nighttimelullabye

the place where I come from is a small town
they think so small
they use small words
-but not me
I'm smarter than that
I worked it out
I've been stretching my mouth
to let those big words come right out

--peter gabriel, big time

my head gets wound all inward when i hear the talking blogheads tell me what blogging is and what it isn't. the noobs don't get me wrong, i'm glad they're here, but damn if we shouldn't get some Freshman Friday deal and throw some whip cream pies in their face just payment for warming up the joint while they were on conference calls in jobs with benefits and shit.

one guy tells me the a-list is thisnthat and its so funny because who cares if they link or don't link, goddam look at your referrer list now a days it's all google anyhow and people are coming from lamebrain aggregators that don't give a shit about sending traffic to your blog, and now winer wrote an app for scoble so he can read techcrunch while at the techcrunch party instead of like 'beingthere' and that strips out everything but pure content, 24x7 all the content you can eat all the time. wtf? we built an all you can eat buffet and what does it matter if they din't bother putting any of those overdone spaghetti noodles with the meatsauce you a slop on top?

i am not content with content. i want context. when i split off from my bad decision content factor relationship, i thought--start the context factor, because content without context is like a Trojan without a receptacle on the end. it's just messy and uncomfortable--no place to go with what you got. i'm just thinking out loud here.

anyway, the a-list thing, you guys we gotta drop that crap. it's not a list. it's not a-list. it's HIM and HIM and HIM. And sometimes HER. Call them on it. Don't give them the power ranking. Say this: Dave don't be a jerk--Amyloo is great but she's not the only woman you know. Say Jay, link to someone who DOESN'T link to you once in a while. Say Doc, i'm gonna send you an email of the best blogposts by noobs each week. Doc's the good guy. We're all busy. Let's be each others interns. Stretch yourself.

or if you don't want to stretch, then by all means sit on the couch, pour a cool glass of ice water or what have you, light up a cigarette for me because i can't, smoke it baby smoke it, and eat me some of those milk chocolate Lindt candy balls, and write. just write. don't write ABOUT anybody who blogs. do two posts right now that don't link. kay. think don't link.

then you can go back to your blogging as usual.

i might do nothing but comment for a week. i think shelley did that one time when she quit. she just commented. that's smart. it's like going a-callin'.

so nuf about me. just catching up and going to sleep.

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some of that old time religion - this post got lots of play for being playful

How to Get Fired Because of Your Blog

...With apologies to blogger.

Do you blog at work? Do you surf porn blogs like there's no tomorrow while you're supposed to be problem solving? Do you think management is so stupid that they'd never think to search you up on Google and find out you've been posting photos from the ladies bathroom since you bought your cool new camera phone three months ago? Well, you're probably right. But that doesn't mean one of your pesky co-workers won't blow you in.

These days, many companies are laying off employees by the hundreds, even thousands. You don't have any job security, even if you think you do, so what difference does it make if you blog at work? The fact is, you'll probably be let go next week anyway, so don't give away your intellectual property (your blog and what you know about blogging) with the illusion that anyone at your company will care. Once you've given them a ten-word definition of blogging, that's all they'll need to sound smart at lunch, on the golf course, and at that next emerging technology conference.

If you think your blogging will make you a star at work, start looking at your company's severance policy today!

How to Get More Hits than Your Company's Website

At the same time, your blog can be a powerful tool for making you more powerful than the company that currently pays your salary (the one that provides you with two days funeral leave if your spouse kicks the bucket). It's very common for bloggers who are intelligent, who write every day, and especially who take pictures of the loading dock at Microsoft, to become far more popular and better liked than the companies they work for. Research from Perseus shows that 97% of bloggers land better jobs once they've been shit canned for blogging at work.

You see, there is a God!

In fact, getting fired because of your blog is one of the smartest marketing moves you can make. Straight to the top of Daypop, Technorati--hey, Andrew Sullivan will probably shoot you a link. That's right. You can be out from under your boss's thumb and working for the coolest new startup, or even the Dean campaign, tomorrow. If you play your cards right.

Layoff or Shitcanned: Two Paths to Blog Freedom

The truth is, your position will probably be eliminated on Wednesday of this week. (They like to let you go right before a holiday weekend, to give you some extra family time, let you stuff yourself with turkey and numb your brain with tryptophan, decreasing the likelihood you'll come back Monday and blow away the Human Resource Manager after you pack your little poetry magnets from the last COMDEX show in your take-home box.) It doesn't matter if you're careful with your posts or not. Corporations have the most uncanny ability to overlook talent, brains, and tenacity in favor of ass kissing and the status quo.

With this in mind, you have two options for shedding your current employer: Layoff (involuntary separation), or Getting Fired (terminated, separated with cause).

Both of these approaches have their good points. For instance, getting laid off usually means you get a severance check, which means you'll have a couple week's salary to spend on your first COBRA health insurance premium. On the other hand, blogging something worthy of getting fired for means you'll be famous on the Web, and may land that book deal you've been hoping for. Or at least a spot on Instapundit's blogroll.

Blogging: Just Do It!

Knowing that you won't have a job much longer anyway, we here at allied recommend that you blog everything. Absolutely everything. Blog about your lame-brained boss. Blog about your loser clients. Blog about the accounting department do-nothings who have fine tuned the art of looking busy while instant messaging their pals in prison but can't cut you an expense check until February of 04.

Blog about your mother, your brother, your fat aunt Sally. Blog about your priest and that little problem he has keeping his hands on the prayer book. Blog prose, blog poetry, blog photos, blog jokes. BLOG TIL YOU DROP.

Because if you think you're career is safe the other way, you're just fooling yourself.

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in praise of bloghims

In Praise of Blog Brothers and Incomplete Ideas

I like it when I get time to write. Write what I want. Here. Not what I get paid to write. Out there.

I remember when we used to finish one another's ideas. Here. A few years back. My favorite thing was to bake words with my blog brothers. That was then, before blogging required that every post be a well-formulated thesis--an entity in and of itself--flawless and final in it's daily decree for the masses to imbibe and link to. That was before pundits mattered.

Then, we jammed some. I might throw out an idea. Half baked. Not baked. Raw. Uncooked. Kind of embarrassing, but all our asses were hanging out anyway. Who cares. And someone would grab it. Gary often. And he'd throw in a handfull of chocolate chips, or he'd mean to anyway, but usually it was coffee beans. Gary was never good at telling those things apart. And then Mike would go off on the thing. And I mean off. Just off and run with it. Jesus. For the love. He would ramble and gamble and put in "print" things that'd make us say, mostly, "Oooooo. Eeeeeks." And how the hell are we supposed to download that, freak? Then Frank, you know, he'd toy with Mike, usually with a joyful zest, but Frank, man, you don't know, he can go off, you just don't see it much, well more now than then. Frank, he'd take it and recap the ingredients so far and then flip the thing right over. Just turn it over. Til you said, OH, I thought it was a pancake, but it's a bison burger! HA! where's my syrup? So Tom would come along, and by crap if he didn't take the damn burger and mold it into the finest fucking filet you've ever seen--and we're going, "Shit, we made this pancake-burger and look at Tom's filet with all that red juice, see he did it again." At which point Marek would walk in and just sit down on that piece of meat. I mean just sit the hell down on it as if he were planting his behind in a leather-backed office chair. As if that's what you do every single day with a fine piece of filet--you just sit your ass on it. And if we were all truly blessed that day, Rageboy would rouse himself long enough to come fuck up the whole works by using the creation as high-gloss latex paint, not as food at all, and we'd go--HA! It's all colors now! And then we'd start all over looking at the entire room, not just the frying pan.

My blog brothers. We made lots of things together out of posts back then.

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in 2002 when world come undone, blog kept me aliving

from sept of 02....

Blog Therapy

cold stone sleep feathers dust damp night
lantern stove light wood appear among
man woman betrayal dance leaving coming
going esteem shame blame run faster guilt
trance eyes closed thoughts come stories
undone swirling starts....
trigger.
stop!
blog.
this is how we heal
this is how we heal
this is how we heal
this is how we heal
this is where we heal.

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wow, i remember when i went part-time at ketchum...

THIS seemed so big at the time. Little did I know that eventually part time would give way to no time, then on my own time, then solo business building, a mistaken partnership, and back out on my own. And all of that AFTER the dot-com bust, following the boom when I worked 12 hour days like I'm doing now.

It seems like I was 22 when I wrote this. It was just four years ago. Time. Keeps. On. Ticking...

Here's how it felt then...

-------------------------

Taking a Chance on Me

I've been working full time for 20 years now. And for me--well you all know me well enough to know that full time is full time plus pulling all the stops out, doing whatever it takes for a cause or colleage--which means that full time is more like 50-60 hours a week. Sometimes more. Not all my dutiful nature, mind you. I got a lot out of my work--I always have since writing has always been involved. So I loved work as much as work loved me. The star performer, the one the client always wants to work with. Meantime, have a baby why don't you, and raise her at home while you work full-plus time, trading care for her off in random intervals with your husband, who is also trying to further his career and take care of business, and suddenly project after project after project, goal after goal after goal, time ticks by. And where did you go? We go?

So I made a decision yesterday, and my employer was kind enough to accommodate me. I'm going part-time. Starting with 30 hours a week, which will give me the freedom to work just the hours Jenna's in school when Pre-K starts August 12th. Doesn't sound like much of a cutback, but when you realize I was working 50 just to be able to bill 40, it could mean a lot. What that means I think, first, is nights and weekends without work. Wow.

Wow. I can't remember the last time I didn't work a weekend to try to keep up, bill the hours. Be the star. The one they think kindly of. That's the wonderful world of consulting. Billability, the double-edged sword. It's sweet when times are good--look how valuable I am = see how much I bill. But in tough times, both economically and personally, the struggle to fulfill your commitment to the organization (when you're an overly consciensous worker like me) can wear you down, wear you out. burn you out.

I'm worn out. And I'm doing my best to change one part of the equation that's burned out my passion. By going part time I think I can give the BEST of me to work and the BEST of me to myself and my family. It's a start anyway. One change at a time, so to speak.

Next week, for the first time in my grown up years, I am a part-timer.

yikes.

wow.

That's all for now.

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burn baby burn

from march 2002, and sometimes it still feels this good hot kind of way.

---------------------------

Doc defines marketing in terms of the elements today in one of the most simplistic and inspiring uses of logic I've seen. He says:

"Somewhere back when Cluetrain was forming out of primordial conversations, I told Chris Locke my Theory of Marketing, the logic of which was slyly intended to scare potentially boring clients away from my consulting business. It went like this:

Markets are Conversations; and
Conversation is fire. Therefore,
Marketing is arson."

I suppose that's why I came away from my reading of Gonzo Marketing with this impression:

It's okay.
incite.
spark to flame.
ignite.

Why does fire seem such an appropriate metaphor for what we are doing right now, right here, on the net? The reasons are plentiful:

Conversations are as primeval as fire, one of the earliest discoveries of mankind.

Aren't we sending smoke signals to anyone who will listen?

Fire levels and clears, readying the land for fresh growth.

Fire evokes fear; those who handle it wrong will get burned.

What we are doing is hot, dangerous, exciting, thrilling, and romantic.

Fire is destructive, but what succumbs to its force is often rickety and unstable.

Enter the arsonist, who creeps through the night, explosive power under wraps, until, POW! The only way to wake up whitey....

The only way to lay business as usual to waste, clear the land, sweep away the debris.

We're burning and building right now.
Burning, building, and blogging.
Can't you hear the sirens?

Spark to flame, ignite.

Tags: social software, web2.0, tech, marketing, cluetrain, gonzo marketing, locke, doc, and weinberger = Powered by Qumana

sunshine on my shoulders makes me happy

discuss.

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Reading BMO is Easy

"I’m approaching fifty and my ass has never seen the light of day." --BMO

better still:

"It's turtles all the way down."

you could write a book off that guy BMO.

And don't forget to read about his very good day too.

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Just got david weinberger's new kid's book on LuLu

I can't WAIT to read My 100 Million Dollar Secret with Jenna!!!!

(thanks Mr. In the Know Stowe for the tip!)

Tags: david weinberger, novel, children, my 100 million dollar secret = Powered by Qumana

when success at blogging means you have no time to blog...

you really have to sit down and think about stuff. or recline. either way. just don't fall asleep. because that won't solve anything. unless it's the middle of the night. in which case it's helpful.

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Number 5....

Chalk.

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Booking Band for International Hotels and Resorts - Music by Montage

An interruption in our regular programming....

Music by Montage is a working band bringing first-class musical entertainment to upscale venues in Asia, Africa, the Middle East, and Europe. Working with artist management and booking agencies as well as Food and Beverage (F&B) Directors at major hotels and resorts -- including Gary's Motown Club in Nagoya, Japan; Club Narcissus in Bangkok, Thailand; The Grand Hyatt's JJ's Club in Hong Kong, and Club Quattro in Osaka, Japan -- Montage works with the finest hotel nightclub operations throughout the world.

Clients rave about the professionalism of the band's members, who are among the highest quality entertainers in the business. They are regularly booked for three to six month engagements at five-star resorts and hotels.

Now, I don't have a lot of expertise in artist management and production, but I have a husband of 20 years with a professional, road-ready, working band, passports in hand, and some great musicians (in Montage and in other acts George works with). I also have a network of blogger colleagues and friends globally. A MATCH MADE IN HEAVEN. If any of you are connected to the F&B folks at major hotels and resorts, or if you have friends who book acts for international corporate and hotel/resort engagements, you KNOW where to find us and where to send them for videos, songlist, bios, and more.

AND: I'm now taking bids from my web design friends on making the rather amateurish Montage website I tried my best with into something a little more presentable. Of course, links/credit/love given on our sites plus a taste of $ is the preferred currency. I know there are typos. George is proofing it tomorrow.

THANK YOU GLOBAL FRIENDS.

Now, Back to your regularly scheduled programming....

Tags: music, working band, hotels, resorts, international, booking agency, F&B, Hospitality, Resorts, Asia, China, Korea, Africa, Dubai, Europe, Entertainment = Powered by Qumana

knock me over with a feather

Bloogle goes beta 2.0. keeeewwwl....

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Paul Kedrosky On MS Jive Writer

 Paul Kedrosky says Live Writer feels like a blog tool designed by non-bloggers for non-bloggers. Here are some problems he encountered:

1. On setup it refused to auto-recognize my blog at its actual address. And the typically over-controlling Microsoft software wouldn't give me a manual config mode screen to set the blog up directly, simply blowing up with an error instead. I had to trick it into giving me a manual config screen by giving it the incorrect URL for my blog. Go figure.


2. The "Web" layout in the app is nonsensical. Because I have a three column CSS layout Microsoft Live Writer faithfully mimics that on screen. Except there is a problem: On the blog those two other (outer) columns have content. On the editor screen they're empty, like giant white margins that should be able to get rid of, but can't. Go back to normal view, however, and it screws up the HTML formatting, like block quotes. Great.


3. It doesn't auto-load your most recently posted stories. Instead, it forces you to go find some stories and load them in yourself. That's dumb.

Tags: Microsoft Live Writer, LiveWriter, Jive Writer, Paul Kedrosky, Blog Editors, DISCLAIMER - I USE QUMANA. = Powered by Qumana

school starts tomorrow

as you can see, i haven't exactly turned my clock around yet. it's 1:39 and i'm wide awake. shit. i hate 6 a.m. waking. I have been on my 11-11+ schedule all summer and that's how i work best. Just let me sleep in. Then the game's on.

So this next week or two will be a challenge. I haven't needed to nap all summer. Now I remember how i got through last school year with the late evening work projects: i napped in the late a.m.

poop. no time to nap now. jenna couldn't sleep. she was too excited. 3rd grade here she comes. lookout, she turns 9 in sept.

well, let's make tonight count. it's the last day of summer in the south--or at least summer with the kids calling you every 2 minutes.

carpool dropoff in 6 hrs.

Tags: back to school, carpool, claypool, sleep deprivation, industrial revolution schedule = Powered by Qumana

fun virtual layers that don't exist (yet) i don't think.

secondwife.com - swap your realworld wife for an online mate -- see who's better at getting the kids to school.

usedcarlot or sellmyride - let people test drive virtual versions of your car for sale, complete with your specific dents, dings, and awesome stereo system.

me-commerce or mecommerce.com - virtualworldizes oldworld e-commerce by creating touch/move/create-and-customize amazon.com type shopping layers -- complete with live in-store demos n stuff.

k, more?

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Tony P TV

"I want D-List celebrities."

Yesss!!

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They call it 'writer' for short - windows live writer

<rant>

why does this read like ze frank talking about knowledge, but with the exact opposite level of coolness? Why do I feel like I'm being talked to as a three year old who can now press the 'enter' key on her own? Why do I think this is stupid?

Why are they saying "Blogging has turned the web into a two-way communications medium" and linking to something dave winer wrote SIX YEARS AGO? Blogging's BEEN a two-way communication medium from the get-go--fuck that, it's a MULTI-WAY MULTI-DIMENSIONAL communication medium. or it's not a communication medium at all, maybe it's the message, mofos. maybe blogging is 8 parts context, 2 parts content.

The last likeable thing about Microsoft was Scoble, and don't make me wander too far into that territory cause there are some weeds to be found.

Microsoft, what side of the bed did you wake up on today--stupid?

"Whether you are blogging about a vacation or a political conflict, maps are a great help in engaging the imagination of your readers."

Microsoft, who wrote that shit?

From what I've read here, I'm not moved to try "Writer" (hey kids, "Writer knows the styles of your blog...Writer also includes other views..." No motherfuckers, I AM THE WRITER. WE ARE THE WRITERS. You are Microsoft. Go make love to the enterprise. Leave the intuitive blog related tools to the folks who care about this space and go fix Vista--an OS I hope to never have to experience. And quit talking to me like I'm three.

Or maybe I'll try it tomorrow.

</rant>

Tags: Windows Live Writer, Blogging, Tech, web2.0, advertising, Qumana, Qumana, Qumana = Powered by Qumana

myspace question what's keeping me wanting

why can't i pay levi seacer right now to download Happy Love and take it with me in my car on a cd of favorite myspace music i like or on my mp3 player, because i have to leave the house right now, and the Internet should make it possible for me to NOT have to leave the song I'm listening to behind--and make sure Levi makes some bread too. Why does it have to be so much work. It shouldn't be. Distribution is flawed. Recommendation is flawed.

There is an entire Big Bang Idea waiting in human-assisted music recommendation and distribution. whatever. Tag it, flag it, pay for it, DO IT SOMEBODY.

I wanted to take Happy Love with me today. You might want to too. But we can't. And he doesn't need to let me take it for free. And I shouldn't have to go hunting around for it. Not w/ all the hooptie-doo of web 2.0 or do i have to wait for 3.0? goodness. pisses me off. i love myspace because of that. we're almost there. then it will populate 100000000 times over.

Tags: myspace, myspace music, human-assisted distribution, levi seacer = Powered by Qumana

social network myspace--notes

myspace is lame, no it's not. rupert's in control, no he's not.

listen i stand by myspace. i like that it doesn't work so well. yet. I like that everytime i'm there i can think of 22 ways to make it better. I can think of 22 more on how to make $--business models blooming. why not let users feed what music is cool out from myspace via rss, why not mashup cdbaby or itunes-likeness, let me pay $2 a song to the artists I like, not who's popular--who's popular TO ME--and i'm the source to my friends. why isn't every one of us a distribution network for music. why don't we even get 25 cents a match--humans as intermediaries powered by tech, not technology as intermediary. a top-ten-sources way to distribute music...love me, love my music because i don't have much in common with 18 year old college freshmen but i have a lot in common with tom and frank and stowe and shelley and e. and mike and gary and chris and lisa and jory and denise and 1000 other friends and i want to see their music distribution feeds off myspace, new music not the same old lame old, and i want to pay the artists and i want denise to get a quarter for making the match.

or what happened to chat on myspace and what if you could invite friends to a shared collaborative space. what if myspace powered collaboration in the communities and groups there--what if advertisers sponsored it with new google-powered search and adwords.

myspace isn't all kids. myspace is my space too--and other social spaces will be my space, but you have to understand, i like myspace because i like who is already there.

add a qumana-driven tagging utility--break me free of pre-configured tags on myspace.

what if i could host events ON MYSPACE not just announce events. getting invited to an event on myspace makes me think: oh goody, something to do online and then i find out it's in LA. i can't get to LA today. Now I DO want to know what's up in the ATL. that's good. let me pick--show me events for Online, Atlanta, Southeast. and so on. Hold some stinking online events--or bridge me to a world where I can.

i like myspace because i don't like finished spaces. I like spaces that still need work. I want to know there's still work to do. in a finished space, the world is populated and everything works, and so what. then you die.

in spaces where everyone has to lean forward to make it to the top of the hill, THAT's where community is. Community is what forms where everything isn't fixed and working and fleshed out. Community is possibility.

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Investing in Women notes

malik, arrington, ali, calcanis,  media moguls 2.0 building empires out of html and css and everywhere-allthetime onlineness. his opinion his opinion their opinion his news his network. new media women keep writing keep writing keep writing--challenge: more Planet Powers, more BlogHers. Invest $ in women to say-->build it out. build it. Go ahead.

It's a no brainer. it's a PR coup waiting. what's taking so long?

Tags: Planet Powers, BlogHer, Media 2.0, Web2.0, Writing, Opinion, Journalism, Investment, Venture Capital, Funding = Powered by Qumana

Film at 11

"How can government, police, and media not do the work of terror. That is a story."

--Tom Matrullo

update - liquids on a plane already!

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