Trust Agents
The Internet is an interesting place.
It is also vast, populated with many onliners and full of content – good and bad.
But what of that? How is that useful other than wasting time; whether for work or personal gain? I believe that the Internet is a place of information and connections – both that can be used for fun and/or promotion. But to take one’s involvement one step beyond where the access to information and the connectivity can be leveraged to a point where one’s presence and involvement is respected and valued. When you start traveling on on that path then the doors start to open because people trust you and respect you – they value you input and they are willing to be involved in your cause.
Yet how does one get onto that journey with quick, confident strides? I think that Chris Brogan and Julien Smith address this in their book Trust Agents: Using the Web to Build Influence, Improve reputation and Earn Trust.
I have been granted a great privilege to be involved, starting this week, in a group blogging project – where a number of respected and cool people read and discuss each of the chapters in this book. Feel free to be involved in the discussion; even get your own book. The Group Blogging project will be hosted over at Christian Web Trends:
And this project is just another example of how we are using web to build trust and influence.
There will be lots to learn and discuss 
Looking forward to it.
Oh yeah and one more great thing: Being in South Africa it is always a shlep to get hold of new book such as Trust Agents. So knowing that I might not obtain the book in time; I sent out a tweet – hoping that someone coming to Cape Town from the US would be able to purchase the book for me and bring it down. And wouldn’t you know: @rcprince was coming down. Check out the incredible work he and his family will be doing here in Cape Town:
[Top Photo by: balachandar]
Yeah, the cool thing about the group blogging project is not only are we talking about how to become better trust agents, but we are actually doing it. Glad you were able to get a copy of the book. Cool story!