This is another Guest Post from Leo Wurschmidt.  He’s a web marketer and branding expert who’s been increasing using web technology for creative means and methods.

Thanks again Leo!

I always enjoyed having Seesmic on my Disqus commenting system. The idea of being able to leave a video message in the comments is awesome and is a nice complement to just throwing some words out on someone’s post. Recently, I ended up switching to Intense Debate because I felt it was a better commenting system. The downside of the switch was that I sacrificed the use of built-in video messaging. Goodbye Seesmic, I will miss our frequent time together.

A couple of weeks ago I was introduced to Bubble Comment. Bubble Comment describes itself as

A great way to quickly add your own video comment to virtually any web page you want.

It’s great for education, marketing and just sharing information with others.

You can imagine my joy when I read this. I could once again infuse a nice blend of personalized video messaging with written text to create great blog comments. Unfortunately, there are some inherent problems with using Bubble Comment for long-term usage. Each video can only be played back a total of 50 times and are only active for 30 days. (Note: You can purchase a membership for $24.95/year to increase those limits.)

The limits are cause for concern. Blog posts are going to be around much longer than 30 days and the loss of the video after that specified time period would reduce the comment to irrelevant or meaningless. This affects the comment’s effectiveness during a good “post-post” comment discussion, which is (or at least should be) one of the goals of an effective ministry or business blog.

A final cause of concern deals with the work going on behind the scenes. Bubble Comment redirects the reader away from the blog post and onto the Bubble Comment website via a new window. From what I can tell, the pseudo-original web page appears identical and functions exactly the same. This is a huge issue. Trust and security are constantly looming in the back of Internet users’ minds. To redirect someone to an identical web page on a completely different website may signal a red flag in some people’s minds. I do not want anyone questioning the security of my website thus reducing possible trust in me as a blogger or my blog as a ministry/business.

An example is below. The web page looks almost exactly identical; however, the URL’s do not lie.

I think Bubble Comment has a great concept. While I feel they have some issues that will prevent me from using their services right now I look forward to seeing what they have to offer in the future. I will keep an eye to see how things improve.

What do you think? Are their time/viewing limits reasonable or would you like to see them extended? Do you see the same risks in using Bubble Comments in your comments? Do you believe the average user would perceive the redirection as a security issue? Throw your thoughts down in the comments below (text and video formats are both welcome).

This is the very first “official” guest post by Leo Wurschmidt (Twitter), Co-Founder and Marketing Director for Triune Designs.

I’ve gotten to know Leo through this blog and another and have loved his passion and insight into marketing and the social media space.  It is an honor to open up my blog to those that are passionate about using technology for the Kingdom, and so thanks Leo for being one of the first.

Charlotte finally put its name on the social media map – the Queen City hosted a bloggers’ conference. It was a great conference full of “expert” panels and Q&A discussions that aimed to help local bloggers become better at their craft.

CLT WordCamp’s how-to sessions provided information on utilizing current blog technology, creating better blog content, and ways to promote your blog. Mark Jaquith gave the final keynote address and discussed WordPress as a whole: its mission, how it operates and why the programmers leave it as an open source platform. Mark also gave us a preview of an awesome upgrade to WordPress 2.7.

While the conference served as a great learning experience, it accomplished something more important that should not be overlooked: CLT WordCamp took a small part of the Charlotte blogging community temporarily offline and enabled participants to have personal interaction with one another.

Do not get me wrong, I love technology and the Internet. The tools they provide are helpful in connecting people all around the world. They provide an extreme amount of value to our work, friendships and social lives.

We should not forget, though, that technology simply acts as a set of tools that provide us with a better opportunity to meet people (both locally and internationally) and reunite with distant friends. As we become more entrenched in technology and make it an increased part of our world we must not lose sight on the value of true, face-to-face interaction.

Image from bz3rk (Flickr)

The WordCamp conference provided us the opportunity to get that human interaction every person needs. AT&T’s old campaign: “reach out and touch someone” seemed very appropriate in my mind. Tweeting, blogging and even video chatting can not replicate what a bunch of handshakes and conversations over pizza gave us.

It is important for church leaders to keep this concept in mind. As churches become more reliant on technology to reach people and help them come to know Christ the person-to-person relationships can accidentally be overlooked.

The value of human touch with non-believers or new Christians is something that cannot be replaced. The question to be asked when addressing the Great Commission is “are we truly investing in other people’s lives one Tweet or Facebook comment at a time or are we missing out by relying more heavily on the tools?”

Here is a good related article about our goals relationships (and investing in others) as opposed to falling back on simple marketing: Why Churches Should Stop Marketing.