courtesy of zazzle.com.au
My brother and I made our way out to Il Motore and the 2nd installment over 2 years of Ignite Montreal, an event which takes place in conjunction with Global Ignite Week. We’d done so on an equally frigid soiree last year.
Courtesy of thecookshack.blogspot.com but likely stolen from elsewhere before that...
Thankfully, I’m well aware of what the acronym in the title stands for. Surprisingly, it takes me a good 4-5 seconds each time I’m forced to recall what it means/stands for. I’m sure a lot of people out there are faced with the same difficulties in processing the infinite amount of abbreviations, so I’ve scoured (ok, ok…I’ve accessed 2 or 3 other sites namely Techterms and Acronyms Online) the web and made a list for your reading pleasure of ones we come across frequently enough.
I must have spent almost 2 hours just tonite procrastinating and being busy checking email and LinkedIn and a myriad of other sites (no Facebook funnily enough…yet – I probably will midway thru this post) – so it’s tough for me to imaging the changes that will have to place if I plan on ever being able to “work” 4 hours a week and make enough coin to pay the bills and the odd night out at The Burgundy Lion.
AJ
This post will also appear on the socialmediabreakfast.com blog. A new site is being launched in there in the next couple of days, thus the group’s founder Bryan Person has asked we refrain from posting new material to the old web property.
See additional party pix at in our FB Album.
I’m sitting down to write this post a little over a week after our first ever Social Media Breakfast Montreal Holiday Cocktail ( a mouthful I know…) took place.
Andrew, Luis, and Mike of KAI Design were kind enough to co-host the affair with Heelatch in their centrally located and super chic studio. Over 50 people were expected at the event, and although we never took an official head count, over the course of the night somewhere close to that number may well have made their way in and out. Why not right? Free food, free booze. Heck, if I were trudging through the snow on my way home from work and known such an event was taking place I would have stumbled in whether I knew anyone or not.
Image credit to 1stwebdesigner.com
There is no such thing as a perfect client. And, as much as you might like to think so, a perfect designer/consultant/idea/friend/parent doesn’t exist either. If after reading that statement you’re saying “whaddya’ mean? I’m damn near as perfect as it gets..”, you and your business/job are already probably already in trouble.
Thankfully I’m offering up some advice. It won’t be perfect, but with a sprinkle of links and references to folks who have played and succeeded in our space, along with some of my personal anecdotes, maybe you’ll see the error in some of your ways and brainstorm some ways you may go about fixing them.
I’ve talked about how the clear conveyance of instructions by and to a client and/or design firm (or any other business for that matter) is critical to a project’s success in the past. My views on the subject certainly haven’t changed much in the year or so that’s gone by, but neither has many of our new clients’ approaches to job specifications and direction when it comes to a design job.
Over on the Duct Tape Marketing Blog, John Jantsch offers up some excellent points in a post titled: How to Collaborate with a Designer. There is no such thing as too much information when it comes to collaborating with a designer/developer – unless you’re relaying fluff (make this “pop”, or “jazz” this up, etc…). Concrete examples work best – visual if possible.
For those who have been living under a rock for the past 4 or 5 years, perhaps you are unfamiliar with this book and author.
The Long Tail by Chris Anderson (editor of Wired Magazine and Founder of TED), has been bouncing around bookshelves (and now tablets and reading devices I suspect) for quite some time. In brief, the book is the end result of the author’s search into how the digital economy has changed business forever, and why this is important to entrepreneurs, artists, businesses, and individuals like you and me. Actually, I shouldn’t say “end result”, as he and others continue to debate the impact of The Long Tail on both markets and the world in general.
This is a guest post by CT Moore.
When Rupert Murdoch shut Google out of its newspaper, the Times alone lost 90% of readers. But what if I told you that Murdoch didn?t have to lock Google out to erect a paywall?
In this day and age, there are countless anecdotes about why paywalls aren’t a viable business model. But that doesn’t mean that you can’t get away with restricting content. Basically, it’s still perfectly viable to (1) restrict your content to registered users only, but (2) still let in Google so that content can still rank in the search engine results pages (SERPs).
The Wolfman
It was a chilly Halloween. So much so that we decided to take our little Giraffe and Tiger to the Faubourg de L’Ile, in Pincourt, Quebec to go trick or treating at an organized 3-5pm event where mall-goers could bring their dressed up kids and do the rounds indoors. Our thought was that maybe, if it rained or snowed, this would be a worthy substitute to the great outdoors and that kids and parents alike could satisfy their sweet tooth.
Brand New World by Max Lenderman
A few weeks ago, I wrote about having attended The Art of Marketing Conference here in Montreal in late September, an event at which Max Lenderman was a speaker. Upon learning I’d secured tickets to the event I made the conscious decision to buy Max’s book and was in the middle of it by the time the conference rolled around.
I am by no means old or very wise. At least not in my own eyes.
Maybe I am to the teen I try and scold who is ripping around my neighborhood and burning stop signs on his bloody scooter at all hours, or to the depanneur cashier who sees me cruise into the store wearing jogging pants and a crusty shirt (I promised myself I’d never wear joggers outside of the house for fear of having given up on life…but they’re just too comfortable). But I don’t care. I’m not old. I may be getting there, but not quite yet.