Check out this chart from Quantcast. Even ESPN has better traffic. No matter how much we, in the inner circle, believe Twitteris fantastic, the mainstream still hasn’t adopted. Essentially, in my opinion, a lot of the conversation taking place on Twitter is with the proverbial choir.
In many states talking with your cel-phone (non hands free) and texting while driving is illegal. Personally, I have no problem with this, but I think it should be extended to eating while driving. Eating while driving is much more dangerous than talking on the phone while driving.
Ok, that said, the thing that has annoyed me for years are the people who drive while letting their dogs site on their lap. Talk about dangerous, that’s really dangerous. Plus, when you let people like Jessica Simpson (who can’t walk and talk at the same time) drive while a dog is on her lap you could end up with some serious carnage.
Jessica Simpson
I was really surprised to see The Governator veto a bill in California that would have made driving with pets on your lap illegal. He already passed laws that prohibit texting and talking on the phone while driving. WTF?
Just a quick note here. This guy posted a photo of a car covered in Post-It notes. It receives a great deal of attention. 3M hears about the photo, checks it out, and want to capitalize on the buzz/momentum. They contact the original owner about using it in a national promotion. He says sure, but requests a usage fee. 3M opts not to pay him, then ignores his follow-up communication, and uses a photo that looks nearly identical to the one he took. The full text from the photo’s author can he read here. You be the judge.
Original Photo
Original Post-It Car
3M’s Photo
3M
One, you really shouldn’t steal and two, you should never steal from your consumers. What was 3M thinking? Dude, we have this thing called the World Wide Web. It let’s people share and communicate with one another. When you do things that are bad, people will find out and find out quickly.
The insane thing about all of this is I can’t imagine the guy asked for more than 10K. He probably should have asked for more, but didn’t. Are you telling me 3M can’t afford 10K? Sad.
Facebook has slowly been making updates to their site over the past few months. Previously, the most dramatic change was switching to a brand new design template.
Today, they introduced a new home page. The new home page utilizes a new image on the left hand side of the page that shows how Facebook enables you to connect with people across the world. It’s a simple visual, but gets the point across quickly. I like it. On the right hand side of the page are the registration fields for new users. In essence, they’ve split the meat of the page into two sections, but both of those sections work together. The left hand image simply shows what Facebook does and the left hand form fields are there for people to take action. Lastly, header now contains a set of login form fields with a checkbox to keep you logged in.
New Facebook Home Page
The design is minimal, simple, and effective.
On September 27, 2008 the great actor, Paul Newman passed away. Now, I’m not a nostalgic kinda guy. I’m not the kinda guy who gets choked up, well unless I’m watching Field of Dreams. However, Paul Newman’s death, is just tragic. Some of my earliest movie memories include Paul Newman. I was first introduced to him via Cool Hand Luke. That movie is how I remember Paul Newman. Of course I saw him in The Sting, Butch Cassidy & The Sundance Kid, The Hustler, and dozens of other movies. Each film was an amazing experience. Each role was like watching a masterpiece being painted.
As I look back on all the movies, I think the other movie that sticks out to me is The Road to Perdition. I remember watching it in the theater and taking from it, several quotes that still stick in my head. These are just a few of my favorites:
“There are only murderers in this room! Michael! Open your eyes! This is the life we chose, the life we lead. And there is only one guarantee: none of us will see heaven. ”
“Natural law. Sons are put on this earth to trouble their fathers.”
“What men do after work is what made us rich. No need to screw them at work as well.”
The words alone are powerful, but watching him and hearing him deliver the lines was chilling. Just watch him deliver his last breath in this scene:
The film world and the community as a whole is emptier without Paul Newman in it.
Always loved this quote from the movie, The Usual Suspects.
“He is supposed to be Turkish. Some say his father was German. Nobody believed he was real. Nobody ever saw him or knew anybody that ever worked directly for him, but to hear Kobayashi tell it, anybody could have worked for Soze. You never knew. That was his power. The greatest trick the Devil ever pulled was convincing the world he didn’t exist. One story the guys told me — the story I believe — was from his days in Turkey. There was a petty gang of Hungarians that wanted their own mob. They realized that to be in power you didn’t need guns or money or even numbers. You just needed the will to do what the other guy wouldn’t. After a while they come to power, and then they come after Soze. He was small time then, just running dope, they say…”
The shit hit the fan, however, when people realized he did. Today, it’s easy to pull the wool over someone’s eyes for a short period of time, but you can’t do it for the long haul. If you lack skills, experience, money, etc. you can only hide it for so long.
I still love this campaign.
There is a fine line between guidelines/guardrails and suffocating control. Look at what DRM has done. Music sales are at an all time low. The iPhone for all its wonders is KILLING innovation. Well, to be clearer, Apple is killing innovation. Their commitment to DRM based music files and insane controls over application development is going to turn away consumers and developers. With Google’s new Android platform being completely open and cross-carrier supported we’re going to see some serious changes. Google is already courting developers that have been spurned by Apple. Let’s be honest, there is nothing more satisfying than sticking it to someone that has wronged you. I wouldn’t be surprised to see developers offer their applications exclusively to Google.
I’m not advocating a wild west attitude. However, I am advocating the need for guidelines that help drive innovation, encourage forward thinking, and embrace sharing. This concept isn’t limited to just Apple and Google. This applies to nearly every company, business, and organization out there today. From your state’s DMV to Major League Baseball to advertising agency I work at, innovation is the lifeblood that will keep the future bright. How we elect to balance a culture of constraints and open doors is paramount to the success of the individuals working for the company and the company itself.
The next time you think, let’s add some layers of protection, let’s try to manage this, let’s try to control it please think again. The level of control you try to enforce may just be your undoing. Embrace, if you will, and organized chaos. It’s being that close to out of control without being negligent or dangerous that makes things exciting and leads to breakthroughs.
This is amazingly timely. According to a new study, there is a link between the number of “friends” you have on Facebook and how narcissistic you are. Specifically, the study states, “the researchers found that the number of Facebook friends and wallposts that individuals have on their profile pages correlates with narcissism. Narcissists are also more likely to choose glamorous, self-promoting pictures for their main profile photos, she said, while others are more likely to use snapshots.”
So why is this timely, you might ask? Well, just yesterday I wrote about the need to focus on quality instead of quantity when it comes to things like Facebook. I’m totally on to something 
Imagine the shear frustration I had after syncing tonight’s run and seeing that I had accumulated 99.97 miles over my first 33 runs. 99.97! I don’t know whether I should be pissed at Nike+ for not pushing me to keep going toward 100 miles or if I should embrace it because it literally makes me want to go outside right now and run the .03 miles needed to reach 100 miles.
Nike Plus - 100 Miles