We students aren’t the only Columbians obsessed with Nutella. While the good people at Columbia News are losing their minds over the addictive substance, the Student Affairs twitter caught Ke$ho getting high on his own supply:

KevSho, caught in the act! fb.me/2eiCG4KHZ

— CU Student Affairs(@Columbia_SA) March 8, 2013

No word on whether his Nutella habit is costing the university $5,000 a week.

On Wednesday, Sree Sreenivasan, formerly the J-school’s Dean of Student Affairs, became Columbia’s first-ever Chief Digital Officer. The tech blog AllThingsD (run by two of Sree’s former students J-school alums) reported the news shortly after it was announced in emails from Prezbo and Provost Coatsworth. But just what does a Chief Digital Officer do? Sree tried to answer that question in an interview with Bwog’s chief J-school correspondent, Peter Sterne.

First off, it doesn’t mean he’ll be running CUIT. “It’s important that my job is in the academic office of the Provost,” he explained. “My job is very specifically to advise and work with him on trying to think through what we do academically.” To emphasize the point, he adds that “all the other operations [like] CUIT still go on. I’m focused on the academic side.” He’s less concerned with day-to-day operations than figuring out how Columbia can bring its world-class education into the online age. This can mean increasing the use of social media, platforms such as Courseworks, and even fully online classes. The key is to make sure that both Columbia’s academics and its brand reach the widest possible audience.

“We have such great content at the University,” he said. However, he continued, “part of what we have to all learn is, you can’t just have great content. You have to have ways of getting it in front of people to see it, whether they’re on campus or across the world.” By content, he means courses, curricula, research—the stuff of academia. Professors probably won’t appreciate their life’s work being reduced to mere “content,” but Sree isn’t trying to offend.

(more…)

The Twitter account, that is. We received word yesterday that the @deantini Twitter has been suspended. Turns out the as-yet-unknown creator didn’t put up the white flag after being unveiled by both Columbia College and the dean himself (see below). His resistance caused a “fair amount of confusion” according to Amanda Lang from CC’s Office of Communications, however, the dean “didn’t dislike being parodied on Twitter” (what a great guy, am I right?). Fortunately, no back alley, internet conspiracy means of account deletion had to be taken: the office simply “asked Twitter to remove it,” and they did. Don’t expect that this means the end of Deantini’s presence in the Twittersphere, however. The office “would consider using @deantini in the future.” Initiate phase three of internet outreach.

Social Media in Action

Update: As of 6/18, the account no longer exists.

Update: We’ve received official word that it’s definitely not the real Deantini.

As of yesterday, “James J. Valentini,” or simply @deantini, infiltrated the Twittersphere. Now this can mean two things: Either Deantini has tried to expand his “hip” social media presence even further, or there is a new addition to Columbia’s fake Twitter scene. With a Tweet poking fun at the dean’s attempts to engage with students, and a lame joke in which Deantini tries to change his name to James Dean Valentini, it surely seems like the latter is the case. So far, he has 70 followers and has followed most of the Bwog and Spec staff. It even looks like he’s made friends with Dean Awnsome of GS:

 And somewhat supports Kevsho’s outreach efforts to the Class of 2012:

Yet his relations with (fake) Prezbo have been hostile, calling the man out on his hair. Could this be the inklings of a celebrity Twitter war, Columbia style?

A bwogger spotted this enthusiastic flyer hanging by the Diana. While it’s most likely affiliated with the company HUGE, making the poster a tad less silly, it’s still fun to pretend.

I'm big in Social Networking

Update 5:10 pm: There are more:

You're making this too easy

That’s right, the fine people of International Wines & Spirits want you to like their Facebook page. More importantly, if you do like their page, you get 10% off your next purchase! So head on over there and save yourself some booze money.

there's a flier, so it must be legit