Microsoft is teaming up with a charity foundation to deliver Xbox 360 kiosks to children’s hospitals across America. Each of these kiosks will come with games, movies and access to a private nationwide network that’ll allow hospitalized children to play or chat with one another.

This is great news because I think it will really make a lot of kids happy, especially when some of them easily get bored or depressed within the dreary hospital environment. I can imagine the much-needed thrill of playing video games with new friends.

Information rarely organizes itself into something coherent, usable or enriching. It usually goes through a series of filters before it reaches you: for example an algorithm developed to automatically sort data or a writer who took the time to translate the complex into the actionable.

These filters are there to make information relevant, to allow you to utilize data into a different form, perhaps a blog post or a mental footnote to be retrieved when needed. However, sometimes there’s just too much information and too little time.

Most social media websites give you an individual profile page alongside the option of befriending other site users. The adding of someone as a ‘friend’ on a social media website is not just an empty gesture. Usually when you add someone as a friend, you’re giving them greater access to you through the social media channel.

For example, some Digg users set their message inbox as ‘friends only’, so you can only ’shout’ or communicate with other users through the site when they have added you as a friend. Only when someone on Twitter ‘follows’ or adds you, will you have the ability to send them private messages or view his/her updates, if they are protected.

A comment left on a popular blog may be viewed by a few hundred people in one day. Multiply that by the lifespan of the blog and you’ll see that a simple comment may say a lot about you. Every blog comment is usually permanent. It’s not just a hyperlink but a long-term representation of your brand.

Too many webmasters view blog commenting as only a traffic or link building strategy. This rigid marketing emphasis has led to certain modes of behavior. For example, one might make the effort to comment exclusively on blogs with nofollow turned off, while using keyword names in order to increase the search engine ranking for one’s website.

Yes, it’s been long overdue but I finally changed the design for Dosh Dosh after more than a year. Because of the lack of time, I’ve been procrastinating but frankly, I’m just really glad its finished now. If you’re reading this from your feed reader or inbox, come over and check it out.

I haven’t prepared a detailed writeup about the design process but I thought I’ll give you all a short tour of the new look. First of all, the logo was designed by David Airey, who’s one of the most reliable graphic/logo designers I’ve worked with.

Social media aggregators are web sites which amass what you do on social networks or websites and centralize it all in one location.

These aggregators enable lifestreaming, which is a simply the publication and sharing of your daily activities in continuous sessions. These social lifestreams allow you to keep track of what your friends or other people are doing online.

In other words, they are tools you can use to observe the activity of others on various social sites or allow others to follow what you’re doing all around the web.

If you’re a new or not yet established brand, how should you use social media to build a reputation for yourself?

Apart from making sure your product/website is relevant to the social media channel, it is also useful to participate in social media communities as an end-user or brand representative.

My previous post on social networking ROI already talked about the benefits for building a strong social media presence so let’s move on to examine the characteristics which constitute successful social media profiles.

Yesterday, I visited my friend Tara’s place and noticed that she put a large piece of paper on her bedroom wall, next to where she slept.

On it was written some quotations and general life principles. Tara wanted to remind herself of these words when she woke up everyday and before she went to bed. It’s a self-improvement trick to overcome negativity and focus on the important things.

So I got curious and read what she wrote. After I came home, I tried recalling what I read but could only come up with two lines. The rest were a blur.