Private conversations are the most important ones,  I’ve come to believe.     I know I’ve written recently that “any idiot can raise an amen chorus“  and I certainly don’t mean to disparage public conversations–  heck,  this blog has been all about public conversations–  but any real professional knows that private conversations online is where business really happens.   Whether it’s discussing future plans with a mentor,  re-hashing a major event with another participant or joking and daydreaming and just being friends,  private conversations are where any good social networker will invest a lot of their time.

I finally managed to steal a glimpse of the new Empire Avenue interface.   So they borrowed a designer from Pinterest to  make a graphical display of your Tweetstream.   Excuse me while I have a nice long YAAAWWWNNN.    I’ve yet to reach any judgment about the value or the utility of the  Empire Avenue changes,   but my first reaction is that they are  hardly game changing and will not require a great deal of revisions in the next  release of    Walking Down The Avenue.      However, a private conversation this morning,  in addition to alerting me to sneak a glance at EAv’s new interface  helped me to conceive  a great marketing innovation for the next release of the book.       Those  who pay a lot of attention to me and my web presence may note that the new account I created on Empire Avenue yesterday has nothing at all to do with Walking or its promotion and is actually about a new project I am conceiving  that is related to bullying and online reputation.     I’m not ready to publicly announce any more than that at this time.

I’ve said many times that the only constant is change,  and nothing in my life experiences so far causes me to in any way doubt this maxim,  which I believe is equally true in business,  in social media and in human life generally.     I find myself getting genuinely excited about writing and selling the next release  of Walking,   even as I continue blogging every day and trying real hard to have lots of public conversations here on my blog  (go say Happy Birthday to my friend Hank NOW if you haven’t already   and think that my new project could be a lot of fun,  and a way to earn a bit of profit.     Life feels good to me this Monday morning.     I hope it feels good in your world as well  and that you have a great week ahead.