For the last five months or so, I’ve been working on a contract basis as the Community Manager of an Internet start-up company called ReputationDefender. In my work, I’m primarily responsible for writing customer-facing communications, including newsletters and daily blog posts about online reputation management, Internet privacy, and personal branding issues. In addition to my writing, I am also responsible for monitoring and managing the company’s presence on social networking sites, such as Twitter and Facebook. It is in this part of my job where I get to have some of the most fun.

For instance, take a look at this exchange I had with a guy named Jay Braymer on Twitter.

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Although Jay didn’t mention ReputationDefender by name, nor did he use an @ reply to tag us, I was still able to see his message and respond to it because I was monitoring the appropriate search terms on TweetDeck. The resulting conversation was not only comical, but it helped demonstrate a value that my company offers, namely that we can help you effectively monitor and manage your online reputation.

Now, I know it probably seems like I’m patting myself on the back too much for something that seems pretty obvious, but the truth is that some companies will only engage their customers at the mention of their brand name. If I had only been looking out for mentions of @RepDef, I would have missed Jay’s message and thus missed the opportunity to have a unique and memorable exchange. Monitoring a diverse set of keywords relative to your core competencies is a great way to start interesting conversations and move beyond the realm of mere self-promotion.

Will Jay become a customer of ReputationDefender? Maybe yes, maybe no. To me, though, that’s not really the point. At the end of the day, when I look at how I used Twitter, or other social media tools, I ask myself, “Did I have any fun or interesting conversations today and did I represent my company’s brand well?” In this case, I’m happy to say yes on both counts.

Chris Brogan, famed communications consultant, author, and President of New Marketing Labs, set the social media world a-twitter (if you’ll pardon the pun) when he non-chalantly shared his consulting day rate in a recent blog post. The number, an impressive $22,000 a day, struck many readers as extremely high, particularly when juxtaposed against another blog post in which Chris solicited an unpaid intern to be a part of a new project he has in the works.

Now, in my opinion, if someone is willing to pay him $22,000 to do what he does, then Chris deserves to earn that kind of money. This is the United States of America baby. If you’re a consultant and you want to get paid big bucks, set high rates and do awesome work. We are all the keepers of our own souls. Do what works for you and don’t sweat it if you’re not at Chris’ level of success.

Of course, I’m not here to ramble on about my thoughts on the issue (I already did that in a comment here), what I’m interested in is bringing together some of the interesting and insightful analysis that sprung up AFTER Chris dropped the bomb. So, without further ado, here are my three favorite blog posts on Brogan-gate! (Is it okay to attach “gate” to this, or am I overreaching?)

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• Does Chris Brogan’s Day Rate “Anchor” the Cost of Social Media Consulting?

In an extremely insightful post over at Incentive Intelligence, Paul Hebert explains how, due to his level of celebrity in the social media sphere, Brogan’s revelation has set an anchor for the high end costs of social media consulting. In other words, though there are those who may charge more, Brogan’s fees are a good benchmark for what the highest earners could be making. Obviously, the majority of consultants don’t make that kind of scratch, but Hebert explains that Brogan’s anchor may still help lower or mid-level consultants earn more money.

Quoting from the post:

“Assume you are a very, very good social media consultant with great references (maybe even Chris himself) but you only charge $1,000 per day.  Congrats – you can probably give yourself a big raise.  Not that you’re doing anything better – just that the anchor for the work you do is now known and you can point to it and say – “hey, I do similar work as Chris and I’m only $10K per day.”  Your clients may now think your $10K rate looks like a bargain. That’s what anchors do.  They provide context for discussion and allow for comparisons.”

• So How Do You Figure Out Your Self-Worth?

In an interesting post at Justin Kownacki’s blog, Justin expounds upon some of the same themes brought up in the Incentive Intelligence post. In essence, Justin says that the reason people were upset over Brogan’s day rate is because they never knew that money like that was a realistic goal. Rather than sulking about how much money you’re not making, however, Justin suggests that you should reconsider how valuable your own services are.

In an excellent six-step strategy, which I won’t repeat here because you really should just read it at his blog, Justin outlines some of the ways that you can accurately determine your own consulting rates.

Quoting from the post:

“Valuing yourself according to other people’s self-estimations is the easiest way to drive yourself crazy.  But valuing yourself according to your own self-estimation is the easiest way to go hungry, because you never truly understand what your assets are actually worth to the people who don’t know what you know.”

• Why Do Price Discrepancies Exist and What Do They Mean For You?

In a wonderfully lengthy and deeply analytical blog post, Mike Myatt, Chief Strategy Officer for N2Growth, explains the important role that pricing plays in all aspects of business, and why some people will pay $30,000 for a Rolex but “feel a Timex isn’t worth more than $50 dollars.”

What I like the most about Myatt’s post is that he carefully explains some of the complex issues that can impact pricing – the strength of your brand, your competition, whether there is a demand for your services –  and how this complexity must be acknowledged in order to fairly assess your own value.

Quoting from the post:

“Bottom line…pricing is not a taboo subject to be avoided, but rather a key metric that needs to be well understood as well as proactively measured and managed. Pricing needs to be dealt with in the most embryonic stages of strategic planning and needs to constantly be evaluated based upon changes in market dynamics”

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Do you have any insights into Brogan-gate that you’d like to offer? Share your thoughts in the comments.

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By now, the odds are good that you’ve heard about film director Kevin Smith’s recent clash with Southwest Airlines. If you haven’t yet heard the story, or you’re a bit fuzzy on the details, here are the essential details.

Kevin Smith, who is famous for directing Clerks, among numerous other popular comedy films, purchased two tickets for a short Southwest Airlines flight from Oakland to Burbank. When offered the opportunity to board an earlier stand-by flight, Smith took the option. Once on board, Smith seated himself and waited for the flight. At this point, according to Smith, it was determined by a Southwest employee that he required two seats to sit comfortably under Southwest’s “Customer of Size” policy and that he would have to be removed from the plane.

Being understandably embarrassed about the situation, Smith demonstrated that he could buckle the seat belt and put down the arm rests (two key requirements of the policy), but he was told to exit the plane anyway. At this point, Smith turned to his more than 1.6 million Twitter followers. In response to his status updates, many of his followers began lashing out against Southwest, prompting a Southwest employee to tweet an apology from the official Southwest Twitter account, along with an official apology at the Southwest Airlines corporate blog.

While you would think that might be the end of it, Smith still has a bone to pick with Southwest. The reason? As he clearly indicated by passing their test, he isn’t in fact “too fat to fly.” Despite this fact, however, while Southwest has agreed to review their “Customer of Size” policy to make sure that it’s appropriate, nobody has gone on record as saying that Smith was not in violation of the policy, which is all that he wants. Unfortunately, because of all the drama that this incident raised, the moniker of “too fat to fly” will now be a stain on his reputation for the rest of his life.

Kevin Smith on Southwest Airlines

As much as I like Kevin Smith as a director, and as a person in general, I can’t help but wonder if he isn’t responsible for all of this media attention. Now before you get mad at me, I want you to know I’m not blaming the victim. From my understanding of the incident, Smith was not necessarily treated fairly and I’m glad that Southwest is reviewing their policies to make sure nobody else must be embarrassed unnecessarily. However, if Kevin Smith hadn’t taken to Twitter with his complaint, it’s likely that the story wouldn’t have made national news (even the New York Times got involved) and he would still be known as one of the world’s most beloved indie-film directors and not the “too fat to fly” guy.

While social media websites like Twitter, Facebook, and Yelp have made it easier than ever to voice your displeasure over bad service, that doesn’t mean that you should automatically jump onto the web to plead your case. As Kevin Smith found out, when you complain about something, not everyone will be on your side. In this case, the sheer volume of angry, obscenity-laced comments against overweight people that the Smith/Southwest story has brought up is enough to show that perhaps it would have been better for him to suffer in silence, and then work with Southwest behind closed doors on resolving the issue.

If Smith had waited to try and sort out the issue privately, he may have been able to reach a more satisfying conclusion that wouldn’t have led to major media exposure. If Southwest wanted to play hardball, he still would have had the option of sharing his negative experience with the world, but he could have done it in a full-length blog post (like he eventually did here and here) where he might have been able to control the story better. Consider how much more impact Smith’s complaint would have had if he weren’t forced to try and explain the story in 140 character outbursts.

Social media has made it easy to give in to our impulses, particularly when it comes to complaining about something. As such, it is very important for companies to engage in proactive social media monitoring and maintain a full support staff for responding to customer concerns online. However, as consumers, we must also understand that Twitter and other social media sites are not always the proper forum to bring up a customer service issue.

Give the company a chance to respond to your concerns through traditional means of communication before pulling out the big guns. If you play your cards right, the company may offer a more satisfactory resolution to your concern than they would if they were forced to play defense online. Besides, even if a web rant does bring you swifter justice, consider the long-term effects in could have on your reputation. Do you really want the first results about you on Google to be a Twitter tirade?

What do you think? Is social media the first place you turn when you have a customer service problem, or do you use the good old-fashioned 800 number?

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Like most of the marketing community, I was generally disappointed with this year’s Super Bowl advertising (see my post at Beyond Madison Avenue). Generally, I felt they were uninspired, they failed to make a strong connection with their intended audience, and with the exception of the user-created Doritos ads, they lacked originality.

With that being said, one redeeming moment came. Thanks to the good people at Vizio, we now have proof that Gary Brolsma, aka the Numa Numa Kid is alive and well.

If, for some weird reason, you’re unfamiliar with the Numa Numa Kid, check out this Wikipedia article and the corresponding video below. Essentially, the Numa Numa saga is the story of how a Web cam, a super-catchy Romanian pop song, and the power of YouTube turned one nerdy kid into a worldwide sensation.

I remember laughing pretty hard the first time I saw this video over five years ago. It was as ridiculously goofy then as it is now. Of course, that didn’t stop it from racking up tens of millions of views and leading the way for countless imitations, interpretations, and parodies.

In fact, Mr. Brolsma has taken his unexpected Internet fame and turned it into an actual career. Long after I thought the video would have faded away, the dancing doofus (and I say that lovingly) has remained a vital part of our popular culture, and he’s not the only one.

In Vizio’s Super Bowl ad, which touted the Web functionality of the company’s new televisions, viewers were treated not only to Gary “Numa Numa” Brolsma but also the silky baritone voice of Tay “Chocolate Rain” Zonday and the world-famous Dramatic Chipmunk.

While I thought Vizio’s ad was only mildly effective (the peak of both Brolsma and Zonday’s popularity hit several years ago), it really made me think about the nature of celebrity in the Internet age. The things that we do online have never been more important to our real life successes and failures. Post a stupid picture of yourself on Facebook and you might lose your job. Post a crazy video of yourself on YouTube and you might turn it into multiple sponsorship opportunities, two music video appearances, and a spot in a $3 million Super Bowl ad.

What do you think makes an Internet meme go viral, and how long do you think these Web celebrities can keep milking the spotlight?

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Have you heard of Foursquare yet? If you haven’t, expect to soon. In November, Pete Cashmore, the founder and CEO of the popular social networking news website Mashable, predicted in a column for CNN that Foursquare would be next year’s Twitter. Cashmore isn’t the only one high on Foursquare either. In a blog post last September, tech blogger and web celebrity Robert Scoble did Cashmore one better saying “I think this lame little location game is going to be bigger than Twitter.”

What’s so special about Foursquare? First of all, it is a location-based application. By this, I mean that it is used primarily on GPS-enabled smartphones that can trace a user’s location. The goal of Foursquare is to use the application while you’re out on the town to check-in to different venues. Secondly, as you check-in, you earn points and, eventually, a variety of badges for your profile. If you check-in to a place more than anyone else, you become its “Mayor,” which, in some cases, gets you discounts on products or services.

The competitive aspect of Foursquare (it’s fun to oust someone as the mayor of a place) combined with its function as a sort of mobile city guide make it a fairly addictive application when you’re out. Since I started using the site myself, I have been focused on Foursquare more than almost any other social networking application I use.

As much fun as Foursquare can be to use, however, there are some natural privacy questions about the service. For instance, is it safe to tell the world exactly where you are every time you go out? If someone was monitoring your Foursquare profile, how easily could they establish your pattern of behavior? Before Christmas, we advised our readers not to share their travel details online to help protect their homes from burglary. If you’re using Foursquare all the time, doesn’t the same risk apply?

As ReputationDefender CEO Michael Fertik shared in a recent interview with the Financial Times, the dangers of oversharing online are plentiful. Truthfully, effective online reputation management can be a double-edged sword. In order to protect yourself from Internet slander and promote your personal and professional brand, you have to maintain a strong presence online. However, the more you share on the web, the more you have to work at preserving your digital identity.

To this end, the key to using sites like Foursquare (and Twitter or Facebook for that matter) is intelligence and moderation. Consider what you’re sharing before you post it. If you’re late to work because you stayed out late, will you be able to explain it to your boss? Not if they can see that you checked into five bars last night and were out until the wee hours of the morning.

Staying on top of the latest trends in social networking is an important part of proactively protecting your reputation online. Foursquare is a useful and fun tool for finding new places and connecting with friends. As long as you commit to sharing responsibly, you shouldn’t be afraid to try it out.

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During the Great Depression, one criminal caught the attention of the world like no other before him. I’m talking of course about the infamous bank robber, John Dillinger. Over the course of his criminal career, Dillinger robbed at least two dozen banks and four police stations. He also escaped from prison…twice.

By the time he was gunned down in the alley of Chicago’s Biograph Theater at age 31, Dillinger had captured the imagination of the public and secured a legacy that would last for decades. (Not everyone gets to have Johnny Depp play them in a feature film.) Why do I bring up John Dillinger? Because, I believe that we may have our very own Dillinger for the digital age in the form of British fugitive Craig Lynch. If you are unfamiliar with Lynch, allow me to catch you up.

28-year-old Craig Lynch escaped from Hollesley Bay Prison in southern England three months ago. Lynch was being held at the minimum-security facility on charges of assault. Since escaping, however, Lynch has not followed the typical m.o. of a man on the run. Rather than laying low, Lynch carried on his life like normal: visiting old friends, going out to restaurants and bars, and updating his Facebook profile with regularity. One would think that publicly sharing updates online about where he was would have gotten him caught, but, to the contrary, Lynch has been able to evade police with apparent ease.

When the news broke that Lynch was a prison escapee, rather than closing down his Facebook profile, Lynch began to use it to mock his pursuers, sharing images of him enjoying the “free life” and hurling profanity-laced insults at police. As news of Lynch’s Facebook exploits began spreading, the fugitive turned into an unlikely web celebrity. At last count, Lynch’s Facebook fan page has over 26,000 fans from all over the world. While a number of comments on the page express disgust for Lynch and his arrogant taunts, a surprisingly large number of Facebook users are openly rooting for him.

It shouldn’t be surprising that, despite his lawless behavior, Lynch has caught the attention of the public. For some reason, as a culture, we have always romanticized individuals who fight against authority, even if they most often happen to be criminals. The key to Lynch’s popularity, however, lies in the transformative power of social media. In the days of old media, Lynch would have been a mugshot on the evening news and nothing more. Thanks to social networking tools, like Facebook, he is able to reach out directly to the public and augment how the world perceives him. In a bizarre and somewhat disturbing way, Craig Lynch is engaging in a very successful form of personal branding.

Facebook has already said that it will help law enforcement in tracking Lynch down, which is in keeping with the site’s terms and conditions (“We may disclose information pursuant to subpoenas, court orders, or other requests (including criminal and civil matters) if we have a good faith belief that the response is required by law.”) However, as explained in this article at Media Bistro, Facebook representatives have been asked to not reveal how they are involved in the investigation.

At some point soon, I would imagine Lynch will be caught. I just find it hard to beleive that he won’t slip into some kind of pattern that police will be able to detect. That being said, while I abhor Lynch’s actions, it is pretty amazing that he hasn’t been captured yet. It would seem that, thus far, he has figured out how to to lead a public life on Facebook without interrupting his private life.

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Since unveiling its new and “improved” privacy controls, Facebook has drawn a lot of criticism. By far, the biggest complaint lodged against the company is that, under the guise of offering users more protection, Facebook actually exposed user information by defaulting privacy settings to public sharing. Because of this, many users accidentally shared pictures, links, and wall posts that would have otherwise been kept among their Facebook friends. Even Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg seemed taken by surprise with the new default settings, accidentally allowing his private albums to be exposed to the world. (Zuckerberg has since claimed that he opened up the photo albums on purpose, which begs the question, why are they still not publicly available?)

In any case, now that Facebook has worked out the majority of the kinks in their privacy controls (though not all), we thought it would be a good time to walk users through the process of protecting their Facebook profile from the world. Using my own personal Facebook account as an example, check below to learn how to make sure your Facebook profile is seen only by the people whom you want to see it.

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Step 1: Find Your Privacy Settings

The first step in adjusting your privacy settings is to find them. Luckily, this part of Facebook hasn’t changed. When you log into your account, go to the upper right-hand corner of your profile and hover on the settings tab. A list of options will drop down, including account settings, privacy settings, and application settings. Click on privacy settings.

Step 2: Learning What Does What

From this part of your account, you will be able to control who can see your profile (Search), whether or not they can contact you (Contact Information), what they can see in your profile (Profile Information), and how much of your information is exposed to Facebook applications (Applications and Websites). You can also manage your Block List, which allows you to cut all communications with someone on Facebook.

Step 3: Limit Your Profile Information

From the previous page, click on “Profile Information.” Now, you should be seeing a page that looks like the one below. From here, you can adjust who can see certain elements of your profile with a very high level of control. As you can see from my settings, all of my profile information is only accessible to my friends. For maximum privacy, we recommend using this option.

However, as we all know, there are friends and then there are “friends.” Do you really want to share the same information with your college buddies as you do with your boss? If there is someone in your Facebook network whom you don’t think should see your personal info, scroll over to the drop-down menu and select the “custom” option. Using the custom option, you can select specific friends to hide information from.

Step 4: Adjust Who Can Find You

From a business perspective, I understand why Facebook defaulted user settings to be more public. Despite the fact that it has 350 million users, it’s been difficult for Facebook to effectively monetize its website because so much of it is closed off from Google and other search engines. In order to compete with hard-charging public social networking sites like Twitter, Facebook needs to have more information accessible for indexing (and consequently for advertising).

Of course, Facebook’s business strategies don’t mean squat to the good majority of Facebook users, which is why so many people were upset when they saw that some of their information was now accessible to everyone. Luckily, Facebook has made it easy to undo this gross oversight. From your main privacy settings, click on “Search.” From here you will see this screen.

If the box marked allow indexing is selected, click on it to unselect it. Conversely, if you want a limited version of your profile to be accessible in Google, you can click the allow indexing box, but you should make sure that everything you don’t want seen is set to “Friends Only.”

Step 5: Adjust Who Can Contact You

Facebook is great for connecting with friends and family, but that doesn’t mean you want everyone to know how to stay in touch with you. To adjust your contact settings, return to the main privacy settings page and choose “Contact Information.” From here, you will see a screen like the one below.

As you can see, this page allows you to control who can add you as a friend or send you a message. If you’re using Facebook for business networking, it is probably okay to leave this option open to everyone. This way, if someone sees your limited profile via a friend’s profile, they can ask you for more information. At that point, you can make an informed decision about whether to add them as a friend. If you choose to de-index your profile from Google search results, the only way someone will be able to find your profile is through a mutual friend anyway.

Step 6: Find Out What You’ve Shared With Your Applications

Without a doubt, the weakest point of Facebook security is third-party applications. As demonstrated yesterday by the hacking of RockYou, companies that develop third-party applications for the major social networks are not infallible to attack. Despite this fact, however, many Facebook users fail to comprehend how much information they allow companies to take when they install a seemingly harmless game like Mafia Wars of Farmville.

To learn how much information you might be sharing with third-party companies, visit the Applications and Websites section of your privacy controls. Initially, you will see a screen like the one below.

From here, click the learn more tab next to “What you share.” The next screen will look like this. It is essentially an explanation of how applications work on Facebook and the kind of information that they may request. At the bottom of the screen, you can click a link to see what applications you have authorized.

I don’t use Facebook to play games or take quizzes, so my applications list is pretty bare (as you can see below). Nevertheless, I checked through all of my settings anyway to adjust them.

Surprisingly, when I opened up my links application I saw that the default setting was everyone. I don’t know if it’s always been that way or if it was defaulted by the Facebook changeover (I’m assuming the latter), but I made a quick adjustment and now (as you can see from the picture), my default setting for sharing links is “Friends Only.”

Step 7: Control What Your Friends Can Share About You

Finally, we’ve reached the last piece of the puzzle. When it comes to applications, you don’t just have to worry about what you’re sharing with third-parties, but what your friends are sharing with third-parties about you. If you go back to the “Applications and Websites” page (seen below), you will see the option “What your friend can share about you.” Click on edit settings.

You should now be looking at a screen like this with a whole bunch of boxes. If any of the boxes are checked, that means a third-party application downloaded by your friend (but not by you) will be able to see that part of your profile. We recommend unchecking all of these boxes to limit third-party data mining.

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If you have any questions about these privacy settings, or would like more information about how you can control your private information on the web, please do not hesitate to contact us.

Last night I attended the Social Media Club Chicago Holiday Party. That’s me on the right there wearing what can only be described as the world’s ugliest Christmas sweater. Yuck. I actually make Shaun Hildner (far left) and Tim McDonald (middle) look pretty good by comparison. Anyway, I had a great time and met a lot of great people. Here, in no particular order, are my thoughts on the night.

• Am I now officially known in the Chicago social media circle as the “Ugly Sweater Guy?” I certainly hope not. Not that I’m ashamed to have worn the sweater (that bad boy won me a $100 gift certificate to Morton’s), but I’d rather be known as the cool, friendly guy who is also a good copywriter and blogger. Next time I come to an event like this I’ll have to wear an Armani suit or something to regain my cred.
• Shel Israel and Erik Qualman both gave excellent presentations on the far-reaching implications of social media for individuals and businesses. Granted, they were preaching to the choir, but their insights were nuanced and they each offered enough specific examples to show quite clearly that social media is no one-trick pony. It also occurred to me that Erik Qualman played on the Michigan State basketball team at the same time as Shawn Respert and Eric Snow. To some people that doesn’t matter at all, but to a Michigan-born basketball fan like me, it’s pretty awesome.
• I finally got a chance to meet Danny Prager from The Ocean Agency in person. I’ve been meaning to talk to some of the cool people at Ocean since I moved back to Chicago, so I’m glad to finally be able to check that off my list. Also, Danny was one of the few people who actually wore an ugly Christmas sweater, so he was sort of like a brother-in-arms.
• One of my favorite things to do in life is introduce two people whom I think might get along. Last night, I got to do that with my friend Shaun (who I already mentioned in the above picture) and Beyond The Pedway creator Tim Jahn. Shaun currently works as a digital media producer for Flashpoint Academy,  a digital media arts college here in Chicago. Tim produces weekly videos about creative Chicago companies at his website, Beyond The Pedway. Anyway, we three had a nice chat and now Tim may be profiling Flashpoint in an upcoming Beyond The Pedway episode. I love when stuff like that happens, don’t you?
• When I first started blogging back in 2006, one of the first marketing blogs that I latched onto was David Armano’s Logic+Emotion. I’ve always admired how David synthesizes his unique perspectives on business, social media, and community through such simple and visually appealing diagrams. (A personal favorite is the Holy Trinity of Digital Experience.)  Anyway, David happened to be at the party last night and I was very excited to meet him and talk to him in person. I’m happy to report David is a super friendly guy and that I didn’t come off sounding like a weird blogger fanboy. I’d say that’s a big win for me.

All in all, the party was a great success and I was glad to be there. Kudos to Jeff Willinger, Amy Rovit Korin, and Barbara Rozgonyi, along with all of the SMC volunteers for putting together an awesome event.

Last week, my buddy Charlie skyped me a link to a pretty funny Twitter account, Loaded Santa. While the name is fairly self-explanatory, I’ll share Jolly Old St. Nick’s one-line bio to help you get a better idea of what this Twitter account is all about. And I quote, “I deliver 2 billion presents in one night to a bunch of shithead kids. I’m having a beer.”

Charming, no?

While crass, there’s an undeniable appeal to Loaded Santa. When I see his profanity-laced tirades against all things Christmas pop up in my Twitter feed, I can’t help but find myself chuckling. If Santa were real, it’s sort of funny to imagine him as an overstressed, overweight, and over his limit alcoholic. It’s the sort of thing that would make for a decent short web series, and maybe that’s the plan.

Earlier this month, Justin Halpern’s hilarious Twitter account, Shit My Dad Says, was optioned for a TV series on CBS. The account, which features actual quotations from Halpern’s elderly father, has been a big hit online, attracting over 840,000 followers in just a few short months. For those who are unfamiliar with SMDS, check out these sample Tweets.

“Son, no one gives a shit about all the things your cell phone does. You didn’t invent it, you just bought it. Anybody can do that.”

“The baby will talk when he talks, relax. It ain’t like he knows the cure for cancer and he just ain’t spitting it out.”

“A scar ain’t 13 god damned stitches. I’ll introduce you to men with REAL scars, then we’ll all laugh at your fucking 13 stitches together.”

Funny, right? Considering the profanity, it’s somewhat difficult to imagine what CBS could do with the concept without totally abandoning what makes it funny. Nevertheless, it’s pretty wild that just a few months ago this guy Justin was a 28-year-old living with his parents. Now, he’s the main creative force behind a potential 30-minute sitcom on a major television network. And it’s all because of social media.

With social media, getting your idea out in front of people has never been easier. No matter what it is – a novelty Twitter account, a web comic, a podcast, etc. – if you think it’s worth sharing, go for it. Just look at a phenomenon like LOLCats. If you were told the premise of that site 10 years ago, can you honestly say you would have predicted its success? It’s impossible to know what’s going to be the next thing, so why not lend your idea to the discussion. As trite and clichéd as it is to say, with the tools of the web at your disposal, the only thing stopping you from becoming a success online is you.