By: Ronald King

If you’re not familiar with Instagram, shame on you. To inform the unaware, here’s a tidbit of background—-Instagram is a photo sharing mobile application that allows users to digitally filter photos and share with other social networking sites like Facebook, Twitter and Tumblr. 

Instagram allows users to dabble with the right, creative side of the brain and produce the art he or she may not have thought was possible.

One can simply take a subpar photo of a soda can on an office desk, play with a couple of filters and voilà, your followers go gaga over it.

 (mcramer7)

Since the introduction of Instagram in October 2010, this application has evolved to become a personal brand building agent. On that note, there is so much potential for brands with creating an account on Instagram, one mainly being that it provides an in-depth understanding of the brand image (no pun intended). After all, a picture is worth a thousand words

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By: Elton Silva  

When I told my mom that I landed a Buzz Builder position with Likeable Media, she was overcome with elation about my latest endeavor. However, I quickly hit a road block when she then asked what I’d be doing. It’s easy enough to explain, right? No, wrong! My mother is Portuguese. Not the kind of Portuguese that pretend that their Portuguese just because of the last name or because they know how to say a few words. Portuguese in the sense that she lived there and then moved to the United States in 1979 in hopes of finding the “American Dream” (which she subsequently found and is one of the main reasons I’m here today). Oh, and not to mention that if I don’t eat 12 courses with every meal, I was looked at as if I had some sort of eating disorder (well it was more like 9 courses). Anyways, back to the initial point I was trying to make. If you thought learning a different language was a difficult undertaking, try teaching the powers of social media in a language that an individual who is computer illiterate can understand. In this case, that person is my mother; the language, Portuguese.

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By: Elise Englander

When my 57-year old father sees me on Twitter for long periods of time and says, “What a waste of time,” I still continue to scroll down my Twitter timeline and look for the latest Tweets from celebrities or other famous people. One reason I check Twitter daily is because I write for an entertainment website. The second reason is because unlike my father, I am genuinely interested in what certain celebrities have to say on social networks, including Twitter and Facebook. Some celebrities use social networks to promote a project they are involved in, which is a clever self-promotion strategy; others also share their personal opinions. This gives fans and followers a chance to read what a celebrity has to say about a certain topic, event in his or her own life or about something important happening in the world. Before social networks, celebrities seemed unreachable and untouchable. Social media provide celebrities with platforms to interact and connect with people all over the world.

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By Helena Hay

Are you going abroad this upcoming academic year? Want your friends, family and strangers to stay up to date on your new awesome life? Don’t make a blog. I’m serious. Here are the top four reasons why you should publicly log your adventures via Twitter instead.

1. Don’t know HTML or CSS? No problemo
Let’s compare the steps to create and maintain Twitter vs. a blog

Twitter

1. 1. Set-up an account. This includes making a username, password, picture, bio and background design if you choose.
   1a. If you already have a Twitter, the above step is already done! Why should you create a whole separate blog chronicling your life when your Twitter already does that? Exactly, you shouldn’t.
2. 2. Tweet to your heart’s desire, 140 characters at a time.
3. 3. Respond to people who @mention you. 

Blog

1. 1. Find and choose a preferred blogging platform (Blogspot, WordPress, Xanga, Tumblr, Livejournal… the list goes on) and a domain name.
2. 2. Make it look pretty. You could select a ready-made theme, or if you’re fancy you could create your own theme with coding and time.
3. 3. Learn how to write eloquently. You can probably already do this but remember, you are publically publishing your thoughts now in full sentences. They should be well-written.
4. 4. Read and respond to comments.

2. Blogs are long, attention spans are short 
I won’t lie here. I’ve had a handful of friends go abroad who all had blogs. I barely ever read them. My favorite parts were always (and only) the pictures and their captions. What I’ve found through personal experience is, people don’t just keep abroad blogs to share with friends and family, but as a type of public diary. Wouldn’t you rather read a handful of varying tweets than a five paragraph tell-all? Keep it short, people.

3. Update on the go! 
If you choose to use a smartphone abroad, not only is your phone smart, but you are too. To illustrate from personal experience, I recently went on a two week trip to Europe and brought an iPod touch as my only form of technology (I’m serious). Here’s why:

• - Free public wifi in Europe is more prevalent than in the US. Even if you don’t have wifi at the time you want to tweet, you can save it as a draft to send later.
• - If you have a data plan, this will allow you to tweet almost anywhere and makes you tweet consciously and with purpose since abroad data packages are not cheap. 
• - Essentially, you’ll be able to to instantly tweet about anything. And so many external apps now connect to Twitter so, go ahead! Upload that photo of the Eiffel Tower via lockerz, twitpic or instagram, write about your gondolier in Venice (#swoon!), check-in to the Sydney Football Stadium via foursquare, upload that video of the Spanish Flamenco dancers via Tout.

4. Hone your loyal friends
You’re probably really popular. Lucky for you, Twitter has a feature that allows your followers the option of sending your tweets straight to their phones as a text message. See the image below, all you need to do is click the little cell phone icon next to the following button on a Twitter page and voila! You just became a modern day stalker, just kidding. 

So if your relatives or even friends don’t want to log on to Twitter to see what you’re up to, they can opt to have it sent straight to their phones! Saving time and confusion.

Spend your time abroad, being abroad. Not blogging about it.

Not convinced? Let me know what you think in the comments below!