Think E-mail is dead? Hey kids, try getting a job without it.
Until you start working in a corporate environment, it's unlikely that, if you're a teen, you'll ever need to send an attachment. Most of the files you have are media files, and you share with friends through various social media sharing sites, services, etc.
That works... until you have to send your resume to someone or negotiate a legal contract. Yeah, I don't think Facebook has "Track Changes".
So, while the kids, with their rock and roll and their ripped jeans and hacky sacks... err.. chrome spinners, may not have a need for e-mail now, it's not going away anytime soon. Plus, most alternative methods, like Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, require both the sender and the recipient to both be on the same social network. E-mail is a least common denominator. We all have one and it requires no additional signup/login to send someone a message.
It's not going away.
You know, if you're going to write a story about what the kids are doing, talking to the kids is great, but I think there's something to be said for looking at your adult life, with adult responsibilities, and be realistic about where these trends are going.
I mean, I don't see ConEd, Citibank, or Sprint sending me e-bill notifications on Twitter or Facebook anytime soon, so I'd better login to my e-mail once in a while if I expect to have a reasonable credit rating.
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Tired of TPS Reports? Join a Startup - MatchupCamp
- Office Space
That's great, because New York entrepreneurs, developers, and designers need you. Maybe you have an idea and need a developer or you're a contract developer looking to dive into your own thing, but need a business person to join you. Contract work is great, but why settle for working on O.P.P. (other people's projects)?
nextNY is doing an event all around getting people who want to join startups together. Best part is, you won't get hounded by recruiters or "venture vultures" looking to sell things to you. Here, you'll just meet other people thinking about the entrepreneurial path.
Here's the info:
MatchupCamp – matchmaking for startups – is all about startup networking, creating a place for ideas and talent to meet. There are many events matching professional services to startups – this one will focus on those looking to get their hands dirty and build something new. MatchupCamp has the sole objective of bringing together people looking to start, expend, or join a startup in New York (and the tri-state area).
MatchupCamp is for those looking for others to work together building exciting ventures in New York. There is no requirement for full time commitment – anyone who wants to take part is welcomed, even if they only have a few hours a week. The important thing is that you are interested in taking part. If you got ideas or skills, come find others to share them with:
- People with ideas looking for others to develop it into a real product
- Anyone with some free time thinking about jumping into the startup world looking to see what’s out there
- Developers looking for cool part-time or full-time projects
- Startup founders looking for employees or co-founders
- Students looking for internships
Details:
Wednesday, November 28 @ 7PM
For Your Imagination
22 West 27th Street
6th Floor
New York, NY 10001
- Office Space
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The Online Networking Window and More LinkedIn
Here's one way that online networking is kind of like a kidnapping. If you can't find a reason to work together with someone and follow up on a networking connection in the first 48 hours after a LinkedIn connection, I'd bet your chances of ever making that connection productive significantly drop off. I know a lot of bloggers and other random online connections that I got really excited about at first, chatted for a bit, connected with on LinkedIn, and then never really did anything with.
LinkedIn needs a way to build in not only more specific follow up, but also drop a few hints. If I'm looking for a front end developer, and I connect to you, if your best friend does exactly what I need, it should alert the two of us that there's a connection to be made. Similarly, a "things I can do for other people" page would be nice. It's not enough to float job requests around that say "Do you know anyone for this?" LinkedIn already knows the answer to that. How about you tell me who I know for that job and save me the trouble!?
The other thing that would be interesting would be some kind of reciprocity score. The same way it gives me a score on how complete a profile I have, it should tell me the +/- of how often I ask for something from the system versus how often I provide something to it. Perhaps I don't make enough recommendations, but shouldn't I get credit for the number of nodes I've added to the system?
What if the writers never came back?
I don't really watch that much television at all. I've not been a regular follower of the Soprano's, Entourage, Lost, 24, Grey's Anatomy, etc... even though they're all probably really good shows, to me, there's just not enough time in the day.
So this writers strike isn't really affecting me at all.
But it got me thinking...
What would happen if both sides dug in, and they just never went back to work?
What if the big media companies said, "Fine, screw it, we'll just put reruns for the next year or two"?
Would people stop watching television? What would they do with their time? Would they go and read books? Would online traffic start to go up? Maybe we'd emerge from our houses and start to discover the outside world in a big way. Has attendance at Meetup's gone up since the strike? Are people in NYC apartments desperately knocking on the doors of neighbors they've lived next door to for years and never talked to before?
"Please... entertain me... I'm desperate! Charades! Jenga! Anything!"
How many seasons of reruns and reality television could they put on before they shake loose every last viewer?
I have to be honest, I was surprised that TV writers get royalties. I thought of it more like a salaried job.
Aren't there tons of creative people dying to be writers anyway? I could never figure out how workforces get away with striking when there's probably 2x their number waiting to get into that job. I'm surprised there aren't more hobby writers that wouldn't cross the picket line. I'd write for one of these shows. How hard could it be to write for Grey's Anatomy, seriously?
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Disconnected
Does the web ever make you feel really disconnected?
I was going through the contact list in my phone before. It was a huge repository of little reminders of all the people I don't really talk to anymore. Social networks get like that, too... they go stale... you keep adding, but there's no pruning.
Someone should create a social network that is just about 100 people. That's it... you can only have 100 friends, and when you add someone, you have to boot someone off.
I love IM, but how many times do you have the following conversation with people?
"What's up?"
"Not much... how are you?"
"Good... and you?"
"Yeah... good."
And then... nothing... AIM is like an ICU, with all these friendships on life support that would otherwise die if not hooked up to the digital feeding tube.
When I die, please donate my screenname to some little kid that needs it more than I do.
What is it about social networking online that makes it so unlike how I interact with real people in the real world?
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Meeting up with some MIT MBAs Tonight
There's a group of 10-15 MIT MBAs coming into the city today to learn about opportunities in the NYC tech world. We're meeting up after work for happy hour at Link Lounge by Union Square if you're interested.
Here's the link on NYCtechevents.com.
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Comment of the Day
Re: Founder's Club
"Oh well, you should create your own club. Oh, that's right. You did. And it's open. Nice." - Nate
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Michael Eisner on User Gen Content
"How many times can you watch a kid get hit in the groin?"Answer: Over and over and over again.
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I can haz one feedz, plz: Why I won't Tumblr
I saw David Karp present Tumblr last night and its posting interface was really slick. It even allows people to suck in RSS feeds of other blogs.
I asked David whether he ever intended on making it go from suck to blow.
In other words, I have ZERO interest in maintaining two places for posting, like Fred and Michael are doing. I find it really annoying that I need to subscribe to two feeds for someone for basically the same stuff. I consider Tumblr a blog, mostly because I read it in a feedreader. Sure, I also consume Fred's last.fm feed and his Flickr feed, but I consume it in the context of those sites, which is what I want. I don't want my whole content experience dulled down to RSS...just blogs.
If the best part about Tumblr is the ease and format of posting, why not separate the two? Let me post a Tumblr style post to my Typepad account. Who cares where it's hosted?
Actually, to be honest, Flock already does some of what Tumblr does. I can right click a picture and autopost it to my blog and the same with a link. Still, Tumblr supports more formats.
And if Oddcast was paying attention, they'd propose a way to allow Tumblr users to quickpost a Voki. Perhaps that could be part of the business model there...paid inclusion. If you want a "post an X" button on Tumblr, you can pay them for it. The group of Tumblr users out there is a very influential and cool group...definitely people you want to market your widgets to.
Guess our Founder's Club invites got lost in the mail... happens all the time.
Live from New York, it's Founders Club--with M.C. Hammer | The Social - CNET News.com
Caroline writes, "So who was there? It was more like "who wasn't there?""
Um... Alex and I weren't. We were too busy hitting the refresh button continuously so we could be one of the exclusive group of 400 people to eek our way into to the Tech Meetup.
I mean, who wants to hangout with Lindsay Campbell and Hammer anyway? Yawn. Besides, the horse drawn pumpkin that we were riding in last night got a flat on 23rd, so we never would have made it over in time.
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links for 2007-11-06
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Who says peer production isn't useful??
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Did they make many Web 2.0 investments to begin with?
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I'm as mad as hell, and I'm not going to take it anymore!
Perfect!
Nothing like buzz over a Yahoo! social network focused on careers to remind you that, even on the day you close some money for angel financing, you have exactly zero seconds in the life of a startup to sit back and relax.
I will absolutely be writing lots about KickStart, but for now, we're focused on building Path 101, not competitor watching.
I have to be honest, though, I thought it was going to be a little bit more of a competitor. Yahoo! seems bent on getting attention away from Facebook and LinkedIn, rather than trying to work with them, and we're happy to let them play that game. A social network around jobs is the last thing we want to be.
That being said, if anyone wants to be my KickStart friend, I'm here. In case you're on mobile RSS, and can't see the link, just remember, the web address is:
http://kickstart.yahoo.com/profile/?QOiLyFc.jlgCr_MDRvWLjlE-
Got it?