Do you read Mashable?  It’s great stuff, and widely read by us “social media” types.  Maybe you should read too?

There were two posts from this week that I have strong opinions about.  I’ll share them if you don’t mind.  Cool?

Twitter Starts Testing Features for Business – written by Ben Par
Make your own judgment on the “Contributors” enhancement from the be-all end-all microblogging platform (disclosure: that was sarcasm), but my take on this feature is that it’s a pointless innovation.  For one, who actually reads the tiny by-lines?  Personally, I make it a point NOT to tweet while holding a magnifying glass.  The font is so small that this feature will go unnoticed by most users.  Oh, and by the way, why do we need this?  Southwest Air seems to be a great example of how you can put a human name behind your business Twitter accounts.

Another opinion on the matter: Twitter ought to be careful.  Have we not learned a lesson from our friends at the once GIANT, and now dwindling, MySpace?  Focus too much on trying to monetize your community and your community will find new stomping grounds…hard and fast.

Facebook Could Learn a Thing or Two From LinkedIn’s Faceted Search – Stan Schroeder
Yes.  Yes, they could.  But will they.  Who knows?  Frankly, if there is a continuous winner in the game of social search engines, LinkedIn takes home the gold.  I love this new feature and am already playing with it.  With new search capabilities also comes new abilities to optimize your profile so that you can be found by interested parties.  To me, this is really exciting stuff and all the more reason why business folks everywhere should be paying attention to the power of LinkedIn.

What do you think?  Do you have different opinions?

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