My blog has moved to http://www.socialmediamercenary.com/
My First Blog Post
April 10, 2010Replace the subject line and body with your first blog post and hit send! Include pictures, an mp3, or anything else you want to share. It's just that simple.
A Genius Idea: Make a Possibilities Calendar
March 3, 2010I saw this tip on Lifehacker:
If you’ve ever been that frustrating situation where you find yourself with some unexpected down time but don’t know how to fill it at a moment’s notice, lifestyle blog Life Scoop suggests putting together a possibilities calendar.
Blogger Asha Dornfest says she often runs across events or activities she’d like to attend, but aren’t necessarily important enough to carve out special time for. She created a “possibilities” calendar in Google Calendar and now, instead of relying on her memory to remind her of an art showing or movie she wants to check out, she simply parks the details on her calendar and pulls it up when she finds herself with some unplanned free time.
Dornfest keeps this special calendar stocked with things like movie and gym class schedules, museum hours of operation, open swim times at the local pool, and so on. Since she uses Google Calendar to organize her life, Dornfest keeps her Possibilities calendar hidden from view until she needs to consult it in order to avoid cluttering up her daily schedule.
This idea is genius. I always find things, like classes at the gym or movie times, that I want to keep track of, but didn’t want to put directly on my calendar or in my to-do list because it ends up cluttering my calendar up and makes it harder to track Must-Do’s and scheduling meetings becomes near impossible. But, without putting them on a calendar, I never could keep track. This solves the problem! Seriously, it’s such a simple idea, yet so genius in execution.
For Those of You Who Think Google is Evil and Take Over the World:
March 3, 2010There was an article up on Valleywag today, http://valleywag.gawker.com/5484200/how-apple-could-remotely-destroy-your-google-phone,
If Apple wins its patent-infringement caseagainst the GoogleNexus One smartphone, it might be able to get all existing handsets bricked or crippled. It’s not a far-fetched idea, a Harvard Law professortold the New York Times Bits blog.
After all, EchoStar was ordered to remotely destroy DVR functionality in its satellite TV boxes after losing a patent case to TiVo. “If the court were to side with Apple and issue an injunction that insists [Google’s manufacturer] HTC kill the phone, or at least some of its functionality, they easily could,” Prof. Jonathan Zittrain told Bits. Still, most lawyers seem to think the case will be settled. Settled, that is, if Apple CEO Steve Jobs can be persuaded to arrive at one of those compromises the perfectionist so famously dislikes.
Just to recap: Apple just started a patent war with HTC, which manufactors the Google Nexus 1, which could end the Google Nexus 1 experiment, if a compromise isn’t reached between Apple and Google, which by the way Apple isn’t exactly known for, which would help to put the iPhone back as the only Super-Smart Phone.
Even if Google is trying to take over the world, at least they allow open-source and some competition. Steve Jobs doesn’t allow either.
This takes away Steve Jobs argument that Google is evil, or at least makes it a pot calling the kettle black situation.
It also further reinforces my belief that Steve Jobs is, in fact, the Anti-Christ.
Learning Leads to Genius or Seth Godin Does It Again
March 1, 2010SEth Godin had a recent post on genius: http://sethgodin.typepad.com/seths_blog/2010/02/genius-is-misunderstood-as-a-bolt-of-lighting.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed:+typepad/sethsmainblog+(Seth’s+Blog)&utm_content=Google+Reader
Genius is misunderstood as a bolt of lightning
Genius is the act of solving a problem in a way no one has solved it before. It has nothing to do with winning a Nobel prize in physics or certain levels of schooling. It’s about using human insight and initiative to find original solutions that matter.
This is exactly why mastermind groups, and reading, and idea discussion are so important. Those things lead to same the human insight and initiative that Seth Godin is talking about above.
With out those, there is no genius. Without genius, there is no moving forward. Period.
Unfinished Projects: An Unexpected Energy Drain
March 1, 2010I was reading http://www.happiness-project.com/happiness_project/2010/02/finish-the-projects-youve-started-or-call-an-end-to-them.html about unfinished projects.
I realized that a source of clutter in my apartment, and a significant drain on my energy, was the uncomfortable presence of unfinished projects.
This is a classic example of things that sound so simply when you read them, but until you read them you don’t really think about it.
The first time I read Getting Things Done, I had a similar realization. While I understood the concept behind the mind dump, I really didn’t think it’d bring about all of the things promised in the book: increased creativity! increased focus! increased energy!
So, I did the mind dump and it was true. I DID have increased creativity and focus, but most surprising was I really did have more energy.
I went a back to my mind dump a few days later and really examined it. At least half of the things on the list we’re half done projects in varying states of completion. I love projects. I live for projects. And I looked at that list and did something completely out of character for me-I picked gave myself a set number of projects to allow myself and crossed eliminated any beyond the number and vowed not to take on any unless the project wouldn’t put me over that number.
Did it alleviate me of all unfinished projects? Nope. Did it stop me from keeping some projects unfinished? Nope. Did it help me focus and actually complete some projects, especially when I had an idea for a new project that I really, really wanted to start? Absolutely.
I’m taking it slow, so my project number is most certainly higher than it should be, but it’s already significantly helped my productivity and overall energy levels and mental well-being. As I get used to having a set number and accomplish more projects, I’m actually looking forward to dropping the number lower and lower until I get to my Ultimate Goal of only three projects open at once.
It really is amazing how much the things you don’t think you’re thinking about actually really do affect you.
Untitled
March 1, 2010
To my surprise, I’ve realized recently that my articles from StayNAlive.com and other blogs are being shared, in their full text, on Buzz and having my ads stripped from them, without my permission.
For those unaware, there’s a “subscribe” button when you visit this blog that allows anyone to obtain the RSS of this blog and plug it into a Reader. For those of you reading this in a Reader, thank you, and you’re already aware of this. One thing I have done with those feeds if you haven’t noticed is at the bottom of each post in the RSS, I’ve added Google Adsense to my feeds so I can at least cover my costs of running this blog and make at least a few cents a day trying to re-coup costs of hosting and time spent writing posts. If you visit http://staynalive.com/feed in a browser like Chrome, you can look at the raw feed and see the ads at the bottom of each post. Or, if you’re reading this post in a traditional feed reader, look down at the bottom of this post and you’ll see the ad.
However, there’s a feature on Buzz that enables anyone reading my shared posts to expand the summarized content and view the entire post, right in Buzz. For one, I didn’t give Buzz permission to do this on shared posts, and second, Buzz is stripping out my ads, depriving me of that potential revenue rather than either displaying those ads, or redirecting the user back to my site where I can monetize that in some other form. This is blatant copyright infringement if you ask me! Now, if you expand my posts, since it’s integrated into Gmail, look over to the right – see those ads? Yup, I’m not getting a penny of that.
Google is now monetizing my content, and neglecting to ask for my permission in doing so, while removing what I had put in place to monetize my content. Starting today, I’m removing my blog from my Google Profile, as well as my Google Reader shares so that I don’t help further the copyright infringement on other blogs I share. The problem that still exists is that anyone who shares my content from Google Reader will also have my content available on Buzz in full format, and my ads stripped. There’s no way to stop it, and Google is encouraging this wrong practice.
To be clear, I’m fine with them either displaying the ads that I put there (and allowing me to monetize off the other ads that are on the page), or just summarizing the article and encouraging users to click through to my site. I’m not okay with Google scraping my content, stripping my ads, altering my content, and pushing it out for them to get 100% of the revenues off of something I spent time and money making.
Google, how is this not evil? Maybe I should us
After reading http://staynalive.com/articles/2010/02/25/is-google-stealing-authors-copyright-with-buzz/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed:+StayNAlive+(Stay+N’+Alive)&utm_content=Google+Reader, I completely see the point that this blogger was trying to make. It’s completely understandable and unfair of Buzz.
My question is if you can add Ad Sense ads to posts in a feed through Google Reader, why can’t you do that with Buzz?
Get on it Google! Chop chop!
Untitled
March 1, 2010
Here is a breakdown of the reasons listed in the video:
-
Social media is now the number one online activity, beating porn and personal email to the top spot.
-
Because 2/3 of the global Internet population visit social networks.
-
Because time spent on social networks is growing at 3X the overall Internet rate, accounting for 10% of all Internet time.
-
Because online, including social media, has become the most influential source in helping consumers make purchasing decisions.
-
Because millions of people are creating content for the social web.
-
Because the next 3 billion consumers will access the Internet from a mobile device.
-
Because Facebook is now the operating system of the social web.
-
Because Twitter believes it will have 1 billion users by 2012.
-
Because one way marketing has had its day.
-
Because in almost all cases social media is free.
I love charts and graphs and statistics. But I found these even more interesting than usual.For one thing is social media is beating porn and email. Porn and email is what the internet was based on. For social media to top that? That’s just huge. Add in the rate at which social media usage is growing and wow. Just wow.I think the note about social media becoming the most influential source in helping consumers make decisions is just huge, for both consumers and companies. For consumers because it allows you get feedback on a product from “real people” and also creates a demand for company transparency. With the dawning of social media and its continuing usage increasing at phenomenal rates, companies are losing the ability hide things, whether it be shoddy products or terrible customer service. This is also big for companies, because if they’re paying attention, it opens up a whole world of possibilities for improved products and customer service, along with better marketing for specialized niches. It’ll be interesting to how this plays out over the next few years.Also interesting to watch is Facebook and Twitter’s current dominance. I’m of the school of thought that everything has a rise and fall, so I’m interested to see when and where the fall will come, and most importantly why. It’ll also be interesting to see what rises from the ashes. I’m thinking that location based apps are the next big thing and either will become more heavily integrated into Facebook or a new Facebook-Foursquare hybrid will emerge.Another interesting point is the last one about social media being free. While yes, the vast majority of social media channels are free, most have ads, so technically you are paying in some way. Whether advertising divisions of companies shape up and deliver more customized ads remains to be seen.
Facebook Patent: A Haiku
February 28, 2010Facebook was not first.
They had thought to patten first.
Tough cookies everyone.
I think that just about sums that up.
Leslie A. Joy 