Image from WikipediaThere’s a Lijit search widget over on the right side of my blog. A friend asked me last week what it did and why I had it. Frankly, because I really like the neat little avatar display of all my social networking sites where I can be found. You can click on them and find me immediately.

Lijit’s wheelhouse, however, is what I’ll call trusted search. By entering a keyword in the search box, you are searching content from Social Media Explorer, but then also content from my social networks, sites in my blogroll, that I link to and so on. Essentially, if you trust me for your social media information, you can search for items on the Lijit widget over there and get data from places I trust, too.

Tara Anderson from Lijit was trying to maim me with stickers at South by Southwest last month, so I turned on the camera and we talked about Lijit. And she hints around about a soon-to-be partnership with “a big blog network” that, to my knowledge, has yet to be announced still.

Tara’s pretty persistent, too. After first reaching out to me last fall and getting a promise to check Lijit out, she emailed me back a few weeks later and called me on not following through. The widget has been on my sidebar since. And I think I came home from Austin with 40 Lijit stickers. Let me know if you want one.

Technorati Tags: Lijit, blog search, trusted search, social media tools, tools, Tara Anderson, Jason Falls, SME-TV

Surely you’ve seen this little number on blogs you read:

We caught up with Josh Guttman of Sphere at South by Southwest (SXSW) to find out more about what Sphere is, what it does and what’s coming soon.

And special props to Josh, who rescued my credit card from Side Bar and returned it, safely, the next day. (I was too interested in the next party to worry about retrieving it apparently.)

The blogs Josh mentions are all well worth checking out. There’s the Sphere Blog, Waxing Philosophic and Bergen Carroll, the latter a neighborhood blog for his section of Brooklyn.

Technorati Tags: sphere, contextual search, semantic web, Josh Guttman, Jason Falls, social media

Going to South by Southwest this weekend offers me the opportunity to gather some great insights and interviews for this blog. There are, frankly, too many cool people, applications and companies to document and investigate, so I’d like your help.

Social Media Explorer TV (that YouTubey thing over there in the side bar) has offered what I think are some strong insights into some interesting topics in the world of social media. I’m taking my camera to Austin and want to interview as many folks as I can but would rather interview the people, talk about the companies and learn about the applications you want to learn about.

So, tell me in the comments who you’d like to have me interview and what you’d like me to ask them. I’ll make every effort to pursue them. Here’s a cursory list of who I think might be of interest. Tell me who to add (or subtract) and assume certain things — Zuckerberg ain’t gonna do three minutes with some jerky he’s never heard of:

• Jeremiah Owyang
• Marshall Kirkpatrick
• Chris Heuer
• Brian Solis
• Maggie Fox
• Connie Reece
• Kami Huyse
• C.C. Chapman
• Scott Monty
• Beth Kanter
• Mack Collier
• Tamar Weinberg
• Chris Brogan
• Someone from Utterz
• Someone from Seezmic
• Someone from Jaiku/Google on what’s going on there!
• Any social media measurement firm folks I haven’t interviewed

Other SME TV Posts You’ll Find Interesting:

1. Profilactic Offers Social Media Lifestreaming
2. Blogging Tips From An A-Lister
3. New Software Offers Chance To Revolutionize Health Care
4. Outing The Ad Business – Holy Fark! Part 3
5. Exploring Social Media Measurement: Radian6

Technorati Tags: SXSW, Social Media Explorer, SME TV, social media, social media interviews, Jason Falls

Rob May built BusinessPundit.com from scratch to one of the top 3,000 blogs on the planet at one point according to Technorati. A co-founder of the Carnival of the Capitalists and one of the first business bloggers in the blogosphere, Rob started blogging in 2003 when Glenn Reynolds of Instapundit.com ignored his business submissions. Suffice to say, he has some wisdom when it comes to blogging. As his final days at BusinessPundit.com approach (he’s sold the blog), Rob sat down with Social Media Explorer to give aspiring bloggers out there some pointers on hitting the A-List.

Check out yesterday’s post as well. In it, Rob talks about the decision to sell BusinessPundit.com, what his new blog, CoconutHeadsets.com, is all about and more.

Technorati Tags: Rob May, BusinessPundit.com, Business Pundit, business bloggers, blogs, blogging, bloggers, business blogs, bestpractices

Thursday will mark the end of an era in blogging, of sorts. Rob May of BusinessPundit.com will post his last entry there. He has sold the blog to Ryan Caldwell, proprietor of snarky entertainment blog Popcruch.com, who has hired what we’re sure he hopes is a suitable replacement for Rob.

May started BusinessPundit.com in 2003 after Glenn Reynolds at InstaPundit.com ignored his submissions and emails of business articles. Soon, Rob was attracting many a business-thirsty blog reader with his interesting link leads and thoughtful commentary on the business world. One of Louisville’s intellectual elite, Rob quickly established himself as the same in the blogosphere and became Louisville’s first A-list blogger.

While Rob will continue to blog at CoconutHeadsets.com, it will be less frequently and for different reasons. He talked exclusively with Social Media Explorer about the move late last week.

In an effort of full disclosure, Rob is one of the executive producers of The Daily Idea, a fun, lifehack-style web TV show I co-write, co-direct and occasionally co-star in. While it would technically be accurate to say Rob is my boss on that project, he doesn’t pay me anything other than the promise of stardom and glory should we ever sell it. We’re friends. Rob is also someone who is always willing to share his wisdom and insights with me. He’s given me both ideas and encouragement as a blogger and for that generosity, I’ll always be thankful. He’s not going away, just shifting gears. But I wanted to offer him a tip of the cap this week as his time at BusinessPundit.com winds down.

Thanks, Rob. For all that and more.

Technorati Tags: Rob May, BusinessPundit, Business Pundit, blogs, bloggers, blogging, Coconut Headsets, business blogs