I just read this article by Sarah Lacy where she describes part of her journey into becoming a brand and then attempting to leverage her new positions. The pivotal paragraph for me was:
Sarah: That take-on-the-world morning, I was having coffee with Steven Levy, then of Newsweek, now of Wired, who challenged this whole idea of whether this “Sarah Lacy” brand was actually translating into things that mattered, like book sales, money, something real and tangible, or whether it was a just smokescreen of hype. And I granted his point. I’ve long been dubious of Internet celebrity’s staying power. It seems the Internet famous hit that moment where they’re on the Today Show, and just about to close a deal with ABC or HBO or pick the big money, you’ve-made-it acronym, but it never really materializes.
I’ve watched this happen several times since I entered the scene in 2006. Internet Celebrities attempting to take their game to the next level. The first, and most obvious example from the paragraph above being Amanda Congdon, formerly of Rocketboom fame, who went on to do Amanda Across America and then a derivative show for ABC where they attempted to emulate Rocketboom, but severely overproduced Amanda, stomping the life and fun out of the personality that she had brought to the Rocketboom anchor chair AND forcing 30-second pre-roll advertisements that had lots of people clicking off the site before they ever got to Amanda’s performance.
Another example would be Lisa Donavan (LisaNova), who went from YouTube to MADtv and then back to the internet. Then, there’s Ze Frank, who made up his own brand of show and viewer interaction, soared to immense popularity, deliberately quit his show after a calendar year and last I noticed, was on the lecture circuit.
So the question is whether the Personal Brand you’re creating “is actually translating into things that matter”. I touched upon this in August, 2008, in Conversion of “Cred”, but Sarah sums up my own personal experience here: Read the rest of this entry »
in: 161 (metal, not electronic)
out: 161 (metal, not electronic)
I had to make the trek back to the real gym this morning, because I could feel that I was going to have a solid workout. I couldn’t take the chance that the bogus gym wouldn’t have what I needed to get ‘er done.
Also, by the time I would have gotten to the bogus gym, the meager resources would have been occupied by the jobless and the night-shift-workers. At the real gym, I wasn’t in anybody’s way, and nobody was in my way.
I need it like that because my workouts, like my life in general, are dynamic. I just *know* what I feel like doing and then I do it. I don’t follow a routine other than feeling out the first exercise I want to do, because that’s going to determine what body parts get fatigued sooner and it’s going to affect the amount of weight I can push in other exercises.
So I wanted to start with perfect-grip close-grip pulldowns. Those fatigue the biceps VERY early on, which affects curling later, but the alternative is curling more weight and being able to do the pulldowns with less weight. Unless you’re focusing on biceps, which I’m not, you don’t want to do that. In general, you want to go from larger muscle groups to smaller.
4) In an office romance, do not email him back every time he emails you unless it is business related
On all non-business e-mails, responding once for every four of his e-mails is a good rule of thumb. Remember, you never know who has access to your e-mail, so keep all romance off the screen and save it for Saturday nights.
This is good advice if you’re using a company account. Other than that, this makes no sense AT. ALL.
I realize that “The Rules” was printed in 1995, so it makes sense for The Flintstones & Andy Griffith to have taken this advice, but in 2009, we not only have FREE personal email accounts, but we have hand-held computers to which we can route all of our correspondence. Assuming you don’t leave your g1, iPhone or Blackberry in the lunchroom, you’re golden.
As far as the actual “respond once to every four of his emails”, that’s easily countered by Read the rest of this entry »
Now, First of all… I’m not knocking “The Rules” AT. ALL! hahaha I think “The Rules” is a fantastic guide for women that are completely clueless about how to carry themselves in relationships or when trying to start them. FANTASTIC! I’m sure there are LOTS of women that would have had ZERO romance in their lives, whatsoever, that ONLY got some because of following “The Rules”.
Having said that, it’s really a bunch of gimmicks. “The Rules” basically says “Even though you feel like doing THIS, do THAT instead”. It’s pretty much the same thing as telling guys to buy a Porcshe in order to get women. That’s a gimmick. Learning how to hypnotize women so they’ll have sex with you is a gimmick. Going around asking women “Did you know I played The Millipede in “The Spirit’s Day Off?” is a gimmick…. hehehe
Buying flowers for a woman in order to “get out of the doghouse” is a gimmick…
The problem with gimmicks is that they’re only temporary fixes. They’re designed to get you over a hump… but they don’t help you long-term. Read the rest of this entry »
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