article in NYTimes: ThinkEquity Starts Web Log to Gather Ideas

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/02/17/technology/17place.html?

ThinkEquity Starts Web Log to Gather Ideas

By JENNY ANDERSON

Published: February 17, 2005

BLOGGING transformed political commentary, rattled the media business and inundated the Internet. Does it have a place on Wall Street? ThinkEquity Partners, a boutique investment bank in San Francisco, will find out as it introduces a Web log today. The firm, which specializes in technology, health care and other fast-growing fields, is seeking to make its investment research department - an albatross at most Wall Street firms - relevant.

article in CNN - Tools to ease Web collaboration

http://www.cnn.com/2005/TECH/internet/02/16/web.collaboration.ap/index.html

Tools to ease Web collaboration

Wednesday, February 16, 2005 Posted: 1:53 PM EST (1853 GMT)

 

DonationPal | SPM Jobs

Besides consulting, I’m putting all of my effort into my two entrepreneurial endeavors:

 

DonationPal

&

SPM Jobs

 

So I don’t have much time to blog.

 

Luckily my dog Sam is a prolific blogger.

Sam the all-black beautiful German shepherd dog

article: Wiki's gaining momentum

 

Thanks to Tony Christopher for sending me this info.

 

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

 

From today's San Jose Mercury, indications of the growing momentum for investment in and corporate use of Wiki capabilities. 

http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/business/columnists/matt_marshall/10671792.htm

 

1/18/05

 

Wiki war born out of Walt Disney deal

By Matt Marshall

Mercury News

 

The battle between the two Silicon Valley wiki companies began in earnest this week. The outcome could say something about Silicon Valley's model of turbo-charged venture capital, and when it's a good time to take money and grow quickly -- or hold off.

 

A wiki, in its simplest form, is a single Web page that can be written upon, and edited, by multiple users at once. Companies are beginning to use wiki software to help their employees coordinate on team projects.

 

For complete article go here:

http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/business/columnists/matt_marshall/10671792.htm

article: The Rise of a New News Network By Om Malik, January 04, 2005 Business 2.0

The traditional news media is going to need to reposition itself.  Yes, I’m a Luddite, but I couldn’t live without a daily fix of the NYTimes.  I also can’t see bloggers doing real in depth analysis or covering well events that span time e.g. global warming, invasive non-native plant threats to the environment, etc. 

 

It seems to me the Social Network Analysis (not the social networking websites, those are just implementations) could be invaluable in vetting the information that is created by individuals.  There has to be some kind of verification as anyone, anywhere can report anything.

 

Cynthia

----------

 

http://www.business2.com/b2/web/articles/0,17863,1013980,00.html

The Rise of a New News Network
By Om Malik,  January 04, 2005

 

The 1990s proved to be the decade when cable news networks replaced network television as the primary source of breaking news for many Americans, just as the 1960s saw newspapers supplanted. In the new millennium, a broadband-enabled, always-on Internet threatens to usurp those cable news networks.

 

For the rest of the article go here:

http://www.business2.com/b2/web/articles/0,17863,1013980,00.html

 

 

(this signature is in HTML format)
C y n t h i a    T y p a l d o s: Passion, Expertise, Experience

cynthia@typaldos.com  | 408 867-8875 office | 408 828-1370 cell

 

 

blog/net articles by David Kirkpatrick at Fortune

Good summary articles.

 

http://www.fortune.com/fortune/fastforward/0,15704,1014511,00.html

DAVID KIRKPATRICK
The Tsunami and the Net: Global Awareness, Global Response
The web not only gave us real-time news of the gigantic waves' destruction, but also pushed us to help the survivors.
FORTUNE
Wednesday, January 5, 2005
By David Kirkpatrick

 

http://www.fortune.com/fortune/fastforward/0,15704,1012909,00.html

FAST FORWARD
Going Blog Wild!
Personal Internet postings are not only changing how we communicate with each other, but also how business markets to consumers.
FORTUNE
Wednesday, December 29, 2004
By David Kirkpatrick

 

http://www.fortune.com/fortune/technology/articles/0,15114,1011763,00.html

Why There's No Escaping the Blog
Freewheeling bloggers can boost your product—or destroy it. Either way, they've become a force business can't afford to ignore.
By David Kirkpatrick and Daniel Roth

 

(this signature is in HTML format)
C y n t h i a    T y p a l d o s: Passion, Expertise, Experience

cynthia@typaldos.com  | 408 867-8875 office | 408 828-1370 cell

 

 

2004 Social Media - Best and Worst

I thought it might be interesting if people posted their thoughts on the best and worst of social media (online communities, social software, social networking, etc.) for 2004.  Kind of like the best and worst movie lists.

 

Feel free to push your own site/stuff but just be explicit when you are doing so.

 

Here’s my off-the-top-of-my-head list (but remember, my nickname is “Cynthia the Social Networking Luddite”).

 

BEST:

 

Dogster

Amazon.com’s Listmania: the best way to find what you really want even when you don’t know what it is

www.paidcontent.org by great newsletter/blog about the content industry

The Social Software Weblog by Judith Meskill

All of Robin Good’s stuff (MasterNewMedia)

Dogs that Blog and the dog blogroll there are now 6 dogs in the dog blogroll (which I maintain), 3 of which are written from the dog’s point of you.  Yes, laugh all you like, but a major newspaper will soon be publishing a story on blogging pets.  This could be the hot social networking topic of 2005

 

WORST:

 

Social Networking website business models (are there any?)

BzzAgent (NYTimes article)

Too many social networking sites

 

Dilbert develops a social networking site

http://www.dilbert.com/comics/dilbert/archive/dilbert-20041223.html

 

Great concept but I think it has already been done J

Tribe.net ?

 

Cynthia “the social networking Luddite”

Dog Blogs

more on buzz marketing...

http://knowledge.wharton.upenn.edu/article/1105.cfm

What's the Buzz About Buzz Marketing?

“There's a new marketing catchphrase that's getting rave word-of-mouth reviews. From articles in the popular press to conversations in the classroom, huge companies to boutique marketing firms, suddenly it seems you can't talk about new products without addressing 'buzz marketing.' "People are buzzing about buzzing," says Wharton marketing professor Barbara Kahn. "People think it's cool. There is something almost empowering about the idea of being able to 'buzz' your way into the products people buy." “

 

Happy Holidays from Dogster

This is still my favorite social networking site.

-----Original Message-----
From: Dogster! Woof Woof! [mailto:dogsters@dogster.com]
Sent: Thursday, December 09, 2004 10:38 PM
To: Cynthia Typaldos
Subject: Happy Holidays from Dogster


Dear Dogster members,

Woof Woof Bark!

Have you seen the Holiday Picture Party yet? Over 1,550 pets have already
posted a seasonal pix. Is your fluffy part of the fun? Join and you could
win one of fifty free dog or cat books from HCI Publishing. To join the
party or take a stroll, just go to:

http://www.dogster.com/hpp/

By the way, did you know Dogster now has over 51,000 dogs and Catster more
than 15,500 cats! When Dogster launched in January I could barely imagine
10,000 doggies. Now we have two sites; 65,000 pets; 50,000 users from 130
countries; 900,000 friend-to-friend connections; 662,000 pet votes cast;
450,000 treats shared; 352,000 corralled favorites; 40,000 messages sent;
5,000 dairy writers and one really busy web server. I may have put my heart
and soul into this, but without your beautiful photos, colorful entries and
profound love for your furry family members it would be nothing but a bunch
of lonely web code! So, I sincerely thank you and offer virtual belly rubs
and head pats for a job well done.

Also we added more new features. If you want you can control who sends you
friend invites and you can optionally receive an email when you have new
Dogster private messages. We even added a holiday Gift Giving Guide to help
find something for even the pickiest pooches. What other new features would
you like to see in the site? Tell us:
http://www.dogster.com/contact.php

Thanks for loving the sites and know as the years roll by, you'll be able to
say, "I joined Dogster in the very first year!"

Safe holidays and a barktastic new year,

Ted Rheingold
Founder and local Top Dog
http://www.dogster.com

Ben Franklin on professional recommendations

This is an amazing document. It should be the warning label on the home
page of every social networking website. Franklin's so-called
"recommendation letter" is hysterically funny and reminds me of requests I
used to get thru Spoke, where I didn't know either person.

I am posting this to my blog at
http://typaldos.blogspot.com

Thanks to Victor S. Grishchenko for the link.
http://pages.plotinka.ru/~gritzko/recommendation-cite.png

The 'Blog' Revolution Sweeps Across China

The 'Blog' Revolution Sweeps Across China

December 2, 2004
By Xiao Qiang, New Scientist

Meet the bloggers who are keeping one step ahead of the censors

By Xiao Qiang, New Scientist
The "blog revolution" has a particularly revolutionary character in China,
where weblog technology is circumventing government censors by
decentralizing and popularizing the flow of information. By inviting the
Internet behind its "Great Firewall," the Chinese government has unwittingly
opened a Pandora's Box of free discourse that threatens its totalitarian
stranglehold on the media.

The entire story may be viewed at
http://www.utne.com/webwatch/2004_176/news/11478-1.html

Ohmynews - citizen journalism in South Korea

From paidcontent.org

 

--  Ohmynews Profits from Citizen Journalism :Ohmynews, the South Korean citizen's media site, is bringing in almost $500,000 a month in advertising and makes a monthly profit of about $27,000, Asia Times Online reports. (Via EditorsWeblog )The site, which broke even last year, has a full-time staff of 53, including 38 professional reporters and editors, and more than 43,000 citizen journalists paid for their contribitions. Roughly 80 percent of the content is citizen produced.

Against a backdrop on media reform in South Korea, the lengthy article explores the site's reasons for success, including the country's overwhelming adoption of the Internet as a primary source for news and its emphasis on interaction. [Nov.29: Link] | Broadband | [by staci]

 

 

article about Wikipedia in NYTimes re: Bush/Kerry

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/10/arts/10wiki.html?oref=login’

(registration required)

 

Very funny article about the Bush/Kerry areas of Wikipedia.

November 10, 2004

CRITIC'S NOTEBOOK

Mudslinging Weasels Into Online History

By SARAH BOXER

20 reasons why you shouldn't post your picture on the internet

Thanks to SiliconValley.com for this link.
http://www.columbia.edu/~rhee/

article: online feuds a big headache

Online Feuds a Big Headache
Put a bunch of people in one place, give them some items and you're sure to start a fight. Online game companies are figuring out how to deal with it. Daniel Terdiman reports from New York.

 

 

Presidential Guidester - Choose wisely on Election Day!

Just in case you are still undecided re: voting for president.

 

What’s next? 

• “What to Eat for Breakfaster”?
• “Where to Go to Buy Groceriester?”
• “Whose Turn is it to Take out the Trashster?”
• “Should I Orderster a Ventester or Grandester or Tallster Lattester at Starbuckster?”

 

Pretty soon we will be able to use the collective opinions of our friends and colleagues, via the internetster, to make all of our decisions for us J

 

Cynthia

p.s. This is all a take-off on Friendster, which was a take-off on Napster.

---

To: cynthia@typaldos.com
Subject: Presidential Guidester - Choose wisely on Election Day!

 

Hi, I want to recommend that you try out Presidential Guidester, which can help you decide how to vote in the upcoming election. Give it a try.

*** Presidential Guidester
http://www.PresidentialGuidester.com/?org=Decidia

 

good article on open access

Open for Business: Why Open Access is Good for Business and Science Publications

By Janice McCallum

From Shorelines newsletter

http://www.shore.com/commentary/newsanal/items/2004/20041025openaccess.html

 

25 October 2004

 

“Many B2B and STM publishers have been struggling to find the right model for distributing their content as they confront pressures that are pushing them towards opening their databases to Web and enterprise search engines. These publishers are seeking the right balance between maximizing the reach and influence of their publications while maintaining the ability to provide - and to be compensated for - premium features for their core readers. If anyone doubts if there are successful business models in an open access environment, they need only look at Google, whose share price has more than doubled since it went public. B2B and STM publishers cannot be Googles, but they can leverage the openness that user-empowering technologies provide to create richer revenue models.”

Read the full news analysis

http://www.shore.com/commentary/newsanal/items/2004/20041025openaccess.html

 

 

 

 

WSJ giving up on subscriptions?

Thanks to alert from www.paidcontent.org

http://www.paidcontent.org/pc/arch/cat_wsj.shtml

 

http://news.com.com/Extra!+Wall+Street+Journal+gives+away+Web+content/2100-1025_3-5423054.html

Extra! Wall Street Journal gives away Web content

By Stefanie Olsen
http://news.com.com/Extra+Wall+Street+Journal+gives+away+Web+content/2100-1025_3-5423054.html

Story last modified October 22, 2004, 1:31 PM PDT

The Wall Street Journal Online, a bastion of subscription-only news on the Web, has begun giving away some content.

In recent months, the business news outfit has been sending nightly e-mail to bloggers, or online diarists, to offer up several daily stories free so that they can point to or link to them from their Web pages. And on Nov. 8, the company plans to remove its paid wall altogether for five days, for the first time in 7 years, according to the company.

For complete story go here:
http://news.com.com/Extra!+Wall+Street+Journal+gives+away+Web+content/2100-1025_3-5423054.html

 

Amazon adding community features - shared photos

Amazon is becoming a destination site.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/customer-images/customer-image-guidelines.html/104-6017248-6987956?%5Fencoding=UTF8&asin=B0001MBJHK&store=generic

 

Found out about this thru www.paidcontent.org

http://www.paidcontent.org/pc/arch/2004_10_22.shtml#010874

Which referenced this blog entry by Steve Rubel:

http://www.micropersuasion.com/2004/10/amazon_jumps_in.html

 

Amazing list of weblog tools

Thanks to John Maloney of the Knowledge Management Cluster (KMCluster) for pointing me to this list.

 

WebLogs Compendium

http://www.lights.com/weblogs/tools.html

 

Take a look at Xoops.  Appears to be open source.

 

 

PoliticalFriendster

 

 

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/10/21/technology/circuits/21diar.html?oref=login

Political Friendster

The site is a total clone of Friendster which in itself is pretty funny.

 

New York Times

Political Dot-to-Dot

By LISA NAPOLI

Published: October 21, 2004

 

Here's a Web site born not out of suffering from broken bones or passion for watches, but of homework. For an art class last semester at Stanford University, Doug McCune was challenged to "do something that involved the election," he said. "It was as open-ended as that."

 

The social networking site Friendster was popular on campus at the time, and it inspired Mr. McCune. "I just had the idea that since it was such a familiar concept for kids my age that using that concept to apply to politics would strike a chord," he said.

 

For the rest of the article go here:

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/10/21/technology/circuits/21diar.html?oref=login

 

 

 

article: Evite takes on Zagat, RedHerring, 10/13/04

More social networking…

 

Evite takes on Zagat’s

The party-planning web site launches a bar and restaurant guide.

October 13, 2004

 

Evite.com, the free social-planning site, plans to announce Thursday the launch of an additional service which will feature bar and restaurant reviews powered by social networking.

 

This new feature will allow Evite users to make decisions based on personal recommendations from friends and colleagues about where to go and what to do, said Evite President John Foley. The service also will be stocked with 1 million reviews of bars and restaurants provided by Evite’s sister site Citysearch - both sites are owned by IAC/InterActiveCorp in Los Angeles.

 

As Evite touted its refurbished site as a unique entry into the already crowded social networking space, industry insiders said it was no different from such sites as Zagat Survey, Yahoo!, Friendster, Tribe, and Meetup. Analysts also questioned the new site’s advertising-only business model, which has not yet proven to be a moneymaker for similar sites.

“In general, people are not going to use a web site for a typical dinner,” said Jeremy Stoppelman, CEO of Yelp.com, a social networking web site based in San Francisco. Mr. Stoppelman pointed to Yahoo! as a potential challenger for Evite because it has separate features for party planning and restaurant reviews. The only thing missing at Yahoo! is a connection between the two, he said.

 

That is Evite’s unique selling point, said Mr. Foley - there are no other web sites that offer similar services.

 

“It’s a totally new value proposition,” said Mr. Foley. “I follow the social networking players closely and I don’t know anyone who is going directly after what we are doing.”

 

For the rest of the article go here

 

Wikipedia users are defining politics - Bigger than Jesus

Complete article here: Wiki wars

Red Herring

Wikipedia users are defining politics   When it comes to political trash-talking, there’s no finer place than the Internet. Leave it to the net-heads to duke out their differences in an online encyclopedia. Wikipedia.com allows users to easily edit encyclopedia entries on its interactive web site. Needless to say, “Bush” and “Kerry” are the two most edited entries on the entire site. The presidential hopefuls beat out both Jesus and Hitler as the most defined and redefined personages on the page. You too can change your definitional destiny in the world of wiki, but before you dive into definition editing, check out Red Herring’s Wiki wars.   Bigger than Jesus Indeed, entries for Mr. Bush and Mr. Kerry have become the most contentious in the history of Wikipedia, said Wikipedia creator Jimmy Wales, president of the Wikipedia Foundation, which is based in St. Petersburg, Florida. Mr. Bush and Mr. Kerry have created even more debate than entries for sex and religion. As of October 8, Wikipedia’s President Bush entry had been tweaked 3,953 times. Its entry for Senator Kerry had been modified 3,230 times. By contrast, Wikipedia’s article on Jesus has only been edited 1,855 times since the site’s inception in 2001.      Complete article here: Wiki wars

 

 

WSJ to open up all online content? (for a week....)

WSJ to open up all online content?  (for a week....)

 

From Rafat Ali’s amazingly informative daily newsletter www.paidcontent.org.

 

These two notes below link to the same story by Mark Glaser, very worth reading if you are interested in the topic of online content business models

 

But the question remains…what exactly is a viable business model for online content?  Clearly the walled-subscription and premium content business models are not working.

My notes on this subject are here:

http://typaldos-expertise.blogspot.com/2004/09/online-content-business-models.html

 

WSJ.com To Open Up Site For One Week: That's the news bit coming out of the OJR story (also linked below): WSJ.com will also open up the entire site for five days starting November 8. This comes after the site started opening up one story a day through RSS and Google News, for bloggers to link to...
WSJ.com editor Bill Grueskin: "Between Google News and everything else, we had to decide how to open them up, and it's something I don't have the answer to yet." [Oct.20, 04] | WSJ |

Open Season For News Sites: Mark Glaser round up some of the recent developments in online media industry: sites such as the BBC and News.com are linking more outside their domains, and WSJ.com and NYTimes.com are opening up more complimentary content in a nod to the "news conversation" online. Call it the blog effect, really...
Richard Deverell, head of BBC News Interactive: "I think Google News has been a shot across the bow of all news originators, making us say 'hold on, there's a different way of doing this.' It's very easy to flip between different sources of news. We either try to reverse that trend, which is likely futile, or we facilitate it, and I'm keen that we take the latter route." [Oct.20, 04] | Newspapers |

 

 

Buy.com buys social networking site Metails.com

-- Buy.com Buys Social Networking Site Metails: Buy.com, the online retail site, has bought out a small Boston based social networking startup called Metails.com.

 

Thanks to www.paidcontent.org for the alert…go here for more info:

http://www.paidcontent.org/pc/arch/2004_10_18.shtml#010755

 

I never even heard of this site…not that I could possible have heard of them all.  I wonder how many there are now?

 

 

Business Week article about revenue threats to content providers

Business Week article about revenue model threats to content providers due to shared registrations and mirroring

http://www.businessweek.com/bwdaily/dnflash/oct2004/nf20041019_9800_db016.htm

 

Why Web Publishers Fear a Little Sharing
Surfers are increasingly sharing passwords to gain access to online content, threatening ad revenue at registration-only sites

 

“…these community registration systems pose a problem for online publishers. To boost ad sales, many content providers require viewers to answer questions about their gender, age, and income level before allowing access to their site. With that information, they can tell their advertisers exactly what kind of demographic groups they would be reaching and then charge a premium to advertise to those readers.“

”Take away such registration, and the future of the $6.6 billion online advertising market begins to look fuzzy. Advertising typically accounts for 85% to 90% of an online content provider's revenues, so this has got to be troubling…”

 

…….

 

“A growing chorus says the only credible response is to abandon online registrations in favor of registrations for premium services, such as message boards. "We use registration only where it makes sense to do so from a reader's perspective," explains Adrian Holovaty, lead developer of World Online, the Web division of The Lawrence Journal-World newspaper in Lawrence, Kan. "The classic example is on message boards and comment forms, where readers want to register so they can own the rights to their usernames -- and, thus, their online reputations." "

 

……..

 

‘Net collaborators pose other dangers to publishers. Just in the last month, sites that completely copy a content providers' site have popped up. Mirrordot.com first posted in September copies, summaries, and links of stories that appear on Slashdot.org, a popular tech message board. Then Mirrordot.com simply caches the stories to which Slashdot links. Mirrordot.com, which runs its own ads with the stories as well as the original sites' ads, tallies the traffic for itself. And it all appears quite legal under current law, say experts.”

 

……..

 

“On the upside for publishers, getting someone to read a news organization's "dumb story", as Haughley puts it, may be getting easier. But making a buck off of content may be getting a lot harder.”

 

 

These are just excerpts, to read the entire article, please go here:

Business Week article about revenue model threats to content providers due to shared registrations and mirroring

http://www.businessweek.com/bwdaily/dnflash/oct2004/nf20041019_9800_db016.htm

at the time of this posting, registration is not required J

 

Thanks to www.paidcontent.org (a great daily newsletter) for alerting me to this article

http://www.paidcontent.org/pc/arch/2004_10_19.shtml#010777

 

My solution to this problem is called “SubscriptionPal”.

 

Cynthia

 

(this signature is in HTML format)
C y n t h i a    T y p a l d o s: Passion, Expertise, Experience

Social Media & Social Software  | Web Communities | Online Content Business Models

Online Career Profiles & Social Networking | Software & Internet Product Mgmt & Marketing

cynthia@typaldos.com  | 408 867-8875 office | 408 828-1370 cell

 

 

article - "Investors flock to Web Networking Sites", Wash Post, 10/13/04

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A28951-2004Oct13.html

 

Investors Flock to Web Networking Sites

By Michael Liedtke

The Associated Press
Wednesday, October 13, 2004; 7:05 AM

SAN FRANCISCO -- Internet whiz kids Marc Andreessen, Josh Kopelman and Joe Kraus share something in common besides reaping huge jackpots during the dot-com boom.

All three belong to LinkedIn, a rapidly growing online networking service whose ability to connect people with common friends and work interests helped persuade the trio to invest in the company before it even started to generate revenue.

 

"From Pull to Point: How to Save The Economist and The Journal from Irrelevance", John Battelle, 10/11/04

Topic is the power of deep linking thru blogs.

John Battelle is Visiting Professor, UC Berkeley Graduate School of Journalism, one of the co-founders of Wired magazine and the founder and former Chair of Standard Media International ("The Standard"), publisher of The Industry Standard and TheStandard.com. http://journalism.berkeley.edu/faculty/battelle/

He makes the same point that Adam Penenberg did in “Searching for the New York Times” (major media is becoming irrelevant because it can’t be found via links) but his emphasis is on blog links rather than search engine links. http://www.wired.com/news/print/0,1294,64110,00.html

I added a comment to his blog entry and linked to my description of SubscriptionPal.
http://battellemedia.com/archives/000957.php

Cynthia

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

From Pull to Point: How to Save The Economist and The Journal from Irrelevance

by John Battelle

http://battellemedia.com/archives/000957.php

 

EXCERPT (NOT THE WHOLE POST)

 

“The real issue is how paid registration is handled. I find, increasingly, that sites which wall themselves off are becoming irrelevant. Not because the writing or analysis is necessarily flawed (though honestly, I don't trust journalists who eschew the blogosphere), but rather because their business model is. In today's ecosystem of news, the greatest sin is to cut oneself off from the conversation. Both the Economist and the Journal have done that.

 

”So what is to be done? My suggestion is simple: Take the plunge and allow deep linking. Notice I did not say abandon paid registration, in fact, I support it. Publishers can let the bloggers link to any story they post, but limit further consumption of their site to paid subscribers.

 

“I'd be willing to wager that the benefit of allowing the blogosphere to link to you will more than make up for potential lost subscribers. First off, if you as a publisher do not offer additional paid subscription benefits beyond the articles themselves, you're not paying attention to your community. And in any case, many folks will pay to subscribe to a site which is continually being linked to. In fact, I'd wager that the landing pages from blog links might be the most lucrative place a publisher can capture new subscribers. It's a massive opportunity to convert: the reader has come to your site on the recommendation of a trusted source (the blog he or she is reading). It's pretty certain that if you make that page inviting, and use it as an opportunity to sell the reader on the value of the rest of your site, that that reader will eventually feel like the Journal is worthy of his or her support.

 

“Why? In short, if a reader finds him or herself pointed to the Journal on a regular basis, that reader knows that by subscribing to the Journal, he or she would be more in the know. After all, all of the blogs read and point to the Journal, the reader thinks, so perhaps I should read it too. Before subscribing, the only time a reader might find out something in the Journal is if someone points to it (a far sight from where things stand today, by the way). But if they subscribe, they can get their own RSS feeds, and be first to know something. And, in the end, isn't that what drives subscription sales?

 

“Net net, I think allowing deep linking will drive subscription sales, rather than attenuate them.”

 

RE: [webcommunities] Yelp - local recommendations thru friends

Charles,

 

Wow, thanks for the great link to Slashdot which linked to the Register article which is excellent and links to some other interesting stuff.

Warning!!!!!  Social Networking Luddite opinions in those articles!!!!  Don’t say you weren’t warned and don’t go there if your toes will get burned.

 

Cynthia 

---

From: Charles Jo [mailto:cjo@inteliant-tech.com]
Sent: Friday, October 15, 2004 11:20 PM
To: webcommunities@yahoogroups.com
Subject: Re: [webcommunities] Yelp - local recommendations thru friends

 

Slashdot has a discussion on Yelp here:
http://slashdot.org/articles/04/10/15/1633235.shtml?tid=95&tid=111

My favorite comment from one of the readers is:

It's about time somebody saved me the hassle of having to hit that CC button, my efficiency is going to skyrocket now.

This one may be a tough sell unless they change their model. But out of curiosity, I may test it.

Best Regards,

Charles Jo
Silicon Valley 

 

article: Neopets gambling controversy

Article: Neopets gambling controversy

 

http://games.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=04/10/15/1413222

 

Posted by Zonk on Friday October 15, @10:05AM
from the neoaddicts-eh? dept.
Neopoet writes "Players of the online virtual pet game Neopets (claims 70 million pet owners worldwide) have gone nuts against an Australian current affairs show called Today Tonight after the show ran segments railing against the Neopets for introducing children to gambling. Click below to read on.

It started when McDonalds Australia included a Neopets plush toy with every kids' Happy Meal in Australia, directing kids to the Neopets website.

To "feed" their pets, Neopets players have to win points in a variety of mini-games, including versions of poker and blackjack. Australia has a high rate of gambling problems with poker machines ("pokies"), so when a mother discovered her nine-year-old playing online poker to feed his virtual pet, she approached Today Tonight claiming McDonalds was setting her son up for a life of gambling addiction.

TT aired the story Parents not McHappy over pokie toy and the Neopets message boards went nuts. Meanwhile McDonalds heavied Neopets into banning Australians from the gambling games. Today Tonight must have received a lot of hate mail because the next night came Neopet players fight McDonalds ban, featuring interviews with adult Neopets addicts. But this only increased the outrage on the Neopets boards - they're now trying to squash rumors of McDonalds withdrawing sponsorship altogether, and Neopets shutting down."

 

(this signature is in HTML format)
C y n t h i a    T y p a l d o s: Passion, Expertise, Experience

Social Media & Social Software  | Web Communities | Online Content Business Models

Online Career Profiles & Social Networking | Software & Internet Product Mgmt & Marketing

cynthia@typaldos.com  | 408 867-8875 office | 408 828-1370 cell

 

 

my latest bio

I wrote this new bio for the upcoming Online Community Summit conference sponsored by the Online Community Report.

I have been creating, developing, and managing online communities since January 1995 when my co-founder and I launched GolfWeb, a dot.com that included a golf course database with reader reviews and a "find a playing partner" service. With a small group of engineers and product managers I added further capabilities including a classifieds section (1995) and the "GolfWeb Players Club" (July, 1997).

The GolfWeb Players Club was a purposeful community application for golfers to use improve their game. It was offered as a subscription service and consisted of a game tracking system (golfers entered their rounds and the community provided the tee lengths for each course), private and public groups (where members could compare themselves to others in 30 different ways), online searchable and browsable profiles (including a reputation system), "invite a friend", and other features which were unique at the time; now standard in successful online communities. GolfWeb was featured in Business Week as one of the "Best Products of the Year" in the January 1997 issue that covered 1996 (click on the image to make it larger). GolfWeb was acquired by CBS Sportsline in early 1998.

Using my experience at GolfWeb as a specific example, I spent the next year exploring the underlying principles of communities by researching sociology and speaking with the leading sociologists involved in online communities (most notable was/is Marc Smith). From that research I developed "The 12 Principles of Civilization", a framework for developing and analyzing online communities (this space is now also called "social software" or "social media").

In 1998 I founded RealCommunities, a software startup that transformed the "12 Principles" into a software platform. We had early success with 3 major customers, then the internet bubble burst and RealCommunities was acquired by Mongoose Technology.

For the last three years I have been consulting and, with colleagues, creating and managing various free services including the Software Product Marketing eGroup (a.k.a. ProfGuilds) and the ResumeBlog.

My areas of passion, expertise and experience are:

• Social Media & Social Software
• Online Career Profiles & Social Networking
• Online Content Business Models
• Software/Internet Marketing & Product Management
• Enterprise Software Product Management & Marketing
• Speaking, Teaching, & Training: Hi-Tech Marketing
• Software Standards
  

I am particularly interested in how my clients can tap into existing services such as blogs, groups, Amazon (lists, reviews, guides), eBay, Evite, social networking sites, etc. to achieve their online community goals -- either as prototypes or even as the final offerings. I look forward to discussing this and other topics with the rest of the attendees.

I invite all dog-lovers to visit the blog of Sam, my foster German Shepherd dog, who is seeking his forever home.

Passion, Expertise, Experience

I've created a new view of my career interests:
Passion, Expertise, & Experience

Blogs are boring

I’ve come to the conclusion that blogs are boring. And the comments on blog entries are often worse than boring…not only are many of them silly but just like the online guest books of 10 years ago, the software is so unsophisticated that it allows the same entry again and again and again.

The goofiest blogs are the group blogs where a chosen “elite” get to post and the hoi polloi get to respond with comments. Each of the chosen attempts to make brilliant posts that will prove s/he is a genius, and each of the commentators attempt to either kiss up to the blogger (because s/he is one of the chosen), or prove that they (the commentator) are actually much smarter and have an even better idea, or just be silly.

However, I’m sure there are plenty of great blogs and great group blogs – but those are hidden from our view. They belong to cohesive communities, companies, friends, etc. – people that communicated before the internet and are just using blogs as one of the many online tools to continue to accomplish their purpose.

Feel free to agree or disagree or just be silly. And prove me wrong by pointing to a blog that you rely on and passionately follow (feel free to include your own).

Incompetent people cannot recognize their own incompetence

This study on incompetent people came out a few years ago but a recent experience reminded me of how true it is.


So, in case you missed it the first time around...

"There are many incompetent people in the world. But a Cornell University study has shown that most incompetent people do not know that they are incompetent. People who do things badly, according to David A. Dunning, a professor of psychology at Cornell, are usually supremely confident of their abilities -- more confident, in fact, than people who do things well. One reason that the ignorant also tend to be the blissfully self-assured, the researchers believe, is that the skills required for competence often are the same skills necessary to recognize competence. "

http://www.lingsoft.fi/~reriksso/competence.html
http://www.apa.org/monitor/feb03/overestimate.html
http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0DTI/is_7_29/ai_79826905
http://www.applesforhealth.com/competence1.html
http://comp9.psych.cornell.edu/people/Faculty/dad6.html
lots more here:
http://www.google.com/search?num=100&hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&newwindow=1&c2coff=1&q=Cornell+University+psychology+professor+David+Dunning+competence&btnG=Search

Blogging at the Demo Nat'l Convention

Maybe I'm reading the wrong blogs, but most of the convention blogs seem to be drivel. The second biggest story of the convention might we actually need journalists after all. I also found it difficult to even find the convention bloggers (OK, it took a few minutes googling but it should have taken a few seconds). And then they weren't connected to each other so it was a pain to go from one to the other. Only to read exciting comments such as "I'm going to my hotel room now to upload some photos". Please tell me I'm missing something here.

CyberTourists in Boston
July 30, 2004, 4:00 AM PT
By Charles Cooper

Professional politicians aren't famous for being early to embrace new technology. So when the Democrats extended credentials to bloggers to cover the party's national convention in Boston, I was left pleasantly stunned.

With all the pageantry and the circus-like atmospherics that make up an American political convention, you couldn't ask for a better backdrop to show off blogging's potential. In full view of the rest of the journalistic world, here would be the most welcome--albeit belated--recognition yet by the establishment that the media landscape is changing before our eyes.

All the more disappointing, then, to report back that blogging blew its big chance in Beantown.

With a few exceptions, most of the credentialed bloggers came off like cyberhayseeds in the big city.

for the rest of the article go here:
http://news.com.com/2010-1028-5289475.html?tag=nefd.acpro

John Dvorak on the blogger fiasco

http://cbs.marketwatch.com/news/story.asp?dist=&param=archive&siteid=mktw&guid=%7B771BE781%2DB80B%2D48DD%2DB94D%2DA1917D357E4D%7D

Unfortunately you have to register to read, but here are a few tidbits.

Blogging at the convention
Commentary: Results of novel experiment prove mixed
By John C. Dvorak
Last Update: 2:55 PM ET July 28, 2004

Editor's note: John C. Dvorak is a regular contributor to CBS MarketWatch.
Dvorak is a longtime technology industry observer and columnist. His own daily musings can be read at www.dvorak.org/blog.

SAN FRANCISCO (CBS.MW) -- When the Democrats issued credentials to between 30 and 50 bloggers and treated them to a special "breakfast for bloggers" at this week's Boston convention, you sensed something is changing in the media.
.......
From what I've seen so far on the Technorati convention blog watch, I'm not impressed.
Many of these posts are vapid observations combined with simple Kerry boosterism or knee-jerk Limbaugh-Republicanist complaints. Some are simply an undecipherable mess. Hopefully a few professionals will come in and publish some thoughtful pieces before the exercise is over, but this looks laughable thus far.
........
Blog mavens see blogging as a new form of media that will destroy the old media and its old-fashioned methodologies. They are living in a dream world.

Blogging is important and will take its rightful place as a resource, but not as a substitute for news organizations. And like the legions of Star Trek fans who pour over every episode frame-by-frame to find flaws, bloggers will, in fact, become the watchdog of the media, combing news reports, and keeping everyone honest. What's more important than that?

ProfGuilds/ResumeBlog Presentations

We presented yesterday (5/5/04) at the Silicon Valley Product Management Association monthly meeting on the topic of Career Management in the era of globalization (this link goes to the current event, at some point our event will be moved to the archive so if this link does not describe our event, look in the event archive).

Our presentations are in the ResumeBlog blog. One is my presentation on Professional Guilds and Career Management, the other is Sachin Gangupantula's presentation specifically about the ResumeBlog. Heather Hamilton, the Microsoft Sr. Talent Scout, gave a presentation but rather than posting her presentation she will make comments in her blog.

BOB - the Big Orange Bee

This is completely unrelated to "work" but...

My relationship with BOB (the Big Orange Bee) is written up in an article on the front page of Saturday May 1, 2004 San Francisco Chronicle Home and Garden section and includes a photo I took of him.
Uncovering the secret life of a blond bee, by Ron Sullivan

BOB is a male Valley Carpenter Bee.

On the webpage, click on the photo to get a larger version, or go here: my photo of BOB

Another photo of BOB that I took.

That’s all the non-blurry photos I’ve been able to take. He never alights.

My plant list is here if you are interested: www.ceanothus.com

My gardener is Jeffrey Caldwell.

My Career is My Business - Presentation

I will be giving a presentation next week on May 5, 2004 evening title "My Career is My Business". I invited Heather Hamilton, the Microsoft Talent Scout, to join me. Sachin Ganganpantula who is a member of the core ResumeBlog team will also be on our panel.

The details can be found here:
Next SVPMA Event
at least until before the event.
I really don't like it when webpages don't have a permanent link. Anyway, if you are reading this after May 5th the SVPMA (Silicon Valley Product Marketing Association) has an archive of the events.

But here are the details. If you read my blog and come to the event, please let me know.
----------------------------------------

Wednesday, May 5th, 2004

My Career is My Business - Career Management in the era of globalization

Speakers:
Cynthia Typaldos, Founder and President - ProfGuilds
Heather Hamilton, Sr. Talent Scout, Microsoft
Sachin Gangupantula, ProfGuilds ResumeBlog Team

Location: Wyndham Hotel
1300 Chesapeake Terrace, Sunnyvale, 94089
408-747-0999 (map)

Cost: $20 at the door for non-members or $100/year for annual membership covering 12 meetings.

6:30 pm Registration/networking/refreshments
7:30 pm Presentation
9:00 pm Wrap-up/networking

Cynthia Typaldos, founder and president of ProfGuilds (previously known as the Software Product Marketing [SPM] eGroup) will speak and lead a discussion on managing your career in the era of globalization. Product marketing and management, like many other knowledge worker occupations. is being globalized and commoditized. Cynthia will speak about how the product management job market will evolve, and how to develop and market a deep expertise thus differentiating yourself. Cynthia will also cover how to achieve professional visibility online, build your reputation, and participate on virtual teams wherever your skills are needed. Heather Hamilton, Senior Talent Scout at Microsoft for marketing, will provide her perspective on the way she seeks out top talent and how this has changed and is further evolving because of the internet. Sachin Gangupantula, a consultant and key member of the ProfGuilds/ResumeBlog team, will highlight the process of creating a ResumeBlog and the benefits this brings.

Cynthia and Heather will also explain the difference between being a “wolf or a potato” in managing your career.

The audience will be encouraged to participate throughout the discussion. This promises to be a lively topic. Please join us and learn the strategies that product managers are using to succeed in today's difficult job climate.

50% off the entry fee if you bring a copy of your ResumeBlog! It’s best to print it in landscape format.

Heather Hamilton and a colleague will be interviewing candidates during the day before and after the presentation for marketing positions at Microsoft (for various geographical locations, not just Silicon Valley or Redmond). If you would like to be interviewed, please follow the directions here: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/webcommunities/message/987

Speaker Bios

Cynthia Typaldos is currently the founder and president of ProfGuilds. ProfGuilds is a set of professional guilds for knowledge workers (formerly known as the Software Product Marketing [SPM] eGroup), currently consisting of 5 guilds in the software space (marketing, sales, engineering, project management, and jobs in India), and over 5,000 members. The ProfGuilds are not-for-profit volunteer-managed organizations composed of career-minded knowledge workers who are employees, consultants, contractors, and entire project teams in the software, networking, internet and telecommunications markets. In tandem with the not-for-profit professional guilds she would like to develop a for-profit company to provide services to the guilds including hosted social software, partnerships, consulting projects, and a barter economy (funding needed). The primary services are a job postings and the ResumeBlog service.

Typaldos is a two-time entrepreneur with 25 years of experience in software and networking. She was previously founder and CEO of RealCommunities, an enterprise software platform for collaboration (a.k.a. social networking) applications (acquired by Mongoose Technology in 2001), founder and COO of GolfWeb, one of the first dot.coms (acquired by CBS Sportsline in 1998), Director of Software Product Marketing at Sun Microsystems, Group Manager of Product Marketing at Data General, and Senior Systems Software Engineer at Bank of America

She is widely recognized as an expert on web collaboration, online communities, and social software. She earned an undergraduate science degree and did graduate course work in computer science at UC Berkeley and was awarded an MBA from MIT.

Heather Hamilton has been working in the staffing industry for ten years and is currently Senior Recruiter for Marketing Talent Acquisition at Microsoft. She is responsible for creating and driving strategies for identifying and attracting the industry's best marketing talent to Microsoft. Heather has been with Microsoft for 5 years in different roles, supporting business and technical organizations' staffing needs. Prior to Microsoft, Heather held roles leading the technical recruiting team at a large multi-line insurance company's corporate headquarters as well as staffing full-time consultants for Y2K remediation and application development and application outsourcing projects for a national IT consulting firm. Heather started her staffing career at Robert Half International in the AccounTemps division after a brief career excursion in accounting. Heather has a BS degree in Business Administration from the University of Southern California and currently resides in the Seattle area.

Sachin Gangupantula is an independent consultant providing services in product and technology strategy, Competitive Analysis, Product Marketing and business development. Most recently, he helped iManage develop, market and deploy highly reliable enterprise collaborative content management solutions. He has over 8 years of experience in developing and bringing to market innovative web-based products and services.

He is currently helping the ProfGuilds team in developing & delivering a compelling open-source innovation with the ResumeBlog Service that redefines Professional Visibility on the web. He is also on the board of SVPMA.

Sachin earned an undergraduate degree from BITS, Pilani and has a Master's in Computer Science from Univ of Hawaii.

Honesty Online Higher than Offline

March 21, 2004
The New York Times
ESSAY
The Honesty Virus
By CLIVE THOMPSON


This is an incredibly interesting article, that draws the conclusion that people are more truthful online than in person or on the phone. I’ve highlighted the most interesting parts below.

The author’s last two paragraphs are astonishing…yet he seems to be on the right path. I certainly agree that I can get to know someone just as well, maybe even better, by working with them virtually.

Our impulse to confess via cyberspace inverts much of what we think about honesty. It used to be that if you wanted to know someone -- to really know and trust them -- you arranged a face-to-face meeting. Our culture still fetishizes physical contact, the shaking of hands, the lubricating chitchat. Executives and politicians spend hours flying across the country merely for a five-minute meeting, on the assumption that even a few seconds of face time can cut through the prevarications of letters and legal contracts. Remember when George W. Bush first met Vladimir Putin, gazed into his eyes and said he could trust him because he'd acquired ''a sense of his soul''?

So much for that. If Bush really wanted the straight goods, he should have met the guy in an AOL chat room. And maybe, in the long run, that's the gratifying news. As more and more of our daily life moves online, we could find ourselves living in an increasingly honest world, or at least one in which lies have ever more serious consequences. Bush himself can't put old statements about W.M.D. behind him partly because so many people are forwarding his old speeches around on e-mail or posting them on Web sites. With its unforgiving machine memory, the Internet might turn out to be the unlikely conscience of the world.
-------------
March 21, 2004
The New York Times
ESSAY
The Honesty Virus
By CLIVE THOMPSON

RealCommunities Business Model

Summary: Goal was to own the API for personal profiles

The business model of my previous company, RealCommunities, had an ambitious plan to create and then dominate in the area of personal profiles. Here's the short description from my business model document that I prepared for our angel investors (written in September 1999).

Community (and Community Application) Portal
As we build up a large base of customers we can create a portal whose purpose is twofold:

• Enable individuals to find the “best” community for their needs (e.g. for mentoring, community opinion, experts, investment clubs, etc.)
  
• Enable individuals to store, retrieve, update and otherwise maintain a “myrealcommunities” capability in order to
  
  • More quickly join new communities (that are powered by RealCommunities)
    
  • Be alerted to new communities of interest to them
    
  • Quickly find and manage their involvement in various communities

The revenue stream from this portal could be from our customers (based on referrals, new members to their site), and targeted advertising (since we know a lot about what our community members are interested in).

Traffic to our portal would primarily come from links from our products on our customers’ websites rather than through expensive branding programs.

RealCommunities Business Model Discussion document, 9/27/99
RealCommunities Executive Summary, 10/00
More about RealCommunities on Typaldos.com

Microsoft Talent Scout Blogs

Heather Hamilton, the Microsoft Talent Scout who gave us all the great ResumeBlog tips previously
(see my notes at http://typaldos.blogspot.com/2004_02_01_typaldos_archive.html#107713767999431713)
has now started her own blog at:
http://blogs.msdn.com/heatherleigh/

Several of the other Microsoft Talent Scouts are also doing a blog
http://blogs.msdn.com/jobsblog

Heather invites all of the SPM members to send her questions about “Marketing at Microsoft” that she will respond to in her blog. See her note below.

If you send a question to Heather, be sure to mention you are an SPM member AND provide a link to your ResumeBlog.

If you don’t have a ResumeBlog, you can create one in 15 minutes by following the directions here:
www.resumeblog.com


Please do not forward this message or re-post it to other lists, but rather if there are other people you know that might be interested, invite them to join our spmdiscussion egroup at
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/softwareproductmarketingdiscussion.


From: Heather Hamilton (Microsoft Sr. Talent Scout)
Sent: Tuesday, March 16, 2004 8:24 PM
To: cynthia@typaldos.com
Subject: RE: notes from our conversations

Hi Cynthia,

I wanted to follow up since our conversation and let you know that I am working on the "top 10 tips" article that we discussed. I have some other projects this week but it is coming along and you should expect it the middle of next week.

I also wanted to let you know that I am officially blogging at http://blogs.msdn.com/heatherleigh/. Maybe some of your folks would be interested in sending in some questions about "marketing at Microsoft". I'd love to hear from people! I've added a link to the Software Product Management eGroup. I hope I can contribute to some additional traffic for your resume blogs as well!

Internet-based Techniques for Recruiters

The Microsoft Talent Scout mentioned the AIRS website where recruiters/talent scouts congregate. We (ProfGuids volunteers) took a look at their website and found two fascinating classes!

• Googling for Candidates
  
• Guerrilla Job Posting Strategies

Some info on the two classes below but go to the class pages for the entire description.

This is excellent proof that recruiters and their like are using internet to troll for candidates rather than just posting jobs on the tradition media or job boards. I believe it also shows that recruiters are spending less time working their rolodexes and more time just finding the people directly.

Googling for Candidates

Class is offered once/month at $495 per person (discounts for multiple attendees)
Online, 4 hours.

The world of Internet search has been turned upside down by Google and other new search engines that reach farther into the Web to bring back pages never before available! This ground breaking class will update you on the hottest techniques on the cutting edge. This class is full of startling new ways to use Google to bring back great results - this is really fun stuff!

Why You Should Attend

Google Rocks!
Google is the uber-search engine that most people rely on today. If you're like our researchers, you've come to rely on the massive scale of Google's index, and the precision of it's results. Though it's still important to use a variety of search engines to canvass the Web, Google is definitely becoming the first stop for Internet search - and an increasingly great resource for finding passive candidates.

Documents You Won't Find Anywhere Else
Google indexes documents that other search engines do not. Learn to find MS/Excel and MS/Word phone directories, MS/PowerPoint organizational charts and other unique documents hidden inside the Web servers of companies, colleges, organizations, forums and other Web communities.

A Suite of New Search Tools
You'll learn to leverage the power of the Google Toolbar, Google News and Google Groups to flip Websites, find hidden pages, get past 404 errors, find executives and listen-in to expert discussions online. Google's advanced features and secrets are powerful tools for recruiters and researchers.

Learn From the Best
AIRS trainers are seasoned professionals with first-hand experience recruiting through a time of revolutionary change in the industry. All are Certified Internet Recruiters, and have cutting-edge e-recruiting skills and technical knowledge, as well as expert sourcing, contact, assessment and hiring skills.

What You'll Learn

* Getting around inside Google.
* The best advanced search process for passive candidates.
* The ins and outs of the Google Toolbar.
* How to find gurus in Google Groups.
* How to find the right Word, Excel and PowerPoint documents.
* How to find DeepWeb pages you can't get to any other way.
* Uncover phone lists, org charts and other high-value documents.
* Using Google Images and News to find specific kinds of candidates.
* Super commands and Google "hacks".
* And lots more!

Guerrilla Job Posting Strategies

Class is offered once in April at $495 per person (discounts for multiple attendees)
Online, 4 hours

Why You Should Attend

Reduce Your Advertising Costs
Lower your costs while you sharpen your focus. Why pay hundreds of dollars a posting to compete with over 400,000 other customers at Monster.com, when you can post your ads for pennies into specialized communities filled with passive candidates? Stop paying a fortune to job boards that broadcast to the general public - and start narrowcasting to the right candidate pools, at a fraction of the cost.

Leave the Crowds Behind
Knowing where passive candidates gather is a powerful competitive advantage. Now you can stop jostling with every other recruiter on the planet for the same overexposed group of job seekers at the big boards. Instead, you'll learn to go out on the Net to find fresh, untapped communities of passive candidates that you can capture with focused, personalized ad campaigns.

Reach Better Candidates
The best candidates are not surfing job boards, because they're not looking for a job. But that doesn't mean you can't reach them. This class will teach you to reach passive candidates by growing relationships with the alumni directors, mail list managers, forum moderators, user group presidents and other gatekeepers who can help you advertise to their targeted audiences.

Learn from the Best
Your trainers are seasoned professionals with first-hand experience recruiting through a time of revolutionary change in the industry. All are Certified Internet Recruiters, and have cutting-edge e-recruiting skills and technical knowledge, as well as a solid grounding in sales, client management and candidate development.

What You'll Learn

* How to write job ads guaranteed to produce better results.
* How to optimize your placement on the Big Boards.
* The most efficient niche board strategies.
* How to build no-cost and low-cost job posting campaigns.
* Find the right Web communities for your search.
* Low cost advertising into forums, mail lists and vertical portals.
* How to cost-effectively drive eyeballs to your own Web site.
* How to measure and refine your ad strategies.
* To reach the best passive candidates at the lowest possible cost.
* And lots more!

Conversations with Microsoft Senior Talent Scout – Rev 2.18.04

Two sets of notes, the first set is from my conversation with the talent scout on Monday, 2.16.04, and the second set is from our group conversation with her on Tuesday 2.17.04.

There is a wealth of information in these notes including specific advice on how to improve your ResumeBlog to make yourself more visible to recruiters and more interesting once you are found.

Cynthia

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

Notes from my conversation with the Microsoft Senior Talent Scout, 2/16/04

Microsoft Sr. Talent Scout is one of 5 “Senior Talent Scouts” at Microsoft. Talent Scouts are essentially the recruiting swat team that helps the business division recruiters when they are having trouble filling a position. This Microsoft Senior Talent Scout first learned about us (ProfGuilds) thru a internet search using keywords (MSN or Google, I didn’t probe). She found the ResumeBlog of Andy Klein (www.andrew-klein.blogspot.com) of this group along with others. Several of the ResumeBloggers are now in discussions with Microsoft concerning open positions. In fact, the talent scout went thru most of the ResumeBlogs in the BlogRoll (the list of ResumeBloggers that is on the right-hand side of every ResumeBlog). This particular Microsoft Sr. Talent Scout and one other talent scout are responsible for marketing, the other three talent scouts are for technical jobs. Via email Microsoft Sr. Talent Scout has shared information about the ProfGuilds’ ResumeBlogs with other Microsoft recruiters. (Note: my ResumeBlog is here - www.cynthia-typaldos.blogspot.com, but see the advice below, my ResumeBlog needs some improvement! A ResumeBlog is different than an ordinary blog -- go to the ResumeBlog blog for more information.)

What the Microsoft Sr. Talent Scout is really excited about is the ResumeBlogs. Overall she is thrilled with blogs in general because they reveal more about a potential candidate and in particular provide insight into candidates that are the levels below director. Higher level people often have more information about them because of speaking engagements, being on company websites, etc. She considers blogs to be a revolutionary tool for staffing professionals to use to find top talent.

The Microsoft Sr. Talent Scout never uses job boards for a variety of reasons including:

• Typically Microsoft already has a person’s resume if they have put it into a job board
  
• The quality is lower than what she can find by an internet search
  
• Microsoft Sr. Talent Scouts find candidates through internet search and then follow-up via phone or email to prospective candidates or people that might know of prospective candidates. They do not usually post their job openings as the internet search method is more effective.
  
• When they (the Talent Scouts or presumably any of the Microsoft recruiters) find a community or cluster of similar professionals they are very excited because they have found these communities to be the best source of good talent.

Feedback on the ResumeBlog service overall:

• This is exactly the kind of service she loves to discover. I got the impression it was unique amongst the various communities she has found. She has already told a number of other recruiters about the ResumeBlogs.
  
• She did not realize the search box would take keywords. We need to change the box description to say “keyword search” rather than “member search”. She thought it was a search by member name only.
  
• She would like to see the ResumeBlog members split out by ProfGuild (we are working on that already)
  
• She would like a “last updated” flag next to each members’ link in the BlogRoll
  
• She would like a service where a recruiter could sign up to receive notification of new or modified ResumeBlogs (some kind of RSS feed?)
  

As you can see, our conversation centered around the ResumeBlogs. Microsoft does not use our job posting services. However that doesn’t mean the job posting services aren’t important. These services are what attracts members to ProfGuilds and then it’s our job to get them to create ResumeBlogs.

Microsoft Sr. Talent Scout and her team are going to write up a list of 10 tips on how to get found as a job candidate on the internet. She will sign this herself and post it to our members. Our thoughts behind this are to get our members to hear directly from one of the industries top talent scouts on how to get a job. I suspect she will be quite convincing in getting more people to create ResumeBlogs.

But wait, do we want more people to have ResumeBlogs and therefore create more competition for ourselves? Absolutely because the more ResumeBlogs we have the more likely one of us is going to be found and as we have seen numerous times, once hiring managers/recruiters find one ResumeBlog they tend to use the search box or the list of links in the Blogroll to find additional candidates.
-------------------

Notes/Input from the Microsoft Sr. Talent Scout from group meeting with ProfGuilds on 2/16/04

Suggestions on how to improve your ResumeBlog:

Content

• Explain more about product space, industry space in your ResumeBlog
  
• Include product context: explain something about the product, that's useful information.
  
• Make it look like a resume rather than a bio; link to other information about yourself (articles, website, press mentions, etc.).
  
• Experience, even older experience is relevant. If there is a natural break you might want to just put company, title, date. Technology changes but functional role does not. Marketing people with previous technical experience is very relevant.
  
• Red flags no dates of employment, too much movement although more acceptable lately.
  
• Green flags. What did the person actually DO? What did they OWN, not just what did they do as part of a team. Strategic without tactics is bad. How they put something thru the whole process.
  
• Keep personal stuff out of it (that is, don’t use it as a personal blog also). Blogs should clearly indicate whether they are personal or professional.
  

Getting Found

• Talent Scouts start with an internet search using keywords of company names, product types, they find people, then use those people to find more people
  
• They search discussion groups to find knowledgeable people too
  
• Once find a person that might be interesting they do an internet search on the name of that person
  
• Are they using social networking tools – LinkedIn, Spoke, and Plaxo? She doesn't use them for the intended purpose, just uses them to get names by keyword e.g. network security. Once she has names she does an internet search on those people. [By the way, my personal opinion is that references are LESS important in the internet world than previously, because now professionals have ways of actually showing their work to a wide audience via internet presentations, articles, press mention, etc. -- Cynthia.)
  
• Smaller companies may have to use other mechanisms because they don’t get the same candidate flow.
  
• Once you get your resume to one recruiter they will pass to other recruiters in that company.
  
• Use KEYWORDS. Company names, titles, is what they do the initial search on. You want your ResumeBlog to come up in that search. OK to put keywords into source code -- talent scout doesn’t look for actual word. Market space terms server, business intelligence, security, digital media, desktop applications, operating systems, ebusiness, smart personal objects, mobility, embedded, consumer space, devices, home entertainment, customer segment specific experience, consumer packaged goods, branding and advertising, architect, developer, etc.
  
• Be part of a community of similar professionals…creates a pool of talent for the recruiters to tap into. They will look at a lot of ResumeBlogs if the are in a logical grouping (e.g. our professional guilds, note that we will be breaking the ResumeBlogs into chunks by guild soon)
  

Getting Hired

• Why are some product marketing/management & technical positions “hard to fill” such that the Talent Scout gets involved? Niche-y jobs. Not just hiring for the position, hiring for the long run. Hiring the best in the industry. Or some recruiters are working on a lot of positions (e.g. 40+) need help from the Talent Scouts.
  
• Looking for people who are smart and not how to get stuff done. People that are successful in working towards a GOAL (and accomplishing that goal). This was THE most important thing she said re: Microsoft, their culture. Can't emphasize that enough. She noted working hard is commendable, but what's important is that the hard work is related to a GOAL.
  
• Picking out doers from talkers. What have they done. Must have been at a company long enough to get stuff done (at least 1.5 yrs).

Recruiting Industry Observations:

• How should we (ProfGuilds) approach recruiters? Network our way in, using email addresses on job postings doesn’t work because those typically go into a folder. AIRS is http://www.airsdirectory.com/. Go thru those organizations and find the recruiters.
  
• Change in the recruiting industry: It’s now all about finding the BEST talent. Typically someone who has a web presence is viewed as a better potential hire…speaking at conferences, discussion groups, articles, etc. Who are the best people in this space?

Make your small URL H*U*G*E !!!

Many of you are familiar with www.tinyurl.com to make a long URL short but…

What if you want to impress others? Wouldn’t it make sense to make a small URL huge?

There is now a service to do this and it is completely totally FREE. No obligation. Total privacy (I don’t actually know if this is true.)

I successfully turned my small ResumeBlog URL into the humongous URL below. You can do the same by going to www.hugeurl.com.

www.cynthia-typaldos.blogspot.com: original short ResumeBlog URL is now the huge URL below!

http://www.hugeurl.com/?NTg2OWE5MzYyYzhjMmU1Y2YzZGVhNjg2MjUyODEyMGYmMTEm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I couldn't get Blogger to accept this as a valid URL but if you cut and paste it back together you will see it actually works!!!

Amazing...

Stanford Business School has just now published all of the videos of their speaker forums including the one on social networking that was sponsored by the MIT/Stanford Venture Lab in which I was a panelist:

Social Networking: Is there a Business Model?
September 2003
link to original event description
link to video of event

"A handful of Silicon Valley entrepreneurs have created a resurgence of Web sites dedicated to enabling social networking: business contacts, affinity groups and even dating. At the same time other technologists are experimenting with network platforms to enable new communication avenues. These were some of the topics that drew a capacity crowd in September for the MIT/Stanford Venture Laboratory discussion on Social Networking."

Since I was hardly allowed to speak by the moderator, Tony Perkins, I haven’t had the nerve to look at the video myself. But apparently my observations were noticed, at least by this person.

http://www.socialwrite.com/archives/2004/01/30/shooting-in-the-dark/

"There are some great videos over at the Stanford School of Business centre for lifelong learning with a panel discussion and keynote on finding a business model for social networking. Of all the panel members Cynthia Typaldos was the most realistic and informative. She was neither sceptical, nor oblivious."

My Business Networking Predictions for 2004

Network Moves asked me to come up with a list of what 2004 will bring in the area of professional networking.

You can find my predictions on their website along with those of Scott Allen, Nick Corcodilos, Diane Darling, Debra Feldman, Craig Frank, Julie Jansen, and Andrea Nierenberg. I'm last since we "experts" are in last name alphabetical order so you have to scroll down to find my predictions. I'm going to asked them for a named link but until then either read it there, or I'll put it right here in my blog.

So far I think my predictions are holding up pretty well! Of course, it is only the start of the second month of the year...

1. Except in the areas of job/career, yellow pages, and small/local businesses, most online social networking is a dud. Do you really want to sell that crummy old couch to a friend of a friend? For more on this, see my recent blog entry, Social networking is mostly silly.

2. The move to member-owned professional guilds will accelerate as everyone realizes that he or she must be a business of one, taking full ownership of their career. Also, the definition of a career will change from successive promotions in corporations to participation in projects with various organizations and teams, structured around a core competency.

3. At the same time, professionals will demand full ownership of their career and professional data. They will say No to proprietary systems like Monster.com and various social-networking start-ups.

4. Not having a professional Web presence will be like not having an e-mail address or a phone number.

5. Open-software and open-innovation concepts and implementation will become even more attractive. For more on this, see my list of articles and books on open innovation.

6. Recruiters and executive-search firms will play lesser roles in the acquisition of talent. Human resources and talent managers—those who can find the absolute best person for any project—will become more important and less subjective.

7. Outsourcing will become less of a threat. Non-U.S. companies will hire the best talent anywhere, be it in Boston, San Jose, Bangalore, Singapore, London, or Mexico City. Virtual teams will become the norm.

8. What you have accomplished will become much more important than who you know. Past performance is the best predictor of future performance. Recommendations are simply proxies for understanding a person's work experience. Professionals will use their online portfolios to demonstrate their talents (ResumeBlog is a start). With connections and validations, white-collar professionals will be hired much more for what they can do rather than what others say they can do. This will be welcome news for those who are not part of the "old boys network," especially in high tech.

9. Successful online social-networking business models will be based on membership fees, the ability to match talent with jobs, and a barter economy. (For more on this, see my recent blog entry.)

10. Online social networks will be offered as features of many products—rather than as stand-alone Web sites, services, or tools.

My Career is MY Business

mycareerismybusiness

This is the write-up for a talk I am giving in February 2004

In the syndicated comic strip "Sally Forth"(0), Sally's husband Ted, a middle management drone, types his name into Google and there is no mention of him. He is greatly disappointed and mentions his "absence of presence" to Sally. Sally responds saying that she will hire a programmer to build a website for Ted.

What's wrong and what's right with this scenario?

What's right with this scenario is Ted, a corporate employee, can no longer hide in his cubicle and expect promotions and projects to come to him. The 21st century is the dawn of the "Free Agent Nation"(1) and every white collar professional must manage his/her own career...not only is lifetime employment disappearing but many forms of employment are being replaced by contractors and consultants. No matter what you do, you need to accept this and learn how to market yourself as a business and manage your career. So, Ted needs to get himself visible on the web, because an executive recruiter might at this very moment be typing the keywords into Google that will bring up Ted...i.e. "tax accountant corporate merger" (I have no idea what Ted "does"(3), this is just an example).

What's wrong with this scenario is that Sally thinks she has to get a programmer to build a website for Ted's professional presence. Having someone build a website for you is the worst possible path because who will maintain it? There's a better solution which is....

...the ResumeBlog(TM)!(4) -- a professional web presence that is easy to create and maintain . Additionally, your ResumeBlog is not a lonely island in the vast sea of internet webpages; it is tightly linked with other people in your industry your professional guild, which makes you findable thru traversable links and a higher pagerank(5).

We will discuss all of the above including going thru the very simple steps to create your ResumeBlog so that when you leave this seminar you can go home and in 10 minutes be findable for that next great opportunity! This talk is appropriate whether you are a professional seeking to expand your opportunities, or if you are seeking talent.

Fortune Magazine's columnist/recruiter "Ask Annie"(6) and "Sally Forth" agree -- you gotta have a web presence in the 21st century!

=================================

(0) the comic strip is here: http://www.kingfeatures.com/features/comics/sforth/aboutMaina.php, go to Nov 16, 2003
(1) see Dan Pink's website: www.freeagentnation.com
(2) read the first two articles by Prof Tom Malone, MIT: http://www.typaldos.blogspot.com/2003_11_18_typaldos_archive.html#106919390880564685
(3) actually comic strip characters don't do anything in between their daily appearance in the newspaper
(4) check out the ResumeBlog instructions! www.resumeblog.com
(5) Google's pagerank algorithm measures the ranking of a page in a search results partly by how many other pages link to it
(6) http://www.fortune.com/fortune/annie/0,15704,539758,00.html Ask Annie: Secrets of an Executive Recruiter, 11/10/03

Social Networking Sites = More Work for Me! Am I a Luddite?

I posted this note in both the SPM Discussion eGroup (900 members) and the WebCommunities eGroup (350) members. Lots of interesting responses; you can search the archives to find them without being a member.

Subject: market/ social software = more work for me

Although I am a big fan of social software in general, I've come to the conclusion that the existing social networking sites/tools (at least the ones I signed up for earlier this year) are simply a way for people I hardly know (or don't know) to ask me to do stuff that I don't want to do (e.g. update their address book) or introduce them to someone else who I hardly know (or don't know) regarding a subject or purpose in which I have no interest, knowledge, or is not even revealed to me.

I admit I have put no effort into my profiles on these sites...after signing up for site number 4 or 5 the whole thing just got to be too much trouble.

Am I a Luddite?

Elisa Camahort was among the many who wrote perceptive comments.

"Networking is much easier for the extroverts among us, and these social networking sites give a false hope to introverts that they can achieve the benefits of networking without really have to interact with people on an individual basis."

And no, I did NOT make my post just for the joy of using the word Luddite.

Cynthia