2015 - Page 6 of 10 - Sam Harrelson

The ‘Real’ Colonel Sanders and Bad Branding

“Other than not quite looking like him, his voice being different, and his inability to cook the world’s best chicken, we thought Norm was the perfect choice to play the Real Colonel,” said KFC US CMO Kevin Hochman in a statement. “I think the fans will agree.”

Source: Norm Macdonald Is the ‘Real’ Colonel Sanders in Latest Ads from W&K

I generally appreciate advertising campaigns that give a nod to the past but push a brand forward in a creative way… I don’t think Wieden & Kennedy Portland have done either here.

Uncle Bill’s Sliver Gripper Tweezers

Amazon.com: 2 Pack Uncle Bill’s Sliver Gripper Keychain Tweezers

Random Saturday testimonial that I had to share… I spent a good deal of time today working on our back yard (field?) to clear out some brush and undergrowth before things get too crazy with the arrival of Baby H in November. As a result, I got a number of splinters and thorns despite wearing gloves.

Luckily, I had a pair of these tweezers that I recently purchased in my beloved pack / man purse / tactical survival bag and got to put the little device to use in a big way. Some splinters were just under the skin but quite a few were embedded deeper. These tweezers really did surprise me in how well they worked.

If you do any type of work or maintenance that could result in wood or metal or plastic etc splinters, I highly recommend these over other options (including my old method of gouging out a splinter with a sharp knife… which never works well).

How Content Marketers and Sites Make Money as Agencies

One of the more interesting line items in the financial statements is “cost of revenue,” which “consists primarily of amounts due to third party websites and platforms to fulfill customers’ advertising campaigns.” (An unspecified percentage of “cost of revenue” refers to the cost of maintaining BuzzFeed’s own servers.) In other words, “cost of revenue” appears to refer primarily to the money BuzzFeed is using to buy traffic from Facebook (and likely other websites too) on behalf of brands advertising on BuzzFeed.

Source: Internal Documents Show BuzzFeed’s Skyrocketing Investment in Editorial

BuzzFeed is an interesting beast because it sits at the fulcrum point between “old news” and “new media news.” BuzzFeed does have quality reporting and long form pieces, but unlike the New York Times those pieces often sit beside the latest funny cat gifs or a hilarious video of a kid after a dentist visit.

How BuzzFeed makes money has been a question that “old news” sites like the NY Times have been trying to figure out with paywalls, subscriptions, email captures etc. None of that seems to be helping slow BuzzFeed down or improve the doom of the more traditional news site economy given the large number of people who get most of their news (quality or otherwise) from Facebook.

Those of us who like to follow these things point back to info like this from 2013 when BuzzFeed was beginning to make serious money and turn heads:

BuzzFeed, for example, has an entire in-house team dedicated to buying ads that drive users to its sponsored posts. Through a program it calls “Social Discovery,” the company buys traffic from a range of sources including Facebook, Twitter, and StumbleUpon, as well as other content-marketing services. It pays to have links to its sponsors’ posts show up in Facebook users’ news feeds and to force them in front of users on StumbleUpon, for example… Peretti said the company is not buying traffic to boost its numbers or meet advertiser commitments. Its brand partners are actually beginning to use its media-buying team as an agency of sorts, asking it to package posts on BuzzFeed with a paid distribution element, too. It doesn’t pay for the ads itself to boost the number of views the content it sells to advertisers gets.

Source: How BuzzFeed Gives Native Ads a Traffic Boost – Digiday

So there you go. If you’re a news site, become an agency with an in-house team to do arbitrage and market your native ads via viewers from Facebook and Twitter (as they are more than happy to take your money). Television and radio has been doing this for decades.

All this has happened before, and will happen again.

Google’s Affiliate Program for Play Store

Google is working on launching an affiliate program for Google Play similar to the one Apple runs for its own digital content stores, a source briefed on the matter has told 9to5Google. The affiliate program, which is said to still be in its early stages of development and could get called off or change significantly between now and its time of launch, is said to be powered by Performance Horizon Group, the same company which in 2013 began supporting Apple’s affiliate program.

Source: Exclusive: Google planning an affiliate program for Google Play, starting with Movies & Music | 9to5Google

Apple’s affiliate program for iTunes content has had some success for larger publishers I’ve talked to (who deal in media and music categories). However, they weren’t blown away by the results. I wonder how much Apple is seeing from the program?

It will be interesting to see if Google can make a significant push by leveraging the affiliate space. There’s so much competition now with Apple, Amazon, Spotify etc that partnerships via an affiliate program might be the way to go to increase market share.

Google has been doing lots of hiring for their physical products category on the Play Store, so maybe this is in conjunction with that effort as well.

You Need the .com of Your Name

If you have a US startup called X and you don’t have x.com, you should probably change your name.

The reason is not just that people can’t find you. For companies with mobile apps, especially, having the right domain name is not as critical as it used to be for getting users. The problem with not having the .com of your name is that it signals weakness. Unless you’re so big that your reputation precedes you, a marginal domain suggests you’re a marginal company.

Source: Paul Graham – Change Your Name

I have so many conversations with clients or potential clients about the need for a good domain name. For a number of reasons, that’s an easier conversation with startups than it is with, say, churches or nonprofits that have existed as an organization for decades.

Regardless of the case, there’s always a way to secure a .com that at least contains your name. Don’t fall for the .churches or .faith or .nonprofit or .startup or .marketing TLD domains that are now being offered. Secure the .com. If you’re a school, nonprofit, church etc, then secure the .org as well.

As an aside, I also have the .com’s of all our family and children (and child-to-be coming this November but is still in stealth mode). You should have that as well. We’ll eventually swing back from a web controlled by social silos to one spread around to sites based on our own identities (again).

Will Google Buy Twitter?

“Obviously, Google could continue to just pay Twitter for access to its firehose, as other services do. But now that its in-house social network has proven to be mostly useless as a social connector between its various services, it needs some other way to plug social into those services and get access to unlimited real-time data, and Twitter is arguably the best method available.”

Source: Google’s failure with Google+ makes it more likely it will buy Twitter – Fortune

I love Twitter (much more than Facebook). I know using a term such as “love” for what amounts to a social network is hyperbolic, but it’s close to being true. In 2006, I latched on to the service as my social network of choice because I was fascinated by it’s ability to deliver news, info, content, and “streams” in near real time. Plus, Twitter was very open with its API meaning that a whole ecosystem of 3rd party apps and services developed. Twitter, in effect, became a coral reef as Dave Winer described here back in 2007.

I had breakfast with a colleague at a tech conference in 2007, and the topic of Twitter came up as we were both checking our phones (pre iPhone) and comparing how we were accessing the service. We discussed our hopes for the service and the web, and decided that Twitter (or something very much like it) would inevitably become a new protocol similar to IMAP or POP (that we use for email still) and deliver us streams of information based on who we followed or “tracked” (track was a key feature of Twitter early on until the dark times) in whatever app we chose. Twitter was going to be this generation’s love letter to the open web and protocols and standards. We were wrong.

The web continued to evolve and social networks became prime motivators in Twitter’s unfortunate path towards becoming a silo after 2008. The last seven years have seen Twitter grasp for its identity as a cast of rotating leadership ping-ponged it from an open web alert service to a celebrity hashtag outlet to a news delivery system to an advertising network. Twitter never had a chance. That’s not because of a zero sum game with Facebook. The two could exist perfectly well and both have billions of users. They are very different services and have entirely different purposes and possible futures (much like Apple and Google or Microsoft and IBM).

Will Google buy Twitter?

I have a feeling they will. Google understands its best bet for the future is a web that exists with fewer silos and more users. That doesn’t mean simple data mining of social networks, but it also means more users on the web for the advertising of the future (which will not be based on clicks or tracked by cookies but function on very personal levels based on the uniqueness of human experience… see Google Now).

Michigan Bookstore Offers Refunds For “Go Set a Watchman”

“Brilliant Books compared Lee’s new book to James Joyce’s Stephen Hero, a book that was never pitched as a mainstream novel.

“Hero was initially rejected, and Joyce reworked it into the classic Portrait,” the store explained in its statement. “Hero was eventually released as an academic piece for scholars and fans—not as a new ‘Joyce novel.’ We would have been delighted to see Go Set A Watchman receive a similar fate.'”

Source: Michigan Bookstore Offers Refunds For “Go Set a Watchman”

Wait… large publishing houses have no sense of decency anymore? I’m shocked!

Is Apple Supporting Terrorism?

“Wittes and Bedell argue that Apple’s decision to “move aggressively to implement end-to-end encrypted systems, and indeed to boast about them” after being “publicly and repeatedly warned by law enforcement at the very highest levels that ISIS is recruiting Americans” — in part through the use of encrypted messaging apps — could make the company liable if “an ISIS recruit uses exactly this pattern to kill some Americans.”

Source: Obama Administration War Against Apple and Google Just Got Uglier

The wars of the future will be fought between increasingly archaic nation states and corporate states just as the Glorious Revolution and the French Revolution (and in part the American Revolution) signaled the decline of monarchies in Europe.

Why You Should Fear the Future and Think about Your Business Now

“This is for the same reason we just discussed—the Law of Accelerating Returns. The average rate of advancement between 1985 and 2015 was higher than the rate between 1955 and 1985—because the former was a more advanced world—so much more change happened in the most recent 30 years than in the prior 30.

So—advances are getting bigger and bigger and happening more and more quickly. This suggests some pretty intense things about our future, right?

Kurzweil suggests that the progress of the entire 20th century would have been achieved in only 20 years at the rate of advancement in the year 2000—in other words, by 2000, the rate of progress was five times faster than the average rate of progress during the 20th century. He believes another 20th century’s worth of progress happened between 2000 and 2014 and that another 20th century’s worth of progress will happen by 2021, in only seven years. A couple decades later, he believes a 20th century’s worth of progress will happen multiple times in the same year, and even later, in less than one month. All in all, because of the Law of Accelerating Returns, Kurzweil believes that the 21st century will achieve 1,000 times the progress of the 20th century.”

Source: The AI Revolution: Road to Superintelligence – Wait But Why

“Things are changing so quickly these days compared to when I grew up.” – Every person older than 30 that I know

That sentiment is true.

“Change” (in this case technological advancement) happens on exponential curves. We, as humans, are geared to view change linearly or on a straight course based on our previous experiences. We love to share anecdotes about the past and think about the future in terms of small incremental bits. After all, I was born in 1978 and things aren’t all that different now than they were then? Yes, they are.

Business wise, it’s time to think about how you or your company or your church or your nonprofit is going to position itself now for the increasing climb of the Law of Accelerating Returns. 2040 will look dramatically different than 2020 in terms of human advancement.

This will impact everything from how we consume and produce products (already happening) to how we drive (already happening) to how we use, spend, and save currency (already happening) to how we worship or view faith (happening at a shocking pace now) to how we do business (if you think “the internet” is important for business, just wait) to how we monitor and adjust and improve our own biological, mental, and emotional health. Not to mention external variables that will affect our future such as climate change, growth in human population, war, strife, and the coming economic calamity because of the gap between rich and poor.

If we don’t nuke ourselves or die from spoiling our resources, the next 100 years will see an incredible change in what it means to be(ing) human.

So, if you think 2015 is weird and annoying with mobile phones, email, and Facebook and you cannot wait until we all just go back to paper and “how things used to be”… just wait for 2025. You should fear the future.

However, this will be an amazing and monumental time for our species. I’m hopeful that technological advancement will bring human progress in a number of areas.

Either way, prepare your business now by thinking about what’s coming.

Polynomial Codes Over Certain Finite Fields, or Why Things You Don’t Think Matter Actually Matter

“Whatever new technologies are on the horizon, history has taught us that Reed-Solomon-based coding will probably still be there, behind the scenes, safeguarding our data against errors. Like the genes within an organism, the codes have been passed down to subsequent generations, slightly adjusted and optimized for their new environment. They have a proven track record that starts on Earth and extends ever further into the Milky Way. “There cannot be a code that can correct more errors than Reed-Solomon codes…It’s mathematical proof,” Bossert says. “It’s beautiful.”

Source: The Math That Connects Pluto to DNA — NOVA Next | PBS

From storing information via DNA to communicating with spacecraft near Pluto to enabling your cell phone and beyond…

Don’t let people tell you that your work doesn’t matter. Small minds are the enemy of progress.

The Death (and Salvation?) of Religious Studies: A Conversation with Carrie Schroeder

Source: Thinking Religion: The Death (and Salvation?) of Religious Studies: A Conversation with Carrie Schroeder | Thinking.FM

Thomas and I have a new Thinking Religion podcast episode featuring Prof. Carrie Shroeder where we discuss all sorts of things… Stargate to Digital Humanities to why you should blog on your own site (academic or church or individual). Fun listen (I think).

Enjoy…

Oh, Microsoft

First thing you see when you begin the upgrade to Windows 10… binding arbitration clause. Thanks, lawyers.

Litmus Test

If you get upset when people mispronounce Suetonius, you should listen to Thinking Religion with Thomas Whitley and me.

We love you and we feel your pain.

Civilians Using Handguns in Self Defense

The NRA likes the idea of training so much that it’s floated the idea of mandatory firearms training for school children. On the other hand, it’s opposed laws requiring mandatory training for gun purchases. Many states allow concealed carry without any training or permit for people as young as 16. Most states don’t require gun owners or purchasers to even be licensed, much less trained. And a handful, like Arizona, have passed laws prohibiting localities from imposing their own training requirements.

Source: Watch what happens when regular people try to use handguns in self-defense – Washington Post

I grew up around guns in our home and the homes of my friends (and the occasional gun rack on the back glass of pickups), and hunting culture. I understand the sentiment that guns are tools and can be used for evil just like any other tool. What I don’t understand is the resistance from some groups to legislate mandatory licensing and training (similar to what we do with automobiles).

If you’re really of the “government wants to take away our guns” so we need to hold up the 2nd amendment as our way to preserve freedom persuasion, I’d argue that a citizenry that is licensed and trained to handle firearms is a much bigger threat to “the government” than the current situation.

Wilco’s Star Wars and My Personal Helicon

Only Wilco could make something this eruptive feel so comfy, like a steel-wool security blanket.

Source: Wilco’s New Album: Star Wars | Rolling Stone

I’ve been enjoying the heck out of this album over the past week. I was skeptical at first … it being a “free” and “surprise” album with a cutesy yet askew title that Wilco just dropped on us all last week.

After listening to it in the office throughout the week then on replay during a 5 hour drive (the album is just over 30 mins, which is something of a miracle in itself for a Wilco production), I’m a believer.

To make it completely personal and anecdotal, Tweedy’s lyrics and the band’s music reminds me that even though I’m heading into my 37th year of being here and continue to find my own way in business while working with my clients, there are still opportunities to explore the cracks in the sidewalk and allow myself to be creative. I’ve smoothed over those moments of opportunity. I’ve wasted my words and openings for personal and work actualization. This album has helped me realize that.

It’s not enough to coast. Sky Blue Sky, Wilco (The Album) and The Whole Love were fine albums in their own rights. But they didn’t cause the type of “woah, wait a minute … think about how these lyrics and this music can get you to explore your own space, Sam” moments that made me start listening to Wilco in the first place.

The first time I heard Misunderstood from Being There, I was in college and trying to figure out what I was going to do with my life. So, I got a religion major. It made sense at the time. That song was a part of that decision that seemed so flippant yet daring looking back on my younger self. “I would never do that today,” I think to myself as I take my multivitamin supplements and do my morning stretches while looking at my agenda.

Shortly after I took my first office job, my friend Jon said I needed to listen to something and slipped me a CD (it was the style of the times). While sitting in my fluorescent cubicle, I plugged in my headphones and the first cacophonous notes of I Am Trying to Break Your Heart from Yankee Hotel Foxtrot entered my consciousness. I started blogging. My career took me on a path I could have never imagined. That song could be a metaphor for my 20’s (at least in my own head) both in terms of work, exploring my creativity, and relationships. It still gives me chills. It, like Misunderstood, was a strange reflecting pool where I could see myself askew and needed to explore that further before I could look away.

The songs on Star Wars are pushing me to that type of mirror pool reflection. The trick, I think, as I turn 37 is to realize that there will be other songs to push and pull me later, but I need to enjoy these for now and see where they go. Creativity in work, and life, is a blessing and a curse as it seems to come as quickly as it goes. You’re thinking up the color of the tech world at 27 and then you realize you’re 35 and still using the same palette.

It’s time to push the obtuse in my work, and find the angles that I smoothed over.

Then, I have to walk on and find the next mirror pond of songs before settling in as I did before:

Others had echoes, gave back your own call
With a clean new music in it. And one
Was scaresome, for there, out of ferns and tall
Foxgloves, a rat slapped across my reflection.

Now, to pry into roots, to finger slime,
To stare, big-eyed Narcissus, into some spring
Is beneath all adult dignity. I rhyme
To see myself, to set the darkness echoing.

‘Go Set a First Draft’

“In one of her last interviews, conducted in 1964, Lee said: “I think the thing that I most deplore about American writing … is a lack of craftsmanship. It comes right down to this — the lack of absolute love for language, the lack of sitting down and working a good idea into a gem of an idea.”

A publisher that cared about Harper Lee’s legacy would have taken those words to heart, and declined to publish “Go Set a Watchman,” the good idea that Lee eventually transformed into a gem.That HarperCollins decided instead to manufacture a phony literary event isn’t surprising. It’s just sad.”

Source: The Harper Lee ‘Go Set a Watchman’ Fraud – NY Times

“What is Left is Pretty Much McDonalds”

“What is left is pretty much McDonald’s — the restaurant of the masses, the great democratizer, the substitute for the community square, where it is possible to read or nurse a cheap cup of coffee for hours, or to nap after taking a daily methadone dose.”

Source: A Manhattan McDonald’s With Many Off-the-Menu Sales – The New York Times

Confessions of a Congress Member

Discouragement is for wimps. We aren’t going to change the Constitution, so we need to make the system we have work. We are still, despite our shortcomings, the most successful experiment in self-government in history. Our greatest strength is our ability to bounce back from mistakes like we are making today. Get over your nostalgia: Congress has never been more than a sausage factory. The point here isn’t to make us something we’re not. The point is to get us to make sausage again. But for that to happen, the people have to rise up and demand better.

Source: Confessions of a congressman: 9 secrets from the inside – Vox

Anonymous member of Congress with some interesting insight into the workings of our government in 2015.

The title refers to a “congressman,” so I assumed this is a male. However the writer never uses that term but frequently uses “member of Congress” or “Congress member.”