Atlanta Bloggers - Local Entrepreneur Needs Your Help

This is an interesting situation CL noted today -- a small enterprise, new business (a smoothie shoppe) that needs more customers. Hmmmm, what would you do within social media to drive more traffic to a brick and mortar store with goodies in it?

Atlanta bloggers: leave YOUR social media tips and tricks for Bridgette, the owner of the Decatur/Oakhurst shop, on the CL post here. Ones you think that could help her drive foot traffic to her store. Or blog about her. And of course, stop by the store if you're in the area. Her smoothies look wonderful!

Calling on that Diva Marketing social media guru, Toby Bloomberg, especially.

Latest '08 Presidential Candidate Poll Results

Matt Towery of Insider Advantage’s Southern Political Report (who has yet to get the Share Your New Media memo and continues to employ un-embeddable video on his site. Heck, he’s yet to get any sharing media memo as there are ZERO sharing tools on the site from what I can tell) has the latest and greatest data on how the ‘08 Presidential candidates are playing down south… and elsewhere.

Matt’s poll results, and fabulous preacher-man hairdo, are here. Good news for Edwards and Thompson somewhere in there. Clinton and Giuliani strong, strong, stong in FL and SC.

Deeper analysis of I Know What Fred Did At The Debate Last Night is here. But I’m addicted to these gosh darn wacky webcasts. There’s something so ______________ about them. Fill in the blank with YOUR bons motes and priceless feedback.

NOTE: This post cross-posted at PP too.

Let's Pick On The AJC! Installment #853

I've heard, time and time again at various press-related functions, the good folk from Cox Media Plantations say news coverage is all going hyper-local, so thus they are too. So let's take a look at just where they've not bothered to "go local" -- on a day when the AJC.com's top, above-the-fold story is about Paula Abdul's makeup. (It was there early this morning, trust me.) Or when they do go hyper-local, it's semi-pointless. Hell, they can't even do "southern."

1.) The NYT had a cover story yesterday about a very dangerous home improvement product that lingered on the shelves of Atlanta-based Home Depot. Not only was the product, Stand 'N Seal, sold in Home Depot stores long after the product was recalled, the company that manufactures the hyper-dubious ingredient in the bathroom sealer product is based in... you got it... Georgia. But we get... Paula Abdul's pimple coverage instead.

2.) When churches throughout Atlanta had their annual pet blessing services to mark the Feast of St. Francis Assisi (historic pet-lover), and a delightful, heartwarming photo-op any 'ole time and place, the AJC runs a wire-service picture of a Golden Retriever in a church in San Francisco. Who needs to get out of the house and down the road a piece for a dog sitting in any church pew along Peachtree Road? Especially when Buckhead has more Golden Retrievers per household than any other place on the planet.

3.) Possibly the most head-scratching omission though is the failure of the AJC, a paper that helped shaped American history by its coverage of all-things-civil-rights, to send one of their own to Jena, LA to cover the civil rights march that happened there on September 20, not here. Rather, they relied on wire service reports the day of the march, choosing original reporting only for... the hyper-local perspective! Too bad that in this case the hyper-local was never where the heart of that story lay. How much can a Motel 6 in Louisisana possibly impact the bottom line?

Local v-blogger Amani Channel did bother to cover Jena, LA though. On assignment for HDNews. Twice. Here's just one of his many fascinating, personal, indie packages from the scene for his blog, MyUrbanReport, proving once again that blogs are now the best place to get your local, in-depth news coverage and analysis. Need more on the Grady crisis? Forget Cox Plantations; try Grift's crib.

NOTE: Once again I find that the best way to work your way through a social media-induced funk is to blog your way out. Confounding medium, eh?

The Great Experiment

I see no real power in social media. No burning, critical business applications either -- for the time being. Sharing media? Yes, there's power in that I suppose, but it all depends on the content. Is any of it worth sharing? I'm going to wind down this experiment. I just simply do not feel like blogging. It's starting to bore the fuck out of me.

Show The Power of Social Media

Instead of your typical, same 'ole same 'ole icons, avatars and pictures on your blogs, Twitter, Facebook, Second Life, wherever... why not change them all, for a day or so, into Buddist monks? A terribly simplistic, but necessary show of solidarity for the people of Burma who seek to be free. Be the monk that has been vanished, symbolically at least. So when Anderson Coopers asks again on CNN, "Where have all the monks gone?" they can be conjured from all over the world.

Photo from the NYT. (And NYT, please, please, please don't sue me just yet. Let's just see if we can pull this thing off, k? Take one for the team, right?!)

Atlanta's Fat Ass

Jeff Haynie, a successfull web-based entreprenuer from metro Atlanta has a fascinating blog entry he's titled: How To Build A Successfull Startup Environment in Atlanta. Note his use of the critical word "environment." Jeff's really on to something here, something we need to help him grow:

I can’t even compare our environments to other major areas like the Valley or Boston - it’s just not much of a comparison. So, I won’t. Atlanta can become it’s own community and has the ability to not only do what others have done before us - but also innovate in it’s community environments. And, we need more people - “completely unknown” around town - to step up and make it happen. We need 100 Billy Payne’s passionate about making Atlanta a successful startup community, as much as the real Payne did for the Atlanta Olympic quest in the late 80s.

Full post here. I urge reading it carefully. There's just so much good stuff all through it. I've had to the good fortune to work with Jeff on media issues and making some cool new media. He's completely inspiring to be around. He gets things like, oh say, SoCon07 done. And Southern Fried Tech.

Like others who have come to get to know one another through SoCon07, PodCamp Atlanta or Atlanta Web Entrepreneurs, Jeff is anxious and willing to help build a strong e-entrepreneur community right here in the SE. Let's hope our entrenched media establishment, some of which he talks about in his blog entry, will keep the faith, the open mind and the initiative needed to help drive just this very thing -- a vibrant web-based entrepreneurial environment and community. Not only is it in our interest, their audience base and eyeballs, it would seem to be in their own self-preservation interests too.

FYI... Jeff's on to BarCamp Atlanta come October! I say... whatever was strong in Mr. Payne, is also strong in Mr. Haynie. Let's move beyond the entrenched way of doing things, the good 'ole boy network. Let's learn, create -- and above all -- share.

Making Integrated Media

Here's a fascinating conversation with Vicki Lynne of Satellite Event Enterprises about blowing-out an event and a marketing campaign in all possible social media ways you can think of! She's really nailed the strategy and the mindset; it's all about... integrating media.

Power Down South

I'm going off the grid, moreorless, for a couple of weeks. I want to reconnect and commune with the beach, the mountains, my daughter, and friends and family outside of Georgia. If I can't incorporate such extreme basics of my existence into what I do as I move forward in business and media endeavors, then what's the point? I want to do some serious thinking-on about The South too, about where do southerners come into the Big Picture of a transforming media landscape? And for what purpose?

I woke-up thinking some oddly positive thoughts about one day not prefacing everything regarding The South with those catch-all phrases trotted out in the news about us, such as "lagging behind", "catch-up to the rest of the country", "dead last"... you get the point.

The sobering reality was that I turned on the morning radio news and was immediately blasted a national news story about the soaring infant mortality rate among blacks in Mississippi. This after having just read a long piece in the excellent Southern Cultures Magazine about South Carolina chronically "lagging" (there's that annoying word again) in economic development due to its chronically undereducated populace.

S.C., as futurist at least, seems to be unable to envision an educated populace; thus state government continues to cut education funding for the sake of low taxes. For instance, less than a quarter of the adult population holds any kind of higher education degree, undergrad and beyond. On the other hand, S.C. does have one of the lowest taxation rates in the country. Around 10% paid to the state per resident.

Then there's always race... In a recent interview with the Charleston paper, The Post and Courier, as she departs for Seattle's school system, Charleston's school superintendent, Ms. Goodloe-Johnson, a black woman, spoke frankly about race and the legacy of slavery on the education process in the South.

Q: You've lived in Texas, Colorado and Nebraska. How does Charleston compare?

A: It's by far the most segregated and racist, and I think that's a function of the South, too.

Q: How would you say the legacy of slavery, particularly in this community, affects the school district?

A: I think it had a dramatic impact that sometimes isn't seen. Because there's a lot of times I would say to my husband, 'That is plantation mentality.' And by that I mean that people tend to be too complacent. They sit back and allow things to happen to them, and that's slavery. I would tell people all the time, 'Slavery is over. Nobody is controlling you. Nobody is telling you what you can't have. Don't allow people to disrespect you and tell you what you can't have.' That's plantation mentality, and it's so obvious here. But I don't think people see it.

Q: What's an example?

A: Let's talk about failing schools. We should not be in a situation anywhere where kids are not given what they need because they don't have parents who have voice or who have political clout or come to school board meetings and make noise. We have a responsibility to ensure that poor kids, that black kids are educated well. We shouldn't have the kinds of divides that we do. And that's all about people not having voice. Just think about, if everybody had voice, how different the school district would be. Because people would not have sat back and settled for things. Or, people wouldn't allow for schools — why do we allow schools to fail for 10 years and then fight to keep the structure? Help! I just want to scream! Don't fight for failure. Fight for what's right for kids. Fight for excellence. Fight to be at the table to be a part of the conversation. Nobody is enslaved anymore. This is 2007. You can go and do anything you want to.

The complete interview with Ms. Goodloe-Johnson is here.

With so many regionalized, crushing issues coming into play for The South, who's to say where we go next? Backwards or forwards? I just know it all needs thinking-on from those who can and from those who do -- think about The South that is, and from the social media perspective while we're at it.

Shout-Out To MY Social Network Peeps

I wish I had thought at the event last night (see below entry) to point out that not only do I read my social network peeps' blogs before I read "real news" (and I was able to make that point at least), but that these blogs matter to me in the greatest way possible because they ARE... my social network.

And we all know, no newspaper or TV station or magazine can really rival a person's unique social network... no matter what the age or the generation. And when these media outlets (and investors?) understand that, then we can all move forward, kindasortamaybe, together. But the peeps always go first.

That bring me to another point I must make... I can't begin to tell you what it meant to me to be standing nervously at the front of a room filled with all kinds of writers and old media and journalists and PR folk, and be able to see my social media support team right there in the front row. That is simply immeasurably value that goes so deeply beyond the incessant "monetization of blogs" yadayadayada.

Then again, it can always be measured in the value we place in the bonds of strong friendship.

Thank you guys. Y'all being there meant the world to me, and was the reason the event was so successful. Here's that blogroll that's worth anyone's daily drop-in:

Being Amber Rhea
Radical Georgia Moderate
Drifting Through The Grift
My Urban Report
Narcissistic Graffiti
Going Through The Motions

Chaos In The 'Burbs

This is appalling, children shooting children at a pool party. I'm sure social media tools helped swell the crowd at this particular event, too. And expect cell phone video and pics to surface. Get to Facebook now, AJC and local TV stations. Now's not the time to be wondering WTF is Facebook all about. Duh...

Social media -- embrace it for better or for worse. In good times and very bad times. I really feel for the families who should be commencing a summer of fun instead of a summer of grief. For all the most stupid, stupid reasons. From today's AJC:

Eight other youngsters were wounded in the 'total chaos" that broke out at the party. "People were just peeling out of here. They were running, screaming, carrying on," said Pete Cox, 38, who saw teens scrambling after the melee at the St. Ives Crossing apartment complex in Stockbridge. Cox lives near the apartments' clubhouse, where the graduation party was held. Police said attendance may have swelled to 300 teens before a fight broke out and shots were fired. Police said the two slain teenagers were shot.

Full story here. There's a link to a WSB-TV video package too, but who knows where that lives at the AJC. Not on the story page I see

Another angle for local media and bloggers to work that could incorporate citizen journalism is how will, if at all, Grady Hospital factors into this chaotic crime scene? This is a great opportunity to put the face of immediate reality, particularly in the 'burbs, onto the ongoing story about Grady.

Media On The Verge

Click To Play

VON07 wrap up video

(or click here)

Wow... I can feel the VON energy and passion coming over the tubes with Jim's package about the (video on the 'net) conference. I actually feel hopeful, for the first time since I read Mel's remarks at least, about the future of new media. Gawd, I wish I had been there.

I'm so psyched for all the guys (shit, it was freakin' Guy World out there. No wonder I wanted to be there so bad) who were able to network amongst themselves. And I'm so proud of an old dog like Jim Long out there learning new tricks, and showing off considerable ones of his own to these young guns and new entrepreneurs too.

Awesome! Sign me up for Boston this fall.

Who's The Redolant Remora Fish Now?

NEWSFLASH: MSM now working for us. See here and here. Shall we commence cultural re-educational initiative today or next week? Lemme check with the cabal first.

Bum Rush The Charts Today

Well, today's the day! The day to go to iTunes and download the song "Mine Again" by Black Lab and see if an indie social media effort can take this song to #1 on the iTunes sales chart for the day. I'm gonna go buy it and see what happens. If nothing, I'm going back in my den for the rest of the year.

If the effort does makes news, well... who knows, maybe I'll be inspired to keep on bloggin'. After all, PodCamp Atlanta went right up the Technorati rankings, and we hardly expected that. So who knows what'll happen today! Let's make it a good one for Black Lab. The song's pretty and bittersweet, just the way I like 'em. You, of course, will have to decide for yourself if Mine Again is one you'd want for your iPod. (FYI... Black Lab will donate their portion of today's sales to a college scholarship fund.)

Here's more on the below clip if you need it. Now BumRushTheCharts!


Bum Rush The Charts

Let's Conversation! About BumRushTheCharts

Social media is not a trend; it's a force. More info about BumRushThe Charts is here.

UPDATE: Speak of the devil/Pogues/Kirsty MacColl yesterday, here's today's NYT with today's Mr. MacGown, on IRA nostalgia, Wordworth vs. Coleridge, etc. Kinda weird, eh?

Technorati tag: BRTC, Bum Rush The Charts

Those Wacky NABET Dudes

Click To Play

(or click here)

My favorite (DC) NABE, Jim Long, keeps playing in the social media sandbox. What will the NBC suits think? Heck, what will POTUS think! And will Jim keep his day job? Will he want to when he wins the 25K purse from this contest?

So many unanswered questions, but one thing a lot of folks might want to ponder over in their squirrelly, entrepreneurial-ish minds... when more and more of this generation and this skill set hit the social media scene, run for cover, youths. The bar's going to be re-set. Real high too.

The big guys are in the house now, so Ladies and Gents, I give you Jim Long, or @NewMediaJim over on the Twitter box.

Because The Political Is Social

Seems Republicans have tried their best to ruin the social inherent in the political process (beats me why), so let's just put the social and the political right back where they belong - together at last!

Angela Trigg of Trigger ID has launched a killer social media site for ALL of us politically-minded bloggers and yappers around the South. Now this is my idea of money and time well spent.

What are you waiting for?!! Jump on in and join the (beta) political reindeer games at A Donkey and An Elephant Walk Into A Bar dot com. Meet you there!

Sorry Peach Pundit, AD&E has tons more bells and whistles. Was nice while it lasted though. I take only fond memories with me. (And yeah, that's a southern gal's kiss-off.)

Citizen Journalism

Our Leonard (I say "our" as he was one of the first people I met through Atlanta Media Bloggers. Speaking of AMB, we need to regroup, eh gang? Kinda let the group slide into Jello. I'll talk to Sherry about that at PodCamp Atlanta, where, BTW, I'll be rapping for two sessions on Saturday March 17: one at 11:30am about Old Media vs. New Media, and then again at 1:30pm on a video blogging panel. So mark your calendars for PodCamp Atlanta, March 16-18 at Emory. Come yap with me! SG - flight attendant on the social media star fleet.)

Anyways, back to the point here about Leonard Witt, he's blogging like a man on fire about citizen journalism, using the AJC time and time again as an example of what happens when you miss the boat and simply "don't get it." Get on over to his PJNet and learn something (all you'll get here is rant and attitude of course), particularly about this Open Source radio. I'm headed there now.

Journalists want to get paid to write about the community and the world they live in. But God forbid they have to sit down at the same table with it. Shame. It's a great raucous party really. They're the ones missing all the fun.

Reminds me of how so very often I'm asked if I get paid to blog. Or why would I bother if I don't. And I have to say that I get paid just fine, in full and often. It's not just necessarily with cold hard cash; fond as I am of that, I also love my fringe bennies. And sometimes, they turn out to be more valuable. Time will tell. Besides, this dude says he'd hire me to blog!

Keep hope alive.

Measuring Your Time Investment in SoCon07

Can you measure the value of attending a blogger un-conference? Why yes Katie Scarlett, I believe you can. Since attending SoCon07 just yesterday, posting on the CrowdVine networking site that Tony Stubblebine built just for SoCon07, networking, talking, meeting for about an 8 hour period (if you count the dinner Friday night) my Technorati ranking climbed by about 4,000 "points." Ahhhh..... social media, where everything, success or failure, is measurable.

Thanks for the CrowdVine site, Tony! And sorry we didn't have a chance to chat more. Next conference.

Clap Your Hands Say Do It Yourself

While I'm not a massive Clap Your Hands Say Yeah music fan, I am a HUGE fan of their business model -- which is based entirely on the (savvy) use of social media. Recently, Ugly Bobby said something dumb about their sales (see #47) because the CYHSY manager, Nick Stern, sent Bobby Lestat this email message below, which kinda sums up just who's going to define success from here on out. Hint: we are!

Hi Bob,
As usual, I'm shocked by your attitude towards Clap Your Hands Say Yeah. I'm convinced you haven't listened to their new record, and I'm saddened that the model created with this band isn't given more recognition by the one person who has called for all the changes we've actually put into practice. To call what we're doing "IRRELEVANT" undermines every single email you send out.

"There's no buzz here, nobody cares."
I don't know what world you're living in, but I think selling 19,000 records in a week means lots of people care. Maybe you're talking about that traditional buzz you're used to, the barrage of radio and video, snipes and singles, playing the game. This is a band that's never made a video, never played with Nickelback at a radio show, never done all those things every other band is forced to do.

The marketing/publicity/radio/video budget for this record is under $15,000. They made a record, they put it out. And they live much better than 95% of all bands I've worked with, including the vast majority of acts I worked with during my time at a major - all this while owning their masters and publishing, touring in a bus, and not being forced to do anything they don't want to.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xUIsP23LTk0

You're so fond of using Pollstar numbers to prove people don't care about bands - go check out ours, from around the world. You'll see the band has been headlining shows for a year now, and maybe 5 or so haven't sold out. Check the numbers from last time they were in LA, two sold out nights at the Fonda. Check out the numbers in Tokyo, London, Paris, Hamburg, Minneapolis, Boston, Chicago, Seattle....go look Bob, you'll see that people do actually care ALOT about this band.

Last year you made some list of 25 things that band's should or shouldn't do. CYHSY had followed 24 of them, the one exception being that they played Letterman. I can never fault a band for wanting to play that show. It's fun playing on the same stage the Beatles played on. But seeing as how we're pretty much your poster children, I'm amazed you don't show us more respect. And go listen to their music. You might actually like it.

Nick Stern
Manager, Clap Your Hands Say Yeah

Greatness Makes Our Happy Meals Possible

First Stephen Colbert sticks a red hot poker in the eye of the media elite at the '06 White House Correspondent's dinner. (Some say Colbert should have been Person of The Year. Ain't that the truthiness.) Now Bill Moyers is preaching from the Church of Social Media to kick-start '07.

Wonder if they're listening out there in La-La Land? Rest assured, the liars and charlatans like Edelman, the networks, Madison Avenue and certain music industry types aren't ever gonna get it. They'll just keep charging, flailing up to the front of the parade they think they're gonna lead, the parade they never even knew existed until it about turned the corner for Main Street. They'll be overrun by the circus freaks and clowns and geeks and monkeys from the back - again.

This Moyers speech is so important I hope you will take the time to read it all. This excerpt is from Craig Aaron of FreePress. net, covering the National Conference for Media Reform, taking place this weekend in Memphis. (And yeah, I'd have sold my momma, again, to have been there, but some of us are busy committing original content in our own backyards; others are simply conference addicts.)

Journalist and author Bill Moyers denounced Big Media corporations Friday in a fiery speech that opened the National Conference for Media Reform in Memphis.

Moyers told a packed house of more than 3,000 activists and organizers that the independent press is under sustained attack, with a few corporations conspiring with political leaders to create an Orwellian world "in which language conceals reality, and the pursuit of personal gain and partisan power are wrapped in rhetoric that turns truth to lies and lies to truth."

Full video and audio of Moyers' Speech is available at http://www.freepress.net/conference

Evoking the legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Moyers compared big media corporations to plantation owners and American media consumers to their slaves.

“What happened to radio, happened to television, and then it happened to cable. If we are not diligent, then it will happen to the Internet, [creating] a media plantation for the 21st century dominated by the same corporate and ideological forces that have controlled the media for the last 50 years.”

“Something is wrong with this system,” Moyers added. “This is the moment freedom begins, the moment you realize someone else has been writing your story, and it’s time you took the pen from his hand and started writing it yourself.”

Moyers honed in on the issue of Net Neutrality, which he dubbed the “Equal Access Provision of the Internet,” and praised SavetheInternet.com’s grassroots and online organizing efforts, saying that Washington hadn’t reckoned with this movement “that once again reminded the powers that be that people want the media to foster democracy, not to quench it.”

Moyers called the SavetheInternet.com campaign critical, as soon virtually all media will be delivered to homes via a single high speed broadband connection. “We now have it in our means to tell a different story than Big Media,” Moyers said. “This is the great gift of the digital revolution, and you must never let them take it away from you.”

All coverage from Memphis is here.