Archive for the ‘Stories in the News’ Category

With all of the tweets and news stories going on around the newest web tool, Chat Roulette, I have to admit, I was curious. Although most of the conversation about the tool touted how awful it was, that every other person was behaving obscenely and it was a bored teenagers strange idea…I still wondered about it (darn that curiosity!). But, I hadn’t checked it out, I just simply didn’t have the time. I pushed it to the back of my mind, and kind of forgot about it.

Yesterday, me, my hubby, @vetlovingpetshb and @elecsecurityguy had brunch at Memphis in Santa Ana, and over unlimited mimosas and french toast, we got on the topic of weird tools and unique websites. Which of course, brought up Chat Roulette. We started talking about what we’d heard about it and what it was really like. None of us new more than the basic principal – go to the site, click play and wait to see who (or what) shows up. It was basically a video chat room, where you just clicked next to move onto another person/conversation. We had all heard that it was definitely nsfw, and that the majority of people on there were men, showing body parts that we had zero desire to see…but of course, after those mimosas, the curiosity came back and so we decided we just had to check it out (curiosity will getcha every time!).

The first tries to get the site to work completely failed…apparently Chat Roulette does not like Firefox. So, we switched over to Internet Explorer, got the ‘play’ button and took the chance. We clicked play, and waited. Three things we realized right away:

1. It auto turns on your own webcam which means the other person can see you laughing.
2. It auto turns on your microphone which means the other person can hear you laughing.
3. No one can prepare you for it, but you’ll definitely be laughing!

As all the news stories and tweets had told us, it was a strong mix of obscenity, with a few normal (albeit bored) people. We lasted about an hour on the site, clicking through about 15-20 different people, and had only one normal conversation, with a college kid in the UK who couldn’t sleep.

My final verdict? This site is a wreck, will end up the late night game at many sleepovers or drunken fraternity parties, and I doubt it will have any real staying power. That is unless they can figure out how to clean it up, segregate the types of conversations and turn it into a safer site for viewing…either way, I wouldn’t venture back.

Have you been to ChatRoulette? What did you discover?

In light of the recent article from Wired.com - 10 Years After: A Look Back at the Dotcom Boom and Bust (really awesome article) – I want to open the floor to you, and hear where you were then and where you are now.

Then, I was in High School, waiting for December to roll around so I could finally get my driver’s license. I worked part time after school with the Parks and Rec’s department in Los Gatos (my home town). I dreamed of going to Northeastern University to study International Business, working for the CIA in European espionage and becoming a best selling author by the time I was 30 writing CIA romance thrillers.

Now, I am happily married in South Orange County, driving an ‘08 Mustang GT. I am a proud alum of Cal State Long Beach with a degree in Rhetorical Communications, the owner of Wright Creativity, and the writer of this blog. I love my business, and am excited every day to see where it will take me. Someday I still dream of becoming a best selling author, but of just plain romance novels and definitely not by the time I’m 30.

Your turn!

The final post topic I gathered from my readers and followers was from Angry Julie (the first two were from @HealthOC and @Hagre). She is convinced the world is dominated by bloggers and wanted to know my thoughts.

I think I agree! Why you ask?

Let’s start by looking at the sheer statistics (stats from Techcrunch, Technorati, comScore and FutureBuzz):

• 133,000,000 – number of blogs indexed by Technorati since 2002
• 346,000,000 – number of people globally who read blogs
• 900,000 – average number of blog posts in a 24 hour period
• 1,750,000 – number of RSS subscribers to TechCrunch, the most popular Technology blog (January 2009)
• 77% - percentage of active Internet users who read blogs
• 81 - number of languages represented in the blogosphere
• 59% – percentage of bloggers who have been blogging for at least 2 years

Need more convincing? Let’s look at the State of the Blogosphere and who these bloggers really are:

• Two-thirds are male
• 60% are 18-44
• The majority are more affluent and educated than the general population
• 75% have college degrees
• 40% have graduate degrees
• One in three has an annual household income of $75K+
• One in four has an annual household income of $100K+
• More than half are married
• More than half are parents

If all the facts aren’t working for you, let’s look at facebook and twitter for a minute. Think about tweets, status updates and timelines…how many links do you see on a daily basis? How many of those sites are run on a blog platform? If you said “almost all”, you’re right. It is rare to see links to “websites” any longer, even if you are referring someone to a product, you tend to send them articles (blogs) vs static sites (websites).

But, it’s not just the sheer volume of blogs anymore, it’s the volume of the voices. People blog about products, whether they like them or not. For example, when the new iPad hit last week, there were articles everywhere about it…and the majority of those articles were written on blogs! Who does the iPad need to impress? Those bloggers! What about something non techie, like a new food item? Doesn’t need to worry about bloggers right? Wrong. According to Technorati, there are over 33,000 blogs dedicated to just food (and the statistics are the same for almost all genres). Bloggers are the new journalists. They can write from anywhere, say (almost) anything about you, and are easily accessible. And if the blogger is popular? Their blogs can often outrank the “normal” articles on any given topic!

But of course, this is just what I see.

What do you think? Are bloggers running the world?

A recent article from Vanity Fair: America’s Tweethearts proves how little they actually understand twitter!

Thanks to @markdavidson, I discovered and read the story. Pretty soon, many of us were in conversation about the missteps and failings of the article.

Mark believes that it capitalizes on female stereotypes and paints these intelligent women as objects.

Joe mentioned that the people they chose were not a representation of real twitter elite.

Jason commented the entire article comes off as patronizing and is bothered that people find it interesting.

EricaJoy added a few others that should have been considered – and the fact that as it stood, it was crap.

While I agree with the points they made, I have a few of my own:

1. I believe that the article paints a poor picture of twitter and really fails to capture the point of the tool. Twitter isn’t about followers, it isn’t about popularity, and apart from @juliaroy, the key women in this article are very poor examples of twitter users. They all have 40k+ followers but follow, on average, less than 10% of them back! That means they are not conversing, not sharing and definitely not participating with their followers. Pathetic, and not the way twitter should be used.
2. The other “twilebrities” it mentions – Obama, Britney, Ashton – are just as bad as examples! None of these people will ever be asked how to use twitter to improve your business, they will never speak at a conference about combining twitter into a social media strategy. The people that do get asked those questions? And do speak at the conferences? THOSE are the “twilebrities”
3. This line from the article “Twitter doesn’t even require real sentences, only a continual patter of excessively declarative and abbreviated palaver” really twisted me…Twitter does require real sentences, real thought and real participation. If what you are doing is declarative and abbreviated palaver (which is really just big words for a short statement of unimportance) then you really are failing at twitter. And, the fact that Vanity Fair thinks that’s what twitter is – proves they have absolutely no idea how it really works.
4. And the last reason I know that Vanity Fair fails at twitter? Their account is run the same way…48k+ followers, only following about 300. How is that participation?

What do you think of the article?

All of you know how much I adore social media. The connections, the conversations, the possibilities. And when moments like this happen, it is even sweeter:

This story was originally shared on Catherine Favazza.com.

The St. Louis business community now knows all about my family’s hugely successful catering order that coincided with the All-Star Game. Yes, it’s true that my pride in my father’s accomplishments spurred this a bit, but without social media–and Twitter, specifically–his story would never have been told.

When I checked my RSS reader Monday morning, I saw a BusinessWeek article about the economic boost the All-Star Game is bringing to St. Louis. It caught my eye because I’m from St. Louis and because I knew about the event’s boost to my own family’s business. I tweeted:

St. Louis bringing in big bucks with All-Star Game: http://bit.ly/R3O53. (Ex: My dad has the largest catering order of his 30+ yr career.)

That message was then re-tweeted by the mayor of St. Louis (follow him: @MayorSlay), without the link to the original story that caught my eye. Soon, a reporter from the St. Louis Business Journal had contacted my family to discuss the details.

This is the new way news happens now. Because of my Tweet, the St. Louis Business Journal reported later that afternoon about my family’s business, Favazza’s Restaurant, received a major subcontract deal for the All-Star Game:

Favazza’s restaurant and catering was called on to provide three days of box lunches as a subcontractor for Sportservice at Busch Stadium and the Edward Jones Dome to meet demand for All-Star Game preparations.

Delaware North’s Sportservice needed a local caterer to help fill food service needs at Busch Stadium for the press and several groups through the St. Louis Cardinals, said John Favazza, part of the restaurant’s family ownership.

Then a few days ago, Sportservice at the Dome asked for help serving 650 police, firefighters and volunteers on duty for the event, Favazza said.

In the end, my parents, brothers, other family members and staff prepared food for 6,700 people, in one of the largest catering orders of my father’s 30+ year career, valued between $45,000 and $50,000.

During the Home Run Derby on Monday night, I tweeted a link to the Business Journal article and Bernie Miklasz, top sportswriter for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch and a frequent customer of Favazza’s, replied: “@KatieFavazza That means I just had one of your roast beef sandwiches… it was good. thank you!”

I saved a Twitter account for my dad months ago and have been talking to him about using it for the restaurant; now, I have a feeling he might be convinced. To all my St. Louis readers and fans of Italian food, please follow @Favazzas in anticipation of forthcoming Tweets.

Have you had an experience with social media that changed your business? Or someone in social media that heavily influenced you? Share your story!

2 weeks ago (wow, does time go by fast, I thought it was just last week), I wrote about how we can change #followfriday to make it more beneficial for everyone involved. My idea had been to

only recommend one or two people each followfriday and include a little reason why. Not only does it make it easier for people do decide whether to follow them, but it is more special for those that I recommend.

Steve Woodruff took a common stand, but had gone a bit further and taken his recommendations off of twitter and to his blog. Last week, he suggested that we answer the question: “Which ONE of your Tweeple would you most want to go on a wine-testing with, & why?” I didn’t participate last week, as I was still testing out my ‘recommend less people with a reason for each’ on twitter. This week, he asked us to share with whom we would like to have an in-depth cultural conversation? This week, I decided to try it his way.

So, my #followfriday #ff2 (the new hashtag for longer followfriday recommendations) is @knealemann. He and I have conversed through twitter quite a few times, and his blog is one of my favorites to read. Unfortunately, due to the unreliability of email, the first time we tried to take our conversation off twitter, our lines got crossed and he missed a message from me, and thought that I wasn’t interested in continuing our conversation about business and life. The email thing leads me to a whole other story, but we’ll save that for another time. Anyway, Kneale is from Canada, and while not too far from California, the culture is definitely different, and one I have never experienced. I would be interested to see what the difference in business practices are – from email etiquette and office styles to commercials and marketing tactics. I would love to hear how and why he started his blog – what he has learned about it – and if the blogging groups are as prolific there as they are here. In reality, I would just love to chat with him, since after reading his work and his tweets, I think we would have a great conversation. Still not convinced he needs to be added to your twitter followers? He’s also pretty funny!

Who is your #followfriday #ff2 recommendation?

Today is day #4 of the better blog challenge from problogger. I also did day #3 today, about promoting you/your blog. Anyway, today’s post is all about analyzing a top blog in your niche. There were only 2 steps.

1. Identify a successful blog in your niche
2. Take 15 minutes to do some analysis of the blog in some of the following areas: Content, reader engagement, design, monetization, traffic and seo

Much to my dismay, the first step stumped me. I realized that I am not sure I have ever really given myself a niche (or maybe better named: pigeon-hole?) to stick in. I have always made it clear that as long as it was creative and beneficial to my readers, I would write about it. According to Alltop – I fit in the Innovation category. According to myself, I don’t really like categories. But since the task is clear, I had to do a bit of research about what other blogs are doing what I am doing, or where I want to see myself. So I went to technorati’s popular 100 blogs and started looking for one that did something, anything like what I do. Around #64 (it depends whether you look by authority or readers), I found Chris Brogan’s, whom I admire his writing and style. Then I found #93 & #95 (searching by readership) and about fell out of my chair. They are spammer sites! The actual title of #93’s on Technorati is: alkimberl Buy viagra on line. You have GOT to be kidding me!?! And that right there made me realize I do not want to be on the top 100 blog list for technorati. Would you want to be on that list??

Anyway, on to step 2. Analyze the blog. Well, since the only one I found that was similar to something I would want to be was Chris Brogan’s but since he gets talked about so much already, I wasn’t sure I wanted to talk about him again. Instead, I am going to think more about question #1, my niche.

After the allotted 15 minutes, I realized that my niche is as a writer. I am a creative writer. I am a freelance writer. I am a passionate writer. I write because I like to write and I think that what I write has a benefit for my readers. So there it is: This is the blog to come to when you want creative ideas and darn good writing.

I feel better.What about you?

How many times have you just felt like today is just a little too serious? Today, I was reading through some of my favorite blogs, a strong mix of business and humor, and ran across an image that I couldn’t help but share:

Although I know that creativity and math smarts are not always ‘have one or the other’, but for me, they were. I was never the math whiz, so luckily, they explained the problem below. I would love to see the faces of the Verizon rep that opened that check and had to show it to their supervisor. What would they do? Is it a valid check? More than likely, he was required to send another check, I can’t help but be impressed at the creativity of Mr. Munroe.

Would you accept the check? Looking for a bank person’s answer as well – would this be considered valid assuming the math problem was correct?

There are hundreds of great graphic design posts – and endless lists of tips and tricks. But, most of those lists are for graphic designers that design for a living, or for people who need advanced tips and ideas. I have found that while helpful, we often forget some of the basic design rules that everyone should know. Regardless if you design for pay or just for fun, these rules will help everything you do look more precise, professional and powerful.

1. White space is your friend. Step away from the color, the boxes and the images. Leaving white space on the page will cause the eye to draw to the important factors in the page – allowing the reader to understand the key points. If a page is too cluttered, the reader doesn’t know what to look at, and you run the risk of your message getting lost.
2. Don’t let your font’s overpower the message Whether creating a piece, whether it is for a website or a magazine the font you choose is important. You’re not going to use BOopee (or a goofy font like it) when talking about a funeral home, nor would you want to use Edwardian Script (or a formal font) when talking about what your 10 year old thinks of his snack food. With that said, you also want to make sure not to pick too many fonts. The best rule is to choose 3 fonts: a font that is for the main writing, a font for the headers, and a ‘fun’ font for highlighting specific words. This will allow your message to get across cleanly, and still allow you a little fun.
3. Pick colors that compliment, not detract I talk a lot about color, how it affects you, and places to find it. I talk about it so much because it is so important. How many times have you seen something and your first thought was ‘the color is wrong’. If this is what you are thinking about, then the message can’t get through! There is no such thing as the right color – mixing things up is a good thing. But, trying to mix too many colors can be overwhelming. Remember, color may surprise you, you just need to know where to look.
4. If people have to hunt for it, they won’t find it Want people to call you? Give them your number. Want people to email you? Give them your email. Simple huh? It seems that this is not common sense. Many times, we get so carried away with making a design ‘look pretty’ that we forget to make it useful too. Unless you are entering your piece in a contest, more than likely the goal is to get a response, so make sure that the people can respond easily.
5. Spell check. Grammar check. No matter how beautiful the site or the design is, if there are spelling or grammar errors, it will be ruined. Do not trust your computer to check the grammar, it won’t. This also includes double checking that your contact information is right, and all the links work. A non-working design fails, no matter the beauty of it.
6. It’s okay to break the ‘rules’. See? I just did, and the sky didn’t fall. Sometimes it is okay to step outside what is expected, to get that surprised response from your audience. Just remember, do it too often, and like anything else, it gets old and boring.

What do you think? Do you have a design trick that everyone should know and use to share? Disagree with any of the above, or have a great example to share?

So facebook owns my data. What’s the big deal?I have to say I was a bit surprised by the response to Facebook’s new policy (just search twitter for #tosfb to see what I mean).

In an article by Stan Schroeder, he talks about his opinion on the new policy. Yes, I can understand his frustration as they basically own your data now, and did it without allowing people the opportuntiy to remove their data before the change. But my surprise is that he thought this was strange or out of the ordinary. Really? Have you read the TOS on most of the sites you use? Check your insurance, banks and credit cards. They own you too!

The web is not a place to take lightly where you put things. But, as long as you remember that anything you put on the web can be used by anyone at anytime, you can’t really be surprised. For example, I wrote a post about some favorite artists of my Twitter friends. I am a very honest person, so not only did I put the links to their sites, but I gave them full recognition for their work. The problem? I still took their images! Without asking. And put them on my site. What’s stopping someone with a more malicious intent from doing the same thing? And if they use it in a way that damages the image of an up and coming artist that can’t afford to fight it – what is the artist to do? Nada.

We know how amazing the web is – but it is also a dangerous place. You wouldn’t walk through downtown LA, SF or NY at 1am carrying a wad of hundreds and talking on the phone; we all know what the outcome would be. So why would you be that careless online? Don’t put your hundreds on the web for someone to steal, and don’t put information or photos that could cause damage. As long as you only put on the web what you’re not afraid of someone ‘borrowing’, you won’t have any issues. We’ve seen the aftermath of tweets gone awry already; we really shouldn’t be surprised that we have no web privacy. I’m not saying that Facebook shouldn’t have given us warning (because they should have) but I am saying that it isn’t a surprise.

Agree? Disagree? What do you think of FaceBook’s new policy? Do you think about what you put online before you put it there? Feel free to share your thoughts.