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- The Two Kinds Of Web PopularityToday
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Everyone wants to be popular. Popular businesses make money. Popular people have lots of friends. Popular artists get their music heard by large audiences.
No one wants to be invisible. Invisible businesses fail. Invisible people are depressed. Artists that publicly state they would like to remain obscure secretly want to be popular more than the popular artists do.
There are two types of popularity the web enables:
1) Insta-fame (or viral fame)
Insta-fame is something relatively new in our society. Thanks to news media, for a while there was the idea of ‘15 minutes of fame’ - a concept the web has killed . The new form of insta-fame is to become internet famous. And once you’re internet famous, you’re forever a part of web culture. Even after your big ‘hit’ you’ll still never shake the references in social media, YouTube remixes, or Google. It could prove difficult, if not impossible to get away from what the web comes to know you as due to insta-fame.
A few examples of insta-fame include:
- 5 Reasons You Should Learn About Social MediaYesterday
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Ken Kadet recently tagged me in a post he wrote on 5 things about social media he’d like to see change asking me to share some thoughts along those lines. Since Ken covered that topic pretty well (I agree with what he wrote), but I’d still like to continue the meme of 5, I’ll instead write on 5 reasons you should learn about social media.
1. You will learn how to get significant social traffic and interest to your web property.
Social media traffic is the true sign that you have developed a remarkable web property. It is essentially proof that you created something amazing, since people liked enough to share it with their personal contacts, or with an entire community of users. Learning the content archetypes to achieve social traffic starts by actually participating on social sites relevant to your niche. If your team is creative, you may be getting social traffic already as a natural byproduct of your efforts, but it is still worth learning and participating as there is an infinite source of inspiration out
- How To Overcome Writer’s Block - 15 TipsDecember 3
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As someone who spends a majority of my professional and leisure time writing (strategic communications by day, blogging by night and music on the weekends) I have battled the elusive writer’s block on more than one occasion.
Now more often than not, I am quite productive - In my free time during the last year, I’ve written 179 posts here, more than 15 new songs, and created a countless amount of content for clients during the work week.
But there are times when all creatives, even the productive types, find themselves stuck.
I thought today I’d share a few tips/tricks I use to overcome writer’s block, as I know many of you reading this are also writers:
1) Get your blood moving
As I wrote previously: finding balance is vital for workers in the information economy. That post focused on the importance of exercise and balancing the sedentary nature of working in the information economy with an active lifest
- The Shift Of Trusted, Influential Media: From Brands To PeopleDecember 1
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There was a time not too long ago when a limited few had power of distribution. And with that power and zero competition, the media moguls built monolithic and faceless brands behind them. Sure, there were talented writers behind the publications, but the writers themselves were not directly intertwined with the brand beyond the extent that they merely supplied content.
Think of your local newspaper or even a traditional national media organization - I highly doubt there is one single writer or editor that immediately comes to mind and stands out as the person behind that brand of media.
All of that has changed.
Web influencers
Think of your favorite online publication, blog, etc., and I bet immediately one person comes to mind. TechCrunch isn’t TechCrunch without Michael Arrington. Erick Schonfeld and the other writers there are incredibly talented and all easily could build their own web brand they are the engine behind, however TC is forever tied to Arrington - if he left it would not be the same publication.
That’s not to say TC couldn’t succeed without Arrington, but think a
- Are You Organized For Failure?November 26
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Clay Shirky’s book, Here Comes Everybody - The Power Of Organizing Without Organizations is essential reading for everyone seeking to understand how our world has been redefined by the web. I threw sticky notes in a few pages and wanted to highlight a quote that warrants more discussion. This is from page 246, where the open source movement is being discussed:
In traditional organizations, trying anything is expensive, even if just in staff time to discuss the idea, so someone must make some attempt to filter the successes from the failures in advance. In open systems, the cost of trying something is so low that handicapping the likelihood of success is often an unnecessary distraction. Even in a firm committed to experimentation, considerable work goes into reducing the likelihood of failure. This doesn’t mean that open source communities don’t discuss — on the contrary, they have more discussions than in managed production because no one is in a position to compel work on a particular project. Open systems, by reducing the cost of failure, enable their participants to fail like crazy, building on successes as they go.
This is a game-changer for your business.
Using digital communications tools allows you to try everything out and see what sticks. It allows you to embrace failure at minimal or zero cost
