Thursday, May 29, 2008

Little Geeks

The PR agency I work for does pro bono work for a good cause called Little Geeks. It was set up by Canadian tech journalist Andy Walker: http://www.andywalker.com/.

Little Geeks is a philanthropic organization and registered Canadian charity that collects, refurbishes and re-distributes donated home computers to children in need. These computers are given free of charge, and are coupled with an Internet connection at the child’s home.

On June 12 from 3 p.m.-7 p.m., The Little Geeks Foundation will hold an event and give refurbished computers, complete with Windows 2000 and Microsoft Office, to 100 families of underprivileged children, free of charge. This event, the first of many to come, is one way the Foundation is reaching toward its 2008 goal of 1,000 PCs delivered to the homes of the families that need them.

The event will be held at:
St Andrew’s United Church, 117 Bloor Street East, Toronto, Ontario, M4W 1A9

People with a child in need of a computer, can visit http://www.littlegeeks.org/ to register. Once qualified, recipients will be contacted by a member of the Little Geeks staff to attend this event and pick up their free computer.

Twitter's Business Model

Brian Alvey thinks he has cracked Twitter's business model. Genius!

http://www.brianalvey.com/news/2008/05/25/twitters-business-model/

Friday, May 23, 2008

A Chance To Be On Seth Godin's Next Book Cover

Seems like a cool opportunity.

http://sethgodin.typepad.com/seths_blog/2008/05/a-chance-to-be.html

It Ain't What You Do It's The Way That You Tweet It

I've had some more thoughts on the way Web Who.0 is going since my last post on the subject.

My contact list is growing steadily, and I've found it very useful recently in finding experts in a given field as part of my work. People are very approachable if you treat them as a busy person, with respect, and be succinct in what you need from them. A link? Referral? Advice? Just ask -- the majority will get back to you in a reasonable time frame; sometimes immediately if they're monitoring their own and/or company's name.

I love the interaction of the Internet. Someone mentioned PR being chained to a desk all day. It's not, really. I am looking out the window on the world, but strolling around the Web Who.0 and talking to people, swapping ideas, giving help, soaking up knowledge, picking brains, offering intros to my network for others. It's addictive.

So, if anyone wants to get in touch fast, here's a recap:

Freelance: http://www.johnjamescarson.com/
LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/johncarson
Twitter: http://twitter.com/johncarson
Microsoft Messenger: kibbutzvolunteer@hotmail.com
Good old e-mail: makejohnnycash@gmail.com

John,
Running around inside a server somewhere near you.

Mesh 08: Enterprise = My Customers Shared

Day two of mesh was better than the first for me, as more of the sessions I attended were relevant to my work. The overall theme that came across was that customer satisfaction is paramount, no matter what business you are in, or starting up.

I came up with a formula to summarize that: e=mc2. (Sorry, Einstein.)
That stands for: Enterprise = My Customers Shared.

The point being that everyone in a company is facing the customer now. Not just the people on the end of a call centre line, the marketing department or the sales clerk. We -- whatever business you are in -- all face the customer, and should have the leeway from the Big Corner Office With Windows to interact with them, and make sure they're happy, without checking if it's OK with 10 levels of management, and oh yeah, I'll get back to you about that next Wednesday.

Some great people I met or listened to at mesh day two included Lane Merrifield (Club Penguin co-founder, makes sure every single customer inquiry gets a personal response from a real human being), Ali Asaria (makes sure that a handwritten note goes out with every order) and Garrett Camp (co-founder of StumbleUpon, still follows the same values now as he did as a start-up in Calgary).

Companies to keep an eye on: Enomaly, Overlay.TV and GigPark (co-founder Noah Godfrey was the publisher of Dose back in the day).

All in all, mesh 08 was an excellent event and a great networking opportunity.

Wednesday, May 21, 2008

Mesh 08

Opening day of mesh was great. Sold out. I've never been surrounded by so many people Twittering at once, or checking e-mails -- it was like a BlackBerry convention.

Got to listen to and/or chat with a number of cool people, including Michael Geist, Colin McKay (aka Canuckflack), Rachel Sklar and AmberMac.

Day two tomorrow.

Nice To Win An Award Part 2

My former boss e-mailed me today; my team won the Council for Advancement and Support of Education 2008 Circle of Excellence Bronze Award. Cool!

Tuesday, May 20, 2008

Marcel LeBrun, CEO, Radian6

I attended Third Tuesday Toronto this evening, and over a nice pint of Guinness, listened to some interesting and informative talks on how to monitor social networks.

One of the speakers was Marcel LeBrun, CEO, Radian6, a provider of social media monitoring tools. He said something along the lines of the company replying whenever they see their name mentioned in the blogosphere or social media space.

I thought that was very interesting, hence this post as a virtual invite. Marcel, if you come across this in the next few days, please feel free to add me to LinkedIn. David Alston is in my network too and it would be good to connect.

Tomorrow, I'm spending two days at mesh, should be cool.

Friday, May 16, 2008

Bloggy Award Review

Just found out that Make Johnny Cash got reviewed by a site called Bloggy Award, and got ... drumroll ... 8/10. Not bad, considering I'm not a full-time blogger. (I did get 10/10 for reading enjoyment which is nice.)

Click the image for the review:

Toronto Star Editors Asleep At The Switch

The last line is priceless. They feel the same way I do about clebrity gossip.

http://torontolife.com/blog/spectator/2008/may/15/toronto-star-editors-asleep-switch/

Bob Ross Is Back For A Cause

An example of how a parody can help a cause. Seems like a joke at first; watch till the end for the message.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RKcMfQrqC7I

Sunday, May 11, 2008

Who's Mikey Boots?

"Who's Mikey Boots?"

I always remember that question from a college friend back in 1993. I was telling him about "my kibbutz" experience, and he misheard me, having no idea what a kibbutz was. I pointed him to my site and hopefully educated him.

Those two years I spent in Israel were great, fun, life-changing times for me, so it was nice to be interviewed about them for The Media Line recently.

Here's the article.

Thursday, May 1, 2008

New Month, New Job

My contract was coming to an end at the College, so after an excellent year of working there, I moved on, and today started work at GCI Group as Senior Digital Media Specialist in their Toronto office.

It's an exciting opportunity, and I'm looking forward to it.