In a world with more information than ever, figuring out how to use the brain to its fullest potential, as well as filling it with as much knowledge as possible, is the main focus of a vast amount of people in this world.

I’ve made it clear on many occasions that I believe in the importance of being a perpetual learner. One of the key activities associated with learning is exploring and understanding the way the human brain functions, and using the results of this to properly hack the critical thinking process. For example, did you know that something called a cognitive bias exists? This term refers to the tendency to think in certain ways.

Have you ever noticed that, when we’re younger, school and learning seem like a chore, and yet when we’re older, we wish we could just spend all of our time consuming information and advancing our knowledge?

Perhaps this is because our minds have matured with age, or simply because we always want to do things once we don’t have to. Or, maybe it’s because once we’ve been through certain experiences, we’re more capable of identifying our true passions.

Elynn Fish started her career in the corporate business world. Before the dominance of social media, she was part of a think tank building internal digital communications platforms. Fish was a pioneer in the social movement, helping companies increase their performance and ROI via content marketing and optimization of both internal and external digital communications.

Not even two years ago, Elynn realized that she had the knowledge and experience to start her own firm helping small businesses with their digital communications. With that, she started the Fish Firm, a consulting company that helps said businesses with strategic elements including content management, ROI measurement and analysis, and sales.

Elynn came across Scoop.it and content curation while following and experimenting with the latest trends in social media. Always on the brink of new digital strategies, Elynn was one of the first Beta testers of Scoop.it, using it with her very first clients.

Glenn Street isn’t your average guy. His claim to fame is being the very first mascot in  the National Hockey League, as well as one of the first mascots in professional sports.  After his debut, Glenn began receiving calls from the opposing teams asking where  they could get one of those costumes! He and his small team startedsimply sewing and  building the costumes for the random customers who were calling.

After a while, the calls started flooding in, and it became too much. That’s when Street Characters was founded. Today, Street Characters is best known for creating sports characters (mascots). Their clients over the years have included about half of the teams in the National Hockey League, National Football League, and Major League Baseball.

This might not sound like a company who needs much social media or content marketing, but we all know that a company like that hardly exists anymore these days.

Lauren Moss curates topics that tend to be a reflection of her interests and areas of research/study. As an architect and LEED AP with experience in green building and urbanism, ‘Sustainable Architecture’ and ‘Green Streets’ are topics that relate directly to her professional and personal interests, and they both highlight case studies, current events, and related news articles.

An interest in design, particularly information design and visualization, stems from her experience with the technical process of architecture and how drawings convey data in an effective and meaningful manner. That said, she finds it intriguing to explore how these concepts extend beyond the architectural realm into other areas, including education and communication, and so the topics ‘Visual Data’ and ‘Green Infographics’ reflect those interests.

“When executed thoughtfully and with intention, content curation will help to establish oneself as aknowledgeable resource who adds value to a topic or community, which will extend one’s reach beyond asingle website or platform, and for the best reasons- because others want to read what you share and will, as a result, share your finds and expertise with their own communities.”

This week, we put Ileane Smith in the Scoop.it Spotlight. Ileane has found many ways to benefit from curation and find success on Scoop.it. If you missed her story, here’s a recap:

“I’m always reaching out to the Scoop.it community, doing some searches, looking at people who scoop my stuff and discovering their topics. That has led me to educational topics, led me to discover new users, and more. I like sharing things from other people. The power of Scoop.it for me is having all the different ways that I can share that content and keep track of it and put it out there for other people.”

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