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TechCrunch Snubbed From Twitter 101 Resource Page

July 24, 2009 By Jim Turner 1 Comment

I am not sure that anyone in the tech world has written about Twitter more than the popular news site TechCrunch. You may have a hard time picking out the single most popular Twitter post since after 38 pages of search results on the subject I lost count of the number of articles. The most popular recently was the scandal involving ill-gotten documents from the folks at Twitter which Tech Crunch promptly published. But more on that in a minute.

Twitter launched today their Twitter 101 pages and of note was their "Key Resources" page which is contained under the domain related to http://business.twitter.com/twitter101/. I quickly glanced at the people that were listed on the page, and noticed right away that TechCrunch had been snubbed. Not a single time was TechCrunch mentioned. You would think with 38 pages of info on the company and some of the best Twitter evangelists on the planet, they could have worked a link back to TechCrunch somewhere. Some of the best Twitter information contained anywhere is contained on the TechCrunch site.

Now this could just be a matter of numbers or it could be that they could not find a good snapshot overview of their service or it could be some other political reason that Twitter was quick to leave TechCrunch off the list as I mentioned above and wrote about in the TechCrunch and the Twitter Documents post.

This is not going to be too unlike the "Suggested Users" list and I am sure there will be plenty of folks that will be screaming about why they were not one of the featured resources that are listed. Congrats to Chris Brogan for getting on this page with his 50 Ideas on Using Twitter for Business. Okay, their might only be 10 in there but 50 was a good number.

Sorry TechCrunch I can assure you that the folks at Twitter are not going to cut you much slack from here forward, but keep up the good reporting and evangelizing!

[Hat Tip to Laughing Squid Links for beginning the inspiration for this post through the photo above.]

Tags: TechCrunch, Twitter, Twitter For Business, Twitter Business 101, Chris Brogan

Filed Under: Announcements, Blog Tools, BTW, Business Blogging, Featured Articles, Findability, Marketing, Media, Meta, Social Media

Working In A Virtual World

July 23, 2009 By Jim Turner Leave a Comment

I used to have an office in Downtown Denver at a place called The Hive, a co-working community office not unlike others we see across the country like Independents Hall and Citizen Agency. It allowed me to have a place to call my office and yet it didn’t bankrupt my budget. I do reccomentd this situation to others if you have the opportunity.

I now work in a virtual office out of my home. I actually have a dedicated office and it has not one but two desks and computer equipment and printers and a dead fax machine and not unlike many offices. The only thing is the noise that surrounds me is beeps and clicks, blips and many other application noises. Yes, even the chirp of the Tweetdeck that everyone wonders about while I am on the phone.

This is my virtual Cube Farm. I used to work in corporate America for about 17 years and at a private law firm for 5 years before that, and I understand what that is like. I was not the greatest fan of cubicles and white button down shirts. Even after the adoption of "business casual" I still did not fit in completely. I guess it comes from my younger years working outside and loving fresh air an sunshine. The scene from Joe Versus the Volcano best described me as the light fixtures sucking out my soul.

I love working virtually from the comfort of my own home. I am much more productive. My commute is very green friendly and my uniform, well, let’s just described it as somewhere south of Business Casual.

I still have the whack a mole type conversations that I used to see happening the cube farm atmosphere, but they are preceded by a whistle or a beep or a bing as it were. I talk and chat virtually with my co-workers all day long. If you can hold on a second I need to quickly have a meeting with my financial advisor and counselor (yes, my three year old fills this role for me).

Mr. Waturi: "And what’s this lamp for? Isn’t there enough light in here for you?"

Joe: "The florescents affect me. They make me feel blotchy and puffy. I thought this this light would…"

Mr. Waturi: "Get rid of the light. This is not your bedroom, Joe. This is an office. Maybe if you start treating this like a job instead of some kind of a welfare hospital, you’ll shape up!"

Photo via MShades

Tags: Virtual Office, Community Office, Cubicle Farm, Corporate Working, HR

Filed Under: BTW, Marketing, Professional Blogging, Services

Want To Be Heard On Twitter? Get Added To A Twitter Roll

July 21, 2009 By Jim Turner Leave a Comment

It used to be that in order to be seen as an influencer or to be really taken seriously in your niche or genre, you had to be on someone’s blogroll. Being added to a blogroll gave you some credibility and it also helped you get read by others in your group. You got to be one of the cool kids if you were recognized on a blogroll. The goal was to get listed on a blog roll by someone with lots of readers as well. It also helped you get read by others, or it helped your voice get heard. Being on a blogroll was the gold standard.

Now with the likes of Twitter we get more of a situation of more noise less signal. It is difficult to be heard. 25 Million people all hoping their 140 characters get in front of someone to read. You may have the best ever 140 characters in the history of the world, but to broadcast it to Twitter is to cast it into the sea of information hoping to find a home. I liken it to casting an SOS note in a bottle into the ocean and hoping someone finds it. Chances are it may never get read by the person that matters. Twitter can be the same way. It seems that many online marketing types believe this a great way now to broadcast their message. They think a message in a bottle is a good way to broadcast. Cast a net big enough and sooner or later someone may hear what you have to say. This is not the best case scenario unless you get on someone’s list or in a group. Instead of blogrolls, we now can put our Twitter friends or followers into groups. I use the popular application Tweetdeck, and I have many groups of my followers distilled into readable tweets. I have my social media colleagues and I have technology people and parenting bloggers and no, even though I joke about it quite a bit I do not have a "Hottie" Twitter group. This is how I track what is being sent via Twitter by those I want to listen to and want to hear. I want to hear all 250 Million people out there but I have yet to figure that out sans some special paid for application.

This is how I read most of the important stuff on Twitter. I go through a specific group and see what they are talking about and what they have to say. It may be an hour after the fact when I re-tweet something or I comment or take notice, and the reason is, I don’t have time to scan the river of noise going by at 10,000 people a minute. In the instance I am talking about you get added to my group if you provide me good thoughts or value. I don’t want to miss your tweet. The only thing is, my groups are not public. I need to find something that allows me to show you my groups. I need a public app that shows my Twitter groups, my blogroll of twitter friends. I need to develop this as a widget for blogs or web sites. You can get on my group in in my Twoops (URL taken I checked)? Anyone?

Photo via Mykl Roventine

Tags: Twitter, Blogrolls, Web Apps, River of News, Noise vs. Signal

Filed Under: Blog Metrics, Blog Mining, Blog Tips, Blog Tools, BTW, Findability, Marketing, Media, Social Media

The Changing Face of Journalism or Fixing BusinessWeek

July 20, 2009 By Jim Turner 2 Comments

I have been a huge fan of BusinessWeek since I can remember. I am also a big fan because of the likes of Stephen Baker who I have been reading in the blogosphere for quite some time as well. I found Stephen’s post related to How to Fix BusinessWeek at his The Numerati blog and I was sad when I read it. It was done in a manner that made me thing that fixing or saving journalism is a simple task but nearly impossible to execute. I don’t think the likes of newspapers and other periodicals will be saved as they cannot be saved. The numbers will make it insurmountable. This opening from Stephen was very telling:

Monday I learned that BusinessWeek, where I’ve worked for 22 years, is on the block. It may be sold, or stay in McGraw-Hill (where it’s been for 80 years). But the business is losing money (I don’t know how much). Whoever ends up with it is going to have to figure out quickly how to turn a business news operation built primarily as a weekly magazine into a profitable franchise for the age of near ubiquitous and real-time information.

Losing money–that seems to be an understatement when you think of the offices and the infrastructure that is all the things that BusinessWeek has. Huge buildings, rent, equipment, well the list goes without saying. They have a huge budget to cover to bring us the news and the information or content we consume for free on the Internet. Stephen follows that post with After The Madison Avenue Bubble. This post hammers home another point that seems to be putting a nail in the coffin of the likes of BusinessWeek:

I just got up from my desk and took a stroll through these Midtown offices of BusinessWeek. In a matter of months, if someone buys the magazine, we’ll be gone. It’s terrific real estate. Down by the top editors’ offices, the big windows look across the Hudson. The eastern view looks across Rockefeller Center and toward the Chysler Building. These are expensive digs.

It took me a while to get used to working for a magazine that spent money like this.

That seems to be the biggest issue that will seal the fate of the likes of old media. Spending money like they do and still producing what I can get for free elsewhere. I am not a mogul in the business world but it seems to me that might be a problem. It appears from what Stephen ended this latest post with was almost an acceptance stage of grief when he states:

But in the end, my initial read turned out to be correct. The rich model for a weekly magazine was not sustainable. Those who want to be foreign correspondents today will be lucky to get what I expected: modest pay to work out of their apartments. It will attract mostly young people, which isn’t a bad thing. (They might ask more unschooled questions, but they’re more likely to move to the action and take chances.) It turns out we rode something of a Madison Ave bubble for a few decades, and now it has popped.

Like Jeff Jarvis however, this seems to me to be quite an asset and something that could and should be fixed or in another word–saved.

Well, now, BusinessWeek is for sale and whoever gets it – it is a valuable franchise with a very valuable and wise crowd – will need to reinvent it. I was going to suggest that the magazine do for itself what we were thinking of doing for GM. But Steve beat me to it.

How do I fix BusinessWeek? Easy, in a manner of speaking, I would level the playing field. I have said many times at conferences, at business meetings, and over coffee with colleagues, if the journalists figure out new media, we are all out of a job. Level the playing field is not as easy as it sounds. But if we were to put journalists that have been reporting, writing and selling and have been on top of their game into the positions now being held by new media types at the places like TechCrunch, or other blogging networks, we would see the real cream of the crop.

BusinessWeek is taking their overhead, basically a champagne budget, and putting it up against the likes of Joe and Mary Blogger, publishing from free applications downloaded from the Internet from the comfort of their own home. Joe and Mary’s overhead is nominal at best but they are being compared on the same plane now with those on Madison Avenue. How do you compete with that? Well certainly BusinessWeek has better access and better connections than does Joe and Mary, but that is beginning to change as well as bloggers gain access to back rooms and walled gardens that were usually only for "special people." The scales were always tipped in favor of the "journalist" as they had the access, the diploma, the expense account and the social capital. The latter of which has shifted in favor of those with the most voice, those with the most eyeballs, perhaps those with the most Twitter followers these days. That seems to be the competition now, but that is another post. Getting scooped by the guy in the building over from yours on Madison Avenue was expected, getting scooped from Joe or Mary the Pajama wearing citizen journalist is something entirely different.

Media costs are not even close to level. You must level them to compete. That means no more overhead. Stephen mentions his 5% as being what BusinessWeek has, and Jeff Jarvis said it was what makes BusinessWeek better. The other 95% has to compete in their eyes, and that can only be done by making the remaining 95% carry the same costs as paying the rent on the corner office, not on Madison Avenue, but on West Elm street in the corner of the kitchen.

Not anyone can write well. I know that there is no possible way I could compete with the likes of Stephen Baker in covering the latest in business news and writing and reporting. The only way for me to compete is to provide the story hope someone sees it and that gets me recognized. The only thing I have going for me is I am not being paid a six figure salary and paying $100,000 per month in rent for an office building and paying for the infrastructure that goes with that empire. When Stephen starts working out of his home like I do and doing the same thing, I don’t stand a chance. How do they fix BusinessWeek? Just download WordPress have Stephen work from the corner of his kitchen and do what he has been doing. No way does their competition compete. Now, the remaining problem, how do you charge the companies wanting to advertise for that model? Welcome to the game BusinessWeek.

photo via BusinessWeek

Tags: BusinessWeek, Journalism, Blogging, Old Media, New Media

Filed Under: Blogonomics, Business Blogging, Featured Articles, Media, Services

TechCrunch and The Twitter Documents

July 15, 2009 By Jim Turner 9 Comments

I have been following along with the hacked or leak of confidential documents from Twitter that have somehow been sent to Mike Arrington over at TechCrunch. I am really fascinated, not by the documents or what my possibly be in them, but how the story is being played by the folks at TechCrunch. Mr. Arrington is in the cat bird seat and knows all too well that this is the case. He is enjoying every waking moment of it. The boastful nature of this story is what I am watching.

I can see that the documents themselves are only in the hands on one news breaker and that is TechCrunch. They were not sent to anyone at ReadWriteWeb, Mashable or CenterNetworks, or any of the many other tech news companies out there. If they were, they would all be playing chicken with the documents to get the most press coverage possible. I am acutely aware and so is Mike Arrington that he holds the keys to that kingdom at the moment. He alone has the magic. I will be watching to see how many posts come out before the first leaked document, and what that document will reveal, if anything. I would say there is not much sex to it or he would have long since posted the information for fear of being scooped. This part also makes me wonder how it is known that he won’t be scooped on the story unless of course, he himself knows that the information is only in his possession which causes some questions. How does he know this? Has he talked with the hacker that provided the info? It’s all very much like a "deep throat" thing.

Mike is going to play this orchestrated tune to the very last. For now, I am going to just watch it as it happens like a Broadway show.

UPDATE: The stories are now being produced one at a time. I am predicting that they are now watching to see what is reproduced and watching like a hawk as to whether they get attribution on each and every post. Anyone else want me to pass the popcorn?

Tags: TechCrunch, Mike Arrington, Mashable, ReadWriteWeb, Technology, Twitter

Filed Under: BTW, Media

Twitter About To Open A Can of Tweets

July 1, 2009 By Jim Turner 1 Comment

I am wondering how this will play out but I just had an opportunity to read through a TechCrunch article by Robin Wauters where it was uncovered that Twitter, Inc. may begin reaching out to people that are using Tweet in their applications or in their businesses and asking that they refrain from the practice. This seems to me to be a day late and a billion dollars short. I can’t understand how they are just now thinking of trademarking in as little time as May of 2009 the word Tweet. What other words have they asked be trademarked? What law firm sold them on this idea? Surely if you began to get some steam as you did back in as early as 2007 you would have thought that some of these names associated with your brand would have been at that more valuable? To begin this process now seems like an oops to me. I actually like the email sent as it seems to give the impression that they have no weight behind the statement:

Hi,

Twitter, Inc is uncomfortable with the use of the word Tweet (our trademark) and the similarity in your UI and our own. How can we go about having you change your UI to better differentiate your offering from our own?

They feel "uncomfortable?" Perhaps if they really thought this was a battle worth winning they would actually be more than just "uncomfortable." I fully expect after the update to the blog post added after the fact wherein Twitter provides a response, that we will get yet another update that says something to the effect that, "We realize this seems crazy but we forgot to actually think of this before." The next thing you know they will be printing up business cards and hiring a receptionist.

This all seems to be the way this company is operating behind the scenes. They fell into a great thing without realizing its potential or what it would turn into. They then found that it was cool and might be worth some money to someone, then they found out that they should have some idea as to how to make money with it, and now they are realizing that they should be protecting it from everyone. I just shake my head at the way this company is shaping up. It must just be one comedy show after another behind he scenes there. The great thing is, it is still loved by millions.

Tags: Twitter, Trademark, Technology, Legal Issues, Business, Social Media Tools

Filed Under: Announcements, Blogs and Law, BTW, Marketing, Media, Social Media

Why Robert Scoble Is A Better Blogger Than Me

June 25, 2009 By Jim Turner Leave a Comment

I have been traveling quite a bit lately and that has caused me to get seriously behind on a large amount of work that I need to accomplish. I have finally caught up with my email inbox which usually hovers around 60 unread messages at any given time, which usually equates to the amount of Twitter bios I need to read to approve or discard. I began digging into the RSS feed readers (yes plural) that I have disregarded that have been so overwhelmed that many of the search feeds I have for the likes of “business blogging” and “social media consulting” are defaulting to the most it will store. In other words, I have much work and little time to get it done. I know I play this off with the idea that I am also the stay at home dad of 4 kids at the ages of 9, 8, 4, and 3, and that has some merit but for the most part I have times when they are sleeping or are not in the picture that I spend catching up but I still think I can be more efficient. I know I need to explain the title of this post. One of the things I need to catch up on that I have not been doing much of lately is finding what my mentors and friends and colleagues are talking about. One of the people I admire and one that I think has his finger on the pulse of my industry is Robert Scoble. I don’t intend for this to be a “Rah Rah Sis Boom Bah” about Robert, so let me explain using him as my example.

Robert is a busy person. I thought that I was busy and had my hands in a lot of things and doing a lot of work, but for the most part I am not much different than your ordinary overworked and underpaid entrepreneur. I have been to conferences and walked into that blogger lounge at 1:00 a.m. and have seen Robert’s wife Maryam begging to leave but he is still uploading the latest video and editing the last blog post before he turns in. That is dedication and it is what inspires me most of the time when I am feeling overworked. It makes me buck up and get things done more often. Put to simple terms working hard makes you successful. I know Gary Vaynerchuk preaches that from his own pulpit. Working hard does actually payoff, but I must say I have worked hard for other people and all it did was make them more successful so I limit that to we entrepreneurs that want to get on top of the heap. Sure I have been rewarded when working for others, but for the most part my hard work for them is just that, for them. I swear there is a point in here somewhere.

I just spent part of the morning reading blogs. I have read all of the folks I love to read in my business, Chris Brogan, David Armano, Beth Harte, Amber Naslund, and yes the list goes on and on. Many of them are also very much like Robert Scoble, and I could have used most of them as my title, but for me, Robert has been a blogger that has been cutting the trail for most of us in this business. He is consistently good at what he does with his blog. Let me give you some of the reasons he is good and why I often use him as an example to people when they want to know about how to be a good blogger.

Consistency - Even when he is inconsistent he is consistent. He puts things up to read during slow news days and up when things are going crazy. Sure he does not have a blog post every single day but posts when he wants and has something to say, which in itself is very consistent.
Opinionated – He gives us his opinion. He may be adding to the echo chamber of sorts but he always gets into his posts why he feels it is important. Telling us why Twitter is cool is one thing but why YOU think it is cool and how YOU are using it or making it part of your life is another.
Academic – He is a smart guy. I have made fun of him in the past about being a “camera salesman” and I mean that more in jest than anything, but he is very smart about business. He has seen the emergence of some very cool technologies that have gone on to be big players and he seems to know what works and has great insights into what businesses can do with their product or service. I can see why he has VC friends. They want to know what he thinks is cool.
Human – He shows his human side. I know when he is angry or when he is fed up or when he is happy about something. I can see his humanness come through in his blog posts. Not many people allow that or even begin to know how to impart that in their blog posts.
Integrity – In a world full of “sponsored conversations” and sell-outs to the little tidbits of advertising dollars, he stays true to what he does, good blogging. This has offered far more rewards than a $500 gift card or a free T-shirt. This has also allowed his access to some of the brightest minds and has opened doors for him that others will never have offered to them. He keeps his eyes on the big prize.
Passionate – You can hear it in the way he talks about things. His job, his wife and sons, and his friends. I have this passion when I am a Daddy blogger and it helped me become a better blogger. I have that passion but it does not always come out in my writing here. Some days I write a post because I think Google might forget about me. That is the wrong reason to put up a post.

As I indicated before, there are many many bloggers out there that have this very same resume and are doing it just as well in these areas or better. I merely wanted to single Robert out as I had his RSS feeds on my list today and I began to feel very small in this big pond after reading and then looking back on my own blog and seeing how I have not been doing things well at all. I have had some great posts and flashes of greatness in the past, but for the most part I can take what I have been taught by those doing it well and try to keep up with them. I am not sure that is possible but I can hope to some day be like that. It took me back to a time when Robert called me out about my job as a blogger and I think maybe I need to go back to being better. I am going to see if I can get into that swing and set out some goals for myself to add to the signal and not the noise. For the moment I will leave you with that as I run into the next room to see if I can figure out what the kids just shattered on the kitchen floor. Is summer over yet? Thanks Robert, and when are you going to start that Daddy blog?

Photo via Wikipedia

Tags: Blogging, Robert Scoble, Scobleizer, Business Blogs, Social Media, Gary Vaynerchuk, Chris Brogan, Amber Naslund, David Armano, Beth Harte, Blog Posts, How To Blog

Filed Under: Blog Consulting, Blog Tips, Bloggers and Blogs, BTW, Business Blogging, Marketing, Media, Professional Blogging, Services, Social Media, The Site

A Nice Cool Dip In The Pacific

June 1, 2009 By Jim Turner Leave a Comment

Captain Tim asked, "Are you with our group?"

"I am," I said as I looked at my phone to catch my last emails before I got aboard the raft we would be taking to Lanai.

"How much does a boat like this cost?" Not that this was relevant to taking a snorkeling tour in Hawaii, which created a strange look from Captain Tim. I was truly interested in the business of snorkeling and other things here while I visit. I have been asking a number of questions related to the business aspects of tourism and excursions and other parts of the Hawaiian experience.

"$80,000 approximately", was the response from our Captain.

"Wow, not bad for a couple of long balloons and an outboard motor," I said in jest to let him know that I thought that was pretty high.

I then began to wonder how tourism sets the price for what we do here on Hawaii. I wondered how much I Captain made in tips and was paid as a result of the job that he did here. We are here but a short time and he has to live here year round. I heard him make cracks about the $8 per gallon charge for milk, and hearing about the free drinks and giveaway pupu (appetizers) at the bar in town and thought, here is a man that is truly scratching out a living doing what he is passionate about.

He took us out across the channel to our destination which was called "The Aquarium". Once I jumped into the crystal clear water I knew exactly why it was called that. I could see everything, and the coral structure and the brilliant fish colors were awesome. We swam and looked at puffer fish and many other varieties and then as I got out of the boat and said "WOW", I was handed a cool passion orange juice and was also given some breakfast. This is the life of the Captain, seeing the look on the face of those as I they exit the water after seeing Hawaii from underwater, and handing them some fresh fruit and breakfast. I would say that is a good salary there, but it doesn’t pay all the bills. I reflected that in my tip as I headed off and away from this Captain for what will probably be forever. Thanks Captain Tim and enjoy your job as only you can!

For more information on Ocean Rafting you can visit their site.

Photo via: Island Star Excursions

Tags: Hawaii Ocean Rafting, Snorkeling, Hawaii, HawaiiHTA, Hawaii Tourism

Filed Under: BTW, Business Blogging, Findability, Marketing, Media, Services, Social Media

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