Confessions of a Graphic Designer

Apple Memories

2011-11-01T00:00:00.000-07:00

Dedicated to Steve Jobs

Special edition of Bloomberg BusinessWeek,
dedicated to Steve Jobs

_________________

When I heard the news that Steve Jobs died Oct. 5, like everyone else who loves him and Apple, I felt a sick sadness in my gut.

I know what it feels like to say goodbye to someone dying of pancreatic cancer. A close friend and brilliant photographer, Jim Cummins, died of the disease. Toward the end he was very weak, but I had the opportunity to say goodbye and to tell him I loved him. There is a certain peace that came when I did. But when you admire someone from afar, it's not possible to express how much they mean to you. So when they die, people are left with an emptiness — grieving when one doesn't really feel they have the right—but grieving nonetheless.

Over the past two and half decades, much of my life has orbited around Steve Jobs, especially as more and more Apple products have interwoven into every waking moment of my existence. I go to bed with my iPhone on the night stand, and wake up to its alarm to check my email and calendar.

This blog post, dedicated to him, recounts a love affair that started in 1985 with the Mac 512K, and continues through a sampling of more than 2 dozen computers in my life over the course of the past two and a half decades, and all of which we still own.

The 512K

Okay…maybe "26-year love affair" is pushing it. The 512K sat untouched in its box for quite a while before my husband, David, opened it. As a hotshot copywriter in one of Seattle's most innovative agencies, he was among the first wave to acquire this cool new tool. But there was something comforting about his IBM electric typewriter, and it was such a hassle to learn this strange, new technology. As somewhat of a neo-Luddite, he entered the new era kicking and screaming, but like the rest of us, found himself embracing it.

My best friend, Paula, was working at a Seattle company called Aldus, which created PageMaker and Freehand and other applications for graphic designers. She encouraged me to start using a computer, but I was afraid. I'd had my graphic design business for 10 years, and used traditional tools like X-acto blades, T-squares, triangles, rapidograph pens and drafting instruments, and I didn't know if I could make the transition.

But in the late 1980s, I did, buying the first of two Mac IIci CPUs. The IIci was a bit spooky to seasoned Mac users because of the new "System 7" operating system. But since I cut my teeth on it, I didn't know anything else. Thus began my dedication to Apple.

The Mac IIci

The "Power PCs" of the mid-1990s were supposed to be the salvation of our beloved platform with the licensing of the Mac OS to "clones." Having achieved a 10 percent market share, most of us felt good to think we would never have to "do Windows." But the market share fell to 3 percent in 1995 when Steve Jobs closed the loophole that had allowed other manufacturers to produce them. We all wondered—what was going to happen?

PowerMac 7100

My cat, Hunter, jumping onto the set with the PowerMac 7300

The Microsoft/Apple alliance seemed to make strange bedfellows. Was the king of "the Evil Empire" (as my Microsoft friends referred to it) really going to save Apple? Steve Jobs said at the 1997 MacWorld Expo:

The issue of Newsweek, explaining the
new alliance between Microsoft and Apple.

"If we want to move forward and see Apple healthy and prospering again, we have to let go of a few things here. We have to let go of this notion that for Apple to win, Microsoft has to lose. We have to embrace a notion that for Apple to win, Apple has to do a really good job. And if others are going to help us that's great, because we need all the help we can get, and if we screw up and we don't do a good job, it's not somebody else's fault, it's our fault. So I think that is a very important perspective. If we want Microsoft Office on the Mac, we better treat the company that puts it out with a little bit of gratitude; we like their software. So, the era of setting this up as a competition between Apple and Microsoft is over as far as I'm concerned. This is about getting Apple healthy, this is about Apple being able to make incredibly great contributions to the industry and to get healthy and prosper again."

The G3 "Wall Street" PowerBook was a spectacular machine. Mine featured a swappable bay for a modular CD, floppy and Zip disk drives, so every medium was accessible. I took it with me on flights to numerous press checks in Oregon and Nevada. I loved seeing Carrie Bradshaw using one in Sex and the City. It seemed to make a lot of cameo appearances, probably because people making films used Macs.

G3 Powerbook

During the Apple Renaissance, from the late 1990s to early 2000s, products including the iBook and iMac—favorites of my family—were introduced.

Early model iBook

iMac

During the era of the iBook and iMac, the PowerMac G4 emerged. This model proved to be among the most productive machines in the office, and remained in use for a long while. A few years ago when one of my kids was taking Spanish, someone gave us an old version of Rosetta Stone Spanish for Mac. All of our machines were too new to run it, so we unearthed one of the G4s, installed the software, and it worked perfectly.

The G4 with Apple's craziest monitor

In 2003 the first aluminum-enclosed tower, the PowerMac G5 was introduced. As with all Apple computers, they were ideal for graphic designers. We eventually had two of them. One was actually a lemon and required rebooting 10 times a day. But it was the only Apple Computer in more than two decades that ever had problems. When we jettisoned it, it was liberating, like having a headache suddenly stop. The cinema display always worked perfectly, though!

The G5 with very cool Cinema Display

In 2007 a MacPro tower was added to the office, and is still used as a back-up computer. It is one of the best, most reliable computers I've ever used and it continues to deliver. Having two DVD drives in one machine is great.

MacPro

I used to scoff at iMacs for professional use until we acquired the 27" iMac. We shopped for another tower, but when considering the separate cost of a large display and CPU, the iMac started looking very attractive. It has been a fantastic addition to the studio. With all of processing speed, tons of real-estate in hi-definition, versatility and minimal desk footprint, I'm now a believer in the all-in-one for pro use.

The 27" iMac

We've never owned stock in the company, but we've done our best to help Apple grow. My hope is Steve Jobs' legacy will continue into the next decade, with every new inspiration harkening back to its visionary cofounder.

_________________

Huge thanks to Seattle photographer, Doug Plummer who shot the photos for this blog post.

Information sourced throughout the web, including MacTracker, Apple and Wikipedia.

Connecting in Real Life

2011-09-30T23:08:00.000-07:00

Real-life Meetups Make the World a Better Place

When I first heard about "Meetup," I had no idea why or how it started, but it sounded like a neat idea. Then a few days before the tenth anniversary of 9/11, an email arrived from Meetup co-founder and CEO, Scott Heiferman. I was so impressed, I asked if I could share it — but in order for it to not get lost in a sea of 9/11 posts and reflections, I wanted to let some time elapse.

His message reminded me of two things: the tragedy of 9/11 changed life forever in the United States, but some goodness resulted; and the importance of real-life, or as my friend, Jake, likes to say — "tangible," connections need nurturing in order for each of us to thrive.

Scott's message:

_______________________________________________

Scott Heiferman, CEO
and co-founder, Meetup

Fellow Meetuppers,

I don't write to our whole community often, but this week is special because it's the tenth anniversary of 9/11 and many people don't know that Meetup is a 9/11 baby.

Let me tell you the Meetup story. I was living a couple miles from the Twin Towers, and I was the kind of person who thought local community doesn't matter much if we have the internet and TV. The only time I thought about my neighbors was when I hoped they wouldn't bother me.

When the towers fell, I found myself talking to more neighbors in the days after 9/11 than ever before. People said hello to neighbors (next-door and across the city) who they'd normally ignore. People were looking after each other, helping each other, and meeting up with each other. You know — being neighborly.

A lot of people were thinking that maybe 9/11 could bring people together in a lasting way. So the idea for Meetup was born: Could we use the internet to get off the internet — and grow local communities? We didn't know if it would work. Most people thought it was a crazy idea — especially because terrorism is designed to make people distrust one another.

A small team came together, and we launched Meetup nine months after 9/11.

Today, almost 10 years and 10 million Meetuppers later, it's working. Every day, thousands of Meetups happen. Moms Meetups, Small Business Meetups, Fitness Meetups... a wild variety of 100,000 Meetup Groups with not much in common — except one thing:

Every Meetup starts with people simply saying hello to neighbors. And what often happens next is still amazing to me. They grow businesses and bands together, they teach and motivate each other, they babysit each other's kids and find other ways to work together.

They have fun and find solace together. They make friends and form powerful community.

It's powerful stuff.

It's a wonderful revolution in local community, and it's thanks to everyone who shows up.

Meetups aren't about 9/11, but they may not be happening if it weren't for 9/11.

9/11 didn't make us too scared to go outside or talk to strangers. 9/11 didn't rip us apart. No, we're building new community together!

The towers fell, but we rise up. And we're just getting started with these Meetups.

Scott Heiferman (on behalf of 80 people at Meetup HQ)

New York City

September 2011

_______________________________________________

I spend more and more of each day on my computer and mobile devices. On a recent weekend away from the Internet (AT&T provided no service to the area) I traded off driving in order to use my iPhone until the moment I went off the grid.

Scott's email is a reminder to all of us of the importance of our connections to others. This past month I made an effort to spend some quality time with friends, and really be present. Getting together face-to-face takes a lot more time and energy than firing off an email, making a phone call or posting a tweet, but for the added effort, the reward is huge.

I'm glad Twitter, Facebook and other social media channels exist because it means no one ever has to "feel" alone. But 10 years after 9/11, maybe it's time to venture out into the real world, take a chance and engage.

Meetup seems like a really cool place to start.

_______________________________________________

Real face time with friends the past month:

Doug Plummer

Dave Morris

Sean Gardner

George Zaharoff, Piccolo Zaharoff, Cindy Chin

Linda Criddle

Kathy Gill (l.)

Chris Pirillo (l.) Chris Widener (r.)

Glen, Paula, and Vic

Chris Burget and Lori McNee

2011-08-18T00:16:00.000-07:00

Guest blogger: Sarah Lenssen from Ask5for5
photos courtesy of Cate Turton / Dept. for International Development

First, thanks to Terri Nakamura (@terrinakamura) for allowing me to post on her blog today! Today, more than 25 bloggers, including this one, are standing with me to Ask 5 for 5 for Africa. Here's why....

I began pursuing a BIG dream two weeks ago. After deciding I could no longer avoid the news about the famine in the horn of Africa, I had that gut feeling that I couldn't sit this one out. I HAD to do something because I could. Something bigger than I could do alone. That's when #Ask5for5 was born.

Two of my children, Ashen and Bereket, were adopted and are from the region affected by the drought in Ethiopia. They would be two of the statistics if they still lived there. I see my son’s and daughter’s faces in the photos of those suffering in the refugee camps. It could have been him. It could have been her. The thought haunts me.

And moms just like us are watching their children go hungry day after day. I can't imagine what it's like, but I have to –I have to be there to help them, because it could have been my children. These families have lost their livestock, their crops, food prices are inflated at the market if there any food there, and don’t have any more lifelines to tap into. Many are traveling hundreds of miles through parched land in hope of finding help. Many are dying along the way. It is estimated that 29,000 children have died in the last 90 days in the famine in Somalia alone.

But I KNOW we can do something about it. Instead of feeling overwhelmed and paralyzed, we can rally ourselves and our friends to respond! I set up a fundraiser through See Your Impact. 100% of your gift will go to the relief and development organization World Vision, where it will be combined with government grants to multiply up to 5 times in impact!

You’ll receive updates on just how your funding is being used to help save lives affected by famine in East Africa. I'm amazed at how much we've raised already -- over $7,000 in just four days! We blew through our first 3 goals in just 3 days and are well on our way to $10,000 and beyond!

I need you to help me save lives. It's so so simple; here's what you need to do:

Donate $5 or more on this page (http://seeyourimpact.org/members/ask5for5)
Send an email to your friends and ask them to join us.
Share Ask5for5 on Facebook and Twitter, and join our page to stay updated too!

I'm also looking for 100 bloggers to stand with Ask5for5 to spread the word during Social Media week, September 19th - 23rd. If you're interested, email me, ask5for5@gmail.com.

Thanks! Please donate and email your friends right now--don't wait for a calmer moment, because if you're like me, other demands inevitably crop up and you won't get to it. A child's life hangs in the balance, but you can help save her!

NOTE: Friend and Huffington Post blogger, @2morrowknight (Sean Gardner) who works with SeeYourImpact.org, asked me to participate in this campaign to raise awareness and much-needed funds to help people suffering in Ethiopia, Kenya and Somalia. I hope you will join with me in supporting this effort.

(e)DUPS: The Real CEO of Empire Avenue

2011-06-28T10:35:00.000-07:00

L-R: Chris Pirillo (e)PIRILLO, top player; Empire Avenue CEO Duleepa Wijayawardhana (e)DUPS

Empire Avenue (EAv) is a social stock market simulation game that has attracted millions of users all over the world. Thanks to Chris Pirillo's EAv Seattle shareholders meetup last week, I had a chance to talk with Duleepa Wijayawardhana, also known as (e)DUPS, the real-life CEO of Empire Avenue. Dups has to be one of the nicest guys around, and I was really knocked out by his engaging personality and wonderful smile.

He graciously agreed to this Q&A, during which I learned he is not just brilliant, but he's also charming and fun.

Enjoy!

When you and your colleagues originally conceived of the idea, what were you doing? I mean, were you sitting around having drinks somewhere and the notion emerged? What was the inspiration? And was it meant to be strictly a game, or did you have other purposes in mind?

The founders of Empire Avenue are Niall Brown, Dr. Michael Mannion and myself. The story of how it all comes together involves Montreal, some beer and philosophizing amongst very opinionated university friends. It involves staring at Facebook and thinking about the future of the Internet and talking about Karl Marx's Das Kapital. We were saying that information production, i.e., that which you put out there as writing, tweets, photos and more, could become the cornerstone of economic production in the future. This led almost directly to creating the game of Empire Avenue which is, in essence, human beings and algorithms valuing networks and content. While the product has changed dramatically over the past year, our core belief that every person has value, and every person produces content of value in their networks, is still foremost and powers our vision.

How did the name originate and how did the very complex structure of the site evolve, and over what length of time?

Mike, Niall and I are from Newfoundland and are proud to be Newfoundlanders. When we had decided that we were going to create a Social Stock Market, we wanted it to be synonymous with Wall Street, except we wanted a street in St. John's, Newfoundland. Empire Avenue was available. Yes it's a real place in St. John's and we aim to make it a global brand.

Our initial prototype and planning took about a month or so, then we destroyed it completely and started fresh, mainly with Tom and myself sitting on his floor with a goal of releasing in a month. Much of the core concepts of the site were created in that month. Since then we've basically been adding and removing features. It is now incredibly different than when we started.

How did you convince your investors this idea had legs?

Doing a start up is about passion. I think every investor pretty much knows that what you will end up with is not what you start with. We have some of the coolest investors (check out empireavenue.com/about/investors) because not only do they believe in us as a team but they help out, they reach out, they tell us when we are doing wrong and when we are successful. I'm pretty sure all our investors thought we were crazy. What they believed in was the team — the same thing I believe in every day: we have one of the coolest teams on the planet!

Would it be possible to see a screen shot of a very early iteration of EAv?

We'll see what we have, we keep many of those locked deep in the vault. We're pretty sure no one has ever seen the very earliest, but maybe we can find some that haven't been seen for a while!

Who developed the logo and badge art?

I'm going to point in the direction of Tom (@evolvetom) and Aaron (@aaronkwhite). Tom and I put together the very first design for Empire Avenue. Aaron contacted me as one of the first of the Friends and Family that signed up and he said, "Dude, you need help." I said, "Dude, spend the weekend designing a new version," and that was that. The achievement art and design is from another friend of ours, Mike Grills, from Calgary. The art really is amazing and we want more!

It seems like you have a sense of humor in identifying noteworthy accomplishments. Do you stumble upon an anomaly, then create the accomplishment, or do you determine a behavior that will be recognized by an award?

It's a bit of both. We take suggestions from folks very seriously. We love it when we get suggestions. A lot of secret achievements we've spent a lot of thought (perhaps too much) into them. We actually launched the site with secret achievements. We love games, we love laughter, we believe life is to be enjoyed!

A sample of badges for accomplishments awarded to Empire Avenue players. The "Spam" badge was the result of inadvertently spamming players with multiple copies of notifications on the morning of June 8, 2011.

I think you told me you have a small team of 5 people, but also you mentioned a lot of people helped you build Empire Avenue — people who are like volunteers? Who are they and how did they find you? How many people do you think have collaborated or contributed in some way to bringing Empire Avenue to fruition?

I joke that it takes a village to raise an idiot (me) but it takes a small army to raise a company. We have 5 core full time: Robert, Tom, Aaron, Niall and myself. Surrounding us are the core group of another 7 individuals: Mike, Brad, Craig, Todd, Brent, Nithum and Ric, who help as they have time in their busy lives, and others who have helped us in the past. You can see everyone on our Team page (empireavenue.com/about/team). Every individual has worked with a multiple of us in their previous lives, and we continue to collaborate which is one of the coolest things in life. In terms of every person who have helped us, Mike, Niall and I will one day create an amazing map and graphic of all those randomly or otherwise who have helped us. Every one of our friends knows how amazing they have been.

The original idea was something like "buy your friends," but eventually that language was banished and it evolved to be a "social network scoring service." What was the catalyst for the change?

We never really intended it to be "Buy Your Friends." I think that was part of us trying to find our way on the path towards defining oneself. We are not really a "social network scoring service" either. We are truly a social stock market which allows you to invest your social capital to build valuable relationships around the world. The scoring aspect and the buying aspect are simply part of the platform.

EAv has attracted real businesses, and those businesses have had an opportunity to interact with consumers on a very personal level. Was that originally part of the concept or was it something that happened organically?

This has always been part of the core fabric of Empire Avenue. I think we'll see more coolness along this front as the site and platform evolves.

What do you think of people who maintain spreadsheets on their investments? I mean, do you think they are seriously demented?

Not at all — I think we are lucky and happy to have such an incredibly involved community. These people are creating niches in a new economy — one we hope will lead to them earning an actual living from us as the platform grows!

A sample spreadsheet, before I came to my senses.

You have managed to establish relationships with some key entities (Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Flickr, YouTube). That seems like a feat in itself. Was it difficult to get them to partner up with you?

I hate to burst anyone's bubble :) but we use open APIs in each case. We would love to establish actual relationships as we grow!

I'm wondering if a location-based entity like Foursquare would ever be connected as well, or would you ever integrate geo-location into Empire Avenue itself?

Our next connection is Foursquare.

What is the end game for you? Do you want to sell Empire Avenue at some point, or do you have another goal in mind? What do you ultimately hope to get out of it?

Our end goal is to have created a global site (we're at 190+ countries right now) which has created some amazing connections, and where millions of users have had lots of fun. That should be enough and a fun way to spend one's life isn't it? :)

__________________________________________

Now for the “Tiger Beat Magazine-style Interview” Segment...

What do you do for fun?

These days, mostly dream about mountains, climbing, camping and otherwise being in the wilderness. I can't do it in reality as I'm not allowed to go off-grid at this stage of our business.

Do you have any pets?

I have a 13-year old cat, Pixel, who thinks he's a dog (I grew up with dogs). I fear the day he develops opposable thumbs.

When you were a kid, what did you want to be when you grew up?

A writer.

Are you an only child? If not, where do you fit into the brood?

I have two brothers who are way smarter and way older than I :)

Do you play any sports? If not, do you work out?

Run when I can, not much for working out :) My other sport is to be annoying to everyone on staff...

Are there any missions that are of personal importance to you, like being a vegan, or a being "green," etc.?

Being a good person. Being a good friend. Protecting the employees of Empire Avenue as if they were family, and having lots of fun.

Favorite color?

The colour of the clouds in the prairies after a violent storm has just passed you by. The blue-green of a glacier-fed lake.

Favorite food?

Sushi

What's the most recent book you've read?

Read? I'm allowed time to read these days?

What's the most recent movie you've watched?

"So I Married an Axe Murderer"

What song is going to come up on your iPod or playlist?

"At the Hundredth Meridian" — The Tragically Hip

I've heard you are fond of beer. Not that this is an endorsement, are there any you particularly like?

New Belgium Brewery — Anything from them! And Guinness!

When we met, you'd had 2 hours of sleep over the previous two days. Are you married or do you have a girlfriend? If yes, what does she think of your schedule? If not, describe your dream girl.

Hahahaha! If I had a girlfriend, by now she would have left me for all the work I do on Empire Avenue. My dream girl is someone cool, wandering the mountain peaks looking for me as I am her ;)

Describe a perfect day.

From sunrise to moonset, spending it with friends, good food and good wine!

__________________________________________

Thanks to Dups and Tom Ohle for their help, and thanks to Chris Pirillo for making it possible to do this blog post.

If you're interested in joining Empire Avenue, feel free to use this link: http://empireavenue.com/?t=161d2i

The cool t-shirt we received at the shareholders meetup!

__________________________________________

2011 Terri Nakamura

Hug Your Kid and Say a Prayer

2011-05-26T14:39:00.000-07:00

Last night I learned a friend's son was in a car accident and is in critical condition. After a soul-replenishing meal with the Sansei Lunch Club, my BFF Paula wanted to wait until after dinner to tell me the news.

But before she could say a word, I asked if she knew Alexander, son of mutual friends, had just graduated from college last week and that his parents had flown to California to attend the ceremony?

She looked at me and said, "Terri, he's been in a bad accident. They flew to California this morning."

When I got home I asked my youngest son, Charley, if he knew about it. Alexander's dad usually drives their carpool to Google. A sad expression. Yes he knew. It made sense to me now. Charley had driven to work yesterday but I didn't know why.

Trying to make sense of something so senseless, Alexander reeled through my mind as I tried to fall asleep last night. He was my first thought when I awoke.

A bright young man at the beginning of his adult life, his parents were filled with pride last week at his graduation. The pictures on Facebook embody the essence of joy.

I find myself praying for his recovery. I want him to know everyone is pulling for him; to wake up and see his family. I want him to be able to look back on this accident as a survivor. I want him to have the chance to use his newly acquired education, maybe helping to reshape our world. I want him to be able to live happily, and to experience all of the highs and lows that make up a person's life. And maybe someday, to have children of his own.

Anything else is just too tragic to contemplate.

I'm often blown away by the generosity of friends and acquaintances on social media, and that's why I'm hoping, even if you don't believe in it, that you'll say a prayer for him. You guys, he just has to make it.

Hug your child. Life is fleeting, and as I've always said to my kids, there, but for the grace of God, go I.

--

POSTSCRIPT:
Thank you to the friends who responded and supported this blog post. Alexander passed away.

Twitter Junior High

2011-03-30T14:54:00.000-07:00

Surviving Social Media Adolescence

Illustration © Mits Katayama

Popular kids, poseurs, drama queens, bullies, geeks and weirdos—all the the archetypes we came to love or loathe in junior high school—can be found on Twitter.

Although you'll find most people fit into the "normal" category, in recent months several occurrences took some of the shine off my otherwise happy Twitter experience:

A troll attacked me on the open time line
Someone tried to undermine several online friendships
I was accosted because I disagreed with an opinion
A person unfollowed me because I didn't divulge a secret

FOR THOSE OF YOU WHO DON'T KNOW, a "troll" is someone who gets their kicks by issuing inflammatory comments with the intent to provoke. Trolls are cowards and bullies. If you've not experienced one firsthand, congratulations. When it happened to me, it reminded me of how I felt when I was in a car accident—shaken and freaked out. Except in extreme cases, Twitter's terms of service allow their behavior. What to do? Two things: Unfollow and block.

SOMEONE WORKING BEHIND THE SCENES attempting to sway alliances, is strictly junior high. This type of behavior should not be validated. If someone tells you something offline that casts a negative light on someone else—think twice before accepting it at face value. Ask yourself what sort of person has the time to engage in this kind of mischief, and then use your own common sense.

A "POPULAR KID" came to me with a notion—that people on Twitter are racist. I don't buy that. I view Twitter as a meritocracy as well as a model macrocosm of egalitarianism. When I attempted to deflect the assertion with jokes, the person became cross with me and the dialog quickly escalated, making me uncomfortable. At that point I disengaged, hoping a "cooling off period" would help. I raised two kids and learned: Do not give attention to bad behavior.

IF A PERSON YOU KNOW UNFOLLOWS you, it's usually an unhappy thing. Having someone unfollow because you won't disclose a secret is the equivalent of a "Twitter tantrum." Does one person's desire to know something trump another's entitlement to confidentiality? I don't think so. When you betray someone's trust, you'll never fully get it back. Tweetlevel says, " It is trust that makes someone act — for this reason alone, having a high trust score is considered by many to be more important than any other category."

So with all of this negativity, why keep tweeting? On the flip side, some positive things occurred:

I've met some terrific tweeps face-to-face, including @MomsofAmerica @LoriMoreno @krystynchong @JessicaNorthey @MartyMcPadden and @Zaharoff. Actually being together, exchanging laughs, thoughts, experiences, hugs—sharing a meal—mean your virtual friendship jumps to the next level: real-life. And the thing is, people are so much cooler in person!
My buddy, @ellies58, helped me with a complicated task to help my son, a U.S. Army captain currently stationed in Afghanistan. It demanded an exceptional amount of trust on both sides, and both of our families were a bit concerned. But in the end, Ellie and I had the last laugh because it all came together. The whole experience really sealed our friendship.
Two friends (@iamwhite and @dallasnagata) met at a tweetup in Hawaii, courted, fell in love and got married—all of it unfolding before our eyes on Twitter. A contingent of Seattle tweeps including myself, @slickriptide and @BecauseUAreHere, virtually "attended" the ceremony at Kona Kitchen (a Hawaiian restaurant in Seattle) "live" via UStream. A dozen people gathered to watch. It was touching to see our virtual friends tie the knot.
And last—the spontaneous hilarity of engaging with friends on the Twitter stream is difficult to describe to someone who doesn't tweet, but let me just say some of the funniest things I've ever witnessed, read or taken part in have occurred on Twitter! Beside giving millions of people a sense of place, it can make you smile and laugh—things proven to be healthy for all of us.

For me, negative online experiences have lowered my tolerance for aberrant behavior. But by far, my connections with people on Twitter have been positive and have added value to my life. I'm constantly amazed by the kindness and generosity I encounter there, popular kids, poseurs, drama queens, bullies, geeks and weirdos notwithstanding.

One of the things I realized while being treated for cancer: There is no use worrying about things you cannot change.

That goes for people, too.

LinkedIn: Social Networks Aren’t Just for Socializing

2010-11-02T17:32:00.000-07:00

Note: hyperlinks in red

I think of Twitter as a cocktail party, and FaceBook as dinner party. Both can be fun, but they can also be noisy and full of drunk people.

LinkedIn is a place where business happens.

I’ve been on LinkedIn for four years. LinkedIn is a social network that allows you to make connections with trusted contacts and essentially create a personal Rolodex in the cloud. But it's much more than that.

In addition to the convenience of finding your important business connections in one place, it offers a host of useful resources for job seekers, sales people who are prospecting, and recruiters who are looking for qualified people to fill jobs. There are too many benefits to enumerate, but it’s not just a social network—it is a database of people and companies that can be searched geographically—and most of what it offers is freely available.

In 2006 my real-life best friend and fellow graphic designer started a job at PopCap, and she invited me to join LinkedIn. At the time, LinkedIn was populated with entrepreneurs, venture capitalists and business professionals, and required an invitation to join. In spite of its gated approach, its membership grew from five to eight million that year.

In 2007 when Facebook opened its doors to everyone and its membership took off, LinkedIn followed its lead, and by the end of the year it had more than 15 million users.

Unlike Facebook or Twitter, not everyone joins LinkedIn, but those who do recognize its value. Today LinkedIn has more than 80 million members across 200 countries and seven continents, and continues to grow at the rate of one new member per second.

When I opened my account, I invited a number of business associates to join me. But before I did, I spent time aggregating information, then wrote an introduction, cleaned up my resume and gathered other relevant data to populate my profile. At that time, profile pictures weren’t included, but they are now, and I think it is worthwhile to include a good photo that reflects the image you wish to project.

I'm not passing myself off as an expert, but I'm sharing what has worked for me.

ADVICE ABOUT HOW TO PUT YOUR PROFILE TOGETHER:

Clean up your resume.
Have someone with editing skills review it for spelling, grammar and punctuation. Don’t rely only on built-in grammar and spell checking tools, as they don’t necessarily detect context or poorly written prose.

Introduce yourself, including information prospective employers or colleagues would be interested to know.
Your LinkedIn page is like an agent who promotes your image to others when you aren’t there to do it yourself. Think about the kinds of experiences you have that sets you apart from others who offer the same goods or services, and make your case.

Identify your affiliations with professional organizations
and groups.
For example, if you and a prospective employer are connected via an alumni group, that could be a point of connectivity. But LinkedIn is not Foursquare, and there isn’t a competition for the number of “badges” you display. Adding affiliations needs to be done sensibly.

If you feel you can contribute substantively, answer questions as an expert in your field.
Members can pose questions, and you can enhance your reputation if you can answer, conceivably positioning yourself as a “go-to” person in a particular discipline.

Take time to consider and make note of your achievements and honors. Today I spoke with a friend who was cited as a tech maven in a Huffington Post story. I think most people would be interested to know about it, and it should be included in a profile.

Participating in your community as a volunteer demonstrates teamwork and good citizenship—attributes that are important to many employers and very often mirror their values. If you have contributed through volunteering, say so.

Who should you connect with? To begin, I think you should connect to real-life current and former colleagues, associates and employers. They know you and will accept your connection request.

And finally, identify people who can recommend you.
You can ask a former boss or colleague if they will write a recommendation for you. You should ask only people who have direct knowledge of your work.

If someone takes the time to help you—I can’t stress this enough—you MUST thank them—preferably with a handwritten note. Why do that instead of sending an email? Because few people do it and it makes you stand out. I’m often amazed at how people fail to formally express thanks when someone goes out of their way to do something for them. There is a great story about the importance of handwritten thank you notes in Chapter 41 of Randy Pauch’s The Last Lecture. Read it.

LinkedIn has led to my receiving unsolicited job offers, which illustrates what it can do for people, even passively. It provides options to link to your Twitter feed and to post status updates, and recently partnered with Behance to link visual work samples to user profiles. But for the most part, you will find only salient information on LinkedIn. Unlike an individual web site which must specifically be sought out, when a person is searching LinkedIn, they are already in the mode to find you.

It really is a no-brainer: An investment of time on your LinkedIn profile can be beneficial on a number of levels. And beside the strictly business end of things, there can be a social aspect of joining groups where others share your interests or expertise.

When I started using Twitter in 2008, I would occasionally see people refer to LinkedIn as a network for old people. Since then, I’ve seen my kids and their friends graduate from college, and more and more of these twenty-somethings are joining LinkedIn and asking to connect.

As LinkedIn has evolved and innovated, one thing hasn’t changed: IT WORKS.
____________________

One reader mentioned he'd received a LinkedIn invitation from me, which is a concern. Please beware—it could be spam.

Friendship in the Digital Age

2010-09-07T22:44:00.000-07:00

Hyperlinks in grey

My BFF Paula Wong and BTF Krystyn Chong. Photo by The Milkie Studio

I've lived in Seattle most of my life and have friendships that span decades. My BFF Paula Wong and I are both sansei — third generation Japanese-Americans. We went to some of the same schools and through different paths we became graphic designers.

Knowing each other for 45 years, we've watched our kids grow from infancy to adults. Professionally, we’ve gone from lead type, phototype and Exacto knives, to falling in love with our first Macs more than 20 years ago. In fact, I have Paula to thank for my tech addiction! When she worked for Aldus, Paula gave me a much-needed nudge to switch from traditional to digital design.

Having shared history, knowing each another's families, being there to experience and support major life events means we share a friendship with great depth and meaning — a rare gift in an era where life moves so quickly that often all we can do is skim the surface.

I think real friendships are important to all of us. How would we get through life without them?

L-R: The Sansei Lunch Club: Paula, Terri, Vic Kubo and Glen Iwasaki. Four graphic designers and friends who have been celebrating birthday lunches since the 1990s.

People now have more ways than ever to connect, but I sometimes feel like technology is isolating me from — rather than bringing me closer — to some of my real-life friends.

It's easier to send an email than pick up the phone. Getting together takes time and effort. Have email, Facebook, Twitter and Skype actually caused erosion of “real” friendships? With the expansion of our communities through social media, where do “virtual” friends fit into the current cultural landscape? And how does the quality of real-life relationships differ from those conceived online?

During the past 18 months I’ve “met” some great people through social media who have caused me to re-examine my perceptions about what encompasses a real friendship.

Last month, Krystyn Chong, my “BTF” (Best Twitter Friend) flew to Seattle to attend Gnomedex, a tech conference founded by Chris Pirillo. Previously we’d talked on the phone and frequently emailed and messaged each other, but had never met in person.

Krys is a persona. She's connected to incredible people in all walks of life, and draws them toward her like a moth to flame. A long-time blogger and online denizen, she’s made a name for herself, not just because she's attractive and smart, but she’s a social media aficionado. She has 15,000 followers on Twitter, regularly creates content for her blog, is a popular DJ on Blip.fm, and recently began publishing to Vimeo with works like “Twitter, Turn it up!”

She and I met for the first time at Chic Meets Geek, a pre-Gnomedex event, and later she stayed with my family and me for four days. She is pretty, petite and lively — definitely WYSIWYG. But spending time together was important because it allowed me to get beyond her online personality. It was great to do that. How else could I have known that she would develop a crush on my 23-year-old son? Or that she loves Skittles?

It’s amazing to have "friends" all over the world, whose birthdays are celebrated, and whose life events are updated and inquired about in much the same way we would with friends in real life. Online friendships are especially great for people who are shy or want to maintain a layer of anonymity. If they aren't "cool" in real life, they can be cool online. As the famous New Yorker cartoon said, “On the Internet, nobody knows you’re a dog.”

The above cartoon by Peter Steiner has been reproduced from page 61 of July 5, 1993 issue of The New Yorker, (Vol.69 [LXIX] no. 20) Its use is editorial only.

So I’ve found myself in a strange new place, where numerous messages I exchange each day are with people I haven't met yet, but I've come to care about very much.

It's hard to imagine having a friendship like Paula's without the two of us spending so much time together over the years. I'm lucky to have — and grateful for — all of my friendships. But I long for the time when I will meet some of my online peeps in real life. For me, meeting face-to-face authenticates a connection in a way that can’t be accomplished otherwise.

I'm looking forward to some day being able to give my virtual friends real (((hugs))) instead of virtual ones.

_______________________________

Paula Wong is Senior Director of Creative Labs for the fabulously successful (and addictive) PopCap Games in Seattle, WA.
Krystyn Chong (@krystynchong) is a social media maven in Sacramento, CA. Find her blog at dreammm.posterous.com/.
Photographer Fred Milkie’s recently published book, Alone Around the Mountain, has been nominated for a 2011 PNWB award.
Thanks to award-winning copywriter David Horsfall for reading this journal entry.

To Lead a Life Worth Living

2010-08-08T15:17:00.000-07:00

Written 5 August 2010 (Note hyperlinks in orange)

Two weeks ago I had the opportunity to talk with entrepreneur Ben Huh, of I Can Has Cheezburger, Fail Blog and other memes.

When I asked him about his ambitions, he responded without hesitation: “I want to lead a life worth living.” And since that day, his comment has continued to resonate in my mind.

Recently our oldest son, Andrew, was home from Germany to spend time with us before his one-year deployment to Afghanistan begins next month. It was a joy for all of us to be together.

Whenever he’s home, we make a pilgrimage to Hood River, Oregon, the breathtakingly beautiful place where my paternal grandparents settled after they immigrated from Japan in the early 1900s. As a teenager, Andrew spent summers working in the orchards during the cherry harvest. He is the only fourth-generation (yonsei) kid in the family to do so.

Beside learning the ways of a new country, my grandparents' early days were physically tough—clearing land, planting trees and growing strawberries between rows to earn money until their orchards were mature enough to bear fruit. "Nakamura Ranch" grew cherries, pears and apples. My grandparents built the small home where they raised three sons and lost two daughters. They endured internment at Tule Lake during World War II and were met with bitter hostility when they returned after the war ended.

Van cherries are not commercially sold.

My two uncles worked alongside my grandparents, and now, decades later, it is a third-generation farm, owned by one of my cousins.

Whenever we visit during cherry season, my aunt and uncle send us home with a large box to share with family and friends in Seattle. This year they included two types of cherries: Lamberts, and my personal favorites, Vans.

Among the people we share them with are our long-time neighbors across the street. Kathy, like me, also is a breast cancer survivor. But unfortunately, after years in remission, two years ago she was found to have bone cancer that had metastasized throughout her body.

She went through chemotherapy and became so weak and sick that I was sure she wouldn’t make it. But somehow she rebounded, and on sunny days I would look out the window to see her tending her beloved gardens.

So you might be wondering how this relates back to Ben Huh?

Today I stopped by to visit Kathy and drop off some cherries. I knocked on the door and there was no answer. I was about to set the bag down in a shady spot when she opened the door.

About two months ago Kathy underwent surgery for necrosis of the jaw bone, a condition where the jaw bone dies and becomes exposed, sometimes caused by drugs used in chemotherapy or for treatment of osteoporosis. Her surgery was extensive and left a great deal of pain in its wake.

She looked thin and frail, but she invited me to sit and visit with her on her front porch bench.

We talked about her family, her health and her prognosis.

She spoke with some difficulty, but told me she has only a few months to live, and at some point soon will be receiving hospice care. For those of you who don’t know, hospice is palliative care for the last leg of life’s journey. I asked her how she felt about dying, and she told me she is ready. She’s been ready.

She took a cherry from the paper sack and put it into her mouth, savoring its sweetness. It was a small act, but it represented the fruit of my grandparents' struggles and made me mindful of how the simplest of things can give a moment of joy.

As I said goodbye, I offered to help in any way a neighbor can, and walked away feeling great sadness about what lies ahead for her.

But I knew one thing:
She’s lead a life worth living.

_____________________________________

POSTSCRIPT:
Kathy passed away Thursday, October 21, 2010, surrounded by her family.

Ben Huh, CEO, Cheezburger Network, and Playmate of the Month

2010-07-27T20:00:00.000-07:00

Ben Huh, CEO, Cheezburger Network

I was going to write about some of the many innovative companies in Seattle, but when a friend helped me set up an interview with Ben Huh (@BenHuh) fearless leader of I Can Has Cheezburger (ICHC) and other memes, my plans changed. So this piece is all about Ben Huh, the big cheese of a company that makes the world laugh. Questions are in bold.

23 July 2010 — Cheezburger Network, Seattle, WA

Everyone has already written everything imaginable about you and ICHC. So I'd like to show you a Dewar's profile and a Playboy bunny interview from 1983. These are the inspirations for how I want to talk with you. I thought this would be more fun. So, is that OK?
Fantastic.

Dewar's Ad: Community Live Journal; Playmate interview, Sept. 1983 Playboy

So, basically, you’ll be like the Playboy playmate of the month.
[laughs]

First question—how do you pronounce your name?
It’s “Huh.” Some pronounce it "Hugh," but it’s “Huh.”

Do you mind telling me how old you are?
32 years old.

Thirty-two? I could be your mother! I mean, technically.
[laughs]

How would you describe your profession—like if you were at the airport and some guy asked what do you do for a living, what would you say?
I’m an Internet publisher. I also describe it as: We try to make people laugh five minutes a day.

You easily accomplish that, don’t you think?
Awesome. I hope so.

I first heard from about ICHC in the early years of Facebook. It was so random and funny—but I had no idea you were based in Seattle. Were you born here?
No, I was born in Seoul Korea.

How did you end up in the U.S.?
Long story, but in a round about way, we ended up in Hong Kong because my father had a job there. Then we moved to the states after that. Later, I went to college at Northwestern and that’s where I got a print journalism degree. Yes I was a writer, but I always wanted to have my own business.

Journalism writing wasn’t like literature, but I learned a lot about editing and writing from journalism school. When I graduated in ’99, I wanted to run a business and become an entrepreneur. So I worked for a dotcom for six months, then started my own company, and in 18 months it folded and died with the dotcom bust—terrible timing in the early 2000s.

But it didn’t stop you?
No. But I had a choice—either go back to school and get an MBA and rack up a bunch of debt, or go to work for a bunch of CEOs who founded companies themselves. I thought since I was completely broke, it was better to learn on the job. A requirement I had was that I would work only for a company in which I had direct contact with a CEO. So if I was going to work for someone, they’d have to be the CEO or I’d at least have to have to have regular communication with the CEO. Not a lot of CEOs would go for that—having a junior kid coming in demanding their time, but a few people did.

It wasn’t an internship?
No. It was a real job. I needed a real salary. I would do whatever. I started as a consultant to an Internet radio company. I did some marketing for another software company. I’d rise pretty quickly in the ranks. Eventually I came out here for a company that did touch screen software.

So that’s how you ended up in Seattle?
Yes. I spent two and a half years working on the east side [of Lake Washington] for a company that serviced Fortune 500 companies. It wasn’t all that interesting. I was making a six-figure salary—more money than I’d ever made, but B2B was completely boring.
So when this opportunity came along I said, OK, it sounds kind of crazy, but I’m going to quit my job and do this instead.

Six-figure salary—I hope you saved some money so you could do this?
My wife and I made a conscious effort to keep our expenses low. So we saved a lot of money.

Is she in this business?
Yeah, she’s the editor. She usually sits right there. [points to desk]

You really have logged a lot of miles to get here.
Yeah—I’ve been around the block.

The team at ICHC, working hard to make you laugh five minutes a day.

No kidding—OK, so let me ask you some of these silly questions.
OK. Sure.

Turn ons?
I would say intelligence is the number one turn on. I think when people say they have a connection with someone, I think what they’re really saying is they share the same intellectual traits or wit that I have. That’s the kind of connection you form with someone else. It’s like when sense of humor or intellect don’t match, that’s when there’s a disconnection.

In the realm of intelligence, would you put sense of humor as a component of that?
Sense of humor is such a widely ranging thing. Being in the humor business, there are a lot of different kinds of humor and you can’t really say one is better than another. But I think intelligence leads to humility—the ability for one to laugh at oneself—and that is actually a very positive trait.

OK. What about turn offs?
Turn offs…Playing fast and loose with the truth.

So, LYING?
Lying is absolutely a turn off, but there’s a line that’s very close to lying that people don’t observe as lying, which is the fact that people kind of stretch the truth, they’re not honest with themselves, right? So like they just don’t—they think what they tell you—they don’t respect the other person enough to tell them the actual truth, or they want to look better to the other person or maybe they don’t think you would ever find out. That bothers me.

But if someone’s really good at that, you’d never know that they were doing it, right?
That’s right. That’s the problem with lying. It's that the moment you’ve become good at it, then you’ve fooled the world, and yourself as well.

Ambitions?
I want to lead a life worth living.

Are you already doing that?
I’m doing it right now. I don’t know at the end of the day that I can say that yet—like that’s something you decide probably right before you’re dead.

Well, OK, hang on. I mean, you have your wife, you have this great business, you’re employing all these people, you’re making the world laugh…
This is a path. This isn’t the destination. I didn’t set out to employ all these people and make the world laugh and to become an influencer. You can be famous and live a life worth living—these are not mutually exclusive things. So at the end of the day I want to say yeah, that life was great. It was worth living. It was HARD. Nothing’s easy. Nothing GOOD is easy—but it’s worth doing.

But you do feel like you’re on the right track?
Oh, absolutely! I’m absolutely on the right track. But this is not…if this track ends and I jump to another track? It isn’t the end…like, that’s not why I did this, right?

Yeah, because you could sell this for X zillions of dollars to whomever
…and move on. But this didn’t define my life.

Favorite music?
I like music with a little bit of soul and personality. I’m not talking about soul music, per se, but it’s like music that shows the passion of the person playing. I tend to like female vocalists.

Like right now, recently, Adele. She has a great voice—she can definitely emote through her voice, like I think that’s fantastic.

Do you have a favorite sport?
I do. Football.

When you say football, do you mean soccer?
No, American football.

So you’re a football fan. Who do you cheer for?
I am actually a 49ers fan.

Secret fantasy?
I want to travel the world for a year. Just let go. Like me, my wife—go and spend 365 days out in the world.

I live in this weird alternate universe where people want to talk to me and people think what I’m doing is interesting, and I kinda want to be in a world where it just doesn’t matter. It doesn’t matter what I do for a living. I’m out there to see the world.

That’s why I was asking about telling someone you’re an Internet publisher because it doesn’t sound like anything the average person could relate to—which is kind of cool in a way because then people just start talking to you about whatever.
That’s absolutely correct.

Last book read, or your favorite book?
The book I’m reading currently is something called “Switch.” Chip and Dan Heath are the authors. It’s a business book about how to effect change within an organization.

So non-fiction—do you read anything just for fun?
The last book I read for fun was “Game Change.” It chronicled the last presidential election.

OK—It’s like, when you go to the beach, you’d be reading “Switch” or “Game Change?”
I don’t go to the beach. If I’m at the beach, it’s like I’m there to walk for a few minutes and then I’m going out and doing something else.

I don’t do the beach, either. I don’t understand people who just lay there for hours.
Me neither! I mean, I’m like, I’d rather go zip lining! Or getting lost in the woods! Or anything!

Favorite movie?
My favorite movie is “When Harry Met Sally.” When I first saw it I was young enough that the movie left an impression on me. And if I watch it now it feels a little old school, but it’s a cute movie—great dialog.

The last movie I saw in the theatre was Avatar because it was 3D. I thought it was well done. I really liked it. And I liked it as well before, when it was called Pocahontas. [laughs]

That’s cool. OK. So what do you do for hobbies?
I sail—a 28 footer or less is what I’m certified to captain.

What's your favorite color?
Orange

Orange? I saw somebody who was like your soulmate yesterday, walking down the street. I was like, MY GOD, look at all that orange. She was a showstopper.
But it has to be done in moderation. [Shows tip of his orange T-shirt under buttoned shirt]

What about your favorite food?
I’m a big fan of BBQ. Any kind of good meat roasted over a slow flame. I, like, go to Texas and I eat BBQ for the whole time I’m there. And I went to LA and ate Korean BBQ the whole time I was there. I go to NY and go to yakitori places—like three times while I’m there.

Different cities have different types of good BBQ they do well. Like you go to LA and get Korean BBQ; you go to NY and that’s the closest you’re going to get to Japan; and you go to Texas to get Texas BBQ. My wife is vegetarian. [laughs] Maybe that’s why I like it, but she likes the salads when we go out.

Do you like Seattle?
You know, I’ve grown to like it more.

You’ve GROWN to like it? That doesn’t sound good.
The weather is brutal.

The last city I lived in was Chicago. It’s a mega-city with lots of stuff to do. And here, I’ve been working a lot. I’ve been trying to grow my social circle a little bit more. We travel a lot so we’ll be here just 6 weekends this summer. I know more people in Seattle than I ever did in Chicago because of business and because of what I do, but personally, it was a lot harder to put down roots in Seattle. Like, we just bought a condo.

I’ve always heard people come here and people are so friendly but it’s impossible to make friends here.
There’s a little bit of stand-offishness. And now that we’re married, we hang out with each other a lot so there’s less incentive to make new friends.

Oh, is that new?
We got married in 2006

Congratulations.
Thank you.

If you were on a dating service filling out a survey, how would you briefly describe yourself?
I’m a go getter who likes to take time out to laugh.

OK—so no long walks on beach, drinking wine, like the typical, “loves Labrador retrievers?” and stuff like that?
I do all of the above, but that’s not how I’d define myself.

Were you a funny or weird kid?
I was neither. Just a normal, nerdy, geeky over achiever.

When did you start using computers?
I first started programming when I was in the third grade. I’m not a programmer. It was a special program at the time in Korea—maybe 1986? Computers were really expensive. The school I went to had an allotment of 12 computers that the government provided. You had to take a test to get into the after-school program in which they would teach you how to do basic programming. I was in that program. That was my first exposure—very, very early in a country that had very few computers.

Are you a US citizen now or are you here on a permanent visa?
It’s funny you mention that. I’m actually taking my citizenship test on Monday.

Really? That’s exciting!
But it’s so easy, though. I mean, I went to high school here!

You did? Where did you go?
Cordova High School, near Sacramento—one of the suburbs of Sacramento. The city is called Rancho Cordova.

So have you been to any of your reunions?
No reunions. Not interested. High school was awkward. It wasn’t the greatest experience. And my high school wasn’t that great and didn’t prepare me for life very well.

I remember going to Northwestern and going to my first philosophy class and there were kids who had gone to Exeter and prep schools and they had read ALL the books in my philosophy class and I’m sitting there going, how do you pronounce “Goethe?” I was like, so unprepared.

Did your parents want you to do something else with your life?
They actually never really pushed me one way or the other. That was pretty unusual about my parents. The first generation of family tends to push toward a professional career, but they didn’t. They were really supportive of me going to journalism school.

Typical routine? When do you roll into the office and leave?
10 o’clock in the morning until 8 p.m.

OK, so you roll in at 10 o’clock and leave at 8. What do you when you get home?
We eat, and then we work.

So you guys are both like total geeks then?
Yeah. We’re kind of very… ambitious. I like it a lot.

Most amusing thing that’s happened since this phenomenon began?
In the book, Game Change—at the height of Palin mania, one of Obama’s advisors [Valerie Jarrett] receives an email with a picture of Obama at the podium pointing with a caption that says, “Chill the fuck out. I got this.” And she shows it to Obama, and Obama says, “That’s what I’ve been telling you all along—I got this. Don’t worry about Sarah Palin. I got this.”

That photo was from our site.

I was literally in New York reading the book at three in the morning and I was like, OH, MY GOD. I recognized it and the caption because we posted it and it went completely viral. And it landed on Obama’s desk.

That’s really insane!
It was awesome. It’s like we are a footnote of a footnote of a footnote of history.

My last question: Do you dream in color?
Absolutely.

Ben in front of Cheezburger Network world headquarters, Seattle, WA

______________________

Special thanks to Larry Asher (@SVCSeattle), of the School of Visual Concepts, for helping me set up this interview; Pulitzer Prize-winning photographer, Jerry Gay, for shooting this gig; and David Horsfall, for taking time to review this piece.

Beautiful Minds — Seattle-Area Developers Discuss Social Graph APIs

2010-07-03T22:49:00.000-07:00

OK. When I got the invitation, it was a bit like, “WHY?” But on the ticket I was identified as a “Super Cool Person,” so how could I resist attending the Parnassus Group’s Social Developer Meetup? And even though one of my specialties is getting lost on the east side of the "pond" (Lake Washington), somehow I got there in spite of the dead battery in my GPS!

When finally I’d arrived, I looked around at the group assembled and wondered—what is this confab all about?

In describing it, Jason Preston (@jason_preston) VP of Strategy and Product Development at the Parnassus Group says, “Ever since we started putting together Twitter Conferences in March 2009, we at Parnassus have thought the next wave of digital innovation will be built by ordinary geeks on top of the rich and emerging foundation of social data platforms. All kinds of cool things are being built by local (Seattle) rock star developers on top of the available social application programming interfaces (APIs), ranging from Twitter to Foursquare to Facebook and beyond. So this initial gathering creates a place where people can learn from each other, share, ‘be technical,’ and socialize.”

And thanks to Peter Chee, ThinkSpace in Redmond, Wash., offered a great place to do just that.

First up was local star developer, and the very tall Adam Loving (@adamloving), creator of Twibes and developer at Vulcan and Foundry Group-funded “Gist.” He talked about how Gist uses Google’s Social Graph API as kind of a personal search-engine optimization to “pre-populate” user profiles.

How Does it Work?

This stuff was over my head, but as I understand it, Google’s Social Graph API makes available a person’s public connections using XFN (Xhtml Friends Network), which identifies human relationships through the use of hyperlinks; and FOAF (Friend of a Friend), a project that aims to create a web of links between people, the things they create, and do.

Because some users create public profiles but don’t always use the same monikers across networks, a hyperlink such as a url or email address can point to friends in various networks who might otherwise go unrecognized. The aggregated data is gleaned only from publicly available information. In other words, if your information is private, don’t worry—it won’t be found! (At least that's what we're led to think!)

By identifying human connections between people and their friends, Social Graph API makes it possible for social application developers to incorporate features for their users, which can make it easier for people to connect to public friends from one application to another.

Do you want to see a demo of the Social Graph API?
Enter some of your known urls and see what comes up. Interestingly, even profiles and accounts you have abandoned or renamed may surface here.

L-R: Chris Pirillo and Adam Loving

Intermission

During a short break, Jason, along with social media mega-star Chris Pirillo (@chrispirillo), tech expert to CNN.com, speaker, blogger, and founder of Gnomedex, gave us a demo of “FaceTime,” the face-to-face video calling feature of the new iPhone 4. It was cool to see, and like all Apple does, it was easy to use. The combination of gorgeous industrial design and functionality has me looking forward to leaving AT&T behind and forging a new relationship with Verizon come 2011. Have I mentioned Chris Pirillo is very smart, cute and funny?

Damon Cortesi, courtesy of Randy Stewart, blog.stewtopia.com

Mapping the Social Graph

Next we heard from Damon Cortesi (@dacort) of UntitledStartup and creator of TweetStats and TweepSearch, among other apps. He touched upon an array of interesting topics including:

How Social Viral Works;
Better Follow Analysis;
the Facebook Graph API; and
Chirp Social Graph Analysis ("Chirp" was the first Twitter developer conference).

He shared an outstanding case study on the viral power of Twitter — the “pay with a tweet” social viral campaign—which shows how a French synthpop band went from zero to thousands in a matter of hours. Also, I think some of his graphs are beautiful illustrations of information.

The “Social Viral” graph, illustrates the progression of what happened when a band called The Teenagers released a new song that people “paid for” by mentioning them in a tweet. Starting around 5 PM Sunday through 10 AM Monday, you can see how the tweets followed a gradual trajectory until someone with a big following tweeted it, and then BOOM—a huge bump. Says Damon, “The concept of ‘buying’ a song by posting a tweet about it has an inherent viral aspect and worked very powerfully.”

The next three graphs show the first 100, second 100 and third 100 people who retweeted. The larger circles show someone with more influence and the ensuing repercussions. (Color changes represent 500 more followers than previous followers.) A slightly larger example showing the viral spread can be seen here. (These gorgeous graphs were created using Protovis.)

When I checked The Teenagers’ MySpace page on Saturday, I could see the "pay with a tweet campaign" is continuing, and when I searched the #PayWithaTweet hashtag on Twitter, I could see it’s still going strong both in the U.S. and abroad.

The "After Party"

I had a chance to talk quite a bit with Adam Loving, a really handsome, lovely, articulate guy who is totally devoted to his craft. He was introduced as a local developer, but you know you’re really “local” when you recognize each others’ high schools!

He says he’s been working in his industry for 13 years, and his love of computing goes back to when he was a kid. Working part time with Gist has been great because it’s accelerated his ability to experiment. So at the end of 2009 he stopped working on the Twibes web site, and started working on some pet projects.

I asked him if aesthetics are unimportant when developers get ideas for applications because I’ve noticed a number of unattractive (or BORING) user interfaces out there. Says Adam, “Programmers who become entrepreneurs can have a fatal flaw — they have all kinds of technology at their disposal, but focus on “What solution I can create? rather than “What problem can I solve?”

So, in the process of "creating solutions," it appears an application's look and feel can be secondary. As a graphic designer, I find myself drawn to the applications that have the strongest combination of features and appealing user interfaces. Some sites that offer great comprehensive analytical feedback I avoid simply because I can’t stand the way they look. I don’t think I’m alone.

One final conversation with Chris Pirillo shed some light on the upcoming Gnomedex, this year being held August 19-21. When I asked him about the speakers he’s scheduled thus far, he told me the line up will probably continue to evolve, but attendees can expect exposure to controversy, technology and ideas related once again to the theme of “human circuitry.” He even shared a sneak peek at the new Gnomedex t-shirt design which included something that looked a bit like an iPhone 4 with a bumper!

Listening, watching and having the opportunity to talk with some of these brilliant guys was a treat. And I know we'll continue to hear a lot about them in the coming months.

Special thanks to pioneering event organizer, author and cofounder of Thunder Lizard Productions, Steve Broback (@sbroback) of the Parnassus Group, for extending the invitation.

And Steve? I had a “Super Cool Time!"

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Thanks to @justinjwilliams and David Horsfall for their feedback.

CS5—A Pleasure to Meet You

2010-05-12T12:23:00.000-07:00

I don’t think I’ve ever been as excited about a new software release as I am about the new Adobe Creative Suite (CS5). Two years ago a friend, one of the software engineers, told me they were working on some very cool things for this release. What an understatement! The new features are unbelievably awesome, and seeing what is now possible made me feel as though my head would explode.

The past two days I’ve been on the Adobe campus, learning about the main components in CS5, and today, specific presentations on InDesign. Why the focus on InDesign? Tuesday was the regularly scheduled bi-monthly InDesign Users Group (IDUG) meeting, which coincidentally took place the night before the “InDesignSecrets Print and ePublishing Conference” being held here in Seattle May 12-14. (For a complete list of speakers, see: http://www.indesignsecretslive.com/speakers.html) So there were a bunch of heavy hitters in town, and we were lucky to have a few of them share some cool things with us. (Note, there are usually maybe 100 people who attend the IDUG, but there were more like 300 for this event. That’s a lot of Pagliacci pizza!)

Monday, the awesome Colin Fleming, my favorite Adobe Application Engineer, did a fantastic dog and pony show for a small group of us, primarily covering InDesign, Illustrator, Photoshop and Flash Catalyst. Tuesday evening he reprised the material for a much larger audience and was met with resounding approval, oohs and ahhs.

Just a FEW of the new features:

The new layers palette allows you to move objects from visual order or into groups instead of toggling back and forth from the selection to direct selection tool
Multiple page sizes in one document!
Ability to track text changes (you can track change data in Indd & from Word docs) and other cool composition tools
New presentation mode for those who don’t get along with PowerPoint. Yes! You can create presentations from InDesign!
A mini-bridge runs in a Flash panel inside InDesign and Photoshop—meaning it is super easy to navigate and identify assets
And speaking of assets, there is a new icon on the Indd file that looks like a set of links. It will show you the links in the Indd file (Really cool! Especially if you don’t remember a file name)
Packaged “Fonts” folder has been renamed “Document Fonts.” Fonts in a particular document gathered at the same level as the Indd file will launch automatically. No more of the ugly pink highlight showing you missing fonts!
“Gridify” works with all creation tools, so you can now create and modify columns and rows instantly :-)
You can build threaded text frames automatically
Now place images that will “autofit," even when the window is scaled up/down
Metadata in image files can be used to automatically create captions
And...drum roll...going from print to digital has never been easier. If you love designing in InDesign, you can now do so while integrating animation, sound and external movie files.

After a short break, during which my iPhone had a seizure and wouldn’t allow me to check in on Foursquare (will I ever earn a “swarm” badge? she asks longingly), a few of the conference speakers started sharing useful, fun and just plain WEIRD tips and tricks.

James Wamser, Senior Training Specialist with Sells Printing Company in New Berlin, WI, showed how custom-sized pages could simplify work flow. He started with a letter-sized page, then added a skinny .25” wide page, and then added a third letter-sized page, to form a front and back cover with spine. Normally, because the spine is an unusual size, the cover would need to be created in a separate document with the front, back and spine on a single page. A great tip he gave us was to save the spine-width page variables so they are there to select for future projects.

One of the weird ones was Mike Rankin, author and manager of work flow automation at Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Co., showed us how it was possible to make a rotated page by drawing a square, rotating it, then using a toolbar button to align the page to the rotation of the square. David Blatner took it a step further by showing us we could alter the square to a parallelogram, and the page would follow suit. Why would this be a good idea? Well, it wouldn’t. It would likely drive your service providers insane. But these guys are über geeks, so of course discovering and exploiting little known “features” really blows their skirts up.

He also showed a cool trick for making interlocking links. Users of vector programs know it’s difficult to pull off, but his workaround took only a couple of minutes.

(Left to right: Mike Rankin, James Fritz and interested onlookers)

We were shown how to fake the “Ken Burns” effect in InDesign, which was really fun and funny, because James Fritz, Milwaukee-based Adobe Certified Design specialist, had to riffle through the demo laptop in search of images to use as examples and had trouble finding some. (One of the other speakers joked, “it’s in the folder... labeled “porn.”) But in the end, he was successful in showing us that it was possible to do rotation movement and enlargement while successive images faded in and out. Folks, this is InDesign!

Basically, there are just too many exciting features to focus on any one in particular. The bottom line is, I’m waiting for my CS5 Design Premium and hope it gets here soon!

One last note: There’s still time to register for InDesign Secrets Live, and last night we were given a code: IDUGS to get “early bird pricing!” (http://www.indesignsecretslive.com/conference.html)

Business Cards: Still Currency in the Digital Age

2010-04-16T09:12:00.000-07:00

I’ll never cease to be blown away meeting tweeps in real life. Thanks to @kirste (Kirsten Mitchell), who told me about the #SM201 conference, I met a ton of people at the tweetup I would otherwise not know—including some of the conference’s top-flight speakers.

It was especially fun to meet dynamic afternoon keynote speaker, Chicagoan @williger (Darren Williger), who gave a fascinating, fun and informative presentation spanning the days of bulletin boards (the first engaging social media platform) to the present. He also shared some cool information about tools available that can aggregate all of the social media streams we populate. Also great to connect with were morning presenter @Uschles (Udi Schlessinger), who talked about intelligent tool building; @mikewhitmore (Mike Whitmore) of Fresh Consulting; and afternoon panelist @digitalkvan (Nadia Aly) of Microsoft. Can I just say all of them were just terrific, not to mention friendly and nice?

The lounge at the Belcarra Apartments was lush and inviting, and the food by Russell’s Dining (Bill Gates’ favorite caterer) was fantastic. With all of the talking, shaking of hands, iPhones, Blackberrys and Droids, one thing I noticed was, people still exchange business cards.

In this digital, “wannabe paperless” age, there is still something nice about the tactile and physical experience one has receiving an attractive business card. And it doesn’t seem so “wrong” because it’s such a small piece of paper. To a graphic designer it’s a good thing, because it demonstrates the importance of investing in the creation of identities and branding, and the natural extensions to web and other collateral.

There were a few people and companies there who understood the importance of first impressions, but they were the exception rather than the rule. I noticed a number of the cards opted for a generic “template” look. Cards are reflections of each person and their companies, so it’s curious why cards would be treated like such an afterthought. Two of the speakers had run out of them altogether.

The conference offered a wealth of in-depth information on a broad range of topics. The more exposure I have to social media events such as #SM201, the more I learn and the more enthusiastic I become about Twitter. Is it just that I’ve been drinking the Kool-Aid? I don’t think so. Twitter brings like-minded people together, and I’m looking forward to meeting more of them. Just don’t forget your business card!

Udi Schlessinger and Mike Whitmore

Darren Williger and tweetup attendee

Nadia Aly and Iris Kao

Joe Kennedy

A nice recap of Social Media 201 by Udi Schlessinger @uschles
http://www.industryreview.org/search-engines/social-media-201-and-the-trip-to-seattle

I was a Twitter Conference Virgin

2010-03-09T19:49:00.001-08:00

OK, I guess I was nervous about attending my first large-scale gathering of tweeps. It wasn't helped by the fact that the same day I had to wake up at 5 AM to arrive in Kirkland to shoot a CEO for an annual report. Driving on the east side is anxiety-provoking enough, but the thought of getting to meet—in real life—people from Twitter, had me feeling like a 16-year-old girl waiting for a new boyfriend to pick her up for a date!

The TweetHouse #140 Conference (#140tc) started at 8 AM, and I missed the keynote speech by Mashable's @BenParr, plus a few morning sessions. When I arrived I called my Twitter bud and Huffington Post blogger, @2morrowknight, to let him know I was there, but my call rolled over to his voice mail. So I went to the registration table where @sbroback (Steve Broback) and Kim Larsen introduced themselves to me, and I decided to grab a cup of coffee before venturing into the auditorium.

The place was packed. The room was dark. There were laptops everywhere and it reminded me of being at a University of Washington lecture hall. Looking across the room, I decided to walk to the left side to find a space. Spotting an empty chair, I sat next to @lindseym2 with Vittana (the startup whose t-shirts were worn that day by @scobleizer, @chrispirillo and venture associate @yush [Ayush Agarwal]). Then my iPhone rang. OOPs—I forgot to turn it off—but it was @2morrowknight!

He and I met outside in the lobby. The first pleasant surprise: @2morrowknight was not only handsome and elegant, but also charming and younger than I expected! We immediately hit it off and sat together for the afternoon sessions.

Since I arrived late, I caught the tail end of a panel discussion featuring @ShaunaCausey. Shauna was the person who told me about the conference and helped me sign up. It was hard to focus, though, because of my excitement about being there! And why wouldn't I? One of the first people I bumped into was @chrispirillo. He was adorable and personable and I felt like I was meeting an old friend, but for the first time. Imagine how cool it was to catch @BenParr, Chris and Shauna together?

Second pleasant surprise: Other people I'd been tweeting with would say, "Hey, I'm following you!" And this is going to sound crazy, but it's probably the closest I've ever come to feeling famous! The pinnacle was when @dom (Dom Sagolla) came up and introduced himself to me, saying he liked my avatar and noticed my name in the streams. I said, "Don't you know my BTF, @krystynchong?" and he said that yes, Krys had just been to his house recently! When Twitter and real life collide, it's still a small world, after all!

@chrispirillo introduced the afternoon keynote by @dom, one of the original creators of Twitter (pictured above). It was exciting, but also entertaining as well as illuminating, to get an inside glimpse of how the Twitter phenomenon was born. It was cool to see how the idea started as a sketch, and unfolded to become such a major element of so many people's lives—not only for individuals, but also for the vast number developers whose applications have been created to dovetail with and enhance the user's experience. @Invoker (Ryan Holmes CEO of HootSuite) @dacort (Damon Cortesi, creator of TweetStats and founder of United Startup) are two I had the chance to talk with. (For a complete list, click here. )

Final pleasant surprise: The tweetup at the Hotel Andra following the conference was a fantastic party. @seattlewinegal did a great job of assembling some fabulous wineries, and the Andra was a terrific venue. I had to make a beeline for @AndrewWill winery — one of my faves, but also enjoyed a tremendous Walter Dacon 2007 Appanage (@wdwines). The energy was palpable and it felt a little bit like #TwitterHollywood or #TwitterFanFest—just an amazing time.

The most striking thing to me was the friendliness exhibited by everyone, the level of fame notwithstanding. If you've ever felt like an outsider, it was the opposite experience at this conference. Tweeps are inclusive and all-embracing whether your following is 20 or 20,000. @zaibatsu (Reg Saddler) once told me Twitter is "the great equalizer," and based on this experience, I have to say I agree.

____________________________________

Postscript:

Thanks to @kirste (Kirsten Mitchell) for taking the shot of me with @2morrowknight, and props to @sbroback, founder of The Parnassus Group, and @tweethouse (The Tweethouse) for putting together such an amazing conference. #140tc was one of the most fun events I've attended in my professional career, and I'm still thinking it was all a pleasant dream. :-)

Tales of a Roadie: Interview with Lance Lambert, Former Band Boy for The Wailers

2010-02-28T18:55:00.000-08:00

This interview is part of a larger article to appear in Munster Style, a magazine devoted to Kustom Kulture and vintage rock.

Paint a picture of what it was like and what that experience was like for you.

Starting in about the spring of 1966, they [Sandy Gillespie and Ron Gardner of The Wailers] asked me if I wanted to go on the road early part of the summer and I said yes.

At that time the band had three vehicles. They had a new Ford station wagon that had "Wailers" painted all over the side of it. They had an Oldsmobile — it wasn't a limousine, but it was a great big sedan, and they had an Econoline [van] that also has "Wailers" painted on it. So the Econoline had the equipment in it, the wagon sometimes had the band and more equipment in it, and the Oldsmobile had the band in it. I usually was driving the wagon or the Econoline.

Anytime I could be in their car and be seen in it, I would jump on it. One time I drove to Owens Beach, Point Defiance in Tacoma, five of my buddies crammed in back, as far back as possible, and when I pop the clutch, I could do wheel stands.

Once I pulled into burger joint before a concert. I get out and there are all these kids. I get my burger, get back in and then back into a telephone pole. It crushed the quarter panel. I wasn't nearly as cool anymore. I crunched the van twice and also got a ticket in it.

How many guys were there?

There were five guys. Plus me [Lance] and Sandy in the entourage.

Kent Morrill – Keyboard and Vocal

Neal Anderson – Lead Guitar

Buck Ormsby – Bass Guitar

Ron Gardner – Saxophone, Keyboard and Vocal

Dave Roland - Drums

How were they getting their gigs? Did they have a booking agent?

They played every little podunk town between here and wherever. They had a guy out of Tacoma that was their manager —I don't remember his name — their office was on 6th Avenue in Tacoma, near Pearl or Proctor. It was south of Proctor neighborhood just west of 6th Avenue and S. Stevens Street.

And he was booking them in small venues?

Anybody that would pay. Back then (need to verify) their standard wage was $700/night. We'd be in Hoquiam one night and Spokane the next night and Eugene the next night. It was just grueling. Those guys were fine with it — they were raised on it — this guy was dying.

When I was in the wagon I would get to a town before the band — a half a day or whatever, and one of my jobs was to contact the promoter. And it was usually a radio station. You'd get a hold of the station and sometimes they'd have me come on and do an interview, which was really fun because I'd say, "Yeah, and my boys will be here later today," and I'd make this big deal.

And you were 19 years old? That's insane!

Yeah, well the DJs that were interviewing me were probably 21—the ones who were interviewing me.

And the motels or hotels would be set up in advance so I or we would roll in. The band almost (and I'm showing you a small window, but in that summer) usually they got two rooms: One for for sleeping and one was for partying. And one of my jobs was — somebody went out and bought the beer, and I would fill the bathtub up with ice and beer.

What was the drinking age at that time?

Twenty-one. And most of the guys were probably 21 at that time — not all of them were, but a couple of them were. I think Kent was the oldest guy in the group. Not sure about that. So we'd hit town, set up at the hotel, Sandy and I would go to the venue and set the equipment up, and then the band was really into their "entrance," which was really cool. Very theatrical. They were really smart about that.

So they would build a lot of excitement and anticipation?

Yes. Sometimes they would intentionally, well, sometimes they would get there early, tune up all their equipment, so everything was ready to go (this is before anybody got there) —I don't remember how many times it happened, but I remember it happening — they would intentionally be a little late. You know, the thing was supposed to start at 7 or 8 or 9, and they would get there at 7:10, or 8:10 or 9:10, and the crowd would be [antsy] — yeah, they'd come through the front door. And they would even sometimes wear trench coats. So these guys would come walking in in trench coats (everyone knew who they were) and rather than come in through the back door like anyone else, they'd come through the front door and the crowd would just part as they came in. And they'd walk up onto the stage, pick up their instruments, and BANG, they'd start playing.

Whenever they played in Vancouver, Canada, the Canadians would fly even though it was just from Seattle because the newspaper in Vancouver treated them like they were the biggest name in the world, so they'd get their picture taken, coming off the airplane, like they were The Beatles or something. Yeah. And they had some of that stuff down.

Sounds like they did a lot of really intelligent things? Like things that were very sophisticated?

They were a smart band—a very smart band. That's why their music's so good.

They would pay their own way and make sure the local media knew when they were arriving. I remember seeing a picture on the front page of the Vancouver newspaper of the band walking down the ramp off the plane while waving at the crowd. Very “Beatles-ish”.

So it seems like they had it all, but musically they were challenged to put out something that reached the same level as when they were at their pinnacle?

When rock and roll was rock and roll, they were the kings around here. Not just here, but they were the kings in Seattle, Portland, Ore, Vancouver—the northwest. When music started changing — and this is just a personal opinion — they were a little slow to change —not that they even needed to change, but once The Beatles started happening, I think the Wailers and a lot of other people thought, "yeah, that'll go away." And it didn't.

And so their music was becoming a little dated. So then they started playing "catch up," and if you listen to their "Out of Our Tree" — Correction —“Walk Through The People" album, that's when they tried to get psychedelic. And a few things before that. And some of it worked, some of it didn't. A typical Wailers album, no matter where they were in the time line, it was always the same thing: a third of it was killer—just number one stuff, a third of it was okay and a third of it was like, nyah. But I suppose you could say that about everybody back then.

I remember that last album — "Walk Through The People," I think was on Bell Records — and I remember, even though this really wasn't the case, the attitude was — boy I hope I don't get in trouble saying things I've twisted in my memory—but it was kinda like, "This one's gotta make it. This album's gotta make it or we have to really look at what we're doing."

With the album art on “Walk Through The People” I think they shot themselves in the foot on it. It looked like two things: “A Web of Sound” by The Seeds was released in 1965 and the Wailers album cover looked too much like it. And then it sort of looked like it wasn't “current.”

So that was still like around '66? So how long do you think that ride continued? You said you kind of hooked up with them just after they'd peaked and they were kind of heading down.

Of course they've had a resurgence, but probably '68 or so? [Things were really changing radically by 1968] They went through...their album, sitting in a spaghetti house in San Francisco — "Outburst"— that has some really good stuff on it—very commercial sounding— and every time I hear it, it sounds like The Monkees to me. And that album— I used to hang around their office—there might've been another writer. They hired a guy to write a bunch of stuff for them, R. Wayne Davies. It was like, OK, put an album out that's not ours—someone else is going to write it. But I remember the guy drove up. He was a rag-tag looking hippie before there were rag-tag hippies. He drove a beat up Corvette and I remember him driving to the office. And he wrote a good part of the "Outburst" album — I think. It was pretty commercial sounding, but there was some good stuff on it. Commercial stuff isn't necessarily bad.

It was sorta like, we're gonna stop being the original Wailers and sound like everybody else, and [not be true to yourself].

Those two albums were produced around the time you hung out?

I think "Out of Our Tree," and "Walk through the People." Maybe they put out 15 albums? Something like that. Among them:

The Fabulous Wailers

The Wailers At The Castle

Tall Cool One

Out of Our Tree

Wailers Wailers Everywhere

The Wailers and Company

Outburst

Walk Through The People

Cadillac to Mexico

Two Car Garage

The Boys From Tacoma

The Sonics is a huge piece of the Wailers history. The Sonics recorded a lot of the Wailers music. The Sonics were another Tacoma band. The Wailers get credit for being the first garage band. The Sonics were really different. They had this feedback system they were using that no one else was using. The Kinks, I think got their whole gig from the Sonics. There are a lot of people who think that.

People think the Kinks were influenced by the Sonics?

Yes. Sonics were recording stuff that the Kinks got a hold of. They thought, “Hey, this stuff is really different.” But the Sonics were a local, popular band. The Wailers took them under their wing—started recording them on the "Etiquette" label. The Sonics, in some people's eyes, eclipsed the Wailers. Their song, "The Witch," was a pretty big hit. I don't know where it landed nationally, but it definitely was up there. And they had a bunch of local hits—some other stuff. They were really an acquired taste.

Did you ever like the grunge stuff? Did it resonate with you at all? Like, did it harken back to those days?

I didn't pay attention. As time went by, I'd hear some Nirvana stuff and thought it was good—it sounded more like the Sonics. I claim no expertise. My own taste in music stopped in 1975 or so.

So during the time you were the band boy, you were traveling vast distances?

I keep getting side tracked. This is a good story. It was really a grind. We'd set up the equipment, the band would go play. Part of my job, for lack of a better word, was being a "pimp." I would make sure that I was seen on stage by the audience. Still to this day I make sure I get "seen by the audience." [Smile.] I would make sure they would make a connection. I would walk up to girls and all I would say is, "Are you 18?" Laughs. They'd say, "yeah." I'd say, [for example] "The Wailers are staying at The Tradewinds tonight. C'mon down. We're in room 502." Only the cute ones. And everything you've ever heard about groupies? They're all true.

There were no drugs. In fact, the Peanut Butter Conspiracy was playing in SF or somewhere and The Wailers might've opened for them. I was invited to go smoke dope with them, and I can't remember if it was Buck or Kent, but he gave me the finger shake. They were all for drinking themselves into oblivion, but don't touch marijuana — nothing.

Do you think that changed over time?

I would suspect so. Laughs. But I have no stories. I witnessed nothing. [Smiles.]

So on a typical summer—would you guys play...

Seven nights a week. One night off per month. They were booked night after night.

If they were making $700 per night, that was a sizable amount of money back in those days.

Each guy, I don't remember the amount of money, but each guy would get a certain amount of money every week and all the rest of it went into Etiquette Records. So they were on a "wage." Etiquette was THEIR label and it still is.

So it was night after night after night. The thing that was hard was, some nights you'd finish playing at one or two in the morning, tear down the equipment, go back to the hotel, sleep til 8, 9, or 10. But sometimes you'd tear down the equipment, climb back into the van, then drive 300 miles. The band might stay behind and sleep, but Sandy and I would drive to the next town. And I did this for two and a half months. One day we were in a restaurant. It was really bizarre because we were eating breakfast at breakfast time. I remember thinking it was 8 o'clock and we were eating breakfast. I got up from the table and went into the bathroom and puked my guts out, came back and said, "Guys, I can't do this anymore. It's just too hard on me, physically."

It must have been the time of your life.

Cherished memories.

When you guys would do these gigs, would you say you'd have an audience of a couple hundred?

Easily. There'd be an audience of 150 to 1,000. A roller rink, dance hall. Probably the biggest gig I saw when I was with them was the Coliseum in Spokane. Huge. Big enough that I was with the Wailers band and Chuck Cantrell (the roadie for the Sonics) is in his van, and we drag-raced inside the Coliseum, aiming straight for the stage. Have you read Pat O'Day's book? There are some pictures in it of the Wailers taken on stage in the Coliseum, that night.

Was there like a pinnacle moment for you in that whole overview of the summer? Like you thought, wow, this is an unbelievable moment? That really sticks out in your mind as the most amazing thing—like, you can't believe you're doing this, or you can't believe you're here?

It won't print as well as it came across, but I remember Sandy, Ron and I —people would pair up/share sleeping quarters/hang out— we went to a department store and all the clerks there, the girls were all over Ron. Two stories: Ron points at me and says, he's in the band too, and all of a sudden they're all over me.

But a better story: Sandy and I are somewhere, we stop at a fruit stand. There was a family with two daughters there. The two daughters saw the van.

They see us and come running and they have a Wailers album. And they ask us to autograph. I said, “Hey, I'm just the roadie,” and they were like, “I don't care!” So I signed it, "Best wishes, Lance Lambert." so somewhere out there, there is an album inscribed like that.

Oh, I have another story...

They're playing in Burien — a club there, like a dance hall or skating rink or something. Concert's over. Tearing down the equipment. The exits doors on the side "CRASH" and burst open and about six or eight teenage girls come flocking in and they all gather around me. And they're squealing and saying "Give us something! Give us something! Give us anything!" And I had some Wailers calling cards, so I gave them each a calling card (like, business cards?) Yeah, and I didn't bother telling them I wasn't in the band at that point. And it was like I just gave them each a $500 bill.

Do you have any mementos from those times? Back stage passes? Ticket stubs?

Nothing. And I'm a guy with lots of scrap books filled with everything. It's crazy. I have a picture of Sandy standing next to the van. I have sadly one bad picture of me climbing into the station wagon. I have Wailers posters I've picked up over the years. But yeah, I wish I had more.

Something I'd like to say about the Kingsmen—I was in Vegas about 15 years ago. There was a concert at The Aladdin. It was Jan and Dean, The Kingsmen, The Shantees (sp), and the Shantelles. Jan and Dean headlined. All four groups took a break (I do have a great, one of a kind poster for the event, made up by the hotel). The bands each were set up at tables to sign autographs and stuff. At the time I think there were two original guys in the group. I said, "I certainly don't expect you to remember me, but I will always remember when the Wailers were sitting at a patio killing time before the show and you guys pulled up in your car because you were staying there, too. As soon as the word "Wailers" came out of my mouth, the other three or four guys stopped talking to whomever they were talking to and scooted their chairs over, and sat there and talked. And this is a direct quote in my memory, "You know, all we ever were was a Wailers-wannabe band." If the Wailers version of “Louie Louie” would have come out a week or two earlier, and it would be their version you always hear."

Through all of this, from '59 until now, I've always thought the Wailers are just a really great rock and roll band. And it's always frustrated me and every one of their fans that they weren't bigger. The rest of the world deserves more Wailers music. You look at them now and they're being recognized, busy and still performing. They just released "Two Car Garage", a new CD with The Ventures. They recorded a bunch of stuff and it's the best version I've ever heard of "Louie Louie."

February 19, 2010

Truth in Color

2010-01-30T17:28:00.000-08:00

Or, why does my stuff look different on screen versus on paper?

Every designer searches for "truth in color," whether it's finding the right blue to evoke feelings of trust and stability or choosing a green that says a company is forward thinking, environmentally-aware, but also serious, not playful.

Recently I was working on a project that was governed by a pre-existing corporate style guide. For those who don't know, corporate standards, graphic standards, brand guidelines and similar descriptors, refer to a document that delineates important aspects of a company's image. Some of the elements it usually addresses include use of the logo; fonts for print and web; graphic elements such as bands and gradients and shapes (such as rounded corners instead of sharp ones); whether the corporate style is to use illustrations versus photos, and corporate/secondary/tertiary color palettes.

During the course of working on this project, the client noticed how different something looks on screen compared to when it is printed on paper. This phenomena is the difference between how the eye looks at emitted light and reflected light.

Emitted color is projected to the viewer through the computer screen, just as it is with a television monitor. All colors viewed this way are composed of 3 colors: red, green and blue. This color model is referred to as "RGB" color, and it is the model used for all colors seen on the web. RGB is also the model used for traditional color film negatives.

Reflected color is color viewed on a surface, whether it is a magazine, bus card, billboard or brochure. Even backlit posters and banners are still produced as reflected color. The model used is cyan, magenta, yellow and black, or CMYK. CMYK is also known as "4-color process," or "full color". If you use a look at the Sunday comics section and you'll be able to see CMYK dots. In addition to CMYK, there is also Hexachrome color, which uses CMYK plus orange and green. Hexachrome expands the color possibilities that can be achieved in full-color printing.

Another ink model used for reflected color is called a "spot" color. Spot colors are pure colors that are mixed with different pigment formulas, sort of like when you have paint mixed to paint a wall. Commonly used spot color sources include Pantone, Toyo and Focoltone, Trumatch plus custom ink mixes. When a job, such as a 2-color business card, is printed — often it is printed with 2 pure spot colors.

Spot colors can be converted to CMYK, but because CMYK is limited in its ability to interpret color pigments, it's not always possible to convert spot to process with identical results. Also at play is the surface upon which the color appears. A shiny surface will appear more bright and saturated than a dull one.

SO...getting back to that pesky client.

Because emitted color and reflected color DO look different, even though he had a corporate color palette, he wanted to specify different colors to be used in print and web. For print, he wanted to specify a PMS color PLUS a CMYK build that was different than the formula normally used for the conversion. Next, he wanted to specify an even different RGB formula for the web. His thinking was that he'd be able to control the look of his color across various media.

WRONG.

It's a nice idea, but in reality, different monitors (LCD, CRT) have different white points (brightnesses) and color capabilities, and every monitor is calibrated slightly differently, just as different color printers have varying color profiles and produce different output. One of my clients LOVED the way Epson color layouts looked and was always a little disappointed because commercial (professional) offset printing couldn't deliver the same results. Just as monitors display colors differently, when you provide a PDF to someone and allow them to print it out, you've essentially lost control over the quality of the color output.

Especially now when so many people are uninformed about how to even evaluate good color, and based on the inability to control color, my recommendation is to choose colors from a widely accepted color library (such as Pantone or Toyo), gearing it to the dominant use—whether web-based or print. But always be aware of what happens in various models (spot, process or RGB) and check out what it looks like on uncoated, matte and coated surfaces. This extra effort will help avoid unpleasant surprises, and It's the only way I know to "idiot proof" and, as much as possible, preserve the integrity of intent.

Retweet Offenders

2009-12-04T23:00:00.000-08:00

For 10 years I would talk to my BFF every day on the phone. We both had our own design practices, both of us are Japanese American sanseis, and we have known one another since before puberty. In 2006 she took a very high-level job as creative director for a hugely popular digital entertainment company, and because her time was now owned by the company, she felt uncomfortable talking to me from work.

I felt bereft and mourned about it for a year or longer. Eventually I became used to not having her presence in my day-to-day life. Other friends began to fill the gap, but I often thought about those great years when we spent so much time talking, sharing and bonding.

Fast forward to the end of 2008; enter Twitter.

I don't mean to turn my blog into another outlet for commentary about social networking, but Twitter actually changed my life. It took hundreds, now thousands of people to replace my friend!

During the course of finding my way around Twitter I've seen trends and topics emerge. One recent annoying practice I've observed is the "Self-Retweeter."

As many people are aware, Twitter analytic applications assess various metrics to determine one's standing. Among them:
• The number of followers you have
• How often you engage in conversations with your followers
• How often you are mentioned
• How often your tweets are retweeted (RT)

Now that Twitter has added the list function, I think lists should factor into the evaluation. Some people with 20, 40 or 60,000 followers are sometimes only listed 2 or 3 times. What that tells you is, that person has a lot of followers, but no one is listening. But it also presents another opportunity for exploitation: People who are inclined to "cook the stats" by retweeting themselves certainly wouldn't be beyond "listing" themselves, and I've seen at least one example where that has occurred.

An example of "cooking the stats" occurred when I was recently approached by someone who had formed a consortium of people who were committed to retweeting and mentioning each other, I supposed to help boost their standings. That sounded ludicrous to me and I elected to not participate. The concept shouted, "hey, my postings aren't good enough to be noticed or retweeted by the general public, so I'm resorting to artificially making myself seem more interesting and influential!"

From my understanding of RTs, they should be reserved for re-sharing information that is found to be interesting, amusing or important enough to re-post.

The newest and most obnoxious trend is the "self-retweeter." These are people who, if mentioned in a tweet, will retweet their own mention. On rare occasions there is a need to leave one's mention in a retweet, such as when the post won't make any sense without it, but I think most of the pros will agree, it's not good Twitter etiquette to mention yourself.

The practice I'm referring to is the equivalent of Twitter diarrhea, or "Twitterrhea" — effluence flooding the Twitterverse and polluting the stream.

Let me cite an example with (I hope) fictitious names, typical of a thank you I might tweet to people who have RTed or mentioned me:

@johndoe @maryjohnson @bobjackson @nonameperson @whoever Thanks 4 RTs & mentions, COOL PEEPS!

Then, johndoe RTs me like this:

RT@terrinakamura @johndoe @maryjohnson @bobjackson @nonameperson @whoever Thanks 4 RTs & mentions, COOL PEEPS!

Then maryjohnson RTs:

RT@terrinakamura @johndoe @maryjohnson @bobjackson @nonameperson @whoever Thanks 4 RTs & mentions, COOL PEEPS!

Then bobjackson RTs:

RT@terrinakamura @johndoe @maryjohnson @bobjackson @nonameperson @whoever Thanks 4 RTs & mentions, COOL PEEPS!

Then nonameperson RTs:

RT@terrinakamura @johndoe @maryjohnson @bobjackson @nonameperson @whoever Thanks 4 RTs & mentions, COOL PEEPS!

Then whoever retweets:

RT@terrinakamura @johndoe @maryjohnson @bobjackson @nonameperson @whoever Thanks 4 RTs & mentions, COOL PEEPS!

So each person to whom the RT is already attributed, mentions HIM/HERSELF again, plus they mention ME again, creating an endless loop of RTs. And to top it off, some of these people actually RT the same mention over and over! It's not uncommon for me to find 5 or 6 of the same RT!

In other words, they've managed to insert themselves into the data manipulating the analytics that determine their values. Don't get me wrong—I completely recognize these people are also boosting MY "tweet-worth," but it's one of the things I'd be happy to sacrifice if only to restore space and value to the Twitter stream.

####

The self-retweeter is the first cousin of the person who begs for RTs (PLZ RT). There is no solution I can see.

The Dark Side of Twitter

2009-11-14T13:19:00.000-08:00

I'd always assumed when I'd met people on Twitter that they were "WYSIWYG" or "what you see is what you get." People who are friendly, intelligent, funny or engaging I would imagine would be very similar in real life. On Twitter, people will either like you or not, so my feeling has always been to be yourself and let the "Tweeps*" fall where they may.

Throughout the past year I've developed actual friendships with fewer than a dozen people. These are people I consider in my inner circle, and we communicate outside of Twitter through email, phone conversations, and in some cases have even met in person. Those friendships, as those in real life, are rare, and I treasure each and every one of them.

Recently, out of the blue, I received a DM (direct message) from a follower I don't know well, warning me about one of our mutual followers. The information was disturbing. Allegedly, our mutual follower was dangerous and violent, and was wanted by the police.

Because of the friendly nature of my conversations with the allegedly dangerous person, I was a bit incredulous accepting the information at face value. I judge people through my direct interactions with them, and I'd had nothing but positive exchanges regarding work and common interests throughout our communications with one another.

The ensuing conversation with my family about this episode led to the conclusion that although the accuser's situation appeared to be dire, I couldn't become involved and should disengage. If the allegations were true and I betrayed confidences to enable someone's incarceration, who is to say I or my family wouldn't become the object of revenge?

Until now, I'd only experienced the best Twitter has to offer. I think this shows the worst.

*Tweeps: one of the many words representing people on Twitter

In Memory of My Best Friend

2009-10-31T21:41:00.000-07:00

We had the most wonderful dog in the world. It's been 2 years since he died, but I still think of him almost every day. I wrote about it at the time of his death, but shared with only a few people. I'm reposting it now.

Rusty was lethargic today and had been increasingly off his food. We were unable to coax him to get up and go outside. He had an accident while lying on his bed. His expression seemed to say it was humiliating to soil himself and couldn’t we see that it was time? When Charley got home from school today, the three of us talked and agreed it was. He no longer had the strength or will to enjoy life.

It was around 7 PM when he died.

Emergencies delayed Dr. Kelly and his assistant Gail. When they arrived, we talked about what had been happening with Rusty — his decline, increasing seizures (2 last week), almost daily incontinence, loss of appetite, inability to stand or walk, and the faraway look in his eyes. They were kind and compassionate and let us spend as much time as we needed to say goodbye. It was very sad for all of us. When the time came, Dr. Kelly injected Rusty's hind right leg with a sedative that put him to sleep, then eased him into death. David stayed nearby, comforting him while he received the injection, and Charley and I stroked him until he stopped breathing. After a few minutes, Dr. Kelly listened to Rusty's heart and confirmed that he was gone.

Afterward, Dr. Kelly went out to prepare their car which was parked in the driveway, and I walked outside with Gail for a moment. When I went back into the kitchen, Charley was kneeling beside Rusty and wiping tears from his eyes. I don't think he wanted us to see him cry. We tried to close Rusty's eyes, but they stayed partly open. Dr. Kelly and Gail wrapped Rusty in a blanket, then David and Dr. Kelly carried him to their car. While Rusty laid on the blanket, we each gave him one last goodbye.

We asked them to let us know when Rusty's cremated remains would be available for us. We want to keep them until Andrew comes home -- or possibly forever. We thanked them for their willingness to come to our home, sparing Rusty the feeling of fear he would have experienced in his last moments had we taken him to Elliott Bay Animal Hospital to be euthanized. We shook hands with Gail and hugged Dr. Kelly, then said goodbye. I watched them back down the driveway knowing the body of our beloved friend was leaving forever.

And what an unforgettable, loving, wonderful, smart and noble friend he was. I want to remember his soft ears and his fur that never seemed to shed, his random white toes, the white blaze on his chest and the black-tipped tail. I want to remember what it felt like to wrap my arms around his neck and deep chest -- the smell of his head, his beautiful, expressive brown eyes. I want to remember how smart he was, figuring out things in a most human-like manner. And I want to remember how funny he was and how he could make everyone laugh. There will never be another like him.

It felt sad during dinner. David, Charley and I toasted him. We told Rusty stories that both warmed the heart and brought tears to my eyes. After dinner it felt strange to not feed him or walk him. After 14 years, there is a huge emptiness.

Rusty, aka Rusty the wonderdog, Googie, Roosty, Big Dog, Great Big, Great Big Dog (said with a Scottish accent) Dog that I love, Rusticulosis, Rustica, Silly old dog who looks like a log, Sill pill, and many other names of affection that somehow never confused him, who entered our lives for Andrew's 10th birthday (September 1993), gently departed from our lives October 1, 2007. We miss him terribly.

Getting the Boot

2009-09-28T02:46:00.000-07:00

I thought I'd been fired, but it turned out to be an escape

Late on a recent Friday afternoon I was left a VOICE MESSAGE telling me I was being replaced. Nice. The new editor of a publication I designed freelance for 10 years couldn't extend the courtesy to tell me directly, and instead had her boss leave the news on my voice mail.

The event spurred discussions with people & colleagues in my inner circle, and I learned it's not unusual nowadays to dismiss people via voice mail or e-mail. I'm not sure if it's due to cowardice, lack of respect, laziness or indifference. But whatever it is, it's symptomatic of cultural malaise.

A week and a half went by when I received a call from one of my printers, telling me the former client had called and asked for downloads of my files. When the printer informed the client that it was illegal to accommodate them, the client emailed me, instructing me to give my permission to the printer to release the files!

As most people in the creative industry are aware, when a freelance designer, photographer, illustrator or other creator of original content, is hired, unless it is specifically stated that the arrangement is for a buyout, copyright ownership is retained by the respective creators. The client is buying the "deliverable"—be it a finished brochure, annual report or other collateral—not the objects themselves.

So, I was let go, and they hired a replacement who was unable to move forward without my files.

A volley of emails ensued. The client insinuated I was trying to strong-arm them for more money because at one point I tried to explain the value of the files and left the door open for her to call me (which she elected not to do). She failed to recognize: If they had been respectful; if they had asked me instead of told me; and if they had not gone behind my back, I would have given them the files to them as a gesture of goodwill.

But lack of professional consideration left me no choice. I let them know their designer needed to proceed on her own. The client then had a "virtual" tantrum, but as far as I was concerned, it was a dead issue.

The next day, out of the blue, I received an email from another person from that office who acted as though everything was rosy, and asked in a friendly way if I was willing to give them the files, or possibly discuss a buyout? She was seemingly unaware of what had transpired between her boss and me, but the ironic thing was, she was the person who originally approached the printer! It was the theatre of the absurd. I explained to her the plan to have their new designer move forward on her own. End of story.

But not quite.

A few days later I received the following handwritten note in the mail:

"Dear Terri,

Thank you for your extraordinary contributions to XXXX with your work on XXXX over the years. You've always impressed us with your creativity and dedication. We are certain it won't be long before another [client] snaps you up! We hope our paths cross again in the future.

Please stay in touch. Thanks again.

[signed] XXXX and the communications team"

The reason for the note is a mystery. After the unethical actions and insulting missives, to suddenly receive such a complimentary note made no sense at all. It was a disingenuous attempt at...what?

When I first learned I'd no longer be working on this project, I felt sad about the loss. Now, realising what a goofed up group of new people are in place, I can only be thankful I'm not sucked into their quagmire.

Since that fateful Friday I've picked up several new clients—all wonderful people who are professional and know what they're doing. So the stars are shining upon me, it seems!

Dinner Party From Hell

2009-08-30T01:22:00.001-07:00

Okay, so I'm being melodramatic when I say it was the dinner party from hell, because it wasn't really hell. The people were nice. It was a beautiful day. We were able to enjoy an incredible view of Puget Sound outside on a deck.

The hell part was the dinner. But I'm jumping ahead...

Several weeks ago I received a dinner invitation from a long-time acquaintance. Because my husband and I like this person, we said we'd love to attend. In these parts, whenever someone invites you to their home for dinner, you will inevitably inquire, "what can we bring?" Nine times out of ten, the answer will be, "No need to bring anything, but if you'd like, bring a bottle of wine."

This time it went differently, though. A few days before the dinner, I received a phone call asking me to bring an "entree salad." As I was unfamiliar with the term, I asked for more clarification. Did it mean a salad that has meat in it? Or a chunky salad? Or something hefty? I was told any of those things would be fine, and to come at 5 PM, so I was left to my own devices to think of what to make.

Though my husband and I are on the dark side of 50, neither one of us are at the point where we want to be anywhere near dinner at 5 o'clock. Coincidentally, we had another stop to make in that part of Seattle that would delay our arrival until 5:30 or 6:00, which is still early but definitely more in the realm of normal for us.

We weren't told how many people would be there, so I planned to double whatever recipe I was going to make. A double volume of salad should be plenty to qualify it as an "entree," or so I thought.

My husband suggested I make a Chinese chicken salad recipe given to me by a former boyfriend's mother, an exceptionally talented cook of Japanese and Asian food. The recipe is labor intense, so usually the only time I make it is for Japanese New Year. It requires the individual preparation of many components, including deep-fried maifun noodles. When made correctly, the maifun blooms into an airy cloud once it hits the hot oil, yielding a light, crispy texture. The deep-fried maifun noodles really make the salad.

The day arrived and I began work. It was unseasonably hot, so my exasperation threshold was three notches lower than usual. The prep work is killer and takes hours. Trying to cut corners, I'd decided to use an electric fry pan instead of deep frying on the gas stove because it's less of a mess to clean up. Bad idea.

The electric fry pan didn't get hot enough. When I dropped in the maifun noodles, they looked right, but weren't light or crispy. In fact, they were mostly rock hard. If you can imagine chewing on threadlike bunches of greasy plastic, that would come close to the texture. My husband, who always finds the positive in every situation, acknowledged they were inedible. Without the maifun it would be an ordinary salad. I was beyond frustrated, so called our friend explaining I was having a meltdown. I was told not to worry if the salad didn't work out - that there would be plenty of food.

Having a safety net thrown, I started what I should have done in the first place - deep frying on the gas stove. When everything was finally complete, I packed it all up and we were ready to go.

We departed, making our other stop along the way, and arrived to find 10 people at the dinner party. We set down the chilled bottle of Prosecco and the salad ingredients we brought, and mingled for 10 minutes before asking for a beverage. Apparently because we didn't get there at 5, the hors d'oeuvres were not to be found. My husband was able to scrape some molecules of salmon off a remaining piece of skin, but that was it.

We chatted for another 15 minutes, then I was tapped on the shoulder and told it was time to serve my salad. So I went into the kitchen and asked if I should plate the salad or leave it in the bowl for people to serve themselves? I was told it would be fine to leave it in the bowl, so I proceeded to assemble all of the ingredients, toss it and set it on the sideboard. Meanwhile, another guest was slicing bread and setting it out. All the while I was wondering why someone wasn't firing up the barbecue? Certainly we were going to have some nice grilled salmon?

It was announced dinner was served. That's when I realised my salad was the dinner and THERE WOULD BE NO SALMON.

The salad was well received, but the other guests were equally puzzled. Should they leave room on their plates for more courses? My husband and I quickly discerned this would not be the case.

Ten minutes later when everyone was finished, the plates were cleared away. Meanwhile, another guest went to prepare their part of the meal, which turned out to be dessert. That was dinner: My salad, bread and dessert. I puzzled over being told there would be "plenty of food," and thought, "yeah, in a third-world country!"

At that point I excused myself and stealthily called our son, asking him to call me back in 15 minutes. When my phone rang, I answered and announced we needed to leave. My husband and I got into the car and asked each other what in the heck was that!? When we got home, we rummaged around for something to eat. We were hungry.

The next day I called a friend who was also a guest and asked what she thought. Yes, it was weird. After all accounting, we deduced everything served at the dinner was provided by a guest and that the hosts did nothing except provide a venue, glasses, dishes and utensils. One of the hosts was Jewish. I asked my friend (also Jewish) if it was a Jewish thing? Her response was, "NO, Terri! Jews feed people!"

So the next time we're presented with an invitation from this person, we're going to suggest dining out.

Separate checks.

How I Became a Twitter Junkie

2009-07-26T00:59:00.000-07:00

In October of 2008, Aaron, a client, told me I NEEDED to get with it and get on Twitter. Aaron (@SeattleBlank) is, like, 30 years old, and is a VP for a public relations firm, and someone I respect.

As a graphic designer, it's important for me to keep up with what's current. It's tantamount to social currency. So sheepishly, I opened an account.

It felt weird, though, all alone in what I'd describe as my "Twitter Room," and since I didn't really know what I was doing, I proceeded to post rather banal tweets about who I was meeting for dinner and where, or the projects I was working on, etc., as if anyone could care. There was no interaction or response by anyone. Was it any wonder that I was unimpressed with the whole thing? It seemed pointless and stupid. I did very little with Twitter for the first 4 months.

Whenever someone started following me, I couldn't understand why. They didn't know me. I thought, "why in the world would this perfect stranger want to follow me? Is he/she a stalker?"

I was paranoid and protected my tweets - and had only a couple dozen followers for several months. But it was intriguing to have people request to follow me and I began obsessing over how many followers I gained or lost. When I'd lose someone I sort of took it personally. It was like, why did they leave me?! Eventually I removed "protect my updates." What, exactly, was I protecting?

For many months I didn't realise it is almost a courtesy to follow back people who follow you (unless they are spammers or clearly have nothing that interests you). I wasn't doing that. Also, I didn't realise a person couldn't send me a direct message (DM) unless I followed them back. In fact, I was doing so many things the wrong way, but I didn't know it!

In January, 2009, I had 42 followers. I decided to reexamine Twitter to determine whether there was any real value, and to give it a serious try. This meant reading everything I could and learning about what people were interested in, and discovering the tools to manage it all. My tweets, until this point, had been boring and offered no value to my followers. How could I make myself more interesting? And what kinds of things did I want to share? After all, everything I tweeted would be a reflection of some facet of myself.

Taking cues from people like Peter Cashmore (@mashable), Guy Kawasaki (@guykawasaki), Seth Simonds (@sethsimonds), and others, I tweaked my tweets, learned about retweeting (RT) and (@) replies. I learned an embarrassing lesson about DMs from Seth Simonds. I'd sent him a direct message and he couldn't reply because I hadn't followed him back. So he posted an @ reply that explained why he couldn't respond to me, and added something like, "I am an aardvark," to point out how silly it was to send a DM without following back. Seeing that on the Twitter feed, I felt like an idiot! (Note: I later sent him a DM, telling him I hadn't understood the mechanics, and he couldn't have been nicer.)

Eventually I figured out my own game plan: be myself but don't focus on myself; post tidbits of information that I find interesting; tweet YouTube videos that make me laugh; share silly things or stuff about the iPhone (something I LOVE), or tweet breaking technology news and other items of interest.

I started paying attention to what was going on around me, being more thoughtful about the news I'd read, and when reviewing email links people would send, I'd wonder if they were "tweetworthy?" I started really working hard at finding things that delivered value, entertainment or information to my followers. Also, I learned it is considered an act of generosity to retweet (RT) - or re-post an item you've read elsewhere, making sure the original person is credited with an @ attribution. And one more important thing: thanking people with an @ reply when they RT something I've posted, or sending them a DM, is just plain good manners.

You can tell you're doing something right when your tweets are RTed. It's a great feeling and addictive because RTs are like little affirmations that say "you did well!" The next great feeling is to have someone #ff or #FollowFriday you. (BTW, the # is called a hashtag, and is a shortcut marker for people to search for a topic or trend.) On Fridays, Twitterers (AKA Tweeps, Tweeple, Twits, etc.) recommend people worth following. When you see your name with a #ff or #FollowFriday, it's quite a compliment because it means your tweets are interesting enough for your followers to recommend you to others.

When I changed my game plan, the number of my followers increased. Each day I would gain a follower or two, then 5 or 6, then 10 or 11, etc. So my measly count that hovered around 40 or 50, gradually grew to more than 700 over the course of several months. I know, that is a tiny volume when Barack Obama, Oprah and others have millions, but considering I'm just a graphic designer in Seattle, Washington, I'm honored to think people find me worth following. And because I thrive on positive feedback, I'll continue to work hard to make it worth their while.

Postscript:
Since this blog post was originally written, I've discovered it pays to do due diligence and vet followers before following back. A good friend, @Tech_Blend (Ahad Bokhari) wrote a blog post about follower/following ratios, which also influenced my actions. His blog post: http://blogspot.fluidnewmedia.com/2009/11/the-new-currency-on-twitter-%E2%80%94-value/

Hair Transplants

2005-04-04T13:07:00.000-07:00

My first office was in the Pioneer Square area of Seattle. One day a writer who recently moved here from the east coast walked in and introduced himself. He was working as a freelance contributor to one of the weekly papers here (also located in my building) to which my business provided auxiliary support.

He was a charming, talented and funny person and we got along terrifically. I loved the sound of his voice and his east coast accent. He was (and still is) a brilliant and quick thinker, and had a great sense of humor. I noticed something odd about him, though, and it was this: the top of his head looked like a miniature orchard.

At regularly spaced intervals, small tufts of hair were dutifully growing, filling in the expanse beginning at the hairline above his forehead. I was really mesmerized by it because I’d never known anyone who’d had a hair transplant, but I was pretty sure that’s what I was seeing.

I thought the hairs that had been planted on his head had come from his pubic area, because his hair, pretty much all over his head, was curly-wavy-kinky. No one ever told me hair transplants were taken from the pubic area, and looking back on it, it was a pretty wacky notion and I don’t know why I thought that. Maybe it’s because it’s a place where not many people would notice if some of it was missing.

He and I never discussed it and to this day it’s never come up.

But one day, years later, I was telling my husband about it. The question, he said, is this: if it WAS pubic hair, would it stop growing when it reached a certain length, or would it grow longer simply because of where it was planted? Which brings up the question of why pubic hair only grows to a certain length? I guess it would be fairly awful it it grew longer, because it would mean there would have to be a hair business devoted to “personal” grooming (beyond bikini waxing). It would certainly paint a new picture of getting a shampoo, cut and style.

The Reason Men Have Sex on the Brain

2005-03-25T10:38:00.000-08:00

Have you ever noticed how men have sex on the brain? Their preoccupation with women’s bodies — always noticing breasts, how big they are or aren’t, or how how much cleavage is showing, is hard wired. I don’t think women notice stuff like that unless it’s really obvious. Women put themselves on display, but it’s almost as much for the benefit of being seen and admired by other women as it is to be admired by men.

Like the other day when I walked into a jewelry store, the salesgirl had a super low-cut top on with her push-up bra cantilevering her boobs up and out like two scoops of ice cream. They were impossible to not notice. Interestingly, she seemed completely oblivious to the fact that she looked like she was serving up dessert on a tray.

It’s mysterious that there is such a difference in sexual radar. Women are all about relationships and seek human connections and men are more like animals. I’m convinced Sex and the City is popular with everyone because it’s all about relationships, so women like it, there’s usually just enough gratuitous nudity to keep men interested.

Several years ago while pondering the cause of this phenomena, the answer came to me in this theory: The reason men think about sex all the time is because they can’t help it. Their genitalia is hanging and dangling and constantly touching things, and this relentless contact with the “outside world” is a constant reminder that their sexual organs are ready, willing and able. Their eyes and brains work in tandem with what’s in their pants, making for a three-bell alarm when it comes to responding to visual stimuli.

Women’s sexual organs, on the other hand, are buried in the body with all sorts of packing material around them. As a result, the notion of sex has to works its way out and up to the brain.

So this could explain the phrase, "he's thinking with his little head."

The Good, the Bad and Ugly Bureaucrats

2005-03-24T22:34:00.000-08:00

I hate it when people who won’t accept responsibility for what they’ve done. I’ve found whenever I screw up and admit it, it takes the wind out of everyone’s sails and the issue dies down. As I said in an earlier posting, others simply want to find out who is to blame, and once that’s established, they go on about their business. My hero and role model in this regard is a friend, Annie Mar, who worked for the City Water Department. I was working on the Water Department annual report when we met.

It was my first important project for a huge bureaucracy and it was there that I quickly learned about “covering my ass.” In fact, I amassed such an enormous volume of documentation by the time each report was completed, it felt as though several trees had given their lives in the process.

The reason for this was because bureaucrats are fearful people and can only make decisions after first looking over their shoulders to see what other people think. To have an original thought or opinion is to stand out, and people generally want to keep their heads down. So whenever a directive was issued it was necessary to get it in writing and create a paper trail in case anything was ever called into question.

In addition to the annual reports, I had a supplemental contract to design bill stuffers, and worked with a particular bureaucrat named Millie, who took the prize in terms of being a career bureaucrat and mid-management suck up. Millie was almost old enough to be my mother, and was a blithering idiot.

One experience with her involved a bill stuffer I designed about meter readers and how it would be nice if customers kept their dogs locked up so meter readers could read meters without being attacked.

After Millie approved the concept of the artwork, I hired an artist to create an illustration that included a black and white spotted dog with a spiked collar around its neck. When Millie looked at it, she decided the dog’s collar had ONE TOO MANY spikes. This necessitated having the illustrator redo the artwork.

Today this wouldn’t be a big deal, but at the time it was quite involved because he had created an actual pen and ink illustration, with washes and overlays!

After the bill stuffer was finished, I issued an invoice that reflected the charges for Millie’s client-directed alterations. She denied making them. But thanks to the paper trail, the truth was unavoidable. If email had been around then, it would have been even easier to nail her.

But back to Annie Mar...at one point during the process of working on the annual report, some copy had been submitted that wasn’t current, and the files had already been formatted and laid out on the “mechanicals.” Instead of trying to blame someone else, Annie said, “I goofed up and sent the wrong file to you. I’m sorry, but that was my mistake.” I was totally blown away. She restored my faith that there were GOOD bureaucrats among the spineless middle-management suck ups. Miracles can and do happen.

Vindictive Billing

2005-03-07T22:53:00.000-08:00

I'm a self-employed graphic designer, so it's important for me to establish relationships with clients in order to cultivate ongoing work. It's usually easy to do this since most people are basically nice, and often my clients become close, personal friends.

But on occasion you might encounter "the client from hell." -- you know, the one who calls you evenings and during the weekend and emails you at all times of the day and night, expecting you to drop everything so you can finish their urgently important project. Please note, these are precisely the people you don't want to have your home phone number.

In case you don't know, the clients who are the most trouble almost always are the ones who want to take the greatest advantage of you. In fact, there seems to be an inverse ratio of “pain-in-the-ass factor” to “billable hours/expenses.” The more problematic the client, the more demanding they are and the less they want to pay. The pro-bono clients are the worst, because you often have to bump paying work to accommodate their freebie project. You’d think the people paying you the biggest bucks would be the worst and expect you to bend over and grab your ankles, but actually, they’re usually the most reasonable AND appreciative.

My best friend, A.G., and I have had many conversations about each of our “hemorrhoidal” clients. One of the worst insisted on coming to the studio and standing over A.G.’s shoulder, directing changes until her blood pressure nearly exploded. Twice I’ve had clients like that, and when it became apparent how much they enjoyed twinking with work on screen, (“Gee, isn’t it just the most fun to work together this way?!”) they were banished from my office. I had to explain to them I couldn’t work that way, but would be happy to address their concerns if they would like to articulate them to me in a meeting, via email/Acrobat or fax. (By the way, A.G. eventually fired her client.)

Which brings me to the concept of “Vindictive Billing.” Lots of firms and individuals tack on a “rush charge,” when a client forces a project to the front of the queue. Rush charges are usually double and cover a lot of ground (working late, working weekends, phone calls, emails, meetings, and whatever else is required to get their job done). It’s a reasonable consequence of rushing something.

But Vindictive Billing works like this: when you’re designing for a client who doesn’t value your work in the first place and you KNOW they’re going to jerk you around anyway, it is perfectly reasonable to charge them more. I even know of a printer that has an invoice line item called, “mental-anguish change orders,” for clients like this, penalizing them for making arbitrary or idiotic changes -- usually under extremely stressful conditions. Once when my husband asked a contractor his hourly rate, the contractor said, “$50 an hour if I work alone; $75 an hour if you watch, and $100 an hour if you help.” He practiced preemptive Vindictive Billing!

You can’t always identify this kind of client right off the bat, but the next time you work together — if there is a next time — you need to incorporate the pain-in-the-ass factor into the cost of the job. And if they don’t like it, in the words of Sarah Brightman and Andrea Bocelli, “Time to Say Goodbye.”

Confessions of a Graphic Designer

2005-03-06T14:33:00.000-08:00

My best friend and I both are graphic designers. We're sort of geeky because we like talking about new hardware and software (we both idolize Steve Jobs) and sometimes even reminisce about our favorite versions of various applications, like Freehand versions 3.1, 5.5 and 8. (Freehand MX is a pain!)

Since we're both self-employed and occasionally suffer from that odious malady, procrastination, at times we've had to explain to clients why a project may be delayed.

In discussing this universally common situation with colleagues, we found designers have some unique and some not-so-unique excuses. Some of the more believable ones (because in some cases, they were authentic) include:

1. My hard drive crashed and I had to reformat my drive and reinstall all of my software
2. I had a press check or the press check was delayed
3. I had to visit someone in the hospital / go to a funeral
4. My email / network / server was down and I never received the files / images / work order
5. I was sick
6. The Fedex / UPS / Airborne package didn't arrive
7. The Word / image files you sent were corrupt
8. I was out of town
9. I had a photo shoot
10. The disc you sent was unreadable (most plausible if the client is on a PC and you're on a Mac)

Being a graphic designer is sort of like being a doctor on call (except you make heaps less money), so press checks and photo shoots really can occur with pretty short advanced warning, and they're sacrosanct: No one ever questions them. The really pathetic thing is, none of the above excuses would be necessary if people could simply STOP procrastinating.

Which brings up the question of why so many people wait until the last possible moment to do things?

Creative people have a tough job -- they HAVE To be creative ALL OF THE TIME. It's just expected that if someone calls with a project, you will magically come up with the most brilliant solution. How many times have I combed through CA annuals, printing and paper samples and my personal stash of "inspirational" scrap (crap?) in search of something to act as a catalyst? When people say "everything is derivative," I have to think somewhere along the line, someone had to have had an original idea.

But the pressure of always having to come up with the next big idea can be so daunting that it's hard to get started. So, reaching back to my earliest days in this field, I remembered something from a book I read ("How to Gain Control of Your Time and Your Life"), which described the concept of "punching holes."

Punching holes is this: Imagine your task as a sheet of paper. Then take the huge task before you and break it into pieces.

1. The first thing you can do that is easy is to start a folder for the project by putting the project name on it.
2. Maybe one of the pieces is viewing and editing a batch of images to see if any of them are usable.
3. The next could be starting the document in the application you're going to use to create the project and just labeling it and saving it.
4. The next piece could be printing out all of the word documents the client has sent and arranging them in the folder.

You get the idea. You "punch holes" in this virtual piece of paper until it resembles a piece of Swiss cheese. Then when you look at what you need to do, you find a great deal has already been accomplished, so the project isn't so daunting.

Sounds simple, doesn't it? It is. But even so, the temptation is to find any excuse to get going. Some of my favorites:

1. Clean my office
2. Go through old job folders/envelopes and toss out stuff I don't need anymore
3. Re-arrange my discs
4. Look for something I haven't been able to find
5. Import music into iTunes
6. Go out to lunch with a friend
7. Go shopping
8. Read
9. Wash and detail my car
10. Cook or bake something

In thinking about this, I've come to realise something: If graphic designers act out this anxiety-provoking behaviour, I wonder about personal injury attorneys, tax accountants or sous chefs? I mean, everyone must have their job-related secret behaviours. What are yours?

The Death of the Democratic Party, and Civility

2005-03-05T23:49:00.000-08:00

Friday night my husband and I had dinner with friends who are former urban dwellers but now live 50 miles outside the city. It's tricky to talk to anyone about politics, because even if you're talking to Democrats, some are so stark-raving liberal that it's impossible to find common ground. But even so, we found ourselves talking about the sad state of the Democratic party today.

Whatever happened to heroes like JFK -- or in our state, Senators Henry Jackson and Warren Magnuson? By today's standards, all of them would seem like Republicans. The Democratic party is now so far left that it alienates moderates from both parties. Why can't the DNC promote a candidate like Ben Nelson, Jr. Senator from Nebraska?

Right now there is a dispute over the authenticity of Washington State's newly "elected" Democratic Governor, Christine Gregoire. I'd voted for her in the past for attorney general, but none of us had voted for her for governor. The reason I didn't vote for her last fall was because of a missed filing deadline that occurred in the AG's office while she was at the helm, costing Washington taxpayers nearly $18 million. Gregoire attempted unsuccessfully to blame it on an assistant (which ended up costing our state even more money when she was found innocent) when she should simply have admitted the mistake. Why is it so hard for people to admit mistakes, anyway? Doesn't everyone know, ALL that people want is to find out WHO is to blame? Once someone takes responsibility, everyone is happy and can move on. Otherwise it necessitates finger pointing until the culprit is found. (In a similar vein, I'm convinced Clinton would not have been impeached if he'd just admitted to his dalliance with Monica Lewinsky!)

In any case, we moved on to the topic of civility and how nowadays many people seem rude, uncaring and self-absorbed. It's not caused just by the cell-phone phenomena, although I'm sure that's a contributing factor, but many people don't seem to care about good manners anymore. You can take someone out to lunch and you're lucky if you get an email or phone call acknowledging it. For some reason this kind of behaviour is especially true of people under the age of 30. Maybe it's caused in part by the impersonal way we communicate. Email is great -- incredible even-- for staying in touch with dozens of people daily. But often there is a mindlessness about email, especially all of the forwarded materials -- much of it thoughtless, time-wasting, lazy and not even particularly amusing or informative stuff. The real killer is the email consisting of a message thread that goes on for five or six pages, and the ONE thing that pertains to you is buried somewhere in its midst.

I think part of what's causing the erosion of our society is the fact that in many, if not most, cases, there is no longer a stigma associated with behaviours that are bad. In fact, "bad" is bad -- you can't even really use that label anymore because it is deemed "too judgmental." So people can behave badly, and you can never call them on it.

When I was in high school, if a girl became pregnant she went away to a home for unwed mothers. Today you see pregnant girls walking the hallways, sometimes with their babies in tow. So things that once kept behaviour in check are no longer in force, and the result is a society where people are unconcerned about how their actions are perceived by others, and consequently do whatever pleases them. Today I was talking to my husband about the weird teenagers and young adults who vow to remain virgins until they are married, and he pointed out that that used to be the NORM. They are now considered FREAKS!

Can things get more strange? I'm afraid so...

Photo from: http://www.libraries.rutgers.edu/rul/exhibits/case/page13.shtml