I Quit for LIJIT...

toad the bwet sprocket**

Okay, once you get past the name (not just of the post, but of the group...and I blush about both), you'll find a remarkable thing happening. Women talking about creating media, companies and opportunities for themselves. Whatever you want to call it, it's pretty amazing.

Gwen Bell started the group (boulder women engaging tech) about six months ago as a way for women working in the Boulder tech scene to meet one another and have some girl talk. And boy have we. Some weeks there are many women, some just a few. But I always look forward to going because I can vent, share, get feedback on projects and listen to other women who work in jobs where there aren't always a lot of other women. Whether it's eating my baked goods, playing Scrabble or discussing new tools, it's community in action, baby. (It's also a lot of Macs.)

This Saturday, bwet is doing it up. Yep, a big event to discuss women in tech. The Houston chapter (hwet?) is flying in to join us and we want to be sure to show them a good time. Starting at 9:30 am at The Cup (a sponsor...which means free coffee), lots of ladies will be meeting for some conversation and some good times. Did I mention interactive activities are planned?

I'm honored to be one of the "speakers" for the event, but saying that makes it feel like it's something I should be nervous about. It's going to be very chill (read that as I'm not preparing anything) and I'll mainly be talking about what I do with Lijit. One of my favorite Texans, Laura Mayes, of Kirtsy will be telling her story and you don't want to miss that. It's a doozie.

So there you have it. I'm excited to meet some new friends and get inspired. Because that's what happens when estrogen, caffeine and techy girl talk come together.

Do join us.


And big thanks to those local businesses that are helping to make this happen: Metzger and The Cup


**It was either this title or "slippery when bwet".

My first podcast**

**Okay, so it's not really my podcast, but it's definitely the first time I've ever taken part in a podcast.

I met Dave Moyer last year at CSIA when he came by the Lijit booth. As one of only a few younger people (and when I say younger, I mean still a teenager) in attendance, he caught my eye. It also helped that he was a blogger who actually understood what Lijit was doing and was super-easy to talk to.

Flash forward to this year when I noticed that Dave had uninstalled the Lijit search widget. (Gasp!) I reached out to him and he shared his concerns about wanting the widget to match his site better. After pointing him to some of our customization options, Dave sent me an email thanking me and asking if I was interested in being a guest on his podcast. After the initial fear of hearing my voice recorded (who doesn't hate that?), I decided that I really had nothing to lose. I am a community catalyst after all. So why not try out different some different ways of reaching out to the people?

Last week, Dave and one of his co-hosts, Beth interviewed me for their Wordpress podcast, smartly entitled, Wordcast. Both Dave and Beth were incredibly nice and very patient with me. As a newbie, of course, Skype crashed a few times. Dave was good enough to edit most of the technical difficulties out of the show, but if you're interested, he left one in for good measure. (And for the possible comic potential...)

To hear me talk about Lijit, you can find the podcast here. My interview starts at about the 17:45 mark and among other things, I discuss the Lijit Wordpress plug-in (where I give a shout-out to Daniel Weiss, who never believes that I say nice things about him), talk about the benefits of using Lijit, and of course, give Dave a hard time about not reinstalling the widget.

Big thanks to Dave and Beth for having me on the show, for (finally) pronouncing my name correctly, and for being such wonderful hosts!

Transparency with Typepad

Micah wrote a great post yesterday about the transparent techniques we employ at Lijit. I loved his post because it's a facet of our company that I take pride in. We never sat down and decided this is how we were going to do things. It's simply something that happened as a result of who we are as individuals within the company.

This issue is something that everyone deals with at some point or another in their online activities. How much do I share and how honest do I really have to be? And the questions don't get any easier if you work for a company that is espousing transparency.

A perfect example of this occurred yesterday when Typepad went down for a bit. I noticed it when I was cruising around, doing some research for blogging outreaches. Then, I saw someone tweet about the problems they were having with Typepad. (This, for me, is when you know that an issue has become critical. Turns out there were about a dozen mentions on Twitter yesterday of Typepad's troubles...)

How to deal with something like this? Typepad did exactly what they should have done. They talked to their users. Early yesterday evening, I received an email from the CEO of Typepad, apologizing for the problems.

"We know you rely on us to provide superior service and performance, and this morning we let you down. Downtime on your blog is obviously frustrating, both for you and for us, and we are very sorry. I'm writing to assure you that this is unacceptable to us and explain some of the background for the disruption."

He then goes on to explain why the service went down and what new features they were working on. Features that users like me asked for back in January, that take time to implement and that most definitely necessitate some downtime. To finish the email, Typepad's CEO gave everyone his email address and asked for comments, questions and concerns.

That, my friends, is transparency. I've had problems with Typepad before (see...even more transparency!) but the fact that the CEO addressed the problem simply and honestly earned him many points in my book. And that's what it's really all about. Keeping your users informed, addressing their issues and going the extra mile to win them over. It doesn't sound like rocket science but actually pulling it off can feel just as hard.

SXSW Highlights...

Now that I've had a few days to catch up on sleep, I feel that I'm better able to write about the experience I just had in Austin at a little conference known as South by Southwest Interactive. Most people are familiar with the music and film portions of SXSW, but if you're a tech geek, then the Interactive portion of the conference is like Disneyland. But better because there's free booze everywhere. After some reflection, I present my favorite moments from South by (which is what all the cool kids call it):

• The Unicorn

He joined Andrew Hyde's panel about half way through and stole the show. Afterwards, the Unicorn was running around giving everyone high-fives. When I put my hand up in the air to receive, he refused to slap my hand. Ouch. Let me just say that getting dissed by a nonexistent, magical creature doesn't make it hurt any less.

• Bowling for Geeks

It's always fun bowling with your CEO but even better when you're talking trash and throwing strikes. Besides the neon balls, the best part of bowling was when the entire alley got Rick rolled by the guy playing the music videos. Only a bunch of geeks would truly appreciate that!

• Seeing Lijit publishers in action

Everywhere I looked at SXSW, I saw familiar names and URLs. Having the chance to thank users and speak with them firsthand about what they want from Lijit was priceless. I went to a session on building community and one of the speakers, Jake McKee, the Community Guy, was proudly wearing a Lijit t-shirt. Bestill my beating evangelistic heart!

• Blog Network Camp

Lijit was one of the sponsors for this event and there was a great turnout for it. I always get a kick watching Todd, our CEO, give a demo because it re-energizes me and makes me remember why I started working for the company in the first place. Mainly because he's very persuasive and we have a kick-ass search service. The response from the bloggers at the event was positive and we're looking forward to seeing how we can make network search even better!

• How to piss off a blogger

I attended this discussion on blogger relations and was pleased to find out that I don't do any of the things we listed as ways to piss off bloggers. I'm self-taught and it's taken me a year, but I feel that I'm finally in the position to lead one of these panels. As I've always said, if you treat a blogger like you'd like to be treated, you're probably doing the right thing. To read more about what we came up with, check out the post written by the session moderator.

• Hanging in da Bloghaus

This was the place to be to meet anyone who is anyone in the blogging world. Interviews were going on left and right, blog posts were frantically typed, free beer was consumed...and all with the energy and enthusiasm of a frat house. The Bloghaus is where I made the most connections, met the most Twitter friends and rubbed shoulders with the most A-listers. A very dangerous place for someone who freaks out around (very) minor celebrities!

• Cathedral of Junk

There was a Flickr meetup in South Austin in the backyard of a gentleman who has constructed a 20-foot high shrine completely out of junk. How could you say no to seeing that? It was awesome to meet some of the Flickr employees, hang with other geeky photo-types and get away from the convention center for a bit. Did I mention that you can climb the stairs in this temple of junk? And that the Austin City Council has been out to check it (at the request of some neighbors) and has found that the Cathedral of Junk meets all of the city's building codes?

• Learning more about the CEO

Trips like these allow me to see Todd dressed up as a pirate (for a panel he rocked, btw) and present me with the opportunity to learn that we have the same size feet. (No need to mention that I have humongous feet. It's common knowledge.) Good to know that if necessary, I will be able to fill the shoes of the CEO perfectly. Yarrrr....

• The people

Duh. Everywhere you went, there was potential for inspiration and connection. Something about the mellow Austin mood must have rubbed off, because I had no problem walking up to anyone (regardless of their page views) and starting a conversation. It was such an electric energy, matching avatars to faces and meeting new friends. You hear people say it all the time in the online world, but honestly, it really is all about the people. I'm just glad I got to experience it myself in a backdrop as cool as SXSW.

What about the parties, you ask? Well, they were good, but I didn't have my camera on me and I ended up shouting to be heard in those venues. The parties were indeed a good time (especially the one that we helped to sponsor!) but for someone who doesn't like staying out late, they just seemed to drain me of my mornings, my voice and my energy.

That's my wrap-up of what went down at SXSW. If you went, I'd love to hear the stories and pictures that you have to share. And if I promised you a t-shirt and didn't have the right size, shoot me an email and I'll be sure to amend that situation.

(Last photo courtesy of Gwen Bell)

Happy BlogDay!

But really, isn't every day BlogDay? The essence of BlogDay is to open up your world to new and interesting blogs that may not normally enter your radar. Working here at Lijit, I get the chance to explore all sorts of different blogs daily. But it makes me especially happy to know that others are doing the same thing the world over today. Ahhhh....how's that for some blog warm fuzzies....

Here are my 5 blog recommendations--

• Grandma's Musings  Maryellen blogs about life, spirituality and her role as caretaker for her husband of 60 years. A wonderful read filled with insight into life as a senior.

• Help Holy Cross With the second anniversary of Katrina this week, there has been a lot of talk about how the neighborhoods of New Orleans are rebuilding and how much further they have to go. To see a community in action, read this blog. The blueprints and plans for the Global Green/Holy Cross housing project are especially exciting to see...the most sustainable, affordable and green multi-housing unit in the world!

• Life in Hanoi Graham blogs about his experiences as a 46-year old English teacher in Vietnam. His pictures are amazing and he writes with great detail about the many places he visits. The most intriguing to me though are the posts in which he simply details his everyday activities. A great window into a different part of the world.

• The Amazing Adventures of Dietgirl Shauna is an Aussie living in Scotland, chronicling her journey to a healthier way of life. Her sense of humor and active outlook on life make her blog fun to read and a great motivator.

• fotosis John and Connie create handmade analog electronic musical instruments. Besides showing you the cool things they make, they also give instructions on how to make your own instruments at home. Amazing stuff.

While the depth and scope of these blogs is very broad, the one thing they have in common...all Lijit users. That's right. I was turned on to all of these different viewpoints and unique blogs through checking out the new users who have signed up and installed our search wijit. Just goes to show you that it takes all sorts to build a community. And how are you celebrating BlogDay?

My BlogHer 07 Top Ten List

I'm slowly recovering from the estrogen-filled weekend that just occurred in Chicago. It's been hard to process all that happened and even harder to catch up on sleep. In the interest of focusing my thoughts, I came up with a list of the things I liked the most about my very first blogging conference.

1. Saturday's keynote breakfast address about what humans do with artificial intelligence. It was awesome to see three female tech geeks talk shop and let us in on the discussion.They brought up many thoughtful points including the difference between "real" community and viral community, how blogging changes our intimate relationships and the fact that blogging brings out the best and worst in each of us.
2. Receiving a tech support call in my hotel room from Ariel on Saturday night, after the cocktail party, asking for help with setting up her Lijit account.
3. Friday's cocktail party overlooking Lake Michigan...simply spectacular!



4. Hearing Penelope Trunk tell it like it is during the Self-Branding session. She spoke about the importance of leveraging your strengths and speaking up about the great job you're doing. A wonderful speaker who used to be a professional volleyball speaker, she was engaging and inspirational.
5. Making fun of our hotel. We stayed at the W on the Navy Pier and while they tried pull off hip, it ended up cheesy. They renamed everything (housekeeping=styling, doormen=ambassadors, gym=sweat), had the motto of "whatever, whenever", and overcharged me for Internet access.
6. Gwen Bell  pressuring me to Twitter and to become a "power user". While I haven't started twittering yet, I'm seriously considering it. I had a lot of fun twittering vicariously through her.
7. Saturday's closing cocktail party held in the Chicago Children's Museum

I've never partied at quite such a venue before. There were photo booths, free booze and dancing enjoyed by all.

8. Meeting some of my blog crushes...Helen Jane, who promised to wear her Lijit shirt, Rachel Kramer Bussel, who gave me a "spanking" bracelet, and Shuna Fish Lydon....while gaining a few new ones....Bossy, who danced and inspired, the Cookie Lady, who handed out samples, t-shirts and advice, Caroline, who entertained with her conversation and introduced me to the concept of career "scanners" and Jen, who let me borrow her very sharp scissors without any hesitation.
9. The BlogHer un-conference that took place on Sunday. The session was led by Kaliya and was a wonderful way to discuss issues in depth with a smaller group of bloggers.
10. The chance to evangelize Lijit to such a wide audience. As Elisa Camhort said in the opening keynote, "Blogging is the gateway drug of technology." Seeing Lijit resonate with so many women of varying tech skill levels was affirming. Having sweet swag shirts to give away didn't hurt the cause either.

The energy and knowledge that I took with me from Chicago will be with me for a while. Thanks to everyone who made the weekend a smashing success!

Rocky Mountain Blogger Bash: 7 series

It's that time of year again. Time to gather together the region's bloggers to drink and discuss a myriad of topics...like who's buying the next round. This will be my second Blogger Bash (you can read about my first here) and because I like lists, here are the top five reasons that I'm excited about going:

1. I actually know people this time. While they may not acknowledge me outside of a dark bar, it warms my heart to know that I'll be able to call them out by name this time when they don't buy me a drink.
2. I get to stay later. Last Bash, I had an important appointment the next morning and wasn't able to spend time talking with everyone that I wanted to. I also wasn't able to drink as much as I would've liked in order to talk to everyone that I wanted to.
3. My boyfriend will be accompanying me. He didn't go last time because he didn't have a blog (and he was out of town). But since the last Bloggers Bash, he has started blogging, if very infrequently. I secretly think that he started his blog just so that he could go to this esteemed event with me and make sure that none of the other bloggers were wooing me.
4. The opportunity to meet new bloggers! I was supposed to have a rowdy discussion with Left Off Colfax but because of my early departure time, I missed the chance. I'm also interested in hearing what Julio Enriquez has to say about the Denver music scene.
5. I've never been to the Celtic Tavern before, but it has dark wood, cigars, Celtic inspiration and single malt...which means that I'll be in heaven.

If you're a blogger in the area, you should come join us. To RSVP, send a note to Zombyboy, who would love to add you to the list of distinguished guests. In addition, the Bash is occurring on a very special date: 7-07-07. What cooler event could possibly be going on? (I mean, besides this, this, or this.)  I'll be evangelizing Lijit, handing out our cute t-shirts, accepting free shots, and bullshitting with the best bloggers this side of the Missisip. And of course, I'll have my camera ready to capture all the inevitable blogger-on-blogger action...which sounds slightly pornographic and should provide the necessary incentive to show up!

New Media Summit '07

 

Last week, I kidnapped one of our developers, Andy, and ventured into the big city for the Second Annual New Media Summit put on by the good people of Metzger Associates. The big draw for both Andy and I was the fact that Veronica Belmont was going to be on the panel of speakers. (Okay, okay, maybe I was a wee bit interested in what Brad Feld had to say. And I'm not just saying that because he's on our board of directors...) Andy is a big fan of Veronica's podcast and I'm just a big fan of Veronica, namely because she was one of the first to respond to my evangelical outreaches. (As we all know, those first few early adopters bolstered my confidence and earned a spot in my heart!) Joining Brad and Veronica on the panel were Phil Weiser of the CU Law school and J.B. Holston, president of Newsgator.

Some of the topics discussed were net neutrality, cyberbullying, system integration, the role of advertising in new media and everyone's guess as to what web 3.0 would look like. Besides meeting new people and getting to spend some quality time with Andy, I came away from the night with some interesting points to ponder.

• Out of the 40 people in attendance, only 2 used IE Explorer as their browser of choice.

• "Constraints of the past will not hold up in the future."--Brad, on net neutrality

• "JFK would not be president in this current environment because you can't hide anything."--Phil, on transperancy in political campaigns

• "You can't necessarily equate readership with accountability."--Veronica, on the issue of who to trust online

• Veronica used the term "blogicide" to describe what happens to bloggers when they make an inappropriate remark and forget that whatever you put online is there forever.

• "Schools have no idea how to deal with it."--J.B., on cyberbullying amongst kids

• "The level of accuracy in the mainstream media borders on fiction. At least with user-generated content, you know it's their opinion."--Brad, on who to believe when it comes to news

Here's a picture of Andy and Veronica. I had to rescue Veronica from a flock of drooling tech geeks, but she's probably used to that. Notice how Andy is proudly representing Lijit.

            Sorry about the bad pic...my flash wasn't cooperating.

An interesting sight at the end of the evening was the remains of a building that we passed on our way home. I thought it looked cool...

and then Andy told me that it was the old Denver Post building that was recently torn down. New media, anyone?

Evangelism 101

I'm back from NYC and there is nothing like a big Passover dinner with strangers to make you figure out your schpeel. You know, the answers to the questions like "What do you do?" and "You're a what?" It's a good challenge to explain to normal people what it is I do as an evangelist and how Lijit provides a valuable service. But either the Manischewitz was making me more eloquent on the topic or else I'm starting to actually figure out how to better convey my job and my company. Which is a good thing for all involved.

Figuring out evangelism has taken time and thought. I recently did a Google search for Technology Evangelism because I was curious to see what other people had to say about it. After reading a few of the entries, I had a couple of realizations.

• If I were to apply for some the technology evangelism jobs that I found online, I wouldn't be qualified because I lack the technical programming skills that many ask for.
• There are many evangelists out there who dislike/disagree with the title.
• Technology evangelism may just be a marketing buzzword or it may be the next big thing...depending on who you read.
• Since evangelism is a relatively new concept (technology-wise), there are not many hard and fast rules.

Here are some of the more interesting things that I found others saying about evangelism:

I agree with what Will says about being a technology evangelist, but the first commenter suggests an even better title: cruise director.

Henry realizes he's an evangelist while at the GNoTE (Global Network of Technology Evangelists) conference. He shares Guy Kawasaki's advice of working for a company you like and the importance of being enthusiastic about the technology.

Mario has collected some great comments about the future of technology evangelism. Darren Barefoot's comment about evangelism simply being another word for 'community outreach' is spot on.

Ed also talks about the GNoTE conference, but I related most to his thoughts on the traits that technology evangelists share. The paragraph pretty much describes me.

Anil takes the cake for the best picture of an evangelist. He blames Guy Kawasaki for coining the job "title that makes no sense outside of Silicon Valley."

Nick is able to justify his existence as a technology evangelist, which I plan on doing once I actually have business cards.

John posts his rules for evangelists which caused me to think of some of my own rules for evangelism. Mine are pretty simple and can be summed up as: be passionate and creative, attempt to engage users through conversation, always be honest, ask lots of questions and respond to feedback.

Stephanie explains why she left her job as a technology evangelist for Microsoft. I love what she has to say about fitting in at a large corporation and how she just couldn't do it.

The original  evangelistic post by Ben that first got me thinking about how to explain or define what it is I do. Scroll down to the comments section of his post to see my initial response. Despite what the first commenter had to say, I am so not a spammer.

To finish this post, I leave you with an image that I found during my extensive evangelism research. I'm not sure exactly what it has to do with the topic, but I thought maybe I could commission a sweet little Lijit dress, to help in my evangelistic outreaches...We'll see if Todd goes for that.

Humpday Hodgepodge

"Widgets are sexy in 2007 and so I would highly recommend you know what they are."
                                ---Frank Gruber of Somewhat Frank

As Mugatu would say, widgets are so hot right now. Which means that we at Lijit are in the right place at the right time....hopefully with the right message. My job is essentially to push sexy new things on the unassuming blogging public. So watch out. No blogger is safe from getting an outreach plea to bring sexy back to your blog. You know you want to.

How do you know you live in Boulder? In the span of 48 hours, I had two different female friends mention that they were thinking of contacting a dog "communicator" to help them with their dogs. Both of them had problems with their dogs chewing too much and thought that by bringing in an "expert" they would be able to figure out the underlying issues causing the dogs to chew. My first question (besides, are you crazy?) was how does a dog communicator differ from a dog whisperer? The only real response that I could get was that the communicators don't actually have to be around the dog to talk to them; it all happens on a psychic plane. Interesting. So you are basically paying someone to talk to your dog without ever meeting your dog and THAT is how you solve the problem. I thought I had seen it all with organic doggy treats, but I must remind myself that living in Boulder means living with crazy dog-lovers.

Speaking of communicators....leads me to think of community. What is it? How does one build it? How do you know if you are a part of one? I've been doing a lot of thinking on this topic being that my new job is all about reaching out to the blogging community (oh, what a large one it is!) and trying to engage it. I got a huge lead this week when I managed to wrangle myself an invitation to one of the hottest social events of the season. Yep, you guessed it. The Rocky Mountain Blogger Bash 6.0 is coming up and I shall be there, representing Lijit, talking to bloggers and trying to score a free drink or two. I'm super excited about meeting real-live bloggers who live in the same area. It's a small step in the right direction. Thanks again Zombyboy for taking a chance on a newbie.

And finally, to tie it all together....with communicators and community...comes the return of Lost tonight. You know that I will be posting about that tomorrow. As a serious addict, I was concerned with the direction of the third season last year. However, after reading some interviews with the producers and some time apart from the show, I'm hopeful that I will not be disappointed tonight.