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What is Tagging?

October 15th, 2005 | Comments | Posted in The Internet

You’ve likely been hearing quite a bit about tagging lately. If you’re not sure what that actually is, here’s a great article that gives a wonderful overview.


Tagging is a non-hierarchal (for hierarchies think of the old Yahoo! directories) means of organizing information or objects on the web. Information is found through associative correlations or inference. In a hierarchy one would go to people, then film, and then actress to find Cate Blanchett. Using tagging one could use actress and moviestar to get a similar result. Prior to computing hierarchies were an efficient means of organizing information. With computing we have more options, which can work just as well.



Much more info in the article.

Online dating – you know ya wanna….

October 15th, 2005 | Comments | Posted in Building Community

Remember when online dating seemed so… pathetic? Not anymore


Online dating has been around for about a decade, and it’s undeniably popular: Some 21 million Americans subscribe to online dating services and 1 in every 100 Internet visitors posts a personal ad.



But that doesn’t mean the dating actually yields a decent date.





But high use doesn’t necessarily mean high satisfaction levels. Anyone who has ever tried Internet dating knows the pitfalls — the difficulty of sifting through hundreds of often generic-sounding profiles, the misleading or outright dishonest ads, the failure to find any connection once you meet the person you’ve been happily e-mailing for weeks.



But there’s hope – in the form of Chemistry.com, at least so goes the theory.

So, how does Chemistry.com come up with matches?

Chemistry.com is quite different than anything else that’s out there (in the online-dating world). I designed a lot of these questions to determine your brain chemistry. If you have high levels of serotonin, for example, you are likely to be calm and stable. More of a guardian, a pillar of society.

There are other personality types as well that are based on chemistry. There are questions that tell us if you are good at abstract thinking, or quick to make decisions and act on them.

Personally, I believe that the next killer app of online social interaction is a large scale profiling mechanism for all of us to be able to feel confident that who we’re talking to is really who they say they are.


Friday funny

October 14th, 2005 | Comments | Posted in Fun Finds

Q: How many Internetters does it take to change a light bulb?



 A: 435,235



1 – to change the bulb



4 – to tell him he should have done it differently



365 – to point out spelling/grammar errors in first 5 posts



1,834 – to flame the spell checkers



4,598 – to correct spelling in spelling flames



6,785 – to say please move to alt.spelling.lite.bulb



15,467 – to say stop cross posting to soc.paranoia and alt.white.house.scandal,alt.adoption, and s.a.a.(m)



23,456 – to endlessly debate which method is superior



236,789 – to concatenate all articles to date, then quote them, only to say, "Me Too"



106,345 – to quote the "Me Toos" to say, "Me Three"



1 – to propose new alt.change.lite.bulb newsgroup



89,345 – to say this is just what alt.physic.cold_fusion was meant for, leave it here



10,584 – votes for alt.lite.bulb

Community Speech

Last week, I was in Albany, NY speaking to a group of marketing people about why they need to start thinking differently – namly how to think as community members, and not marketers. The group was about 150 strong, and I nailed the speech. You know those times where you just know you nailed it? You don’t need any feedback, you just can tell from the crowd (at least those up front) that you’re getting through? You’re having a “on” day, you’re hitting your points, making your slide transitions, the whole nine yards. That was me.

The downside, however, was that with about 5 mins left to go in my hour long speech, they fixed the sound and viola! people could hear me in the back. Apparently, the sound system in the room wasn’t working very well, and despite speaking in a very loud voice with the bad mic, I wasn’t being heard in the back of the room. So here I was nailing my speech and most of the room was struggling to pay attention. Damn.

I’m going to polish up my notes from last week’s presentation (and yes, by polish I mean make comprehendable by someone other than me) and post them here. Someone might be interested in seeing what I’ve been talking about, and it was a great overview of our approach to working with community and internal colleagues.

A quick recap of the top 10 list that the speech was based on – the speech was titled “Everybody goes home happy”:

  • Everybody goes home happy - I’ve explained this one a million times, so hopefully everyone is pretty clear. The basic idea is that both fans and TLG need to get something beneficial and satisfiying. If either side doesn’t, something’s wrong with the relationship.
  • Open and honest relationship - In order to ensure that there is a healthy relationship between fans and company, that relationship needs to be based on openness and honesty. Both groups need to feel like they can have honest discussions about anything that’s on their minds.
  • It’s not about selling - Sure, I work for a company that’s in business, and is here to sell product. Sure, all of my efforts, at some point, relate to selling… that’s the nature of working for a company, and that goes for any employee of any company. But my daily tasks aren’t about selling products to fans, or trying to get fans to sell products for me. My focus is on making sure that there is a solid, healthy, happy relationship built up between fans and employees. The rest turns into sales down the road, nearly by default.
  • Be an advocate - As the community liaison, it’s important for me to be an advocate for the fans inside the company, to carry their voice and their concerns to all corners of the company. And of course, it’s part of the task to carry the voice of the employees into the community. But more than simply being a messenger, community liaison types have to be an advocate – willing to be beat up on a regular basis because they see a grander mission of ensuring communication is happy and healthy.
  • Create a team – When working with a community, it’s important to create a “team”, of sorts. To find the key leaders in the community, the key groups, the key Web sites, and really get to know them. Build a “quasi-team”, so that the relationship has a foundation to grow on.
  • If you wouldn’t do it, don’t ask – Seems kinda obvious, but you’d be surprised how many marketing folks say to the idea of working community the first time they really get it “Cool! We can push that project I don’t like off on them”. As the advocate, it’s my role to ever so gently (or not so much when it calls for it) to remind them that … if you wouldn’t do it yourself, don’t ask someone else to do it for you.
  • Secrets and Paranoia – This is a biggie… and tough. Anyone in the business world has been taught that sharing is bad, and any company information is secret. It’s important (again, as the advocate) to push people to answer the question “Is it properitary or uncomfortable?” There’s a huge void between those two. Information is what drives a solid relationship, and secrets is what destroys them. Anyone who’s dated can attest to this!
  • Control through participation (not Control through directive) – The idea of control is fairly laughable in the first place, but in the past, companies have had this idea that they can control consumers through any number of means. These days, that idea is nearly laughable, yet too many companies tend to try to give directives to consumers about what they can and can’t do. Since we all know that that doesn’t work, the idea of control (or really guidance) should come from standing side-by-side with consumers/fans and explaining and sharing why things are important or significant.
  • Formalize at the last stage – Marketers love their formalized programs, campaigns, and projects. Communities don’t. They just like people to show up. I’ve been doing community work for 5 years now, and we’ve only this year implemented our formal programs – the LEGO Ambassadors and LEGO Certified Professionals. Push back the formalization until it’s really needed.
  • Spending money is for fools – If you ever want to wake up a group of marketing people, just say these words outloud. Just be sure you have ambulances on hand, because at least 10% of the room will have heart attacks! Marketers are pre-programmed to spend money in order to achieve results. I keep my group’s budget purposely low (we barely cover our travel costs each year), and focus on talking to the fans about what they really want. Most of the time, it has very little to do with money. Nine times out of ten it has to do with getting free product, respect, interaction, and inclusion. (OK so product costs money, but very little, relatively speaking)

Anyway, more to follow as I get time to actually polish (i.e translate) my notes into something readable. I may even expand each of the 10 points above into separate blog entries. Hell, I wish that I would have recorded the speech in order to turn it into a podcast. Damn, I need to start thinking about that.

Feel free to challenge the ideas above or ask for clarification. I’m always up for a good community-themed discussion.

Corporate Blogging Examples

October 11th, 2005 | Comments | Posted in Blogging/Podcasting

I’m doing some spring…er… fall cleaning, and noticed I’d been collecting links to corporate blogs but never posted them. Here you go!

Monster.com (recruiting) – http://monster.typepad.com/monsterblog/



Stonyfield Farms – http://www.stonyfield.com/weblog/



GM – http://fastlane.gmblogs.com/



Ford – http://blog.ford.com/BLOG.CFM



Xbox (unofficial, but from one of the team members) – http://www.majornelson.com/blog/blog.html



My LEGO Corporate blog – http://www.bricksonthebrain.com/blog



Maytag Skybox – http://www.ka-thunk.com/



Multiple examples (some without links because they’re internal)

http://www.marketingprofs.com/4/ochman5.asp

Forrester – http://forrester.typepad.com/charleneli/2004/11/blogging_policy.html

Cool new tools

October 10th, 2005 | Comments | Posted in The Internet

Been surfing around a bit this weekend and found some cool new tools. Each is worth a look:


Sun’s posting policy

October 10th, 2005 | Comments | Posted in Tricks of the Trade

One of the Sun employees posted a great article called "Sun Policy on Public Discourse". The article is worth a read, but here’s the key points:

  • Advice
  • It’s a Two-Way Street
  • Don’t Tell Secrets
  • Be Interesting
  • Write What You Know
  • Financial Rules
  • Quality Matters
  • Think About Consequences
  • Disclaimers
  • Tools

Community Documentation

October 6th, 2005 | Comments | Posted in Tricks of the Trade

I came across a very interesting PDF: Online Community Members are Real People Too; Focus on Users


Introduction: In our busy roles as community managers, we often forget that all our efforts are really centred on one thing: allowing and encouraging users to have communal experiences on our sites. We spend a lot of time talking about, and dealing with, problem users. We look at new technologies and try to work with our technical teams to support them. We cut deals with third parties to provide prizes for competitions or links in exchange for advertising placements. It’s all part of the job we’ve chosen, but let’s not forget those who justify our employment: the users.



The Internet was developed initially as a research network, so it’s no surprise that there now thousands of social scientists and social commentators researching Online Communities and Life Online. This presentation is just a taste of that research and will provide examples of how Online Community professionals can use the work of researchers to improve the way they conceptualise, build and administrate online communities.



This presentation will begin to answer the following questions: What is "Online Community"?

What are people doing in online communities?

What user trends can help us plan for the future?

What research resources are available?

Craiglist by Craig

October 5th, 2005 | Comments | Posted in Building Community

It seems obvious, but sometimes obvious is the most important things to ensure you don’t forget.


"Unless we listen to our community very carefully, they?ll find another site that works better for them. We have many public discussion boards on our site including a feedback forum. We really listen to suggestions and complaints on the boards, and we don?t make any big changes on the site without first discussing it with the community. Everyone has a voice on the site, and we listen to them all equally, which seems to be the most democratic approach."



New PodCasting Sites

October 4th, 2005 | Comments | Posted in The Internet

Came across two great new (at least to me) podcasting subject matter sites. Well worth a look if you’re into podcasting, or would like to start.

Podcast Rigs – Getting your equipment setup to start podcasting, from basic to professional

Ultimate Podcasting – A great reference site on podcasting news and info

And speaking of podcasting, Apple finally gets in the game. Version 4.9 of iTunes will include built-in support for functionality like iPodder.