Not because it won a ton of awards. Not because every blogger and Twitterer writes about them. Not even because Banana Republic launched a line of clothes inspired by the show.

Mad Men has rocketed in the uber phenomenon status because cute little muppets are now teaching kids about emotions (and advertising) on SESAME STREET.

See it for yourself:

I started using TweetDeck, which is an application that allows you to organize, search and mark tweets as read. This has improved my Twitter break efficiency tremendously. Now I can go right to my friends and family first, then check other feeds that I am interested in and if I have extra time, read randomness from everyone else.

Because I have been on Twitter a lot more, I have been posting a lot less on the blog. But I can’t blame my slacking on Twitter alone. I am involved in SO MANY THINGS right now! In addition to having a full-time job and social life, I have taken on lots of side projects, including:

• Serving on the advisory board for the Gateway Tennis Association
• Planning a summer fundraiser for the United Way – stay tuned for details!
• Opening a shop on Etsy
• Continuing my consulting – writing resumes and cover letters and assisting people with their job search

Anyways, my inspiration for this post is based on an article by Adam Singer: 19 Reasons You Should Blog and Not Just Tweet. Here are my favs:

1.  Blogging demonstrates true commitment and passion to your industry that you really can’t fake long-term.  Most won’t be able to sustain it over long periods of time with frequency, but those who do so are rewarded in spades and stand out from the crowd.

5.  Secret everyone knows:  most of Twitter is just linking to blogs and content on the open web.  Being the end product people are actually interested in and focus their attention on is where your ideas will be studied carefully, not in the cacophony of Twitter.

7.  Twitter is in a sense social sticky notes, or the SMS of the Internet (however you want to consider it).  It’s snack-sized content.  Are you or your business interesting enough to provide the full course?  It’s telling who engages deeper vs. those who simply choose to engage 140 characters at a time.

8.  Cumulative results over time from blogging, each post incrementally adds value to your site as a whole.  Not necessarily true on Twitter.

13.  140 characters is often more than necessary – but also it is often less than necessary.

14.  Everyone on Twitter is looking for the next big thing or most interesting piece of content to link to.  Wouldn’t you rather be the big thing than merely another person pointing at it?

17.  Careful of how much time you devote to Twitter instead of contributing to your own channel.  Spend the most time nurturing that – time spent in Twitter comes at the opportunity cost of fresh content to your blog.  You can use Twitter and other micro networks to draw subscribers and interest, but the premier value is in working on your own material in a unique space.

Okay, Adam. You got me there.

I thought so too until I found out that the company wanted me to blog about their clients products and how fabulous they are. And while I’m all for evangelizing the stuff I like, I think it’s crooked when people get paid to talk about said stuff. It’s a little something I like to call conflict-of-interest.

I turned down the job because, while I like blogging and money, I do not like to get paid money to sway what I blog about.

And it turns out that the FTC feels the same way. They are now proposing new laws to mandate disclosure of financial relationships between bloggers and products they review.

Read this Phillip Givens Law Blog post to learn more about the proposed FTC changes.

In advance of pending legislation, I’d like to disclose that rather than get paid to write anything on my blog, I, in fact, pay to blog. Between domain registration and hosting, this site costs me about $25/year. I have no paid advertising or sponsorships. How’s that for full disclosure?

My boyfriend was the kind of kid who would take a part things just to see how they worked. I never understood those people… until it came time for me to understand the Internet. It started when I was about 12. I had this really cool graphics software on my computer and there was a way to design web sites on it. So I made a web site and posted it online just to figure out how it worked.

So when everyone started talking about the “blogosphere” I just didn’t get it. Why post things in chronological order? Why would people turn to everyday individuals to hear what they say when they could turn to “credible” published sources? I thought blogs were little Internet diaries where dumb people posted their innermost thoughts for the world to see… and the proceeded to piss off all their friends and families when they saw what they posted online.

I started off just reading blogs, you know, just to see what good would come from it (check out my LINKS page for some of the blogs I frequent). Then I realized that I too had a unique perspective and experiences worth sharing. Not going to go in to details about my personal life or try to piss people off, but I could definitely share things from my school, work and networking experiences.

My subject matter has expanded and changed over the last 12 months If you check out post #1, you can see why I started Resume Rehab and focused this site a little more on marketing, networking and the web.

Then, like any good addiction, I got hooked. And I started writing on multiple blogs. I made new friends through the blogging world. Learned the joys of WordPress and SEO, keyword searches and organic linking. Not only has it been a fun year, I’ve also expanded my professional skills and can help colleagues, clients and friends with navigating the confusing world that is blogging.

I’ve been dabbling in Twitter now too, and let me tell you, I’ve opened a whole new can of worms.

Thanks for stopping by and reading what I have to say. Thanks for year number one and here’s hoping for an even more wild and fun year number two!

As the end of the 4th quarter approaches – a year after “official recession-dom” – everyone is talking about blogs. How they’re free… search-engine friendly… and extremely effective for creating two-way communication.

And a lot of companies are now scrambling to start something up. People that are effective bloggers are in high demand. Don’t believe me? Read Douglas Karr‘s latest post on Talent Zoo: Your Company is Going Under, and You Could Have Stopped It.

Now my only remaining question is whether or not the late-adopters will get anything out of jumping on the bandwagon now. Established blogs (and bloggers) have already established themselves as authorities and gained a following. And there’s no use doing something unless you do it right. I guess we’ll see!