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Archive for September, 2006

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19

I’m being Cloned!

Categories: Social MediaPosted on September 21st, 2006

How’s the phrase go? Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery?

This website is grabbing all of my content (even my pics) and building a blog and setting up adwords AdSense around it.

It doesn’t really bother me (I know it makes Scoble really really pissed off) but what would be the right course of action.

I don’t mind if my content is aggregated into new forms that add additional benefit (like techmeme), but this just seems like it’s scraping everything and adding little value (except from the adwords profits)

For anyone reading this post IN bitacle, this is probaly looking a bit strange. If you ARE reading this post in Bitacle, then please note the real blog is at web-strategist.com.

Posted in Social Media | 19 Comments »

21

Chicago Blogger Dinner

Categories: Blogger Dinner, EventsPosted on September 20th, 2006

Stepped off the plane and went right to the Blogger Dinner. Felt like an idiot as I stumbled through the busy restaurant with my luggage. Found Scoble and the bloggers. We had a variety of conversations around Yahoo, Microsoft, Wireless, MySpace, Vox, Blogs, Edelman, Hitachi, pretty much anything and everything geek.

This was my first time in Chi town and having a REAL pizza pie at Girodano’s.
Present were David Dalka, Jeff Treem, Robert Scoble, Joseph Thornley (Who blogged about the dinner), Kevin Dugan, Chris Thilk, David Armano, and Mike Miller one other (didn’t get his card sorry). I knew this was a good group, as there was an excess of money for the tab.

Chicago Airport

My Taxi Driver (I taught him what blogs were)

David Dalka fiddles with Sidekick

Jeff Treem is getting paid by Sam for this product placement

Kevin Dugan and Jeff Treem

Blogger Dinner

nextgoogleceo.com

Robert Amazed by Authentic Chicago Pie


Posted in Blogger Dinner, Events | 21 Comments »

2

Naked Conversations Collection

Categories: Community Marketing, Ruminations, Social MediaPosted on September 20th, 2006

At Lunch 2.0, Shel Israel handed me a stack of signed English and one Japanese version of the book he co-authored Naked Conversations. Appropriate, given that we were at Hitachi Data Systems.

The cover is a bit racier, and may suggest something other than blogging, but Japanese tend to be receptive to exciting advertising. The blue book is the ‘proof’ version that Shel gave me in 2005 before the book release party at TechCrunch. Later, I purchased over 60 copies for Hitachi employees. I guess the only thing I could wish for now is the Klingon Version, when’s that coming?

I’m in Chicago right now, and tommorow I’m giving a speech (Scoble is keynote) about Business Blogging at the Ragan PR conference, although I’ve not done everthing perfect, one could say I learned from the best, Shel and Scoble. Thanks guys.

Naked Conversations: English, Japanese, Unreleased Proof
My Three Copies of Naked Conversations: English, Japanese, and the Unreleased “Proof”

Of course you read right to left...
Of course, you open the book to left to right, and read top to bottom.

Posted in Community Marketing, Ruminations, Social Media | 2 Comments »

9

EMC enters the Blogosphere, Welcome!

Categories: Community Marketing, Data Storage, Social MediaPosted on September 20th, 2006

Welcome Mark from EMC to the blogosphere, as you may know, Hitachi Data Systems and EMC are both in the Data Storage industry and this will make for some unique conversations. In an effort to bring community to the whole Data Storage industry, I’ve added Mark to the Data Storage Wiki, this page shows all the bloggers in the industry, and is intended as a resource for storage practioners.

I’ve been wondering for a while when EMC would join us, anyways David Berlind from ZDNet has some additional thoughts, see Techmeme for more developments.

Posted in Community Marketing, Data Storage, Social Media | 9 Comments »

10

Religious Groups Harness the Web (Social sites, Podcasts, Mesh Networks, Blogs)

Categories: Podcasts, Social Media, Web Marketing, Web UsagePosted on September 20th, 2006

I’m seeing more and more religious groups harnessing the web, here’s some observations:

  • I say this nearly all the time but I’ll say it again: Web is the number one medium in the workplace in North America and Second at home (TV is lead but will merge with the web). Religious groups realize that using the web to spread their message is needed.
  • I met a SF Bay Area pastor, and he said most of his sermons are published as podcasts. For those that are podcasters, creating the file is the hard part, publishing is the easy part. Podcast.net the podcast directory lists thousands of podcasts.
  • I met Joe and his wife last week at Lunch 2.0 (pic below). They’re the founders of mychurch.org, which is a Social Network for Your Church. Very cool folks, I wish them the best.
  • Red Herring published this article; “Religion Sites Embrace Web 2.0. God might not have a MySpace, but He’s got the web’s attention“
  • Jewish? See Koolanoo.com, the Jewish Social Network.
  • Muslim? See MuslimSpace.com.
  • There are stories by Xeni of Monks using wireless mesh networks to connect. They even have solar panels to power.
  • Mark and I had discussed a few months ago why this would be a good idea. I’m not surprised someone had already built eBible.com
  • Need a blog network? See this CrossConnector site; “Functional Blogging for Ministries and Missions“
  • My favorite is Church Marketing Sucks. Heh, one would think this could have been written by Seth Godin himself. The practice of Religious Evangelism and Marketing may have quite a few similarities. Some sophisticated SF Bay Area Church’s have marketing managers, collateral, a web strategy and other outreach programs. if you know of a good example, please leave a comment.

myChurch.org

I met Joe and Carol Suh of MyChurch

Posted in Podcasts, Social Media, Web Marketing, Web Usage | 10 Comments »

15

Web Strategy: Using Delicious for Marketing Research

Categories: Search Strategy, Web Marketing, Web StrategyPosted on September 20th, 2006

Delicious is Social Bookmarking
Folks mention that Delicious (A Yahoo Property) is great for finding information later that you’ve saved, or information that other folks have seen, like Social Bookmarks. It’s always interesting to see what people tag your website as. Here’s what people have tagged this blog with. The only tag that really surprises me is all the web 2.0 tags as I don’t consider myself a web 2.0 expert. Here’s the delicious tags for Hitachi, or Web Strategy.

A non-hierarchical keyword categorization system is used on del.icio.us where users can tag each of their bookmarks with a number of freely chosen keywords (cf. folksonomy). A combined view of everyone’s bookmarks with a given tag is available; for instance, the URL “http://del.icio.us/tag/wiki” displays all of the most recent links tagged “wiki”. Its collective nature makes it possible to view bookmarks added by similar-minded users. -wikipedia

Use Delicious to understand how folks think of things
You can do your own searches (try your company name or product name) to find out what others think of it. Here’s some of the Delicious features you can View recent entries, popular entries, popular tags

Reverse Engineer your Search Marketing Research
Tie this into your web marketing efforts, the keywords that folks are tagging information with should also extend to your Search Engine Optimization programs such as metatagging your content, or making text match the same keywords. Also consider extending these keywords into the Search Engine Marketing keywords that you’ll be buying. After all, this is how the end user or consumer is thinking about your webpage.

Audience
I’m sure delicious users are only a small segment of the web users, but the fact that they’ve taken time out to tag your content deserves some credit, take the time at least to understand how they’re tagging your content (or your competition)

Additional Resources

Posted in Search Strategy, Web Marketing, Web Strategy | 15 Comments »

0

David Berkowitz: Are you down with ODS?

Categories: Data Storage, Search StrategyPosted on September 19th, 2006

David Berkowitz has taken my Online Data Storage discussion to new heights.

I initially wrote these 40 points for the web and data storage community, but David has provided some additional insight from the marketing and online search perspective. My initial conversations with David we’re great, he caught on to the idea faster than nearly anyone.

Consumers are now publishers, and the Web, Marketing, Advertising and IT industry will need to respond.

To add on to David’s thoughts, two other challenges that will need to be addressed will be Security (Although many will swear online storage is safer than having a local drive) and Identity Management. We heard these same themes at Future of Web Apps.

Posted in Data Storage, Search Strategy | No Comments »

2

Requesting Eric Conveys an Emotion Part Deux

Categories: RuminationsPosted on September 19th, 2006

Do you remember Eric Conveys an Emotion from the first internet wave? He was pretty popular and I think he even was nominated for a webby.

He started an adventure series, but I’ve not seen much since. My favorite was this one, the New Pad. (guest appearance by Min Jung)

I propose that Eric should continue his online adventures, perhaps a video blog? a blog?
Eric was at Lunch 2.0 last week, he’s been working out and got buffish. And no, I’m not F-ing related to him. (although he did work with my cousin and does work with my friend Irvin)

Anyways Eric, just wanted to thank you for the all the ridiculous humor and joy you brought me and my colleagues when I was working at Exodus.

Posted in Ruminations | 2 Comments »

4

Revver Redesigns

Categories: Community Marketing, Rich Media, VideoPosted on September 19th, 2006

Left: Image of Micki taken by KK+ at Webvisions.

Micki the community manager at Revver recently alerted me to some changes that have happened, they just launched their version 1.0. If you’ve never played around with their video site (yes, I know another video site) they have a pretty fast interface with quite a few tools for social sharing and voting.

Revver Shares the revenue with the uploader. (I was talking about this already happening, the future will be point 24) read their FAQ to learn more.

It’s really simple: you upload a video to Revver, and we attach a brief, unobtrusive ad and our unique tracking technology to “Revverize” the video. Every time that ad gets clicked, we share the revenue with you 50/50. You can then track your video’s performance through your Revver account - which tells you exactly how many times your video is watched, and how much money you’re earning.

About Micki
Micki, her famous pictures here, or her video blog and I met at Webvisions a few months ago in Portland. She’s also known as one of the famous Valleywag hotties.

Posted in Community Marketing, Rich Media, Video | 4 Comments »

1

Online Storage and Replication Nuances

Categories: Data StoragePosted on September 19th, 2006

Pete Abilla sent me an email alerting me to a post he did TechCrunch Waffles on Online Storage Perfection suggests that TechCrunch doesn’t give enough emphasis to the difference between “Online Storage” and “Replication”.

I tend to agree, but with one caveat. Replication is a subset of the Online Data Storage, it’s still part of Data Storage. Most would agree that Replication is a solution for Disaster Recovery  (say your laptop is stolen, or blows up from a battery, etc)

Pete’s interview with Mozy also helps to show the differentiation between the two.  Be sure to read Nic’s comments from Omnidrive. (He’s buds with Arrington, and quite the gentleman).  If you want to learn more data storage see the Data Storage Wiki I kicked off.

Posted in Data Storage | 1 Comment »

7

Web Advertising: Promo Bait

Categories: Web AdvertisingPosted on September 19th, 2006

Andy has reported that Yahoo will be giving away free coffee for those that set their browser homepage to Yahoo.com. I realize this is part of a larger campaign for Yahoo to take back mindshare (or earn what’s rightfully theirs) as the portal wars continue to heat up.

I question if using bait to encourage folks to switch to their homepage will result in long term effects, or just short term buzz. Some may argue they’d rather have improved features rather than a free cup of coffee.

Either way, the awareness for Yahoo should be great.

Edit: OUCH.  Read what happened, and What Scoble says, he may be right.

Posted in Web Advertising | 7 Comments »

0

Travel Industry waking to the power of Blogosphere

Categories: Social Media, Voice of the CustomerPosted on September 19th, 2006

I enjoyed this article from NYTimes about how Marriott and other hotels are starting to realize the power of customer voices using blogs. What industry has yet to wake up the voice of the customer?

The article mentions Shel Holt’s blog on travel. I’ll be seeing him at the Ragan PR conference this Thursday, interesting, I didn’t know about this blog he did.

The article states that Marriott has assigned an employee to watch the blogosphere, I know what’s that’s like ;)

Speaking of which, I’m working with some contacts to put together a workshop/roundtable to discuss that very task. I’ve been asked to moderate or lead a discussion with some industry thought leaders, or folks that are responsible for listening to the blogosphere, more news on that to come.

Over time blog posts can get more and more focused with technologies like microformats, and mobile devices where bloggers and customers can make instant, fast, reviews about services, products, hotels, and restaurants. Scary for businesses, and empowering for customers. The voice of the customer is louder and easier to find.

More discussions on this article on Techmeme

Posted in Social Media, Voice of the Customer | No Comments »

2

Holly’s Video of Lunch 2.0 at Hitachi Data Systems

Categories: EventsPosted on September 18th, 2006

Wow, Holly, this is so cool. Thank you so much, I love the house music, it’s very reflective of the high-tech center we have, and the energy at the event. This has got to be your best video to date! And I’m glad everyone scored so much booty!

Check out Holly’s video of Lunch 2.0, be sure to turn up the music!

You can see all the links from Lunch 2.0 here. Even our CTO has blogged about the event and our visit later that day to the Computer History Museum to celebrate the 50th of the Hard Drive. So much blog goodness out there.

Posted in Events | 2 Comments »

1

Animation: Life Without the Hard Drive

Categories: Data Storage, Events, Rich MediaPosted on September 18th, 2006

My colleagues at our sister corporation HGST (They make hard drives, HDS sells Storage Solutions) have published this cute animation of what it would be like without the Hardrive.

See the lower right image on this page to watch the animation, or access the video directly here. (No, I did NOT do the voice over for the little kid)

I first saw this video live at the Golden Celebration at the computer History museum with Hu Yoshida. The crowd had a good chuckle with this animation. See all my pics from the party here.

IBM had a clever video one too called the “Rebels with a cause“.

Update: I just submitted this story to Digg. There are other animations such as “Perpendicular Recording” on Digg.

Posted in Data Storage, Events, Rich Media | 1 Comment »

3

Online Backup and the Future of Online Storage

Categories: Data StoragePosted on September 17th, 2006

Michael reports that Carbonite looks like it’s doing hidden replication for a mere 5 dollars a month. More discussions from Techmeme.

A few days ago I published my thoughts on the Future of Online Storage - 40 Points to think about.

Carbonite, Mozy, Microsoft, and the other 100 online data storage companies all fall into my predictions, but please pay close attention to point #24.

Update: Kent has left some thoughts, see my points #35

Posted in Data Storage | 3 Comments »

7

The Big Heart of Robert Scoble (Would you let a Troll sleep in YOUR house?)

Categories: Community Marketing, RuminationsPosted on September 17th, 2006

Just got off the phone with Robert Scoble, his troll is going to sleep in his house tonight. He’s hosting Christopher Coulter at his house in Half Moon Bay. I can kind of tell that Robert’s a bit uneasy about this, both in his blog posts and the tone in his voice. I don’t know for sure why, but I think Chris announced to Robert that he’s coming to stay with him, or maybe the fact that Christopher has been Robert’s troll on his blog for quite some time now.

He frequently has left negative comments and challenges Robert’s postions, sometimes in a less than desirable sarcastic tone and attitude. He’s bothered me, but Robert seems to embrace him.

I admire Robert, the form technical evangelist at Microsoft who published his cell phone for the whole world to call him, and has an open door policy at his house for anyone to stay over. Wow, the guy is all heart.

I asked to talk to Chris but he couldn’t get to the phone, he said they’ll do a videoblog later, I can’t wait.

My questions for the videoblog:

1) To Chris, what made you want to come to Robert’s house?

2) To Chris: What do you do for a living, what’s your background?

3) To Chris: Why do you challenge Robert constantly?

4) To Maryam: How do you feel about this, and the open door policy? does this make you feel uncomfortable?

5) Robert: What’s your reaction to this all?

I wouldn’t normally blog about an situation like this, but I think it’s really big of Robert to let someone like this stay at his house, Robert’s about to announce his upcoming videoblog since he joined Podtech. I was just making sure that Robert gets positive vibes as he approaches this release, not just negativity or criticism from Christopher.

I left the following comment on Robert’s blog:

“I’m really surprised on this timing to have Chris come to your house now?

I wouldn’t want him around to detract you during your next phase.

I wish I could be a fly on the wall”

In Robert’s true diplomatic fashion he responded:

“Jeremiah: great ideas survive harsh criticism. That’s why I like having Chris around.”

I applaud you Robert, 99% of the world would never let their troll into their house, you’ve got a BIG heart Robert.

Posted in Community Marketing, Ruminations | 7 Comments »

1

The Web SIG Organizes

Categories: Events, Web IndustryPosted on September 17th, 2006

I’ve been exchanging emails with Bess Ho, one of the early members of the Silicon Valley Web Guild, and is an active member of the Internet Industry. She’s contacted me as she’d like me to help get the word out about some upcoming events her group The Web SIG is sponsoring and hosting. Apparently, she was at Lunch 2.0, but I didn’t get a chance to run into her. Here’s a nice summary of Web SIG:

Web SIG is a group focused on the latest Web technology, design and trends. Its platform promotes open discussions on technology and provides a friendly environment for exchanging technical information. Web SIG was founded by the original executive board members of Silicon Valley Webguild, a former local chapter of the Association of Internet Professionals and the oldest and largest Web organization in the bay area. from Web Host News

  • They have an event which will focus on Wikis.  It will be themed Matrix style for Halloween! You can get the details here.
  • They’ve other events at Adobe in Nov. Topics to include the Adobe Lab, Flex, and learning about the Startup Snapvine.com.
Web SIG is apparently free, and doesn’t charge admission online or at the door. Members can get discounts on books and other resources.Do you have a non-profit or special interest group for the internet industry event that you’re trying to promote? I’ll help if it’s on behalf of the fine professionals in the web industry. Good luck Bess and the rest of the Web SIG group.


Posted in Events, Web Industry | 1 Comment »

2

Best Wishes to Damon Billion, the Customer and Community Advocate

Categories: Community Marketing, Events, Ruminations, Voice of the CustomerPosted on September 17th, 2006

Yesterday we wished Damon a safe and happy journey to Thailand where he’ll be marrying his sweetheart.

If you don’t know Damon, he’s my counterpart (an early pioneer in Community Marketing) at Simplyhired, (known as SimplyDamon) and has been in similar roles at PayPal before that (read this paypal article about him).

Aside from our common professional backgrounds, Damon knew me in a previous life, (we ran in similar social circles while I was in college).

Damon and I have had many interesting discussions about business blogging, community marketing, social media, and the impacts of web on business.

At Damon’s party, I had a chance to talk to Dave McClure about a variety of web industry topics, also with Mario Sundar, and Julio Garcia.

Damon, here’s wishing you the best on your journey, I’ll be reading your blog, chat with you on Voip and see you in a few months.

Posted in Community Marketing, Events, Ruminations, Voice of the Customer | 2 Comments »

4

Heading to Chicago for Ragan PR Conference

Categories: Community Marketing, Conference, Social MediaPosted on September 17th, 2006

Speaking at PR Conference
I don’t consider myself a ‘PR’ guy by the traditional sense. However Social media certainly is a factor in the modern corporate communications effort, it’s empowered anyone to have a voice, customer, prospect, and employee. This Thur, I’ll be at Ragan Communications’s Strategic PR Conference.

In my opinion, it’s about message enablement, where multiple (if not all) employees participate in public relations. This has been a challenge for many ‘message holders and controllers’ across the industry but progress can’t be bottled and stopped. Learning to listen, understanding these new mediums, and then applying best practices are the key steps.

I’ve been asked to present this Thursday at the Ragan PR conference in Chicago. I’ll be discussing Web Strategy, Business Blogging, and Community Marketing.

(Update: just got off the phone with Chris Kent who’s working with Ragan PR, she’ll be interviewing me for the session. She read THIS blog post within minutes, I love it! I prefer dialogue rather than me speaking over powerpoint slides so I really welcome her involvement. She’s really cool, and apparently a bay area neighbor, looking forward to the session.  We’re going to talk about Social Media, Media Relations, Traditional PR, Lunch 2.0, and how Community Marketing programs fit within overall corporate announcements.)

PR/Social Media Thought Leaders
I’m also looking forward to meeting Jeff Treem for the first time, who’s a Chicago native. (David Dalka wants to have some interesting conversations, I can’t wait to meet him as well) I’ll also be in the wings of some great thought leaders like Shel Holtz, (yes the other Shel), Katie Paine, Jen McClure, and Robert Scoble.

Please reccomended things to do in Chicago
For those that have been to Chicago (or live in the area) can you please recomended some things for me to do and see while visiting, this will be my first visit to the windy city and I look forward to hearing your suggestions. Kindly leave a comment below.

Posted in Community Marketing, Conference, Social Media | 4 Comments »

0

Internet Popart Mashups: You’re the Man Now Dog!

Categories: Social MediaPosted on September 17th, 2006

Have you seen “You’re the Man Now Dog”? It’s hard to describe as it’s a combo of; Pop Art, Internet Culture, Mashup, inside and dark humor, and often crass. It was recently featured in Wired magazine, and is part of the internet experience. Anyone can upload these bits create audio and animation. It becomes a social art project as uploaders answer and ‘out do’ each other.

“YTMND is a site created for the purpose of furthering the creativity of its users. It stems from an idea that, using sound, and image, and some text, the users can convey a point, funny, political, or otherwise, to the general media. ” -Official About Page

Warning, some of ytmnd is not ‘work safe’ or may be less tasteful to some, so please cruise at your own leisure. Turning on sound is higly suggested.

Leave comments of your favorites.

Posted in Social Media | No Comments »

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