I’m thrilled that today marked the publication of my first blog post for Oprah.com, Spice Up Your Dates with Technology. As a contributor to this site, I’ll show how you can use technology to “live your best life”, in Oprah’s words. Keep an eye out for upcoming stories on my profile page, which will highlight different ways to make meaningful use of technology in your life and relationships.

My first post shares six ideas for how technology can make for better dates. One of the tips I share is to create a date night dashboard. Here’s a peek at what mine looks like:Screenshot of iGoogle page set up as date night dashboard

I hope you’ll check out the story on Oprah.com, and share your own ideas for making love with technology.

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How to think like a social media artist

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If you want to sharpen or deepen your use of social media, try going to art school.
That’s the big takeaway from my first months here at Emily Carr University of Art + Design. I can’t say I’m “going to” art school — my role heading up the new Social + Interactive Media Centre has so [...]

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A novel approach to life online

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For the first time in a year, I’ve lost myself in a book. It’s Barbara Kingsolver’s latest, The Lacuna– a marvellous historical novel that centers on a Mexican-American who becomes cook and secretary to Diego Rivera, Frida Kahlo and Leon Trotsky. I’ve disappeared into the world of mid-century revolutionaries and artists, surfacing into my own [...]

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10 things to do in a hotel room other than eating the minibar’s peanut M&Ms

March 2, 2010

Try to fix the aspect ratio on the TV screen so the people don’t look double-wide
Re-route the ethernet cable on the desk so that it reaches the bed
Marvel at the prices of the TV system’s content-on-demand
Post mini-reviews of the complimentary toiletries to Twitter
Iron your underwear
Copy edit the room service menu
You know….
Rate your hotel on TripAdvisor
Use [...]

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Rob and I have been together for 12 years this month, but I still remember what it’s like to get over a previous love. Back in the day when there was a little more turnover in my love life, I found that moving on to a new relationship wasn’t enough to cure the heartache of [...]

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The message of usability

February 18, 2010

Completing an online form that reminds me that when you’re the one GIVING the money out, there’s no pressure to create good user experience.
I celebrated Valentine’s Day the traditional way this year: filling out a really terrible online form for a funding application. Funding organization that received that application this week: if you do the [...]

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The beauty of baffling

February 17, 2010

It’s the nature of Twitter that you baffle half the people who follow you & are baffled by half the folks you follow.
I wrote this tonight in response to an old friend who was teasing me about finding half my tweets baffling. It’s a comment I get a lot, often from Facebook friends who are [...]

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An open source bedtime story

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Tonight my daughter, a.k.a. Little Sweetie, requested a bedtime story that was “more educational”. (Apparently she didn’t like my version of the Three Little Pigs, in which the Big Bad Wolf helps the pigs with their unwanted facial hair.) After trying her on the tragedy of the commons — my version stressed the importance of [...]

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We tweet: 6 ways Twitter can strengthen your love

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A few weeks ago Rob and I went out for dinner at r.tl, which must have the best URL of any restaurant in the world. A waitress brought us our menus, and asked if we’d eaten there before.
“We were here for Valentine’s Day,” I said. “Actually, I think you were our server.”
“I’m sorry, I don’t [...]

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Using Twitter to create social media content that boosts SEO

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With so many businesses looking to tap the power of social media — and so many experts interested in selling to them — it’s no wonder that headlines like this one flourish across the web. Promise people bottom-line maximizing, brand-leveraging, social-media-packed goodness, and they will tweet and retweet like little demons. Best of all, they [...]

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Need a woman for your all-male SXSW panel?

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I’m looking forward to this year’s SXSW (including lots of panels featuring great women), but I’ve noticed that the all-male panel is alive and well. I’d like to offer up my XX chromosomes (among other qualities) to round out one of the already-scheduled panels…and I’d love to hear from other women who, like me, are [...]

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