Rock and Roll Faux of Fame (ver 1.1) #RnRFoF

I figure SOMEONE needs to be in charge in cataloguing the huge number of completely awesome band names that emerge in Twitter. 

I'll gladly assume that responsibility. 

Here is a small starter list, please comment/e-mail/tweet me with others.

ROCK AND ROLL FAUX OF FAME (#RnRFoF) Ver 1.1
 
Selfish Porcupine, Bionic Turtle - @anniecolbert
 
Cake Zombies - @YeungJeans 

God Particle -  @natekelly

Arboretum Pathway - @TakeSumE    http://twitpic.com/7w4xl2

Biopsychosocial Context - @garwboy

Tattered Libido - @orzelc

 

Massive Thatchers - @megpickard
 

Fountains of Methane - @lastcurfew
 

Joplin - @LisaMarieBowman
 
Social Butterflies - @sarahvargo

I am not including my "Rhymes With Bunt", because that is not the kind of band name you share with polite company.

Many, many, more to come...

ver 1.1: added @anniecolbert names. I am ashamed I missed them initially

Facebook, Twitter, Google+ breakdown

Just felt like sharing some trends I have noticed in using Facebook, Twitter, and Google+ simultaneously 

                                                                FACEBOOK        TWITTER           GOOGLE+

How much I care if there are
more people following/friending me              Not at all                  Tons                  Not at all
than I follow/friend

Percent of posts related to Google+          
(which I mainly do now to annoy                 15%                         20%                      60%
Matt Cava)  

Percent of connections that pretty               85%                          30%                      15%
much hate me    

Where do I post the most                            3                               1                           2

Where do people respond to my                  2                               3                           1
posts the most?

Average percent evil I operate at                80%                           75%                      30%
(Note: 92% is my upper limit)

Where do I make new connections             3                                 2                           1

Places where my posts are                        1                                 1                            1
superior to Christy Berka's

What do I check first?                               3                                 1                            2

Connections                                             430                            1,257                     148

Will probably add to this later on.

Here is why the universe is a safer place since I stopped coding

DO UNTIL (you figure out where to post)

  IF (you live for Farmville) THEN
      USE [facebook]
  ELSE
      IF (interested-based relationships are your thing) THEN
          IF (you are long-winded) THEN
             USE [google+]
          ELSE
             USE [twitter]
          END IF
     ELSE
         IF (personal-based relationships are your thing) THEN
             IF (you actually have personal relationships in good standing) THEN
                  USE [facebook]
             ELSE
                  USE [craigslist]
             END IF
         ELSE
              USE [angry birds]
         END IF
    END IF

END UNTIL

Google+

So, I have been playing with Google+ (gplus.to/kellythul) and here are some early observations:

• Location check-in is super crazy easy
   
• Appears to be plan to fold in Blogger to some degree.  If that is deep integration, it is going to confuse me.  I have viewed this blog and my Twitter and Facebook activity as connected, but different
   
• Circles look to be an effective way to organize feeds to work, home, industry, etc. -- IF you approach them thoughtfully and have some level of organizational skill.  So, I'm doomed pretty much
   
• The "sparks" feature is an awesome way to catch posts on your interests (and yes, the first one I set up was for Alice Cooper).  Sparks will be wasting much of my remaining existence
  
• As you would expect, works quite well on my Droid.  Not sure how the mobile integration will happen for iPhone users - but it clearly has to somehow/sometime.  Not that I associate with iPhone users of course
    
• Today was the first day where for a fleeting moment I wondered if my Facebook page will end up like my I-think-I-have-one-but-not-completely-sure MySpace page.  It was fleeting, but it crossed my mind
   
• Still seeing big differences in my use of Google+ and Twitter.  Google+ does not appear to be a particularly nurturing environment for hashtag games... and I GOTS to have my hashtag games

More to come... someday.

The Unbearable Niceness of Being

The evening of June 8, I tweeted/wall posted the following:

 

@kellythul I plan to be pleasant and supportive in person and in social media tomorrow. Just to confuse people. 

This resulted in some interesting observations during the longest June 9th of my life (that STILL isn't over as I write this).  These observations included:

 

1. I like to pick on people - I really do.  I started to twitch when a nemesis posted the morning downpour made her look like a "wet dog", and all I could say was "Sorry to hear!".  I had several more interesting thoughts I could have offered related to the "wet dog" that was served to me on a silver doggie bowl.
    
2. People expect me to be unpleasant - Greeting people with a simple "Hello" or "Nice to see you" left both of us standing there confused... waiting for the next comment to undo the initial pleasantries.  The number of "OK, now you are starting to creep me out" also grew as I remained true to only uttering pleasant/supportive comments throughout the day.
    
3. People like to pick on me - Easy target to be sure.  I am shoe lace challenged, unfettered by focus, and just a tad goofy.  But it is less fun to point that out if I just reply nicely.
    
4. The further away you are from me, the more you like me (keeping in mind everything is relative) - In aggregate, my Facebook connections are more local, while my Twitter gang is far more distributed.  Barely a ripple occurred in Twitter when I posted my ill-advised "niceness day" plan, but Facebook lit up with a VERY heavy skepticism that I could pull it off. 

So, all in all, it was an interesting experiment I have little desire to repeat again any time soon. 

 

So, I'll hang on until midnight tonight with the whole "nice" thing, but look forward to a June 10th dedicated to catching up with a few people.

 

#EOTS

I expect many of the readers of this blog are like me.  Kind.  Friendly.  Always willing to offer words of support.  Basically a walking human hug.

One would think that a person with these characteristics would attract Twitter followers and/or Facebook friends sharing a similar temperament. 

Sadly, I have been beset with Twitter/Facebook connections that attack my age, musical tastes, general intellect, sports team alignment, shoelace status... just to name a few of the topics they smack talk me on.   Always unprovoked.  Always undeserved.

While the only road I have a map for is the high road, I was finally left with no choice but to establish "Enemy of the State" lists in both Facebook and Twitter.  Since the Twitter one is more accessible, here it is:

http://twitter.com/#!/kellythul/enemies-of-the-state

The basic workflow is as follows:

1. You wrong me (consistently unjustified)
2. I add you to the appropriate "Enemy of the State" list
3. I virtually point at you and in a loud and commanding voice declare you an ENEMY OF THE STATE! (and hashtag you with #EOTS in my Twitter declaration of your enemyness)
4. I feel better

Just hoping there are high limits for how many people I can add to these lists

Snow is just God's way of trying to kill you

Well, here I sit in Bloomington Illinois, waiting for 12, 24, or 30 inches of snow over the next few days.

Bloomington is noted for it's large strip mall and chain restaurant population, Beer Nuts, Lincoln stretched his legs here once... and a surprising large and active Twitter community.

Often, the somewhat unfortunate hashtag #blono is used for our area. We (blo) are part of a twin city thing with city of Normal (no). Yup, we are not Normal, just near it.

So, given the potential dire problems that could emerge with the storm, the #blono Twitter community has sprung it action.

We are trying to pick the right hashtag for the storm.

Options include..

#bilizzkrieg
#BloSno
#BlonoBlizathon
#blonosnowpocalypse
#snowkrieg
#Snowmageddon11
#snowpocalypse
#snoprah
#SnotoriousBIG

#snoprah is mine and is best followed by bellowing "IT'S HUGE", but I have to cast my vote for #SnotoriousBIG by @christyberka. This pains me, because I hate @christyberka. But it is a heck of a name.

Just wanted to provide an update and close by quoting a heartfelt tweet from yours truly...

@Kellythul: I am afraid this storm is so bad we have simply no choice and must burn Justin Bieber as fuel.

In defense of Jay Cutler

I have been a Bear fan for a looong time. "Quarterback poor" would be a generous assessment of Chicago Bear fandom in the post-Luckman years/decades. The bright spots for me...

• Bobby Douglas - ran for 1,000 yards, passed for significantly less, and actually spent some time in the White Sox farm system
  
  
• Bouncing Bob Avellini - A lumbering mass of a QB, drop back challenged, and half of the Avellini-Latta combo that terrorized defensive secondaries (about 3 times)
  
  
• Jim McMahon - played hard / partied hard, smartass, and a wannabe offensive lineman. Jim actually made the Pro Bowl. A Bear's QB in the PRO BOWL! My head almost exploded. Best I can tell, he showed up drunk to that game
  

And then came Jay Cutler. The savior from Denver. The man that would wash the visions of Henry Burris away FOREVER.

Wellll... that has not quite happened yet. Turns out Jay is not "Mr. Instant Offense" or "Mr. Personality" either.

It is not Jay's fault that his default facial expression is best described as "laconic mopery". It is his fault that he won't even cast a glance at fans trying to high five him from the end zone seats after he runs it in for a TD at home.

And then came the NFC championship game.

He didn't spark the offense. He painted the sidelines with his grimstorm of body english. Then he left EARLY for the locker room after another hope crushing INT. THEN according to Twitter, he quit.

In fact, one wiseguy fan trotted out this little tweet-o-venom...

Rodney Dangerfield's "oh my arm, oh my arm" in Caddyshack was more believable than Cutler's knee injury #bears

Yes, that was me, @kellythul on Twitter (follow me for more treasures like the item above)

We all had a story line and refined it real time via Twitter. Twitter, our friend, our enemy. Twitter, where speed and rush to judgment can too easily trump gathering actual facts.

Best I can tell, leveraging these pesky "fact" things, it appears Jay actually WAS injured in the 1st half. Stayed in the game and tried. In pain. Came out the second half and tried. In pain.

I didn't tweet about that. Didn't lend itself to 140 characters of snarky.

So, I apologize to Jay (knowing full well he would be indifferent). I hold out hope that he will emerge as a leader and the kind of QB you are so glad you have when your team is down 7 with 1:40 to go in the game. A QB that gives you hope.

All that being said, props to Caleb Hanie for making a painful game interesting for a bit. But seriously... if your name is "Caleb Hanie", how is sporting a trailer park mustache a good idea?

Guess it is better than Kyle Orton's neck beard.

Profilin'

Boilerplate Kelly Thul profile:

Serial Dabbler. Hippie anarchist. 92% evil.

Commentary here is my own and does not represent my employer's positions, strategies, or opinions.

On occasion, I get the chance to speak to groups. I was a last minute sub recently and the organizer must of Googled me. He responded back to the person I was subbing for asking: "Is he the 92% evil guy?? If he is, hope we get the other 8%!"

So, figured it might be good to explain this a bit...

1. Serial dabbler - I am. To my core. I learn best via experience and be it Geocities, Amiga game development, Digg, generation zero stream-powered MP3 players, Xtranormal, Sea Monkeys... whatever - I try it out to attempt to gain a better understanding.
   
   
2. Hippie Anarchist - A coworker, and shockingly human-like lawyer, gave me this tag. It comes from a LA Times article quote from Thomas Nolle, "The problem is that it (the Internet) was devised by a bunch of hippie anarchists...". She viewed the folks mentioned in the quote and I as kindred spirits. She was pretty much right.
   
   
3. 92% evil - This was the score I received after completing a Facebook "How evil are you?" quiz. We are all aware of the rigorous scientific method Facebook insists upon for a quiz like this - so the results are not to be questioned. Most of the people I work with think the score is low BTW.
   
   
4. Commentary here is my own and does not represent my employer's positions, strategies, or opinions - Back to the serial dabbler/experiential learner thing. Social create this huge band of blur between professional and private musings. I want to understand it better, so here I sit blogging, tweeting, etc... to learn.
   
   I am a huge fan of the organization I work for and I am transparent as I can be when I talk about it. When I am not talking about it, I hope the language above helps create the appropriate distinction. While I think (hope) my company considers me an OK guy, I am certain my content (a mix of Alice Cooper/Star Wars/geekdom/zombies/White Sox/Nancy Grace hatred) is not reflected in company brand/communication objectives.
   
   Which is fine - for both of us :)

BTW, I am going to blog sometime on my favorite Twitter profiles later, but had to share my all time favorite one.

From @TakeSumE ...

I killed a lot of hitchhikers once.

Hashtaggery

I really enjoy Twitter. It speaks to me because...

1. Any insight I have usually runs out of gas in 140 characters or less
   
   
2. It is a fantastic instant news source. I am SO on top of where earthquakes hit now - instantly
   
   
3. It is a match.com for kindred spirits for any topic or idea. Examples include: Alice Cooper, Star Wars, social media, White Sox, the fake rock group Joplin, lobsters becoming our overloads, etc..
   
   
4. Unlike my e-mail inbox, no harm/no foul if I miss something
   
   
5. The warm glow of retweeting and being retweeted
   
   
6. Hash tag fun

Let's dwell on number 6 for a moment.

How fun is it to participate or start a dialogue in Twitter framed by a hashtag?? #realfun!

I love trying to come up with #badstarwarsnames, joining the shared experience of watching #sharktopus together, or asserting something #thatwouldbeawesome.

With hashtags you can start the dialogie, or simply join in. The one I like to advance is #improvedbyaddingzombies. Now, it has been pointed out, that zombies are awesome and nearly EVERYTHING is improved by their addition, but it is still fun to identify things that become the most enhanced (for example: Swan Lake is clearly #improvedbyaddingzombies)

So join in the hashtag fun, and be sure to share your zombie thoughts.

BTW, if I select the "Babe Ruths" of hashtaggery... nationally, I'd have to go with @paulandstorm, and locally @Doc_Shiv.

Retweet vs email forward

Awhile ago, Anil Dash (http://twitter.com/anildash) tweeted..

"It's an interesting accident of history that we consider sharing tweets "retweeting" instead of "forwarding", like in email. RT = FWD?"

This annoyed me on two levels:

• It made me think
• I disagreed, but couldn't pin down why

Upon further reflection (to the degree I can execute that) I still do not think they are the same thing. Why? Well, best I can come up with so far is:

• There is a stronger validation with a retweet than a forward
• My email address book and Twitter follower lists are not identical, and there is a reason for that
• The act of retweeting is more public - those beyond my lists (followers or email) can be exposed to the content I resurface
  

Cheating on my blog with Twitter

I have resolved to get back to posting to a couple of blogs that I have neglected lately.

Trying to understand how I got there.

Was I lazy? Sure, always a bit, but that is not it.

Did I run out of things to say? Unlikely.

I blame Twitter.

Now, I am no 7x24 mad tweeter, but I have had several people mention lately... "Are you on Twitter ALL the time???"

I am not, but I also NEVER had a similar question asked of me regarding blogs.

So, why? Here are some initial thoughts...

• Twitter is easy and quick. I love easy and quick
• Twitter is short. I find most of my insight can indeed be executed in 140 characters
• Twitter seems to connect me to others better - I have more regular tweet readers than blog readers
  

That being said, this was kinda nice. Got to use multiple sentences... spell check... even bullets!!

Worthwhile considering this in a business context. You want people with good thoughts in them to share them. They might be willing to do that, but will want the easiest path. It is probably not and either/or thing, but matching the right person to the right tool could help you succeed.

Kelly
(@kthul on Twitter)

Twitter - FollowFriday

I remain, at best, a Twitter minor leaguer, but thought I would share a few things I learn along the way.

I have not found Twitter's help particularly insightful, so I thought I'd take a shot once in awhile. For many of you it will appear to be the basics, but for the few it is not - hope this helps some.

So, for today, it is FollowFriday. The hash tag #followfriday (maybe more on hash tags later) is basically a way for you to recommend people you like to follow to people following you.

This article recaps the history, growing abuses, and intended use quite well.

So, I'll shut up and let you read ;)

Spontaneous order

Been trying to align Twitter to some economic theory. I a dug around, I came across "Spontaneous order".

First of all - WAY cool concept...

"Spontaneous order is the spontaneous emergence of order out of seeming chaos; the emergence of various kinds of social order from a combination of self-interested individuals who are not intentionally trying to create order." (Wikipedia)

Second, seems to have roots in the Scottish Enlightenment, my FAVORITE enlightenment of all time.

Third, seems to be a good match to what happens in Twitter, but I need to mull it over more.

Skittles

Ok, so Skittles has had their website based on Twitter, Facebook, and Wikipedia in rapid succession. I have to wonder - what is the point? To add insult to injury, they bundled these with some of the most annoying (and persistant) pop ups I have ever seen.

Each version has augered into the ground. Just showing you are aware of these tools and and turn them on is meaningless to me.

There Twitter-base version rapidly pointed out what happens when you stride in with self-serving intentions and a desire to be "cool" - and then let anyone respond.

And respond they did.

Pun 2.0

I guess puns are considered the dregs of humor because, in the end, the wit required to execute one is minimal. I wonder if the same is true for quirky uses of social media for grins. There have been many early adopter humorists out there for each new "hot" technology....

Blogs spawned... Vader's blog

Facebook spawned... a Civil war page

Twitter offers.. history, Batman, and a mime.

I have to admit, each of these made me smile when I first saw them, but wonder how they will age. Vader's blog holds up the best for me right now, but that is one part clever writing by the author and one part I am a hopeless geek.

Email data points

After getting to update data on 79 of the 312 homes in our subdivision (I am the homeowners' association's web/email/newsletter/database guy), thought I would share some insights on our small slice of the world...

- 86% of the homeowners provided an email address
- 50% wrote them so I could read them
- Gmail and Yahoo are the most popular web mail addresses. Live & msn are barely present
- AOL is the Jason of email. Several still out there and they just don't die

And for the gang trumpeting the death of blogs (hope not) and email (I wish); while Twitter is cool and along with Facebook gets first attention from me when I am online - pretty darn sure I am going to need to count on emails verses tweets to engage the gang online for some time.

My Amiga was MUCH easier to work with

Finally spent some time trying to better connect my Twitter account, blog, Facebook, cellphone, iTouch, YouTube, blender, spare socks.....

Some progress, and deeper understanding that these are not things I am gifted in managing.

However, if you are in need of some low resolution animations in Deluxe Paint 2 - I am SO a candidate :)

Happiness is hacking Twitter

If you use a simple password on Twitter, Facebook, MySpace, etc... might want to read this cautionary tale of a Twitter admin who clearly had a positive attitude at least.

Tweeting towards terror

Interesting article on terrorists using Twitter. I think it is a grim reality that each new capability we get that "shrinks the world" can be used as much for evil as good.

I was also struck by an specific section in the article....

"Twitter has also become a social activism tool for socialists, human rights groups, communists, vegetarians, anarchists, religious communities, atheists, political enthusiasts, hacktivists and others to communicate with each other and to send messages to broader audiences,"

First - "hacktivists" - first time I have crossed paths with that term.

Second - first time I have seen vegetarians lumped in with socialists, communists, and anarchists. Kinda speaks to me :)