An Urgent Message -- And Apology -- From uSphere

To the uSphere network of students, parents and schools:

We have just received troubling news from a student who tried to use our service, and we wanted to communicate with you about it.

Cutting to the chase: some visitors to the uSphere.com site were shown pornographic ads. This is an egregious error by one of our advertising partners -- but we'll shoulder the blame, as it's our site and our partners should have been chosen more carefully. Especially on a site that serves students.

WE VALUE THE TRUST YOU PLACE IN US. We will do everything in our power to make sure this does not happen again.

uSphere uses some ad networks to show ads that, in our judgment, help you better plan for the going-to-college process. We have limited our ads to those that we think make sense. In fact, we have a long-standing relationship with two ad networks -- Google and Commission Junction -- whose service is exemplary.

It's another ad network that has caused this problem, and they assure us they're addressing this matter.

It's a shame that this had to happen on a day like today -- when hope should win out over fear, and we shouldn't be too cynical to think that a website that helps students find the right colleges can actually do so without offending people.

We're truly sorry.

Dave Van de Walle
and the
uSphere team

In Case You Missed It -- Excerpt from Sunday Night Stickam (Web Chat on College Admissions)

uSphere was joined by Zach Uttich, an admissions counselor at Millikin University in Decatur, Illinois. Zach had a ton to say -- here's an excerpt on what Millikin looks for in their incoming Freshman class:

zuttich: and my responsiblities in the admission office include visiting high schools and college fairs, managing a territory, evaluating applications, fielding questions and concerns about financial aid and am the supervisor for student tours

zuttich: millikin really looks for a student that is well rounded, to be honest

zuttich: of course we like you to meet requirements, but there are great students who don't, so we look for a total package

zuttich: that includes involvement, aspirations, grades, test scores, extra curricular activities and potential

zuttich: millikin looks for involved students

zuttich: both with their high school and the community

zuttich: we require our freshmen to partake in a certain amount of philanthropy hours and want to make sure our recruits are willing and ready to participate

usphere: thanks - is there any way for a student to be "too involved?"

zuttich: absolutely...a resumee can only be so deep...we don't want students to just have a bunch of things listed on their application because they showed up to a meeting

zuttich: so we expect students to have the background to support their claims

zuttich: ultimately, having a rap sheet for your clubs and organizations means you had free time, we just want to know you used it constructively


So there you go from one admissions counselor...

For discussion -- students, is this what you're hearing? Do you think you're doing enough -- or doing too much?

FYI - we're planning to make Sunday Night Stickam a regular thing -- but this Sunday might look a little different...we're ironing out the tech tools at our disposal...we'd love your feedback...

Sunday Night Stickam with uSphere and Special Guests

Coming this Sunday Night, January 18, uSphere presents Sunday Night Stickam -- A Video-Enabled Web Chat with college admissions experts. And none of them trying to sell you something; they'll all be sharing their expertise on this whole "going to college" process.

Dave from uSphere will moderate the discussion and we've booked (so far) Paul Lloyd Hemphill from VideoCollegeCoach and an admissions counselor from one of our fave schools, Millikin University in Decatur, Illinois. (MOre college admissions reps to come.)

The university types on the chat will be sharing tips on how they find you, how you can stand out, and what scholarship dollars and financial aid money is really out there.

My buddy Paul will make sure you know what he helps his clients with -- some tried-and-true strategies for getting in.

And about this Stickam thing? It's a mind-blowingly cool web chat tool with all sorts of ways to connect.

Students: we guarantee you'll learn something.

Parents: we guarantee your kids will learn something.

Colleges and universities: if you want to get on board, follow @usphere on Twitter and send me a note there.

uSphere and Twitter and Ning used in the same sentence...

We've had an interesting week here at uSphere headquarters. Some of it is subtle (uSphere vs. U Sphere), and some of it a lot more blatant. All in the name of helping kids and colleges connect.

And, on Saturday, we had a really interesting exchange that can actually justify our using uSphere and Twitter and Ning in the same sentence. Here goes:

Our nascent (SAT word) social network, which you can join by clicking here, is hosted by a company called Ning. Theirs is the DIY social network tool and we're big fans.

Yesterday, though, we ran into a minor blip -- what turns out to have been less than 20 minutes of downtime. And what helped fix it? Twitter.

I sent a note to Ning's customer service team and, while I was getting impatient, posted on Twitter (you can follow me here) that I wasn't happy. Within minutes, MINUTES, I was twittered back and told that all was fixed -- there were a few networks with the same issues, the tech team was on the case, and downtime was minimized.

And I have a new friend, http://twitter.com/lauraoatning.

We've seen schools have similar success with twitter (Butler's admissions team, for instance), and, in this instant gratification society, well, it's another way to connect and get answers, like, now.

U Sphere presents a guide to acronyms that will become popular

While none of this is LOL funny, some of these can help you during the college application process.

Let's start with the obvious: LOL. Last week, I had to question whether it meant "Laugh out Loud" or "Lots of Luck." Neither...

LOL: "Let (me in) Oh (PLEASE) Let (me in)." An acronym to be used only by the student who cannot accept a denial letter from his or her school of choice.

IMHO: "Ivies Might Help you Out." For instance, if you're the right person at the right time for the right school -- like a left-hander from Wyoming -- then it's a good idea to apply to the Ivy of your choice.

GG: "Don't bother me, the latest edition of US News came out, and I'll just go crazy if the school I've always wanted to go to isn't one of the Top 76 Liberal Arts schools that don't offer Master's East of the Missisippi but still North of the Mason-Dixon Line."

EOM: "Error on my transcript." I didn't really need to take Typing as a Freshman, so the D shouldn't count. (It happened to me. They called it "typing" then. Now, as a Freshman in High School, do you take "Texting?")

And, the most popular one, like, ever:

OMG: While use of this acronym is prevalent, using it on the application process contains this asterisk: *"My use of the term OMG means that I am 100% on board with your school's religious affiliation. For instance, I WILL CONVERT to Wesleyanism to get into Wesleyan. Or Southernism to get into Southern Methodist."

The News Release on Our Brickfish - JMC Academy Partnership

Here's the news release that hit the "wires" yesterday afternoon.

August 21, 2007 05:25 PM Eastern Daylight Time

U Sphere Partners with Brickfish to Send One Digital Design Devotee Down Under with Exclusive Scholarship

College Networking Site Connects Up and Coming Designers with Aussie Art Experts

SAN DIEGO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Brickfish, the online content marketing platform, today announced a partnership with college networking site U Sphere, Inc. (www.usphere.com) to launch the “U Sphere JMC Design” campaign, a contest inviting students wanting to embark on the world of digital design to enter their art for the chance to win $5,000 in tuition towards a year of study at the accredited JMC Academy in Sydney, Australia. Located at www.brickfish.com/Lifestyles/UsphereScholarship, the contest will award the most artfully-inclined entrant with a week of higher education in the land down under.

“As a global network of students and universities looking to find each other, we understand that digital media is a red hot industry with a vast number of prospective students vying for the chance at a once in a lifetime opportunity,” said Dave Van de Walle, president & CEO, U Sphere. “Aspiring artists are eager for the chance to showcase their work and a user-generated content campaign allows them to share their talents with millions of people globally across the Internet. We can’t wait to whisk one deserving student off to Australia and the exclusive JMC Academy to train alongside the experts.”

The campaign enables entrants to submit online examples of their most creative digitally designed art. Anyone can view, vote on and share their favorite designs and U Sphere will hand select one grand prize winner from the U.S. to receive a $5,000 tuition scholarship towards a year of study at the JMC Academy or a $1,000 scholarship for any educational purpose in the U.S. A second place winner, chosen by top score from the top 50 entries, will receive a week of online design tuition, and the most viral entry will receive a $100 Amazon gift card.

According to Van de Walle, the Brickfish user-generated content (UGC) platform creates the perfect opportunity for students and aspiring designers to broadcast their talent over the Internet by enabling users to share their favorites through email, Instant Messaging and hundreds of Internet sites around the world. In addition, it provides a way for entrants to obtain direct and useable feedback on their work because anyone can view and vote on entries.

“Good education has become increasingly coveted as students vie for that one-of-a-kind experience,” said Shahi Ghanem, CEO of Brickfish. “UGC creates a unique way for educational institutions to preview potential students and secure feedback from outsiders. We are very excited to work with U Sphere to make one student’s dream take off with an incredible scholarship to a leading international design school.”

The “U Sphere JMC Design” campaign ends September 28. For contest rules and more information about Brickfish, visit www.Brickfish.com.

About U Sphere, Inc.

U Sphere, Inc., headquartered in Evanston, Illinois, works with students throughout the globe to match them with the colleges and universities that are appropriate for them. The company's proprietary platform includes an application tool and "Personality Profile," which aims to get at the character traits that are most in line with the needs of U Sphere's college and university clients (in North America and around the world). Schools can then make an offer of admission to those students who they think will fit in best on campus.

About Brickfish

Brickfish is an online marketing company that has created a new platform for driving consumer interaction and response through User Generated Content (UGC). Companies use the Brickfish platform to launch advertising and marketing campaigns that spark the creation of brand-relevant UGC, such as blogs, images, video and audio. Campaign content is shared in a peer-to-peer fashion via email, IM and thousands of sites across the Web and campaign participants are rewarded for creating, voting, reviewing and sharing campaign content. Brickfish tracks consumer interactions with this content and then provides customers with comprehensive analytics on campaign reach and performance. This approach provides better value than traditional online marketing approaches such as display-based advertising and key word buys. Brickfish is headquartered in San Diego, Calif. with personnel in New York, Chicago, and Los Angeles.

Contacts

Brickfish
Rachel Kay, 858-587-2530
Rachel.Kay@Brickfish.com

| Business Wire 2007

Wired weighs in on Social Networks for the college-bound

Great post on Wired magazine that talks about the Social Networks and their use by the college-bound in a whole host of ways.

What I found most interesting is that LinkedIn is actually mentioned by Wired. Sensible, in that LinkedIn was popular with the tech types a long time ago, but Facebook (which grew up on college campuses) and MySpace (which grew up more with the high school crows) are both where the students are. And Bebo is probably more popular for students to use than LinkedIn.

(That being said, if you're a student and you want to join my LinkedIn network...oh, never mind.)

Digital Natives Going to College

More notes from Vancouver's session with the International folk:

Shaun McElroy, a counselor in Shanghai (and blogger about all things relevant to the international student here), was co-presenting a session on Web 2.0 in college admissions. One implication for BOTH sides of the audience (college/university personnel AND the counselors on the high school side): the realization that "digital natives" are by and large taking over the college-bound set.

If you're new to the terms "digital native" and "digital immigrant" -- well, they are as they sound. Digital natives have always grown up with stuff that's electronic. Digital immigrants remember putting film into cameras. Things like that.

Leading us to another possible extension of this term: "facebook natives" and "facebook immigrants."

The natives were the early adopters who HAD to have a "dot-edu" email address to use facebook (so that, ironically, they could stop reading email and JUST use facebook to communicate). The immigrants -- I'm one of them, I'll admit -- are the ones who have just recently been allowed into the facebook universe.

AND then there's those who make up fake names for themselves (more popular on mySpace than facebook)...would those be "facebook aliens?"

This college-bound set would include, then, digital natives who are, theoretically, facebook immigrants. They're trying to connect most efficiently with digital natives (who recruit for colleges) who might work for a digital immigrant.

txt me if this doesn't make sense.

Good Luck Making Sense of All This...

The Early Show continues...

Big article in The Wall Street Journal (link here, subscription required) that discusses a number of random things going on with early admissions. Different Early Decision dates, different styles of applying early, different product names.

If your head is spinning, join the crowd.

The article also discusses "FastApps" and "SnapApps" -- common tools that some schools are employing to offer you, the student, a pre-approved offer of admission (sortof) by pre-populating your application with a bunch of your info.

(The article didn't mention a school that is offering free iTunes just for applying. Such an animal is rumored to exist, and I, for one, am anxious to sign up to join the Freshman class. After all, college is all about ignoring the professor while listening to your iPod, right?)