Seamless Messaging
The seamless messaging system provides users with a simple way to keep in constant contact with each other and carry on a conversation – in real time. This is different from email because the Facebook Message system is modeled after Facebook Chat. Facebook removed the subject line and encourages users to communicate with each other as if it were a verbal conversation. Users can send messages back and forth seamlessly and pick up conversations right where they left off.

Cross-Platform Conversation History
Once you’ve signed up to use the free Facebook Messages platform, you’ll be given an @Facebook.com email address. When you access your account, all conversations that take place going forward, whether they be via email, text messages, instant messaging, Twitter updates, and Facebook posts (just for starters), will record in one seamless stream. You will have a complete conversation history no matter where the conversation took place.

The Social Inbox
The new social inbox is intended to stay clean, spam-free, and well organized. When you log on to your Facebook Messages account, the only messages you’ll see are messages from your friends and their friends.  That’s it. You’ll have the ability to adjust your privacy settings to determine exactly what you see and will have the ability to filter everything you don’t want to bounce back or save into a folder called, “Other.”

Facebook Messages is rolling out slowly and is currently available to users on an invitation-only basis. It’s too early to tell just how successful it will be, but the screen shots and promotional video seems promising.  Will this be a game changer?  We’ll soon see.

(For more information on Facebook messages, including a promotional video about the new features, as well as a slide show with a Facebook Messages walkthrough check out this article on Mashable.Com.)

Andrew Germer is Fanscape’s Manager of Social Media Strategy. In this recently created position, Andrew oversees the company’s team of graphic designers, large-scale custom developers, programmers, technology partners and vendors. Andrew is central to Fanscape’s strategy department, providing recommendations for ways clients can bolster their social presence and improve the customer-centric experience.

Andrew received his MBA from Pepperdine’s Graziadio School of Business. When not maintaining his (Foursquare) Mayoral status at Fanscape, Andrew can be found rooting for his beloved Angels, mastering the art of Rock Band or catching his favorite dance music artists when they come to town.

Fanscape: We know you love Foursquare, but what are some of your other favorite social applications or widgets?

Andrew: It’s not a new app, but the MLB At Bat app was recently updated with a “ballpark check-in” feature that allows you to view stats, scores, and other highlights from all of the games that you attend live.  It’s a huge upgrade over saving my ticket stubs and looking up box scores.  I also love WorldCard, which scans business cards and turns them into contacts.

Fanscape: What are your favorite websites?

Andrew: In the social world of course I love Mashable and the newly revamped Digg.  I also grab news from ReadWriteWeb and for my Angels baseball news, I go to my favorite blog Halos Heaven.

Fanscape: Share with us one of your must-see pieces of branded entertainment?

Andrew: I think it’s pretty amazing what Trivial Pursuit did with YouTube.  Combining a rich flash-based trivia game and pitting users against viral celebrities is a unique way to brand themselves and appeal to a very wide audience.

AOL Fanhouse – for the sports geek in all of us.

Funny or Die – Everyone needs a laugh, right?

Mashable – Such a great place to get your social media news and views.

TechCrunch - All the reporting you need on gadgets, gizmos and the web.

Tumblr – As one of my co-workers so aptly described, “it’s like Twitter on ‘roids.”

Mashable put out a helpful How To yesterday, to make YouTube channels more aesthetically pleasing…

“YouTube recently redesigned channel pages to make them more dynamic and easier to customize. The beta channels are now a hodgepodge of your uploads, favorites, playlists, and numerous in-channel editing options. Should you upgrade to the new design, you have a greater chance of creating an eye-catching channel that’s likely to keep your viewers engaged for longer.

YouTube originally made the redesigned channels available to a select group of elite members and new users. Now however, the video site is letting anyone upgrade their channel, and eventually they’ll be moving all remaining channels over to the new version.

As previously reported, the redesign allows for wider videos and better organized pages; the result is a viewer-friendly experience centered around your content. As such, we wanted to highlight some of the best ways to maximize the redesigned channels and show you how to customize them to your liking.”

To read the full article click here.

Even Shaq weighed in via Twitter

Watch live video from starburytv on Justin.tv