like this future, but I’m afraid it doesn’t care. It’s something any blogger worthy of the name will want to at least contemplate.

I hereby declare that as Minnesota’s conservative media federation, the MOB is behind the curve regarding social media. I’m looking forward to having a few chats with some MOB members about this at the MOB Party on March 13.

Technorati: Minnesota Organization of Blogs, social media, Twitter

One could think of the MOB as the bench of the Northern Alliance. One could think of the MOB as Minnesota’s conservative media federation. Crossword Bebop is a proud member in good standing of the MOB.

The MOB isn’t merely a Twin Cities organization, as there are a number of members in the St. Cloud area (SCSU Scholars, Psycmeistr’s Ice Palace, and View From The Cloud). There are also some expats such as Bear Creek Ledger (Tennessee) and Ladies Logic (Utah) who moved from Minnesota after joining the MOB.

The MOB has made Keegan’s Irish Pub in Minneapolis its hangout of preference, having once biannual (twice a year), but now only occasional parties there. The last one was in March 2009, chronicled here.

If you look at the top, there is now a page called “MOB.” That page contains the roster of the MOB, and a search engine for searching the blogs of the MOB.

If you want to find out more about the MOB, I suggest you visit Mitch Berg’s excellent blog Shot In The Dark. Mitch is writing a series of blog profiles of the members of the MOB. He will always have a happy place in my heart for his kind words about the Cypriot Syllabary Sudoku:

Eclectic? Heck yeah; you think posts about Sodoku written with archaic Cypriot syllabic alphabets grow on trees?

Technorati: Minnesota Organization of Blogs