TechAddress

Tech Events Guide: Mashable Reader Discounts

Tue, 11 Nov 2008 01:46:21 +0000

Part game, part free music site, TheNextBigSound is surely one of the slickest new music sites we’ve seen.

As demoed at the TECHcocktail event in Chicago last week, the concept is simple and ingenious: listen to free music from unsigned bands, and “sign” your favorites to your own virtual record label. When your signed artists become hits on the site, you score points.

Simple…ingenious…and very addictive.

Once you’re done building a music empire, don’t forget to check out the hundreds of other free music sites we’ve covered recently:

Online Music: 90+ Essential Music and Audio Websites

Keep Rocking: 30+ Sites for Free & Legal Music

30+ Awesome Sites for Streaming Music

25 Tools For The Independent Musician

Music News Toolbox: 50+ Links For Discovering New Music

Source:Mashable!

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

I’m thrilled that websites are increasingly becoming aware that long registration forms discourage you from joining them. Like free drinks at a bar, there have been a few core approaches used to increase your chances of committing: simply shortening a form and leaving much info optional until later is a popular choice, and so is allowing you to test-drive or tour features firsthand before ever giving away your personal info.

Image editor Picnik and form-maker Wufoo are superb examples. But still, after you’ve signed up, you’ll likely want to enter a bunch of stuff — especially on social networking sites that ask about your taste in music and your pet’s middle name. So what do you do? Here are some simple steps that you can use to smooth the form-filling process, and each subsequent time you sign up for a site, think of the following as a handy checklist that ensures you’ve got everything ready.

Use the same username everywhere

Not always possible, but the reason why this matters is that it curbs the sheer frustration of “WHAT WAS MY USERNAME!?” Yes, modern Web browsers can remember it for you, but what if you’re at a public terminal and want to login? Or what if you clear your personal data? Even if most places offer a “Forgot your username/password?” service, avoiding trouble from the start is smartest.

As essential as water is wet: pick something brief yet unique, and definitely memorable. If you can use your email address as Guy Kawasaki is fond of advocating, that folds 2 things to remember into 1. I go with “Torley” because that’s my first name — it may not be so clear for you, but in any case, I recommend trying out UserNameCheck.com (previously covered on Mashable) to get a good feel. It shows where your suggested name’s taken across almost 70 sites.

Even if you’ve already signed up for various sites, this is a good principle to keep in mind going forward. Another reason why it’s important: if you’re into lifestream aggregators like FriendFeed, they’ll ask what your usernames are on other services. Some aggregators have the ability to auto-add you to multiple services if you have the same name on all. Otherwise, it’s more laborious.

I should mention this can also be a good motivator for being an early registrant of a site you might possibly be interested in, just to make sure you’ve claimed your name.

Prepare a “passport” of all commonly-used info

At the most basic level: it never hurts, and often helps to have a folder in an easy-to-reach place on your computer — like your desktop or Documents — where you have a plain or rich text file containing the stuff you often enter into profiles either during or after initial registration.

Some examples of common fill-me-in fields: Biography (aka “About Me”), Location, Interests, and Occupation. Social sharing sites get more granular, e.g., Flickr also has a “Favorite Books & Authors,” “Favorite Movies, Stars & Directors,” and even “Favorite Music & Artists.” MySpace, FaceBook, and others have their own equivalents. I may not fill these out unless there’s some compelling advantage to doing so — like finding others with the same taste, or posting my fave bands on a music recommendation site that actively parses that info to suggest new tunes. But the point is: these “personality pop quiz” fields can be time-consuming and require some thought, so a prepared copy-and-paste can make a big difference!

Part of your text file could look like this:

- Favorite Books & Authors: Harry Potter, Stephen King’s The Stand

- Favorite Movies, Stars & Directors: Johnny Depp, Ed Wood, Neil Patrick Harris as Dr. Horrible

- Favorite Music & Artists: Tangerine Dream, Vangelis, Yanni, A-Ha’s “Take on Me”

Then, copy-and-paste as needed.

One level up on the automation scale is making your Web browser help you autofill. Modern browsers have autocomplete, and Firefox offers add-ons like Autofill Forms which I adore. I know many people like RoboForm, which works with Internet Explorer too. These tools have the disadvantage of possibly not being able to recognize a form if it’s seemingly labeled the same but has a different ID, so that’s where copy and paste fallback is useful.

And further up — or perhaps sideways, since this is complementary, a macro app will let you enter long chunks of text with a single, or few keystrokes. I favor PhraseExpress (version 6 was recently released), which works in just about any Windows program that supports pasting text. One of the best ways to judge if you need a program like this is to ask yourself: “Do I find myself typing the same stuff over and over while grumbling about how tired I am?”

The goal here: the quickest possible access to your text, cutting down on time and trouble.

But ah, what about pictures?

Have your “passport photo” ready, too

You know what they say about a picture being worth so many words. Many sites have a generic placeholder until you choose to override it with one of your own, which you should. And if you belong to many sites with the same visible identity, it helps to use the same picture — it’s easy and boosts your personal brand, if you’re into that.

Aside from selecting from a premade gallery, these are the two most common choices:

1. Local upload - Browse your hard drive for a photo

2. Remote upload - Specify an URL, e.g., http://blahblah1234.com/profile.jpg

Let’s cover both of these. With “Local upload,” it helps to put a few different versions of a picture in your earlier-established profile passport folder, alongside your text file(s). Some sites have eccentric requirements, but by and large and not unlike fast food, you’ll want a:

1. Small size - 75×75 pixels or less, useful on many forums, Gravatar, etc.

2. Medium size - Say, 500×500 pixels, likely to be shown in your “extended profile”

3. SUPER-SIZE - As big as it can be!

It’s true some sites will auto-resize or allow you to crop your upload (e.g., for non-square ratios), but that’s far from universal, so don’t count on it. Your image can be in JPG or PNG format — the former’s more common. And make sure it looks great at a small size. (E.g., no Boschian gardens in their entirety.)

The same principle applies to “Remote upload.” It gets easier if you use Flickr, because Flickr automatically creates up to five different-sized versions. Click through to see the actual profile pic/avatar/buddy icon I use, called “Watermelon Eye:”

And you can save Web images for local upload, sparing you resize time. But please don’t violate anyone’s rights (that sounds so dirty) — make your own art or get something in the public domain or Creative Commons.

I love to save time so much that I use Direct Folders (basic version is free), which provides easy access to your commonly used files and folders. It allows me to double-click when a file browser is open, then select my profile image with one more click. Pedantic? No way, all those clicks add up when you’ve signed up for over hundreds of sites for experience’s sake as I have.

Simply put: a well-chosen photo helps you to stand out and be more memorable.

Identify profile patterns across sites

Certain site profiles look similar because they’re built on the same software. vBulletin forums, WordPress blogs, and Ning networks are prominent instances. If you sign up for a lot of one or more of these archetypes, you’ll want to continually optimize your “profile passport” to be streamlined for the next time you sign up.

For instance, you’ll often notice a vBulletin forum’s User Control Panel has a layout like this:

Thus, reinforced lesson of the story gleaned from the above: be prepared!.

Extend these principles to specific site content

A growing number of sites use data and metadata like tags to organize your stuff. Flickr — which I mention so often because it’s a great example — makes it easy to see which tags you’ve used the most. Some places can autocomplete popular tags. Unfortunately, they’re the exception, not the rule. When I upload a video tutorial to YouTube, blip.tv, or Vimeo, I have a PhraseExpress shortcut: typing in “[tags]” expands that abbreviation to a list of commonly-used tags, which I can edit as needed. Just like a word processor template isn’t the end of your creation, but is a facilitator to get on the right track.

Here’s another example of specifics: if you’re a musician, there are numerous music (like Jamendo and SoundCloud) and stock content sites (like Envato) which encourage you to upload your MP3s. Do just that, and put the MP3s alongside the text files in your passport folder. In this case, your text file would have relevant info like the story behind each song — whatever you observe keeps appearing on different sites.

This goes beyond filling out your profile and can be applied in a variety of ways, but the same benefits are incredibly true. It’s part of what I call knowledge compound interest, where the methods you “invest” today and share tomorrow — exactly as I’m doing here — will earn unto itself in the long run. After all, a well-filled profile shows how interesting you are, and tags add value to identifying your content. Time’s a-tickin’, and the sooner you get started, the more you have to gain.

Don’t be stressed to fill everything out at once

I emphasize this, because as much as a rabid, buzzword-binging junkie I can be at times, I’m also smart enough to know that the best experiences come with extended usage, not all in a day. Especially with so many startups to check out on Mashable.

I like to dip into various sites and tinker around to gain an understanding, and naturally cling to the ones which are useful for me after weeks. I never stay on a site just because of peer pressure.

Accretion counts for a lot: incrementally edit your profiles as you grow in life and your passions evolve. Leave optional fields empty if your intuition indicates you won’t benefit from filling them out. And as for what you are willing to share, I can’t say it better than Madonna: “Express yourself, don’t repress yourself.” Even if your taste in colors is a bit wacky:

If you find a site particularly well-worth using and you enjoy being active in the community, then by all means, contribute what you feel will be helpful for your fellow members to get to know you. And if you’d rather lurk, then make that your modus operandi.

The usefulness of what I’ve shared above will make itself clear after the next few signups you do, but don’t hesitate — apply and adapt them for your comfort at the earliest opportunity you get, and let me know your time-saving tips ‘n’ tricks!

Source:Mashable!

Here’s Mashable’s latest round-up of upcoming Web 2.0 events, parties, and conferences. For more upcoming event listings, check out Mashable’s Events section.

Not on this list? Contact us and let’s establish a media partnership.

November 11-14, 2008, Las Vegas: For anyone involved in the production, marketing, or management of an Internet web site - this is a must attend event to be held in Las Vegas, NV. PubCon covers search engine optimization (SEO), search engine marketing (SEM), web hosting issues, domains & the domaining business, Internet video, podcasting, multimedia, and special sessions of interactive attendee site reviews. In addition, there are tracks on new marketing techniques, linking strategies, social media, and online advertising. Save 15% by using the code on our discount announcement.

November 12-14, 2008, Las Vegas: The word of mouth marketing industry is young and nimble, and it’s changing rapidly from week-to-week and month-to-month. Whether you live and breathe word of mouth or have seen firsthand the impact of WOMM and want to learn more, WOMMA’s annual Word of Mouth Marketing Summit is the place to be. WOMMA’s Word of Mouth Marketing Summit is crammed with informative sessions that address this fast-changing industry, and will bring attendees up-to-date on the current state of the WOM world. A discount of $75 is offered to Mashable using discount code FriendsofMashable.

November 12, 2008, London: E.Factor is hosting a “Measuring Success” discussion to understand metrics for performance pacing, dangers of relying on profit, using non-financial indicators, and overcoming measurement problems. Get the details here.

November 12, 2008, Mountain View: At Under the Radar: Mobility, the team at Dealmaker Media is showcasing mobile startups from ‘round the globe at their pinnacle Under the Radar conference. Test driven, vetted mobile startups will hit the stage to be judged and critiqued by the likes of Motorola, CBS Mobile, Nokia, the iFund, Comcast, T-Mobile, Verizon and more. A $100 off ticket is here.

November 14, 2008, San Francisco: AdRevenue 08 is the first open conference totally dedicated to improving the monetary value of ad inventory for online publishers and ad networks so you can go from having unsold ads to revenue. A 20% discount code and more information is right over here.

November 17-19, 2008, Mountain View: Mashup Camp is a free, unconference-style event focused on connecting and engaging hundreds of members of the Mashup community at a grassroots level. Chalk Talks, SpeedGeeking sessions, Best Mashup Contests, panel discussions, free meals and an extensive list of “rock star” speakers including Tim O’Reilly (O’Reilly Media, Inc.), distinguish Mashup Camp as the go-to event for anybody (software developers, IT pros, etc) with an interest in the mashup approach to software development.

November 17-20, 2008, San Francisco: Attend the Advanced Learning Institute’s 3rd National Forum on Social Media for Internal Communications: How To Engage Employees, Drive Change & Improve Your Bottom Line Using BLOGGING, PODCASTING & The Latest WEB 2.0 Technologies this November 17-20 in San Francisco to learn how to use social media for internal communications and leverage the latest interactive tools and techniques to advance your organizational goals.

Hear from leading experts at Wachovia Corporation, JetBlue Airways, Sabre Holdings, IBM, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Watson Wyatt Worldwide, and more on how to integrate social media technology into your communication programs to engage employees and dramatically improve internal communications.

If you mention Mashable when registering, you’ll save $200.

November 18, 2008, San Francisco: At SF New Tech, hear live 5 minute demos of great companies, enjoy cocktails and conversation, and more. This month, 23andMe, 11SquareFeet, MixMatchMusic, ChoiceBot, Hubpages, and FixYa will be presenting. It all goes down at Mighty @ 119 Utah St at 6:30pm. Be there!

November 18, 2008, Mountain View: Web 2.0 Mapping and Social Networks group is about sharing, teaching, learning, and networking around current and future web-based geospatial and social networking technology. You belong if you are an entrepreneur, VC, developer, social-networker, product manager, programmer, developer, visionary, geographer, geologist, explorer, marketer, business exec, project manager, student, or creative person who is curious about Web 2.0 mapping and social networks. We meet on the third Tuesday of every month at Google in Mountain View, CA. We welcome all and exclude no one. This month, hear presentations from OpenLandmark and Wichro.

November 18-19, 2008, Redwood City: At the VentureWire Technology Showcase, you will see 125 early- and later-stage start-ups from the U.S., Asia and Europe who have been deemed as industry stand-outs in Advertising, Business Technologies, Media, Mobile Applications, Networking, Web and Wireless. Selected for their breakthrough technologies, the presenting start-ups are truly positioned to redefine their markets. This is your chance to scout these prime deal prospects, acquisition targets or business partners as well as potential competitors. Spend two days mixing and mingling with the tech industry’s leading venture capitalists, entrepreneurs, corporate executives, analysts and other influential figures. More information and a discount code is right here.

November 18-19, 2008, Toronto: Join nextMEDIA – Monetizing Digital Media, a unique two day event that brings together the broadcast, new media, and advertising communities to focus on the dollars and sense of digital media. More information and a discount code is here.

November 24-25, 2008, Israel: Affiliate marketers unite in Israel for Affilicon Israel. For the first time ever, you have the chance to meet face-to-face in Israel with top affiliate marketers and learn from experts in Search Engine Optimization, social networking and media, and other leading internet technologies. At Affilicon, network with highly successful affiliates who live and breathe the world of affiliate marketing. Meet new people and explore new potential relationships with operators and vendors. Want more information? And perhaps a discount code? Click here.

December 3, 2008, San Francisco: The 2008 Holiday Season is upon us and when the NYC Webgrrls Community gets together for the Holidays, it is an industry event, not only about revelry but also about the celebration of the achievements of women in technology and business. The event starts at 7PM with a 2-hour open bar followed by great Italian food, door prizes, and drawings. More information is here.

December 3, 2008, San Francisco: Silicon Valley Rocks! is the first music showcase featuring performances from Silicon Valley’s tech community - from VCs and entrepreneurs to bloggers and software developers - to raise money for Music in Schools Today (MuST) a Bay Area non-profit that seeks to rescue school music programs from budget cuts. The full details are here.

December 4, 2008, New York City: Webgrrls is having a NYC party just like the one in San Francisco the night before (scroll up for more information). Or just get the information and RSVP.

December 9-10, 2008, San Francisco: The Mobile Media Investor Conference (MMIC) program will happen in San Francisco and is your opportunity to network with mobile industry leaders and investors. At the MMIC program, you can hear case studies and learn real examples of how to make money and how to raise money in the mobile media world. Your 10% discount is here.

February 6-7, 2009, Orlando: In today’s economy, maintaining a competitive advantage is crucial, whether you are a freelancer, or run a development shop. Using the productivity benefits of Rails helps us to stand out in the crowded space of developers and development firms. And the Rails core team hasn’t kept us wanting, adding features such as internationalization, compatibility with Ruby 1.9 and JRuby, thread safety, and much more. And if the Rails Rumble proved anything, it’s that a small team of Rails developers can accomplish a great amount with little time. So how do we as developers continue to improve how we work and what we produce? Get more information by attending the acts_as_conference.

February 12, 2009, Santa Monica: The highly-anticipated Twiistup will hold their 5th and largest event to date on Thursday, February 12th at a massive hangar in Santa Monica, CA. The search is on for startups to “show-off” at the event. Fifteen showoffs will be selected to showcase their products and services to an audience of investors, entrepreneurs, press and other influencers in tech, media and entertainment. You can find out how to apply and register for the event by clicking here.

March 9-10, 2009, London: The Social Networking World Forum is the perfect event for professionals to learn and discuss the future development of social media. The two day conference and exhibition will provide a focused platform for the global social media industry. The conference aims to address core issues such as monetization, future technologies/services, engaging social groups with brands and how businesses can get the most out of social and business networks.

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What’s Your Favorite Places and Events Site?

Mon, 10 Nov 2008 23:30:44 +0000

Source:Mashable!

This post is part of Mashable’s Startup Review series, which highlights great unsung startups. The series is made possible by Sun Startup Essentials.

Company Name

GroupTable

20-Word Description

GroupTable is Web-based collaboration software created to help student group projects and study groups improve their document management, communication and project planning.

CEO’s Pitch

Student enrollment at higher learning institutions are increasing. Due to the economy students are staying in school longer and many students are going back to school. Group work is a part of any student’s life. Study groups are proven to improve students grades and group projects are often required in classes. But students have busy lives and meeting in their groups can be extremely challenging.

GroupTable was created by several students who were frustrated with the stress caused by group work and the lack of tools available to meet their needs. GroupTable solves this problem and enables students to manage their study groups and group projects anytime and anywhere.

Mashable’s Take

Though it’s hardly a stereotype worth repeating in a world in which controlled workspace chaos in academic and corporate situations is tolerated and sometimes even encouraged, students in need of organization are often required to brave certain circumstances their own unique way, whether the subject be course-related or extracurricular. So for those groups of students who feel the need to keep things tidy, neat and collaborative, particularly when not gathered in person, GroupTable may well come handy.

The entire makeup of the service is quite impressive. From its primary group management role to the data sharing feature present within the Binder element, things seem well thought out. Powerful but not overwhelming, is how we would phrase it.

As you can see, the paint work is appreciable, too. Quite a lot of software today is heavy on utility and light on sparkle, and while the latter focus isn’t so very important compared to the first, it does get noticed by a portion of users. The fact that GroupTable’s creators went that extra mile is not lost on us, and deserves its share of commendation.

Getting back to the utilitarian track, we sense there is little that GroupTable doesn’t address that a collection of students would have to see in such an application. Apart from full-on social network interconnectedness with the likes of MySpace and Facebook, everything from the group dashboard to the file storage component to timekeeping to comment threads is clearly designed to bridge users together on important matters without completely overshadowing real-world engagement.

Of course, there’s a strong chance that users of GroupTable - which, as an open beta, has registered just over 1,000 users to this day - will have GroupTable at hand whether they crash inside their respective dorm rooms or as one collective somewhere on the campus commons. But it is not the be-all and end-all of group organization. And that’s just how it should be. It’s the classic value-add mantra executed in modern-day fashion.

Editor’s Note: This post is part of an ongoing series at Mashable - The Startup Review, Sponsored by Sun Microsystems Startup Essentials. If you would like to have your startup considered for inclusion, please see the details here.

LinkedIn Events Bring Conference Networking Online

Sat, 08 Nov 2008 01:41:46 +0000

Source:Mashable!

This article is part of the Open Web Awards, an open, international contest for the best websites and services.

Recently, we all got some perspective on just how huge online photo sharing has become – Facebook announced that more than 10 billion photos have been uploaded on the social network, while Flickr soon after reported that it had passed the 3 billion mark. Even President-elect Obama posted behind-the-scenes photos from election night to Flickr.

In addition to the big photo sharing sites, there are also online photo editors like Picnik, Fotoflexer, and now Adobe Photoshop Express. Not sure which one should get your nomination? Check out our list of more than 90 different photography tools and then submit your pick in the widget below:

Make Your Nomination

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Source:Mashable!

This post is part of Mashable’s Startup Review series, which highlights great unsung startups. The series is made possible by Sun Startup Essentials.

Company Name

Vizzual

20-Word Description

The idea of VizzualForms is to allow users to create even the most complicated forms in a simple manner. It is about collecting, storing and processing data.

CEO’s Pitch

VizzualForms is a Web-based data management system created for collecting, storing and processing data via the Internet. It allows you to create and publish Web forms in mere minutes without any programming knowledge or advanced computer skills.

It is a time- and cost-effective solution for private or business use. It is very easy to use, yet it is powerful. It includes a visual form creator, data processing tool, contact manager, invitation module and report tool.

With VizzualForms users can create a broad spectrum of forms, invite others to fill in the forms and see or share the results in real time. Our integrated email notification system can send email with data to a mailbox each time a form is submitted, guaranteeing that no request or data will be missed. Forms created with VizzualForms can be embedded into Web page or delivered using an invitation module.

Mashable’s Take

There are a number of applications and services, online and off, that will accomplish the task of producing forms for numerous purposes. Tools featured within the near-ubiquitous Microsoft Office can manage things like surveys and registration forms and whatnot. The same with Apple’s iWork suite and other similar releases. Meanwhile, Web-based options like FormSite, ExtremeForm, JotForm, and Wufoo can accomplish needed designs with varying degrees of customization and interactivity.

Vizzual Forms is one such character. Users of Vizzual Forms are served with what basically amount to two utilities. One intended for form assembly, the other for data analysis. The first is fairly intuitive to operate. It generally works the way the average user might expect it to. Its strongest features are for editing. Sending things to a user’s contact list might be a little tedious at first, but so long as you maintain an account with regularity, you’ll learn the proverbial ropes pretty quickly, we think. Besides, if you’re conducting an online poll or making some other request, embeds can be easily made.

Depending on your level of engagement, you can make do with a cost-free and ad-supported account, or spring for a Basic ($8.50), Small Biz ($16.50), or Enterprise-level registration ($31.50). Companies looking to host Vizzual on their own servers can even pony up $1,900 for the privilege.

To be honest, what Vizzual Forms will help you produce won’t be aesthetically brilliant by any means. The examples it reveals are pretty ordinary. Apart from a palette of colors, you might say things are a bit boring. But rarely is the act of filling a form with information a truly fun endeavor. So the important thing, then, is for the service to help Joe Creator ease through the process as best he or she can. And Vizzual Forms appears conditioned to do just that. You can certainly be specific with an editing job if you like. Nothing really stops you from spending a great deal of time fine-tuning a poll or whathaveyou. But you’ll rarely, if ever, be lost for a visual guide on how to get it done.

HOW TO: Market a Web Company in a Down Economy [Video]

Thu, 06 Nov 2008 09:31:44 +0000

Source:Mashable!

I and just about everyone on the so-called tech blogosphere’s A-List just got the follow notice on Twitter that Al Gore, the so-called inventor of the Internet, had finally decided to tweet as promised.

The account looks real enough - the naming scheme follows a lot of celebrity tweeters’ styles (theREALdvorak, theREALbritney, etc). The website linked to the account even looked official enough, with prominent logos and links to all of Al Gore’s various ventures and projects.

Something about it all set off my hoax-o-meter, though, so I decided to do a bit of late night investigation.

The first thing that caught my eye is that the list of followers reads like a who’s who of the A-List. It starts with the Twitter staff like @ev and @biz, and works it’s way down to folks like @laughingsquid, @xenijardin and @scobleizer. Combine that with the fact that the follower/followed ratio is something like 102/1600, it’s obvious that there’s an adding bot involved here (or an intern with a very sore clicking finger).

The first two tweets were a little suspect, too. The first one says: “invented a new blog @ www.aninconvenientblog.org”, and the second tweet says: “world’s first blog post…http://tinyurl.com/65ezrt.” I’ve never met Al Gore, but I can’t imagine him playing on his widely known faux pas in such a cavalier manner.

Both links bring you to a blog post where Al Gore is supposedly congratulating President-Elect Obama on his big win, and alluding to Al Gore’s role in the new administration:

As many of you know, I am good friends with Barack. I called him earlier today to congratulate him on his victory over Senator John McCain.

I look forward to serving in the Obama administration and while I cannot yet reveal what my exact role will be, I can assure you that President-Elect Obama and I are eager to get started building a new world. One that is green and sustainable.

I took a look at the DNS records, but they provided no real clues (only more questions). The DNS information was protected by a standard anonymizing service out of Canada.

I did an informal poll of a few folks who were chatting with me via IM at time the Twitter notification came in. All of them had just recieved an identical invite, and all of them responded pretty uniformly, along the lines that it appeared to be an expertly done forgery.

My best guess would have to be that this is a fakery, perhaps with the motive of tricking some journalists into speculating whether or not Al Gore will be involved with Obama’s ecology initiatives. I could be wrong, though - if you have evidence to the contrary (or even more solid evidence to prove it is a fakery), please contribute it via the comments below.

Source:Mashable!

The wine and web marketing expert Gary Vaynerchuk was canvassing on the streets of New York on Wednesday night: bringing the “Yes We Can” mantra to the web community.

The meetup, co-organized with Mashable, began as a cosy indoor networking affair. But with high volume levels inside, the group gleefully marched out to the street for an upbeat pep talk; a location much more suited to the themes of improvisation and resourcefulness.

Video: Staying Upbeat in a Down Market

The full video of the “sidewalk keynote” is posted below, courtesy of CenterNetworks. (Warning: contains strong language throughout.) Or skip to the “7 Points” below for our summary.

Gary’s 7 Points on a Social Media Upturn

1. “Hustle” - improvise, be resourceful, do whatever it takes to care for your community. Tough times require creative solutions.

2. “Next 24 months are the biggest opportunity for social media” - social media is mature. “It’s a baby. But it’s mature. It’s a baby with a mustache.”

3. “Large companies will cut social media because they don’t understand it” - the longer the big players stay away from new web technologies, the greater the opportunity for new entrants.

4. “The new barrier to building a brand is your time, not your pocketbook” - nobody can stop you from starting a global media brand from your house; all you need is time.

5. “Telling main street about Twitter is a waste of time” - keep it quiet; knowledge of new web technologies is your competitive advantage.

6. “Take Your Money” - go to Google, type in the keywords in your space. Look at the ads next to the results: these are people who pay to market in your niche. Call them. Convince them to spend those dollars on you instead.

7. “Anything that gets eyeballs is monetizable” - 2500 unique visitors a day should be enough to live on.

Agree? Disagree? Think the “sidewalk keynote” is the new “unconference”? Leave a comment below!

Partners

A final thanks to Conversive and FreshBooks for partnering on this event:

“Conversive®, Inc. provides market-leading automated conversation technology that makes information easily accessible, using the most natural process – one-on-one interaction and engagement. Anything else is just chat.”

“FreshBooks is an online invoicing, time tracking and expense tracking service designed to help entreprenuers, freelancers and creative professionals save time, look more professional and get paid faster. Sign up for a free account at FreshBooks.com.”

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Ad Spending At AOL Down 6 Percent

Wed, 05 Nov 2008 17:30:31 +0000

Source:TechCrunch

On Election night everyone was glued to their screens. Not just their TV screens, but also their computer screens. Going to the major news sites, hitting refresh on the interactive electoral maps millions of times, and watching Obama and McCain give their final speeches of the campaign streamed live over the Web. According to Akamai, which is the content delivery network for most major news sites including CNN which had a record day on its own), NBC, Reuters, and the BBC, global visitors to news sites peaked last night at 11 PM with 8,572,042 visitors per minute. Source:TechCrunch
Time Warner reported its third quarter results today and revealed that the AOL business isn’t doing too well but not as bad as some had expected (though it’s bound to get worse this quarter).

Total revenues for Time Warner Cable remained flat compared to the same period in 2007 at $11.7 billion with earnings of 30 cents a share, while revenues for the AOL segment decreased 17% ($207 million) to $1.0 billion. Ad spending is hurting (6% decrease to $33 million), as are revenues from subscription services (26% decrease to $165 million).

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