Here are some social media articles that I have found on the Web which I hope inspire you as this week kicks off to a firing start.

Chris Brogan writes about 50 Steps that can be used to establish a consistent Social Media practice while Information Week has a look at Google’s online encyclopedia offering and the New York Times reports back on Facebook’s latest features that were unveiled last Wednesday, including the social network’s new design. Also read Sean Moffitt’s article on three “social media elephants” that needs addressing in social media-related business discussions.

In other news, Mandy de Waal asked me to write an article on Social Media for the Wired section of Moneyweb’s newest feature called ‘MoneywebLife. Let me know what you think.

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David Meerman Scott has a good post on Web Ink Now that discusses how we try to find reasons to avoid the inevitability of social media. David talks about how we tend to use our own experience (”I don’t read blogs”) or rely on flawed polls (many people don’t know that they are using RSS feeds when they look at Web pages) to decide whether social media is “taking off” yet. David’s insight reminded me of a similar experience I had recently.

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Last week a number of separate issues came together around Twitter activity and I just had to wonder why some people are in love with Twitter while others are on the side-lines with folded arms and a scowl.

The divide is pretty strong even among social media advocates. Check out this post from Steven Hodson. Who says

I find it insulting that Twitter is even considered to be in the same field as blogs or even micro-blogs.

This is a common response I get on Twitter. Folks who don’t use it seem to roll their eyes whenever I jump on my iPhone to jot down what I’m doing.

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Somewhere in the middle of all the drama last week was a discussion on fake social media profiles, and as usual the white hat zealots were ready to crucify anyone associated with them, claiming they were yet another tool disparaging the SEO and internet marketing industry. Well it’s my profession responsibility to provide some examples of this nefarious behavior and out some of these high profiles social media spammers …

The first one has nearly 50,000 followers on twitter, is one of the most popular people on facebook, has more than 400,000 myspace friends, and 15,000 youtube friends. Clearly this level of involvement and activity in the social media space can’t be the work of one person, what we’ve got here is a team of people keeping this fake profile running. So who is this nefarious social media spammer …

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All we do here at Ignite Social Media is social media marketing. So we watch it carefully, looking for trends, what’s coming next, what’s likely to bubble up. And it’s got me thinking. I believe that social media is in its infancy. Not everybody does.

But I’m quite sure we don’t have it all figured out yet. FriendFeed is a perfect example. What could be an interesting utility is a lengthy stream of noise so far. The design is not very friendly. That’s just one example.

So, based on the assumption that we have a long way to go, here are 5 predictions on the future of social media, ranked from shortest time horizon to longest.

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I read a post from Jake over at 10e20 blog recently with a promising title, “Social Media Marketing is NOT a Direct Response Channel.” I could not agree more. Jake’s point that you should not expect social media to compete with your direct response channels, like pay per click, is 100% valid.

Social media is not a switch that you turn on and off like a light. Engaging in a social media campaign is a commitment to a new form of communicating with your customers. And that can pay huge dividends.

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Steve Rubel of Edelman wrote a post the other day that got me thinking. His premise was that social media specialists will no longer exist in the near future. Given what we do at Ignite Social Media (we are social media specialists after all), I disagreed, but I’d like to explain why it would be both unnatural and unlikely for social media thought leadership to come from public relations agencies.

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Sign in on the subdomain www.new.facebook.com and you’re greeted “Welcome to the new Facebook.” And indeed it is. Facebook is unveiling a new redesign, and the long-tested tabbed profile pages aren’t the only changes.

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We all purport to be social media experts these days, yet most of us are truly students. Many of us overlook some of the most rudimentary elements that define and inspire the socialization of content, especially the social sciences involved with observing the culture, behavior, and conversations within online societies.

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Sure, you can join Facebook, you can put up a MySpace page, you can follow your friends on Twitter. You can pick your friends based on mutual interests or, gasp, actual friendship. I just joined a new social network today called “InSocialMedia.”

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