Month: November 2018

Getting Lost Along the Way

This from ‘Quitting Instagram: She’s one of the millions disillusioned with social media. But she also helped create it‘ at The Washington Post:

“There was so much pressure to do things that ‘scaled,’ to use the Silicon Valley buzzword,” said Josh Riedel, the third (Instagram) employee after Systrom and Krieger. “But when you have over a billion users, something gets lost along the way.”

My first job was at a tiny grocery store in a busy vacation town. Everyone knew one another. Lots of hand written notes in the employee areas. The express check out aisle was built out of wood.

Then we moved to a bigger store. Suddenly there were people we didn’t know. The charm and grit of those small aisles was replaced by a vastness of overhead lights and neon signs.

Now years later that quaint express lane has been replaced by self-checkout lines.

Lots got lost from that progress, from the growth, from the expansion. I mean, easy to just think nostalgia, right? But same goes for this website stuff.

You’re not “succesful” unless you have a ja-gillion users, or followers, or listeners. The allure of “big enough” is rarely praised.

First Ten is Still Relevant almost Ten Years Later

I love this bit from Seth Godin, riffing on his 2009 post, ‘First, ten.’ There is no sense trying to win 1,000 fans if you can’t see the 10 right in front of you.

“Do your first 10 see your thing and thank you and move on,” asks Seth, “or do they go tell more people?”

If they don’t tell anyone, you need to work on that. Back the drawing board. No amount of tactics or tricks is gonna make it spread, you need to bake that into what you’re selling.

Our Well-Being is All We Got

This is amazing (via CNBC):

Our findings strongly suggest that limiting social media use to approximately 30 minutes per day may lead to significant improvement in well-being.

Read More: https://guilfordjournals.com/doi/10.1521/jscp.2018.37.10.751

How many of us hit 30 minutes by 9am?

I’ve been trying to put two things in my way of checking social media in the morning – do some pushups, then make my bed.

When I do those two things, then I allow myself time to scroll through my social media feeds. Funny thing is, though, after pounding out a few pushups and making my bed, I actually don’t want to open Twitter.

 

Please Secure Your Sites

Been noticing a handful of non-secure music sites lately. I mean, I’m no security expert, but Google has been warning site owners for years (like, 2014) to secure their sites (at the most basic level that means a site starts with https instead of http).

And, I sort of feel like it’s affecting search results. I use web search quite a bit for my day job and I am noticing some sites being left out of my initial search results.

Working All the Channels

I have a love hate relationship with podcasts. Having worked in and around online media for 17 years, I can’t help but wonder about the work flow, the revenue, the sustainability… it’s just stuff that goes thorugh my brain all the time. I can’t help it.

It really seems like so much of podcasting is built via SqaureSpace, Blue Apron, and Freshbooks (at least the stuff I’m listening to). As SNL poked at last weekend, it’s pretty damn predictable. And once those dollars go away, then what?

I’m surprised the skit didn’t include a bit about Patreon, to “support the show” and get exclusive bonus content. Sigh. This is stuff I used to think about with Skull Toaster (RIP 2011-2018), and honestly I’m glad to be out of that game.

But this is all the million dollar question – how do you monetize? How do you support a media project without sponsors, or member support? I’m not trying to answer that here, but I think about that situation a lot.

Post Twitter Living

It was about 2013-2016 when I found a wonderful community of people on Twitter. I had joined Twitter back in 2006, one of the first 2,500 users to sign up for the service.

But then things changed, as my pal Jasper nails:

“I used to tweet about great music but now that Twitter is for Nazis I just write about it here instead.” – Jasper

Years ago I stopped reading blog comments, and then Twitter turned into the blog comments. Sea-lioning. And yeah, Nazis.

Catching up with some blog posts, or swapping some emails, the occasional message – all replace social media wonderfully for me. And you know what? Apple News works wonderfully for me for keeping up without the fire hose of click bait headlines and unending chaos (read ‘Apple News’s Radical Approach: Humans Over Machines‘ over at the NYTimes).

Staying Alive Hopefully

In typical 90s kid fasion, well, most of my wardrobe is black. Usually not a problem in terms of safety, except when that usual afternoon stroll to the coffee shop turns dark because of Daylight Savings Time doing its thing and then you’re walking home dressed entirely in black, with a dark green umbrella in the rain. Oops.

In the spirit of not dying I bought a bright neon green “shell” jacket (a North Face Men’s Resolve 2, to be exact) to wear over my more fashionably adept wardrobe, all in the hopes of not being dead anytime soon. Yes, I thought for a minute to just buy one of those safety vests, to save some money, but really, would life really be worth living at that point?

Ten Hours

I think my new favorite app on iOS is Screen Time. It reminds me that I spend way too much time looking at social media, and I’ve been actively trying to look at it less. Lately I don’t use my phone when making and eating breakfast. Or an hour or so later when I make my french press coffee. Each of these moments might amount to 10 minutes per day, but over seven days that’s.. 70 minutes. Instead, I’ve been slowing replacing the every-so-often dopamine rush of anger / sorrow / terror with nice things:

  • Reading books on my Kindle
  • Stretching
  • Looking out the window at the vast beauty of the changing leaves

The minutes, the time is still the same. I can’t make the water boil any faster. But I can choose how I spend those moments. Am I feeding my body and mind with good things? Or am I giving away my time and energy to a company overrun with trolls and nazis under the guise of “staying current?”

Ten hours is too much.

Just Try Shit

I’ve been trying some workout apps since, well, I have the upper body strength of a desk lamp. I’ve used the Nike Training Club app for awhile, mostly for the videos since I don’t know a lot of the moves, plus it’s free. There’s HIIT Workouts (from the makers of Daily Burn), which is okay, but recently got into Aaptiv.

There’s no video. You just put in your earbuds and go. You can use it for stretching, running, and there’s even “workouts” for winding down to sleep. It’s not free ($100/yr), but it sure beats trying to find stuff on YouTube, or making up my own programs. Plus, honestly, the “encouragement” from the trainers is nice.

That said – just try shit. For working out, buying a new computer, or embarking on a new adventure.

In my early 30s I left NYC on my bike with my laptop and some clothes stuffed into a messenger bag. I didn’t know a whole lot about that sort of “life style,” but wow, I figured it out. Also figured out overnight bus adventures down south, surviving while broke and still traveling, and I guess I figured out how to run a half marathon, too.

But like I said, just try shit. There are a million things to read and videos to watch and podcasts to listen to, but it’s 1000% to just wing it, fuck it up, and keep winging it.

I remember running on back to back days for the first time.

Will I be okay? Will I hurt something? Is this too much?! How will my body react?

Guess what? I lived. I took it slow, made sure I was rested and hydrated, and I did it. No research, no books, no asking my favorite runner icon on Instagram… I mean, there’s a time and place for lots of stuff to dig deeper, but live is for living, so live it up a bit.

More Screen Time Thoughts

In a week I looked at Instagram for about seven hours. Before I get out of bed, have a look. Waiting for my french press to brew. In line at the bank. After a run. These tiny moments add up.

And maybe it’s not all about all the OTHER things I could have done with that time, like worked, or read a book, or stretched, but all the nothingness I could have done.

To stare out the window, look at the trees, a late night walk. Life can’t just be about maximizing every single hour, right?