davidjewlian

In support of Mr. Mitchum’s efforts.

Love to all the social media realm!

Love you.

DS

…despite my brief stint in public relations.

The beauty of accountability

It’s no surprise with all the databases and doohickies associated with the Internet to say that the digital age brings accountability to the performance of websites, media, and other such digital routes of expression. In business, this is called return on investment, or ROI, an acronym I am so sick of hearing. I guess it’s what matters when you want business results, but jeez, talk about over-use.

Marketers love digital because of all this. They can tell how customers got to where they got, and even who the customers are. When you look at the data, it becomes very 1984. But in a good way, I like to think. If I frequently travel to San Francisco during Christmas, I’d like to have airlines send me offers around that time for discounts and deals. If a little bit of creepiness can save me a few hundred bucks, why not? But that’s what makes Gen Y different from Baby Boomers, or so I hear.

To me, for this site, and for my own personal research into other sites, it’s useful yes, but above all fascinating.

How do you do a nerdy face on GMail?

That sentence will be forever etched in my brain. Why? Because it is the first organic search engine lead that led someone to this exact site (well, actually, to this post). It occurred on March 5, 2009 at 7:20 PM. I could also tell you which web browser and operating system platform the visitor used. See what I mean by a little creepy?

At the time of this person’s visit, my website was the first for that exact search: “How do you do a nerdy face on GMail” and I’m rather proud of that. However, now that it’s many, many days after that person landed on my page, I’m no longer even on the first page.

Knowing that there are actual people searching for things that may end them on these pages is comforting though. It sure beats a lot of the comments I get submitted for approval on these posts, which range from “hentai” to “miley cyrus [inappropriate words go here]” to “titten” and “zkyxkvw.com,” which I don’t think is a real website. So this is why they invented Search Engine Optimization. Do those comments really think I will help drive business to their sites? They should know that most people don’t appreciate the SPAM, and they’d be better off being classy. Like Playboy.

I’ll get off my rather short soapbox now.

The customer is always right

Unfortunately, when whoever it was landed on my page, they did not find the “nerdy face” they came in search of. There’s one reader I’ll probably never get back. Adieu!

However, if they (you) do come back in search of a nerdy face, I do not want to disappoint. So here’s the best I could muster up:

:-B

Because, obviously, all nerd have buck teeth.

DS

…if you thought it was, I bet you were sorely disappointed when you got here and read my crock of shite.

But your first entries have been a-tweet with tech references and topics!

There’s a simple answer to that: it’s my current fascination. Last week I made a choice to start a website for a couple reasons (explained below). Then I decided to see what Twitter was about. Then Dailybooth came along. And now I’m head-over-heels drowning in social media and technology.

That and I got a new MacBook a few months ago and I lurve it

The truth is I get obsessed over things easily. At one point in my life I even had a failed blog about it, called “LesNouveaux.” Don’t bother looking for it, it was short-lived and incredibly underwhelming. That said, there have been past obsessions. I have an immense amount of scarves during my knitting phase. I have an unordinarily large library of Tori Amos songs (and my mother says I breathe heavily when I listen to a particular one). I know a lot about customizing a PC computer to look like a Mac (or anything else). And more than a lot of other things in life, I love strengthening my skills at Trivial Pursuit. That means a lot of aimless Internet research. But the word “research” makes it seem far drier than as I experience it.

And that means this blog will change focus over time.

But don’t you have to have a focus?

To be successful, yes, probably. The best blogs seem to have focus. Take, for instance, Brazen Careerist. AdScam. Engadget. TUAW.

But blogging isn’t about success, is it? There are many millions of blogs out there, but only a few are read with any regularity or with any monetary success. This copyblogger post explains, quite sadly, why you cannot make money blogging.

My blogging is for me. I said before I began this website for a couple reasons. There were two reasons:

1. To gain some digital technology experience. At work, I have been helping re-launch a website for our company. I don’t have a digital background. I went to school for marketing and business and only had passing experience with HTML coding, absolutely none with further forms of programming. When I was thrown into this project, people began asking me about PHP, XML, and all other sorts of abbreviations that made no sense to me. I thought, the best way to gain this experience and not sound like a doofus would be to get some experience and be able to play around with these things not under the watchful gaze of my more experienced colleagues.

2. To work on my written communication skills. Again at work (see a common theme in my life), I recently had a performance evaluation and one of the most striking comments was that I need to work on my written communication skills. Copywriting, memo writing… all of it. I don’t think I’m all that bad, but I know I can use vast improvement.

Those are my reasons for beginning this site. No overarching message, no focused theme. Which makes me think, makes me hope, that maybe blogs don’t need a theme. iJustine doesn’t seem to have one except her and her Macs (love the site, watch obsessively–but not in a creepy way don’t worry). And while the Huffington Post focuses on current events, they’re not just about foreign policy, not just about celebrity, it’s news in general.

The thing that each one of them has, I’ve come to realize, is a kernel.

A kernel…!!

Chris Brogan has a great post at his site here about blogs and kernels and how you don’t need a focus, you just need a kernel, a point of differentiation, a purpose of sorts.

Now, I hate to break it to you, but I haven’t found mine yet. Seeing from the last couple posts, maybe it’s obscenely long posts. But I like to think that this blog is mainly about fascination, with a small dose of just plain daily happenstance. I’m fascinated with social media now, yes. But I’m also fascinated with Parkour, and Muay Thai. With advertising and psychology. And I’m completely enamored with science and celebrity. So perhaps all of those topics will show up here at one point or another. Perhaps you’ll get to read all about what I’m interested in, and I hope some things in which you are interested as well.

For now, I know a few things: I began this blog to write, and that is what I’ll do. I began this blog to learn, and that is what I’ll do. And I hope you enjoy.

DS

My first comment is indeed from my mother.

Everyone, look for a new posting sometime between this evening and tomorrow morning.

DS

…are a lot more underwhelming than I had thought they were going to be.

Public notoriety always tastes sweet like coconuts

Let’s be real: we all start blogs in order to get read. If we didn’t want anybody to read these things, we’d all be authoring Word docs locally stored on our computers. But we don’t. We publish these bad boys for the entire world (or at least the wired world) to read.

So there’s a certain sense of exhilaration when you get comments on your blog post. Which is why I got excited when my Gmail informed me that someone had commented on one of my blog posts. “Wow,” I thought, “My sitemeter tells me I’ve only had less than 100 hits, but somebody thought what I wrote was so compelling that they had to, just had to comment? That’s satisfying.”

So imagine my diappointment when I saw that my first comment was from none other than the username “cialis online,” and their comment was soon followed by two from “levitra online.”

At least SPAM bots find me interesting. That’s a lot more than I can say for some of the former blogs I’ve started.

And hey, at least it wasn’t my mom saying how proud she is that she raised me. I mean, Ma, feel free to comment, but you don’t need to digitally pinch my cheeks. Unless absolutely nobody comments, then feel free to leave a comment about how proud you are.

DS

…all my friends are avatars.

I think Drew Barrymore may have said it best

And what she said was “now you just have to go around checking all these different portals just to get rejected by seven different technologies. It’s exhausting.” Yes, did pay good money to see He’s Just Not That Into You. Now, I’m talking about rejection per se here, but just the fact that, nowadays, you can get information through an unnumbered amount of venues, and they all matter.

No, I am not going to post about “the Octamom“

But that article above about her pings something interesting in the world of these new forms of media. The journalist, while still using primary sources like a good newsman is supposed to, on multiple occassions references how this woman’s reputation has been tarnished and commented on via Twitter, YouTube, and Facebook, and how this opinions lead to the true barometer of public opinion.

It’s no new news that journalism has become pedestrian. That many people get their information via blogs that are rife with op/ed tangents and very little traditionally unbiased news reports. The New York Times is still purchased, its site still frequented, but it no longer has the importance it once did in forming public opinion and informing the public. The difference between now and a few years ago is that the default is now pedestrian. The default is not the Wall Street Journal, the New York Times, or even USA Today. Many people would rather go to The Huffington Post to read news stories, and in a modern development, some people don’t even go that far and receive their desseminated information via Twitter–such was the case in last week’s plane crash in Amsterdam, which broke first on Twitter.

The computer really is personal again

This increased importance of the digital channel, and its increased viability as a trustworthy news source have all contributed to involvement with the digital realm, and thus it becoming more of a personal space.

I remember when I was in junior high, the biggest deal were chatrooms and clip art avatars. Law & Order: SVU was littered with stories of pedophiles taking advantage of children because of the anonymity granted through the digital space. Not that the same anonymity isn’t easily accessible in today’s digital environment, but compared to the genuine and compared to “real” social interaction, that anonymity is becoming a smaller portion of the digital interaction pie.

We put more trust in these digital channels because these digital channels have become much more personable. No longer is the only option for identification of yourself a witty clip art avatar. We now have gravatars made with digital cameras, so the picture is actually us. We now have YouTube, where you can post real-life videos and truthfully expose yourself over the Internet. The latest development I’ve found (and come to love) is Dailybooth, where you can take instantaneous pictures and load them in a micro-blog format, to show interested parties what you’re doing at this very second. Seems a little silly, but the interactions built upon that idea are fascinating and fun.

Because of this increasingly human aspect, where your face is out there, your likes and dislikes are out there, and your personal experiences are sometimes rooted in digital interaction, it’s not creepy to have digital friends anymore. It’s not like you don’t know what they look like–sometimes you even know how they take their tea.

Networking vs. Social Networking

And this brings us to the key difference between the old school, business school “networking” and the new school, blurred line “social networking.”

In University, we were always taught the importance of networking, and that sentiment is still echoed deeply in my current entry-level life. But the buzzphrase in this world of new media is “social networking” and all of these social networking platforms and portals. By placing the word “social” in front of the classic business term, you eject it out of the commercial and into the personal. This reflects the new channels and indeed the blurred line between personal and professional, a growth of which I believe my generation is blamed for. I can be friends with my boss on Facebook, post this website on my online profile at work, have it link to my Twitter and my Dailybooth, so that my colleagues (who are also my friends) can interact with me on the same level as my college buddies (who, obviously, are my friends as well). There’s no reason to hide it, because it’s not a sick medium that populates Law & Order episodes. It’s a true form of interaction.

Which is why Drew Barrymore’s character Mary in He’s Just Not That Into You can get rejected by all her various “portals.” All of these portals are very relevant and very valid and very real portals of communication. If news can break on Twitter, than you bet it’s kosher to be dumped via MySpace. Sensitive? No. But valid.

DS

…is not just the name of a Weird Al song.

Time for me to geek out

It may come as a shock with the paltry offerings of this blog, but I work in the world of advertising. That’s right, I’m “the man” that we all try so hard to fight against. Believe me, I’m disgusted as well. But I find it intellectually stimulating, and at times simply exhausting, so it’s better than flipping burgers. No offense to all you burger-flippers. Especially you, Bobby Flay.

The first client I worked on, all the way back in July, was an information technology client, which is when I got interested in all these doohickies that entice people into sitting in front of an LCD (or, god forbid, a CRT) screen for hours upon hours upon hours. We talked about ERP and CRM, SaaS and cloud computing, database types and middleware technology. All in all, things I know nothing about.

And one of those terms brings me to the crash. Oh yes, “the crash.” I’m not talking stock markets, it depresses me far too much when the DOW is close to 7,000 points. I’m talking about the Gmail crash that’s been making the news rounds yesterday. Everyone’s a-twitter about it. And the term that it connects back to is “cloud computing.”

This Fox News article states it as such, “The outage exposed the underlying vulnerability of ‘cloud’ computing, in which applications and data are accessed by users on the Internet instead of their own hard drives.” And this article employed the headline: “Does Gmail’s Crash Forecast ‘Dark Cloud Computing’?”

What is cloud computing?

Cloud computing is exactly what the Fox News article defined it as: “applications and data accessed by users on the Internet instead of their own hard drives.” Think things like Google Docs, Windows Live, and of course, the hero of the hour, Gmail.

How do people feel about it?

It has had mixed reviews in the past. Some people herald it as the harbinger of a new digital age where hard drives become obsolete and you can access anything, anywhere, at any time. It speaks volumes that I can get my Gmail on my BlackBerry, at work, at home, and an Internet cafe. That I could conduct an entire business meeting using shared documents on PowerPoint with nobody being in the same room, or even the same time zone. And the fact that I can have any number of people simultaneously editing a document that is on none of their computer without emailing anything is simply fascinating.

However, other people, such as Larry Ellison, CEO of software giant Oracle, has been known to say it is “complete gibberish.” Perhaps he forgot  that he has made many millions of dollars in supporting its use.

My bias is probably evident, but I think it’s the complete opposite of “gibberish.” The fact that we can now do all that I referenced above is completely amazing. That I can get my email anywhere, edit my documents anywhere, and share them with anyone is what this new open-source society is about. Granted, it’s also a little “1984″ in that a handful of organizations head up these applications I use, but that’s a trust issue that seems to be more prevalent among those who were led through Nixonian times, rather than those who grew up in the dot.com bust and take these risks as a given of life.

Though, I think there’s also something to be said about locally storing information, especially when looked at in the light of my apartment’s sometimes faulty Internet. I don’t want to be restricted from working on some documents because I can’t access Google Docs in a world without Internet access. And there aren’t nearly enough cyber cafes in the city of New York to accomodate these infrequent inconveniences. Which is probably why I’m not a heavy Google Docs user, and why I’m sort of glad I have a BlackBerry to access my Gmail at all times.

Should we be worried about this Gmail fluke?

I’m thinking probably  not. It’s like saying a plane crashed so I’ll never fly again. That a boat crashed so now I’m afraid of water. That I stubbed my toe once on the piano so, heck, let’s just throw that piano out. Running from the problem doesn’t solve anything because, let’s face it, the other 364 days of the past year have been basically worry-free from Gmail. Why would your software solutions be any different?

DS

…because you have more patience than a third grade special education teacher.

My (first unsuccessful) foray into the world of vlogging

No, you will not find a link to a YouTube video here (though you can see the two videos I do have up by clicking the yellow box to the right of this post). You will not find a video log entry because, well, because they take an incredible amount of patience and, moreso ability, a skill that is absent in my current state of Mac literacy (or lack thereof).

This becomes all the more apparent when I look at a few posts from my most recent Twitter friends (I feel weird saying that): @iJustine and @coollike. They are both popular vloggers on YouTube and other sites, and have both Tweeted in the past day about editing and posting videos. Charlie (coollike) seems to have spent 2 hours trying to post a video only to end unsuccessfully and leave it for today, and Justine spent 10 hours shooting and editing, until 3 in the morning! Do that four times a week and you’ve got a full time job, if you’re lucky enough to work just 40 hours a week. Side note: France, I’m jealous.

Now, I have to say Charlie’s was worth it, because he painted himself purple.

You know what they say if you don’t succeed

I think they say you’re supposed to try again. So I will! I’ve never vlogged before, so don’t expect it to be a gold mine, featured video. But give me some time.

DS

…just not always the things you’d expect.

From whence I come

Back before I lived in New York City, I was a rather small suburban town kid from the city of Santa Rosa, California. Yep, wine country, and 3,000 miles from where I currently sit (actually, 2567.4196 miles, according to Gmaps Pedometer). It was your average childhood with all the average stories and nothing so spectacular happened much, except that Hollywood wanted to film the horror film Scream at our rival high school (aside: the school board wouldn’t let them–too violent).

Everyone had their own little dramas, and I suppose the following is a piece of mine, but man! how cool to get written up in the paper, right?

Car slams into house

Don’t worry,  it wasn’t my family whose car slammed into the house. And it wasn’t our house. But it was the house that is connected to where my brother lives, which is sort of a granny unit/garage. Don’t worry, nobody was hurt, my brother was at work, and the whole mess should be about cleared up by now (it happened on 2/19).

Next time I talk with my brother, I’ll have to ask him if he’s the “resident … who asked not to be identified” referenced in the article.

My second favorite part could only happen in the magic of the Interwebs: the four oh-so intelligent comments about the accident. We grows ‘em real smart where I comin from!

DS

P.S. Other front page news today at the good ol’ Press Democrat? “Marijuana seizures and arrests in Mendocino County.” If you know anything about Northern California, or happen to like the herb, that’s really no surprise.

I just read over my latest post, which I should probably do before I publish it. I noticed that I put the words “Internet celebrity” in quotes, as I just did, but not referencing a prior placement of the words.

I want to clarify that I didn’t mean it as a diss, because I could see how it could be seen as that. Internet celebrity is celebrity, I’ve come to realize that in this world of new media. I meant it as a more abstract quoting of Them. You know, those people out there who write about the goings-on of the Cyberwebs.

So, sorry to iJustine or any other Internet celebrities who might take offense.

DS