This morning, I was seriously considering posting a linkdump of all the news going on with Twitter lately: the apps controversy, the promoted tweets, the Library of Congress’ tweet archive, the junk science of Kardashploitation…

After all, Twitter has absolutely dominated the news lately. Even the old computer guys on local 10 a.m. call-in radio show are talking about Twitter as I write this.

But then I suddenly found myself having a conversation with one of Kansas City’s most famous brands on social media.

You’re no doubt familiar with Hallmark Cards.

Headquartered at Crown Center (exactly 1.1 mi from my apartment), the world’s best-known greeting card maker is a century-old Kansas City institution.

And when I saw on AdRants that Hallmark was running a new social-media contest clearly targeted at a young demographic, I wondered why I hadn’t heard about it (despite the fact that I’m no longer part of said demographic).

Now through May 3, Hallmark is crowdsourcing customers for the best things to do before you turn 30, encouraging people to tweet their ideas using the hashtag “#b430” and to post their ideas on a Facebook fan page. The best idea gets an iPad. Evidently, this is to support an ad campaign for a line of cards targeted at twentysomethings looking at 30, a.k.a. death.

But then I noticed that the Facebook and Twitter accounts running the campaign are located in the UK.

When I visited the Facebook page of the Hallmark I know and love, there was no trace of the contest, nor on the site proper, nor any of Hallmark US’s four Twitter accounts, which, by the way, are pretty dry — you really want your main account to be branded “@HallmarkPR“? Who wants to interact with a PR channel?

Anyway, first I called the press desk and got the standard-issue voicemail greeting that assured me no one would be getting back to me anytime soon.

Then I figured, why not address this on the same channel where the contest is being run? So I posted my question, with a link to a UK tweet, right smack on the Real Hallmark’s wall in front of some 25k fans. After a friend pointed out a typo in the British tweet, I had a helpful response directing me to the UK Hallmark’s rules for the contest.

That’s OK. IPads are for kids anyway.

But I’m still kind of scratching my head about this Hallmark social media brand confusion. Though UK Hallmark’s website and Facebook page are clearly British-based, its Twitter account, @hallmarkcards, looks like, well, Hallmark Cards. (@hallmark doesn’t appear to be anyone.)

If I were occupying a corner office at Crown Center, I’d get on the blower with the London office and demand they append a “UK” to that username. The bigger and more diverse the company, the more important it is to establish naming conventions.

Social, after all, is global.

With the iPad finally in stores, I thought it would be fun to call my friend Mick out at iResQ, an excellent Apple repair shop based in Olathe, KS, for a test drive (test touch?) of the new device. Mick and his boss, Brian, gave me even more than that when I visited their facility yesterday. Hint: If you’re the type who likes taking expensive things apart, this video is for you.

Talk has been swirling for months prior to this past Saturday’s release of the Apple iPad as to whether the touch-screen tablet could be or definitely won’t be the savior of print media. (If it’s the former, paid newspaper apps clearly aren’t the way to go.)

But there’s been surprisingly little talk about what this revolutionary(?) device could mean for another struggling industry: music.

With so many labels and artists faltering because of the free exchange of their product, the arrival of a new device for conveying and possibly capitalizing on that flow of content should be a call to arms for the industry. Shouldn’t it?

Instead, it seems that the music industry is either behind the curve or waiting to see how this iPad craze shakes out. (So far, some 300,000 people are shaking it out.)

Back in January, we suggested that the iPad could enhance the music-consumption experience for end users and also empower self-managing musicians.

So far, the marketplace isn’t there yet. But there are a few early adopters.

1. Music Makers

Epicenter highlights the free Rj Voyager iPad app. Made especially for the electronic group Kids on DSP (which, by the way, seems like an obscure choice), the Rj Voyager allows users to manipulate the group’s songs through the iPad’s touch interface.

Here’s a demo (imagine your finger where the cursor is):

Wired credits the app to Michael Breidenbruecker, formerly of Last.fm and now with reality app design firm RjDj.

In addition to everything else it is, the iPad could be the quintessential active (as opposed to passive) music playback device. The tilt sensor has clear potential for adding filter sweeps and other effects. The ambient-light sensor could put on ambient music when your lights turn low. And of course the multitouch screen has massive potential for virtual synthesizers and touch interfaces yet to be conceived.

We put the question to Breidenbruecker: Will the iPad’s larger screen help people interact with music, rather than just listening passively?

“Absolutely,” he agreed. “I think the genre will see a big move forward on the iPad. I don’t think everyone is interested in fiddling around with music like musicians are doing. Instead, we will see totally new formats and also music-related games gaining traction … we want to offer a solid technology platform for this.”

Now that’s more like it!

I have no doubt that in the very near future, people — especially kids — will be making music on the iPad and devices like it.

Just as ProTools made the PC a home-recording juggernaut, the iPad will pave the way for a whole wave of tablet musical engineers.

Already on the way: Midipad, a Multi-touch iPad midi controller. (That’s the image at the top of this entry.)

Because even more compelling than people composing music on an iPad is the possibility of hyper-intuitive, touch-screen apps that facilitate home recording. Want to move a track? Just touch it and drag it. Think about it.

2. Music Players

Not great news here. Though, naturally, the iPad will carry iTunes, CNET reports that the device won’t be able to stream music until “at least the third quarter.” CNET writes:

It will be a disappointment for iTunes fans who have been speculating as to when Apple might use music site Lala–which Apple acquired in December–for its streaming expertise to launch a cloud-based music service.

Meanwhile, CBS, of all companies, is the first major conglomerate to launch an iPad app. Called, dinosaurically, “Radio.com,” the app provides streaming music (much of it from Yahoo), news and sports content.

Not exactly an auspicious start for iPad music consumers, but as streaming functionality is added and more and more people get their hands on these little machines, the music industry will be forced to adapt.

Or it can settle for what it already does best: Dying.

Last week, we showed love for the 52nd Grammys’ massive We’re All Fans social media campaign. Quick refresher: In addition to loading up Grammys.com with social content, the Recording Academy’s marketers created wereallfans.com, an elegant promotional site featuring fluid displays of user-generated content.

Now that the ceremony is over and the numbers have come in, it looks like the push paid off in spades, proving that investing in social media marketing brings tangible returns.

On average, 25.8 million viewers tuned into Sunday night’s ceremony, making for the ceremony’s largest audience in six years. That’s a 35% increase over last year’s ceremony, which was promoted only minimally on social sites.

The built-in buzz around Best-Album-winning Taylor Swift and Jacko-tributing Lady Gaga no doubt helped, not to mention everhot Beyoncé Knowles, who won became the biggest-winning female artist ever by taking home six awards. But we think the real buzz was online.

Mashable ran the numbers for the “We’re All Fans” campaign and found staggering results.

125,760 Facebook Fans
48,776 Twitter Followers
1,505,838 combined views on YouTube for the “We’re All Fans” campaign videos.
2,050,699 combined views on Grammy.com for the “We’re All Fans” campaign videos.
The Grammys were a trending topic on Twitter for more than four days.

Numbers = truthy.

Additionally, the awards ceremony itself reflected the ways in which social media has become an integral part of pop culture and everyday life. Nowhere was this seen more strikingly than in Imogen Heap’s mind-boggling Twitter dress. It was a dress. That tweeted. Crazy.

And there was also Stephen Colbert using an iPad to announce the Song of the Year nominees. Though not overtly social-media-related (and no doubt the result of an Apple product placement deal), the fact that Colbert whipped out an Internet-buzzy device on a mainstream-TV awards show — and got laughs — is pretty significant.

And lastly, on an unfortunate note, the Washington Post blog saw fit to point out how Swift’s cringeworthily off-key performance in her duet with Stevie Nicks echoed across the Twittersphere.

If art imitates life, social media reports it.

Imogen image courtesy Moritz Waldermeyer.

Months of plate-shifting hype made for a volcanic debut for Apple’s iPad yesterday.

As Steve Jobs descended from Mt. Cupertino, a mock-turtleneck clad Prometheus, bringing new digital fire to mankind, every tech blogger from here to Sparta felt compelled to weigh in on the supposedly revolutionary tablet computer doohickey. And I suppose, as this post proves, I am no different.

But as I’m tempest-toss’d upon this sea of speculation, I can’t help but wonder what the iPad will (or won’t) do for the music industry.

After some thought and a pot or two of coffee, I’m come to the following conclusion:

The iPad (or devices like it) is a boon for DIY musicians.

That’s not because of any new technology that comes on the device. As MusicWeek points out, Jobs’ presentation was largely devoid of digital-music talk.

The iPad will come with iTunes, the App Store, and whatever apps, such as Pandora or Last.fm, people use to consume music on their iPhones/iPods/etc.

Maybe Apple isn’t talking about music right now, but regardless, the change in size and format of the medium could make a huge impact on how people consume music.

Think about the change in physical music from LP to cassette to CD. See a pattern here? Computer … iPhone … iPad … anyone?

The iPad is clearly a better medium for the visual side of music — artwork, video, liner notes — and that’s really important. And with user-generated content sites like YouTube and Ustream, it’s going to be that much easier to get your music into people’s hands and before their eyes.

Also, for musicians on the go, managing one’s own content on a tiny mobile device requires some serious iPod-chi. I’m not sure how easy it is to store and access shared files (MP3s, PDFs, etc) on an iPad, but I’m assuming its laptop-mobile hybrid status makes it a little easier. Maybe not.

Best of all though is that the price is right. For musicians on a budget (i.e., most), the iPad could fill a serious need: cheap connectivity.

For planning a tour, this is huge. Unless you’ve got a manager, publicist and label doing all the networking, communicating and planning for you, it’s up to you to use some combination of your wits, the phone in your pocket and whatever Internet access you can hijack to make your way across the country without hemorrhaging cash and/or success.

The iPad ranges in price from $500 for 16G of storage, to $700 for 64G. Add $130 to the price tag plus $30 a month if you want to go 3G and not have to worry about finding reliable wi-fi hotspots everywhere you go.

For many indie musicians, laptops just aren’t in the budget. It’s expensive enough to pay the smartphone bill on top of the cost of gas, equipment, food, beer, unexpected medical expenses and so on.

In summary, for musicians looking to make it in the industry, devices like the iPad could mean cheaper, more effective ways of spreading content and managing business.

Thanks, Prometheus.