10. The Atlantic’s Shrimp Population wins the  ‘You Only Live Twice’ award. Two lifetimes wouldn’t be enough to polish off the mound of aquatic delicacies which seemed to keep multiplying in the largest martini glass I’ve ever seen. The ocean called…they’re running out of shrimp.

9. Katherine Bateman and Lu Montague, winners of ‘The World is Not Enough’ award. These two frantically transformed Buddy Media HQ into Las Vegas East, equipped with blackjack, roulette, and craps. Somehow, they also managed to keep the night running smoothly, while seemingly enjoying themselves just as much as everyone else. Bravo!

8. Jeff Ragovin, who wins the night’s ‘Live and Let Fry’ award, for donating his office/Fortress of Solitude to the catering staff. A scented candle the size of Rhode Island won’t be big enough to eliminate the smell of hot oil from the room, but Mr. Jeff agrees that it was all worth it – if only for the tasty beef cigars and mini-Monte Cristos.

7. Patrick Stokes wins the ‘Thunderball’ award for taking off his poker face and placing a suckers bet on the roulette wheel. Of course, he hit big. He was last seen wrestling with the pit boss, who tried to convince him that the chips he had spilling out of his pockets were not exchangeable for cold-hard cash.

6. Chris Dessi, who wins the ‘Guy Who Loved Me’ award. This guy did more schmoozing than a politician at a funding drive. At one point, I saw him sketching a mock-up of a Public Profile in a giant bowl of guacamole.  Ole!

5. The ‘Doctor No’ award goes to Mike Jaindl for letting his hair down and surviving an evening without charting each hour’s milestones in Basecamp.

4. Will Gallego, who put on a suit that was concentrated awesome. Honestly, I’ve never seen the guy wear anything but a T-shirt, and last night he was looking C – double O – L.  As a result, he went home with the ‘License to Will’ award.

3. I don’t like to pat myself on the back (even though it’s quite easy with my extra-long arms), but based on the amount of positive feedback I received, I’ve given myself the ‘Man With the Golden Voice’ award. One guy even called me melifluous.

2. The ‘For Your Sighs Only’ award goes to all of the Casino Night invitees, who went home empty handed. Sorry, folks, better luck at our annual X-mas extravaganza.

1. Of course, the night couldn’t have happened without the Lazerows, winners of the evening’s ‘Goldfinger’ award – for throwing a raging bash and providing each Buddy with the opportunity to work for the coolest company in the world.

This post wouldn’t be complete without an extra special thanks to all of our clients and friends who made Buddy Media Casino Night an evening to remember. Diamonds are forever, but the relationships that we’ve built over the last two years are truly eternal. Thanks for choosing not to gamble your media dollars and instead going with the surefire path to a social media jackpot!

On the chosen day, the teams were assigned – eight groups set loose with naught but five score clues and fifty bills of fare. Apollo’s golden chariot hung in the celestial heavens surrounded by an azure sky.  Champions all, upon departure, hope drove them forward – hope for success, hope for victory.

‘Set forth,’ she said, ‘be fruitful, and may your steps be rapid, as fleet-footed Hermes. The clues you hold shall be your boon and wisdom shall be your guide. Do not look to me for aid, for I will not provide it. You shall not see me again until the anointing of champions at the ritual feast.’

Off they set, scattered like chaff in the wind. From Columbus Circle they flew, dispersed to all points on the compass. They rode on mounted stone thoroughbreds and set adrift in boats of steel in the city’s great park. They searched for treasures in the city’s great museums. They conversed with strangers, a trustworthy lot who recorded their feats with newfangled daguerreotype.

When all was said and done, one team emerged victorious. While teams rushed about from landmark to landmark, these champions quested for apples. Eve’s gift to Adam proved to be most valuable, for each image added to their Olympian score. Oh Muse, sing to me of loopholes, by which one team may triumph, whereas others fail.

Oh Muse, forget the singing and leave that to Buddy Media’s tired warriors, for they proved themselves worthy of adoration by the masses of groundlings at Hill Country BBQ. For you, oh Muse, could not sing as enchanted a song as Eugene Ventimiglia, who charmed the crowd like the great Eros. The voice of Matt Zarzecki cut through the din, preaching the gospel set forth by Canada’s most famous crooner. Spurred by Dionysus himself, Abby Lauterbach chanted a hymn known to all. Our humble leader proved himself savvy at rhythm making, while his wife strutted to his steady beat. And let us not forget about Patrick Stokes and Luke Taylor – like the mighty Hercules and Achilles, the two brought down the house.

As mysterious Nix filled the evening sky with a cloak of darkness and Diana hung her crescent lantern amongst the constellations, we were left in anticipation of the next chance to prove our worth. For the oncoming sowing season will bring us to battle again, with naught to separate us but a red ball and the color of our tunics. Oh Muse, it is called a scavenger hunt, but we did not feel like Hades accursed carrion birds. We felt like gods born all.

Our development team was excited to integrate Facebook Connect functionality with the Buddy Media website and we shot around a lot of ideas about how this technology could be appropriately implemented. We decided that leveraging the capabilities of Events in conjunction with Connect would be the smartest strategy, as it would allow us to spread the word to the Facebook community about conferences and gatherings that we sponsor or attend.

The addition of Facebook Connect will let visitors to the Buddy Media corporate site indicate whether they’re attending an event. The interface also displays profile photos of all registered attendees. The user can then choose to spread the word about the soiree by posting their response to the Facebook Newsfeed – which includes a link back to the Buddy Media Events page.  This increases exposure for our corporate events by seamlessly aggregating our audiences from Facebook and the open web into a single transparent group.

Feel free to check out the Buddy Media Events page and let us know what you think.

Mike’s week began at the Social Ad Summit, an invite-only, conference focused on strategic issues driving the growth of advertising in social media, where he treated the crowd of industry insiders to a keynote address entitled, “Social Marketing: Where are we? Where are we going?”

The presentation outlined the present state of a burgeoning business and the positive outlook for the future. Mike included a high-level breakdown of strategies for marketing big brands to highly targeted audiences on social networks like Facebook. Mike didn’t pause to rest on his laurels, however, as he remained at Tribeca Rooftop to moderate a one hour panel discussion called “Alternative Social Advertising.”

Tuesday brought the highly publicized announcement of our partnership with Social Media, the largest stand-alone ad network on Facebook. This deal will allow big corporate brands to enter into a single engagement with both companies to plan, develop, promote, and monitor applications on social networks. This deal is huge, as it signals the companies’ intent to work together to help the social marketing space grow quickly and effectively. What does this deal mean for corporate America? It means that social app-vertising campaigns are easier to execute, as well as being more accountable and results-driven. Better yet, it means that brand advertisers have greater support from the two thought leaders in the industry.

All of this jaunting about town has built up to Mike’s big day today at the Jacob Javits Convention Center, overlooking the Hudson River on Manhattan’s West Side. Mike will be speaking twice at the Web 2.0 Expo – the East Coast’s largest tech conference. Web 2.0 is a celebration of the future of the Internet and its myriad of potentials and possibilities. Obviously, Mike fits in perfectly with this crowd and will get a chance to display his breadth of industry knowledge from entrepreneurship (Cashing Out: When, How, and How Much?) to the sundry benefits of brand advertising on social networks (Why Brand Advertisers Will Be the Biggest Beneficiaries of Social Media and How You Can Participate). See Mike’s presentation on Social Marketing above.

What does the future hold for Michael Lazerow? Only time will tell, but you can bet that Mike’s future and the future of social media advertising are intimately linked.

Buddy Media made its presence known from the opening moments of the conference with a crowd-pleasing tutorial moderated by Jeff Ragovin (Vice President of Sales and Business Development). Jeff led an interactive session in which he had participants develop social media marketing strategies for an imaginary product called “Apple Window.” The audience was tasked with coming up with ideas for an Apple-branded Facebook application that would serve to market the product while engaging users in a fun and addictive “casual gaming” experience.

Buddies Patrick Stokes, Dan Seldow, and Abby Lauterbach chatted up the masses while distributing popcorn and spreading the good word about our success in marketing branded applications for big brands.

Mike Lazerow had the prescience to see what was coming down the social media pike and turned that hunch into a thriving business that’s way ahead of the competition. That forethought was on display Tuesday as Mike participated in two panels on the emerging power of social media advertising – highlights from his presentation are included in the slideshow below.

If anything we’re zealous in our evangelizing of Facebook and all of its possibilities. As part of our commitment to helping the social networking world evolve and grow, we felt it was our duty to take a leadership role at GSP.

Some highlights to look forward to:

• Jeff Ragovin (Vice President of Sales and Business Development) will be leading an introductory tutorial entitled “Viral Marketing and Advertising Strategies for Social Networks.” This workshop will provide an overview of marketing and advertising solutions for popular social networks; including Facebook, MySpace, LinkedIn, and others. Attendees will learn how to create social advertising campaigns, create branded groups, drive brand awareness using social apps & widgets, and reach consumer audiences on social networks & widget platforms. The session runs from 1:30PM – 4:30PM on Monday June 9, 2008.
• Mike Lazerow (Our Fearless Leader and CEO) will lead “Apps & Widgets: The New New Ad Units” which will reveal all of the latest trends around emerging advertising standards for apps & widgets. This session is on Tuesday June 10, 2008 at 9:50 AM. Mike will also participate in a panel discussion entitled “Where Social Gets Down to Business: Advertising vs. App-vertising.” The panel will share their knowledge about using social networks, social advertising, and social applications to reach hundreds of millions of today’s online users.
• No conference is complete without a good old-fashioned cocktail party! All Buddy Media partners and clients are invited to stop by the GSP East VIP bash at 3303 Water Street for drinks and hor d’oeuvres overlooking the monuments in our nation’s capital. (Tuesday June 10, 5:30 – 7:30)

Would we spend the day bowling and hitting golf balls at Chelsea Piers? Would it be an outing to Central Park for a picnic and whiffle ball? Or maybe the plan was to go to Jeff’s apartment and scrub the grout in his shower? Most agreed that while scrubbing Jeff’s bathroom tile would be fun, we’d prefer a day out in the sun. Well, our wish was granted when Kass and Mike unveiled the Buddy Media Scavenger Hunt.

After receiving detailed instructions (Instruction #1 – Any calls to Kass will result in a strict penalty!), the staff was split into five teams and unleashed on the Big Apple, with only $50 and a digital camera. In order to complete each task on the Scavenger Hunt, team members needed the courage to negotiate with pedestrians and civil servants, and the street smart savvy necessary to traverse NYC from the Upper West Side to the southern tip of the island.

Five hours of frantic scrambling around town ended on E. 53rd Street at Top Tunes Karaoke, where Kass reviewed each teams photos to determine a winner. (While it seemed like a lot of work went into the planning of the hunt itself, it soon became evident that the most work went into the Excel Spreadsheet that Kass used to track each team’s progress.) When all the points were tallied and all the photos scrutinized, the team of Isha, Josh, and Greg emerged victorious.

The real victors however, emerged after the Scavenger Hunt, as the teams bellied up to the karaoke bar and started belting out classic tunes like true professional amateur singers.

Post Event Reward Wrap-up…

The “Something I Never Thought I’d See” Award – Eugene singing a serviceable version of Tammy Wynette’s “Stand By Your Man”

The “Give Me A Stage and a Microphone and I’ll Entertain Myself All Night” Award – Abby, who managed to contribute to just about every performance

The “I’ll Only Sing If the Microphone is Broken” Award – Dan, whose one appearance on stage paled in comparison to his appearance in the back of a police cruiser

The “Who Knew” Award – Luke, whose show stopping version of Elvis Costello’s Alison was the talk of the office for days

The “Thumbs Up” Award – Patrick and MJ displaying their thumbs more times than a hitchhiker on a ten-lane interstate – Runner-up: Jeff, whose thumbs made an appearance for the first time since the X-mas party

Join me and many others who are much, much smarter than me, at Dave McClure’s Graphing Social conference. I’ll be speaking on the social games panel. I’ll also be hanging out a ton by the pool in my Buddy Media-issued Speedo.

The conference is March 3 & 4 in sunny San Diego.