After a year out of work (bar three months doing what amounted to a project) I will, on Monday re-enter the rat race with Fluid Creativity as an SEO Technician.

It’s fair to say I’m both excited and nervous in equal measure. I’m not nervous about my ability to do the job. If anything, and without being arrogant, I am probably overqualified / experienced and the salary is certainly a LOT less then I am used to being on. The nerves come from getting back into that working routine and how it will affect my life and my relationship. The nerves are unfounded, of course, but still…they exist!

Why have I taken such a massive pay cut and a ‘lesser’ job than I’m used to? Simply because I want to start again, rebuild what amounts to my career and LEARN. I’m more than happy to do so and I won’t be sitting still. This isn’t the role I want for life at all, it’s one I want to build from and on, hopefully with Fluid.

I’ll be trying my hardest to do my best both for the company and our clients and I want to impress. It’s refreshing to start from the bottom again and get a proper grounding in things.

If you’re interested in who Fluid are and what they do (and especially if you want them to help you out!), check out their various presences here:

@fluidcreativity

Fluid Creativity on Facebook

Fluid Creativity on Vimeo

Fluid Creativity on flickr

Fluid Creativity on LinkedIn

Fluid Creativity Blog

I’ll still be keeping up my own project at Sporting Fare (@sportingfare; Sporting Fare on Facebook) so please do pay regular visits!

"No more development"

Well, a while back I blogged about Google Wave and how it wasn’t turning out to be quite what Google intended. Seems I was right, as TechCrunch reports today.

I still haven’t figured out what Google Wave was for, or how it could best be used. Without users it is pretty much useless and as it turns out, Google have been disappointed by the take up of their actually brilliant technology and as such are stopping development of it. They’ve opened up bits of the code to allow developers to continue where they are leaving off and say it will stay live – but they won’t rule out shutting it down in the future.

It is a shame, because when you look at it it’s a huge step forward. Perhaps it was just ahead of its time, who knows? Either way, Google are done with it. Can developers make it more user friendly and appealing to the masses? Maybe, time will tell, but again, without users it’s useless.

I hope Google doesn’t get to down about this and continue to innovate. They do it SO well.

Google are, apparently, developing a social networking platform to rival Facebook by, erm, copying Facebook.

Clearly Google Buzz hasn’t worked, Google Wave died on its arse and so now we’ll get Google Me. But how is copying Facebook going to CHALLENGE Facebook?

Ok, Google are running scared of FB at the moment and clearly want to make some impression on its 500 million+ users but this can’t be the right way?! There’s no sense in it.

They could simplify FBs still ridiculously complicated privacy settings, they could import some of their other functions – risking complicating the format in doing so – and they will, no doubt, make it a much prettier place to be. But if it’s still going to be an FB clone I’m really not seeing the logic.

Still…I WILL check it out, I WILL use it and IF it turns out to be another Google flop I WILL abandon it just as quickly as I did Buzz and Wave.

Make or break time for Google on the social media front, either way.

Remember this? “LFM Uld /w Achievement”

Well now it’s been replaced with this:

“LFM ICC10 /w GearScore”

“LFM ICC25 5.2k gs only”

“LFM weekly raid. /w gs and achievement”

GearScore - irrelevant!

In some ways it is slightly fairer. When idiotic raid leaders wouldn’t let you join a raid because you didn’t have the Achievement I could only wonder how you were supposed to GET the Achievement if no bugger would let you raid.

With GearScore it’s in your hands. Put the work in doing the daily random, the weekly raid and the odd bit of raiding and you can increase your GearScore on your own.

It’s being misused though, at least on my server. You try PUG-ing a raid now and unless you have already done eight of 12 bosses in ICC and managed to get your GearScore above 5.5k and you won’t even get in a ToC or Ulduar raid. Madness!

It’s been said many, many times – SKILLZ > GEAR. And the fact it is entirely possible to increase your GearScore with no help means that any old idiot can have the right score, but just can’t PLAY.

So come on you supposed IMBA raid leaders. Cut those of us who can’t play all day, every day some slack and invite us. We won’t let you down. We know what we’re doing. And if we don’t, because it’s our first attempt on a particular boss, don’t worry – we learn VERY fast.

(I should point out my GearScore is now over 5.7k – but that’s because I can PLAY, not because I’ve spent months farming Emblems of Frost)

So four students from New York City think they can build a rival social media platform to Facebook and have received the money to do it. I am intrigued.

My feelings about Facebook change constantly. Sometimes I love it. Sometimes I hate it. And sometimes I wonder what the point of it is. But I continue to use it, both personally and as a way of promoting my own website with a Fan Page.

I sometimes feel that Facebook gives too much, shares too much, but the beauty of it is, of course, that you only share what you want to share. It just doesn’t feel like that sometimes. 500 million users can’t be wrong though, right?

Back to these students and Diaspora though. They bill it as “The privacy-aware, personally controlled, do-it-all, open source social network”. There’s little else as yet to give us a clue as to what that actually means. Sure, there’s a blog that gives a few hints, but in the main the whole thing is a mystery.

Obviously the guys are picking up on Facebook’s recent privacy problems, promising to give complete control of data to the user. But in all fairness, Facebook do try that – just not very well, not very user-friendly and they probably lay too much open to search engines and the like.

So Diaspora presumably won’t do that. Which is a good thing. But what will it do?! I want to know. And I want to know NOW, dammit! The guys aren’t giving much away as yet and will be spending the summer writing the platform now they’ve got about £160,000 of funding, plus offers of support from all over the place.

Visit joindiaspora.com for an explanation and, unless you are technically gifted, you are left feeling more confused than before you arrived. It’s software. You host your information wherever you like. You’re a seed. I have no idea what they are talking about to be honest. Nevertheless, as I said, I am intrigued.

I have had run-ins with similar things before that never went anywhere. A friend tried (and may still be trying for all I know) to build his own social networking site. Google Wave was supposed to bring a number of technologies into one but it hasn’t done a damn thing, as I ranted about a few weeks back.

I can only hope Diaspora proves more successful.

I don’t for one minute think they will manage to challenge the dominance of Facebook. It’s too entrenched in the world’s psyche now. If you’re not on Facebook, who are you? There are, of course, pockets of resistance, MySpace die hards and the technically inept who will never get on Facebook. Could they be tempted by Diaspora? Possibly. Hard to tell when we know nothing though!

I’ll be keeping an eye on it. It could be the next big thing. It’s good to know people are still pushing the boundaries, at least.