How to design Twitter backgrounds

If you’re tired of the standard background options on Twitter, or want to personalise your Twitter home page, then here’s a step by step guide showing how to design a bespoke background. If you don’t use professional image editing software then there are some other tips here showing a range of different options.

WebTV MeetUp 2

Well goodbye #uksnow the WebTV DrinkUp is back on for the 18th! Do register here and please click on the RSVP so we know how many of you are coming.

The event is held at the very wonderful One Alfred Place and drinks are sponsored by our friends at Videoplaza.com. They are also giving away a bottle of Swedish Vodka to the winner of the business card draw. So bring lots of cards and look out for the goldfish bowl on your way in.

It’s an informal format – there will be a short introduction from Sorosh Tavakoli the Videoplaza CEO and some screens available for you to experience their system. The rest of the evening is for networking and making new friends. Feel free to Tweet this to your friends and colleagues who would like to attend.

A resounding “Cheers” also goes to Bill Gash from Partners in TV who secured us our sponsor.

Enjoy!

Twitterfall

I’ve just been introduced to Twitterfall (thank you @joannejacobs) – what a cool way to follow a Twitterstream while multitasking. Well OK working.

Follow the top trending subjects in the left hand menu or put in your own Hashtag to follow events like #fryappletalk or #ted. I need another screen!

Stephen Fry Apple Store Talk

I arrived at Paddington station on my usual Monday 9.30 from Newton Abbot to find London had ground to a halt. A wonderful winter wonderland – unless you lived south of the river and were trying to get into town. As a result the Stephen Fry talk at the Apple Store was postponed as was the Tuesday night WebTV DrinkUp sponsored by our friends at Videoplaza.com.

This of course worked out well for me as the Fry talk was re-arranged for the Tuesday night. I left One Alfred Place and braved the icy winds blowing down Oxford Street and was amazed to be able to walk straight in at 6.30pm! I guess many who made it into work that day decided not to risk the potential train fail that evening and called it an early night.

Mr. Fry was impressive. Not only entertaining an audience of around 150, mainly 20-30yr olds, with an encyclopedic knowledge of computing history but sharing many personal stories along the way. One that particularly stood out was allegedly showing Peter Mandelson his first website in 1997. 1997! Perhaps he was too busy swanning around on Yachts and in Greek Taverna’s before then…

He recounted numerous other stories which I won’t divulge as the Podcast is available here so you don’t need any spoilers from me. Though do listen out for my question “What Would Oscar Wilde have thought of Twitter?” which received an enthusiastic and somewhat detailed response. All in all it was an informative and amusing event, presented by a master of delivery and eloquence so do check it out.

He went on to party at Paramount with a coterie of fans but it all ended up rather pear shaped, with an ending that if it had been scripted you wouldn’t have believed it. Put it this way if you get invited there don’t take the lift.

What amused me even further was the hilarious and inspired viral marketing Tweet that went out to followers of a certain Aleksandr Orlov who posted a picture entitled “Me with Mr Stephen Fry in a lift. Stuck, stuck, stuck…” brillant but “simples”!

Getting Your Blog Tweeted

Having to update all your social networks individually is time consuming. Use Twitterfeed to set up RSS feeds to Twitter from your blog. It’s a simple three step process:

1. Decide which social networks you want to post to.

2. Log into Twitterfeed using your OpenID (OpenID is a standard for providing single sign on between web sites
You can register your own OpenID for free, or may even be able to use your existing blog ID)

3. Provide them with the URL for your blog’s RSS feed

If this all sounds very techie it isn’t. Just click on the help links. I set up this blog to feed into Twitter this way by just adding <https://eyetoeye1.wordpress.com/feed&gt; into the Twitterfeed site and it updated straight away.

Simples!

Make Your Mark With A Tenner

Social entrepreneur Oli Barrett runs Connected Capital, an innovation company. He has recently founded an initiative called “Make Your Mark With A Tenner”. The funding has come from Peter Jones of Dragons’ Den fame and from Michael and Xochi Birch, the founders of social networking site Bebo.

20,000 school pupils have signed up to take part to see what they can achieve with just ten pounds in the month of February. Any idea that encourages children in entrepreneurship has to be a good thing.

The challenge is supported by NESTA. It’s an inspirational idea that I’m also very happy to support. It’s also an idea that could spread across the world – pass it on!

Moon Dust-DNA Watch

In addition to our Orbit DVD project celebrating the 40th anniversary of the Moon landing in July this year a Swiss watch company has come up with the ultimate in collectors watches. The watches’ dials, which feature tiny craters, will have dust in them from the moon rock that was taken from the first visit to the Earth’s satellite.

Steel from the Apollo 11 space shuttle will be used for the case and the strap will be made up of fibres from a spacesuit worn during the ISS mission. Even the hands of the watches are designed to replicate Sputnik’s antennas.

The Romain Jerome group will make 1,969 watches — matching the year of Neil Armstrong’s and Buzz Aldrin’s first journey to the moon – for the “Moon Dust-DNA” collection.

The first of the Moon Dust-DNA watches will be on display for the first time in March at Baselworld, the world’s largest annual fair for the watch and jewelery industry.