Archive for the ‘rock’ tag
Outside Lands: The festival where rock ‘n’ roll and tech startups collide
Outside Lands may be the only major outdoors music festival in the world where you’ll receive push notifications about your favorite acts from your iPhone, mingle with executives from trendy tech startups, and be offered gigabytes of storage instead of free beer.
It’s San Francisco, so I’d expect that tech companies would dominate the proceedings this year. If you’re headed out to catch the evening shows or you’re simply curious, here are some of the winning music-meets-tech moments of Outside Lands 2012:
In the Bay Area, you’re never quite free of the advertising push for cloud-based computing. SugarSync, a competitor to Google Drive, Sky Drive and others, gets my vote for the best showing at Outside Lands for its handy recharging station near the main stage, and offer to passers-by of 10 gigabytes of free storage.
But most of all, for convincing one its senior-level executives to don a unicorn mask and SugarSync t-shirt (see below). Now that’s dedication.
Outside Lands Mobile Apps
Outside Lands launched its own mobile apps, which are designed to make it easier for festival-goers to get around. If you’re headed to the festival this afternoon, make sure you download either the free iPhone or Android app. The app includes maps, and a list of options for food, beer, and wine. The in-built GroupMe messaging made it far easier for me to connect with friends, and avoid an annoying string of Facebook messages.
If you’re lucky enough to be attending the festival today, I recommend making a list of your favorite acts via the app. You’ll receive a push notification when these artists take the stage.
The online ticketing service, where a large portion of the festival-goers purchased their passes, set up an air conditioned tent (not that we needed it, given the icelandic temperatures this year) with live DJs, beer and wine, and a sports bar. The tent was strewn with large-screen TVs, which streamed live sports, including major league baseball.
It was never jam-packed, so proved to be the perfect chill-out spot.
PayPal’s tent was absolutely rammed this year. The online payments company set up a tent on the Polo Field for festival-goers to recharge devices and sip Jamba Juice. The juices and smoothies were available to buy via credit card on Here (A PayPal-owned competitor to Square).
PayPal also set up a convenience store for people to pick up sunscreen, mints, and gloves. All the proceeds from the store will be donated to charity: water and the Seva Foundation.
There is still plenty of time to listen in to the live show for free, courtesy of TuneIn. If you’re not familiar with them, TuneIn is a popular radio app for iPhone and Android and is based in Silicon Valley.
Tune in today via the app, and you’ll still be able to catch some headline acts, including Jack White, Stevie Wonder and Bloc Party. Check out the full line-up here.
Filed under: VentureBeat 
Google Doodle Pays Subtle Homage To Mars Rover Curiosity
Unless you live on Mars (wait, that one doesn’t work here…under a rock!), you know by now that the rover Curiosity landed on Mars last night.
Google’s search engine doodle today subtly honored the rover, placing a small drawing of it above a javelin thrower in the Olympics.
Already saw today’s javelin
#GoogleDoodle? You may want to look again, there’s something new roving above the audience. twitter.com/GoogleDoodles/…— Google Doodles (@GoogleDoodles) August 6, 2012
The doodle originally featured just the javelin thrower with a blimp above him, but updated to show Odyssey lowering Curiosity.
Welcome to 2012, where Mars rovers tweet drawings of themselves on Google…
That’s anything but the pits! Look again at the Aug 6
@googledoodles twitter.com/GoogleDoodles/…— Curiosity Rover (@MarsCuriosity) August 6, 2012
10 ways to be a rock star social media manager
The internet is pretty great: It’s allowed the human race to be infinitely more productive as marketers (and as humans on the whole). Still, it can slow us down dramatically unless we manage to avoid time sucks and other distractions. Here are my 10 biggest tips on how to be more productive online, and become a more organized and happy brand ambassador.
Avoid time assassins
The internet, in all of its glory, can occasionally be distracting, and one of the prime ways to end the amusing cycle of cat-videos and games (such as Google Pacman Doodle) is to use a tool that literally makes you get back to your community management responsibilities.
A great example for Chrome users is Stayfocused. This Chrome extension is an easy way to stop unproductive behaviors in their tracks. The overall aim of Stayfocused is to kill the time assassins plaguing the elusive work ethic by giving you time limits on predetermined websites. For example, you can use Stayfocused to block or limit the time you spend on the websites you maintain a love-hate cycle with. (Facebook anyone?) This can increase the amount of time you allot to more productive uses of time, such as syncing with your product team to learn about upcoming exciting announcements, fielding a support question on Twitter, or networking with influencers in your space.
Take a break
One key way to increase your creativity and ability to think with clarity is to give your brain a break. Finding inspiration in the midst of a blank page and frustration can be difficult, so try taking off a couple of minutes away from your work to do something totally relaxing. Donothingfor2minutes.com is a website that makes you do just that — take a couple of minutes to look and listen to waves crashing. If you get antsy and move your mouse, you have to start over. So give into your need to relax for a hot minute.
Focus on the goal ahead
More often than not, it is easy to stop thinking about the purpose of your work, and the overarching goal guiding the task at hand. Instead of beginning repetitive thinking on how difficult or long it will be, try some positive thinking. It is important to step aside from such negative thinking and instead try to focus why you’re doing it: Try to see the work as a way of accomplishing something, instead of some kind of draconian punishment that should be delayed for as long as possible. For example, you might get frustrated answering what seems to be a common question such as “How do I get started with your company” but if you maintain perspective, you will realize that you are signing up new customers!
Turn off your laptop and get some sleep!
One thing which cannot be articulated enough is the importance of sleep. Lack of sleep has been heavily correlated with a multitude of issues, ranging from learning and memory to obesity and heart disease. Furthermore, bright lights coming from electronic devices such as computers, cellphones, and televisions may interfere with the body’s natural circadian rhythms, preventing the easy onset of sleep. This means more time spent getting coffee and less time focusing on writing, re-writing, and re-writing your response to someone on a forum. Don’t over think, go with your gut, and your helpfulness and positivity will shine through.
Clear off your desk(top)
A clean desk (and desktop!) equals a clear mind. People can be highly affected by their surrounding and environment, and an easy way to control your own environment is by organizing your desk. Cables, random piles of paper, and trash can all create visual clutter, which can cause one to feel more stressed than necessary. By clearing off your desk, you can create more workable space, be able to find vital pieces of information with ease, and feel more free to work with management teams without a sense of stress. Toss anything you don’t need or use, organize your files so that they’re easy to find, and try to find home for the things you use the most that is closer to you. The less stress you associate with your space will have a positive impact on your focus on
3 Things to Know About the Bad Pitch blog
Some housekeeping rules regarding the care and feeding of this blog. In addition to reading the posts, you have other opportunities to interact with Bad Pitch content.
1) We want ALL pitches, good, bad and ugly
“Give us your good, your bad…Your unsung pitches yearning to breathe free.” With apologies to lady liberty and all, keep sending bad pitches our way. We keep you and the sender as anonymous as you want. But we also profile good pitches. In fact, you might argue we want those even more than the bad ones. So if you receive a good pitch, send it along with some context as to why it’s good. And if you created a good pitch, send us the pitch and a link to ink. We’ll take it from there.
2) Guest Posts
Guest posts are also welcome. But we don’t recycle…when it comes to guest posts. So if you send us a post, written and ready to publish? We won’t even read it. But if you have an idea? Send it to us and we can go from there. Once it’s written, you own the post. So once it’s published here, you will have ample opportunity to cross-promote and, eventually, recycle…if you choose to do so.
3) Richard vs. Kevin vs. Blogger vs. Name
If you’re sending a pitch to our general email at badpitch AT gmail DOT com, don’t start it with Richard OR Kevin. The person sending it to Richard AND Kevin? They immediately become our bestie. And their pitch will not suck — on principle alone. Every pitch that starts with feigned customization? Those pitches suck on principle alone. But if you send a pitch to NAME? Those make us laugh. At you.
Our readers rock. That means you rock. You have helped us make it clear that our industry will not be defined by the actions of its minority. And, while the above may sound likes rules, these guidelines are hopefully encouraging you with other ways to get your Bad Pitch fix.
:: Kevin Dugan, @prblog
This week’s video roundup: Mayer, Google, hackers, and veterans
What a week it has been, what a rare mood I’m in — why, it’s almost like being in tech!
This week, we’re giving you a quick update on the week’s biggest stories:
- Unless you’ve been living under a rock (and even then), you’ve probably heard that Marissa Mayer left Google to be Yahoo’s new CEO. Good luck, Mariss! (Can we call you Mariss?)
- A new study found that only 15 to 20 percent of Google web search’s above-the-fold real estate was devoted to organic search results. It’s a click war!
- Here’s a security saga: A Russian hacker (our favorite kind) has been giving consumers a way to get in-app purchases free of charge. He’s like Robin Hood, but instead of stealing from the rich, he’s stealing from app developers who may or may not be rich.
- Don’t miss the launch of Vets In Tech! It’s going to bring U.S. war heroes and tech jobs a little bit closer together.
Have a great weekend, folks. Don’t drive like my brother (tune into your other favorite weekly nerd-out show while you still can).
Filed under: VentureBeat 
learn the lyrics, learn english
Make a Picnic Blanket Tote [DIY]
You’ve added a shower curtain liner to keep your picnic blanket from getting soaked by wet grass and you’ve sewn rock pockets to make sure it doesn’t blow away. Complete your picnic blanket trifecta by sewing a tote that keeps your blanket organized and gives you a convenient handle. More »
How To Screw Up Email Like the Pros
This post comes from our Email Marketing Channel Sponsor AWeber.
Although it’s not a holiday, Friday the 13th has morphed into a very special occasion.
We get caught up in superstition, and the idea of bad luck and things going horribly wrong on one particular day almost seems rational.
But as marketers (and human beings), we actually screw up quite a bit. From minor errors to epic fails, none of us are immune — not even marketing rock stars.
Marketing All-Stars Have #FAIL Days, Too
If only we didn’t feel so isolated when those emails slip out with a glaring subject line typo or a missing call to action. Or go to the wrong list. Or simply fall flat.
Who better to console us than the marketing all-stars whose books and blogs we read?
That was precisely the thinking behind our Email Campaign Confessions project.
We asked a bunch of email pros to share stories of their own foibles, flops and email campaigns gone wrong. Then we taped their confessions, and what they did to bounce back, to reinforce important lessons and provide comfort the next time things go awry with our campaigns.
We’ve whittled them down to our Top 10 Confessions, with situations ranging from a three-part error and bad timing to syntax and the perils of batch-and-blast. We have included three of them in this post for you to watch.
Enjoy this bit of Friday the 13th fun and remember that, the next time you screw up an email, you’re in very good company.
Are you looking for the right provider for your email marketing needs? TRY AWEBER’S EASY-TO-USE EMAIL SOFTWARE FOR 30 DAYS FOR JUST $1!
The views expressed in this post are not necessarily those of Marketing Pilgrim.
a guitar worth smashing
Pinterest Referral Traffic Wins with Only a Tiny Percentage of the Pie
Unless you’ve been living under a rock, or you’re a man, you’ve probably been on Pinterest a few times in the past week.
The social photo sharing site has taken off in ways no one ever imagined to the point where large corporations are now carving out their own space on the network. But is it good for marketers? New numbers from Shareaholic suggest it could be so, depending on how you look at the picture.
Shareaholic has been comparing the referral traffic from the top sites for the past six months. In February, Pinterest’s share of the referral’s topped those from Twitter. Jump ahead to June and Pinterest eats up the shares from Twitter, StumbleUpon, Bing and Google referral traffic.
Here’s the crazy part. Even at it’s height, Pinterest’s referral traffic share percentage was only 1.19%. Yes, all this glee and arm waving is for 1.19% of the pie. That’s like a paper-thin sliver, just crumbs on the plate. So big deal, right?
Well, it is a big deal for this reason; the top referral provider is Google Organic with 46.80%. That’s nearly half the pie. Facebook claims 5.65%. Everyone after that, StumbleUpon, Bing, Yahoo, Twitter, all fall under to 2.0 mark. This means that the vast majority of all referral traffic is coming from two sources which is like putting all your eggs in one basket. (And yes, I’m mixing my metaphors, but there are eggs in pie so. . . )
What makes Pinterest of in-ter-est, is that it represents the best option out of the remaining small cluster. And who knows where it will go from here. It’s not going to beat Facebook, but it could continue to grow into a healthy social-system marketers with a very visual product. It’s already there for some, getting there for others, but it still not where it needs to be in terms of monetization and navigation.
You do have to give them credit for the climb though. Check out this graphic from Shareaholic:
Look at Pinterest just shooting for the stars and look at StumbleUpon, stumbling badly. Yikes.
What do you think about Pinterest’s popularity? Is it still just a novelty or can they hold their place at the top?