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I am obsessed with playing in the busy intersection where Social Media (community), Public Relations (influence), & the News (content) come crashing together.  

The latest application of this obsession is, literally, an actual application. 

It’s called “Newshound,” and it’s built on the Facebook Platform.  If you are a Facebook user, I hope you will give it a try, and invite your friends to do the same.  

By dropping the Newshound bookmarklet to your browser toolbar, you’re empowered to:

• Save any webpage and add your personal comments (just as you would with del.icio.us);
• Publish up-to 3 of these news items or webpages to your own Facebook profile.  (Similar to the “Cool Reading/Links of the Day” posts that many bloggers use when they’re too busy to craft a long post.) 
• You can also publish the Saved News (and Commentary) of up-to 3 of your fellow Newshounders.
• Plus, your friends can subscribe, via RSS, to either your Saved News singly, or, to the Saved News of You + Your Friends. 
• Your friends can also share individual links via a “Share This” badge, which allows people to post individual News Items from your profile to their own profiles, even if they don’t use Newshound themselves. 
• Lastly, your friends can also respond to your Saved News (and Comments) by commenting on your Wall or sending you a message, from within the Newshound app.

Here’s a screen capture of the application, from my own Facebook page:

There are similarities to the Google Reader Shared Items app, but Newshound allows for user commentary and “collaboration,” in that you can also display and comment and subscribe to your friends’ news.  (It also is not dependent on using Google Reader!)

I hope you new-media types all enjoy this new Facebook application…  Please let me know!?

It would be waaay cool if some of the 2.0-style influencers like Scoble, Calacanis, Rubel, Arrington, Malik, et al., were to adopt this app to supplement their blogging/microblogging efforts, eh?  Yet another way to reach their readers and to drive traffic toward interesting news and companies.

At this point I must more formally bow in thanks, deeply and respectfully, to Mr. Shannon Whitley of PRX Builder. 

It’s pretty daunting for a PR guy to dream-up an application, since I have no programming skills whatsoever.  So imagine my delight when I approached Shannon with this idea a couple of weeks ago, and heard him say, “Sure, I can do that!” 

He subsequently whipped-up this elegant application in his spare time, exactly as I’d envisioned it.  He’s a genius programmer and a true friend.  If you are interested in the future of the Social Media News Release, and/or in trying one out for your own client or company, I urge you to check out Shannon’s PRX Builder service.  Shannon’s up to some cutting-edge stuff over there, which I’ll cover in the near future (though some have beat me to it).

Now, Facebookers, go check out Newshound!