I’m headed out with some of the other fine members of Team Spring Creek to check out the Womma summit in Las Vegas. If you are headed to the event, please be sure to find me via text, email, twitter or your other favorite social media channel….
Author Archives: Andy Boyer
Thanks UW CIE
Thanks to Professor Mina Yoo and the folks over at the UW Lavin Entrepreneur Program for letting me wax philosophic for 2 hours about Social Media and small business. It’s always nice to get to test a few theories in front of a new audience, so thanks for the invitation.
Twitter recognition of Fall of the Berlin Wall
It may be funny to think that a technology that didn’t even exist in 1989 could do a nice job of commemorating the anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall. But http://www.berlintwitterwall.com is a pretty cool mashup of Twitter feeds from around the world. You don’t need to be a Social Media wonk, or even have a Twitter account to enjoy it.
SonicsCentral.com Reviews Candidates
SonicsCentral.com has done a good job of keeping us up to date on Seattle candidates’ views on the NBA returning to Seattle.
Props to David Nelson of the P-I for asking these questions:
http://blog.seattlepi.com/insidebelltown/archives/182579.asp
Joe Mallahan:
I think we have to work very hard to attract an NBA team back to Seattle. That particular proposal I haven’t examined closely. The NBA’s not coming back if we don’t provide an arena that’s at NBA standards, the NBA’s come a long way. We have to figure a way for private and public dollars to partner to make that happen but it has to be done in a way where it’s not on the backs of the taxpayer. I am committed to working fervently to get a team back. The NBA is a huge part of our culture.
…With the tax payers paying their fair share. That’s a complex formula that we’re going to have to work on and partner with the private interests that are interested in owning an NBA team. As a community we blew it and we have to recover, it’s a big part of our history and culture and I would be very proud if I could help bring a team back.
Mike McGinn:
I need to know more about the proposal before committing to supporting it. My key issue here is ensuring that we’re making a wise investment of public resources into the arena and not finding our self in a position where the city ends up on the hook, these are pretty serious budget times. I’m open to a renovation of Key Arena, but I have to see what the payoff is.
We have to be careful with taxpayers and we have to make sure we’re doing the right thing for the surrounding business district, the arena, and Seattle Center. But I’m certainly open to people making the case.
Apparently, WSDOT Suggests I Move
Oprah’s Flash Mob
You’ve probably seen this, but this is a pretty cool Flash mob. I have no idea how they pulled this off.
Wild MLS Finish
Whether you are a soccer fan or not, if you like sports in general, you have to appreciate the final weekend of the MLS season this Saturday and Sunday.
An 8 team playoff starts next week, with significant advantages for the top 2 seeds in each division. And going into the 30th and final game, 6 teams have punched their ticket, with 6 more teams battling for the final 2 spots. There are about 1000 permutations for which 2 teams will sneak in.
Furthermore, in the West, the 4 teams that have already qualified all have 45, 45, 45, and 44 points respectively. What that means is that virtually any combination of teams could be 1,2,3,4.
TV wise, it couldn’t have worked out any better for MLS, as every game this weekend has playoff implications. Since few of the teams in the race are playing each other, every team has an important game.
I bring this up for our non-soccer fans, to ask you to imagine what the last weekend of November would look like for NCAA football fans, if 6-8 teams had to win to grab the final spots of an 8 team playoff….that would be fun…
Garys Social Media Count
(Finally something somewhat social media related.)
Here’s a fun little ticker from a guy named Gary Hayes and his blog Personalize Media. Who knows if the data is accurate, but it’s fun to watch numbers go up…
Thinking About Charlie Davies
The name “Charlie Davies” was a trending topic today on Twitter. That either means that Twitter is made up of the same nerds who watch soccer, or the U.S. Men’s Soccer Team was finally creeping into the national mindshare. Or, perhaps it means that no matter who the athlete is, even if we don’t know who it is, we feel a need to forward the news.
There are two ways to think about Charlie Davies. First, consider him as a member of the U.S. Soccer team, a man who represents his country on a world stage, who trains with International players in the top league in France, and is/was widely considered to be one of the top players for his country for the next 2 World Cups. That kind of role assumes a level of responsibility. Now think of him from another lens. Consider him as a 23 year old guy making a ton of money, jet setting across the globe to play in the biggest cities in North and Central America, and then travel back for 40 games in France. A kid just a few years out of college, seemingly indestructible, cockily looking ahead 9 months when he’d have a chance to go head to head with the top players from Italy, Brazil, England, etc…
Is it a surprise that the second description of this 23 year old would get in a car 2 hours past his curfew, and be involved in an accident that caused career threatening injuries? So why is it shocking that the first description was involved? Why do we assume that a guy who is on the verge of greatness, may not regress into being the stupid 23 year old we all were? We all have a story in our closet where we realize we tempted fate and she spared us. We all could have been the guy in that car, but the story wouldn’t have been on ESPN.com.
I feel sad for Davies, whose World Cup 2010 run is over, and whose career will never be the same. And also have to be sad for the families of the un-famous other folks in the car with him. One person is dead an done person will have to live with the double guilt of killing one friend and crippling the career of another. But we have to wonder, how can we make these people who we watch and cheer for – how can we make them not do stupid things? Can we?
Our Own Personal Soundtracks
One of my favorite parts of the new Internet Era is the “possibility” that music becomes decentralized. That it’s not the same 5 guys in the same 5 ivory towers deciding what we should like.
We have such huge opportunity to personally evaluate and recommend music to our friends. And as part of this evolution, I suspect we would each have a select list of artists who we dial up for our own personal pleasure that no one else knows. With that as context, my personal soundtrack includes a steady dose of Bob Schneider, Alex Woodard, Reckless Kelly & Micky and the Motorcars.
We suddenly have these great opportunities to find music we like, without the interference of radio. I encourage everyone to explore and share their favorite finds.