Sorry this post is so delayed, but I gave birth to a bouncing baby boy on Tuesday, October 7 and he is keeping me very busy! Anyway, I promised in an earlier post from the MIMA Summit that I’d talk about Twitter. Coincidentally, that same week we also got an email from geeky reader Maile in Los Angeles wondering: “Why should I use Twitter?”
Let’s start with Maile’s question: what I think she’s really asking is “Is Twitter relevant to me or is it some piece of crap I should ignore?” I can’t really answer that, but I can tell you everything I know about it and you can decide if it’s relevant to you, or if you want to file it under “stuff those crazy kids are doing on the interweb.”
What is it?
If I had to boil Twitter down into a brief description, it would be that it allows you to give others a brief snapshot into what you are doing, thinking, or looking at right now. It’s faster, easier and more portable than a blog.
Here’s what Twitter says it is: “Twitter is a service for friends, family, and co–workers to communicate and stay connected through the exchange of quick, frequent answers to one simple question: What are you doing?”
Not to keep relying on Common Craft, but damn. Those guys make some awesome videos. Here’s how they explain Twitter:
Here’s how I use it:
I first heard about Twitter in March 2007, on an episode of Future Tense on MPR. It sounded interesting, and my personal blog was in a state of utter neglect; it was time to close the coffin and bury it. So, using Twitter as a sort of “micro-blog” was intriguiging to me. I liked the idea of keeping people updated on what I was up to without the commitment of a full blog post. I posted about Twitter on a Clockwork blog (speaking of neglected…) and a few co-workers signed up. Then I slowly started gathering non-work “Followers.” Some are friends who signed up for Twitter as it started gaining in popularity. Others are people I have never met and I wonder why they care what I’m up to. But, for some reason, they do.
When I signed up for Facebook last year, I saw that there was an app that would sync up your Twitter updates and your Facebook status. How efficient! So, now if I “tweet” something, it also shows up as my Facebook status. Handy.
So, what does one talk about on Twitter? Whatever you want to. In the past week, I’ve tweeted about: a vole in my basement (eek!), my grandma’s death, the presidential debate, the fact that the new macbooks all have glossy screens (boo!), the New Kids on the Block reunion concert and my newborn.
Here’s how you can use it:
1. Sign up at twitter.com. You can enter your name (for a long time I had just Meghan, but recently added my last name as well. You can enter in whatever you are comfortable with). You’ll also select a username, which other people will see and will use to send messages to you (see #4 below). Mine is irishgirl. Click the “protect my updates” checkbox if you only want people you approve to be able to see your updates.
2. Type in what you are doing in 140 characters or less.
3. Find some people that you want to follow. If you don’t know anyone on Twitter yet, you can follow me. Or Nancy. When you follow someone on Twitter, they are notified, and may start following you back. If any unsavory characters start following you, you can click the link that says “block” and they won’t be able to see your updates. The most common type of Twitter unsavory is the spammer (yes, they are everywhere). When you visit their Twitter page, you’ll know they’re a spammer because they’ll be following thousands of people and will only have a handful of people following them back. Don’t feel bad about blocking these people.
4. Talk “at” people and send them private messages. On Twitter, my username is “irishgirl” and Nancy’s is “nylons.” So, if I want to tweet something to Nancy, but I want everyone else to see it, too, I would type it as follows: @nylons let’s have lunch next week. If I want to tweet something to her and I don’t want anyone else to see it, I would type it as D nylons let’s have lunch next week. This sends her a “direct message” that no one else can see.
Ready to get even funkier? I knew it!
5. You can also get Twitter updates on your mobile phone (as text messages), on your desktop, or on your browser. Frankly, I don’t care enough about what people are doing to want to get a text message about it, but I do use Twitterific on my laptop. Whenever there is a new tweet from someone that I follow, a cute little bird icon on my desktop turns blue. Whenever I feel like it, I can check in on the statuses of those I’m following or post a quick tweet myself. I prefer this to visiting the Twitter web site, and I don’t even mind the little ads that show up. I also use Hahlo on my iPhone for posting mobile tweets and checking in on what others are doing. There are a bajillion other Twitter apps listed on the fan wiki page here.
6. Use Twitter search to see tweets on particular topics. Want to see what the Twitterverse is saying about Palin? Check Twitter search and type in Palin. Voila!
7. Categorize your tweets with hashtags. Uh, what? Yeah, this one is super funky. But, it can also be super cool. Here’s an example: I attended the MIMA Summit on October 1. Inside the program, they printed the MIMA Summit hashtag: #mimasum08. Some of the breakout sessions even had their own custom hashtag. This allowed attendees to see — in real-time — what people were saying about the Summit.
So, back to Maile’s question: “Why should I use Twitter?” Crap. I still don’t know the answer.
But — just like my earlier posts about RSS — I’d encourage you to try it and see if you like it or not. The only problem I’ve had with it so far is people who overtweet. Like, a million meaningless tweets a million times a day. But, that problem is easily solved by “unfollowing” them.
So give it a try. And as always, I’d love to hear how it’s working for you!
Augh. Impossible to keep up with liveblogging; the day is going by too fast! Ran out of power and couldn’t cover my first breakout session which was around interactive TV. Now hanging in the Geek Out room with moderator @halvorson where we’re discussing how the day has gone and giving input on next year’s Summit.
Too bad I’m going to have to leave before happy hour to do daycare pickup; I really want to hang and chat with people. I haven’t even had a chance to find everyone I know who’s here!
So far, Ze Frank is great. It’s gotta be hard to talk while people are eating and he’s doing a great job. Engaging, funny and smart. (And yes, @hlockwoo, also adorable.)
My favorite part so far, re: user-generated content: “The Crapucopia: There is so much crap being made.” Amen, brother.
Excellent point #2: the conversation is not about the content. The value is the conversation itself, not necessarily the topic.
Random side note: it just occurred to me that there’s a really funny double-standard going on. There’s lots of twitterchatter about how cute/adorable/attractive Ze Frank is. How offended would I be if a woman was keynoting and people were tweeting how hot she was? Would men dare to tweet about a hot female keynote? Food for thought.
For breakout session #2, I chose the Marketing Mix challenge. Interesting to see how four different marketers would approach the launch of a new product using a three-month marketing budget and with Minneapolis/St. Paul as a test market. Really dug the approach of the first presenter, Luba Smulka from General Mills’ consumer insights team. Eric Boyles from Medtronic had a great approach as well; he packed a lot of great data/thinking into just three slides.
Overall, very interesting. Now, let’s see what the audience is asking about…
People are wondering about the lack of social media in everyone’s mix. The response from the panel is that the three month trial needs to build a real-world experience before engaging social media online. Great insight from Luba: just because you build it, they won’t come. It’s about building the experience first. Get them to try it so they will start talking about it.
Did you think the budget was realistic and how closely did you stick to it? What would you do with twice as much money? Patty Henderson responds that for proving whether audience will try/buy yes. As far as testing marketing vehicles for national launch, would like more money. With twice as much money, she’d use the same approach but with broader tactics. One of the guys (can’t see who, I’m sitting on the floor!) responded that he’d double the timeframe to 6 months instead of 3.
Question from Twitter about the role of package design in all of this. Luba assumed that good, communicative packaging was a given. Would also use the packaging as a vehicle for couponing.
If and how would the current state of the economy affect your mix? Couponing and sampling becomes more important to get into the consumer’s budget. Couponing is effective across all income brackets.
How would this plan change if the test market was Manhattan and not Minneapolis? The mic went out, so I have no idea how they answered this, but it’s a fascinating question.
I’m sitting near an outlet in the back of the room to keep my laptop charged. Not comfortable at 9 months pregnant and I’m pretty sure my foot just fell asleep.
So, I couldn’t literally liveblog during the first breakout session, because Nancy and I were moderating a discussion titled, “Wired Women.”
We had almost 25 people show up (including some Clockworkers — thanks, guys!) for what I thought was a lively discussion about women in interactive. We met some kickass women from around the Twin Cities and beyond and I thoroughly enjoyed the discussion, the disagreements, and — surprisingly — I thought the uncomfortable silences that are typical of most panel discussions were pretty minimal. Thanks to everyone who showed up and participated; if you have any feedback, I’d love to hear it. Oh, and here’s a link to the article I mentioned during our discussion: Women and the Labyrinth of Leadership.
Now, I’m in breakout session #2, the Marketing Mix Challenge. I had to sneak to the back of the room before my laptop died and find a power outlet. So far, I’m digging this breakout session; four marketers discussing how they’d spend a marketing budget for a new product launch.
Update (10/2): I read this article on MinnPost this morning which hits on some of the same points about women in leadership roles as the Harvard Business Review article above. One of the things that came up in the panel discussion yesterday was a concern about whether we exacerbate (or even create) a “problem” where one doesn’t exist simply by naming it (e.g. are there really not enough female voices in the interactive field, or are we looking for a problem where one doesn’t exist). I guess my argument here is that we know there is an overall problem (that people are reluctant to address and don’t fully understand the causes of) of not enough women in leadership roles across the board and that extends to the interactive realm as well (perhaps even more so within certain interactive roles like programmers, etc.). It also extends to the creative departments of many ad agencies. I’m not advocating for a “woe is me, I’m just a girl” approach to this, nor am I saying that I feel oppressed or held back or have ever let anyone’s perception of me as a woman keep me from speaking my mind. But, I’d be lying if I didn’t say that I see gender bias issues in our industry, and in others. And I’m interested in doing something about it. Nancy and I will be posting more about our thoughts on this in the future! For now, I thought that MinnPost article was relevant and worth sharing.
Today we have an opportunity to do some liveblogging at the MIMA Summit (we’ll also be tweeting* if you want to follow: @irishgirl or @Nylons). We’ll be updating throughout the day with our thoughts on today’s happenings.
So, here goes. We’re here at the MIMA Summit, enjoying some hot coffee and crullers. So far, the morning keynote by Rebecca Lieb is honestly, underwhelming. The topic is supposed to be “The Decline of Advertising & the Creative Renaissance” but we keep just watching viral vidoes together. And, I don’t feel like I’m getting any new information yet. Like, did you know that traditional advertising is over? Thanks for the heads-up. Did you know that advertisers are now content generators? Whoa. I’d much rather watch these vidoes on my own later and hear the presenter give us a more insightful analysis.
Hm, so far…I’m not impressed. At least the crullers are good.
*Wondering what the hell tweeting is? Twitter will be this Friday’s Geek Chic topic.
The last three weeks have been heavy duty, what with all that RSS talk. This week, I figured we’d keep it short and sweet. And it’s Friday so we might as well talk about pizza.
Since I’m married to a guy with an intolerance for all things lactose, I rarely order pizza. So, I had no idea of the amazing advances in online pizza technology until Geek Girls Men’s Auxiliary member Eric Hanson sent me an email (with screenshots, even!) raving about a recent online ordering experience.
This was followed up with a link to a CNN article (courtesy of another Men’s Auxiliary member, Justin Dessonville) that discussed the whole online pizza revolution and the insane amounts of money being made by pizza chains online. Who knew?!
Let’s start with Eric’s experience at Domino’s. Gone are the days of picking up the phone, getting a crazed-sounding teenager on the phone asking if you can hold, placing your order (all the while fearing that the distracted kid isn’t writing it down correctly) and then hoping that it shows up sometime before you go to bed.
With the online pizza tracker, you know — to the minute! — when your pizza is made, when it got in the oven (and who put it there!), and when it will arrive. You also know who’s bringing it to you, so if you want to be a total freak you can open the door and say, “Hi, Michael!”
According to the CNN article, online pizza orders are increasing at an incredible rate. I’m embarrassed to say I haven’t ordered a pizza online since 2001 (when I used papajohns.com to order pizza for an office meeting). Part of the reason is probably because the kind of places that serve non-dairy cheese pizza aren’t exactly nationwide chains and don’t offer online ordering. But, the other reason is that, sadly, I’ve just never thought about it. I tend to just pick up the phone and dial up a Pizza Hut or whatever. How old-fashioned of me!
So, your homework for this evening: don’t cook dinner. Order a pizza online. Links are below so you have no excuse! I expect a full report on Monday about which site has the best online pizza experience. I’ll be participating, too. The lactose-intolerant husband has plans tonight, so the girls are staying home to watch a movie and order some pizza. Online.
This is Part III of a three-part series. The first post covered why you should care about RSS and how to use basic RSS readers. The second post explained more sophisticated RSS aggregators. This final post will go more into the mechanics and history of RSS for those who are really interested in knowing more.
Okay, so we’ve talked about two different ways to subscribe to RSS and I hope everyone’s been experimenting with it. (And if not, come on ladies — get clicking!) For those geeks among us who also like to more about the hows, whats and whys, I present the following abbreviated FAQs about RSS:
What does RSS stand for? Depends on who you ask and what version you’re talking about. RSS version 2.0 (the current version) is known as Really Simple Syndication. Earlier versions were known as Rich Site Summary (v 1.0) and RDF Site Summary (v .90). One site claims it stands for Real Site Summary but, they seem to be the only ones saying that. So, if you want to sound smart I’d say Really Simple Syndication.
So, how does it work? In really simple terms, a web site publishes a file in a format known as XML. Your feed reader (or aggregator) that we talked about in Part I and Part II reads that file and displays it to you. Think about it like this: when you create a file using Microsoft Word. it saves the file in a DOC format, which other people can also open up using Microsoft Word. And Word knows how to display all of your fancy formatting like headlines and italics and highlighted text.
If you want to know what an XML file looks like (one that’s not being displayed in an RSS reader), you can see an example here. Your feed reader sees this and then displays it to you with nice, fancy formatting. Just like our Word example above.
This video is also a pretty sweet description of the whole system; I wish I would have found this when I wrote the first post!
The cool thing is that — like we talked about in Part II — just about anything can be syndicated via RSS: books you’ve checked out from the library, the date your garbage man is going to show up, photos you’ve posted to a photo-sharing account, whatever. It’s pretty sweet.
How many people use RSS? I have no idea, and no one else seems to know either. I can tell you is that it’s millions (according to this post, Feedburner — one of many RSS feed publishers — has 65 million subscribers), but is still a pretty small percentage of overall Internet users (this site says that North America has somewhere around 237 million Internet users and Wikipedia claims there are 1.2 billion people online worldwide). So, this is your chance to be an early adopter. Take advantage of it!
This is the shortest of my RSS posts, and probably the least helpful (aside from that awesome Common Craft video). But, I promised I’d do a little bit about the boring details of RSS so there it is. Next week, I’ll be back with some sexier Geek Chic. I don’t know what yet, but I’ll come up with something!
This is Part II of a three-part series. The first post covered why you should care about RSS and how to use basic RSS readers. This second post covers more sophisticated RSS aggregators. The third post will go more into the mechanics and history of RSS for those who are really interested in knowing more.
Last week we talked about adding RSS feeds to your My Yahoo! or iGoogle pages, which is a great place to start with RSS. Now that you’ve mastered that (right?) let’s talk about another, more sophisticated way to monitor feeds: an RSS feed aggregator. There are two types of aggregators I’ll talk about here: web-based and local applications.
Web-based Aggregators
Let’s start with the web-based aggregators. Two of the most popular are Google Reader and Bloglines.
I know many people who use — and love — Google Reader. But, honestly, I’ve never tried it. So, I’m going to focus my examples on Bloglines, which I’m more familiar with. But, I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: when it comes to learning new stuff online, don’t be afraid to just try things out. Give both apps a test drive and see which one you prefer!
Here’s a screenshot of my Bloglines page:
On the left, you can see a list of folders I’ve created to keep my feeds organized by topic (Blogs, Bollywood, Business, Entertainment, etc.). I’ve expanded the Business folder, so you can see that there are three sites that I’m monitoring that I put into the “Business” category. Within those sites, you can see that one is bolded: “David Allen Company Master RSS Feed.” That means that site has new posts that I haven’t read yet. There are two numbers in parentheses. The first (54) is the number of new posts on that site since the last time I visited Bloglines. The second (6) is the number of posts I’ve “saved” in my Bloglines account because I want to read, re-read, or refer to them later.
When I select a site from that list on the left (in this case 43Folders, which is highlighted in gray), all of the posts (new and saved) from that site appear in the right side of the browser window. Depending on the feed, either the whole post/article will display, or just an excerpt (which means I have to visit the site to read the full article). Either way, I can scan through the new posts, read what interests me, check off what I want to save for later, and move on. If the site has nothing new at the time I’m checking Bloglines, it won’t be bolded and I’ll know I can skip over it. Easy, easy! And you can see why this approach is more sophisticated than My Yahoo! or iGoogle, which is showing you only the three most recent posts, no matter what. This way, you can save things for later, or go on vacation and know that you’ll be able to catch up on the 54 articles that were published while you were gone (if you really want to).
For more information on other online feed readers, you can check out this 2006 TechCrunch post. Sure, it’s two years old, but it still contains a lot of good info!
Local Applications
As you can see, there are a LOT of posts I haven’t read yet in my Bloglines account. That’s because I’ve been slowly migrating to the second type of aggregator: a local application (one that’s installed on my laptop and not accessed via a web browser). Again, there are a lot of options: my husband is a big fan of NetNewsWire for the Mac; for the PC, NewsGator is a popular choice (and apparently integrates with Outlook). I’ve been experimenting with the RSS reader that’s integrated into the most recent Mail application for the Mac.
In my case, I started using the Mail-integrated RSS reader beacuse it’s so convenient. I’m already in Mail all day for work, so it’s easy to toggle over to my RSS feeds to see what’s new and I don’t have to remember to open up a different application to read my feeds. The downside is that I can only access those feeds on my laptop. So, if you work for a company where you need to keep work and personal information separate, or if you mainly access the web from a shared computer (like a library, school or other public space), a web-based aggregator that you can access from a home or work machine might be a better choice.
The good news is you don’t have to choose just one. I use iGoogle and My Yahoo! to monitor feeds that I don’t care as much about staying on top of (like, CNN headlines. I don’t need to see every headline that’s been published since the last time I looked, I just want to see breaking news when I open up a browser window. So, Google shows me that.). I use the Mail-integrated RSS reader for the feeds I want at my fingertips throughout the day. And, I’m keeping Bloglines around for a while just in case. It’s sometimes nice to be able to view feeds online if I don’t have my own laptop handy. There are many ways to use RSS and there’s no need to choose just one: try ’em all!
Your homework this week is to look around for useful feeds and try a “real” aggregator. You’ll be surprised: in addition to all the usual RSS suspects like blogs and news sites, you may be able to subscribe to feeds at:
your local library’s site (I have a feed that tells me all the books I currently have checked out),
photo-sharing sites (I subscribe to my Flickr photo comments so I know as soon as anyone has posted to one of my photos),
online calendar sites (I subscribe to Upcoming.org so I know about family-friendly events around Minneapolis)
I even have a co-worker who subscribes to a feed that tells him when his next garbage and recycling days are!
A Word to the Wise
The one caveat I will give you is this: if you’re the kind of person who feels obligated to read things you subscribe to (like me), be selective about which feeds you add to your RSS. Be choosy about what you take time to read, and what you skim over and discard. One of the reasons I still have Bloglines (in addition to Mail) is that it’s great to have a “trial” area for feeds. So, I might add something to my Bloglines and if I find myself really wishing I had faster access to it, then it can graduate to my Mail feeds. If I find that I let many unread articles fester in that account, maybe it’s time to delete it. I’m not saying that to discourage anyone from devouring RSS feeds ravenously, but I’ve seen people get overwhelmed feeling like they “have to” or are “supposed to” keep up with all of their feeds, get frustrated, and give up. We’ve all got plenty to deal with already, so find a happy medium. There are lots of ways to use RSS to make life easier; if it starts to feel like it’s making life harder, rethink how you’re using it.
And don’t forget to email me to tell me how it’s going.
For you hardcore geeks who want to know more about how RSS came to be, tune in next week.
This is Part I of a three-part series. This first post will cover why you should care about RSS and how to use basic RSS readers. The second post will cover more sophisticated RSS aggregators. The third post will go more into the mechanics and history of RSS for those who are really interested in knowing more.
You may, or may not, have been hearing about RSS over the past few months (or years). It continues to gain in popularity as subscribing to RSS feeds gets easier and becomes more integrated into tools like My Yahoo! and iGoogle, but many people still have no idea what it is (so don’t feel bad if you’re one of them). Some people are using it and don’t even know it! But, as we all attempt to manage the massive amounts of information out there for us to consume, and as RSS moves out of its geeky beginnings and into the mainstream, it’s an important technology to use and understand. So, instead of starting at the potentially boring beginning with a precise definition and history of RSS, let’s start at the more practical and interesting end with, “Why should I give a crap?” and “How might this make my life easier?”
The simple answer to both questions is that RSS allows you to keep tabs on many web sites without having to visit each one of those sites to see what’s new. A site sends out its latest headlines and content (the “feed”) and by subscribing to that feed, you can quickly see if the site has posted new information, and skim through it to decide what you want to dive into and what you want to skip over. Saves time and energy and allows you to check in at your leisure (as opposed to subscribing to an email that shows up in your Inbox whenever the site feels like sending it, instead of when you want to read it). Nice, eh?
There are a couple of ways to take advantage of RSS. In this first post, I’ll cover the simplest: a web-based RSS aggregator from a search engine like Yahoo! (My Yahoo!) or Google (iGoogle). These sites offers a somewhat half-assed way to read RSS feeds, but are an excellent place to start and can be great as a supplement to another reader (but more on that in Part II). For now, let’s dig into what Yahoo! and Google offer.
Here’s a screenshot of my iGoogle page:
The headlines you see above are sites whose RSS feeds I’m monitoring. In this case, iGoogle is showing me the three most recent headlines from those sites. I don’t have to visit Wired or Engadget to see what’s new — the latest headlines just show up on my iGoogle page (which is also the page my browser opens to automatically, so I see it many times a day) and I can choose to expand the headline to see the first couple of sentences of the article, and then visit the site to get more information, or just move on (notice how I’m not using People.com as an example — it makes me seem smarter, right?).
The downside of monitoring feeds in this way (and the reason I call it half-assed) is that it doesn’t keep track of what I’ve read or not read — it simply shows me the most recent stories from that site. Same deal with My Yahoo! — it just shows the most recent headlines for the sites or blogs you’re monitoring. But, again, it’s an excellent place to start and next week we’ll get into some other, more sophisticated, ways to monitor RSS feeds.
So, now that you have a vague idea about what RSS is and why you might want to try it, let’s talk about how to add feeds to your My Yahoo! or iGoogle pages.
First of all, have you seen this symbol on sites you’ve visited? If not, start looking for it and you’ll be surprised how often it shows up. That symbol (which may be on a web page itself, but also shows up in the address bar of your browser and may be either orange or blue) is your signal that the site you are on publishes a feed that you can subscribe to. Some sites even have multiple feeds (like MinnPost.com — you can subscribe to the homepage feed, or a particular author’s feed, etc.).
Once you find a site that has a feed you think you want to subscribe to, the mechanics of actually subscribing to it will depend on the site. I’ll start with iGoogle. Once you have a Google account (Oh, just do it. It’s free! I can wait.), you can set up a free iGoogle page. At the top of that page is a link to “Add Stuff” which will take you here:
You can easily find Google Gadgets to add to your page or you can click that “Add feed or gadget” link and you’ll get this:
Then what? Here’s where it gets interesting. When you’re on a site where an RSS feed is available, you can click the image and you’ll get to a page like this:
with a URL like this: http://www.geekgirlsguide.com/index.xml
Paste that URL into that pop-up on the Google page and voila! It will magically appear on your iGoogle page.
With My Yahoo!, it’s just as easy. Click “Add Content” and you’ll see a window open where you can add content that’s available via Yahoo! (similar to the Google Gadgets) or you can click the “Add RSS Feed” button and paste a feed URL just like we did above with iGoogle.
That’s enough for now, class. Your homework is to set up a My Yahoo! or iGoogle page and start subscribing to stuff (I do recommend those juicy People.com headlines…). You can always delete things later, just get out there and play around. Let me know how it goes.
Next Friday, in Part II, we’ll cover more traditional feed readers and how to use them. Too excited to wait for next week? You can also check out Oliver Starr’s excellent RSS overview on GTDTimes.com.
