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May 17 2010

Just Click It Links for Monday 5-17-10: Microsoft IE, Facebook Privacy, Apple iPad

Category: just click it (hot links),social media — jmacofearth @ 2:08 pm

Mayors of Starbucks Now Get Discounts Nationwide with Foursquare
It had to happen. Foursquare is tying into Foursquare promotions. I saw this coming, but now I might have to join the movement… Nah… I'll check in on my own, thanks very much.

Check Your Facebook Privacy Settings With ReclaimPrivacy
Fighting privacy battles with Facebook, is like trying to protect your online data from Google. All I can say is, "Good luck." The rest of my advice is, "Be informed, and turn the shit off if you are worried about it. And if it *really* freaks you out, just quit using Facebook. And then get over it." But all my rants aside, there are some issues with Facebook's rampant use of your images, your "likes" and other information that they want to use and sell to third party vendors. I'd say these are worth opting out of.

How Facebook’s ‘Community Pages’ and Privacy Changes Impact Brands by Jeremiah Owyang
When JO speaks you need to listen. One of the smartest guys in social media and business metrics. Here's the nut:

Facebook has launched several new policies and features since the F8 Conference ‘Crusade of Colonization’ which has resulted in a large backlash from media around user privacy. It’s not clear if beyond the vocal media if users will leave the site in droves. Perhaps more importantly, Facebook launched “Facebook Community Pages” (read the official post) a feature that aggregates content from wikipedia and Facebook wall posts. Think of it as a cross between Wikipedia with user comments –sometimes unwittingly. These changes cause confusion for users, diminishing control for brands, and strains on the already torrid relationship between Facebook and brands.

What if FDR’s Ideas Ran the C-Suite and Your Social Media?
I can’t help to think his words and wisdom might serve us all now as we look for leaders — not dreamers — to change the world and get growing again.

Federated Media goes all Facebook for this Monday's SIGNAL.

Microsoft Needs to Stop Trash-talking IE6 and Just Trash It
Microsoft Australia has launched an online campaign to try to persuade people to stop using Internet Explorer 6. The campaign likens the browser to a carton of milk: you wouldn't drink nine-year old milk, so why would you use a browser of a similar vintage?

The iPad: Beautiful product demos, rich presentations & seamless syncing between HQ and travel
We’re not waiting. As soon as the iPad was unveiled, my team saw its potential and ordered a few. For $31 worth of apps, total, we’ve turned the device into a powerful way to show off our products and keep our travelers in sync with each other and our Austin HQ. Our Sales Directors, Client Success Directors and Market Developers attend around 30 total events per quarter, from the Bay Area to London and beyond. When they bring along fully-equipped iPads to each conference, show, meeting and client dinner, they’re bringing with them a way to enrich each interaction.

How To Get Verified on Twitter
Twitter verifies a limited number of accounts. There’s no guarantee that your verification request will be processed by Twitter. I know of several celebrities whose verification request was turned down by Twitter. Therefore, Twitter advises users to apply for a verified account only if they are under the threat of impersonation account.

And if you can't get Verified, you can go to an earlier post of mine
So If I Can't Get Twitter-Verified, I'll Just Create An Elite Club Of My Own

@jmacofearth
permalink:

Tags: apple ipad, bazaarvoice, communities pages, elite accounts, facebook, facebook privacy, facebook security, foursquare and starbucks, IE6, IE7, IE8, ipad-iway, jeremiah owyang, mayor of starbucks, microsoft, reclaim privacy, verified twitter

Comments (1)

May 15 2010

The First Cut: Applying The Way of the Sword to Life and Tennis

Category: about me,community building,executive learnings,trust & reputation — jmacofearth @ 11:42 am

Note: My actual time with the sword is quite limited. I trained in karate and tai chi during my college years. And at that time, I was on track to begin sword training at my dojo. As part of my initiation into the sword path I was given a bokuto (wooden sword) to sand and polish while I contemplated what I wanted out of my sword training. In the months that followed, my life and my training changed. I kept the bokuto, but only "worked" with it as part of my tai chi practice. And this consisted of contemplation and addressing the sword rather than using the sword as a training tool or weapon. Thus ends my romantic association with The Way of the Sword.

The concept of kendo is to discipline the human character through the application of the principles of the Katana (sword). — The Kendo Guide

So, several months ago, the concept of the sword and training with the sword came back into my mind. I've had the bokuto with me ever since. Usually it adorns some shelf, not as a trophy or object of respect, but more as a tool (to push closed the attic door) or a reminder of when I "did train." And as I began to talk to some friends about finding a master, reinitiating my discipline and training, an amazing process started to take place.

One of my close friends wanted to know what I wanted out of training. Why would I be seeking out a teacher at this time, and what role would that person play.

And a few days ago, a friend who has trained for years in Aikido and has been a master teach himself, began to explore with me the ideas behind my desire to "train" and "follow" again.

Here's what I came up with.

1. I want to re-instate my commitment to discipline and training.
2. I want to follow and be taught.
3. I want the physical hardening that comes with training.
4. And specifically, with the sword practice, I want to embrace the concept of cutting away all distractions in my life, and finding a clearer direction in my life.
5. I want to participate again in group meditation, group spiritual growth and encouragement, and group training.
6. I want to reawaken the snow leopard inside that is patient and quiet to a point, and then deadly with intention and action when it is required.
7. I want to rejoin a tribe.
8. I want a better defense and a better offense.
9. I want to re-enter that moment of oneness, flow, or "way" where all my concerns and challenges melt away into the moment of the practice.
10. Not as an escape, I want to BE HERE IN THIS MOMENT. (In action, contemplation, and reverence.)

And is the written "purpose of practicing Kendo" – The Kendo Guide

To mold the mind and body,
To cultivate a vigorous spirit,
And through correct and rigid training,
To strive for improvement in the art of Kendo,
To hold in esteem human courtesy and honor,
To associate with others with sincerity,
And to forever pursue the cultivation of oneself.

Sooo… Here's where my friend, my "training aware" friend, went with the discussion.

We talked about "life way" as a part of Aikido. And any training we engage in is meant to support the whole of our life in many ways. And it is the passion for the training and the competition, if that's part of our path, that fuels our growth and expansion into the higher learning or "way" of the practice, or discipline. We train so that we may apply the lessons and strength in our daily lives.

And we talked about Tennis, since I was suffering from some neck pain related to my competitive tennis play.

And in a eureka moment, he said, "And there's that guy who wrote that book about tennis."

My eyes lit up. "Timothy Gallway."

"That might be it."

"You mean The Inner Game of Tennis, by Timothy Gallway?"

"That sounds right."

Holy Cow! He had hit me square in the heart. Not only had The Inner Game of Tennis formed a HUGE part of my youth, and my understanding of tennis as an exploration of self, but more recently I had gotten in touch with Timothy Gallway, in order to support the publication of his new book, The Inner Game of Stress.

"YES!" I said. "The concepts of the Inner Game have been part of my life for a long time. I think they've guided me more often than I know. I mean, I learned them when I was about 14 or 15."

"Well, there you go."

"I was trying to learn about tennis, and this "self 1" and "self 2" concept was a bit over the top. BUT… It worked."

"That's what I'm saying. I think you have your training. And it's something you've been working at passionately for years."

"Yeah, since I was about 10."

"And you still love it."

So we talked about tennis and Timothy Gallway for a bit and I said something about the tennis racquet being sort of like a sword. And the game being fairly analogous to a duel. And in telling him about my game, I was describing my serve as a powerful weapon.

"The first cut," he said.

In principle, the serve is a single motion and attack, when executed effectively puts the opponent on the defensive. In my game it is my single strongest weapon. Nothing gives me more confidence than to have my opponents complement my serve at the end of a match. At the completion of a doubles match, hearing "We just couldn't get a handle on your serve tonight," is truly the highest complement one can receive in tennis. In addition to the WIN, that is.

I'll go fish out My Gallway book. And both my friend and I made a point to go seek out the new book The Inner Game of Stress.

Now I think I'd better go hit some tennis balls before the weekend rain starts again.

@jmacofearth
permalink: http://bit.ly/tennis-sword

Resources:

Tags: finding the inner game, inner game, innergame, kendo, playing tennis, tennis, tennis as a way, the first cut, the inner game, the inner game of stress, the inner game of tennis, the tennis way, tim gallwey, timothy gallwey, zen of tennis

Comments (7)

May 15 2010

What Have You Tweeted for Me Lately? or Burnout In Twitterville (update 5-15-10)

Category: about me,community building,social media,tech opinion,tools — jmacofearth @ 9:46 am

Update 5-15-10: If you don't provide value the fall will continue. That's the trend at least, after dropping nearly 1000 followees, the people continue to wake up and return the favor. But here's the good part, I don't have a plan or a program for growing my flock again. What I do have is a strategy to create tweets that are valuable for people who follow me. No tweets about TV shows or what I'm eating at the moment. Some about social media trends and ideas, some about leadership ideas, and some about my latest writing. AND if someone likes what I'm tweeting, I'm HOPING that that is how they begin following me. But of course there are a lot of strategies for building a Twitter following. One of them is just to follow as many people as possible, and hope that they follow back. I don't really subscribe to this technique. I guess it's okay if the "land grab" mentality is all that matters to you. "How many followers do YOU have?" Perhaps. But I don't think it's the REAL way to be. And again, that's merely MY opinion.

BE REAL, BE REAL-TIME, AUTO-NOTHING, CONVERSE. [tha post on this]

Update 5-13-10: Flirting above 7k followers, my UFs thins my flock. Well, this was expected.

Today I spent twenty minutes UNFOLLOWING folks. I used ManageFlitter, (looks like they had to change their name from ManageTwitter) my favorite app/site for helping you do some of the heavy lifting in Tweep management. And I think in the coming days and weeks my cleaner stream might provide more valuable information.

And here's where the return is. If I thin the heard, even my Tweetdeck tools become better at parsing out the tweets of value from the tweets of promo-mundane-eatingthis-followme-pleaseretweet-teeth whitening chatter that gives Twitter a bad name.

So unDiscovery is almost as much fun as Discovery. And ManageTwitter gives you some tools to help ID and unFollow a lot of people at once. (I can hear you saying, "hey John, why were you following all those people anyway?" and I do have an answer for you, but let's hold off on it for second.)

First MF puts your suspect followers in several categories for easy sorting.

And then here's my simple process.

And one of the best things you can do is BLOCK and REPORT the obvious spam accounts. Like this:

So the fun part of this is… You can rediscover some of the folks you unfollowed, as if they were new discoveries! I mean, seriously, if you miss a tweet from Chris Brogan, it's not gonna kill ya.

And then the next step is to examine what YOU have been tweeting. If you were to go back and look at your entire tweetstream, can you pick out some "best of" tweets?

We're all learning this process in our own ways. Some people like to tweet about TV shows and what food they are eating or making. That's cool, but not for me. And I'm not for everyone either. I try not to get bummed when going through the "not following you" section and learning that some of my real-life friends are no longer following me. One friend said, "I was following you for a bit, but you are insane. 90% of the time I have no idea what you are talking about. So I had to unfollow you."

(Nod.)

I get it.

@jmacofearth
permalink: http://bit.ly/unfollowthis

Check out The Twitter Way TAB for all the Tweet-related posts.

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