Eggblogg

Why I loved Gary Vaynerchuk's 'Crush It!'

Do you ever see those tabloid-shriek business books about how to work less and become a billionaire by using the internet, and think 'oh puh-lease'?' Or get a bit fed up with the self-promote-merchants who scream about how much they LOVE their work, how GREAT their business is doing, etc etc? Or, when you do give in, buy their book/seminar/product you then feel short-changed?

Happily, this blog post is not about that kind of experience. I've just finished reading Gary Vaynerchuk's 'Crush it! Why now is the time to cash in on your passion' and loved it.

Not because it delivers plenty of good, solid advice and ideas based on what Gary has done and learned in the process of building his business, although it does. 

Not because it echoes a number of my own core beliefs, such as the internet being as transformational as the printing press, although it does.

Not because it's to the point, easy to read, witty, and written just as Gary speaks, although it is.

The real reason I loved it, and what made it stand out for me was that it seems an honest book. By that I mean not just authentic, but really walking the talk, and what's more it's in the moment. Just as Gary claims not to ever do a second take on his Wine Library TV, this book seems to have benefited from inconspicuous editing. He admits he dictated the entire book, and that is undoubtedly a major part of its charm.

There are moments of thinking aloud, such as the section on Flickr - "It has a ton of passionate users, although I'm not one of them.. photographs don't speak to my DNA," admits Gary, but by the end of the paragraph he's starting to change his mind. "In fact, now that I think about it, it's insane that I haven't done this already. Anyone who cares about wine should be able to find me on Flickr, so I'd better get onto that."

Crush it! is inspiring, uplifting and great fun. It reminded me of all the things I plan to do but haven't yet. I'd better get onto that.

Who were the early internet 'thought leaders'?

I've recently had the pleasure of discovering some excellent and thought-provoking people writing on the subject of social media and the future of the internet.

It's made me go back and look again at some of the earlier internet 'thought leaders' who had such a great influence on me in the late 1990s, such as Nicholas Negroponte, founder of the MIT Media Lab. His 1995 book 'Being Digital' was one of those reads that sent my head spinning - so many ideas and possibilities of how technology was to change the way we communicate.

I went on to read Esther Dyson, another great web visionary. She foresaw the role of peer recommendations, content sharing and co-creation long before social networking was around. Similarly, Sherry Turkle's pioneering work Life on the Screen was a huge influence on me when I was first drawn to the idea of online community.

The Cluetrain Manifesto was another internet milestone that set the scene for the advent of social media. For me, this publication signalled the beginning of the end of traditional marketing. This has a poignancy as it came out at the same time that I left corporate, 'offline' marketing for good and moved onto the internet. I admit I don't remember the authors' names, but you'll find that out if you follow the Wikipedia link.

Going much further back, I must mention an article I only came across in 1999 although it had been written in 1945 - 'As We May Think' by Vannevar Bush. I can't describe how thrilling it was to read this for the first time. Bush was a US scientist at the time when technology was being developed for one purpose only - to wage war. This paper is his call for scientists of the future to apply new technology to non-military purposes, for the good of all, and in so doing he conjures up a digital future that is visionary, extraordinary and elegant.

Do you agree? There have been so many waves of internet pioneers in its short life. Who were the ones who influenced you? I'd love to know.

Also, who are the exciting thinkers of today, those who'll be remembered, not just for being the biggest names, but for their vision and influence? I have my list! But I need to stop reminiscing now and do some work. So that's for another blog post.

Photo: Grace Murray Hopper, early computer scientist and inventor of COBOL. Credit: Computermuseum.li

Where do we find the time for social media?

I read a fantastic post yesterday, by Clay Shirky, author of Here comes everybody. It wasn't new - it was the transcript of a speech he delivered a year ago, viewable on YouTube (thanks to Martha Leyton for sending me the link). But I found his central idea fascinating.

There's a common reaction from people who don't spend their time on the internet, creating stuff, having conversations, playing games , posting videos, writing blogs or contributing to wikis. It's 'where do these people find the time?' (usually said in a way that implies 'sad people with no life').

Shirky's answer is 'by not watching TV'. By way of example, he's worked out that the total time required to create, code and write the whole of Wikipedia, in all its languages, has taken about 100 million hours. As opposed to TV watching - "two hundred billion hours, in the U.S. alone, every year.' In other words, the time spent on participating in social media is a tiny fraction of time spent passively watching TV, much of it soaps and adverts. He calls this the 'cognitive surplus' - the time and energy we waste on consuming and don't spend creating, sharing and doing.

Shirky claims that if we were to watch just 1% less TV than we are currently, that alone would be the equivalent of 100 more wikipedia projects each year. For me that's mind-blowing. As is his story of the 4-year-old looking for the mouse that went with the TV. Go read the article or watch the video and you'll see what I mean.

Photo credit: NMeM – Hulton Getty

Pecha Kucha - just what business presentations need?

Everything Japanese seems to have become ultra cool over the last few years. Karaoke, Hello Kitty, manga, Lost in Translation, bento...recently I came across another Japanese import, Pecha Kucha. Pecha Kucha nights have taken off around the world.

Basically, it's a new way of presenting with slides, designed to counteract the horror of 'death by powerpoint'.  As they say on the website: Each presenter is allowed 20 images, each shown for 20 seconds each - giving 6 minutes 40 seconds of fame before the next presenter is up. This keeps presentations concise, the interest level up, and gives more people the chance to show.

I've sat through many awful presentations (although no doubt I've given a few in my time!) and this sounds like the perfect way to eliminate waffle, show-boating, embarassing 'ice breakers', slides overloaded with bullet points and all the other dreadful stuff.

PS I heard about pecha kucha through Garr Reynolds' excellent book Presentation Zen. There's a website too at http://www.presentationzen.com/

Where on earth have I been?

This is my first blog post of November - my only excuse is that I've been distracted with various other projects both aside from work and overlapping with it.

Last week was Bonfire Night, which in my home town of Lewes is bigger than Christmas. Six bonfire societies each spend all year fundraising and preparing for the 5th November, then each process through the streets with flaming torches in elaborate fancy dress, culminating with massive bonfires and what must be some of the best fireworks displays in the world. I spent many hours making my costume and then blogging about it, somewhat after the event but then there's always next year...

Then also last week was the November meeting of First Friday Lewes, and I made my first video about it which is now on the homepage. OK, so it's a bit rough round the edges, but you have to start somewhere!

Also, with a number of presentations coming up, including sessions on 'What makes a good business website' for ProftNet, I'm really enjoying reading Presentation Zen by Garr Reynolds and through it have just discovered Pecha-Kucha. I feel I'll be talking about this more very soon on this blog!