The Flickr Tradeoff

A long time ago, I switched my Flickr account name to my Yahoo! screename.  Why?  Because they asked me to and because I basically use the same signin for everything anyway, so it really wasn't such a big deal.

And eventually, it will probably happen with MyBlogLog and del.icio.us, too.  Seriously... who cares?  It won't make me use any more Yahoo services.

And why don't I care?  I don't care, because, at the end of the day, I'm glad the little startup where I store all my precious photos got bought be a big profitable company.

Yahoo! has lots and lots of servers and they're unlikely to ever completely go out of business.   So, if I had a choice between signing in to Flickr with my Flickr vs. signing into Yahoo! and giving me a better shot I won't have to move any of those photos in the remaining 58+ years of my life, I'll take the Yahoo! ID and signin.

It's the same as when your bank gets bought by a bigger bank and they give you a new card with new numbers.  It's a little bit of a hassle, but your money is probably safer at Citibank than it is at  First Fifth Third Bank of Saskachawan.

I'm not pissed off.  I'm thankful that such a great service exists, no matter what I need to enter in the box to login.

Superbowl Wiki Update

Right now, after a day, we have 23 participants in the 100 Bloggers, 100 Boxes Charity Superbowl Wiki.

A good start, but we have a long way to go, so please, pass the word and consider participating.  It's for charity!   We'd love some tagging, digging, and reblogging to help get this out.

links for 2007-01-31

• January 2007 :: Do Email Silences Matter?
  (tags: email marketing communication)
• Gotham Gal: Japanese Dinner
  (tags: sushi recipes food)
• Unit Structures: The Network Effect Multiplier, or, Metcalfe's Flaw
  (tags: socialnetworking statistics economics value networks fordhamclass)

Is Tom Dead?

There's a Matrix-like movie called Equillibruim that stars Christian Bale where an omnipresent Big Brother character called "Father" appears on TV screens across the land.  We find out later that the real Father died years ago and the powers that be voted to continue to use his digital likeness to rule the masses. 

Lately, that's sort of how I feel about MySpace.

Of course, I know that MySpace founder Tom Anderson isn't really dead, but when his own profile got hacked and he never addressed the community about it, you couldn't help but wonder if he and his millions are largely checked out.

I mean, he doesn't even seem to really use the service, other than to be everyone's default friend and to accept comment worship.  No cool layout.  Same pic all the time.  No widgets.  Jeez, adopt a BunnyHero pet or something.  In fact, despite the fact that he gets 100's of comments a day, Tom has only addressed the community seven times in the last year through bulletins...oh..check that..six.  One of them was a spam bulletin sent when his profile got hacked.

Whenever my profile gets hacked or my widgets suddenly don't work, I look to hear from the voice of MySpace... and I get...silence.  As spammers and hackers run amuck on this site, the community is made to feel like they are fending for themselves. 

Contrast that with Facebook.

The other day, I was recruiting for a position through Facebook by targeting young marketing people.  I didn't get 30 emails out to people with public profiles about a real job from a real company before I tripped the spam alarm and was warned against it.  When I contacted the support email address they gave me about it, an actual human with a name answered my questions and politely asked me not to use Facebook for recruiting.  And when users were up in arms over the newsfeed, you couldn't login to the site without hearing directly from Mark Zuckerberg who, like seemingly all the other people who work at Facebook, actually use the site.  They even worked hard to get new privacy settings into the system. 

The same holds true for Craigslist, where Craig Newmark cares about the community so much that he has handed the day to day running of the business to someone else while he spends all of his time on customer service issues.  He trolls forums and chases down New York City real estate scams.  Talk about rolling up your sleeves!

Spam, scams, and other bad stuff are products of MySpace's relatively open architecture, which is part of what makes it great in the first place.  I understand that.  What I want is a voice, Tom's or anyone else from behind the curtain, to talk me through it all...an actual human who tries to explain what's going on and makes me feel like we're all in the same boat.  If Tom's kickin' it in Aruba with his millions, good for him, but then there should be another voice to anchor the site.  Wendy from Customer Service... we could all be her friend.   Or, maybe he's working hard fighting pedophiles or setting age policies or whatever...the point is, the average user's experience is that MySpace is a ship cast adrift.  Everyday, another one of my friends gets their profile hacked or sends a spam bulletin they didn't intend to.  Fake people try to add me left and right.  (Sidenote: There's going to be big market for average looking models in the spam profile world, because right now, the girls that try to add me are too hot to be believeable as actual humans using the service.  Get some average looking people to add me and maybe I'll fall for it.) 

Equally ignored is the development community that has both benefitted and benefitted from the site's open architecture.  The other day, aspects of the Flash embed code were changed completely without warning, wreeking a good deal of havoc, albeit temporarily, with the widgetosphere.  Would a public developer notice ahead of time been that much trouble?  I know we would have liked to be able to tell our customers that their avatars might experience some odd behavior and what to do about it.

The site is still growing.  Its only going to get more and more commercial.  It needs someone telling the users where that line is going to be... that there's someone out there who cares about the quality of their experience.

Tommy, can you hear me?

links for 2007-01-30

• 100 Bloggers, 100 Boxes: The Charity Superbowl Wiki
  (tags: superbowl nfl football charity)

100 Bloggers, 100 Boxes: The Charity Superbowl Wiki

As an experiment in non-profit collaboration on the web and to give us reason to keep watching in case Rex Grossman throws 4 INTs, I've created The Charity Superbowl Wiki for 100 bloggers to participate in a charity game.

For a donation of $10 (plus PayPal transaction fees), you get to stake claim over a box on a 10 x 10 table whose row and column numbers will represent the last digit of the scores of the Colts and Bears at various points in this Sunday's Superbowl. 

The key is that you are playing for a charity... and all of the proceeds, net of PayPal fees, will be going to charity.  When you win, your charity will get money. 

Check it out here, and please help us run up the various meme lists by linking, digging, tagging, etc.  It's for a good cause.

Are you going to be one of the 100 bloggers to participate?

Partly Cloudy and 9

Right now, it's 6:37AM in New York.  The skies are party cloudy and it's nine degrees.

That's right. 

Nine.

One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine...

Welcome to snot freezing on the inside of my nose weather.

links for 2007-01-25

• Capitalism 2.0: SecondLife: Revolutionary Virtual Market or Ponzi Scheme?
  (tags: secondlife economics)
• Conde Nast's Flip to Allow Users to Control Ads · MarketingVOX
  (tags: Advertising mevertising)

links for 2007-01-24

• E-mail from the grave? Microsoft seeks patent on 'immortal computing'
  (tags: bizzare funny life science weird future email)

Pugsley's Kind of Empty Right Before Class

mmm...Chicken roll.

Fordham Library

This campus always feels like home....

Paninis, Pretty Girls and Metro North

I made myself a chicken parm sandwich to eat for dinner at work, but of course, I forgot it in the fridge on my way out. So, when I showed up at Track 103 to take the train up to Fordham with two minutes to spare, I got hungry. Panini stand right across from the track. Sah-weet. Dude, you got about a minute and a half to get me a panini. Go pay now, he says, and I'll get it to you. Pay...pay...shoot...four bucks on me. Credit card. Well, the woman behind the counter totally dropped the ball on the credit card machine. Fumbleruski. Fumblaya. Final seconds ticking down. Sorry, gotta bag it. Abort! Abort! Just get me the credit card back. Dropped the panini and bolted. Shoot...train leaving. I ran up to it anyway. By the back door, the ticket taker gave me the nothing I can do but shrug like a doofus look. Damn you..its still 5:37!!

Enter the pretty girl. Man, sometimes, I wish I was a hot girl. Ok, so we can pee standing up, so we've got that going for us, but being an attractive female is like having the Force.

*Waves hand*

You will check out my legs and open the door for us.

I think I'll check out your legs and then open the door for you, despite previously shrugging off the bald guy.

I wish I had that panini...or my sandwich.

Fight Like a Girl - Pillow Fight League in Brooklyn

Last Saturday, I saw a pillow fight.   

It wasn't just any pillow fight.  It was a kick-ass, no holds (as long as there's a pillow in between) barred action packed official Pillow Fight League pillow fight.

Here are more clips of the action.  (PS.. Let me know if they're choppy for you... I was having a little problem with them at home...and what system/browser you're on.)

I took some photos as well.  My friend Allison took part in an amatuer match and won, but she was a bit worse for wear afterwards.

The whole thing was quite a lot of fun.  The girls were tough, but they were also creative, as they each had a persona invented for the fighting.   I think Allison and I agreed that Boozy Suzey was our favorite, mostly because she would cover someone's head with a pillow and just punch away.  I mean, seriously, if you can't be entertained by a bunch of girls fighting, go back to watching American Idol or that stupid Howie Mandel and his magic suitcases show.  This was real entertainment.   

I can't wait until these girls come back to New York!!

links for 2007-01-23

• Get a First Life: A One Page Satire of Second Life
  haha... Hilarious.
  (tags: secondlife funny)
• This is going to be BIG! - Getting into this online stuff: Getting started and keeping up with LinkedIn
  (tags: linkedin fordhamclass)
• The Viral Garden: The Viral Garden's Top 25 Marketing blogs
  (tags: marketing Blogging fordhamclass)

Poke My Career

There's been a minimeme going around about Facebook vs LinkedIn as the future of professional social networking.

Its obvious that Facebook clearly has a lock on college social networking and LinkedIn is quickly wrapping up the 28+ professional market but it's not entirely clear that its a generational gap.  I'm inclined to think that, at some point, people just start getting more proactive and systematic about their career management and that's why they join LinkedIn. 

Plus, Facebook hasn't quite mastered or had an interest in the idea of the professional profile.  There's a section to fill out work information, but it's not exactly intuitive how you would show your drunken college pics to your friends, other people at your college, but not recruiters who may have went to your college.  I think maybe they need a "Don't show to alumni" privacy feature, because many alumni recruit at their own schools.  This is why, like danah, I don't believe in one network to rule them all.  People are multifacted and they want to show different sides of themselves in different places.  Facebook, as a community, may be best served just sticking to being a social service, even though I think that they could do a lot of good in helping young people reach out and help each other professionally.

Speaking of alumni, Facebook also hasn't been particularly aggressive in keeping alumni interested in the site.  I've heard a lot of people say that they just don't use Facebook much after school, and maybe that's just natural.  Plus, I'm not quite sure what alumni features would be.  Perhaps they could enable people to publish alumni events and notices to everyone in the network via the newsfeed?  Just an idea. 

Keeping people interested in the site after graduation would be key to winning in the professional networking market, but I don't think that's where they want to go.  They have setup work networks, but it seems like that's more about your friends from work than anything else.  I fact, the other day, in trying to recruit for an entry level marking position, I tripped the spam alarm because I was sending a job post to a lot of young marketing majors.  I was warned on the site, and when I contacted FB to tell them that I was a real person with a real job opening at a real company, and asked if that was spam, they very politely said it was and asked me not to use Facebook for recruiting.  Recruiting and jobs seems to be a big business they're leaving on the table, and I'd be really surprised if they didn't make a move there.  Prolific commenter Jeremy said that they should at least corner the internship market and I agree.  They might just allow free internship postings and live off the ads around those pages.  If they did that, I think they'd be well served to use Indeed to give themselves a huge head start in backfilling the database day one.

But, again, moving up the ladder to these types of professional tools doesn't seem to be on their roadmap.

On the other hand, LinkedIn trends older and hasn't made any headway at all into the college market.  Career offices don't push its usage, and when you're just starting out and don't have much of network, the value of LinkedIn isn't immediately obvious.  If I was LinkedIn, I would use the Facebook API to pull in your major, your school, your friends' names...not only to give younger members more value, but if nothing else than to signal the market that you never can start too early.  I wonder if perhaps they really don't want the college crowd on LinkedIn, because their networks wouldn't add much and they'd likely take more than they would give.

So if I'm in college or just out, LinkedIn doesn't want me, because I'd be a mooch, and Facebook doesn't want to help get me a job, because that's not fun and social enough, so where does that leave me?  Pretty underserved, I'd say.  It's really amazing to me that one of the largest and most desperate group of job searchers, and the youngest and most technically savvy doesn't really have a place to go to start building professional networks. 

I think there are two causes for this.  First, there's a lot of self-fulfilling proficy going on with this age group.  It is assumed, often in liberal arts schools, that career management is too early because they don't know what they want yet or they're still focusing on their education.  So, what happens is that college seniors often find themselves illprepared to enter the workforce and they take the first decent job that comes their way.

Second, I wonder if today's MySpace Generation who grow up with recreational social networking has been trained to think of the internet as a place for friends and not really for careers.

Either way, I really think there's an opportunity for someone here.

links for 2007-01-20

• This is going to be BIG! - The Startup Song... or... Sunscreen 2.0
  (tags: web2.0 advice sunscreen music technology)
• FELLOWLIKE PET PRODUCT CO., LTD.---Hot News
  We anticipate that all dog hosts can get a dog-shit-free living environment from this product, and all people who feeding or not feeding dogs, and dogs, can live harmonically together in our society.
  (tags: funny dogs)

A little dusting in NYC today...

IMG_0510, originally uploaded by ceonyc.

I have to teach my car to shake off the snow. Certainly there's a pneumatic solution for this...

MySpace to Widgets: Let me see you dance (Flash embed code fix)

So our little talking people didn't work for new embeds starting last night.  Before we sold our firstborn to Fox Interactive Media, we did a little work and blog reading and found this helpful user comment:

"MySpace began rolling out a change that would block embed tags, but allow object tags for embedded content. This caused some users to report stickers as “not working.”

...This is probably part of a larger, more-intelligent Flash filtering solution that would lend itself to a situation where MySpace acts as a gatekeeper to Flash stickers (as discussed)."

Well, we're all about more intelligent filtering solutions in MySpace, its just that a little notice would be nice.  I still think MySpace should launch a developer or whitelist program.  We're a legit company... whatever we need to do to our code to play nice in their, we're all about it for the sake of the users.  In the meantime, we'll just keep playing cat and mouse.

So, for now, the code that works is as follows:

<object type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width="400" height="300"> <param name="movie" value="movie.swf" /> </object>

After which, MySpace will forceably add a bunch of PARAMs into the code.

So, I'm happy to report, my little MySpace guy is still quoting Spaceballs.

Thanks Chris Bennett for the fix.

The Startup Song... or... Sunscreen 2.0

I graduated high school in '97, so the original version of this song means a lot to me.   Here's my take on it for today's tech world:

Entrepreneurs of the class of '07... launch a startup.

If I could offer you only one tip for the future, startups would be IT.

The long term impact of startups has been proven by analysts, whereas the rest of my advice has no basis more reliable than my own meandering and thus far shortlived experience.

I will dispense this advice now.

Enjoy the power and beauty of simple HTML. Never mind. You will not understand the power and beauty of simple HTML until the web has been completely eaten by Flash and AJAX. But trust me, in 20 years you'll look back at your site in the Internet Archive and recall in a way you can't grasp now how much possibility lay in simplicity and how fabulous your site really looked.

Your app is not as lightweight as you imagine.

Don't worry about the future; or worry, but know that worrying is as effective as trying to code PHP by chewing bubblegum. The real troubles with your servers are apt to be things that never crossed your worried mind; the kind that blindside you at 4am on some idle Tuesday.

Add one feature every day that scares you.

Sing....on YouTube.

Don't be reckless with other people's data, don't put up with people who are reckless with yours.

Sleep.

Don't waste your time jealous of other people's traffic spikes; sometimes you're TechCrunched, sometimes you're not. The race is long, and in the end, it's only with yourself.

Remember compliments you receive on your company blog, forget the insults; if you succeed in doing this, tell me how.

Keep your old wireframes, throw away your old Paypal confirmations.

Sleep.

Don't feel guilty if you don't know how you'll monetize. The most interesting startups I know didn't know at 22 million dollars of funding how they wanted to make money, some of the most interesting 40 million dollar startups still don't.

Get plenty of link love.

Be kind to your beta users, you'll miss them when they're gone.

Maybe you'll get bought by Yahoo!, maybe you won't, maybe Google, maybe not, maybe you'll implode in a bubble, maybe you'll dance the funky chicken at your initial public offering.

Whatever you do, don't congratulate yourself too much or berate yourself, either.

Your clickthroughs are half fraud, so are everybody else's.

Enjoy tagging, use it every way you can. Don't be afraid of it, or what other people think of it, it's the greatest categorization you'll ever use.

Dance... on YouTube. Even if you have nowhere to do it but in your own living room.

Create an FAQ, even if no one reads it.

Do NOT read Dvorak, he will only make you feel angry.

Get to know your users, you never know when they'll be gone for good.

Be nice to your angel investors; they are your best link to your past and the people most likely to stick with you in the future.

Understand that developers come and go, but for the precious few you should hold on to them. Work hard to bridge the gaps in geography and lifestyle of your userbase, because the older you get, the more you need the young people who will paste your widget in MySpace.

Build a company in New York City once, but leave before it makes you hard; Build in Silicon Valley once, but leave before it makes you soft.

Travel...after you get bought or blow up.

Accept certain inalienable truths, prices of AdWords will rise,
politicians will drop the ball on net neutrality, you too will get old, and when you do you'll fantasize that when you were young AdWord prices were reasonable, politicians were noble and children entered their correct age during registration.

Respect your Privacy Policy.

Don't expect VCs to support you. Maybe you'll get funded, maybe you have a wealthy hedgefund partner; but you never know when the dry powder might run out.

Don't mess too much with your hair.  In fact, just shave it, because bald is cool when you work at a startup.

Be careful whose blogs you read, and comment when someone blogs about you. Blogs are a form of feedback, and subscribing to the right ones is a way of cutting through the noise.  Just gloss over and paint over the ugly parts, recycling reviews on your front page for more than they're worth.

But trust me on the startup.

links for 2007-01-19

• Ground Report
  (tags: news publishing fordhamclass)
• New York Daily News - College - Stout lifts Fordham
  (tags: fordham sports basketball nyc)

Fordham wins vs. St. Joe's in OT!

Fordham wins vs. St. Joe's in OT!, originally uploaded by ceonyc.

HUGE win for Fordham last night. Marcus Stout stepped up with 4 ticks left in OT. FAAANTASTIC!

A Quote About Loving Words

"Maybe you like the beach, maybe you don't.  Maybe you're favorite color is blue and mine is black.  Who cares.  It's really all about approach. Love is about adjectives and adverbs, not nouns and not even verbs. Blue, black, red, green, quiet, loud, jazz, fishing, scuba... it all doesn't matter.  In fact, sometimes, its better if it's different, just to make things interesting and expose the other person to new things. Run, bike, scuba, travel...  all these things can change, too.  Don't like me because I play sports, b/c if I get MS, will you no longer love me?  But happy and happily, and lovingly and openminded and sweet, thoughtful, sexual, sarcastic and selflessly...  these things are you... they're forever and they effect every moment of your life.  I want to marry an adjective and an adverb."

People I won't care to see go...

Just a few random things.

This guy killed two cops and was put in a leadership position in a gang, "because he put enough work in."  Now they're deciding whether or not to give him the needle.  Let's hope he doesn't get the opportunity for overtime.

Note to self.  Switch this guy's pack with a pack full of pots and pans Bugs Bunny style.  Idiot.

This man kills puppies.  Note to self: Organize pitbull and rotweiler puppy Meetup at his apartment.

Sort of reminds me of the line in U-turn...

""Forty thousand people die every day. Why can't you be one of them?"

links for 2007-01-18

• Wired News: How Yahoo Blew It
  (tags: fordhamclass business strategy advertising)

Now Appearing at 24Hour Fitness Clubs Everywhere: Me

I got interviewed for the inaugural issue of You24, which is a magazine for 24Hour Fitness clubs.  My article comes right before Lance Armstrong, on Page 36, and in an amazing coincidence, right next to a fullpage Jamba ad.

Barak: We hardly know you and that's why we like you

Although, as John Kerry proved, being "the devil you don't know" won't get you elected... so hopefully we get to know Barak better as this moves forward.  Here's his first step at talking with us:

links for 2007-01-17

• MySpace’s Tom Hacked - Mashable!
  (tags: myspace socialnetworking)
• The Pillow Fight League - Fight Like A Girl!
  (tags: funny events pillowfight brooklyn)
• Behind the Scenes: Ron Mueck - a photoset on Flickr
  (tags: art nyc brooklyn museum)

The PBWiki for my class DISAPPEARED

Its 2:24PM and I am freaking out...   The PBWiki that I created for my class tonight COMPLETELY DISAPPEARED.   I spent hours this weekend on it.

Support has been contacted, but I'm going to go LinkedIn my way to someone higher up.

2:50PM Update...   David Weekly, the founder, who has all his contact info online, including his cellphone, just IMed me back and said there was no data lost and they're fixing it.

Can you imagine IMing Bill Gates when Windows crashes?  I love startups.  :)

links for 2007-01-16

• Hollywood Asks YouTube: Friend or Foe? - New York Times
  (tags: fordhamclass hollywood movies video youtube business)
• 24-Hour Newspaper People - New York Times
  (tags: Blogging fordhamclass)

South Slope Cat Lady Moving... I guess...

Bizzare sign

Product Managing for Ourselves: My Parents Get It, Bloggers Don't

So the other night, my parents asked me what an iPhone was at Gino's...

...Clearly, that's some fantastic PR when new technology trickles its way into my parents' conversations just days after launch.   I mean, my dad just got broadband last week.  (Wooo!)

"It's a phone and an iPod in one, so you don't have to carry both things around."

"Wow, that's great."

They didn't care about iHandcuffs, third party apps or whether or not they are locking themselves into Apple. 

The fact is...   Apple's products are such a vast improvement in overall consumer experience that most users will be more than satisfied.   All the technobloggers are bitching about the lack of openness.   

I ask you: Open to what??

I have a $600 PocketPC Phone and you know what third party apps I have on it?  Newsgator Mobile and Typepad, and Typepad I could just blog through an e-mail address anyway.   A lot of good my open Windows Mobile platform is doing me.  Two apps.  Two goddamn apps.  Plus, the stupid thing can't switch out of apps fast enough to answer the phone a lot of times anyway.  Without apps that people really care about, no one gives a rat's ass about open.

I wouldn't switch, because I'm a business user that needs more robust e-mail and contact management, but I recognize that this product isn't for me.

Closed?  Bleh.  DRM?  Boo.   But, give Apple credit for singlehandedly carrying the whole digital download market on its back and putting music in our ears in the first place.  Do I think it's stupid that I basically walk around with a small computer in my iPod that can run no apps at all?   Yes.   Do I hate their DRM?  Yes.   Is it a ridiculously better product than anything than came before it?  Yes, absolutely. 

Open is great when you have something to be open to...and, geekery aside, if I had to choose between open for open's sake and a great consumer experience, put me in handcuffs, baby. 

Let Microsoft come out with a better product that has a development platform for it.  Zune was a punchline...  and until someone starts understanding what consumers want as job one, no amount of handwringing is going to bring about "open".   

Its funny, because we bloggers say the same thing about carriers.   My non-techie non-blogger friends bitch about carriers, too, but not because they can't get off-deck apps or don't have an open OS...   because they pay too much per month and that's what my parents thought of the iPhone.. it costs too much.

People want value.  Value means more or less money in their pocket.  They can touch and feel money.

They also want real improvement in function.  iPod+Phone... that's a real improvement.  That's one less device that we need.   Third party apps?  Which apps?  What do they look like?  Who wants them? 

There's a reason why people buy Apple's stuff and if there's no useable alternative that is open, can you blame them?

links for 2007-01-15

• How To Market Your Blog in 2007
  (tags: blogging fordhamclass traffic)

Seriously, who doesn't like a good hug?

links for 2007-01-14

• Platforms Vs. Experiences » Publishing 2.0
  Interesting take....
  (tags: platforms apple fordhamclass)

No good pocket knife wielding sons of bitches

 

So this morning, despite the fact that my alarm is set to 6:45, I don't wake up until 8:30.  Fine, no gym.  Oh, but now I have to rush a little because the car is on the wrong side of the street and I have to move it by 9:30.  No prob.  Comb my hair and grab my hat... out the door in seconds flat.  (Its a Beatles line...I have neither hair nor a hat.)
Checking the car as I always do before getting in, I notice that the back left tire is really low.  Strange..didn't notice that before.  So I drove to the gas station to get some air.  Pretty much right at the moment that I realize the tire wasn't really reinflating was when I noticed the stab wounds.  Some fucker (or fuckers) put four half inch holes in my vinyl top, directly above the tire.  Goddammit.  Why you gotta mess with a man's ride?  Oh, by the way, did I mention I jammed my thumb badly at last night's dodgeball game.  (We swept all four games for those of you keeping score at home.)  Do you know how hard it is to change a tire with no right thumb?  Functioning opposable thumbs are a critical component of the tire changing process, particularly since the jack that Ford provides was ergonomically designed to be a cruel practical joke.  Throw on top of that the ridiculous amount of softball equipment I usually keep in my trunk, making access to the donut quite the exercise in one thumbed unpacking.  I got the tire, which on the Mustang, of course, is heavy and fat off, but not before playing wheel lock adapter scavenger hunt inside the car.  An examination of the tire pinpointed the last and most devistating of the half inch stab wounds inflicted on my car. 

Now its 10:42 and I'm on the Manhattan bring, transmitting this post from Typepad Mobile, finally on my way.  Do you know how badly I would have liked to catch the assholes who did this?  Note to self...store tire iron in winter coat.  My thumb hurts from thumbing this, too.

I'll deal with the donut and new tire over the weekend.  For now, its parked.  Who stabs cars in Bay Ridge?

links for 2007-01-11

• Hands on with the RCA Jet Stream: high quality, truly wireless cans - Engadget
  Personally, I don't think I'll ever go wireless with my headphones, because the wire prevents me from loosing them.
  (tags: music earphones wireless)
• Talkin' Avatars with Oddcast: Top 10 Digital Advertising Trends to Watch for 2007
  (tags: advertising marketing business trends)
• Advertising Age
  (tags: socialmedia media numbers stats fordhamclass)
• Advertising Age
  (tags: Advertising marketing socialmedia viral)
• apophenia: PEW data on social network site use
  (tags: fordhamclass socialnetworking stats myspace youth networking)

2007 Digital Ad Trends on the Oddcast Blog

Hey folks, check out this post I wrote over on the Oddcast blog about what we might see in 2007.

Tomorrow: 70 AND snow. Friday: Locusts

I case you didn't notice, it snowed this morning in NYC.

Robocop the Historian?

  So I turn on the history channel the other day and Robocop is talking about the Roman Empire.

So bizzare. 

It turns out that, according to the Daily News, " Weller, 58, who holds a master's degree in Roman and Renaissance art and is working toward a Ph.D., has become one of Syracuse University's most popular professors."

You know what he says at the end of each class?

"Thank you for your cooperation."

We have left the group "Facebook Newsfeed Sucks"

Because, in the end, it actually doesn't. The put in the privacy features that allow people to decide for themselves what gets broadcast, but a lot of people never even bothered changing them. I have to say that I find it to be one of the most engaging features on any social site.

In fact, yesterday, I was at a Fordham Young Alumni Committee meeting, and someone mentioned this girl that two of us knew. I couldn't help but add, "And it was her 25th birthday" and someone else said, "Yeah, I'm sorry I missed that...it looked like fun." Everyone else was a little confused, but what the two of us realized was that both of us had seen separate friends of ours tagged in photos from the part in our Facebook Newsfeeds that day.

What the Newsfeed does is to keep oiling the social gears in the machine. I have no doubt that it causes more comments, more messages, and more importantly, more offline interaction. That's something a lot of other networks are missing. I'm signed up to about a dozen other networks at least. Friendster I hear from once a week with similar updates on friends, but my friends just aren't that active anymore there. Once in a blue moon I get a Tagworld invite. And the flurry of Kaneva friend requests? They've dropped off the table...not sure why.

Keeping people engaged is so critical to a social network, and what Facebook does best is to put keepping people engaged with each other over keeping people engaged with the site. For example, they just sliced an extra (advertising supported) pageview off the poke. When you poke, you get a quick java popup, not a full page refresh or new page to confirm. Slick, easy, faster. Another good example is how they show me my friend data. They actually tell me who my friends just became friends with. Friendster, on the other hand, makes me click through to my friend's friends to discover that on my own, and see another ad.

The Newsfeed has also started to feature sponsored items and I really don't find them intrusive at all. If I'm not interested in them, unlike email, they disappear down the page.

So, despite the weeping of tears and beating of the breast, I think the Newsfeed turned out pretty well, actually. It's definatlely keeping me more engaged with my friends and the site, too.

Eleven Minutes to Blog

I'm sitting outside Joe's Pub waiting for my friend Alicia. We know each other from when I was a sophomore in high school and I did Oklahoma at her school. That was a great way to meet girls when you went to single sex high schools...doing plays. They always needed guys at the girls schools and you really didn't have to be that good. Anyway, I don't even know what I'm seeing or what we're here for. I totally didn't read the email. I just know where I'm supposed to be and what time. I do know I'm getting fed, though, which is great because I'm eating for the first time today in days. Because of that damn Bread (Bacteria) Factory chicken sandwich last Thursday, all I had to eat in three days was a pork chop and two bagels and none of it took. (eww...I know) I dropped seven pounds, but today, I'm all better. In fact, its a good excuse to have a peanut butter moo'd at Jamba tomorrow now that I think of it. I did, however, play dodgeball on Sunday, despite my illness, and played quite well. I signed up for a Sunday team as an individual since my knee is bothering me and I can't really bike, so I needed another activity to make up for it. Twenty seven and I'm falling apart! Don't baseball players peak at 27? Two minutes to go... no Alicia. I'm surprised she's not early. Hmm... now I'm just sort of filling time. Oh, hey, get this. I found MySpace to be a great recruiting tool today for that social media instigator job. I searched by industy, age, and location and found a lot of socially savvy candidates that I contacted directly. Here's a question. Is it sexist to believe that women generally have more influence in online social networks than men? I feel like most of the female profiles I see, with the exception of artists and musicians, have a lot more friends and comments than guys. Am I sitting in the right place? Is there a different entrance somewhere else? She just called... "Just wanted to make sure you're not inside..." :)

I don't smell anything... I have the worst sense of smell ever.

Apparently, everyone else in NYC smells something in the air.

See the NY1 and NYT stories...   The Path train has been shut down, too.  I'm hard of smelling...

links for 2007-01-08

• The Musings and Prophecies of Metstradamus: In Search Of...
  (tags: baseball funny mets)

Yesterday's Bizzare Convertible Weather

Yup...January 6th was convertible weather in NYC. Hmm... Maybe Al Gore was right about this global warming thing.

links for 2007-01-07

• Most teens are responsible online, study shows - USATODAY.com
  Most underage users of MySpace.com don't display information or photos that could attract pedophiles, but a sizable percentage still post potentially provocative photos, a new study concludes.
  (tags: myspace fordhamclass)

links for 2007-01-06

• How to Change the World: Ten Ways to Use LinkedIn
  (tags: linkedin fordhamclass)
• Three Minds @ Organic: Brands on MySpace
  (tags: myspace brands fordhamclass mevertising myoddcast)

In and Out (of the browser): Why I'm long web connected desktop apps

A few years ago, we saw a big push for software as a service (SaaS).  Why built big clunky pieces of software that required installs and updates when you could sign folks up with just a browser and a registration, and push updates on the fly... makes a lot of sense, right?

Well, now I'm thinking that the browser isn't really the right place for a lot of these apps.  I think the tipping point for me was yesterday when I tried to run Zimbra, Gmail, Facebook, MySpace, Google Docs, Typepad, and Newsgator all out of the same browser window in tabs.  Firefox and it's lovely memory leak ballooned to 800MB of memory usage and my computer started spitting up Mentos and Coke.  Ok, so not really, but it definitely slowed to a crawl.

Today, I'm back in Outlook, patched into our Zimbra server in a desktop e-mail client. 

Browsers were historically meant to show text and graphics in a one way broadcast, and now we're asking them to run some pretty resource intensive apps.   I don't know if Apollo is the answer, but it seems pretty clear to me that we're going to see some apps bust back out of the browser and onto the desktop while retaining some connection to the web. 

Desktop apps are better for uploading, which is key in a two-way, interactive web and notifications as well.  (That's why I was never a fan of MeeboMe....   didn't want to have to sit in the browser window the whole day to see IMs.)

So are desktop widgets the answer or does someone need to build a better browser for running apps?  And when does this start to happen?

Unsympathetic or Oblivious?

We had a meeting with some outside folks here yesterday and we ordered some sandwiches from The Bread Factory.  I grabbed a chicken sandwich and it was terrible from bite one...  just, well... blah.  Just tasted really processed and artificial... that's the best way I can describe it.

By the end of the day, my stomach wasn't feeling well at all, so when my friend Susie told me she wanted to have some bar food after work, I was a little hesitant, but went along.  We went to Heartland Brewery in Union Square.

I ordered a salmon burger and mashed potatoes.  I didn't each two bites of the mashed potatoes before I realized that any further consumption would cause something bad to happen, so I stopped.  If you know me, you know that not only do I never get sick, but it takes a lot to get me to stop eating.... so things weren't good at all.  I asked our waitress for a ginger ale after I already had an iced tea still sitting full.

That should have been the first thing that tipped her off.

The whole time she keeps walking by us, glancing over, and I'm not eating at all.  Hint two.  Something's obviously wrong.   I got annoyed because I figured she thought there was something wrong with the food and wanted to avoid having to take something back.

When Susie was almost done with her food, she comes over to me, and completely oblvious of the fact that I hadn't eaten at all, she goes, "Are you done with that?"

Done?  I hadn't touched it!  So I asked her to wrap it up because I had eaten something bad for lunch and wasn't feeling well, but there was nothing wrong with the food (not that she cared).

She didn't ask if I was ok or felt sick.  If I were her, I might have casually mentioned where the restrooms were, just in case.  But, nothing.  She comes back with the food wrapped and the check.  No, "Feel better".

Susie thought I was being ridiculous, but I was really annoyed.  I think a good waitress would have been a little more sympathetic. 

In case you people care, I'm still not feeling too well...  That's the last time I get anything at the Bread Factory.

links for 2007-01-05

• Black Sheep
  (tags: movies funny)
• Unit Structures: Social Networking in 2007
  (tags: community socialnetworking web2.0 facebook myspace postonmelater fordhamclass)
• Browser Statistics
  (tags: browser stats resolution)

Advertising vs. Licensing: How can you tell what is appropriate?

Here's something I don't quite understand the economics and protocol of...

MLB pays to advertise, right?  Whether it's the league or teams or whoever, I see baseball ads in the subway.

Yet, if you want to use MLB stuff in a video game, you have to pay them for the license.

But, when MLB wants to be in Second Life, that's free, except for the product costs of hiring someone to contruct the virtual ballpark.

So let me get this straight.... MLB pays to advertise in old media channels that people are paying less and less attention to, only pays minimal production costs to play in what a lot of people believe is the future of online, and then gets paid to be in a growing market where attention is full and engagement is off the charts?

Am I missing something?

Poke me, Add me, Kiss me, Kill Me: Various forms of digital social networking signalling

Social applications have added a wide array of nomenclature and associated protocol to our digital lives.   There are lots of ways of indicating social association, but what about various levels of stalk...er...  um.... interest in association?

Take the Facebook "poke".  It's sort of unique.  It's not public.  You don't gain anything from getting poked in the community, nor does the poker really lose much in terms of effort or social capital if the poke is not returned.  It's sort of brilliant actually.  Poking is like the grease in the Facebook machine.  I wonder how many pokes a day there are and how often men poke versus women, and what the average pokes per person are.

The other thing I like about it is that there really can't be any alterior motives with a poke, unlike a MySpace "add".  Some people are just maximizing friends and don't care about actually connecting with you other than as a statistic.  Sometimes, you'll get asked to be someone's friend as a first step on MySpace, before they write to you or expect to be written back, whereas in Facebook, well, that would be sort of sketchy. 

They work very similarly to the "winks" in Match.com.  Winks, pokes... what else could people do.  Cough?  Sigh longingly?

In Flickr, it's a different story.  Most of the people who have added me on Flickr either know me and look at it like a newsfeed of either my life or NYC or just like my photos.  I don't think I've ever gotten an "add" that was more meant to be a "poke" in Flickr.  Yet, I've talked to people who want to reach out to people they see in Flickr and can't figure out what the right protocol is.  Do you just start leaving comments?  Do you add someone?  Both?   What about one way adds?  Is it rude not to add people as contacts who have added you?  Mary Hodder is subscribed to my photos, but I'm not subbed to hers...   I didn't want to make it obvious by doing it now, because I feel like I passed my window of opportunity.  I'm hoping she doesn't notice.  :)

One thing I can't really figure out at all is the del.icio.us network.  One time, I had someone recommend a lamp store to me on the web because they noticed that I was tagging furniture for my apartment... and it was the first time I realized that anyone was actively reading my tags (before they were posted daily to my blog).  Why would someone want to read my tags?  Thought it was sort of weird at first, but now we have expressed networks.  As I look at my network...  I have 80 "fans"....people who read my tags...  Over half of them have never attempted to contact me in any way and I have no idea who they are, but they're not pure lurkers, b/c they know I can see them.  (Hi, you guys... hope my links are satisfying and entertaining).   Is this a form of del.icio.us poke?  Am I supposed to join their network in return?  Is it also rude if I don't?

I think the worst network you could ignore or turn someone down on is LinkedIn.  Unless I'm spamming my contacts, if I met you in person, and then asked to be connected to you, it's really quite a smack in the face to turn me down.  I had one guy do that to me and it was someone I had met at two angel investing meetings and a NY Tech Meetup, and his response was that he didn't know me well enough.  I'll always think he's kind of a prick for that.  Fine... I don't want your stupid network connecting to mine.

I don't know where I'm going with this post... I've been writing it intermittantly all day and I forgot whether or not it ever had a point.

Eye of the Tiger, Baby

You know your commute is rough when you need boxing gloves. Also, he's standing way too close to the edge of the platform.

links for 2007-01-04

• kiteblog
  Apparently, Bill Tai is a kiteboarder. I can imagine a lot of broken entreprenuers trying to learn the sport to get a meeting.
  (tags: kiting)
• YourPerfectGirl.com
  She's perfect for me!
  (tags: dating girl perfect funny)
• YourPerfectGirl.com
  (tags: dating video viral oddcastbloglinks)
• Toronto Daily News - Curves In, Furry Boots and Celebrity Divorces Out - Biggest trends for 2007 are predicted by a team of Virgin Mobile's trend setting scientists.
  I'm sorry... when did curves go out?
  (tags: trends curves)

My Perfect Girl

Josh sent me an e-mail today...   

Check this girl out - she's perfect for you...

http://www.yourperfectgirl.com/default.html?playlist=161_161_93_51_15_343

Ladies and gentlemen, the search is over.

I knew in all those RSS subs, there had to be someone like this...    :)

Make your own at www.yourperfectgirl.com.

Linking into the Wind... the Most Statistically Insignificant Blog Posts of 2006

If you still think that everyone who blogs is a member of the same community, check out Buzzmetrics Top 10 Most Linked To Blog Posts of 2006.

The top post has 800 or so links in, and it is a petition in the LiveJournal community not to change the interface.

800...and then they really drop off from there.

So basically, in a community of 60+ million blogs, according to Technorati, no more than 0.00126% of people linked to the same post at once.

Of course, that doesn't count del.icio.us tags, where sometimes posts get a thousand links or two, but even that's just a drop in the bucket.

Even the most popular blogs overall don't have significant mind or market share when you think about the overall blogging audience, let alone the readership.  Engadget and Boing Boing have about 20,000 blogs linking in... or about 0.033% of all blogs.

So, before you think that pitching to the most popular blogs overall is going to make or break your product, get a little perspective.  What is the right audience for what you're trying to do?  Maybe you're better off pitching to a recipe blog that has 200 really active readers versus a tech blog with a hundred thousand readers who mostly just browse and comment to be seen.

links for 2007-01-03

• the Chiara String Quartet
  (tags: events classical music brooklyn)
• SportsPickle.com - Eli Manning Not Sure How to Tell the Giants He Was Adopted
  (tags: football funny eli manning giants)
• TrailFinder - Ski Maps
  Wearable... no more fumbling for wet paper maps or taking my gloves off
  (tags: skiing maps)

Congrats to Jarah Euston and FresnoFamous!

A really fantastic young woman named Jarah Euston just had her site, Fresno Famous, get acquired by the Fresno Bee, a McClatchy publication.  I met Jarah back in 2000 when she was interning for a bank when we were both in college here in New York City and ran into Fresno Famous randomly sometime last year.  It's a very cool site and I hope it can manage to continue being a community resource now that it's found a home.

links for 2007-01-02

• Address Book Access
  (tags: addresses invitations plaxo myoddcast)

links for 2007-01-01

• Narrows Botanical Gardens in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn, New York
  (tags: volunteering brooklyn bayridge)