One of the great benefits of being a part of the Media Bloggers Association is the opportunity for the members to get some recognition and be utilized as experts or new voices when the media is looking to cover a particular story. Earlier this week, Robert Cox wrote about some great examples of this happening recently, including some television appearances. If you're interested in finding out more about the group - or are looking for panelists or discussion possibilities, check out the members list or contact the MBA at info-at-mediabloggers-dot-org or through our voice mail at (928) 223-5711

If you're interested in a Gmail account, be one of the first six commenters on this post, make sure you leave your email address, and I'll send one over.

Note: if you have a competing free email provider - check your spam bin if you make it into the comments - it seems that some invites have been coded as spam on the receiving end.

(I've been replenished. 0 left!)

If you're in the market for shiny new Gmail invites, then this is the place for you. I've got four in hand, and the first four commenters will get 'em.

(0 left!)

Okay, I've got six Gmail invites in my mailbox waiting for happy users. If you're interested, leave a comment. The first six to comment will receive an invite, and then comments will be closed. So don't email, leave a comment on this post. All gone!

[update] Okay, I've got six more. The first six replies after Matt's comments get invites. (0 left!)

WBAL in Baltimore picks up an Associated Press item stating that the Baltimore Sun's managing editor, Anthony Barbieri, will be leaving the paper at the end of August.

More details here at the Sun's site.

Okay, so I'm kind of fed up with my Outlook and Outlook Express. Outlook keeps crashing on me, and OE doesn't exactly have the features I'm looking for. While I do use my web-accessible Gmail account, I'd like to have some software on my laptop to use. I've not used any other software packages for a few years, so I'm not sure what the best stuff is out there right now... Any suggestions? Feel free to comment on this post or email me here or here.

Also - I've been informed that Google doesn't want anyone "bartering" for Gmail accounts, so I wasn't able to offer one up the other day after my request for a site suggestion. Alice Marshall from TechnoFlak had suggested that I get it put to good use by a miltary serviceperson, but I haven't been able to hook up with anyone else who knows how to do so, unfortunately. Alice had made the suggestion, but didn't want the invite in return, obviously. But she still gets props for having the best idea.

Steve Rubel from Micro Persuasion informs us about an upcoming ANA conference (actually, two) where bloggers will be given press credentials in order to attend. Details in the block.

The Association of National Advertisers, the industry trade association that represents 340 companies with 8,000 brands that collectively spend over $100 billion in marketing communications and advertising, will issue media credentials to very select number of established marketing bloggers for its upcoming annual conference.

The ANA Annual Conference, which takes place October 7 – 10, 2004 at the Ritz-Carlton Naples, in Naples, Florida, is the industry’s marquee event. It focuses on issues critically important to ANA members, including building brands, accountability and ROI, and marketing innovation. Terry Semel, CEO, Yahoo! and McDonald's CMO Larry Light will keynote the event and Ron Insana, of CNBC's Street Signs, will join as host. Other speakers include Michael Winkler, chief marketing officer, Hewlett-Packard; John Costello, executive vice president, merchandising and marketing, Home Depot; and Kevin Roberts, CEO Worldwide, Saatchi & Saatchi.

Bloggers interested in securing credentials should contact Steve Rubel at srubel@cooperkatz.com. Webloggers are required to cover their own travel expenses for the conference and will receive credentials based on a qualitative assessment of their audience and topic relevance. For more information on the conference, visit www.ana.net.

Not sure on the rate details yet for pressfolk, but the room rate for the Ritz-Carlton runs at the least $299/night around that time and goes up from there.

Rubel also points out that bloggers who are qualified for credentials will also be able to attend any ANA event where the press is permitted. Coming up in July is the 2004 ANA Marketing Accountability Forum, taking place on Monday, July 19th at the Grand Hyatt Hotel in New York City. Further details on this and other ANA events are also available on their website, www.ana.net.

If you're a LinkedIn user, you've probably noticed one interesting thing that had been lacking from user profiles - educational background. Now, you can enter that information, which I'm sure will assist in networking with alumni. Kudos to the folks at LinkedIn for improving their service once again.

While I had hoped to get a few people together this week while I am in Washington, D.C., I was happy to get to meet with Alice Marshall who blogs at TechnoFlak. She's a PR-focused blogger, and we have some business theories in common - except that I'm an internal PR/marketing person, and she is an agency-based PR person. It's interesting to see the dilineation of strategy, considering we are doing some of the same things. It was also great to hear about items of interest in the D.C. area, from technology to politics.

Perhaps next time when I have a little bit better idea of where I'm going to be and when, something a little bigger can get organized. So if you're planning on being around the northern NJ or NYC area, feel free to drop me a line to get together and discuss blogging, media, or whatever.

Yesterday I received an announcement that two U.K.[based companies have joined forces to put social networking and job hunting together. As of now, members of Mediabuddies can utilize Real Contacts for their job hunting needs. The two services seem to be linked once you are plugged in over at Mediabuddies and decide to click on the links towards the Real Contacts service. The job finding is free for members, and employers who hire someone through the service pay a portion of the contract/salary value.

This is now the second social networking site I have seen doing something this specific - LinkedIn and DirectEmployers did the same thing here.

[via eReleases]

If anyone's interested, and is in the Washington, D.C. area tomorrow evening, I'm planning a little gettogether for about 8:00pm. The site is Sake Club on Connecticut Avenue (right before Calvert St.) if we can get in. Otherwise, there are a few hotel bars in the area.

Let me know if you can come along, send an email to tom@themediadrop.com and we'll go from there. If I don't answer you right away, don't fret - I'm at a business conference and am not on the computer at all times. Thankfully, the hotel I'm staying in has free WiFi in the rooms. If you have any better suggestions than this, feel free to send them along as well. Sorry, Rox - I'll be doing cleanup duty on Wednesday and don't know what my schedule is like. Another time!

[update] Also suggested are Medaterra or Aroma, just up Connecticut Ave.

Next week, TMD is going to be spending some time in Washington, D.C. at a conference, and is planning on getting some DC bloggers, readers, newspeople, or otherwise interested parties to hang out and have a drink or two. Perhaps it'll end up being coffee, or dinner, or some combination of the above.

In any case, I'm aiming for either Tuesday, May 18th or Wednesday, May 19th. Tuesday is the more likely of the two as my schedule permits better that evening. I've already spoken with a few folks who say they'd probably be in , so figure it's at least 2 or 3 so far. Suggestions are also welcome, wifi enabled or not. I'll be in the area where Connecticut and Calvert streets converge, to give you a quick idea of where I'll be, at least. There are some decent restaurants and bars in the area.

Feel free to drop a comment, send me an email, and/or pass this along to others in the area. Maybe we'll get a decent gig together. C'mon DCers, don't disappoint!

Well, I'll be attending BloggerCon 2004 two weeks from today in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Looks like a great event so far, with almost 350 people registered right now.

If you're interested in attending, click here for the necessaries.

Tonight I was invited by Debra Galant to attend a gathering of local writers and editors (spouses and bloggers were also apparently allowed past the bouncers!) in the Montclair, New Jersey area at a place called Diva Lounge. The group hosting the event is called MEWS (Montclair Editors and Writers), and its creator is Pamela Satran, who wrote some baby-name books you've probably heard of, among other things. The group has a newsletter that keeps everyone apprised of what's going on in the area, including book signings, job postings, etc. - so it sounded like a great chance to mingle with the locals, if you will.

Two major things came out of this event for me. 1> The area I live in has a fantastic concentration of "media" folks, and 2> there is so much content and information out there I could only hope to scratch the surface of it all. And talk about variety... I was able to chat with people who ranged from authors to individuals from the New York Times to someone at DC Comics to one person from Institutional Investor. Topics ranged from how people planned on marketing their next book to people asking me all about blogging and how they could get into it.

One of the coolest things (though somewhat of a bummer) was that I didn't even get to talk to 1/10th of the people in the room. There was only so much time to get around and speak to people, but what was great was that everyone had some starting point in common - they were into writing/editing and had some proximity in where they lived. So no need for icebreakers. Being able to have access to people such as these is a great opportunity, and is one of the reasons I've been promoting stuff like LinkedIn so much offline and on. Orkut is fun and all, but that's not what it's for.

So we'll see what kind of results are garnered from tonight's event. All I know is I'm leaning towards going to the BloggerCon event next month...

Whether you're on Orkut or just some other social networking deal, this would be relevant to you... I find that the messaging about new groups and random stuff gets a little out of hand. I get more messages on Orkut from people telling me that they are going on vacation and they're like four steps away from me. I'm also connected to former Presidential wannabe Wesley Clark, and I get three messages every two days about random stuff - through him. Kind of delusional. People are turning into de facto spammers before our very eyes.

Tomorrow is International Blog Meetup Day, so if you're up for a night out to meet some folks, then St. Patrick's Day is the time to do it (you can go to the bar afterwards!)

I'll be at The Dancing Goat in South Orange, NJ at about 7pm, along with Jeff Jarvis of Buzzmachine fame, John Shabe from The Jersey Side, and others... Be sure and sign up if you're interested in going - or check out what events are taking place in your locale!

Last night I joined my first online-networking system, LinkedIn. I figured it was worth just checking out, even if I stopped using it after a while. I'm not a big fan of them, as people use it for too much of the online dating type stuff, which is fine, but seriously - leave your house once in a while.

I see the FOAF (Friend of a Friend) following to be quite useful if you are able to a) actually access the system, and b) find a network of individuals which you can actually reach out to and utilize, whether for finding a job, finding a candidate for a position you're looking to fill, or, in my case here, finding folks that would be willing to give their insights and inputs in a short interview for the site.

So, I figured I'd give it a whirl, signed up, and searched a little bit to see if there was someone worth doing a short interview with. I sent a message out to him through the system, and woke up today and was happy to see a positive reply - so I'll hopefully have one short interview put together for the site in the next week or so, and can go from there.

So, the question is - are FOAF-type systems good for you, or are they another tedious trend that will go the way of nehru jackets?