The Flurry Blog

A year ago, during the Iran Election Protests I posted about a small project a friend and I embarked on, to help spread the word in solidarity with the people of Iran being oppressed.  We often think we have little leverage to make change in today’s world.  This morning I was once more compelled to use the tools and connections I have at hand to spread the word for change.  Randy Elrod posted a blog and painting in protest of the planned stoning of an Iranian woman named Sakineh.  He is asking others to stage an online protest.  Here is his full post and art:

As I casually perused CNN.com this morning, an article titled “Global Protests Held Worldwide Against Iran Woman’s Execution by Stoning” jolted me from my Saturday reverie. You can read it HERE. Feeling profoundly moved to join the protest,  I Googled an image search of the words “stoning muslim women.” The pictures brought hot tears of horror to my face.

I began passionately painting a watercolor and below is what came from the shock and realization that murders like this still occur in our “modern” world. I thought, why not start a blog, Twitter,  and Facebook protest against the stoning of this very real person named Sakineh?

Will you please participate? CNN says that Iran has been known to stay an execution, when the protest is loud enough. If you would like to join me, please do so. If not, that is fine, I’m not trying to put you on a guilt trip.

But, I’ve spent my day off painting a watercolor in this effort, so will you take a few brief seconds and do a blog post, Twitter, or Facebook update to save Sakineh’s life??

You can simply copy and paste this post, or write your own. Please use the exact title so that we can be heard as one voice. You also have full permission to use the watercolor as your social network image, in your posts, and I have created Twibbons for your Facebook and Twitter profiles.

Facebook

Twitter

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People still ask me what is the worth of Twitter. This morning I was reminded of the main value I find in the tool, inspiration. Susan Lewis posted a link a while back to a really good blog on finding Inspiration by Jonathan Mead.

If you simply look at the massive amount of tweets being posted on the home page of Twitter, you’ll be missing the true value. But if, through time, you build a community around your interests and expertise, then you will eventually have a refined group of people and sources from which to draw inspiration. In an earlier post I explained a few of the lists in which I have grouped those that I follow. Two of these lists never fail me when I am seeking inspiration for a new idea.  I  probably spend an hour and a half each day browsing and engaging with those in the lists as well as ones I have created for the brand communities I coordinate. I’d like to say that Facebook does the same, but at this point (unless someone is posting the same content I am finding via the lists on Twitter) it does not inspire as much.

The other places I find inspiration for professional creativity are: books, listening to my closest friends stories, and personal reflection.

Where are you finding inspiration today and what tools are you finding it with?

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Today it has been two years since I started using Twitter. As I started to reflect on what it has meant to me, I realized I could not single out simple descriptions.To me it is like asking what does the telephone do for you. So rather than make a long list I’d like to ask you about the good, (if you know me, you know I love using the tool) and the bad. Tell me your stories. I had no idea where it would have taken me two years later.  If you want to know when you joined ( as well as the odd thing you first said ) then go to myfirsttweet.com.

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When I first heard about www.helpareporterout.com or HARO for short, I thought it might be a good service to check out for the brand communities I work with.  What surprised me is what resulted after using it for a week.  I found myself sending multiple story leads to friends in my network. I had signed up to find ways to promote my brands, but more than anything, it has turned out to be a valuable tool for my network.

HARO is a free service that allows reporters to post story requests that then go out to the nearly 135,000 subscribers.  Each day the subscriber receives an email listing all the reporter requests sorted by category. Who would not benefit from direct access to reporters that are asking for either expertise or leads?  I first heard of HARO from its founder and CEO Peter Shankman during his keynote at the Portland Social Fresh Conference.  It was not only after hearing him speak at The Portland Communicators Conference that I decided to sign up myself.

At that keynote, I remember an attendee asking Peter where he finds cool things to share.  This group was mostly made up of late adopters, peppered with some innovative new media users.  I am not sure why Peter didn’t just say, use Haro?  Would it have been self promotion? Probably, but so what, if it is true.  There has not been one day yet that I have not found a perfect fit lead to send on to a friend.  It is too early to tell if any of the leads will result in them being in a news story, but one thing I know for sure is that each person has been very glad I thought of them.

Last year I read Andy Andrews book The Noticer.  In it the name sake of the book goes in and out of peoples lives noticing things, and thus really seeing people.  People react when you notice something about them.  It shows them that you really see them.  Chris Brogan begins his talks with the Zulu greeting, “Sawubona” which means I see you.

Drop HARO in your tools box as a way of helping not only a reporter out, but someone in your network of friends.  It is a great way of saying I see you, I’m in this with you.

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On Friday a group of friends congregated to spend some time in our small downtown. Our mission was simple. We planned to take and upload as many pictures of and about local businesses as we possibly could. What surprised me was the response we received. Many shop employees didn’t know what to do with us. As if working from a script, many of them just looked more worried than anything, having a handful of people wanting to take pictures of their store for free promotion. One store though gave us an incredible experience. Even though they were closing, Brett of City Barber Shop welcomed us in and even agreed to a free youtube video while he gave a mohawk cut. Brett told us about the history of the shop as the clippers hummed and my friend Loyan got his mohawk. The whole group was thrilled as he went on about the shop he loved. We even learned they have a vintage barber chair that once was used on the Vegas Strip. Brett had no script. He readily lapped up the free publicity. It was like watching a skilled improv artist.

Do we have set ideas of how to get our word out? Do we resist new ways because we are afraid of them?

The businesses and connections in my network throughout the country are thrilled if you share their link, take a picture, leave a review (good or bad). They see it as free and sharable promotion. How would you or your employees react if given the same opportunity?

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This post is in response to Seth Godin’s post on calls to action.

Yes “all calls” are annoying, when we can’t filter them out. We live near a car parts lot, and every day they used to make loud announcements from the classic horn. This became intrusive, if you were anywhere outside your house. I have not noticed it for a long time. It may be that I have just filtered it out.

That brings me to why there are still good reasons for some all calls. I have made some great discoveries using the all call on Twitter. It has mainly been when I was trying to wade through a massive google search for either a product or service. I found Drop Box via a friend’s suggestion, a cool BlackBerry tool from @nanpalmero (he is especially helpful), and many other solutions by just asking simple questions of my community. Now mind you, I try my best to search out my answer first by asking a specific expert or I use the search tools at hand. But I don’t hesitate to ask my community if my quest is not fruitful. Is that wrong? I don’t believe so. Have I annoyed anyone? I hope not.

My key point is that the all call is useful, if you have exhausted all other means or time is critical. Example: (tsunami approaching Maui and my nephew and his wife were only able to receive text messages. They received news, after I sent out an all call via Twitter. They were sitting at an evacuation center waiting to hear if their house on the beach had been destroyed or not).

Would I not follow you if you constantly sent out annoying all calls that could have been answered with simple detective work? Yes, but I have seen the occasional all call stimulate discussion and problem solving when used well from Twitter, facebook and other community sites.

There are several types of all calls that feel negative: email spam, mindless cc’s (people have learned to not send them to me), facebook’s insistence on sending email to notify us of every follow up comment in a thread. But besides these, all calls work. If you have social capital with your network they can be a great resource. I enjoy helping others out when they ask something I know. We build community to be a community.

Regarding social capital, here is a great post by Mitch Joel.

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Over the last few weeks I have seen a noticeable drop in conversations on Twitter.  At first I thought it was because people were not engaging as much. A few friends began to comment about the same issue. I had to wonder if it was the result of us not engaging others first.  After all, if we go to a party no one will talk back if all we do is listen to dozens of conversations.  We have to find the conversations to engage in.

Many of the twitter accounts I use are steadily growing and so the number of messages in the main river has become a bit overwhelming.   On my personal account I only follow three types of accounts and for a few reasons.  First I follow personal friends, next I follow friends within my sphere of interests (company culture, marketing, tribal leadership, publishing/writing, and non-profits). Last, I follow news sources and brands I like.  With that number growing I have found that I need to divide them into digestible lists (these lists are still being built). I am very social and find it hard not to try to read through all the followers I have. They all have some value or I would not be following them. That number has become unmanageable though. Rather than unfollowing anyone I have divided them into lists.  In a previous post I talked about one list that I follow and why, the authors-engaged-online list.

What I have noticed, now that I am using my lists to read tweets, is that I am once again finding the conversations to engage.  As I reengage, Twitter again becomes the valuable tool that I have always loved it for; a place to find and share discoveries.

To create your own list, I have found it useful to find out first what your focus is, and two (maybe more important) what others look to you for or what questions are they asking you to answer.  If you are adding any type of value, this won’t be hard.

Also, check out some of your friend’s lists.  You may find ones to adopt as your own.

Scott Gould summed it well in a post this morning that caught my attention:

Deepen your existing connections. …. Value trumps volume. Connections trump community.

We lose conversation if we are not engaging in the community we have already built.

How are you finding ways to reengage in the ever increasing noisy spaces that sites like twitter, are becoming?

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Having ordered my iPad to be delivered sometime after April 12th and not at all thrilled to be standing in lines, I had settled into a the comfortable state of monitoring iPad news and seeing friends and others report on the device the first day of release.  I was surprised to receive a call from my friend Chris Nordyke, who was standing in our local town’s Mac Store looking at a stack of stocked iPads.  There were no lines and no hassles.  With a quick cancel of my apple.com order, I was on my way to the store.  My Saturday turned into a fun and interactive day, talking and sharing details with other friends who had purchased the device.

Like many, I have been researching the iPad on it’s  rumor filled journey to debut.  As a web technology and community professional, I have been looking forward to the iPad to supplement my other productivity tools.  I was not prepared for what the iPad would offer.  To break it down, I use a home and office desktop pc for heavy computing. I have a 6 year old laptop that is reliable, but seriously hobbled due to a short battery life. It  will soon be obsolete as Microsoft slowly pushes xp out of commission.  My mobile devices are an HTC Eris and an Apple iTouch.  Out of all the devices I probably use the iTouch the most to monitor and engage with the non-profit and business communities I am involved with.  The apps I use handle everything I need to stay productive and connected.  What it lacked was a good word processor and a media reader/viewer of decent size. Basically I was pleased with the iTouch.  While traveling or away from my desk it was my device of choice. So I knew that the iPad would supply the same excellent experience as my iTouch, but I was not prepared to be as impressed as I am.

Having the same capabilities on a larger scale would have been enough for me.  But it goes way beyond that.  The inclusion of a built in microphone allows voice recognition software  use (see my list of apps mentioned below) and phone services like Skype. On the iTouch you need the proprietary headphone and mic combo from Apple. Some have complained that it is difficult to type on the device, but I am finding it easy.  In fact I am writing this blog on it. The Twitter app that I have come to love on the iTouch is even better in the iPad version.  Beyond that, all the the other apps  that I use are all slowly releasing iPad version that integrate it’s great functions.

Last, the iPad is just a pleasure to use.  It’s rich video and built in stereo speaker make it a great mobile media device.  And while games were fun on the itouch, they are mind blowing on the the iPad.  It is going to take a while for many apps to catch up to releasing HD versions (there are currently 1,000), but I believe the experience will only get better.  (most iPhone/iTouch apps play in a small screen version of their native resolution and can be expanded to the full screen with degraded resolution with a 2x button)

Some have said it is foolish to buy a first generation Apple device, citing the far from great first version of the first iPhone.  But really this device feels like it has had a thorough testing and quality evaluation.  Like I said before, Apple scored by just building off of it’s senior sibling the iTouch.  Yes improvements will come with 2nd and 3rd generations, but it has taken me 6 years for my current mobile computer’s use to run it’s course.

Here is a list of a few of the outstanding apps I have found.   What has been your first impressions? I’d love to hear them as well as any great apps discovered.

And yes there are a few things that are a bit annoying, but the fact that it took 3 days to bump into them I don’t think they will be deal breakers for most (no flash support, copy and past between a few apps does not seem to work, and no video camera built in).

Pages- (incredible word processor)

Twittelator Pad (power user Twitter app)

Netflix

Dropbox (Syncs files with your pc and laptop)

iBook

Amazon Kindle

The Wall Street Journal

Pandora

Skype

WordPress

Dragon Dictation (a surprisingly accurate dictation app)

Marvel (Visually stunning comic app)

WeatherBug

Mashable

TweetDeck

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Something has changed profoundly in my reading habits.  I am beginning to choose books and the authors that write them for a whole new reason. I look for authors who engage in conversation with their readers.  A few years ago authors never would have dreamed of interacting with readers outside of book tours, signings and readings.  Now authors and readers are communicating via many formats.  Personally, when I choose my next read I look online to see if the author is connected.  Are they engaged in conversation already?

So would Hemingway have been willing to communicate with his readers?  I hope so.  With the way publishing is going today, authors need to engage and build communities involving their readers.  (For more information on getting published today see my friend Jon’s blog post)  They win both financially and relationally.

Here is a short list of authors and organizations that are doing this well and willing to risk engagement.  Their risk is paying off.

Mary Russell (The Bee Keepers Apprentice), Tony Hsieh, Seth Godin, Steve Garfield, Gary Vaynerchuk, Chris Brogan, Andy Andrews, Dr. Tim Erwin, Ransomed Heart, Dr. Emerson Eggerich, Jane Kirkpatrick, Rick Warren

To find your own authors, search Facebook for their name or title. On twitter search for the book name or author. Many readers create a search term if the author has not (you can do this by simply posting on twitter about your book with a #hashtag in front of the term).

Please list add any you have found engaging.

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Last year the Shorty Awards began to swell in popularity in the twitter community. I had a few friends that were pretty high up in the running to win including @luckystartups and @savvyauntie. While there was some talk of ulterior motives behind the awards, I thought it just promoted a dynamic and rapidly growing community of connectors.

Suspicions came back, as this year’s awards rolled around. First of all, these are not people in my social circle. I don’t follow celebrities. People I do follow that approach that status are usually offering great value. It had the feeling of the Oscars. Every year I feel as if the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences is out of touch with the rest of the world, voting for what their tight circle believes should be given the title of best. The Shorty’s gave me the same feeling. Most of the nominated top list I have never even seen let alone gained value or interaction from. Something stank. I began to dig into the Shortys page. On the main Shorty foundation page, sorry.. the Real-Time Academy of Short Form Arts & Sciences (sound similar to anything?), I found the source of all my discomfort in a simple but spooky tag-line “defining media for the new decade”. Yeah. What? I thought the community, the customer, the individual was now defining media. So to say the least I am done with Shortys. In checking my own temperature I shot my friend Ash Shepherd a quick note asking his take. His response confirmed my reaction.

“I thought the Shorty awards were a democratic process whereby Twitter users vote.  How does “the Real-Time Academy of Short Form Arts & Sciences play a vital role in choosing the winners of the Shorty Awards”?  And defining media for the new decade?!?  If anything we have seen the media now being defined by the users and not media moguls and celebrities any longer.  Wait, who did the academy say will comprise their membership? Media Moguls and Celebrities??  Who got to pick this elite group of Media definers?  Themselves. Sounds like the old guard is trying hard to find their way back into the spotlight and control of media.  Weak attempt to promote themselves again if you ask me.”

I asked Ash to elaborate his thoughts here:

Two thoughts really bubbled to the surface for me. The first was the hypocrisy of it all. When I first got a vote for a shorty award I was surprised and excited all at the same time. So naturally I did what you do with any tweet you like on Twitter, I gave it a ReTweet. Imagine my surprise when I saw that doing this action automatically added me to the “egocentric” category for the shorty awards. A nice bit of public shamming that could not be undone. Had I only known it would have been better to create an academy, name myself lord of new media and Arts & Sciences. I would have become a hero and finally gotten some mileage out of those two science degrees.

The second was the double edge of user defined media. So not only can anyone create content these days but apparently if you can create a website and Twitter account you have license to create an Academy.

Your thoughts?

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