The value of blogrolls
A good friend of mine recently told me that he doesn’t know what to look at or where to go when he surfs the Web. I think all of us have suffered from information overload syndrome when it comes to finding quality content on the net. Google searches and Yahoo! home pages can only take you so far and sometimes can leave you more frustrated than enlightened because you never really did find what you wanted. So where do you start?
Every so often at work, I’m called upon to create a list of influential blogs that cover a certain topic/industry. I’ve learned a lot from creating these lists–the most important lesson being the inherent value of blogrolls. Typically, good, dedicated bloggers are mini-experts on whatever topic they write about and usually know the online playing field better than someone who is just beginning to research the topic. They include a blogroll–a list of their favorite blogs–on their own site to inform their audience, help fellow bloggers, and hopefully, be included on others’ blogrolls. It’s a great referral tool, but more importantly, establishes your legitimacy as a blogger “in the know” because you know where to find the quality content.
As you can see, Couple/think’s blogroll needs some work. It’s a careful process though because you don’t want to throw up any old link, as your blogroll is a reflection of your own tastes. For example, I’ve come across many a blogroll that had extremely outdated links (blogs that haven’t been updated for 2+ years), non-working links, etc. Would you give a potential employer a list of outdated references? I’m not the first one to point out that our virtual identities are becoming increasingly tied to our ones in real life.
When I want to find fresh material or a new blog to add to my feed reader, I look to my favorite blogs blogroll first. It’s like being introduced to a friend of a friend - most likely, you’ll have something in common with them and will be interested in what they have to say. I’ve come across many of my favorite sites this way and feel that blogrolls definitely contribute to the makings of an online community.
Crossing the home/work computer divide
The separation of home computer and work computer has caused me grief many times. Whether I’ve forgotten a birthday and the address I need to send out the card is on my home computer, or am simply sick of emailing an excel sheet back and forth with my wife to make home budget updates, there is a solution to my aggravation. Google Docs.
This free to anyone with a Google account product is an easy way to create, access, and share projects, documents and spreadsheets online. Take for instance my birthday card problem, I need an address, but don’t have access to it at home. Recently, I backed up all my addresses to a file on my Google Docs and now have access to them anywhere I can get online.
Another excellent use of the Docs feature is the spreadsheet. Even though it’s pared down, it has much of the same functionality as Excel. And taking the advice of one of my favorite blogs, Get Rich Slowly, Kirsten and I created a budget and have been keeping it updated since the first of the year. Having a shared spreadsheet template for each month allows us to access it during the day to make updates. It helps take away the, “I’ll do it later” factor that caused our previous budget attempts to fail. After being on the computer all day at work, by the time we got home, neither of us wanted to get in front of the screen again to do budget updates. With our Google Docs system, we can now take a few minutes at lunch to do it and keep us on track.
Advertisers want you, but in a different way….
What began as ingenious contests has turned into a new advertising and marketing concept– viewer created ads. I remember watching Terry Tate the Office Linebacker during the Super Bowl in 2004 and laughing hysterically at what a great commercial it was. It created an even greater connection in the following days when I learned the ad was originally a student film. I had never heard of the acceptance of a non-professional in that area.
Four years later the doors have been opened for nearly anyone with a good idea to succeed. In that time, we’ve gone from Terry Tate, to BMW Films, Converse, The History Channel, to Visa and MasterCard all asking everyday people to present their ad ideas. As this concept continues to evolve, the marketing and advertising agencies behind those initiatives are stepping out from behind the curtain to the forefront. Instead of creating a campaign based on the contest, they are actively soliciting pitches for clients.
Just yesterday Edelman Studios, a division of Edelman Public Relations, launched their website to accept new pitches for some of their clients. Just as Current TV has been doing for quite some time now with their VCAM, viewer created ad module assignments. The evolutionary step these programs have taken from the contest idea is that if your pitch is accepted, you’ll get paid. A modest sum, but a nice compensation for your effort, and let’s face it, if you are pitching these ideas, you probably doing it thinking…”This could be my big break.” I look forward to seeing what content makes it into production, and seeing if the advertising game is truly opened up to anyone with that great idea.
(Disclaimer: Kirsten works for Edelman Public Relations, but has no connection to Edelman Studios)
Mini-masterpieces of film
Movie trailers, at least the good ones, are mini-masterpieces of film. Sometimes the series of trailers before a movie impresses me more than the feature presentation (should have listened to Rotten Tomatoes on that night!). A really great trailer (ala Dreamgirls) can inspire me to look up the film on IMDB, visit the official movie site, and order my tickets early on Fandango.
There’s serious money in trailers. If you’ve ever seen the movie “The Holiday” - Cameron Diaz’s character makes movie trailers for a living and lives a pretty incredible lifestyle in L.A. Now I don’t know how accurate or inflated this portrayal is, but it made me curious about the people behind the infamous green screen shorts.
Devin Hawker is a copy writer and co-owner of Gas Station Zebra (site under construction), a motion picture advertising agency that specializes in theatrical teasers, trailers and TV spots for feature films. Hawker was profiled in a 2006 L.A. Times article titled “Piquing interest to a point: The art of crafting a trailer.” When asked about her background leading up to her current career she said:
I was writing corporate films, education films. I just sort of stumbled into this. I was doing aerospace stuff, and then the Berlin Wall came down and all of that work left Southern California. A friend of mine was working at a trailer company. But it’s like anything in Hollywood. You have to make them an offer you can’t refuse, which is sort of do it for nothing until you prove you’re valuable.
Incredibly interesting to see one career path of a successful movie advertising executive and how it’s not just all about who you know - but what you’re willing to personally sacrifice in order to make a career like that come to fruition.
If you love movie trailers as much as me, here are a couple favorite sites:
Apple.com’s Trailers
Best site for trailers hands down. Offers HD and iPod formats in addition to many independent films and documentaries if you’ve already tired of the summer blockbusters (go Indiana Jones!).
TVLand.com’s Movie Land
This is a new feature at TVLand.com and is great for those interested in retro trailers from the ‘50-’90s.
Twitter followers: who are you?
Last summer, I discovered the social media app that’s still making headlines - Twitter. For those of you who are unfamiliar with this chat-driven site, it’s similar to Facebook status updates, but on a much bigger scale.
You develop a list of friends, post short text updates and participate in a constant steam of chatter that circulates across the Web.
Well, when I first signed up, I couldn’t find a single person I knew that actively used the site (save a few work colleagues). So an easy way to build your contact/friends list is to “follow” friends of friends. Apparently, a lot of people use this practice of adding friends which you can easily spot when someone’s “following” # greatly surpasses their followers (i.e. juancarzola is literally following 59,217 people - including ME for some reason - but only has 6,920 followers)
Personally, I’ve struggled with finding interesting things to write in the “What are you doing?” box. I don’t want to tell the whole world that I just ate a grilled cheese because I honestly don’t think anyone cares (they shouldn’t care :)). I’m definitely not a hardcore “Twitterer” or “Twit” or whatever. But, for some reason, I’m getting new followers each week. OK, it’s certainly not like juancarzola levels - I only have 50 followers total and am following 26 people. I still find it interesting that people are coming across my profile, one I have hardly updated, and are choosing to click “follow” underneath my pic. Who are you people?
Maybe I’ll make an effort to be a little more active on Twitter and come up with something a bit more interesting than lunch menu updates. Apparently, there are 50 people out there that are somewhat interested in what I have to say 
Under the bus, out of my mind
Reality television, I’m very disappointed in you. Well, I’m discouraged by the contestants and participants more than the actual shows, but the hosts are starting on the downward spiral as well.
Anyway, I’m fed up, done, can’t stand it, and need to say something before this epidemic spreads into mainstream society. I’m referring to the make my brain want to explode phrase, “under the bus.”
Yes, these three little words, which under normal sentence construction would cause great alarm, such as: Don’t drive forward there’s a kitty under the bus, now only create rage when I hear them. Now, instead of putting the words in that sense I’m constantly hearing ‘you/he/she through me/him/her/you under the bus.” And, as two of the more popular reality shows, Survivor and Big Brother, are coming to a conclusion I’ve probably heard this phrase a million times. Here’s a quick YouTube search to get you up to speed if you’re not sure what I’m talking about. Completely annoyed now? Good.
With the surge in popularity, I wondered if this was a fairly recent entry into American culture, but the first reported use was back in 1987-1988. Now, I’m not totally against the phrase itself, but the lack of creativity, or possibly the complacency, of the people I’m watching to use anything in its place. Is it that hard to think of something different to say? If so here are a few replacements: made me look bad, disparaged me, put me in a bad spot, told lies about me, and so on.
Hopefully we won’t have to watch our beloved reality “stars” discussing strategy while they stumble, stutter, and search for that perfect phrase, and then in defeat regurgitate “under the bus.”
I guess I’m not the only one who feels this way.
No News is Rooney’s News
With my occupation in documentary production, I watch many journalistic and documentary-style news magazine shows. A few of my favorite series are Dateline, 48 Hours Mystery, Primetime, and 60 Minutes. While each show has its ups and downs as far as interesting stories and topics, they always strive to present new information.
However, I cannot overlook the mind-numbing ramblings tacked on at the end of 60 Minutes any longer. Yes, Mr. Rooney I am referring to you. Now, don’t take this the wrong way, I admire his esteemed career in broadcasting a great deal. I understand that this is an editorial piece. But, over the past many weeks he has stolen those five-minute segments of my life that I will never again possess, and last night was the final straw.
During last night’s broadcast, April 20, 2008, he outlined his campaign for people to quit traveling because highways and airports are overcrowded, expensive, and never on-time. I was shocked. I never knew these problems existed, and personally have never encountered them. Is that the response he expected from Americans? Does he think the issues of long airport lines, miniature seats, high prices, and anticipated delays are new problems?
I think I might know where Andy Rooney came up with his idea for, “all travelers boycott flying for a week in order to get airlines to meet the demands of their customers.” He must have recently received that chain email we all get numerous times a year instructing us not to buy gasoline on X day this year. Brilliant, now we just have to decide on the week we’ll all boycott. Please let me know, as I’ll be sure to be traveling that week to take advantage of the amazingly empty planes and highways, and no, I won’t be setting my Tivo to record 60 Minutes that week.
Having It Your Way with Online Radio
I’m a huge fan of listening to what I want, when I want. However, I like surprises and love listening to a steady stream of songs that maybe I wouldn’t have thought to queue on my iPod. With that being said, I’ve tried just about everything when it comes to customizable internet radio.
As I’ve mentioned before, I try to stay in tune to new Web 2.0 and social media sites. If there is a good buzz about it on Mashable or KillerStartups.com, I’ll probably check it out.
So internet radio seems to be a fairly competitive space. I first tried out Pandora, which by the way has gone through so many changes in the past few months (def. more social media friendly now). Loved it because it was very plug and play–just type in your favorite artist and GO. But, as I starting to listen every day, the same songs kept coming up and up again. Repetition to a point where I didn’t want to listen to the same three Tori Amos songs every day.
I then came across Jango - “Social Internet Radio.” Jango lured me in immediately with the first couple hours of music I listened to - it was so right on with my tastes, I was floored. Yet, after a while, all of these random small-time artists I’ve never heard of started to infiltrate my listening stream. It quickly got old to click on the “Never Play Again” button over and over again (not to mention all the random friend invites and “I like your style” messages).
I figured that I’d never really find a site that could match my musical tastes while not trying to peddle some obscure artists into the mix. The funniest thing to me is that the internet radio site I first dabbled with in college (before Facebook, MySpace and during the boom of Napster) is the one I’ve returned to today. Gotta tip my hat off to Yahoo! Launchcast. This site constantly surprises me (how did it know I secretly like some ’90s Michael Bolton??) - and really reminds me why I adore music so much. The big drawback of course is the commercial interruptions (if I hear one for Speed Racer one more time…). You can choose to pay to avoid these, but I’m sorry - I love free and I can deal.
Nothing is perfect, but this one comes closest for me. Just wanted to share it simply for the fact it took me quite some time to find what was already there.
Jumping in
Welcome to Couple/think. I’m Shane, one half of the equation that it takes to make this duo, and I see you’ve already met Kirsten, my wife, and as the old maxim goes, the better half of our couple. We’ve been meaning to start this blog for some time, but now are finally jumping in. Kind of like going to the pool on the first day it opens, you know it’s going to be a cold shock, so stop thinking about it and take the plunge.
To go forward I should probably go back and tell you a little about me. I work in documentary production, and my convoluted career path started in 2002 when I was already a junior in college and discovered digital filmmaking. The confluence of storytelling and technology completely captivated me. In the years since I’ve pursed producing in various angles, but finally took the leap completely in 2005 and entered graduate school for documentary production. I graduated nearly a year ago, finished my thesis film First Letters, got married and moved to Chicago.
Another year has passed since and blogging seemed like a great extension for creative development and storytelling, especially as a couple. As this site evolves, we’ll cover a myriad of subjects like careers, interests, hobbies, news and how we connect with those ideas as a couple.
It only took eight months…
Soon after my husband moved to Chicago last June, we thought it would be a great idea to start a blog. I was going to start a new communications positions that was entrenched in social media and web 2.0 and Shane was off to start work on a documentary series. In August, we bought a domain, got a host, and in no time - had WordPress up and running (Thanks Chris!).
Well it’s now April 17th, a little over eight months later, and I’ve finally decided to write the first post. What took me so long? With any new project or idea, I often get stuck in the creative/beginning stages and want everything to be just perfect. I’ve been to blogging conferences where incredibly successful bloggers have already made a living out of their passion and advise newbies to stick with a theme, have a central topic, know your audience, get savvy with SEO, etc. I quickly learned that there could be oh so much more to blogging than just sitting down by the computer and writing what’s on your mind.
I came up with a theme of sorts… and a domain name. Couple/think - musings of a creative, committed couple. I didn’t want to begin just another blog by another girl about her life. My husband constantly inspires me to think out of the box and go for what I want - so why wouldn’t we tackle this project together and make it ours? The more we discussed it, the more we fell in love with the idea.
However, months passed by with no blog posts from either of us. Heck, we were even charged for the next six months of hosting and that’s when I thought - O.K. this goes beyond procrastination - I’m paying for something I’m not using. So here I am finally writing and committing myself to this idea - this blog that for better or worse, will not be one of those sad little blogs that fall into the great black hole of blogs that only have four posts or were last updated in 2003.
While I don’t have a central subject, an awesome handle on SEO, or a knack for what words make the best tags, I’m starting Couple/think today because it will evolve into what it should be. I’m vowing to quit over analyzing what makes a successful blog… because I think I just realized the answer is pretty simple…blogging makes the blog. And if you don’t have good content and a committed author(s), you’ll never have a good blog.
Here’s hoping the next eight months are filled with that resolve.
