Travel Blogs

I love travel – the trip, the planning process, travel magazines, shopping for luggage and toiletries – and everything that goes along with it. Most of all, I love the experience of trading in my usual routine for something that promises adventure and excitement. If I could, I would travel back in fictional time and inhabit the world of Indiana Jones.

My love for travel causes me to devour every bit of travel information I can get my hands on. Lately, I have been paying more attention to travel blogs and following a few travelers on Twitter. There are hundreds of travel blogs out there with first-hand accounts of travel to every country and state. This is fantastic for keeping travelers well-informed and providing authentic, transparent information about what's out there.

Listed below are some of my favorites:

Almost Fearless
Europe String
TravellersPoint
Travel Q & A
The Perrin Post
The Daily Traveler
World Travelista

I'm also excited to discover so many tools on Facebook, Twitter and other social media sites that allow you to share your travel photos and experiences with your friends and families. It is so exciting to get a taste for the world, even if it is vicariously through those you love and trust.

Social media elevator statement

Calling all entry-level practitioners...you love social media, right? You have had a Facebook page for years, you watch YouTube on your iPhone and even if you're just starting to get into Twitter, you understand the game. Some of you might even claim that you're a social media expert (which I would advise against).

Now the question is: can you advocate for social media use within your organization?

This is the challenge I found myself up against recently. In attempting to initiate use of social media within various organizations I work with, I've discovered that there is a big difference between using and understanding social media and knowing how to communicate it to others. When recently asked the question, "why should our organization have a Facebook page?" I found myself momentarily speechless.

Fortunately I recovered and managed to share several reasons why I think Facebook is an effective platform for communicating with young people. However, it made me realize that I need to be more prepared next time. My endorsement of social media needs an "elevator statement" - a message that I can quickly use to summarize its uses and benefits. I'll be giving this idea more thought because I want to ensure that my elevator speech opens doors rather than closes them (pun intended). In the meantime, I would love to know - how would you pitch social media to an organization in less than 30 seconds?

Social Media - will it be made up of atoms or stories?

While reading the Young PR blog, I came across a post showing a photo of a New York Library street tile. On it, there is a quote by Muriel Rukeyser, who said, "The universe is made of stories, not of atoms."

As my engagement with the online world has been increasing at a rapid pace, I have started to contemplate the impact that social media will have in my life and the way we take in information and communicate it to others. I find myself wondering, will our interaction with social media help us to create stories or will we merely consume tiny atoms of ideas?

Consider this daily routine: Open a browser. Click to Twitter. Myspace. Facebook. Track an RSS feed. Read a blog or two -- or 20...Get lost in the network. Sound familiar? Even talking about all of the social networking platforms sounds disjointed. As entertaining and informative as blogs and social networks can be, they can also turn into Internet channel surfing, leading to nothing more than distractions.

And then there are those blogs that inspire you and prompt you to contribute to the discourse. There are the exciting moments when you think (in the back of your mind) how amazing it is to be connected to people all across the world who want to discuss the same little threads of conversation that you do. There is a sense that the Internet has an endless potential to connect us and take communication to the next level.

Connection should be at the center of all communication. It is the motivating factor behind telling stories, sharing photos, listening to your friends' latest band-discovery, and understanding what's going on all over the world. Telling stories about who we are, what we desire, where we go, when we have new information, and why and how we are here is the reason we create social networks in the first place. Applied to social media, a mission of creating connection will make the atoms fade into the distance and the stories come to life.