May 2008

I love Seesmic which is best described as video twitter - though people have a hard enough time explaining twitter so I am not sure that is all together helpful. Anyways, the people at seesmic recently were able to interview the crew for the most recent Indian Jones movie. Personally I think the movie fell tremendously short of its predecessors - but there are some interesting seesmic interviews with Ford and the gang - one of which I have below:

• Apple released Mac OS X 10.5.3 (Leopard) today. It seriously helped with ical and mail.app stability as well as continuing to may .mac and apple services sync work better. It needs all the help it can get.
• I am half way through my Google week where I am only using Google applications for my productivity (except for Remember the Milk for tasks). So far I have not wanted for a feature or tool bouncing between Gmail, Google Calendar, Gtalk and Google Documents seamlessly. My only complaint so far is that Firefox 2 has issues being slow - but I need to use it because of the killer extensions for Gmail and Docs (Docs has offline support now and Gmail’s Better Gmail 2 extension totally changes the game).
• The Design Firm my wife works(ed) for lost their niche client she was brought on to support. So she was let go today. She still has work she does through Scrap Girls - but really just wants to be a mom as well. Just another hurdle!
• Our car is dying. It has some blue smoke starting to appear (engine burning oil = bad) and now it won’t cool itself. We have to run the heater just to drive anywhere which isn’t going to work in SoCal summer weather.
• Coming out of the Purpose Driven Network Summit I have finally connect with the ministry crowd in my networks - specifically twitter. My two worlds of social media and church have overlapped to help me connect with the people that are thinking like I am - social networks and new media channels rock!
• I want a MacBook Air & Kindle. There I’ve said it.
• I have been really getting into video and pictures lately and may end up video blogging a lot more if for nothing else then working on my verbal communication skills - they are getting dusty!

This is part of a series of videos I helped Saddleback Church do for their Purpose Driven Network Summit. Huge thanks to Carlos Whittaker, Tony Morgan, DJ Chuang, and Mike Foster for coming to the summit, hosting interviews and blogging for it!

If you’ve been in ministry then you’ve meet angry people. A parent who doesn’t like the music you played in the van or the games you played at camp. A senior pastor who doesn’t like your work “style”. And on and on. For most of us we think that the next step in dealing with these angry people is to keep treating them like normal people in the plans and processes we have. Seth Godin has a very enlightening article about angry people - and their ability to bring value.

Angry people can’t move down the “value line” because angry people don’t move. Until the anger goes away you can’t and shouldn’t attempt to move them down the “value line”. A “value line” is the different processes that you help people navigate for themselves or for the success of your ministry. So, very practically:

• Don’t recruit an angry parent to chaperon an event or become a volunteer (especially to “appease” them).
• Don’t make an “ask” of your senior pastor if he is angry at you.
• Don’t change your ministry programming because a parent didn’t like a game.

Just like the bible outlines, when you have an issue between you and another person - resolving that issue is the one and only thing you focus on with them. Most of us act in a pretty cowardly way and try to sidestep the awkwardness of dealing with an angry person. But for the success and health of you and your ministry resolving conflict head on is essential.

What are you thoughts? Do you agree with Seth? What has been your experience with angry people?

Angry people are different from other people. They are not just an inch or two along some curve. Instead, there’s a gap in the curve, a vertical chasm, separating the angry from everyone else.

[From Seth's Blog: Angry people are different]

Beach Day #2 - Newport Beach from Tony Steward on Vimeo.

Chris has a great article on the Basic Business Blogging Suggestions. If you have a company blog or are thinking about it this article is a great way to know what you are getting into with a blog, and how to effectively pull it off. Blogging is much different than the typical marketing copy that most companies generate - realizing and adjusting for that distinction is essential.

Above All Else, Be Human

If that advice sounds familiar, it’s not unlike the very first post in the Social Media 100 series: Above All Else- People. The advice is the same. People are who read blogs (okay, we could argue that Google also reads your blog, but let’s save that for another time). To that end, present yourself as a human. Write with the first-person (”I”) perspective, and write as if you’re telling me something, not a faceless mass.

[From Basic Business Blogging Suggestions | chrisbrogan.com]

To check out the ustream room click Here.

Read/WriteWeb has a great article talking about the crowd dynamics on the internet, and specifically how sites like Digg are often hurt by them. Digg is a social bookmarking website where people can submit a link and then it gets voted on by the people who come by. The idea is that the cream will rise to the top, but sometimes what rises to the top only gets there because of the fickleness or immaturity of the crowd digg can have.

Read/WriteWeb lays out these guidelines from a post last year:

Last year, we laid out a set of rules to get the most out of a crowd. It might be a good idea to revisit those here:

1. Crowds should operate within constraints. To harness the collective intelligence of crowds, there need to be rules in place to maintain order.
2. Not everything can be democratic. Sometimes a decision needs to be made, and having a core team (or single person) make the ultimate decision can provide the guidance necessary to get things done and prevent crazy ideas and groupthink from wreaking havoc on your product.
3. Crowds must retain their individuality. Encourage your group to disagree, and try not to let any members of the group disproportionately influence the rest.
4. Crowds are better at vetting content than creating it. It is important to note that in most of the above projects, the group merely votes on the final product; they do not actually create it.

The potential of the internet, and crowd-sourcing like seen on sites like Wikipedia and Del.icio.us are exciting. But creating those environment isn’t as easy as just throwing a fun website up, you need to know who your crowd is, where your quality content will come from and how you will help your crowd know the “rules” so they are free to interact with each other in a way that actually creates value.