Community Guy – Jake McKee

Clue Unit #14: Non-traditional Discussion of Transparency

Continuing our May theme of Transparency, Clue Unit episode 14 has been released!

(click here to listen – MP3)

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Episode 14, about 30 minutes.

Today’s Topic: Non-traditional Discussion of Transparency

•     Spammer Contacts Jake  
•     Flickr Censors User  
•     Engadget Drops Apple’s Stock Price  
•     Heather and Derek Leave JPG Magazine 

With Jake McKee, Lee LeFever and Christopher Carfi. As always full show notes are available at www.clueunit.com.

We’ve also created a Twitter account to make it easier to keep up with the podcast. Check us out at: twitter.com/clueunit

Comments have returned

Apparently I really have won the war. After only 48 hours of having comments turned off, I got the following message in my inbox:

I have to say that I’m impressed. First time a spammer has contacted me and apologized. I even followed up to ask him if he’d be willing to come onto our podcast (I was curious to talk about Transparency – this month’s theme). Unfortunately he (very politely) declined.
While I’m happy with the result, and am taking the optimistic position that it’s for real, I’m still extremely troubled by the larger issue. Globalization and cheaper labor costs are creating many, many new opportunities for both parties involved. Some of these models are fantastic, some not so much. Cool user generated content sites, for instance, would be far fewer if content moderators weren’t outsourced. But when it’s possible to pay nearly nothing to have real humans creating quasi-relevant spam, it becomes even more important for companies to act responsibly and honestly.

Lost the battle, won't lose the war

OK, fine. I’m throwing in the towel, at least temporarily. The manual spammers have won this battle, hopefully they won’t win the war too.

In the last week, I’ve gotten about 100 manual comment spam posts. These are blog comments that are posted by a real person, probably overseas working for a tiny amount of money, that aren’t “spam” in the traditional sense. They actually read the entry then write some sort of quasi-related comment in the hope that you will think it’s a real comment and not delete it. Since they can include a URL as part of their personal info, this helps drive up their Google Juice. When they start applying this practice to the very entry where I called their ethics and morals into question, there’s no hope.

Of course it’s still spam. In fact, it’s actually worse than traditional spam since it’s not as easy to ignore. This means the overall value of the blog conversation is severely hampered.

I suppose we can score one for globalization, but this practice is a significant dark moment for blogging.

Hopefully turning off comments will help them lose interest in this site and I can turn comments back on soon. Here’s hoping….

Clue Unit Podcast: Transparency and Communities

Hot on the heels of the Digg.com craziness this week, we launch a new Clue Unit podcast. This episode is the first in a new format we’re trying out. Basically, we’re creating a monthly theme, and will do 2 traditional episodes loosely based on that theme. Additionally, we’ll do an interview episode each month, and then one "palette-clearing" rapid fire episode that may or may not be related to the monthly theme.  Should be a good time, and we welcome your feedback!

Our first theme will be: Transparency.

(click here to listen – MP3)

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Clue Unit Podcast: 3 new episodes!

We’ve released several new episodes of The Clue Unit. Subscribe to the feed here.

Regularly scheduled episode: Clue Unit #12: A Grab Bag of Topics – April 30, 2007

(click here to listen – MP3)

I also had a chance to interview two groups of LEGO fans I worked with on some co-creation projects. They had some great things to say about the process.

Clue Unit: Bonus Episode: LEGO Co-Creation – Mindstorms NXT

(click here to listen – MP3)

Clue Unit: Bonus Episode, LEGO Co-Creation – Ultimate Train Builder

(click here to listen – MP3)

Clue Unit: Co-creation and Contest

The latest Clue Unit podcast has been posted, this time we focus on co-creation.

(click here to listen – MP3)

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Since we were talking about co-creation, we’d be remiss if we didn’t call out one of our favorite examples of co-creation: JPG Magazine. In the spirit of wonderfulness that JPG is bathed in, they have offered up several subscriptions to the print magazine for us to give away.

If you’re interested, the rules of this contest are simple:

1. Surf over to www.jpgmag.com and dig around.
2. Find your favorite photo related to creation.
3. In the comments section of the Clue Unit blog entry (not on this site), post a link to this photo and a reason why you think that photo describes creation.

In about a week, we’ll randomly select 2 random qualified entries. Winners will be reading/drooling over JPG with the very next issue!

If you’re interested in increasing your odds, you can submit more than one entry (only one per day, please).

What are you waiting for? Start your search!

Pitching Bloggers

Ben started a great conversation about how to pitch (or not to pitch) bloggers.

Once again, the right thing comes back to building relationships – doing the hard work of actually having a conversation. Who’d have thought?? Actually talking to people before pitching your wares blindly? It’s so crazy it just might work!

Some additional discussion here, here, and here.

Clue Unit iPod Giveaway

As a thank you to you, dear listener, we’re giving away a brand spanking new 4gb iPod Nano (red), courtesy of our friends at eModeration. 

All you have to do to win this tasty iPod is to answer a few questions. In the age of google, the questions should be easy to answer.

Better hurry, first one to find and post all three correct answers on the clueunit.com site wins!

The Clue Unit Podcast Updates

I’ve been remiss in sharing the posting of new Clue Unit podcast episode updates. To help you out, here’s a link to the the last three episodes:

Clue Unit #10
Kathy Sierra and Cyberbullying Followup and "How To Hire A Community Manager" – April 9, 2007

Clue Unit #9
Kathy Sierra and Cyberbullying – March 30, 2007

Clue Unit #8
Starting Small, Customer Service, Social Work – March 23, 2007

RSS Feed

The audio quality has improved significantly and the vibe between Lee, Chris, and me is getting more and more relaxed. We’re creating something I’m proud of, and I’d love to get your feeeback!

Blogging the Presidential '08

My buddy Dave is putting on a fun event on Monday. Check it out if you’re into politics, or blogging.