Zappos.com is using Twitter. It's refreshing to see a company using Twitter "correctly" (IMHO, of course).
"Correctly" = an actual person committed to updating the account; not just a river of news; not simply re-broadcasting an RSS feed.
For your reading pleasure: my crawl of the interwebs today.
And for your viewing pleasure: the first 20 or so photos in my flickr favorites.
Feeling the Jayhawk love today.
In case you're not following NCAA men's basketball, my beloved University of Kansas Jayhawks won the national semi-final last night against the University of North Carolina (not to mention against KU's old coach of 15 years, Roy Williams)!
My dad has this same figurine, and I'm nearly positive it was my grandfather's. While none of the kids in my generation attended KU, the crimson & blue blood runs deep.
Here's to an amazing championship game on Monday night. It will definitely be one heck of a game as the two teams play very similarly and are really well matched.
Rock Chalk Jayhawk KU!
Good People Day is a "flash holiday" (props to @pistachio for that term) started by Gary Vaynerchuk as a way to give a little back to the amazing people that inspire us, who we learn from, and love.
Listing all my Good People here would be impossible, so I've decided to limit my shout outs to people who've made an impact on my life in some way in 2007. As I just twittered, 2007 was the year I stepped out of my home office and into the amazing geek community here in SF. It was also the year that I finally put the SXSW deadline on my calendar and made sure to get a hotel room early so I had no excuse for missing it. I met so many wonderful, inspiring, and talented people at SXSW -- it's like a Good People meetup!
On with the post...
1st, my wife Anna (@abrownie), for being an amazing, righteous, huge-hearted, wicked smart, beautiful gal.
2nd, I recently twittered that I was having dinner with three of my favorite people in the universe. One was Anna, and the other two were Pippa (@drpippa) & Jodi (@jsperber). You two make life a little brighter.
3rd, the two main reasons I've been able to meet so many cool SF geeks this year: Citizen Space and Laughing Squid. I've met Scott (@laughingsquid) a few times, and his generosity to and passion for the techie community in SF is overwhelming. As for the folks at Citizen Space, all I can say is a big, huge Thank You. Getting out of my spare bedroom and my coffee shop office, and out into the world changed my life. Chris (@factoryjoe) never ceases to amaze me with his thought leadership and insight. And Tara (@missrogue) continues to be an inspiration and has become a good friend.
5 people I met & got to know a bit in 2007: Tara (@missrogue), Larry (@lhalff), Todd (@toddsieling), William (@v), and Colin (@cbrumelle)
5 Bay Area people I met in 2007 but hope to get to know a bit better in 2008 (i.e. concerts, dinners, parties & skiing/boarding in our future!): Willo (@willotoons) & Ali (@spangley) & Aubrey (@aubs) & Ryan (@rk), Daniel (@dburka), Juliette (@linoleumjet) & Mark (@trammell), Kevin (@kevnull) & Coley (@coley), Cindy (@cindyli), Kristy (@kristywells) & Chris (@chrisheuer), Andy (@andykaufman), Rob (@robknight), Tim (@planspark), and Matt (Kid Kameleon) -- Ok, I really cheated on that one.
5 gals I'd want in my corner on any project (who haven't already been listed): Erica (@ericabiz), Erica (@ericaogrady), Gwen (@gwenbell), Laura (@pistachio), Silona (@silona) -- and SO many more!
5 of my favorite new "conference friends"*: Andrew (@andrewhyde), Colin (@cdevroe), Marcus (@marcusnelson), Matthew (@organ_printer), Robert (@rhjr), Angela (@spunkygidget), Jacob (@jacobsayles) and the IndyHall crew (@alexknowshtml, @johnnynines, @themartorana, @dbanana, @designgeekgirl, & more) (cheating again, I know)
*conference friend = someone who would undoubtedly be a good bud if we lived in the same city; but since they don't, hanging out at conferences will have to suffice.
And finally, and not simply because we wouldn't be blogging, vlogging, and twittering about this if it wasn't for him -- Gary Vaynerchuk (@garyvee), you rock. It was excellent finally meeting you at SXSW and I truly hope to get to hang with you again soon.
Yeehaw!
I'm off to SXSW for the first time. I actually never thought my first SXSW showing would be for the Interactive festival instead of the Music festival; but so be it. I'm psyched!
There are all kinds of SXSW calendars cropping up, but this one is my favorite: http://sched.org. I'll be attending all kinds of panels, book-readings, and parties. If you're curious, this is what I'll be snacking on for the next several days.
A heads up to twitter followers. If you are following me via SMS and you have a limited text messaging plan, I won't be offended if you turn it off for a few days. I'll be back to normal as of March 12th!
Also, a couple of notable events:
type @username <3 and you'll tweet out a very sweet valentine's day message.
e.g. @abrownie <3
February 12, 2008
Exit polls: Obama stealing Clinton's base
Posted: 08:39 PM ET
(CNN) — Barack Obama did well with Virginia Democrats across both race and gender lines, and seems to be eating away at Hillary Clinton's backbone of support: women.
According to exit polls, Obama won nearly 60 percent of the female vote, a demographic that has carried Clinton to success in past primaries. (my emphasis)
Clinton even fared worse among men in Virginia – more than two-thirds chose Obama.
Meanwhile, the Illinois senator scored his highest percentage of African-American support to date — winning close to 90 percent of that voting bloc. And the two evenly split the white vote as whole, even though in past primaries Clinton has held a slight edge among white voters.
The only demographic Clinton won in Virginia was among white women, who broke for her over Obama by 10 points. But that margin is significantly smaller than the national average on Super Tuesday. She beat Obama among white women by 25 points then, according to national exit polls.
– CNN Ticker Producer Alexander Mooney
Read/Write Web did an article last summer about "rolling your own office." As a telecommuter, and a consultant/freelancer previously, I'm intimately familiar with most of those tools, and have fully and completely jumped on the web application bandwagon. My calendar is online. My email is web mail. My project management tools and todo lists are online. My "office" software is online. I haven't yet paid for online storage, but I do have an account at box.net, and am seriously considering making the move. (Currently, I use Hamachi to VPN to my desktop at home. This is fine most of the time -- except when massive storms hit San Francisco and the power goes out.)
Early last year, frustrated with Sprint's voicemail system, I began looking around ago for an online substitution. I started using GotVoice to check my voicemail and get it on the web (visual voicemail pre-iPhone!). Then I signed up for a GrandCentral number and fell in love. I emailed my family and work contacts, put the new number on my business cards, and made the switch. I've used Skype when I'm on the go and can't get a cell signal, but haven't had to resort to this too often.
I write all this to get to the point of this post... I'm currently in Vancouver at Web Directions North, and AT&T's international rates are pretty high. After the first day of making calls, checking email, going online, etc., I realized that I was roaming and promptly turned data roaming off. I can do without the email and the browsing, especially since I have access to WiFi at the hotel during the day. But what to do about all those pesky calls coming in?
Here's what to do (if you have a GrandCentral account):
EqualityCamp SF was a huge success. Thanks to all who participated. Stay tuned for EqCamp OAK!
