What's keeping moi busy?

So, what's keeping me busy?? WORK!! 

But that doesn't mean it's boring. Far from it actually...

Since I've embraced the web division at my work place with open arms and turned my back against the news division... lol okay, news was interesting but web feels like.. this-is-where-I-should've-been-all-my-life! and I totally look forward to coming to work every day.

So what do I do at the web division? Well, our division handles 7 websites - 3 for tv, 3 for radio and 1 for news. I've been given responsibility of 1 tv, 1 radio and the news site with a colleague of mine who overlooks me (let's call him "W" shall we?). Now, this doesn't mean I'm a serious techi, but maybe I'm such a wanabe and I'm loving all the new things I'm learning. I love that feeling you get when you work on something and hit 'refresh' and voila! the results are online LOL yeah yeah it's lame but isn't it just awesome? :D

And lately I started writing 'newsy' articles for our news website. Well, it's actually called "featured" articles but I want to make a brand new blog site for the articles and get with the web 2.0 and "W" is going to help me - the noobie to make it happen very soon. Hopefully I'll share the link when it's done.

Apart from all that, I manage all of the Social Media accounts and Social Media Marketing aspects for the two English tv and radio channels as well as news. That itself keeps me totally busy. Social Media and SMM are beginning to catch on really strong in Sri Lanka and I'm learning all I can these days. Actually, if you remember, the 5-day U.S. tour that I went on, in March (a completely free tour, thanks to the U.S. Embassy in Colombo and the Foreign Press Center in U.S.) was because of the work I've been doing on Social Media for the media organisations I've been working for during the past one-and-half years or so, as well as on my own. Guess it paid off pretty sweet yeah?

Aaaand my Social Media adventures continue....! This Saturday, I'm going to attend the first Social Media Marketing work shop.
I really hope it's worth my time and money (I have to pay for this one!). Since it's the first of it's kind in Sri Lanka, I'm going to see if I know better or they know better *grin*

Other than the work shop I'm hoping to attend, which is a paid one, the U.S. Embassy in Colombo are currently conducting a series of free webinars on Social Media and they're having the 4th session, which will be on Linked In, next Tuesday. I've already attended the previous 3 sessions, which were on Blogging, Twitter and Facebook. There will be 2 more after the 4th one, altogether 6 of them. The speakers are from the U.S. They did say they are giving a certificate for those who successfully complete the whole series so I'm hoping to earn it. Btw, you can follow the webinar series on Twitter, cuz we're live tweeting from the webinar on #uselk2010 so stay tuned.

In more Social Media news... Couple of weeks ago, I went for this little gathering and offline networking of a small techi community in Colombo called "Refresh Colombo". The community is pretty new and there's a bunch of interesting people who know various stuff. You can join totally free and they have monthly meetings that are totally casual. You can just walk in, sit down, listen and have a go at the free food and drinks lol. No, but seriously, it's very interesting because it's a place where people share their knowledge and get valuble feedback from the little community. Offline networking is very important and for the techis in and around Colombo, this is a super start! So far they had only two meetings and I only got to know about them just in time for the 2nd one. Next one will be in August so I'll be writing about it here. Of course we'll be live Twitter on #refreshcolombo. They also have a Facebook Page - Refresh Colombo. And if I'm not mistaken, they are going to have a massive tech, web and gadget lovers gathering somewhere in December this year. I bet that's going to be VERY interesting.

So now do you see why I don't have much time for blogging?? I HAVE been since going places and doing things other than the SM stuff I've written above, but seriously haven't had the time to write those down and I feel awful. Okay to a certain extent I guess *grin*. Alright I admit I haven't put links to any of the things I wrote about but I will, maybe tomorrow because now I gotta go and read another article about Facebook pages and FBML. I swear I'm going to master FBML one of these days and I will not rest until I do!

I really think that right now, Facebook pages are only second to a company website for any business or organisation (or a cause, but causes have a separate "causes" page on Facebook). I'm still learning how to master the art of Pages on Facebook. I wonder... how many of you can make your own "landing tab" or "welcome tab" or "static FBML" tab on a Facebook Page. And, does anyone know how to do some neat edits on the FBML page/tab or know any great sites that teach you some fairly advanced FBML coding for really good looking landing tabs for Pages?