On a Saturday in May 2011, Leadership Pittsburgh, Inc’s Leadership Development Initiative (LDI) program (Class XVIII) will be filming a once in a lifetime, one of a kind movie filmed in the Fineview neighborhood in Pittsburgh’s Northside as the culmination of our leadership learning lab experience – PopUp! Pittsburgh. “Lights! Camera! Fineview!” will be a day-long event which includes production and filming of “Spineview” a documentary/mockumentary/zombie hybrid movie. Lights! Camera! Fineview! will also transform the Fineview neighborhood into a movie set with activities, fun and food for all ages for one day.

We want YOU to help design a logo to promote the event. The name of the event, “Lights! Camera! Fineview!” and the title of the movie, “Spineview” do not necessarily have to be included in the logo design, but can be. The following language: “PopUp! Pittsburgh is produced by Leadership Development Initiative XVIII a program of Leadership Pittsburgh Inc.” and the website, www.lpinc.org must be incorporated into the logo design and the font must be Futura Light/Bold. The logo design must be artist’s original creation and should not be copied or duplicated from a third party. The selected logo will appear on all web and print collateral and the firm or individual who submits the winning design will be recognized in the movie credits and on the event website.

Submissions are due by 5:00pm on Friday, February 4th and should be emailed to Talia Piazza (talia@ppnd.org) in color and black white versions. Goodluck! “

Three short years ago.  Three long years in digital media.  Three years ago, we launched 1129 Ridge, an online haunted game.  We had no budget so naturally we turned to social networks to promote the game.  MySpace was our top promotional vehicle and drove the most traffic to the site.  We used Facebook, but had not developed the marketing muscle that it now has.  We also used a new thing called Twitter, but MySpace drove our game for us.

A lot changes in three years in the social media world.  We can now control games with FourSquare tags, not in existence for 1129 Ridge.  Twitter is now a legitimate marketing engine.  And Facebook?  Well, Facebook has officially crushed MySpace.  The exodus started long before today, but the point was drove home when the embattled MySpace announced you could use Facbook to log in to their network.  Unheard of in the battle for supremacy, but  a reality in today’s digital world.

I must confess I am a little nostalgic for those 1129 Ridge days.  However, I am excited to see what we can do in the next three short, long years in digital media.  The constant evolution is what makes digital media interesting and as the last three years have shown us – it will definitely be a fun ride.

I had the recent pleasure of presenting at Podcamp Pittsburgh 5.  Below is the video from Once Upon a Time: Telling Your Story Digitially.  Utilize the digital marketing tools to tell good stories.

Been asked “where have you been?” a lot lately.  Yes, I know I have not kept up with this blog as much as I should or would like to.  However, I am pleased to show you where I have been – Pittsburgh on Video.

Pittsburgh on Video is a new community video hub built for The Pittsburgh Foundation in conjunction with Miro.  Think YouTube without all the crap like ads and such and centered only on the local community.

Miro is open source technology that can pull video submission in from any video sharing site.  Their free player will allow you to connect via RSS feed and have your favorite videos sent to your desktop for viewing.

I am the first curator of the site.  I hope you will check it out and submit your videos on, for, set in or about Pittsburgh.  If you have a passion for community journalism, I invite you to become a regular contributor to the site with news reports from our neighborhoods, the issues that face our community, the people that make this are great, or whatever topic most interests you.

Check out the site at http://www.pittsburghonvideo.org

My favorite thing about social media is probably the spreading of new ideas.  I never want to stop learning, stop trying, stop being creative, stop innovating.  Here is a great idea from a great conference (TED).

“The Art of War” was written eons ago, but Twitter would fit right into the text if it were written today.  I witnessed this first hand during last year’s G20 summit in Pittsburgh and see its use expanding around the world from Iran to the Vancouver Olympics to wherever the next global conference will be held.

During last year’s G20, many of the groups used Twitter as their communications tools.  Protest sites were broadcast and then retweeted to others to join.  It was effective in organizing ‘troops’.  Police movements were broadcast for all to know as well as event happenings as they unfolded.

Then the authority figures got wise and began monitoring.  In true fashion, they began to position their troops based on what they saw on Twitter.  The game is up, right?  Not at all.  You see the protest groups figured out the authorities were monitoring, so they used that against them.

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In the words of David Bowie, ChhChh Changes, turn and face the strange. UniversalWit is getting down to making a change.  We have changed from a social media marketing consultant to a digital media producer.  What’s the difference, you ask?

Truthly, not much.  We still use social media actively, we just don’t use it how we used to.  UniversalWit began as an online and social media marketing consultant.  However, in 2009, we began to see the changing lanscape.  We had a choice: expand into a full service agency or assist others.  We would have needed to add programmers and client services people and all sorts of people.  Frankly, that was never our goal.  So instead, UniversalWit went on hiatus and Christopher went to The Pittsburgh Foundation.  Christopher was happy, UniversalWit not so much.

So today, we officially announce our new direction.  UniversalWit is now a digital media producer.  It was not a drastic change for us.  After all, the company really got its start with the launch of an online game, 1129 Ridge, and our child friendly game Santa’s Magic Clock just wrapped up its third season.  We have also messed around with online video with our pal Greg Straub and have joined the For Real For Real storytelling series thanks to our pal Viv.

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Thanks for playing this year’s game.  We will be back in November 2010 with all new Santa’s Magic Clock adventure, the fourth in the series.

I truly believe the debate will rage on about if social media can be measured.  I also believe that new, simpler measurement tools are developed each day.  Hopefully, the scales will balance in the not so distant future.  As the below chart demonstrates from Marketing Sherpa, we are not quite there yet.