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Random Ramble on Celtics' Line-up

Donna Winter — Sat, 05 Sep 2009 23:01:54 GMT

This pic of Celtic line-up hits a nerve when you consider they added Rasheed Wallace (story 2 will be WTF are the Pistons doing--Billups and now Wallace?). (FYI it's the Boston Celtics' Paul Pierce, Ray Allen-former Sonic, and Kevin Garnett.) These guys, with Garnett off the bench/uninjured, ought to make for some great games and *ugh* really give the Lakers a run for their money. *Did I just type that out loud?*

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The Used

Donna Winter — Mon, 31 Aug 2009 13:34:15 GMT

Twitter listening party. The Used's new album "Artwork" is released today. You can listen to it in its entirety for free today (#musicmonday on Twitter) by following the link below. It's coleslawesome! I have and LOVE all of their albums! Rock on Bozos! ~ D

Check out this website I found at twitter.theused.net

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Facebook Privacy Breach?

Donna Winter — Fri, 21 Aug 2009 20:36:00 GMT

hmmm...I replied to a discussion board thread today on a Facebook Page and received a notification in my fB notifications and an e-mail when someone replied.

The e-mail and notification identified that a person had replied ("Bob Smith" has replied to your comment on...), but when I clicked on the link to view the reply, it showed that it was a reply from a Page administrator. It seems that fB sent me the personal profile information to an actual Page admin, which is contrary to their very own privacy statement:

Facebook states:

Q: Will users be able to see that I am a Page Admin and contact my personal profile?
A: As a Page Admin you will not be visible to your Page's fans. Any communication you have with your fans will be under the name of your Page.

I checked the bug reports: http://www.facebook.com/help.php?page=909 and found 2 similar bugs mentioned (that they obviously do not want to hear any more about):

1. When I comment on a fan's photo, the comment appears to be posted from my personal Facebook account.

>>When a Page admin comments on a fan’s photo, the comment may appear as if it was posted from the admin’s personal Facebook account. No further reports of this issue are needed.

2. When I Like a fan's link, the Like appears to be posted from my personal Facebook account.

>>When a Page admin "Likes" a post on their Page, the post may appear as if "Liked" from the Page admin's personal account. No further reports of this issue are needed.

What pisses me off is that, as a fB Page admin myself, unless the user reported to you as an admin that they'd been sent your personal fB info, you wouldn't know.

I chose to share with the revealed Page admin that their personal information had been given and I gave them a copy of the e-mail from Facebook to me and the notification in my Facebook account both using their name and links back to their personal profile to do with as they choose.

I'm guessing that not everyone is noticing or reporting this to the Page admins, but, I certainly would like to know. Businesses are using Facebook for professional Pages, including paying for advertising. They have a right to know that Facebook has some issues with their Page privacy.

End. Rant.

Rock on Bozos ~ D

Billy Talent Concert, New Album and Widget

Donna Winter — Fri, 10 Jul 2009 19:33:00 GMT

Saw Billy Talent in concert (for the 5th time!), one of my favorite bands, whom I'm happy to see are growing a larger fan-base. They are revivalist punk and may not be for everyone. If you're here reading my blog, you should already be aware of the type of music you may stumble across.

I'm pretty impressed with how their marketing has developed. This new widget is downright badass and I love seeing them pop up on Facebook and Twitter to truly create the mashup. We all know MySpace is a place to go look for bands, but not everyone goes there and is going to stumble upon them.

They have a new album, creatively called Billy Talent III (guess what their first 2 albums as Billy Talent were called?), out now in Europe and coming out this week in the States. If you get hooked and want to hear them at their grittiest you can try to dig up their debut album Watoosh when they played as "Pezz." They also created a brilliant collaboration with Anti-Flag called Turn Your Back.

There may be more to this story later, but, being the Internet marketing technobozo and music junkie I am, I HAD to put a shout out!

Rock On Bozos ~ D

Laurie McClave Gallery Showing

Donna Winter — Wed, 03 Jun 2009 02:36:13 GMT

Artisans on Taylor, the most happening gallery in Port Townsend, will host an opening for Laurie McClave featuring new works in oils and digital art. There will be live music by the the Ollec Quartet and Megan Trenary of Luxi Leather will be working on beautiful creations live.

Laurie McClave will be showing her work at Artisans on Taylor, 236 Taylor Street, Port Townsend, WA. Google Map

The show opens on June 6, 2009. There will be a reception with the artist from 5:30pm-8:30pm.

Nothing Spiteful by Laurie McClave

Laurie Mcclave on Facebook

Hope to see you there, Bozos! ~ Donna

Pandora One

Donna Winter — Thu, 28 May 2009 04:23:19 GMT

I love Pandora. A friend of mine heard about it in 2004 while on a flight and called me on Skype because he “was certain this new Pandora-music-thing had my name written all over it.” I’ve always been a sucker for discovering new music and the concept sounded too good to be true.

Mind you, this was back in the day when Skype was new (online users often in triple digits) and Pandora would play about 5 songs on your newly created station before running out of compatible songs. “Searching…having difficulty…you might want to try another station…” Ah, the good old days. But, I stuck it out, and look what we’ve got, no, what we’ve been given, now? Pandora has always been available for free to anyone with an Internet connection.

Pandora has offered subscriptions, which removed the ads. Pandora One removes the ads for your $36-a-year AND you get 192kbps streaming, a few cool skins for the web-based player, longer uninterrupted play time if inactive (5 hours) and a desktop app option.

As you can imagine, I’m on the computer and Internet all day: readers, feeders, e-mail, adding content to websites, writing blogs, editing, Twitter, Facebook, Google docs, hosted CRM and project management tools…and that's all before my second cup of coffee.

The desktop app was my first target. I have accidentally exited Pandora too many times to count when I close my browser, even when I’ve had the mini-player open I mistake it for yet another open browser and just click it off. I may be tech-savvy but that doesn't make me occasionally absentminded.

I love it! It’s Adobe Air so it looks cool (below--I've got a black desktop; the app is translucent). No alternate skins available that I see, but surely those will come. The best part: I’ve not closed it once on accident today!

Being the true Pandora user (I’m all thumbs) I can’t leave the damn thing alone for 5 hours to test the interruption time, but, it’s been streaming on high quality since I purchased the subscription at about 10am with no downtime. No computer freakisms. All equals one very happy gal!

With the RIAA issues and Pandora sticking it out with no income for nearly 10 years, I’m more than happy to toss in my $36 a year (that’s $3 a month!) to hear my personally tailored music genome all day.

I’d also like to thank Pandora for hanging in there. I hope it was worth it; this listener thinks so!

<cheers>

Rock on, Bozos! ~ Donna

Comedic Marketing

Donna Winter — Sun, 24 May 2009 19:23:00 GMT

Imagine that, the Internet gives me a perfect example of what I was discussing in Marketing of the Gods.

No, I didn't finally figure out why I shouldn't be consuming pomegranates but, what does your website have to grab a visitor's interest once they've found it?

There have been some tongue-in-cheek customer reviews of select items on Amazon, which have caused a HUGE increase in the sales. When you see the items (I hope) you'll realize that these reviews could be the only reason they are selling.

The BBC reports a 2,300% increase for a really groovy shirt and The Seattle PI has a great summary of the phenomenon.

I've not yet gotten myself a three-wolf-shirt (I'm waiting until they come out with one showing wolves on the sleeves, too), but I have been contemplating buying myself some great Zubaz pants made from the skin of the wild zebracorn.

I'm so enthralled by the reviews of Alan E. Schmidt aka "Monkey Head" that I'm considering using his reviews to choose Christmas presents for my family this year! Thank you, Monkey Head, and I'm sure my family will thank you, too!!!

Honestly, if they had RSS feeds for some of these viral "product reviewers," I would subscribe.

I digress. The question is, do you spend time reviewing your website and customer base considering what could be added to grab the interest of your target audience and keep them coming back for more? It may not be humor, and we all can't begin selling, um, interesting items hoping for viral customer reviews, but there is a niche for every audience.

Rock on, Bozos! ~ Donna

Read more about Internet marketing

Marketing of the Gods

Donna Winter — Sat, 23 May 2009 12:27:00 GMT

When the checker at the grocery store said, "I wouldn't consume anything containing pomegranates right now," I thought: Damn, is there some sort of pomegranate recall? Are they grown in China and fertilized with lead and melamine? Is the pomegranate-lime flavoring in my seltzer water even derived from real pomegranates?

Then he said, "Not while he's away."

Well, that clarified things.

I hate not being in-the-know so I googled my brain: pomegranates missing man

Hmmm...the search query seemed a bit vague. Luckily, Checkout Dude clarifies things by conspiratorially sharing, "Yeah, Persephone is all alone down there."

pomegranates persephone missing man down there

What do they call Hell in Greek mythology? I'm onto something but my brain is refusing to cooperate.

"I use the Greek baby name websites to generate all my server and gaming usernames and passwords," he says as though he's shared a brilliant epiphany.

I'm baffled because I talk to geeks all day long and I have no idea how the hell this conversation got here. "Oh, my daughters' names are from Greek mythology," is all I have to offer.

"Lord Hades is not down there in the spring and fall so I wouldn't drink the pomegranate stuff."

mmmmmKay..."Maybe it was harvested in the summer or winter," I chime in. I want the seltzer water.

He even rolls his eyes at this point. He thinks I'm going to be attacked by...what? Lord Hades himself? If it's a Greek myth, I'm more likely to be seduced and I consider buying real pomegranates.

I haven't searched the Internet for answers yet because I'm planning to go back to that same store and look for Checkout Dude. I not only want to hear the answer from him, I've been snickering about the experience ever since. What a great marketing tool!

I do Internet marketing rather than brick and mortar marketing, but, aside from the geeky tags and codes, it boils down to the same thing. Once you figure out how to get people to your website, they need to find something unique to keep them coming back.

Maybe your newsletter is amazing and they subscribe, or your jokes in the sidebar or product descriptions are too funny to miss and get shared with friends, or your free shipping has them hooked...or you are given randomly strange tips on which foods to avoid during what season so you don't incur the wrath of some Greek god.

What does your website have to offer?

Rock on, Bozos! ~ Donna

Wild Style City by Earthmine

Donna Winter — Wed, 20 May 2009 23:20:00 GMT

Okay, this could be one of the new "biggest time-wasters!" So much fun, though.

Earthmine has photographed San Francisco and you can take a 3D Flash virtual tour. You're thinking: Well, Google Earth does that. So what? muahahaha! You get to write graffiti while you cruise around!

Check it out: Wild Style City

I can only imagine how this is going to get used.

Rock on, Bozos! ~ D