She supports on the internet

These boomer trendsetters demonstrate that they can find technical solutions to the things that pull them in many directions.

The real elephant in the room for these busy women is the problem of distance. Her kids are in two different states, with the grandchildren, her parents live several hours away and her siblings are scattered across the country. Travel is expensive and time restricts her desire to be with those she loves for every important life event. She has now turned to the web to assist her in navigating around this elephant in the room and succeeding in her various areas of support.

Regular readers of the AlbinoPhant blog know that we are passionate about the gift-giving support system within families. The baby boomer woman drives a significant portion of the gift market in the US, as she supports a multi-generational network of family and friends. She manages gifts for birthdays, graduations, holidays, weddings, births and much more. She purchases gifts for business clients and office associates and still she struggles with the idea of doing more to make this process more personal and warm.

Barbara Baby Boomer stresses over the emotional choice between actually traveling to the party or just sending a gift through UPS. She knows that traveling drains the pocketbook, but the UPS option raises the level of guilt from missing the event.

AlbinoPhant is a white elephant party that tackles the elephant in the room called distance. The online gift giving application will never be as warm as an actual hug from grandma, but it is still a stronger substitute than a cold UPS delivery.

What other things should be developed to help Barbara get around the elephant in her gift giving processes?

Images of Elephants in the Room

To further our understanding of the use of the Elephant in our language and our art, we have included some fun images of the elephant in the room. We have also included some of the context that are supported by this imagery.

We believe that the tyranny of distance is the elephant in the room for families and friends when it comes time to share gifts with each other. This is why we have created an online platform for sharing gifts, no matter the distance..

Enjoy these images of the elephants in the room…

Elephant in the boardroom.
Venture Beat suggests that multi-billion dollar funds could soon be a thing of the past, so the investment firms are ignoring the possibility, thus and elephant in the room.

Elephant in the Room represents net neutrality.
The Sponge-ist blog discusses a massive elephant in the room in the debate over abandoning net neutrality?

Elephant in the Room and Poetry
Amy Abrahams shared this image and a poem concerning the elephant in the room.

The 800 lb nuclear elephant in the room
Pamela Geller likens political posturing to a large elephant in the room when it comes to government policy for Iran.

Elephant in the Room and blogging

Fuel Your Blogging posted that some stories like Haiti, create an Elephant in the room when it comes to planning a blog post.

The elephant in the room for many families during important gift events is the missing people who could not attend the party. Sharing time together is an important social support system and we feel badly whenever someone is left out of the activity.

This is the reason that many chose to stay connected online using various web-based tools.

How are you addressing the elephant in the room?

The Elephant in the room has left the building

The term “the elephant in the room” creates an odd picture. Maybe that is why it has such a powerful influence upon our thoughts when used to describe something completely idiotic.

Here is how the Wiki’s are describing the topic: “Elephant in the room” is an English idiom for an obvious truth that is being ignored or goes unaddressed. The idiomatic expression also applies to an obvious problem or risk no one wants to discuss.

It really is silly to consider that a massive beast, like an elephant could wander into a house and someone not say or do something about the occurrence. But since the 1800’s we have used the expression “Elephant in the room” to paint the picture of something that we tend to ignore and put off fixing.

We developed an online white elephant gift exchange system to fix the “elephant in the room” of family gift giving events. Most of the time we ignore the fact that some family members can not come to the party because they live so far away. These people don’t get an invitation and are thus left out of the fun.

The elephant in the room is even more glaring on the day of the party, when others ask why Grandpa or Auntie Barbara is not in attendance. These subjects become the elephant in the room that nobody wants to bring up to spoil the mood of the day. The online gift party application removes the elephant and allows everyone to attend and share in the fun.

There is an elephant in the room poem that speaks to what we are talking about, even though it has a bit of a darker side to the subject.

The Elephant in the Room

By Terry Kettering
There’s an elephant in the room.
It is large and squatting,
so it is hard to get around it.
Yet we squeeze by with,
“How are you?” and, “I’m fine,”
and a thousand other forms of trivial chatter.
We talk about the weather;
we talk about work;
we talk about everything else—
except the elephant in the room.
There’s an elephant in the room.
We all know it is there.
We are thinking about the elephant
as we talk together.
It is constantly on our minds.
For, you see, it is a very big elephant.
It has hurt us all, but we do not talk about
the elephant in the room.
Oh, please, say her name.
Oh, please, say “Barbara” again.
Oh, please, let’s talk about
the elephant in the room.
For if we talk about her death,
perhaps we can talk about her life.
Can I say, “Barbara” to you
and not have you look away?
For if I cannot,
then you are leaving me alone
in a room—with an elephant.

↓

Take the Elephant in the room out of your family gift giving celebrations and invite everyone to the party.

Albinophant is a mimic of the traditional Yankee Swap or White Elephant parties used in social circles in the US and Canada. With this online version, players purchase real gifts, share them, steal gifts from one another, and then the present for each individual is shipped to their door by conventional methods.

The party is hosted on Facebook so friends can easily join and invite others into the gift exchange within the social network platform. Each player uses custom ecommerce markets to shop for a gift, then they virtually wrap their present in preparation for the party to begin.

There is a common game play page in the AlbinoPhant application that acts as the virtual living room where all players gather for the fun. The game play page has a comment area where players banter, share videos and images, all while opening and stealing presents from each other.

The application is remarkably similar to the actions that millions are familiar with in the traditional White Elephant exchanges. But there are extra enhancements that are not possible with the regular event. Players can actually share a part of the party experience on Facebook, with friends not in the party, which expands the fun. In addition, posting YouTube videos in the party allows players to embellish their comments to other players. There is also a gift rating system and player awards built into the actions of the online party.

Hosting a party is simply a matter of joining the application, selecting a time to start and then scouring Facebook for those you want to invite. Explaining the rules is easy and the game allows players from any part of the US to join and share in the fun.

This year the Elephant in the Room has become active and is a party animal on Facebook. So invite your family and friends to join in an online fun party this holiday season.

I got the CASH right here!

When discussing the monetization of social media, we can say that a sustainable business model is… the Elephant in the Room.

Soon, a new elephant will march out of the jungle and onto the pages of Facebook… And this social pachyderm is fully monetized!

AlbinoPhant, the white elephant gift party, uses a traditional party game, along with Facebook, Amazon and PayPal, to make money. What makes AlbinoPhant unique is that this application pulls its own weight without the need to fight for shrinking advertising budgets, like other social properties.

Here is the way it works: People buy gifts for use in the gift exchange, using eCommerce. Then they share the gifts with family and friends in the virtual atmosphere of a white elephant gift exchange, on a special playing page. When the party is over, the gifts they claim in the party arrive at their doorstep, using established shipping companies. This makes AlbinoPhant a gift merchant on Facebook.

You are probably scratching your head to figure out how you can play online with real gifts, without everyone being in the same place at the same time. Well, AlbinoPhant only uses the image of the gift that you have identified and purchased for the party. This allows for all party guests to virtually wrap a gift, participate in a virtual gift opening, then do some virtual gift stealing, and finally claim ownership of a gift from the party activity.

AlbinoPhant manages the party, provides the gift markets to shop within, and makes sure all the right gifts get delivered to the right addresses after the swap. Party attendees pay for a gift, the delivery costs and the fun, all at a flat fee,  selected in advance by the party host.

Hosts use the Facebook invitation system to gather their friends for the party. They also select the spending level for the party, between $15 and $50 dollars. This host selection system provides a level playing field for everyone, and reduces the challenge created by “big spenders” or “cheapskates”, when it comes to gift sharing.

So, the Elephant in the Room for AlbinoPhant is fully visible and a very useful gift merchant for the developers of the party. Advertising revenues will eventually become the bonus income that will be earned as the application makes its mark in the social media jungle.

There is an elephant in the room...

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Photo thanks to Gizmodo