blogging

It is with excitement that I announce that I'm writing a new book, Twitterville--How Business can Thrive in the new Global Neighborhoods. Charlene Li will be writing the Foreword and Chris Brogan will author a guest chapter on Twitter tools. My publisher is Portfolio, a respected Penguin Books, imprint. I start writing later today. Like Naked Conversations, Twitterville is primarily a business book. It is filled with examples of how people in all sizes and kinds of business are using Twitter to thrive in these tough times. It explains how Twitter and social media shine some light to the exit from the current economic tunnel. These are times of enormous constraint. History shows us that constraints always lead to fundamental change. Old ways die and new ways emerge and thrive. Twitterville argues that in these tough times, certain business practices--those that have become bloated, inefficient and ineffective will fall by the wayside only to be replaced by newer, better ways. New, cheaper, faster technologies almost always replaces ones that have become frayed by modern times. Picking up on a theme of Naked Conversations, Twitterville argues that we have already entered into a new Conversational Era, one that is replacing the old Broadcast Era, whose approach is simply too costly and ineffective. This has been going on for a while, but now, businesses wishing to survive these tough times, wise businesses will accelerate their migration to social media. Their second choice is to take a one-way trip to Jurassic Park to join other fossils who could not meet challenges for change in their times. Twitterville champions all social media and recommends that businesses choose the right combinations of tools that are now in the vast social media arsenal. But it points to Twitter as a tool that almost no company should overlook. Why? Because it is the most intimate of social media tools. It lets people in business get closer with customers, partners and other ecosystem members. It is fast, inexpensive, the barriers to entry are close to non existent and the community is quick to forgive and forgive minor gaffes to new Twitterville community members. Most important, Twitter, lets people behave online almost exactly how they behave in real life. Conversations often start on everyday subjects--as they do in real life. Two people chat about weather, sports, movies and yes, what they had for dinner. Over time they get to trust and understand each other. They begin to recommend to each other items to buy, watch, listen to or visit. They influence each other in ways that no advertisement can compete with. These simple, frequent conversations dwarf the influence of a newspaper ad. I call it Twitterville, because it has the feel of a small town, a place where neighbors know each other by name and reputation, help each other through a sense of community a place where the greatest influence is achieve, not by a branding budget, but the contributions made to the community. But Twitterville may be the world's largest and fastest growing small town. There are at least 3.5 million people there and it is growing faster than any megalopolis in the real world. The people of Twitterville come from scores of countries and speak many languages. Yet it remains a small town. Twitterville resides only in cyberspace, where geography is almost irrelevant. The space is virtual, but the relationships being formed their are real and powerful and have already begun to reshape businesses. Twitterville is primarily a business book. It looks at more than a score of examples of people in global enterprises and in home offices; people in retail, service, emergency preparedness; candidates and shows how they are using the small town, personal, transparent little teaspoonfuls of conversation to transform their businesses even in these tough times. They may not be thriving today, but as times get better, as businesses get closer to the inevitable light at the end of the tunnel, they will be in a better position to thrive than entities that fail to meet the urgent challenges of change that these tough times require. Writing this book will be my fulltime endeavor for the next few months. This book needs to get out fast. I am hoping that you will help me as much as the blogosphere helped Scoble and me to write Naked Conversations. I'll be talking about this book here and on Twitter a great deal. I want your feedback. I want you to tell me what works and what sucks. Mostly I want you to share with me great examples of businesses and organizations who are using Twitter in innovative and effective ways. Because of the focus necessary, I am tabling two other projects for the next few months. The Social Media Global Report's weekly interviews will be put on hold until after the book is written. I will keep paying attention to China, but as of today, I will be writing about it less. I expect to return to both in the Spring, after this book is completed. I look forward to hearing your comments and ideas. shel

A three-year research project, headed by Mimi Ito, involving 28 researchers and 800 subjects, and sponsored by the MacArthur Foundation, finds that the stereotypical idea of the Internet as a soul-devouring, anti-social wasteland for our kids is just plain wrong. If you suspected otherwise, now you know you were right.

The report makes a key distinction that helps explain some of the confusion we’ve been living through. From the press release:

The researchers identified two distinctive categories of teen engagement with digital media: friendship-driven and interest-driven. While friendship-driven participation centered on “hanging out” with existing friends, interest-driven participation involved accessing online information and communities that may not be present in the local peer group.

Here’s one interesting observation, from the overview:

Some youth “geek out” and dive into a topic or talent. Contrary to popular images, geeking out is highly social and engaged, although usually not driven primarily by local friendships. Youth turn instead to specialized knowledge groups of both teens and adults from around the country or world, with the goal of improving their craft and gaining reputation among expert peers. While adults participate, they are not automatically the resident experts by virtue of their age. Geeking out in many respects erases the traditional markers of status and authority.

The study’s implications for education are significant. From the overview:

Youths’ participation in this networked world suggests new ways of thinking about the role of education. What, the authors ask, would it mean to really exploit the potential of the learning opportunities available through online resources and networks? What would it mean to reach beyond traditional education and civic institutions and enlist the help of others in young people’s learning? Rather than assuming that education is primarily about preparing for jobs and careers, they question what it would mean to think of it as a process guiding youths’ participation in public life more generally.

[Tags: internet_sociology macarthur_foundation education digital_natives ]v

Monty Python has announced that it’s making all many of its works available for free on YouTube. Yay!

What is the best Python-referencing headline for a post announcing this? “A hovercraft full of reels”? “Not pining for the fee(ords)”? “Wring out your dead”?

[Tags: monty_python doep puzzle ]

There are many joys in the journey through life, but plenty of pitfalls too. Sometimes the most difficult blockages to overcome are the ones inside your own head. The way you think, and what you tell yourself about events and people, can stop you cold on the journey towards happiness.

Read the full text of this article on the blog's website.

Make money: not by building an internet company, but by using the net as a tool to create value and get paid. Use the internet as a tool, not as an end. Do it when you are part of a... Seth Godin

I wanted to take this moment to celebrate the launch of my sixth book, Mobile as 7th of the Mass Media (subtilted Cellphone, Cameraphone, iPhone, Smartphone). The book appeared on Amazon UK and Amazon USA this week and had its first ranking at the UK site already (debuting at 59,000 ranking and number 36 in telecoms books and 78 in advertising books). Remember that you can always buy it direct from the publisher (probably also the fastest way to get the book still now in November 2008) who ship worldwide at http://mobile7th.futuretext.com/

The book has incredibly warm first reviews, ranging from Chip Hawkins (we all know him as the founder of Electronic Arts and he now is chairman of Digital Chocolate) to Vodafone's Strategy Director Daniel Appelquist calling it my best book yet. Digital tech guru and fellow author Paul Golding has written the first book review (I can't believe how fast these are coming in these days, when my first book came out, it took literally six months for the first review to be published) and I can only say, thank you Paul, you are incredible.

But the big news is that I have launched a blog about the book at   www.7thMassMedia.com   and welcome all of our readers to sample the blog and those who have an active interest in how mobile is used as a mass media channel (including of course mobile advertising, mobile marketing and engagement marketing on mobile). The blog will also track the feedback for the book.

As to our loyal readers here at CDB - do not worry. I am not going to desert you ha-ha.. I love the CDB community and especially waking up and starting my online day visiting the CDB blog and discovering a new blog by Alan. He is my inspiration and hero, and I only wish he had time to post every day...

And then there are our regular readership, who give us such a rich sounding board here in digital feedback, and a continuing dialogue on the comments sections. I will of course continue blogging here. But some readers must have felt over the past three years that at times Tomi's postings are "almost too much" about mobile. That is why the 7th Mass Media blog (and book). I will focus mobile-specifc blogs to only 7th MM, and advertising/marketing blogs only to CDB, but any convergence areas to both of course.

But check out the 7th MM blog and consider it for yourself. And yes, anyone reading this, if you would like to sample either my brand new book on Mobile being the 7th Mass Media, or if you have not yet read Communities Dominate Brands - then send me an email to tomi at tomiahonen dot com and request an excerpt of either (or both) books. The CDB excerpt is one chapter in length (plus book foreword from Coca Cola and one case study) while the 7th MM book excerpt runs 2 full chapters and the foreword and one case study. I'll be delighted to send you the samples from the books so you can safely test the books for free, before thinking of buying them. We believe in this method, that is why we practise what we preach at CDB (and 7thMM).

I now had 3 days at 2 conferences in London where both Jonathan MacDonald and I spoke (or chaired) here in London and we both observed a palpable energy about this intention to pursue that "army of fanatics" and how comprehensively that will change not only advertising and marketing, but also telecoms and IT, and media, and indeed all of business, and beyond business, into government, education etc.

Jonathan "J Mac" wrote about how this changes his mind-set, and he is shifting gears. For those who know him, he does not mean he is "shifting down" ha-ha (J Mac is incredibly energetic and dynamic, far more so than I am for example, and many say I am quite energetic ha-ha) - no, Jonathan is shifting gears now - upwards. He goes from talking about the "Communication Ideal" in the "Every Single One of Us" thinking. I just blogged about it that it is the natural progression of where our book ended in 2005 and should be read by anyone who liked our book.

But now, he moves beyond. J Mac is working on "volume 2" of the Every Single One of Us thinking. He goes from how to communicate it, to how to do it. He calls it "No Way Back from Here." He blogged about it yesterday (I cannot imagine how he found the time for that), a very revealing posting showing where he feels the "vibe" is in this space.

Meanwhile at the Mobile Content conference yesterday, that I chaired and where J Mac was deliberately set to be the last speaker to close it out (he chaired it on Day 1, when I was the keynote ha-ha, see the parallel), I was asked by several, why no, why here, why us. Why not Silicon Valley, or Finland, or based on my book Digital Korea, why is this sudden leadership into the "army of fanatics" philosophy not emerging out of South Korea. I had some quick responses to that, but am thinking about it, and have a far more complete picture in my mind emerging now. I will blog about it shortly.

If you look at young people - under employment age but already fully literate - and how they interact with technology, and in particular computers and mobile phones, and the internet on both (a revealing statistic of Flirtomatic UK users from the conference yesterday - Flirtomatic has over 1 million users mostly in the UK, with a little over half using mobile and the rest using the internet version, with a youth and young adult -skewing user base. But an "online" survey conducted via mobile only (so obviously these are heavily mobile Flirtomatic users) of 6,000 Flirtomatic registered users, which asked do you use the internet - not if they used Flirtomatic - on their mobile phones - then a totally stunning 85% said yes. If this is out of half a million british users, and a massive sample size of 6,000 (normal Gallup style marketing research surveys have sample sizes typically of 1,000 or so) - they find over 8 in 10 (young) mobile phone users in the UK who access the internet on their mobile.

I do not mean to suggest that 8 in 10 Brits do so. Absolutely not. But I do mean this indicates that of the Flirtomatic (mobile version) user base, which is half a million strong, the vast majority already do.

Sorry about the distraction (oh, and another side note, Flirtomatic CEO, Mark Curtis's book is Distraction, and a brilliant read. Its subtitle is Being Human in a Digital Age, it is very very thought-provoking).

Sorry, yes. But I meant, if you look at young people today - younger than working age, and how they use the internet, mobile, etc - then you see they work and collaborate totally in different ways to their elders.

Totally differently. They know instinctively how to Google and search. They know instinctively how to collaborate in Wikipedia and post their reviews on Amazon and give their mood on Facebook. They do real time commentary on Twitter (I just had a series of 20 or so comments of my Future of Mobile conference presentation Twittered in real time. I read them afterwards and it made for a strange reading of what was on the minds of the audience. Very humbling..)

Now how will this Generation C (Community Generation) behave in the future? How will they work when they graduate and get their first jobs? How will they run companies when they move up the ladder and start to assume control.

They KNOW instinctively, that collaboration - especially in the digital information age - is the natural competitive advantage. They will insist on collaboration. Remember the "bizarre" CEO fifteen years ago who insisted that all executives have to use email, or the CEO ten years ago who insisted all management have to actively use SMS text messaging in internal communications. Their companies achieved competitive advantages over their rivals that in hindsight gave them "insurmountable" leads in productivity, and ceteris paribus (all other things being equal) would propel their company into far better competitive performance than their peers from that time.

Now, lets get back, to our J Mac.

He read our book. He says so everywhere. He then went out and thought about it. He came back, worked in this space - helping launch Blyk - and now is teaching the digital advertising world how this really works - through his current employer Ogilvy One. Fine. But he already wrote one book, and no doubt is collecting his thoughts onto his follow-up volume.

Imagine from an investor's or owner's point of view. If you could have someone like J Mac (or our Alan Moore or say David Cushman or someone else like those, who has actually done it, built successful "Communities Dominate Brands" based businesses and processes) and who then have taken those lessons and pushed this thinking beyond our 2005 book - all while sharing and collaborating with us. Imagine if you could have this talent in your organization, to tap into that ocean of marketing power, that is "an army of fanatics." Your company would shortly become unstoppable.

And army of fanatics. Imagine if you had that? You could not lose. Apple has an army of fanatics with the Macintosh computers. Apple has another army of fanatics with the iPod (with some overlap obviously). Now they launched the iPhone - through their army of fanatics. Of course it became the best-selling smartphone in the USA (where the bulk of that army of fanatics is, obviously). Barack Obama used his army of fanatics to get elected.

This is not just Blyk in the UK. This is an universal trend. But it is a radical innovation in all of business (and government and non-profits - imagine Greenpeace - that is certainly an army of fanatics - and beyond). An army of fanatics is not "only" in the digital space. It is a universal trend in humanity, and only online digital networks will enhance that ability, boost it. Remember that the mobile phone is the ultimate lubricant to this interactivity and collaboration, as Howard Rheingold said, mobile phones amplify the human talents for cooperation. Because we all carry them (not all have laptops) and because we always carry them (even sleep with them) and they are always connected (not like spotty coverage of laptops at some WiFi hotspots).

But yes, a rambling posting. There is a fierce urgency of now. Some companies will "get it" and increasingly they will seek out the best thoughts of the thought-leaders in this space. And then when David and Alan and J Mac (and Tomi) say that wait - there is an even more profound change happening now, beyond just blogging and Twittering and SMS...  That there is a fundamental shift in how some organizations work - they will pay attention. And they will experiment in this space. And their experiments will bear incredible fruits - remember Tohato potato chips campaign from Japan, remember the BMW winter tyres campaign from Germany, remember Obama's campaign from the USA. Its not just here in the UK, it is global.

There is no going back. We have come upon the cliff. We know there is a future and now we are told to take a leap of faith. And the latest to push us to jump is J Mac. He says there is no way back from here. Read it.

Rebranding a Newly Acquired Business: They Told Me Not To

Not long ago, I purchased an online business. When I bought the business, it came with its own, pretty well known brand, was a fairly profitable business and had a loyal client base. After obtaining the business, I pondered over completely rebranding it. The business didn’t require a fresh image, but it was something I personally felt would be a profitable choice as the new owner. I had plans to grow the business prior to acquiring it and giving it a brand make-over is just one of the ways I hoped to do so.

During the planning process, I consulted with business coaches, owners, and even those who worked in the same type of service based business. During that time, I had not one, but two business coaches tell me NOT to rebrand it. Both suggested rebranding the site was not necessary due to the fact it already had its own unique brand.

This led me to really think about which direction I wanted to take the business. I also had a hard decision to make in deciding just how willing I was to possibly lose current clients or turn future clients away. No one wants to think they may lose faithful clients, especially when acquiring a new business that has reached successful status. However, the more I thought about the direction I wanted to go and the types of clients I wanted to attract, the more I realized the following:

1. If the previous owner was the only reason they did business with the site chances are likely that they were eventually going to leave anyway, regardless of whether I took the site in a new direction or not.

2. Those clients who stayed on board did so because of the quality my team had given them since I took over. If they were happy with our services and we maintained those same services and quality, they would continue working with us no matter what I chose to do with the brand.

I planned to continue with the same services and have even added a few more. Therefore, the choice based on those two items was fairly easy. I now had one plus on my pros and cons of rebranding list.

My ultimate goal was to grow the business. I now had to think about the types of clients I hoped to attract in the future to make this possible. This is where rebranding gets a bit personal. Branding is more than just a logo and tagline. It also includes the ideals, direction and personality of the business. In the case of an online service based business, this means the owner, team members, and customers, given that they all make up the business.

This is another of the reasons I deliberated rebranding the business. When I took over, it had already changed hands once. The current brand reflected the original owner perfectly. However, the brand wasn’t really representative of my personality or the professionalism I wanted to portray.

I wanted a broader, more qualified image that reflected who I am as a person and more of the actual services offered. Yes, the previous site was good at letting people know that articles were their forte due to the fact the word article was in their name. However, I wanted to reach more than just business owners who needed ghostwritten articles. When someone simply sees the word “article” it doesn’t tell them right off the bat what it is the business is all about. If someone is searching for a service that creates special reports or sales pages for example, would the word article turn them away because they think at first glance that it’s only an article writing service?

What about the person who does needs articles ghostwritten? Due to the previous business name, it wasn’t really clear if it provided article writing services or something else. See where I’m going? I wanted to capture a broader range of customers that needed more than just articles written. By changing not only the brand, but the name of the business as well, I would be opening the playing field to a bigger range of possible customers.

Of course, these are not the ONLY things I had to consider before deciding whether or not to go forward with the rebranding of the business, but they were a big part of the thinking and planning process. I knew the business was doing well when I purchased it and absolutely respected the decisions of those who told me I shouldn’t rebrand it (after all they are business coaches for a reason and very good at what they do). Even after all these things, I still felt in my gut rebranding was necessary to get where I wanted to be with this business. Therefore, I went ahead with my original plans and gave the site a completely new look and feel.

I’m happy to say the results have been phenomenal! In the less than two months since the rebranding process was complete and Get Content Results (formerly Article Mojo) was opened to the public, I have more than doubled my client base!

No Tags

Writing a novel is a much different beast than writing magazine articles or maintaining a blog. That’s why a new tool called FortyChapters makes a lot of sense. The site is essentially a web-based app for organizing your work, saving it so it can be accessed from anywhere, and providing some ideas and prompts for how to structure your novel.

The key features of the app are being able to create characters, acts, and chapters. You can see all of these from one screen, which should help writers keep track of where they are in the book and the attributes of the characters they’ve created. Novel writing, according to FortyChapters, can essentially be broken down into three acts: (1) Before (2) Impetus (3) Outcome. Within those three acts, you can create chapters. The service then offers a simple text editor for writing your story, which allows you to save all of your work online. This is convenient since it means you can work on your novel from anywhere there is Web access.

Beyond helping you write and organize your novel, FortyChapters provides some simple options for exporting and printing. The service offers a free 30-day trial, after which subscriptions are $10/mo. This is incredibly fair – many users will likely realize writing a novel isn’t for them after 30 days, while those that have invested a lot of time in developing their work will gladly start paying to continue using the service.

One thing I’d like to see on FortyChapters is more of the writing prompts and structural ideas that accompany some of the different features; as a blogger that occasionally gets writer’s block, I can’t imagine the stress that novelists must feel from time to time. The UI can also be a bit clunky, though the organization – being able to move back and forth between characters, acts, and chapters all from one screen – is quite good.

While personally I don’t aspire to write more than 300-500 word blog posts anytime soon, FortyChapters might be worth a look if you’re setting out to write the next great novel – or at least want to try to for a few weeks.

Simon Salt is CEO of marketing communications company the IncSlingers. He writes for www.simonsalt.com and Dad-O-Matic

You use Twitter, email, IM and even your phone to stay in touch with your world. Maybe your office uses services like Yammer for internal communication. But once you are done tweeting, emailing and instant messaging, you have to do actual work.

Wouldn’t it be great if you could at least use those tools to help you get some of that work done? Xpenser, developed by Trastr Inc, allows for a number of different tools to be utilized to keep track of expenses. Here is how to use Twitter with Xpenser to track them:

Get Started!

Getting started is simple. Go to Xpenser, create a free account, and add your Twitter account (no password required). Then add Xpenser to your list of following, which will let you send direct messages to that account, e.g. D Xpn Taxi $15.00 #clienttrip. This automatically updates the expenses for the category clienttrip. The same can be achieved through the use of IM, email or SMS.

Track Multiple Clients and Expenses

If you are on a multi-leg, multi-client trip, you might want to ensure that the right client is billed the right expense. To do this you go to the “Reports” tab, enter the name for the new report – ClientABC, ClientXYZ, VegasConference, whatever you decide to name them. You can decide to make one of the reports the “default” report, which means that all new expenses that are untagged will go into this report.

Keep Track of Mileage

Xpenser has a conversion feature which enables you to keep track of your mileage. It can be accessed from the “Keywords” tab, where you can set a pre-determined rate of conversion. Imagine a realtor driving from appointment to appointment throughout the day. Now, instead of having to write their mileage down for each appointment and then get back to the office and calculate their mileage expense, they can simply use their smart phone and Direct Message Xpenser on Twitter with the number of miles for each appointment as they arrive: D Xpn 23 miles Jones house.

As long as the message includes either the word mileage or miles, Xpenser will convert the number of miles into a cost based on the preset conversion rate. It then enters it into the account that you specified, and if you don’t specify an account it will go into the default account.

Everywhere Else

If you’re not interested in using Twitter to create expense reports, Xpenser also supports instant messaging, email, text/sms, and voice. There is also an export to Freshbooks feature, and through partnerships with Jott and Dial2Do, voice recording is available in the US, Canada, and 17 other countries, allowing users to simply “call in” their expenses. In addition, the web interface allows you to edit previous entries or make new ones, export to excel, Quicken, MS Money, and Freshbooks.

So, would you manage your expense reports on Twitter?

Simon Salt is CEO of marketing communications company the IncSlingers. He writes daily at www.simonsalt.com and weekly at Chris Brogan’s parenting blog Dad-O-Matic, and is also an avid Twitter user. He is focused on dragging traditional marketers into Web 2.0 before the arrival of Web 3.0. He loves to help out and volunteers his time and knowledge whenever asked. He is Director of Technology for the Austin Chapter of the AMA and is currently working on a Twitter guide for all users.

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Maybe you’re a fan of Google’s Grand Central phone controller. Maybe you also happen to be a Mac addict. So how do you match those two loves into one? Vocito, that’s how.

Savvy to your Mac OS X desktop and things like Address Book, Automator, and the third-party engineered QuickSilver, Vocito manages your management of the multiple phone numbers in your life within slick fashion. In a manner of speaking, it makes easier a process that’s already been quite easy. Way easier, you might say, even if its job is technically more complex.

You could of course use Vocito much the same way you would the browser-based application - albeit doing so within a more Mac-like enclosure. Nothing stops you from heading straight down the usual road.

Open Source Power to the Nth Degree

But power users in the Mac realm might consider that a sheepish use of code. Address Book integration is convenient enough, yes. Yet Vocito’s support for Automator and AppleScript actions, as well as Quicksilver commands, takes things to another level. Really, if you wish, you can manipulate the application without drawing your hands away from your keyboard.

For the most part, Vocito lives a pretty non-ostentatious life on your computer. So long as you can tolerate the presence of a favicon-sized menu bar button sitting astride your clock, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, and audio control features, it’ll be at the ready while keeping largely out of the way.

And that’s presumably how many Grand Central users choose to operate the service, making Vocito an ideal candidate for extending your virtual phone switchboard to your Mac desktop. Wonderfully enough, the download is Tiger- and Leopard-compatible with both Intel and PowerPC support. It’s also entirely open source.

Limited GC Beta Access Puts a Cap on Vocito’s Debut

The only immediate downside is that Google is holding Grand Central under a limited beta restriction, disallowing any immediate sign-ups, which I imagine a good number of folks interested in Vocito will be looking for. A forum has been established for people to voice their thoughts and concerns.

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Mobispine, the mobile services developer already responsible for introducing a $1.99 self-titled iPhone application for RSS news junkies, has debuted a white-label option for wireless carriers to deliver to subscribers seeking classic MMS utility from their devices. Just short of an extension of the iPhone’s standard SMS software, Mobispine’s offering is something that just might fly.

Media Sharing Apps Aplenty, But Still No Real MMS

As iPhone users have known since the App Store’s launch, there are already many ways to send MMS (multimedia messaging service) data from the device to Web users. The Mail and optional Facebook applications are just two avenues. And a pseudo MMS service for iPhone, called Flutter, gets iPhone users into mobile-to-mobile.

But white-label - and ultimately carrier-branded - MMS software is something Mobispine seems to be breaking new ground with. True MMS software just does not inhabit the iPhone world. And if any operators are to convince Apple of the efficacy of bringing such an option to the platform, it is the selection of wireless carriers around the world who are partnered with Apple that will make it happen.

Is the White-Label Angle the Golden Ticket?

Nothing’s certain, mind you. Though Mobispine says it is “confident that operators will find the service easy to use and profitable with an opportunity to expand messaging usage, improve subscriber retention and increase revenue,” adoption is something that has no guarantee. But things in the world of SMS and MMS are very much about uniformity. Mobispine appears to offer the latter option.

We’re eager to see who bites first.

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WhoVoted.net tells you who voted, based on public election records. So far it’s only ratting out those dirty stinking voters in four states (Florida, Idaho, Ohio, and Washington).

Who voted and who contributed money to campaigns has always been public info in the US. But when you had to blow dust off of ledger pages in the basement of your town hall, we didn’t feel quite so exposed. Welcome to the fishbowl!

[Tags: democracy elections transparency ]

Many people decorate their workspace with pictures of their families. Often, these photos serve as a good conversation piece. But, what if you could have a life-sized cutout of your kids, playing sports? That’s where StickyFan comes in.

The service lets you upload a photo of your kid (or really, anyone, but the focus is on child athletes) and then order either a huge cutout or a poster. Cutouts can be up to 6 feet tall, while posters are 24” x 36”. Stickyfan offers its own photo editing tools, and sends you a proof of what your cutout will look like within 24 hours of submission so you can approve it or request changes.

Of course, some might look at placing a life-sized cutout of your kid in your office as a bit gratuitous, but I’m sure plenty of child athletes would love to have one for their room. After all, life-size cutouts and posters of professional athletes have always been a staple of kid’s room decorations. StickyFan is also doing some smart marketing, offering youth sports leagues an opportunity to utilize the service for fundraising.

Meanwhile, since my youth sports career peeked around age 12 and I have no kids of my own yet, I’ve taken the humble measure of ordering a life-sized cutout of myself on top of a mountain:

Andrew Warner is an Internet entrepreneur and the founder of Mixergy.com.

Tim Ferriss’ relationships with bloggers helped him reach the New York Times bestseller list with his book, The Four Hour Work Week. I recently called Tim to ask him how to market to bloggers. Here’s what he taught me:

Start before you need something

“I reached out to certain bloggers as far as a year in advance of the book being published,” Tim told me. By building his connections ahead of time, he never had to start a relationship with a blogger by asking for a favor.

Meet bloggers in person

Tim started building his relationships face to face. “The least crowded channel for meeting high profile bloggers is in person,” Tim said. “Email is the most difficult, the most crowded… I’m a top 1,000 blogger, not a top 100 blogger, and I get hundreds of pitches by email every week. Most of them I don’t even see because my assistant declines them.”

Don’t be a promoter

Nobody wants to get to know a guy who does nothing but promote himself. “Your job is to convince them of the messenger, not the message,” he told me. “Don’t try to push your message until you establish yourself as someone they’re willing to listen to.”

Don’t join the crowd

Top bloggers can be mobbed at events. Instead of joining the crowds, Tim got to know the people behind the top bloggers. The first time he met Robert Scoble, Tim said, “You know what man, everyone wants to talk to you. I don’t have a really good question for you, so I’m not going to hassle you.” And he got to know Robert’s wife and coworkers instead.

Be part of something bigger

Instead of pitching his book, Tim talked to bloggers about a trend that his book related to: outsourcing as a way to save time. When he called them, he’d say, “Here’s a concept or phenomenon that I think would be fun to talk about with your readers.” He told me that bloggers would often give him credit for the idea, and when they mentioned the name Tim Ferriss, they “inevitably linked to my page or my Amazon book page.”

Do you know any other tips for promoting to bloggers? Add them to the comments.

Andrew Warner’s last internet company was a big stinking failure and he had to shut it down. To keep from having a company collapse again, he’s interviewing as many Internet successes as he can. You can hear his interviews on Mixergy.

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Online music and its controversies are unavoidable, and with no end of hunger for access to tunes, the market has been an evolving battleground. With mavericks (in the non-Palin sense) like the aptly-named Grooveshark seeking to take a bite out of things, it’s refreshing to know that some services are using a lateral method — a “blue ocean” approach, you might say.

SoundCloud is one such service. Previously in invite-only beta, SoundCloud launched publicly in October. The service lets you “move music fast & easy. The platform takes the daily hassle out of receiving, sending & distributing music for artists, record labels & other music professionals.”

Anyone can sign up for a free SoundCloud account that includes five track uploads a month. They’re already distinguishing themselves by simplifying the process of sending demos to record labels, something which has historically been done by sub-optimal “attach an MP3″ email or form submission. I’ve done a lot of multimedia compilation, and all those extra steps to sort files gets tiring and dampens the joy of listening.

Beyond the usual…

Here’s where it gets really exciting: SoundCloud is exceptionally blissful to use. Not just pretty, but practical. Beyond the usual AJAX and Flash touches that reduce page reloads and imbue a sense of sheen, there are helpful features that are often found on desktop music apps but seldom on web ones.

For example, after a song’s uploaded, you can tap BPM (Beats Per Minute). Part of the reasoning behind this is because SoundCloud has started holding remix contests, where knowing the tempo is essential to syncing parts, also known as “stems”, with others. Even better, you get a true waveform with your beautifully embeddable widget — a pleasure to navigate, especially if you’ve ever been disappointed by all the pseudo-volume meters and fake waveforms out there (which is a Flash dev’s inside joke in some circles).

Even the upload process is a pleasure. While there’s no batch uploader yet — which would be highly time-saving for musicians with large catalogs who’ve upgraded to the somewhat confusingly-named “PRO Max” account @ €60/month — the uploader is as close to a practical flow as I’ve seen: you use a standard browser to select a file, a progress bar with countdown appears, and there are a few required fields.

Not just MP3s are uploadable: WAV, AIF, AAC, FLAC and OGG are supported. This is great news for professionals concerned about lossless fidelity. If desired, you can add genre details, and being forward-thinking, they’ve included Creative Commons as a licensing choice. The only unfriendliness I came across was getting a weird “(-280)” error after uploading that I wasn’t able to reproduce.

Feature request: as your music collection builds, it’d be great to mass-set permissions. And keywords should be clickable to find other stuff tagged similarly, as the similarly orange-and-purple Jamendo allows.

If you run a site and want to accept music, you can embed a SoundCloud DropBox in your sidebar, as Synthtopia has done. The first time I saw it, my first reaction was to drag an MP3 from my desktop to it — unfortunately that didn’t work, as it’s really just a button you click to get to the standard upload form. Nonetheless, I’ve noticed more of these popping up, suggesting they’re catching on.

What about the social aspects of SoundCloud?

You can add timed comments to a track, which is handy for calling out highlights like “OMG THIS BREAKDOWN ROX!” A few video-sharing sites like Viddler have a similar feature, and it’s not unlike adding markers or hit points in a full-fledged DAW.

You can choose whether your uploaded tracks are public or private. Interestingly, even if you’re on a free account, I discovered you can go above the five tracks/month limit by uploading to your own or other people’s DropBoxes, and I’ve asked SoundCloud about how this is intended to work. There’s a public gallery of Hot Music and Latest Tracks, and mandatory social networking features like adding friends are present. In this Rickroll Era, even MC Hammer is getting in on the fun:

And suitably, when they can’t build their own solutions, SoundCloud piggybacks on complementary companies, using Seesmic for video blog comments and Get Satisfaction for support. I’ve also noticed they have a running Flickr stream of photos tagged “soundcloud.” Observing what other companies SoundCloud is aligned with gives glimmers into their philosophy on creating community. I haven’t extensively tested their help yet, but have seen numerous positive experiences.

Kudos to SoundCloud for their excellent screencasts. They communicate well and compel you to try it out firsthand — with so many sites competing for your attention, a good video tutorial can really “sell” you what it’s all about in a couple minutes and drive your decision to get started.

3 things to look out for:

1. SoundCloud touts their API for plugging in custom apps to their tech. Well-documented, open APIs helped spread Flickr and Twitter’s popularity, so it’ll be intriguing to see what it does for this burgeoning audio service.

2. Copycats of their design by other sites. SoundCloud’s taken the usual “Web 2.0″ staples (starburst graphics, share-this buttons) and done an exemplary amount of going further and leading by unique example. But even if you can bite their style, you can’t steal their community.

3. Will SoundCloud’s freemium business model succeed in the long run? They currently don’t accept PayPal, but say it’s “coming soon.”

Give SoundCloud a go and share your experiences in the comments. Have a fave site that combines the best of substance + style? Let us know!

Torley amplifies your awesome with the useful and fun. He loves life, wife, and watermelons. You can check out his music at Torley.com

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An Iranian blogger has been arrested in Iran and charged with spying for Israel. He could face the death penalty if found guilty. Hossein Derakhshan, known around the world as the father of the Iranian blogosphere, was recently arrested upon returning to Iran from Canada.   Jahan News, an Iranian website affiliated with Iran’s intelligence community, reported on Monday that he admitted to spying for Israel. Derakhshan, a 33-year-old secular Iranian, has been living in Toronto for the past seven years and holds Canadian citizenship. It was in Toronto that he started writing his blog, Hoder, in both English and Persian. Derakhshan has participated in many international forums as a representative of the younger Iranian generation.  

Observers have noted a tougher tone in his writing over the past couple of years, in that he has been more supportive of the regime in Tehran. Derakhshan has appeared in numerous news reports providing an Iranian point of view and expressing support for Iran’s controversial nuclear program.

Source The Media Line that I picked up off twitter

We blogged about it here The fight for weblogistan and beyond and here

Flows of information and communication cannot not be ultimately suppressed. If I wanted to create create a movement in Iran to fight extremist views of all persuasions I would enlist the bloggers, hence Iran's obvious distaste for Hossein.

Mashable is proud to announce that voting has begun in the 2nd Annual Open Web Awards, a unique opportunity for the most accomplished websites and services to receive international recognition for their achievements.

During the nominations round, we received over 43,000 verified nominations. We narrowed down this huge pool to the 10 most-nominated sites and services in each category (where 10th place was a draw, we allowed more than 10 nominees in that category).

VOTE NOW: One Vote Per Category Per Day

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Mashable Open Web Awards

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Top Tip For Nominees

You got through? Congratulations! Did you know you can create a custom version of our voting widget above to post to your company blog or website? Just visit the Open Web Awards Widget Creator and check the box to preset a category or company. This means your fans only need to enter an email address to vote - simple!

Start Canvassing for YOUR Candidate!

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The Open Web Awards is made possible by our sponsors. By supporting the Open Web Awards, these companies reward and encourage innovative web technologies. We can’t thank them enough for sharing our passion: building great web companies.

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YouTube was built in no small part by users uploading copyright clips of British comedy group Monty Python. Ok, it was built by users uploading copyright clips of lots of different media outfits, but nonetheless, the group’s influence on the video sharing site has been huge.

This week, they’ve decided to get a piece of the action for themselves, creating an official channel on YouTube so there are “No more of those crap quality videos you’ve been posting. We’re giving you the real thing - HQ videos delivered straight from our vault.”

The channel features dozens of skits from the original show, which include advertising that Monty Python hopes you’ll click on to “soften our pain and disgust at being ripped off all these years.” The group further explains the new YouTube channel in the clip below:

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Download YouTube Video

I gave a lecture at my alma mater, the University of Toronto, a few weeks ago, at the Faculty of Information. The video is here. (Nit: The slides have the wrong font.)

[Tags: university_of_toronto knowledge moi_moi_moi ]