RT @Nightwyrm: Sign the Wellington Declaration TONIGHT and FIGHT ACTA for your Internet rights! http://tinyurl.co...

RT @Nightwyrm: Sign the Wellington Declaration TONIGHT and FIGHT #ACTA for your Internet rights! http://tinyurl.com/y6vg9rl (this is international!)

via SimplyTweet

Posted via web from Simon's posterous

RT @estateofflux: RT @TeamXero On the Xero blog: Social marketing "blowing up traditional advertising business mo...

RT @estateofflux: RT @TeamXero On the Xero blog: Social marketing "blowing up traditional advertising business models" http://bit.ly/dprnXZ via SimplyTweet

Posted via web from Simon's posterous

I'm sitting here very thankful for several things, one of which is the ability to get the cover off our spare pc ...

I'm sitting here very thankful for several things, one of which is the ability to get the cover off our spare pc without a screwdriver, (thanks IBM) and the other of which is the ability to communicate your thoughts concisely

via SimplyTweet

Posted via web from Simon's posterous

What I tweet about (in the last year)

Follow me on Twitter.
Get your own Tweetcloud.

Fancy a tweetup?

Even if you don't actually use Twitter, it'd still be nice to meet you as a reader of this blog.

When: Thursday 18 December, 4:30pm
Where: Galbraith's Ale House, 2 Mt Eden Road, Auckland


View Larger Map

RSVP in the comments below, or just show up and look for the geeky folks in the corner :)

Do people want to talk to companies via Twitter?

It'd be interesting to know, right? So I asked the other day, and here's what a whole lot of you said:

ayouens @audaciousgloop yes please. I love talking to companies through Twitter 11:56 AM yesterday from twitterrific in reply to audaciousgloop

	darrylb @audaciousgloop Use twitter to communicate with people - not companies. People in companies is a good thing IMHO 11:50 AM yesterday from TweetDeck in reply to audaciousgloop
	vye @audaciousgloop like : @ New World - how come you stopped stocking Buderim lime & ginger marmalade, now I have to go to Countdown 11:49 AM yesterday from web in reply to audaciousgloop
	vye @audaciousgloop Yes - think twitter is particularly suitable for quick feedback - where I wouldn't bother writing a letter... 11:47 AM yesterday from web in reply to audaciousgloop
	JodiTheTigger @audaciousgloop Communicate with companies using twitter? We'll I have already done it with @orcon and @vodafone and it has been a good exp. 11:38 AM yesterday from web in reply to audaciousgloop
	thatwebguy @audaciousgloop I think that would be a great idea, a lot of companies already do it like @zappos. But more would be great! Any thoughts??? 11:37 AM yesterday from web in reply to audaciousgloop
	marklincoln @audaciousgloop sure to the extent of general updates and as a starting point to initiate conversations elsewhere. 11:37 AM yesterday from web in reply to audaciousgloop
	jossdeb @audaciousgloop Yes - but above all they need to answer queries at all. Most don't answer email or do so badly. 11:37 AM yesterday from web in reply to audaciousgloop
	jasonwryan @audaciousgloop If they are willing to genuinely communicate back, then yes... 11:33 AM yesterday from TweetDeck in reply to audaciousgloop
	_june @audaciousgloop Certianly not every company, but for those who is suits. I like being part of their community, and them being part of mine 11:32 AM yesterday from web in reply to audaciousgloop
	trib @audaciousgloop in order seeya and an unequivocal yes. 11:32 AM yesterday from twhirl in reply to audaciousgloop
	ioj @audaciousgloop depends on the communicator 11:31 AM yesterday from twitterrific in reply to audaciousgloop
	mrjudkins @audaciousgloop I would like the opportunity to provide feedback or ask questions, if they didn't spam me & I felt they were genuine. 11:30 AM yesterday from web in reply to audaciousgloop
	Mishon8 @audaciousgloop - no not really 11:30 AM yesterday from TweetDeck in reply to audaciousgloop

That's a lot of varieties of "yes" and only one "no". Very interesting!

Meanwhile, Warren Sukernek went and did a proper scientific survey. Nice one!

Viral marketing on zero budget - iJumpTV #39

Click to Play

When you have zero marketing budget, where do you start getting your message out? James Stewart put his own body on the line, creating the Million Dollar Leg project. Learn his secrets for getting buzz! In this episode: http://artklick.co.nz/ http://milliondollarleg.co.nz/ http://inkode.co.nz/ http://madefromnewzealand.com/ Top recommendations for buzz-building: Facebook page YouTube Twitter Skype Digg and Stumbleupon Bonus resource: The Idea Virus by Seth Godin

The blog post about nothing

Blogging every weekday is kind of addictive - most days I have something interesting to say.

So I find myself sick on a Friday, with very little in my head, and yet still I want to blog.

But scratch anyone these days, and you'll find something they have to share. I'm the same ... so what can I share?

• Blogging every day must be something Google likes - or something - because just about every post I've done has received a comment or two. Is this because I'm posting every day? Or because I'm posting on consistent(ish) topics? Is it because of Twitter?
• Or is it just that blogging and commenting has become a mainstream part of society, compared with my other blogs in the past, which didn't often get comments?
• Or maybe I've just become a better writer? That's always a possibility...

I've also been thinking about how Twitter is kind of like blogging, only better. Just this morning, I posted a link which in turn led to a minor conversation. In the past, that kind of conversation could - theoretically - be held through a blog post and comments. Twitter speeds up conversations and helps us learn things from multiple perspectives. Which is a really good thing.

So there we go... this post wasn't about nothing, after all!



Nothing

Do you perform? Are you an introvert?

JJProjects posted a pretty thought-provoking piece on Twitter yesterday:

People always talk about community and conversation, but hardly ever about performance. People don't like to speak of this in those terms

He then said it on 12Seconds:

Community, Conversation and Performance on 12seconds.tv

(Check out the following conversation)

Once I'd sorted out that he meant performance as in "Broadway" as opposed to "Performance Management", JJ's thoughts tapped into my own latent thinking about this area.

When you perform, life is fun. That's what the people in the book Fish! A Remarkable Way to Boost Morale and Improve Results found out, that having a performance mentality can make even mundane tasks into a game.

Performance could also be called acting. Some people think of acting as being fake, as being something else. But anyone who's done a drama course, or studied the Robert deNiros and Dustin Hoffmans of this world, knows that can't be true. Acting is a way of letting the real you out!

And so is social media. Yesterday I got a review copy of Against the Machine: Being Human in the Age of the Electronic Mob, written on the premise that "the internet's widespread anonymity eliminates boundaries and encourages otherwise polite people to be downright abusive."

That may be so for some, but I've seen the other side of the coin - real people, exploring and discovering themselves, learning how to become "micro-famous" ... not necessarily for the esteem of others but out of sheer curiosity about what makes us tick.

So... back to performance ... how about this statement:

The self-publishing tools of the internet give people like me (particularly introverts) a playground to explore, discover what I have that is unique to the world.

It's like an incubator for self-branding.

There's a lot in this. Thankfully this is a blog post, not an article or a book, so it's okay that these are fragmentary, half-formed thoughts. There's something to the performance aspect, and there's something to the game aspect that I haven't even touched on it.

And there's also something to the introvert side of it. I find that self-expressing through blogging and Twitter has made me generally more confident in physical-world (I despise the term "real-world", as if what we do on the internet isn't real) situations.

What do you think? Love to hear your thoughts.

Possibly related:
Courage and Cameras
Virtual, or Fake?

4 ways Twitter is like God

Twitter is like God. Not in that it's omniscient, omnipresent or omnipotent, but in that Twitter is:

* experienced in many different ways (on the site, using Snitter, Twitterific, Twitteroo, Tweetr, Twitterpost, Twitterlex, Twhirl, several IM clients or cellphone)
* a source of genuine fellowship (=having something in common)
* ignored by many in the world, who don't even know it exists.
* maligned by people who haven't tried it for themselves and can't see the point.

Okay, so I'm not a theologian. But don'tcha reckon?

What use is Twitter??

When I describe Twitter to people, I often get blank stares.

"Why do you need more interruptions in your day? Aren't you already busy?"

Here are two examples of the true power of Twitter:

* Last Friday I was having real trouble with WordPress. In frustration I twittered "Wordpress, what part of
don't you understand?"

It was more of a rhetorical question than anything, but within the hour Nick Hodge from Sydney tweeted back the answer! (It's
, if you're interested.)

* Later that day, I sent out a tweet for feedback on some design tweaks to SimonYoungWriters.com. Again, within the hour, I had some feedback from a 16-year old freelance designer in Auckland!! (feedback which I'll attend to very shortly, Ludwig - thanks again!)

Is it just me, or is Twitter getting more social?

I've noticed a couple of things lately:

1) The A-listers, heavy outputters of information like Jeremiah Owyang and Robert Scoble, have slipped off the radar. They've been characteristically transparent about the reasons why - mostly, they're busy (which is a relief! They're human too!).

2) The rest of us - not especially famous people, but often producers of their own content either blogs podcasts or online video - seem to be commenting more often about more things and getting more conversational.

Maybe it's just that I've recently tapped into a vein of particularly chatty people, and been replying a lot more often. But it's great to see Twitter being used to its potential.

Steve Rubel

Check out Twitter Danger #3 Revisited - and note the second comment after the post.

Make a mistake, yes. And own up to it publicly. Yes! Go Steve.