Samuel Ekstrom - National Scout Reserve Scholarship Award Winner

I'm proud of Samuel for earning the 2017 Scouts - Summit Bechtel Reserve Scholarship in honor of Dan McCarthy. The Summit Bechtel Reserve (SBR) Staff Association awarded $2,000 to the 2017 recipients. Samuel served as the Aquatics Director at the waterfront for camp and used the scholarship to help pay for his last year at Central Michigan University.

Samuel Ekstrom was the Lead Professional Lifeguard and Lead Instructor for all Aquatics related programs at Summit Bechtel Reserve - James C. Justice Summer Camp.

Sam was responsible for developing an advancement program, training/supervising staff and overall responsibility for the well-being of all participants taking part in any aquatics activity including Paddleboarding, kayaking, swimming, water reality and fishing. 

 The waterfront at the James C. Justice National Scout Camp at SBR is the busiest in the nation. His responsibilities including overseeing all aquatics activities for the Senior Scout Camp, Appalachian Adventure programs on Goodrich Lake. 

The waterfront had as many as 800 scouts in attendance at any one time, with professional staff and volunteer staff under Samuel's leadership and supervision. 

Samuel attended the BSA National Camping School and received his Aquatics Director certification in order to take on this significant aquatics and management position.

This year he worked as a Manager at the waterfront and completed his Marketing/Advertising internship at SBR by working as a Media Content Creator. Samuel shot photos and video at SBR to help promote the program on all media and social channels.  

Sam shot photos and video for Facebook, Instagram and more for the 2018 year for Summit Bechtel. 

Prior to working as the Aquatics Director, Sam worked at the Shooting Sports Academy as an NRA certified Rifle and Shotgun instructor. Sam helped scouts and visiting guests to camp experience and develop their rifle, shotgun, muzzle loader, pistol and archery skills. 

Facebook Finally Trumps Google

So what's driving Facebook's incredible traffic? Traffic monitor Hitwise, has announced that Facebook has usurped Google for the first time in the company's traffic counter for single individual days.

According to Hitwise research director Heather Dougherty in her blog, Facebook was the most visited website in the U.S. on Christmas Eve, Christmas Day, and New Year's Day as well as the weekend of March 6th and 7th. But those were just individual days. Now Facebook has officially surpassed Google in overall traffic for the week ending March 13. At least according to Hitwise.

Granted, the two offer wildly different services, but traffic is traffic. And new unique users are like gold. Facebook managed to add 100 million users between September and February, to a swelling 400 million active users. Traffic is up 185% compared with this time last year, whereas Google's traffic has risen by only 9%. Seems there are a lot of wanna-be farmers out there.

Casual gaming, or facebooking, is a driving factor in the remarkable success. Leading the tractor parade to greener pastures in the "farm with your friends" game Farmville. Gaming is the vehicle to engage, connect and disconnect from the troubles of the world.

I'm of the opinion that internet holdouts are finally seeing the light. Too many conversations at the water cooler or with family during the holidays has spiked the numbers. When family is together, they talk about life. Those not on Facebook realize they're missing out on the connectedness of family, friends and fun. Holidays are the perfect down time to hook up relatives and add them to the growing network of users. Farmville is a hook that drives traffic and entice users to give more information about themselves - deep linking them into the system in a fun way.

My dad, a reluctant professional that probably didn't trust the Web that much, joined after I posted updates and photos on Facebook after one of my son's had an accident and was in the trauma unit receiving care. We are social creatures that care about loved ones and friends. Facebook was the easiest way to get updates out to the people I cared about most.

Combine that with the popularity of mobile devices, improved newsfeeds, casual gaming, the impressive ability to connect with high-school classmates, and you can plainly see why Facebook is luring in many hard-core holdouts.

Clever Facebook Photoshop

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Stimulus Scams – don’t get hooked

The stimulus scam bandwagon is making its rounds on the internet in deceptive Web sites, advertisements and e-mail campaigns. The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) is getting the word out that Slick looking ads promise consumers thousands of dollars in stimulus grants – they only need to pay a small credit card fee, for as little as $1.99 (Each scam is different so beware). The scammers claim they’ll help you skip the red tape and take care of all the details for you. It’s a ruse of royal proportions. The $787-billion stimulus package is so complex, not even the Senators are really clear on what all is included.

These scam artists are exploiting that confusion with clever ads on Facebook, and on WordPress blogs that feature fake testimonials. Worse yet, the crooks could walk away with your identity.

Watch out for official-looking Internal Revenue Service (IRS) e-mails that promise stimulus payment. The IRS never requests private information via e-mail. Never give out your bank account information over the internet unless you are positive of the recipient.

Some of the bogus websites:
jessicasmoneyblog.com
mygovtstimulus.com

“Hi, my name is Jessica and I’m from Bloomfield Hills, MI. I started this blog because I want everyone to know how I went from being a struggling single mom to paying off all my debt in a few months simply by spending a couple minutes filling out a few forms online!”

A Tennessean.com article said the state's consumer watchdog office warns about some of the scams it has detected:

• People are urged to give bank details so that their portion of stimulus money will be deposited into their bank accounts. The scam artists then empty the bank accounts.

• A person is asked to verify personal information to qualify for stimulus money; the scam artists then use the details to commit identity theft.

• A consumer is offered a list of economic stimulus grants, which supposedly include money for individuals, in exchange for charging as little as $1.99 on a credit card. The charge is actually a down payment for "negative-option billing," in which a consumer must decline the option of automatically receiving goods and being billed for them.

• Sometimes, a person only has to click on links provided in an e-mail to inadvertently download spyware used to steal personal information.

Words to the wise - watch out for these crooks.

Skittles.com is Social Slick

The Palm Pre promises to be effortlessly blend a sea of social networks into one easy-to-use device. We did something similar at the Jeep brand when we pooled all the social media sites into one hub. The innovative Jeep Experience portal is the collective home to Flickr, YouTube, Facebook, MySpace and more. It's your one-stop-shop for everything Jeep.

Now Skittles has launched skittles.com and it's based on a floating navigation menu that remains the same regardless of the social media site your on. Instead of importing videos or photos to their site, or linking the user out to Flickr, or YouTube - the navigation follows you on your path to social serenity. While this navigation system won't work for most applications - it is a strong hint at things to come in the future in regards to fluid infrastructure and seamless integration to social networks. Bravo to the Media Planner who bought into this elegant experiment.