Stuff I’m reading/watching this fine Saturday, not all of it is related to Web Strategy, but hey, it’s Saturday!

• Jeremy’s got a video of Beck Puppets, funny.
• Even eBay rolls out social site features, they’ve got the community, this could be a big win for them. There are over 300+ social sites. Some good some bad. How many can we have and support folks? It’s about niche communities. As many communities we can have, is the amount of social sites we can have.
• Legal info about taking photos. I take a lot of public photos, am I at risk? how about you?
• Cnet creates a second life building (looks a lot like their HQ)
• Holly put all her videos on Blip. (have a great trip Holly)
• Checking up on Damon who is in Thailand, he appears to be ok.
• Mark’s going to Oakridge Mall in SJ, he couldn’t find any genius folks to help iwth his Apple mouse at Valley Fair (yeah I still call it that)
• Web 2.0 Exit badge strategies, Jumpcut gets the Yahoo one.
• Drum Solo Video: Tony Royster Jr video, I know this is old, but it’s still good.
• I get my Viral Video fix from Dumpalink, while it’s not bottom-up voted, it’s still interesting. Please note some images and videos are not work safe.
• Waiting to get the full report on the Portable Media Expo from Martin McKeay, hopefully he tooks pics as well.
• Educators are using Social Media (Blogs and Podcasts) to teach kids. Great way to extend the learning experience outside of the classroom. (and let parents see what’s going on)
• I was wondering what’s going on with Riya lately, here’s an update from one of the board members.
• Sometimes, I like to see what people save as their ‘favorites’ in flickr. I noticed that Tara’s are very colorful and fun.
• Watched a few episodes of Tiki Bar TV again. Lala has a MySpace page.
• I linked to this earlier, but the HP slimming feature in their new cameras are still pretty funny/interesting.
• Have you seen the Halo Wars trailer? Download the hi-res version and come back in a few minutes, and put on full screen. I realize this is a movie and not what the actual game play will be like, but it’s still dramatic.
• Watch a video of a lighter in slow motion, neat.
• I don’t understand why Krumping is getting popular (video)
• I’m listening to Pandora, I’ve two stations, one around BT, and the other around Thievery Corporation.
• Geez, Dave McClure is involved with a lot of projects.

Aside from this post, what are you reading? leave a comment.

Meet Josh and Chris of the Web 2.0 Show and Steel Pixel
I really like Josh and Chris, they’re the hosts for the popular podcast “The Web 2.0 Show” which I’m subscribed to. I first met Josh at the Future of Web Apps conference (my day 1 and day 2 notes), I heard a familiar voice behind me. After a few hours I realized they were directly behind me. I few times I accidentally blinded them with my camera flash while I was trying to take picture of folks asking questions on the mic. If you’re a web developer, designer, or marketer in the Web 2.0 space, I highly recommend subscribing toe their show, they have quite a few interesting guests.

Listening to your marketplace
Recently, we’ve been covering some issues with Andy’s web host Dreamhost (I’m also hosted with them, but I’ve few issues, other than the outage a few months ago). Josh and Chris have a business in addition to the Web 2.0 show called Steel Pixel. They contacted me via email with an offer for Andy and I to take up two months of hosting for free and a discount for anyone else that reads my blog, or just wants to switch.

Here’s the comment they left:

Jeremiah,

I am sorry to hear that your friend is having such a tough time with hosting. We (The Web 2.0 Show podcast guys) run a hosting business and we would like to invite both you and Andy to give it a try (two months free). We would like to also offer a 10% discount to all your blog readers, they can just use the discount code “switch” when they sign up.

We try to keep a very human feel to our hosting, we use IM and campfire to allow real time chat with customers. We don’t really spend money on advertising because we feel the dollars a customer spends with us should improve the services we provide them. We are very much a fan of “Creating passionate users” . You can read more on our ideas at our blog.

Michael sent me this link to the Marketing Sherpa Reader’s Choice Blog & Podcasting Awards 2006 awards, very cool list.

Best B-to-B Marketing Blog

• B2B Lead Generation Blog by Brian Carroll

Best Blog on Email Marketing

• Chris Baggott’s Email Marketing Best Practices

Best Blog on Search Marketing

• Search Engine Roundtable

Best Blog on Advertising

• Adrants by Steve Hall

Best Blog on Marketing to a Specific Consumer Demographic

• Andy Wibbels, the Original Blogging Evangelist by Andy Wibbels

Best blog on Affiliate Marketing

• ReveNews

Best Blog on the Topic of PR

• Active Voice by Matt “PodBoy”

Best Podcast on the topic of Marketing

• Across the Sound by Joseph Jaffe (One of my favs)

Best Blog on Small Business Marketing

• Duct Tape Marketing by John Jantsch

Best Foreign-Language Blog

• Marketing-Blog Biz — Besserwerberblog * Marketing für Besserwerber

Best Blog on General Marketing Topics

• Seth Godin’s Blog by Seth Godin

Honorable Mentions: Five More Blogs That Deserve Your Attention

• Adland
• Future Now: A Day in the Life of a Persuasion Architect
• StartupNation
• The WebMarketCentral Blog
• Ypulse

John thinks that Alexa is worthless but it’s not. Like a survey it’s a sample of an audience, while it may not be completely accurate, there is no other tool out there that can provide measurement across all sites as we don’t have access server analytics on all websites.

My former manager explained that analytics in themselves are pretty useless, they vary from one system to another. The rule is to follow and look for trends, patterns, spikes and valleys and how they tie to events on the websites or around the industry.

John, while it may not be very accurate (and a bit easy to manipulate) it’s not worthless, as it’s the best we have.

Taken by Shirley with the new Canon PowerShot SD700 IS ($350)

This photo was not altered in photoshop, it’s a camera feature called “Color Accent”

Pretty cool, once you access the settings, a small box appears on the screen which will help you to select the color (like an eyedropper feature in photoshop)

Once you select that, any color in your photo that is close to that will appear in color, the rest won’t. Kind of like a ‘mask’ in photoshop.

I’m amazed at how camera technology changes so fast in one year. Oh, and the 2gig memory card is only $35, sheeesh. (oh, and there are no easily available Hitachi cameras I could find)

Update: This is funny, HP camera’s have a slimming effect, so anyone can look thinner than they really are.

Great article User-Generated Web Content Will Grow Rapidly Through 2010 that reports the following:

• The size of downloads/views are estimated to eclipse 1.1 exabytes of data by 2010, with uploads growing to more than 9.1 petabytes.
• 23% of the dozens of UCG sites studied currently support mobile access, with others making announcements for this support in the near future.
• YouTube holds the highest market share for video, but MySpace has the most visitors.

I heard on the Joseph Jaffe podcast that by 2010, that 50% of all media will have been created by Users. By the way, I don’t know the correct term for content created by ‘the people’ so I just said

“User/Citizen/Amateur/Citizen/People/Consumer”

I’m learning a lot about photography and watching this artist cruise around SF taking pictures. It’s neat as you can watch the video, hear his insight, and then the actual final photographs will be shown on the video

Part 1: Thomas near golden gate bridge

Part 2: He discusses some of his more advanced tactics, gets wet and crawls around on the floor like a sniper

Part 3: Night shooting the golden gate, and taking pics of people

Part 4: City shooting at night (food porn discussion too)

Online Video is going to be important, here’s why:

• It tells a unique story that text or audio can’t tell alone
• It’s engaging (but requires most or all of your attention)
• Online video can and wiill be distributed in the following vehicles
• Browser (in players)
• Mobile Devices (Like video iPod)
• TV hybrid devices (like Tivo, Slingbox)
• TV (someday, someone will create a channel that pulls in content from web, like Current TV)

Robert, I’d like to see the blue sky, not the washed out white background, is that possible? I know you’re just getting started.

More Resources

• Thomas Hawk’s Blog
• Zooomr.com (Thomas works at this photo sharing site)
• Thomas Hawk’s Zooomr photos
• Thomas Hawk’s Flickr photos
• Robert Scoble’s Blog
• Scoble Show

Big thanks to Dreamhost for restoring Andy’s websites, he’s coming out of hell.

You can read his horrible experience on this blog that he created in Blogger called NightmareHost.

Andy has gotten some human responses, so hopefully this will all be resolved.
Several folks blogged about it, such as myself, Julio, and Brian.

I had breakfast with Robert at a podtech session and told him how powerless Andy was, he chimed in and there was a flurry of discussion, Robert blogged about it and there are 23 comments. It seems hit and miss with dreamhost, some have problems and some do.
Robert was compared to Dreamhost using the term “Suck” (As that’s a good way to google a company or product to see how folks think of it) You can see the battle between “ScobleSucks” vs “Dreamhost” Sucks. The results: 74 Scoble, to 24,600 Dreamhost.

A potential customer turned away from Dreamhost, because he read the blog posts. Blogs impact revenue.

I don’t know if Social Media helped to pressure Dreamhost to talk to Andy again, but it’s interesting how feedback and the voice of the customer can be heard and read in near real time.

Lastly, thank you Dreamhost for restoring Andy’s service and communication to him.

Update: Josh from Steel Pixel has left a comment offering Andy and I free web hosting for two months, and also a Discount for you. This is an example of social media spreading the word (and super fast). I’m going to evaluate the offer closely.

I’m sitting at PodTech’s breakfast event, it’s a focus on corporate podcasting with John Furrier, and Robert Scoble. Ran into Dave McClure, and met a lot of other interesting folks.

I’m using Google Wireless network for the first time, it asked for some authentication and pushed me to my Google/IG page. Although I’m indoors, I’m clocking about 11mbps. Here’s a few observations, pictures will go up later

• John and I had a conversation about Zune, interesting.
• I talked to Dave McClure about the blog ad model on techmeme, he’s been publishing on the oDesk blog.
• Podtech was started a year ago by John Furrier, he’d publish his interviews on his blog.
• Within a few weeks thousands of downloads were happening of his audio interviews
• Has over 30 employees
• Is ventured funded to build a media company to publish the voices and to document the valley.
• Discussions about the importance of word of mouth marketing and how social media is a big impact
• Dell support and Jeff Jarvis example, Dell didn’t look.
• Techcrunch in the early days added images, and it helped Mike to stand out of the crowd
• Podtech’s videos on the recent Acrobat (there are some wordpress errors FYI) announcement received more traffic than podcasts as videos really stand out.
• Google works by lots of linking patterns, Microsoft research showed that most folks in google results never click the ‘next’ page.
• Discussions about Second life, used for marketing purposes and even a town in east coast that re-created their city to simulate disaster planning.
• RSS is an bottom up driven technology that empowers users.
• Video can be used to demonstrate things that text is not able to convey.
• Questions:
• Q) Is videoblogging or podcasting going to get adoption levels like blogging? Each medium has it’s strengths and weaknesses
• Q) Chapters needed in video and podcast shows , A) It makes the page more complex, but there’s a wiki coming as well.
• Q) What’s the audience and traffic like A) Different audiences, John says: “Bloggers email and podcasers call”. iTunes audience is part of the PodTech listenership. It’s less techy. Most of the audience is Techie elite and early adopters. Create informational ‘info talk’. They didn’t go for the mass audience. 5 million downloads since then, and now they’ve added some metrics to find real listeners and its about half a million downloads a month. Audience is a tough subject, so they are looking for downloads. Many discussions around metrics will occur over the coming time (Jeremiah: Just because someone downloads a podcast to an iPod doesn’t mean they listen to, or if they do, how MANY times they listen to it). There are many ways to track analytics, perhaps looking for feedback. A new audience is emerging is called “tech aware”, which is more mainstream audience.
• John’s Predictions
• Niche Programing, a cross between browser, mobile, tv. Seagate is going to take advantage of this.
• Q: How is PR not scared sh*tless about blogging and pocasting A) they are, but now they have to content with it.
• Q: Audience: digitally savvy, C level, early adopters, Dual degree, and plus all of Scoble’s audience (which is about 30k subscribed a day plus visits)

Hosted at Fenwick and West

John Furrier Prepared

Greeted by Maryam Scoble

We gathered Podtech Briefing

And talked with the Xilinx Crew

“Do you have a Blog? No, I have a Blog 2.0!”

Great summary of all the key learnings from the Future of Web Apps conference in SF, I think this is well categorized and hits many of the major points. Read and print out 10 Things That Will Make Or Break Your Website. I’d like to extend this list just slightly

1. EASY is the most important feature of any website, web app, or program
2. Visual design and copy are extremely important.
3. Open up your data as much possible.
4. Test, test, test.
5. Release features early and often.
6. Be special
7. Don’t be special.
8. If you plan on developing a successful webapp, plan for scalability
9. Watch, pay attention to, or implement right away:
10. User generated content and social software trends

I’d like to add the following:

11) Revenue. I sound evil, but it’s true, and something every investor, partner, and your father in law will ask about. As I understand it there are six potential revenue models: Advertising, Premium, Transaction, Consultation, Partnering and Acquisition. While I agree the best sites come from passion (I make no direct dollars from this passion web strategy blog) putting food on the table for your family is important.

Resources: My notes from the conference are here for day 1 and day 2, I can really appreciate the work that AUinteractive did for these top 10 points.

I just learned from Julio about Amazon’s next major move called Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (Amazon EC2) - Limited Beta. You know about Amazon’s entery into Online Data Storage right? Smugmug pays them $27,000 a month as a storage utility, it’s a pay as you go model.

“Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (Amazon EC2) is a web service that provides resizable compute capacity in the cloud. It is designed to make web-scale computing easier for developers.

Just as Amazon Simple Storage Service (Amazon S3) enables storage in the cloud, Amazon EC2 enables “compute” in the cloud. Amazon EC2’s simple web service interface allows you to obtain and configure capacity with minimal friction. It provides you with complete control of your computing resources and lets you run on Amazon’s proven computing environment. Amazon EC2 reduces the time required to obtain and boot new server instances to minutes, allowing you to quickly scale capacity, both up and down, as your computing requirements change. Amazon EC2 changes the economics of computing by allowing you to pay only for capacity that you actually use.”

Making IT a Utlity (like Power, Gas, Cable)
They are building a complete outsourcing of your IT department for consumers, small business, and in some cases medium sized businesses. Perhaps soon they will provide helpdesk support (pay per minute), rent desktops and laptops (pay per minute) or even access to applications (like photoshop) via a web tunnel or some type of pay-per-minute usage fee.

Want to learn more about Online Data Storage? I’ve predicted these things happening here (I know I push this post, but it’s not because I want traffic, but it’s because there are some important changes happening)

More Resources

• Alexis defines EC3 in more detail
• He points to Pillbox which is running on EC2
• Amazon’s Dev Blog

I’ve been hearing from friend Andy about his nightmares with Dreamhost (in fact I’m a customer too, partly due to his recommendations). He manages multiple websites and they’ve been shut down today. Andy doesn’t believe he’s at fault, and is asking for a dialogue with Dreamhost, and now they’ve clammed up.

Having worked closely with Andy for some time, I highly suspect that he’s pretty careful about how he manages his websites, and I suspect this is a simple misunderstanding. I hate having to do this to a company, but I really want to encourage a conversations between Andy and Dreamhost.

Folks, imagine if your blog or websites was taken down, locked, and they refused to talk to you, how would you feel?

Dreamhost friends, please respond to Andy, it’s really an appropriate professional courtesy, thanks in advance!

Update:

• Julio Garcia has given his thoughts about Dreamhost.
• AUinteractive talks about their experience being Dugg’d with Dreamhost
• A different Andy did not buy Dreamhost due to these blogs
• Robert Scoble talks about Dreamhost,
• He suggests one way to learn about a product is to do a Google Search using the terms “Sucks”. Here’s the query for Dreamhost. wow.
• Brian Stephens has blogged about this as well
• Brian has an interesting solution to how this could be resolved in the future -data backup

Big Update:

Apparently Dreamhost has contacted Andy and will be restoring service. !!!

Recently someone emailed me and said they loved reading my BLOB.

For one reason or another this came up in discussion today. Denis, gave me one of his most cherished magnets the “Blob” magnet.

Thanks Denis!

I want to dispel the myth that MySpace is for teens alone, in fact I’m hearing more and more from folks that it’s indeed crossing the middle segment of age and culture. According to SFSU Prof Dr John Sullivan:

“More than 80 percent of the site’s registered members fall into the core demographic of 16-to-34-year-olds. Note that this demographic includes a large quantity of college-educated professionals with as much as 13 years of work experience…” (outside the box recruiting)

Also, others are noting that MySpace is growing up:

MySpace, the cyber home of countless teens and 20-somethings, is attracting more interest from an older crowd. In fact, the News Corp. (NWS - commentary - Cramer’s Take) site has recently experienced declines in its audience aged 12 to 17, 12 to 24 and 12 to 34, while seeing increases in the 21-to-34, 25-to-34, and 35-to-54 demographics, according to data from comScore Networks. (MySpace grows up)

Interview with MySpace User: 52 year old parent and Martial Arts Instructor
To learn more, I’ve done an interview with a MySpace user (John, a parent and respected silicon valley profesional) that doesn’t fit the young teen audience, let’s hear from John:

1) How old are you? (you can say early 40s, or mid 40s if not your specifics)
Ha. My Myspace page gives my age – 52. Myspace pages show your age – you can lie - but you have to give a birthdate.

2) When did you first start using MySpace and why?
Around March of 2006. I teach cardio kickboxing at a gym called WAMA and was seeking SEO strategies to drive people to the WAMA website. I have a younger friend who started another fitness studio and she made a Myspace page, which was a huge hit with her friends and people who took her classes. I also noticed that the Myspace pages in general had high google rankings (long story). So I made a page for myself, with hotlinks to the WAMA web site.

3) What are your primary reasons for using MySpace, which features suit you best? How frequent do you use it?
My primary reason was attracting people to my cardio kickboxing classes. I like the free-form nature of Myspace page creation which lends itself to creative expression. The multimedia effect of having sound as a standard feature, and of being able to integrate whatever graphics you choose either as backgrounds or individual pictures. Of being able to use hotlinks to offsite locations. It was a lot of fun building the page. I usually log in once a week or so, or whenever Myspace sends me mail telling me someone is trying to contact me.

4) What type of people do you interact with, are they similar to you?
Unlike my friend Paige, I have had little luck getting my local peers to make Myspace pages. Martial artists over 30 are often not very interested in online networking. Most of my interactions are with people from around the world who have similar interests in the fitness space. I did work with the friend who owns WAMA to make a WAMA Myspace page that is pretty closely integrated into the WAMA website.

5) Do you have concerns for online behaviors in MySpace, and what would you recommend ?
No real concerns. If you pay attention to the Myspace guidelines (don’t use full names, don’t give personal contact details). I think the press makes a lot of noise about problems on Myspace because it sells… I found my son (17) had a Myspace page, I’d advise parents to ask their children about their web activities, just as they would ask them where they went at night.

6) If social sites like MySpace were not around, how would you communicate with your network?
Well, I primarily use Myspace for advertising. I am beginning to use Myspace for networking, but I still use Linkedin and direct email more. But I’m an old goat. I don’t even text message…

7) In your personal time, what else do you do online?
Research things I’m interested in. Read the news. Read blogs. Track new web applications (web 2.0esque – have you seen swarm?). Build websites and post things I’ve written. Keep in touch with old friends.

Thank you John for your time, you’re one of the individuals I’ve been so impressed with that adopts and harnesses technology very rapidly. If others have folks for John (or just want to be his MySpace friend) please leave a question below, and perhaps he’ll have the time to answer, once he’s done hanging out in MySpace.

Additional Resources:

• David Berkowitz’s research on MySpace Searches
• Fortune reports that MySpace sells its homepage for $100,000 a day
• MySpace the most popular website in America\
• MySpace a lifestyle brand (and a trend)
• Don’t believe the MySpace Hype
• Marketing to Kids where they Live
• Using Myspace as a recruiting tool
• Making Friends and Money on MySpace
• MySpace grows up

Picture from Laughing Squid

I headed to the launch party with Mario, ran into the usual suspects I see at most events. During the presentation videos, I was very impressed by the rich and well produced content. It’s really a lifestyle channel, that’s a bit edgier and more raw than traditional TV. In fact they are specially aiming to be the opposite of MTV. After the introductions, videos ran and played clips of all the shows.

First broadcast television. Then cable television. Now, you can kill your television. Revision3 aims to prove that on-demand, distributed online content is better, faster, more effective, and better targeted to what YOU want to watch.

Tonight, September 26th, Revision3 launches their brand new website with all-new shows, all-new faces, and a few surprises that are sure to turn some heads! And all the familiar Revision3 faces are back with some new episodes, too! You might even find something new from the show that started it all! So raise your drinking glass of malt liquor and share a toast with Revision3 as we push IPTV to the next level. (revision 3 site)

Here’s how I can describe the shows that will be coming; fast, unique, edgier, under 30ish, lifestyle, geek. Those around me noticed that unlike other geek events the crowd was super charged with screaming, dancing, and everyone having a great time partying. It was a welcome change from the business networking events I’m accustomed to attending.

Distribution of course will be native to the web, or for fatter downloads you’ll use bit torrent. I’m sure that many shows will be subscribed to mobile devices, and with products like Tivo, Slingbox, and other IPTV technologies, you’ll be able to take in their content in a variety of ways that you want, another example of how the consumers are taking charge.

Here are several ‘channels/shows’ that will be available; Systm, diggnation, thebroken, infected, InDigital, geekdrome, CtrlAltChicken (It’s a cooking show!)

Resources:

• It all started with this Social News Voting Site Digg.com
• More on the Revision 3 site (which will probaly have a redesign, that we saw last night)
• Wikipedia’s entry on Digg
• Scott’s pictures from the party (amazing as usual)
• All flickr pictures tagged Rev3
• Update: Digg’s Revenue Model: VC Funding and Monthly incomes
• Update: Meaning behind the name (Revision 3)
• Update: Thomas Hawk’s thoughts
• CBS News video
• Update Sept 30th: Revision Forums Launch

Rev 3 Team
Got a quick photo with Kevin Rose of Digg.com

He’s too fast!

Ctrl Alt Chicken Cooking Show

Ryan Carson likes my photos!
I was given a ‘press’ pass to the Future of Web Apps Conference, I blogged about Day 1 and Day 2. Ryan Carson, the founder and director, sent this thank you email to all the attendees of Carson’s Future of Web Apps:

“Event coverage Re-live those Summit moments

There’s some great coverage of the event from Scott Beale and Jeremiah Owyang (links below), or view a wider Flickr selection with the Summit tag - futureofwebapps-sf06

laughingsquid

jeremiah_owyang”

First of all, to put me anywhere near the mastery of the Scott’s photos is just amazing, he’s the photoblog master. Carson Systems, thanks for the ‘press’ pass to the conference, I’m glad I was able to give back to your event.

About my photo Strategy
I used just a commercial grade consumer camera, it’s under 500 dollars, and fits in my pocket, my strategy is to take a lot of photos (it’s the Asian in me) and use the smaller camera to get right up in the action in an unassuming manner. Sometimes I get the best shots from folks that had no idea a camera was present. Of course I’m sensitive not to post embarrassing photos, and often ask strangers if I can shoot their pic first…then I silently disappear into the thick dense foliage.

The bad news
My camera is no longer with me. I noticed it gone after taking a public bus in downtown Chicago going down Michigan Street, I took a photo while on the bus, so I know that’s when I last had it. My instincts suggest that I was pick pocketed (although I’m usually so careful about these things).

Camera Recommendations needed
So I’m looking for recommendations for cameras under $450, any suggestions? As you know I’m really into peer review, I’ve done my homework with editor and consumer reviews Here are my Requirements:

• It needs to be fast: turn on fast, take pics fast.
• Fit in my pocket: I run around with it on me all the time, it needs to be small
• Take crisp pictures rapidly. The Sony P200 I had often had blurry pics.
• Should not have proprietary technology like “Memory Stick”.

I’m thinking a Canon SD700, its about $350 via amazon. Based upon my discussions with photography friends, most agree it would do the trick.

Any other thoughts out there?

Yeah, and I’m a stupid, stupid tourist. *Jeremiah kicks himself*

Robert just turned his VideoBlog The Scoble Show live. Warning, some of the vids take a while to load, I suspect because so many people are trying to watch what’s happening.

Interesting how Seagate is the loan sponsor of the show. I know Robert visited them a few weeks ago.

I’m watching the Thomas Hawk video right now, it’s fun to watch him in action. (Thomas’s blog)
(Update: the ScobleShow music makes me want to put on a red headband and pop and lock)

If you haven’t had a vacation in a while, I suggest you take a virtual visit to paradise with Ahmed Zahid’s amazing photography.

Check out Ahmed’s Pictures of Paradise
He’s travelling through the Maldives, writing to this photoblog, and publishing his photos to his growing flickr collection.
It’s interesting how social media empowers everyone to upload photos and professional photographers can easily publish their work without a middleman. (Such as Shutterpoint, and ImageDisplayworks). Now that I think about it, that would be a great feature for Flickr/Zooomr to add on.

The blue colors in Ahmed’s photos really relax me, learn more about him in this interview with him. Ahmed, thanks for helping us escape into your paradise.

Gabe just announced his pricing model for Techmeme Blog advertising and pricing model.
Simple Math reveals the following potential revenue stream:

• $4500 +
• $3,500 +
• $3,000
• = $11,000 a month
• X 4 Sites (Ballbug, Smirch, Meme, Techmeme when they get rolling)
• = $44,000 a month (when all engines are firing)
• X 12 months
• = $528,000 a year.

Hot dang Gabe, way to go, you deserve every cent of it.

Jon is proving how the internet can be used for betterment of planet earth and it’s people.

A few weeks ago I had an enlightening conversation with one of my relatives who had recently traveled to South America on a missionary journey. She made some points that have stuck with me about the value of the internet for third world countries (or the lack thereof).

I recently ran into this blog called the Nata Village Blog that is written by Jon Rawlinson who is doing the following:

1) Raising awareness about Nata and their issues with poverty and Aids using ‘cheap’ social media tools.

2) Getting featured around the internet, including Rocketboom

3) Raising money from donations and distributing directly to the village (previously some monies went to larger villages)

4) Telling the world about the story of the Nata

Here’s what the Nata Village Blog has to say about itself:

“The Nata Blog was born as a result of a world traveler, Jon Rawlinson, passing through Nata on the way to the Okavango Delta. The tour books referred to Nata as nothing more than a dust hole and he had no intention of spending any time there. But, as coincidence would have it, he met a Peace Corps Volunteer named Melody Jenkins who is working as an HIV/AIDS educator and community capacity builder. Jon was interested in seeing more than the tourist destinations of Africa and wanted to learn more about the impact of HIV/AIDS on Botswana. After just one night of meeting the locals and hearing first hand accounts of the struggle to control the spread of the disease, Jon was hooked and wanted to help. He has since been back to Nata twice and has been introduced to the Kgosi (chief) and most of the professionals working to stop the spread of HIV/AIDS. Nata will benefit from the fact that our world traveler is also a professional producer and editor as well as a website designer. Jon and Melody worked on a documentary about HIV/AIDS in Nata in hopes of bringing the story of Nata to the world. Jon discovered an incredible village filled with the beautiful Mokolane Palm trees lining the Nata River. Unlike most tourists, Jon wanted to do more than just snap a few photos of elephants and giraffes and return home. He wanted to make a difference and offered to design and administer this website.” (meet the team)

A great example of how the internet can be used to raise awareness and then funds to make real world differences. The barriers for The Nata people to get their message out have dropped significantly due to social media.

Additional Resources

• Nata Village Flickr Account
• More about Nata
• Videos on Current TV’s website
• Video: Nata Village Blog featured on Rocketboom (Amanda)
• Apparently they raised over $4,000 from Rocketboom exposure.