Loic (@loic) of Seesmic (@seesmic) just launched the start of an excellent video series. The series should assist those seeking to develop their brand, but also help them make the best from social networking while doing it.

He will be releasing 1 video per day for 30 days. What better company to learn about social branding from than Seesmic?

You can follow the series on his YouTube channel at loic.tv.

Here is the intro video to the series to get you started.

I am sure that you have heard (from one of the thousand other blogs, tweets, status updates etc.) about Pastor Rick Warren’s tweet yesterday that caused an uproar throughout the “twitisphere”.

The outcome of this tweet was a negativity that I wouldn’t wish upon anyone. At first glance, the tweet somewhat caught me off guard. A second pass-through, resolved my conflict as I can clearly see that he is proud of his church, it’s members, and what they’re doing (as he should be). I think the majority of the negative response came from people who clearly misinterpreted what the man was attempting to portray in a mere 140 characters.

Could he have reworded it to be less conflicting? Possibly. Nonetheless, Rick Warren is still human, and 140 characters is still VERY limiting in regards to detail, and desired interpretation.

To the people who lashed out with negativity, well I think I said it right there (lashed out). It’s one thing to question or challenge a person for the direction they have taken, it is another to lash out with things that do nothing more than tear down the individual.

Though I disagree with challenging another church for the sake of competition, I strongly agree that we should always be challenged to increase our spiritual maturity, Godliness, and commitment. Isn’t that what we’re here for; to become more like Christ?

Here is the tweet that caused all of the commotion, as well as Rick’s response to some of the more challenging responses he received thereafter.

Original Tweet

“I Challenge any church in America to match the spiritual maturity, godliness & commitment of any 500 members of Saddleback”

Follow-Up Tweets

“Paul COMPARED the Macedonia church’s commitment to Corinth’s & challenged them to MATCH it 2 Cor. 8: 1-8. Wise teaching tool”

“I want to test the sincerity of your love by comparing it with the earnestness of others. – Paul 2 Cor. 8:8″

“BIBLICAL leaders use themselves as examples to challenge others. Paul often did. See David’s courageous model! 1 Chron 29:2-5″

“Many leaders can’t challenge others to be generous because they aren’t! Who is willing to follow my example & give? 1 Chron 29:5″

“I challenge every pastor to intentionally increase your giving percentage every year & grow far beyond tithing. Luke 16:11″

@rickwarren always has some challenging stuff to say on Twitter.

I see nothing wrong with a “challenge”. After all, Iron sharpens Iron, right?

What do you think?

Today is somewhat of a special day.  In fact, it is one that I hold dear to my heart.  Yes, today is “System Administrator Appreciation Day”.

For those of you who don’t know what a System Administrator is or does, maybe this small list will help you out. I got these from the official System Administrator Appreciation Day Site. Here are just a few of the things that a System Administrator does.

1. A sysadmin makes sure your network connection is safe, secure, open, and working. A sysadmin makes sure your computer is working in a healthy way on a healthy network. A sysadmin takes backups to guard against disaster both human and otherwise, holds the gates against security threats and crackers, and keeps the printers going no matter how many copies of the tax code someone from Accounting prints out.
2. A sysadmin worries about spam, viruses, spyware, but also power outages, fires and floods.
3. When the email server goes down at 2 AM on a Sunday, your sysadmin is paged, wakes up, and goes to work.
4. A sysadmin is a professional, who plans, worries, hacks, fixes, pushes, advocates, protects and creates good computer networks, to get you your data, to help you do work — to bring the potential of computing ever closer to reality.
5. So if you can read this, thank your sysadmin — and know he or she is only one of dozens or possibly hundreds whose work brings you the email from your aunt on the West Coast, the instant message from your son at college, the free phone call from the friend in Australia, and this webpage.

System Administrators are important people. Though not more important than anyone else, they do play a huge role in most others getting ANYTHING done. Take a moment to thank your System Administrator for what he/she does. They will appreciate it.

What is your mobile weapon of choice?

For the past year or so, I have exclusively used the iPhone.  I loved the look, the OS was fast and pleasing to the eye, and there were tons of apps to choose from.  I anxiously waited for the iPhone 4 pre-order site to become available and attempted to place my order as soon as it was.  While waiting for the processing to go through, I decided to browse around at some of the other options available.  Several of my friends have recently made the jump to Android, so I thought I would check it out.

I was impressed by the community response to this mobile OS and the devices that run it.  My iPhone pre-order failed and I soon got the word that no more pre-orders would be taken for a while.  At that point, I made the jump.

Enter, Google Nexus One.

I made the Android jump, and I haven’t looked back yet.  This phone is simply amazing.  It has a beautiful touch screen, fantastic response time, and a large assortment of apps to choose from via the Android Market, and the phone itself is every bit as pleasing to the eye as the iPhone.  I can’t believe I didn’t make the jump sooner.

Anyway, enough with my new mobile addiction.

Have you had similar experiences with a Mobile OS?

Have you recently made a switch like the one I just described?

If you have, tell me about it!

If you’re a new Christian, and looking for your next move, check out What’s Next Kit.  This site is packed full of fantastic answers to questions you surely have, as well as other resources to keep you moving on the right track.

If you’re a leader, needing a place to direct a new Christian for some guidance, this site is for you too.

Here is the idea of the site as quoted from Tony Steward’s blog:

The idea of the site is simple; to give people who have just become a Christian some next steps and basic information to help them growth in their new faith.

What an awesome tool to have.  I can’t wait to pass it along!

Check it out: http://www.whatsnextkit.tv

LifeChurch.tv has done it again.  These guys are truly amazing.

They have created an incredibly relavant resource for churches and ministries.  In fact, its so relavant, I’m not sure why is hasn’t been done already.

Today’s church is more than ever socially interactive, and one of the more prominent ways that this is taking place is through Facebook.  Facebook has attracted an audience of all ages, including members of your local church.  If you’re thinking about setting up a church/ministry Facebook page, you’re on the right track.  If you simply want to get involved with your members on a personal basis using the web, you’re also on the right track.  Either way, this resource can help you along:  Facebook Training Videos

Here is how LifeChurch.tv describes the purpose of these videos:

“This training is for anyone who is the champion of a Facebook page, or anyone who will interact and communicate through a Facebook page.”

This is just one of the many resources available on their free resource site named “Open”.  If you haven’t visited this site, then you’re missing out in a huge way.  They have tons of resources available for all types of ministries, not to mention its FREE!

Here is a little bit about it as quoted on their site:  “At LifeChurch.tv, our passion is to see lives changed – across as many miles and in as many places as possible. Our desire is to maximize the effectiveness of the resources which God has entrusted to us. Therefore, the LifeChurch.tv Open website is available to pastors, churches, and ministries worldwide to give access to and usage of an entire library of LifeChurch.tv creative materials – at absolutely no charge. Materials include outlines from a wide variety of message series, complete with corresponding promotional design graphics and videos, broadcast-quality opening videos and much more. And every bit of it is free – all you do is browse through the site to find any resources that might be helpful to you and set-up a login to download those resources.

In return, all we ask is that content is used in a non-commercial application in which the overall mission is to lead people to Christ. That’s absolutely it. And if a free gift with no strings attached seems too good to be true…well, isn’t that why we’re all doing what we’re doing anyway?”

If you’re interested in checking it out, just go here:  http://open.lifechurch.tv

Are you using Open in your church?

I was recently faced with the challenge of providing a small/medium sized church with a new website. Since this was to be their first “domain name” purchase, I saw an opportunity to take this challenge a step further. Knowing the staff pretty well, I began to think of how I could take the way they complete their daily tasks to the next level.

I came to the conclusion that in addition to a new website, I would also provide them a centrally organized way of communication, collaboration & utility. It was obvious that these things were needed, but I was also aware of the tight budget that I was to operate within. Pricey options such as “Windows Server”, “Exchange” etc. were out of the question.

As I started researching cost appropriate solutions, I began to evaluate the state of technology in general. I thought about the ways that I manage my personal documents, emails, etc. It was at this point that I realized that I needed to direct my focus towards cloud computing service offerings.

I find it appropriate to share a little bit about the client and their specific needs, as cloud computing may not be the right choice for every church or organization.

The church is small, with roughly 10 staff members. All staff currently communicate by email and workgroup file sharing from desktop to desktop. Email is provided by their ISP. They use Microsoft Office for all of their weekly preparation and scheduling. That is basically the extent of it.

Their are numerous services out there that would provide everything that this church needs and a lot of stuff that they don’t. I’m going to focus on the one that I choose to go with, Google Apps.

I chose Google Apps for a few reasons.

1. Most people/users are familiar with the services that Google offers.
2. It has a huge community base.
3. It provides all of the essentials (Docs, Storage, Email, Calendaring, Chat)
4. Best of all, its free to certified non-profit organizations with a 501(c)(3) status. (They offer an upgrade from “Standard Edition” to “Education Edition” once your organization has been verified.)

Google Apps is a fantastic, cost effective way to provide small (or large) businesses the high powered, effective solutions they need without breaking the bank. Here is how easy it is to set up.

1. We purchased their first domain name.
2. Signed up at http://www.google.com/apps.
3. We were instantly provided access to “Standard Edition“.
4. Properly set up CNAMES to forward to Google Servers.
5. 2 1/2 weeks later, we were approved for “Education Edition“.
6. Migrated all existing email (using tools provided by Google) to Gmail type infrastructure.
7. Currently training users on new features 1 step at a time.

Moving to Google Apps was easier than I ever imagined. The documentation is fantastic. You simply can’t go wrong. However, if you do, Google support is right there for you.

Now, this church has made one giant step in the right direction.  It is running on a fantastic infrastructure that will provide organization and collaboration like they have never had.

Keep in mind, every organization is different, and every migration will not go as smoothly as this. Users have to be trained, and it will most likely consume a significant amount of time for the “Administrator” until they are comfortable using all of the services.

Given some time, this church will be running like a “well oiled machine”.

I didn’t want to bore you with tons of detail regarding the Apps infrastructure.  I simply wanted to make you aware of it, and that it can be a great alternative for just about any sized organization.

Does your church use Google Apps?   What are your experiences with the product?

I finally have a blog look that I am completely happy with out of the box.  Standard Theme was finally released.  This theme is cram packed with industry standards and looks amazing!  If you are thinking about blogging, I highly recommend that you swing over to their site and pick up a copy.  It is well worth the investment.  I might possibly write a whole separate post just on this theme, and why its great.

With this new look comes a fresh install of WordPress, and a new attitude towards blogging.  Hopefully this means that I will focus a little bit, and write more about things that I enjoy such as ministry, technology, and the church.

We’ll see how it goes…

DS

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