CrapHammer

Errors and Inclusions

Oops.

This has got to be the most memorable and humorous error screen I have ever received.  I assume this screen is reserved for the extreme and unexpected system errors (losing a server, etc.)   If it's the only error message, the lack of contextual and timeline information may get a little annoying.  But as a final fall back, it's brilliant. 

Kudos to the Bloglines folks.  Brings some humanity back to these dastardly devices we are all addicted to.

P.S.  If you use BlogLines, get the latest Firefox!  It finally integrates BlogLines (along with some other like Google Reader).

Sigh. Please upgrade to IE.

This is a common and avoidable mistake - error pages that demand a certain browser for simple content.  While it's arguably legitimate to demand a specific technology for advanced functionality, I was simply trying to access the "contact us" page. 

The part that really got under my skin was the offer to upgrade to the latest "Netscape Navigator" browser.  Are you kidding??  This highlights the importance of error messages and how they deserve to be continually reviewed.  Something we all could use to remember as it's never a priority on any project.  Myself included.

All of this is because Starbucks is using IE specific javascript to protect their email address from SPAM.  A simple mistake, and one that can be easily rectified.  If you can get through to the contact page and let them know, that is.  ;)

What really surprised me was that Starbucks would not recognize the number of Mac types frequenting their organization (designers, agency types, programmers, etc.). Perhaps they don't have statistics on this?  Or maybe we're hidden?  Or maybe they just don't have the ability to test on this platform?

Note: I did finally contact them from a Virtual Machine on my Mac.  And people wonder why I get so little done in a day.

Play with me

Meant to post all this last week.  Took an impulse trip to Florida to watch the world UPA Ultimate Frisbee championships.  Just got back to the cold frozen north last night.  Joy.  ;)

Follow-up on Loitering post
Last week I proposed that youth activity online could be viewed as a form of "loitering."  In the same vein, Mark Glaser over at MediaShift  speaks to the social media usage of youth.  Great collection of stats about youth from a variety of sources such as Nielson, Pew, and eMarketer. 

He references the limits on youth today and how social networking sites give them back their freedom of Expression.  What I found most interesting were the references from Danah Boyd which identify online social sites as "identity development processes".

[To paraphrase pretty heavily...]  Where blogging requires authorship, many of these profile building sites, like MySpace, allow users to cut and paste an identity together and even develop their view of self.

Wow.  So much for dressing up like Boy George or Madonna like in my day.  ;)

Game Dynamics
Why are some online properties so addictive?  The folks at Shuffle Brain propose it's because of the implementation of game dynamics.  See their powerpoint presentation for an insightful walk-through even without their notes.  A must read for anyone developing or following "web 2.0" successes. 

Certainly explains why I get so addicted to checking my Squidoo page and my Technorati ratings, feeble as they may be.

Do the Nike step (virtually).
Artist and Designer friend Bernice (aka TrickyDog) launches "nikestudio" on Second Life. Build and customize your own Nike shoes with your own designs and art. 

Interesting example of Nike looking to bring value while still allowing for its brand.  What I like is it doesn't attempt to "trick" users or exploit the conversation.  And it potentially provides value, allowing users to design, purchase and sell their customized Second Life nike shoes.  Read more...

UPDATE: I was swindled! Er... confused, rather. This was just a CONCEPT that Bernice came up with. But a brilliant one. Anyone know anyone over at Nike??

Delinquent and Viral

Morgan gets it

I was sitting at a table with a very talented, up-and-coming musical artist.  His name is Morgan Ross and he is the lead singer and founding member of the Birds of Wales.

We've selected them as a partner on an engagement marketing roadmap - a transparent approach to connecting them with their audience utilizing social networking and other tools.

I hope you all get a chance to meet this young man.  He is intelligent, heartfelt, and cares about the people around him.  And he is talented.  But what is most surprising is his savvy regarding social networking.

 

  I can spend an hour on MySpace or I can waste an hour doing anything else. Postering. Promoting. You name it. Nothing compares to that hour I spend on MySpace.
  - Morgan Ross  

I spoke to him for some time about blurring the lines between traditional websites.  Much like Jonathon Coulton is doing.  Or the latest news post from Sigur Ros that allows their fanbase to download "cover" tunes of their work by other artists.  (My favorite is a choir doing "Untitled 1".)

We are collecting baseline data and will share the results and tactics in later posts. 

Viral Me Up, Baby.

Ok.  So not too long ago I joined a Viral Announcement email listserv.  I thought, "Hey, Sean, you can be notified immediately whenever anyone launches a cool new viral campaign!"

Someone SHOOT me.

While I love the sprite-like flash games as much as the next guy (read: there is a reason Colleco Vision is no longer around), I have to wonder when Viral became nothing more than a game on a website.

P.S.  The one source I watch that ISN'T like my rant above is ViralMeister. Check 'em out. Great blog.

Social Networking Just for Delinquents?

If anyone can direct me to the source of this tidbit, I would GREATLY appreciate it.  Because it is WAY too insightful and brilliant so I must have read it somewhere.

Basically, something I was reading took the position that Social Networking sites like MySpace and YouTube help to fill the loitering gap for a good portion of our youth.

It's getting next to impossible for kids to just "hang" anymore. Malls, pizza parlors and even parks are all off limits to non-paying customers.  It's fine to be in any of these places, but not necessarily if you are a youth.  And certainly not if you aren't actively spending cash.  But online, <b>anyone</b> can hang around as long as you want. 

Some of the online behaviors do gain a different light when viewed under this lens.  Take the growing adoption of group communication features (like on Myspace). Just as you would chat with your friends when loitering at the corner or hanging at the mall.

It caused me to think differently about a transition we've been witnessing from the interaction design models we've used in the past.  The desires of users are no longer so easily modeled as "task-based".

The simplest, most direct or fastest way to accomplish something is not always the driving force.  Rather, it's often about the feel, the fit, and the fun.  And perhaps it's now about supporting an experience that is in itself fulfilling.

ie: It's not about whether they accomplished a task.  It's about the experience they had.  Period.

Photo Credit: 'Orange Skies Cotton Candy and You' on Flickr

Polar Rose: all quiet on the PII front.

Polar Rose is a very interesting, if not potentially troubling, technology which allows for people to tag the faces of their friends and then share this data with others. 

 

  Polar Rose lets you discover people in pictures. Learn who people are, and help improve results by tagging pictures together with other users.¹  

Certainly there is much talk about youth being less concerned with identity issues online.

But being an old-fashioned, decrepit old-timer at the no-longer-hip old age of 37, I'm not so cool having people I don't know be able to identify me because I showed up in some photo.  Whether those photos come from "flickr, 23, Kodak gallery, or any other website" ¹.  Or, pray tell, some public camera on a street somewhere.

My friend Kate who first announced this on her blog, counseled that while paranoia may be a good thing, others have dealt with the PII issue quite adequately.

So I wrote an email to the CEO of Polar Rose, asking him to wade in on how they plan to deal with the potential PII issues.  Or if PII was even pertinent.

 

Hi Nokolaj,

  In today's world of public exposure, one of the growing challenges and fears for us older-timers is how we control our personally identifiable information.

  My face is one thing I consider to be PII (Personally Identifiable
Information).  Mostly when tagged with my name.

  I'm sure this is something you have contemplated.  I would love to find out how Polar Rose expects to deal with this issue. "  

So then I waited for a couple of days.  To no avail.  No response. 

So now I have to ask Nicholaj in public.  Maybe you will have better luck than me? His email is given publicly on their site as: nikolaj[aT]polarrose[dOt]com

Maybe it's a hoax?  Maybe I'm just paranoid?

¹ source: polar rose website:  http://www.polarrose.com/

UPDATED:  I've received an email and a comment from Nikolaj.

Seeing clearly from inside the web 2.0 bubble

Much of the blogosphere I follow revolves around the ever changing practices and trends that are driving social marketing and word-of-mouth online.

And in such things, this week did anything but disappoint. The stories were varied but each showcased a different element of the same story; an indie musician getting national acclaim for his use of social networking tools, an experiment in social status via blogging, and a UK initiative to engage a particular community in a movie launch.

Case 1

Many thanks to Kate for her post on Jonathon Coulton and his write-up by eMarketer. At first glance, Jonathon's blog is not all that unusual for the genre. He's a musician with humorful and even geeky songs. His site and activities showcase a number of web 2.0 tools and traits.

• Fans are making "funny" videos about him
• You can purchase his music in MP3 format through his own jury-rigged system - a la carte or even by the album.
• You can buy a range of humorous t-shirts from cafepress
• Don't forget to make a donation!
• How about some Jonathon Coulton ring tones?
• Or my favorite, creating reverse demand via eventful (see linked graphic to the right).

None of these features, on their own, are all that unusual. And I'll admit that all together they amounted to a professional and effective utilization of social networking and web 2.0 services. But there was this nagging feeling. Why was the author so enamored by this particular artist? Wasn't it just a little over the top?

Perhaps. Or maybe this is just another sign that we are in a web 2.0 bubble. Are we seeing less than effective behavior being rewarded? Check. Are we seeing utopian claims? Again, yes. From heavy long-tails taking over the medium to corporations tearing down the membranes between customers and employees.

Not that both forces aren't at play. But the level of hype around them together with the latest acquisition of YouTube with the subsequent scramble for a business case leads me to believe we are indeed inside a web 2.0 bubble.

So the question in a bubble, as everyone scrambles to get a piece of the pie, is what is just hype and what will withstand the test of time. And in some cases, the answer doesn't matter as hype generates press and even big results (short term).

Source: David Armano

Case 2 Now we travel over to Eric Kintz's blog regarding his experiments to better define the core practices and principles of blogging as measured by social status and traffic. The results of his ongoing experiments has led to a number of case studies each with some key learnings and potential rules. Blog post frequency is a myth. In fact, posting too often actually risks losing your subscribers. Content must be relevant and appropriate to niche/micro-community bloggers Viral Marketing does not spread well. Reaching the "Level 1 Influencers" is critical. Repeated exposure lowers the probability of viral infection.1 Finally, localization (translation) matters as do vehicles that don't create trackable "links" such as newsletters 1[SH] Yahoo drop in ad revenues might be a case in point of this. His articles go into a lot more depth with copious source links. Apologies to Eric for over-simplifying the issue. But what strikes me is the amount of effort required to "create value" as a blogger and to what end. I wouldn't lump blogging into a primal basic need of the human psyche (sleep, eat, shelter, etc.) So the reward for this effort likely comes down to social status or $$. Both of which bring whispers of sex, cars and rock & roll. Even in the midst of the "hype" of todays web 2.0 bubble, most marketers and big brands are not going to invest the effort, time or corporate restructuring necessary to take advantage of the lessons learned above. Hugh Macleod correctly, in my mind, refers to blogging as a "disruption channel" in regard to business adoption. [my article on this] So brands are not going to rush en-masse to integrate themselves into the blogosphere. What brands and corporation WILL demand is the ability to exploit the current online hype. The smart/innovative ones will go beyond this and look to leverage the growing micro-communities online. So this takes us to Case 3.

Case 3 Juzzie's latest case study on engagement marketing from his session at ad:tech London is concise, insightful and pertinent to this discussion. "Around 40,000 people from the local market checked out the Lightening McQueen character’s home page on Bebo. Over 5,000 of these Beboers included the movie trailer on their home pages, which was subsequently seen over 35,000 times. Some 2,000 or so Beboers also linked to the Lightening McQueen Character as friends, creating over 700 profile comments"     -- juzzie @ ViralMeister He goes on to make some great points. I'll attempt to summarize a few. Niche engagement marketing appears to be working Social networks offer us the ability to target local and relevant markets It avoids the hassle of targeted seeding and the challenge of breaking through the growing viral clutter. Like viral campaigns, there remains a challenge and inability to measure the ripple effect that occurs. The big players like myspace and bebo don't have to worry too much about justifying anything as everyone is attracted to them like "moths to a flame." "So the demand is outstripping the social networks resource to cash in the advertising dollars, which is why Google has been able to wade in like a Knight in shining armour or at least offer wads of cash while they try and figure out their business models."     -- juzzie @ ViralMeister

Perhaps Doc Searl nailed it with his concept of emerging "intention economies". The basic concept being that we inherently identify our intentions or interests when we visit a site on a regular basis or via our activities within a community. With the 3 million plus reach of the xspace launch, one can only wonder how much of Google's bid for YouTube had to do with the size and strength of the inherent intention economies within. And the corresponding engagement marketing and advertising opportunities.

Let's not forget the recent investment in b5media which will both reward and accelerate its growth into an even more influential community of niches. Another sign that the market may indeed value and reward engagement marketing opportunities.

The bubble will burst. What are you betting on to be the best path?

Links for 6 Oct 06

• Change The Statistics
  "Viral" campaign to motivate some of the 38 million women who do not get mammograms to get one. You take a pledge online and your photos rotate through Times Square. No strong blog tools or presence. Too bad.
• Pink for October
  Here is a campaign that totally gets the long tail of digital distribution. Over 500 blogs have adopted the campaign creating quite a buzz. Many thanks to the Kate'ster for her rant that raised this to my attention.
• There are 42 different sphincters in the human body
  Don't ask. But the fact that I even know this proves the power of wikipedia to invade my world at work. Our office manager wins the bet for anyone who is interested. The link is provided in the title for any body trivia hounds.

Brits take it back

Reverse Vending. The simple concept of recycling applied to distributed drink machines without the collection and storage issues associated with most schemes. These machines identify, sort, collect and process (crush, compress or shred) used beverage containers. Utilizing the barcodes on the deposited items, it determines the method of processing.

As someone who's seen many an item fail to scan at a supermarket checkout line, I do wonder about the maintenance issues should the scanner fail to recognize a deposited bottle. Does it just beep and kick it back out again? But this is a great idea and visually well designed, not to mention a great addition to any area with limited recycle collection capabilities.

Links for 5 Oct 06

• b5media gets funding
  The VC's explain their investment as an opportunity to cash in on the intention economy - ad networks that target based on reader interests (reading a photography blog, for example.) Nice to see Toronto gettings a little VC action.
• ViralMeister recaps Social Media sessions at ad:tech London.
  Brief, insightful and well-written. The latest is Case Study 2 with Yahoo Europe's take on leveraging social media. Buzzwords: 360 degree solution and pesonalization.

Carlton FlashBeer

Carlton's Flashbeer ad is a better hit than the "Big Ad", in my mind.

They used Vividas like last time from a micro-site. This time, though, I'm hapy to see their ad is all over YouTube and a variety of other sources.

I'm interested to know if it was "stolen" and put on YouTube or released to YouTube. Again, this is what I call a "cross-over" ad. A traditional ad vehicle aimed at creating viral activity/interest.

NOTE: Click to view the article if you are reading my RSS feed and want to watch the video.