The Brogan Effect 2: Electric Boogaloo

Last week, I mentioned that a retweet from Chris Brogan had resulted in 21 times my normal daily blog traffic. When I mentioned this, a commenter asked what effect my blog post about "The Brogan Effect" would have on my traffic that day.

As it turns out, a lot.

Once again, according to Lijit, my daily traffic (which normally hovers around 30 visits, or so Lijit tells me) jumped to 563 visits on the day I posted "The Brogan Effect." That's about 18x my normal traffic, or just a hair off from the previous instance. (And, yes, Chris Brogan retweeted *that* day's post too, so the same effect still applies.)

As I mentioned before, Chris isn't the only person who drives traffic to my blog, nor does that traffic always stick around after his initial "must-read" suggestion has been heeded. (In fact, last week, my traffic steadily declined each day after the initial Brogan bump.) But it's becoming clear to me that one way to generate a large amount of daily traffic is to either:

* write a post that the influencers (like Brogan, whose word is trusted among his readers) enjoy and recommend, or

* write about the influencers themselves, because their sheer association with a blog post is somehow magnetic.

This leads me to two larger observations about the future of blogs and media:

* In this new millennium, as Gary Vee implores, anyone can become a content creator, but that's still not enough to topple the existing media congolmerates. However, being a trusted thought leader of thousands *could* be enough, because that kind of clout leverages both the distribution AND marketing power of those corporations into smaller, individualized channels that prompt direct action. (Lucky for you, I've assembled 10 ways to become a thought leader.)

* If writing about the influencers is the best way to aggregate an audience -- at least for a day at a time -- does this mean we'll all be reading (and writing) a lot fewer posts about original concepts and a lot more posts about what other people are already doing? I know none of my posts that involve critical analysis of a subject generate anywhere near the amount of feedback as the sound bite-friendly, personality-driven ones do -- probably because the web isn't designed for analysis, but snapshots of distraction.

All of which means I should probably find a way to work the word "Brogan" into everything I write from now on, just to make sure my bills get paid on time... and so should you.

Image by Randy Stewart.

5 Ways to Positively Disconnect

I'm overwhelmed with media buzz 24 hours a day. I wake up to email and go to sleep with video games. Very little in my day is spent outside the thrall of media consumption.

When I need to clear my head and re-attune myself to what REALLY needs to be done -- or, just as important, what my subconscious tells me I want / ought to be doing -- I need to unplug; sometimes for a few minutes, sometimes for a couple days. If you have trouble doing the same, here are five tips to help you disconnect:

1. Commute in Silence

The drive / ride to work may be a great to time listen to podcasts or the radio, or catch up on phone calls / email. It's also a good chance to disconnect your mind (for a regulated period of time) and let it wander.

Observe your surroundings. People-watch. Listen to the sounds of your car. Maybe you'll notice something you overlooked before, or stumble upon a new idea.

2. Eat Alone

For all the business wisdom associated with NOT eating alone, sometimes a quick lunch or lengthy dinner on your own terms is enough to reset the vibe. Find a window seat. Eat at your own pace. Have dessert. Then return to the issue at hand.

3. Leave the Cell Phone at Home

Blasphemy? Hardly. When I volunteer at the Animal Rescue League in the evenings, I rarely take my cell phone with me. The hour or two that I spend walking dogs is made even more pleasant knowing I won't be interrupted by telemarketers or arbitrary texts.

4. Meditate

Reserve a small portion of your day -- in the morning, after lunch, in the evening -- for voluntary solitary confinement. Find a quiet place where you won't be interrupted. Turn off distractions -- except an alarm clock, if you tend to fall asleep in such circumstances.

Allow your mind to wander freely. Focus on the positives, both real and desired, in your life. Then return to your daily routine with renewed clarity and vigor -- and, perhaps, a few new ideas.

5. Take a Tech-Free Vacation

Unless you're on a business trip, the best thing that can happen to you is to be booked into a hotel with no internet connection. The harder you have to work to stay connected -- where is the nearest internet cafe? -- the easier it is to allow yourself to become disconnected.

When I went to Paris last April, I had no working cell phone and no laptop. We relied on maps, a guidebook and a basic understanding of the French language to get around. And the fact that I couldn't check my mail for three days made me forget why I ever wanted to check it in the first place.

Getting Past the Fear of Seclusion

Society has trained us to believe that we're only experiencing life if we're connected. That's entirely dependent on what your "life" consists of. For most of us, it could (and should) involve a lot more activities without keypads and screens.

Don't think of disconnecting as a negative. Think of it as a way of getting back to that larger life we keep forgetting we're part of.

VON: The Industry Perspective

I don't proclaim to know everything there is to know about our industry. If I did, I'd have retired by now.

But I do know a lot about the content creator's side of the story, and I got a much better perspective of how we're perceived -- and where our industry is heading -- at VON.

Bright, Shiny Things

Six months ago, I said "it's frustrating to be one of the only people in the room (at VON) that gets it."

"It" was the potential of web video, and the other people in the room were primarily old media representatives trying to figure out how to do old things with new media. The possibilities were endless, but they were only interested in looking at it from the pre-existing standpoint of control and monetization, without seeing the bigger picture.

Now, we content creators are no longer the shaggy, ill-portending strangers we may have been percieved as previously. Instead, people recognize that we're here to stay, and that we've earned a place at the table (which we've essentially built ourselves, so thank you).

In one way, we're the bright, shiny things in the room. Everyone else is attracted to our potential, but no one's really sure what to do with us -- or what we CAN do -- yet.

Neither are we.

The Downside

The bulk of the presentations I saw were directed at existing industry employees looking to monetize the space.

This makes absolute sense, because that's who the conference is for. And, without someone finding a way to monetize web video, it won't grow past the YouTube stage anytime soon.

The frustrating part is, listening to a pack of industry "experts" sharing their viewpoints -- and frequently exchanging information that seems flat-out pointless -- does nothing to boost morale among those of us looking to disrupt the playing field. It actually worries me that people are spending this much time, effort and money to NOT get ahead of the curve.

Example: a gentleman from Nielsen was invited to give a presentation on audience metrics. Despite assurances that this man was chock-full of vital information, the six of us from the content creator side could not believe the words coming out of the man's mouth. As any of us will tell you, the high point came in the following quote:

"The bad news is, homes with broadband connections are watching less television."

Um... Bad news for who? Those of us already creating content in this space or those in the industry who still think "Must-See TV" is the cutting edge?

(More alarming: given that the event was called "Video on the Net," who exactly was that comment directed at? The people who see video as a necessary evil, or another task they have to channel into their workflow? Was this conference seen by some as a warning rather than an opportunity?)

Suffice it to say, that kind of talk left a few of us out of the loop on occasion.

The Upside

It's always great to see so many content producers in one spot. Anytime this occurs, a few things happen:

- Old friendships are rekindled
- New friendships are begun
- Information about HOW we do what we do is exchanged, improving everyone's work, and
- New ideas are generated through conversations you just can't have electronically

At an event like this, you also get to take a peek at the new technologies coming down the pipeline and wonder, "What COULD we do with something like this?"

I met so many great people at VON that I don't want to slight anyone by choosing favorites. However, there are three companies whose services stuck in my mind:

- VideoEgg is a service that enables video producers to embed clickable ads in an overlay channel, similar to watching a football game and seeing an ad for the network's news show pop up at the bottom of the screen. Except, in this case, it's clickable. Could be a great alternative to post-roll advertisements. They also offer distribution options through a network of affiliate channels.

- Visible Measures was the exception to the "metrics" rule. These folks understand what we content producers ACTUALLY want: comprehensive understanding of how our audience interacts with our media.

In this case, their systems can analyze every frame of your video and tell you which sections have the highest drop-off rates and which ones are rewound and rewatched the most. Forget "number of plays" -- now you can chart individual interactions on a second-by-second basis. Partner tyhis with an ad overlay service (like VideoEgg) and now you have a marketing weapon.

- Bubble PLY, by PLY Media, is the wild card. I'm most interested in them because, quite simply, I don't think they've yet understood the full potential of their own software.

In a nutshell, this is the interactive web video version of "Pop Up Video": content creators can allow visitors to overlay their own word balloons, thought bubbles and caption boxes atop existing video, thereby changing the content directly by adding a pseudo-narration... or a self-mocking tone... or vital statistics... or trivia... or advertisements... or easter eggs...

The sky's the limit here, and this is one of the first ways I've seen that we at STBD, for example, could open the doors to our audience and allow them to tinker with our "finished product" (i.e., each new episode). We're in discussions with the folks at PLY to see how best we can make this happen. Look for a mini-announcement in the next week.

Summary

We're not light years away from last year's VON Boston, but we have made progress. More than anything else, the space has become MUCH more crowded. If VON Boston was the wild west, this is the Land Rush: everyone wants a stake in what's happening, even if they're not sure what it'll lead to next.

It's a very exciting, occasionally aggravating, and ultimately eye-opening time. Thus, I leave you with three bits of observed wisdom:

1. Make friends. (It's impossible to do this alone. It's even worse to attend an industry cocktail party and not bring business cards.)

2. Keep friends. (It's great to know everyone. It's better to actually know a few people WELL. Those are the people who will make an effort to help you succeed and see you as more than just a number.)

3. Ask questions. (Having surfed the various blogs and Flickr photos after the event, I'm amazed at everyone I didn't talk to. Whether I just didn't see them or I didn't think to introduce myself, there go another 2 dozen great conversations -- and contacts, and resources -- I could have enjoyed.)

Don't confuse this space with something that makes sense. We're all in this together. Start making waves.

5 Ways Twitter Has Changed My Life (After a Week)

I started using Twitter last Monday.

I was wary. I didn't know if it would be worth my time. I didn't understand how another attention-stealing device could improve my life.

After 8 days of use, here are my five observations:

1. Twitter Is Highly Addictive

This is obvious, because that's what Twitter was built to do. It's designed to enthrall the generation that can't help oversharing with itself, 24/7. But it's WHY in which it's addictive that's unusual.

Unlike a publicly-accessible forum, in which you may or may not particularly care what half the commenters have to say, the members of your Twitter group are all friends you've VOLUNTARILY chosen to "follow." This amounts to a nonstop stream-of-consciousness dialogue with the people whose opinions and anecdotes you inherently care about.

In my case, my Twitter friends happen to be a few dozen of the movers and shakers in the new media space. This colors the information I receive. Instead of inane posts from friends whose lives are no more interesting than where they're eating dinner and what they're watching on TV, I get real-time windows into the offices and mobile lives of the people who are changing the way we communicate.

This enables me to take action or supply information as needed on an instantaneous basis, which means I need to stay connected.

2. Twitter Replaces Multiple Websites and Apps

Twitter is billed as a "better IM" -- or, in some circles, the app that will kill blogs -- but I disagree.

I see Twitter as an ever-updating group chat or forum thread. Here, my Twitter friends can post links to news articles they're reading (or writing), events they're attending, pop culture they're consuming and world events they're considering.

Instead of needing to check Digg, Newsvine, CNN and other rapidly-updated sites all day, I can usually gleam the best of the buzz from my Twitter list. If something's relevant or worth talking about, someone on my list probably mentioned it, and included a link.

Instead of leaving Instant Messenger open all day, I now logon only when I'm looking to communicate with someone directly and privately and may need to transfer files. (I could do most of that directly in Twitter as well, but I have yet to cycle AIM completely out of my bag of tricks.)

And I check MySpace almost exclusively for business purposes at this point, because the people I'm really interested in keeping up with are on my Twitter list -- and I don't need to waste time opening their messages or approving their comments in Twitter; they're just there.

3. Twitter Inspires Me to Do More

Seeing what everyone on my Twitter list is up to reminds me that I need to keep up with their productivity.

At my old day jobs, I paced my workflow against that of my managers. If they seemed to be slacking, I knew I could slow down because the vibe was mellow. If they were stressed out, I knew I'd better keep my head down and get things done.

Now I can gauge the day's workvibe against my Twitter friends. And since the folks I follow on Twitter are all involved in a medium I'm highly interested in, and their work has massive and far-reaching impacts on the medium (and on me), they set the bar pretty high.

Speaking of which...

4. Twitter Urges Me to Be More Relevant

The meta-conversation my Twitter friends have tends to be the kind of conversation that moves a medium forward. At any given moment, a few of them can be asking questions, soliciting advice and making connections. If I'm fast on the draw, I can be part of the problem-solving process.

Twitter is also a great place for self-promotion. Did you just blog about something? Include a link in your Twitterstream. Are you being interviewed at a certain time and place? Mention that to your "followers." New song? New video? New website you've found that no one else seems to have glommed onto yet? Stake your find on Twitter.

Meanwhile, if I've noticed that 3 or 4 of my own most recent Twitter updates are of the "what I ate for dinner" variety, I realize I need to get back to work...

5. Twitter Reminds Me to Get Up Earlier

If I didn't realize I was wasting time by sleeping in before, I certainly do now.

It's embarrassing to see Chris Penn posting a new Financial Aid Podcast, Chris Brogan wading through three meetings, Jeff Pulver flying through twelve time zones and Steve Garfield raising the dead before I've even had breakfast.

Striving to keep up with my contemporaries means I need to get at the workload earlier and hit it harder. Otherwise, the dozens of people who get my Twitter updates will start noticing I haven't been around, and they may presume I'm wasting time... and they might be right.

The Last Word

Despite the downsides to the service -- it's obviously growing faster than it can handle, and it doesn't currently support a lot of features that many of us are striving to find workarounds for (like groups, filtering and "highlight reels") -- the immediate upside is hard to argue.

Twitter hasn't yet changed my life in such drastic tones that I can't imagine not having it around. But it certainly does add a new facet to my daily web life that I'm finding increasingly more dynamic by the day. And it enables me to live at the pulse of the new media lifeline.

I don't believe I'm jumping the gun when I say: The revolution will not be televised -- it will be Twittered.

So Much for a 24-7 World...

Have you noticed that the web tends to slow to a crawl on the weekends?

Does anyone else find it ironic that the internet, which is used to connect people 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, operates primarily under the guise of a 9-5 workweek?

What a lot of people forget is that the web is powered by the same people who live a life beyond their monitors... and those peolple tend to need a break on the weekends, too.

In a way, this is a good thing, because the people who READ the blogs and USE the websites need just as much of a break as the people who generate them. Otherwise, we'd all be sailing into information overload.

On the other hand, this still limits the ability of new information to inlfuence us in real time. Just like the frontpage of USA Today's Friday edition usually looks antiquated by Sunday night, many of the conversations we generate during the week seem like completely different animals the following Monday. By the time we've had a break from the norm, our motivations have had a chance to wind down as well, and it can take a huge effort to restart that same energy all over again.

So: what's the solution? Stay connected throughout the weekend and allow the momentum of ideas to continue along their course? Or unplug for the weekend and remind ourselves that there IS a real world?

Who Do You Know?

Yesterday I mentioned that the new media landscape is filled with uncertainty. The main reason most people delve into it is not because of the promise of untold riches or eventual stability, but simply because it's an unexplored territory. With no rules, expect those which we make on our own and agree to follow, it feels more like the Old West than it does a modern media evolution.

In the Old West, the number one goal was survival. Prosperity is great if you can find it, but you can't build your empire unless you have food, water and shelter first. How did the early settlers make their mark on the new territories? They formed small, close-knit communities that provided for one another.

In short, they formed a lifeline.

Last Night's Lifeline

Yesterday evening, I attended the latest monthly PodCamp Pittsburgh Meet-Up. These gatherings of anywhere from a dozen to 40 people are the miniature versions of what we celebrated at PodCamp back in November: an opportunity to have a large conversation and share our individual bits of information with the larger audience.

It's a community-building effort that allows us to form a bond in this new media frontier, so we don't have to walk through the dark alone.

Among the attendees last night were some new faces. Some folks heard about the meet-ups and decided they wanted to take part, ask questions, make connections.

They wanted to shore up their lifeline.

Everyone at the meet-up has an area of expertise. Everyone there knows something -- maybe 2%, maybe 50% -- about what it takes to succeed in this new arena. And everyone there wants to know what everyone else knows, so they can add that experience to their own repertoire.

But, more importantly, they all want to know they have someone they can ask for help.

Cold-Blogging and the Accidental Creation of a Movement

Last year, I started cold-contacting any blog I could find that was talking, even remotely, about web video. As the creator of Something to Be Desired, a web series that's now in its fourth year of existence, I felt I knew something about the medium. What I didn't know was how to get that knowledge out to a larger audience.

The logical thing to do, it seemed, was to contact the people who were already talking about it and ask them if they'd be interested in talking about us.

Some of these cold-contacts worked out. Most didn't. There's no harm in trying, just like there's no harm in being told that someone's not interested in what you have to say -- all you lose is the stamp, or, in this case, the time it took to send the email.

But of the ones that DID work out, one turned into a much larger conversation.

I stumbled across a blog post from someone named Chris Brogan, who was working in the technology field somewhere in Massachusetts. He'd mentioned an idea or two he'd had while exploring YouTube, in a post I found while searching Technorati. I commented on his post and referred him back to STBD, which he then watched and enjoyed enough to write about on his blog.

Instead of one obligatory post, Chris decided to continue the conversation. He had other questions about new media, and some ideas of his own, and he wanted to know what I thought about them. Over time, what started out as a request for media coverage turned into an actual friendship, with each of us bouncing creative ideas off one another and wondering where this all would lead.

During that time, I observed Chris grow from interested outsider to someone who wanted to take action and learn as much about new media as he could. Why? So he could do... something. He didn't know what it would be, and neither did I, but we each new it was different that what he'd been doing. For all we knew, what he wanted to do hadn't even been invented yet.

In order to find out what it was, he'd need to ask questions. He'd need to acquire information.

He'd need to meet people.

Flash forward to September of 2006. By this time, Chris had befriended a number of mediamakers in Boston and beyond, had begun his own podcasts to better understand the medium, and had taught himself as much of the existing infrastructure in this emerging field as he could. Inspired by the communal energy of the experience, and well aware that he needed more information to expand the conversation, he and his fellow Bostonians decided to launch an informal get-together known as PodCamp -- a grassroots meet-up for bloggers, podcasters and other new media creators to share ideas, opinions and connections.

In essence, one gigantic lifeline.

Now an Armada

Over 300 participants arrived in Boston last Septemer to take part in PodCamp. People came from as far away as Florida and California, Canada and England. All of them wanted one specific thing: to talk to other people who "got it."

When you work in any medium, whether you're a bricklayer or a computer programmer, you understand the kindred spirit and ease of dialogue you find when you discover another person who shares your passion. For new media folks, finding a way to talk, face-to-face, with a large group of like-minded individuals was tricky because everything was (and still is) so new. So when the opportunity to shore up their lifelines tenfold appeared in the form of PodCamp, the un-conference was literally flooded with people hungry for that connection.

Based upon the overwhelming success of the first PodCamp, a number of dominos began to fall. (Not least among them was Chris Brogan's newfound job as Community Developer for Network2, a new creation from Jeff Pulver's Pulvermedia group.) Suddenly, that original blog comment I'd made half a year earlier was starting to have major ramifications.

Since September, there have been two other PodCamps, one in Pittsburgh and one in San Francisco. There's another one scheduled this weekend in Toronto, and yet another in New York City in April, with even more to come later in the year (including the second go-rounds from Boston and Pittsburgh). And what happens at each of these events, regardless of the locale and the logistics, is this:

People meet people.

People make connections.

People establish lifelines.

PodCamp for Housewives

What works at PodCamp works in all walks of life, for one simple reason: it's all about communication.

Every one of us has lifelines. Each of us has a tiny mental Rolodex of friends we know we can call on when the going gets tough, or when we need help moving, or when the fuse in the basement blows at 2 AM and suddenly there's no heat.

Others have massive roll calls of people in their life whom they can call on for any question under the sun: doctors, lawyers, mechanics, repairmen, engineers, babysitters, chefs. There's not one pothole on the road of their lives that they can't negotiate with a little help from a friend.

These differences are merely cosmetic. Neither approach is demonstrably more useful than the other. That's because there are three ways to build your lifelines.

Have a LARGE lifeline

Know as many people as possible. Ask questions. Make friends. BE OF VALUE to as many people as possible. MAKE YOURSELF AVAILABLE to as many people as possible. Like the PodCampers, this will enable you to create a multilayered lifeline. And this way, whenever a problem pops up, you have a giant mental Rolodex to refer to. I call this BEING A HUB.

Have a LONG lifeline

If you don't have the time or the inclination to know everyone, GET TO KNOW PEOPLE WHO KNOW PEOPLE. Everyone knows someone. The more everyones you know, the more someones you have access to. It's a degrees-of-separation thing. You don't need to know everyone yourself, but the people you know may know other people you may someday need to know. MAINTAIN YOUR IMMEDIATE CONNECTIONS, and when a problem pops up, you'll be able to ask those immediate friends for referrals down their own lifelines. This is what makes sites like LinkedIn so useful, especially for the people who can't be (or don't want to be) hubs. I call these people THE CONDUITS.

Have a STRONG lifeline

Just as a lengthy lifeline can come in handy when something far outside your comfort zone becomes an issue, so too can a strong connection to your immediate support group. Sometimes it's not about knowing a guy who knows a guy, nor is it about knowing everybody. Sometimes it's just about knowing THE RIGHT PEOPLE. You may not be the center of attention or the person who makes things happen, but if you PROVIDE REAL VALUE in the lives of others, the bonds you form will enable you to weather more storms than the tenuous connections of a long lifeline, and will draw your central connections closer together. BECOME A SPOKE THAT CONNECTS TO A FEW VALUABLE HUBS OR CONDUITS.

Moving Past Survival

The Old West and the image of a lifeline seems apt when dealing with a new territory, whether it's the wild world of web media or the daunting prospect of college in another city. But eventually your needs change. Eventually the border towns are established, and the class schedules have been mastered, and you no longer need to worry about mere survival.

Eventually, you want to prosper.

This is when your lifeline becomes electric.

Now, you no longer need the bare basics. Now you no longer need the food and shelter and security, because those elements -- even if only crudely and impermanently -- have been established. Now you're ready to take action.

But it's impossible to take action alone.

Just like I never would have created something larger than my own portfolio in college without the connections I made to like-minded, motivated friends, and just like PodCamp never would have occurred without a few curious experimenters wondering what they DIDN'T know, the next steps in whatever venture you intend to embark upon -- whether it's repairing your garage or starting a new business -- won't be taken alone.

You need a team.

If your lifeline is large, you'll have dozens of potential teammates to call on from your hub.

If your lifeline is long, you'll have access to all the answers somewhere along the conduit.

If your lifeine is strong, you'll have a select group of dedicated friends to help you tackle the next task.

What you won't have is the worry that you're about to be overwhelmed, or that you're setting off unprepared, or that you won't be able to accomplish what you're intending. Because even if all of those fears turn out to be true, you know you'll be able to make the adjustments, change course or even retreat to dry land and try again later, with more experience and a different point of view.

That's why they call it a lifeline.