Media Bullseye

While social media engagement is a significant portion of many PR pro's jobs, Tom Murphy makes the excellent point that many have plenty of other responsibilities to keep them busy. So is it really the quantity of their engagement (or the number of people they "follow back" on Twitter), or the quality? Also: raise your Twitter profile, communications plan advice, and the evolution of pitching.

We all love Twitter, but how often do we consider its usefulness for business purposes? Colin Carmichael of Social Media Group has a great post with four ways that Twitter can help your business. Also: Make your conference rock more, and some thoughts on the echo chamber.

While Second Life itself may have hit the "trough of disillusionment" on its hype cycle, it's on the way to the enlightenment phase; and virtual worlds beyond Second Life are still something to which you ought to be paying attention, because they're on the cusp of a major expansion.

Online shoe retailer Zappos and CEO Tony Hsieh have developed a dedicated following online, particularly on popular microblogging platform Twitter. Soren Jacobsen delves into the company's culture, ideas on transparency, and customer service to discover how they became an online force to be reckoned with.

Executives at eBay have a new headache today, thanks to new competition called Wigix, or the "Want it, Got it Exchange." The new service, just launched into public beta, aims to simplify the process of listing and searching for online auction items.

Slowly but surely, companies and brands are understanding there is something profound happening in this new media world, and increasingly it's something they want to be a part of. But how can they know to whom to turn for advice on engagement? Is it their PR or marketing agency? Their technical group? Or is it someone else entirely?

TV is going digital, and a major topic of discussion at AdTech San Francisco revolved around whether "programming is dead." Sean Howard writes about his experiences at AdTech, and how TV advertisers are going to have to work to stay relevant as viewers' commercial tolerance drops.

Is there no such thing as a "bad" viral? As long as people are talking about your video and your brand, should you not concern yourself if the talk is somewhat negative? Nike doesn't think so, following its new Kobe Bryant YouTube offering. Also: Panic in the Twitterverse, and social Earth Day.

Actor and rap music artist Will Smith has partnered with his entertainment company Overbrook Productions to launch an online music video site, with some videos in high definition. Started with $2 million in venture capital, the site features thousands of music videos from popular artists from BMG, Sony, Universal and others.

America Online announced this week that it has acquired Sphere Source, a leading provider of contextual search tools that offers related content to publishers. Sphere will be a subsidiary of the Web company's programming division.