<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<rss version="2.0"
	xmlns:content="http://purl.org/rss/1.0/modules/content/"
	xmlns:wfw="http://wellformedweb.org/CommentAPI/"
	xmlns:dc="http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/"
	xmlns:atom="http://www.w3.org/2005/Atom"
	xmlns:sy="http://purl.org/rss/1.0/modules/syndication/"
	xmlns:slash="http://purl.org/rss/1.0/modules/slash/"
	>

<channel>
	<title>Must. Be. AWESOME!!! &#187; vids</title>
	<atom:link href="http://www.mustbeawesome.com/tag/vids/feed/" rel="self" type="application/rss+xml" />
	<link>http://www.mustbeawesome.com</link>
	<description>Because doing it to standard is LAME.</description>
	<lastBuildDate>Fri, 20 Jan 2012 19:03:36 +0000</lastBuildDate>
	<language>en</language>
	<sy:updatePeriod>hourly</sy:updatePeriod>
	<sy:updateFrequency>1</sy:updateFrequency>
	<generator>http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1</generator>
		<item>
		<title>Melt Faces at Mad Rose Tavern, Feb 2nd</title>
		<link>http://www.mustbeawesome.com/2012/01/melt-faces-at-mad-rose-tavern-feb-2nd/</link>
		<comments>http://www.mustbeawesome.com/2012/01/melt-faces-at-mad-rose-tavern-feb-2nd/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Fri, 20 Jan 2012 19:03:36 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Du4</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Events]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[awesome]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[badass]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[brains of j]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[DC]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[du4]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Facebook]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[music]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Pearl Jam]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Rock music]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Twitter]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[va stripper]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[vids]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.mustbeawesome.com/?p=1806</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[I&#8217;m spending more time offline in 2012 planning and executing events and building integrating marketing plans around those events. Many of these projects are exploding through client work, some as experiments via my volunteer time in cause-based organizations. I&#8217;m learning a ton from it though, and I&#8217;m putting a lot of the lessons learned to [...]]]></description>
			<content:encoded><![CDATA[<div class="tweetmeme_button" style="float: right; margin-left: 10px;">
			<a href="http://api.tweetmeme.com/share?url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mustbeawesome.com%2F2012%2F01%2Fmelt-faces-at-mad-rose-tavern-feb-2nd%2F"><br />
				<img src="http://api.tweetmeme.com/imagebutton.gif?url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mustbeawesome.com%2F2012%2F01%2Fmelt-faces-at-mad-rose-tavern-feb-2nd%2F&amp;source=Du4&amp;style=normal&amp;service=bit.ly&amp;b=2" height="61" width="50" /><br />
			</a>
		</div>
<p>I&#8217;m spending more time offline in 2012 planning and executing events and building integrating marketing plans around those events. Many of these projects are exploding through client work, some as experiments via my volunteer time in cause-based organizations. I&#8217;m learning a ton from it though, and I&#8217;m putting a lot of the lessons learned to work in my other passion: MUSIC.</p>
<p style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://www.mustbeawesome.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/01/IMG_1328.jpg"><img class="wp-image-1807 aligncenter" title="IMG_1328" src="http://www.mustbeawesome.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/01/IMG_1328-764x1024.jpg" alt="" width="496" height="666" /></a></p>
<p style="text-align: left;">Last year, I started two rock bands. <a href="https://www.facebook.com/pages/VA-Stripper/229627847096881" target="_blank">VA Stripper</a> grew out of mine and guitarist Andy Petrick&#8217;s love for 1990s rock, a passion we both shared experiencing the music scene at <a class="zem_slink" title="South by Southwest" href="http://www.sxsw.com" rel="homepage">SXSW</a> 2011. For various reasons, VA Stripper never quite got off the ground explosively, so we started another act. This act &#8211; <a href="https://www.facebook.com/brainsofj" target="_blank">Brains of J</a> &#8211; paid tribute to one of our favorite &#8217;90s bands still rocking today, <a class="zem_slink" title="Pearl Jam" href="http://www.pearljam.com" rel="homepage">Pearl Jam</a>. Both are very different projects, and both give us very different satisfaction in performing. Brains of J is a headlong dive into the music of Pearl Jam, while we plan on writing our own music as VA Stripper at some point in the very near future. However, both use similar methods of integrated event marketing to get fans to come see our shows.</p>
<p>Hence, the <em>Must. Be. <strong>AWESOME</strong>!!!</em> call to action:</p>
<h2>Come see both bands Feb 2nd at Mad Rose Tavern</h2>
<p>If you&#8217;re in the DC/North Virginia/Maryland region, consider coming to see both VA Stripper and Brains of J for our first full-on rock show. Joined by DC sensations <a href="http://thevandelays.com/intro.cfm" target="_blank">The Vandelays</a>, we&#8217;ll have a solid show of facemelting from 9pm till closing time. The Mad Rose Tavern sits within spitting distance of the <a class="zem_slink" title="Clarendon (WMATA station)" href="http://maps.google.com/maps?ll=38.887102,-77.095192&amp;spn=0.01,0.01&amp;q=38.887102,-77.095192 (Clarendon%20%28WMATA%20station%29)&amp;t=h" rel="geolocation">Clarendon Metro station</a> on the Orange Line. <a style="color: #0000ff; text-align: left;" href="http://maps.google.com/maps?ie=UTF8&amp;q=mad+rose+tavern&amp;fb=1&amp;gl=us&amp;hq=mad+rose+tavern&amp;hnear=0x89b64d3e93a4abf1:0xd7f52686dbc1012c,Alexandria,+VA&amp;cid=0,0,9720840237236440100&amp;t=m&amp;vpsrc=0&amp;iwloc=A&amp;ll=38.886112,-77.09498&amp;spn=0.006295,0.006295&amp;source=embed">View a Map of Mad Rose and the surrounding area.</a></p>
<p style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://www.mustbeawesome.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/01/madrose.jpg"><img class="size-full wp-image-1814 aligncenter" title="madrose" src="http://www.mustbeawesome.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/01/madrose.jpg" alt="" width="430" height="300" /></a></p>
<p>Be sure to grab one of us and tell us what you think of the show too!</p>
<h2>What else can you do to support us?</h2>
<p>Engage, baby. Here are a few things you can do to keep track of us:</p>
<ul>
<li><a href="https://www.facebook.com/brainsofj" target="_blank">Like Brains of J on Facebook</a> and, on our Wall, tell us your favorite Pearl Jam songs</li>
<li><a href="https://twitter.com/#!/BrainsofJ" target="_blank">Follow Brains of J on Twitter</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.facebook.com/pages/VA-Stripper/229627847096881" target="_blank">Like VA Stripper on Facebook</a></li>
<li><a href="https://twitter.com/#!/vastripper" target="_blank">Follow VA Stripper on Twitter</a></li>
<li>Post your photos and videos of our performances to our Facebook Walls</li>
<li><a href="https://foursquare.com/v/mad-rose-tavern/4d34e2fc329e5481163dc61d" target="_blank">Check in to Mad Rose</a> (and future venues) with hashtags #brainsofj or #vastripper</li>
<li>Sign up for our fans-only mailing list &amp; newsletter using the form below</li>
</ul>
<div id="mc_embed_signup">
<form id="mc-embedded-subscribe-form" class="validate" action="http://mustbeawesome.us4.list-manage1.com/subscribe/post?u=96b2ec8e5d222ed6f5c9f5ad3&amp;id=7b9c88357d" method="post" name="mc-embedded-subscribe-form" target="_blank">
<div class="mc-field-group">Enter your email address:</p>
<input id="mce-EMAIL" class="required email" type="email" name="EMAIL" value="" /></div>
<div class="mc-field-group input-group">
<p><strong>Email Format </strong></p>
<ul>
<li>
<input id="mce-EMAILTYPE-0" type="radio" name="EMAILTYPE" value="html" /><label for="mce-EMAILTYPE-0">html</label></li>
<li>
<input id="mce-EMAILTYPE-1" type="radio" name="EMAILTYPE" value="text" /><label for="mce-EMAILTYPE-1">text</label></li>
<li>
<input id="mce-EMAILTYPE-2" type="radio" name="EMAILTYPE" value="mobile" /><label for="mce-EMAILTYPE-2">mobile</label></li>
</ul>
</div>
<div id="mce-responses" class="clear"></div>
<div class="clear">
<input id="mc-embedded-subscribe" class="button" type="submit" name="subscribe" value="Subscribe" /></div>
</form>
</div>
<p>&nbsp;</p>
<h2>And in closing&#8230; some FACEMELTING!</h2>
<p><object width="400" height="224" classid="clsid:d27cdb6e-ae6d-11cf-96b8-444553540000" codebase="http://download.macromedia.com/pub/shockwave/cabs/flash/swflash.cab#version=6,0,40,0"><param name="allowfullscreen" value="true" /><param name="src" value="http://www.facebook.com/v/10150473814570780" /><embed width="400" height="224" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" src="http://www.facebook.com/v/10150473814570780" allowfullscreen="true" /></object><br />
<a href="http://vimeo.com/35167087">Brains of J &#8211; &#8220;Hail, Hail&#8221; Live at The Front Page</a> from <a href="http://vimeo.com/user6387740">Chris Dufour</a> on <a href="http://vimeo.com">Vimeo</a>.</p>
<p>&nbsp;</p>
<div class="zemanta-pixie" style="margin-top: 10px; height: 15px;"><a class="zemanta-pixie-a" title="Enhanced by Zemanta" href="http://www.zemanta.com/"><img class="zemanta-pixie-img" style="border: none; float: right;" src="http://img.zemanta.com/zemified_e.png?x-id=9931c798-0bc2-43cf-ae05-4d2dfd575945" alt="Enhanced by Zemanta" /></a></div>
]]></content:encoded>
			<wfw:commentRss>http://www.mustbeawesome.com/2012/01/melt-faces-at-mad-rose-tavern-feb-2nd/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
		</item>
		<item>
		<title>Video: The Four Thieves #du4roadtrip</title>
		<link>http://www.mustbeawesome.com/2011/07/video-the-four-thieves-du4roadtrip/</link>
		<comments>http://www.mustbeawesome.com/2011/07/video-the-four-thieves-du4roadtrip/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Wed, 20 Jul 2011 22:28:26 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Du4</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Esoteria]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[awesome]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[badass]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[cool]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[music]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[nashville]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[travel]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[vids]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.mustbeawesome.com/2011/07/video-the-four-thieves-du4roadtrip/</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[p247.mov Watch on Posterous I had the good fortune of catching these kids performing on the streets of downtown Nashville, desperately sweating it out to shimmy a couple bucks from tourists too hot to care much. When asked their name, one of the lads said &#8220;The Four Thieves. The fourth guy&#8217;s in jail.&#8221; Perfect start [...]]]></description>
			<content:encoded><![CDATA[<div class="tweetmeme_button" style="float: right; margin-left: 10px;">
			<a href="http://api.tweetmeme.com/share?url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mustbeawesome.com%2F2011%2F07%2Fvideo-the-four-thieves-du4roadtrip%2F"><br />
				<img src="http://api.tweetmeme.com/imagebutton.gif?url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mustbeawesome.com%2F2011%2F07%2Fvideo-the-four-thieves-du4roadtrip%2F&amp;source=Du4&amp;style=normal&amp;service=bit.ly&amp;b=2" height="61" width="50" /><br />
			</a>
		</div>
<div class='posterous_autopost'>
<div class='p_embed p_video_embed'> <a href="http://du4.posterous.com/video-the-four-thieves-du4roadtrip"><img alt="" src="http://posterous.com/getfile/video.posterous.com/du4/gwDJuevmxrbbkztIIaGvAsCqmHlvqaFlmlavJqigqwuxthxtlcmcjjnlhmFz/frame_0000.png" /></a>
<div class='p_embed_description'> <strong>p247.mov</strong> <a href="http://du4.posterous.com/video-the-four-thieves-du4roadtrip">Watch on Posterous</a> </div>
</p></div>
</p>
<p>I had the good fortune of catching these kids performing on the streets of downtown Nashville, desperately sweating it out to shimmy a couple bucks from tourists too hot to care much. When asked their name, one of the lads said &#8220;The Four Thieves. The fourth guy&#8217;s in jail.&#8221;
<p>Perfect start to an illustrious career in musicianship and performance.</p>
</div>
]]></content:encoded>
			<wfw:commentRss>http://www.mustbeawesome.com/2011/07/video-the-four-thieves-du4roadtrip/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
		</item>
		<item>
		<title>Ladies &amp; gentlemen, from Nashville, TN&#8230;The Four Thieves.</title>
		<link>http://www.mustbeawesome.com/2011/07/ladies-gentlemen-from-nashville-tn-the-four-thieves/</link>
		<comments>http://www.mustbeawesome.com/2011/07/ladies-gentlemen-from-nashville-tn-the-four-thieves/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Wed, 20 Jul 2011 01:11:36 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Du4</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Esoteria]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[awesome]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[badass]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[cool]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[music]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[nashville]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[travel]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[vids]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.mustbeawesome.com/2011/07/ladies-gentlemen-from-nashville-tn-the-four-thieves/</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Taken at Gruhn Guitars]]></description>
			<content:encoded><![CDATA[<div class="tweetmeme_button" style="float: right; margin-left: 10px;">
			<a href="http://api.tweetmeme.com/share?url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mustbeawesome.com%2F2011%2F07%2Fladies-gentlemen-from-nashville-tn-the-four-thieves%2F"><br />
				<img src="http://api.tweetmeme.com/imagebutton.gif?url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mustbeawesome.com%2F2011%2F07%2Fladies-gentlemen-from-nashville-tn-the-four-thieves%2F&amp;source=Du4&amp;style=normal&amp;service=bit.ly&amp;b=2" height="61" width="50" /><br />
			</a>
		</div>
<div class='posterous_autopost'><a href="http://instagr.am/p/IDuV7/">
<div class='p_embed p_image_embed'> <a href="http://posterous.com/getfile/files.posterous.com/du4/fvguAdiqeHulbBJkohibuaEHmmHttFvsgIdtvIoziIkcFjnJIJclllaGBaJz/media_httpimagesinsta_nCBiz.jpg.scaled1000.jpg"><img alt="Media_httpimagesinsta_ncbiz" height="500" src="http://posterous.com/getfile/files.posterous.com/du4/fvguAdiqeHulbBJkohibuaEHmmHttFvsgIdtvIoziIkcFjnJIJclllaGBaJz/media_httpimagesinsta_nCBiz.jpg.scaled500.jpg" width="500" /></a> </div>
<p> </a><br />Taken at Gruhn Guitars</div>
]]></content:encoded>
			<wfw:commentRss>http://www.mustbeawesome.com/2011/07/ladies-gentlemen-from-nashville-tn-the-four-thieves/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
		</item>
		<item>
		<title>Links of the Week: April 22, 2011 Edition</title>
		<link>http://www.mustbeawesome.com/2011/04/links-of-the-week-april-22-2011-edition/</link>
		<comments>http://www.mustbeawesome.com/2011/04/links-of-the-week-april-22-2011-edition/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Fri, 22 Apr 2011 17:05:51 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Du4</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Links]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[awesome]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[body mod]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Business]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[cartoons]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[cool]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[EmpireAve]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[futurism]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[gaming]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[innovation]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[movies]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[nanotech]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[new thinking]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Philosophy]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[pics]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[posthuman]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Social media]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Transhumanism]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[TV]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[vids]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.mustbeawesome.com/?p=1454</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Trying to get back into the swing of things after recovering from a trip to the Emerald Isle. Jet lag lasted way too long. Here is big dump of links from the past month or so. As always, other notable things I found cool and interesting are all captured on my Pulse Posterous feed. 2045: [...]]]></description>
			<content:encoded><![CDATA[<div class="tweetmeme_button" style="float: right; margin-left: 10px;">
			<a href="http://api.tweetmeme.com/share?url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mustbeawesome.com%2F2011%2F04%2Flinks-of-the-week-april-22-2011-edition%2F"><br />
				<img src="http://api.tweetmeme.com/imagebutton.gif?url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mustbeawesome.com%2F2011%2F04%2Flinks-of-the-week-april-22-2011-edition%2F&amp;source=Du4&amp;style=normal&amp;service=bit.ly&amp;b=2" height="61" width="50" /><br />
			</a>
		</div>
<p>Trying to get back into the swing of things after recovering from a trip to the Emerald Isle. Jet lag lasted way too long. Here is big dump of links from the past month or so. As always, other notable things I found cool and interesting are all captured <a href="http://cpdu4.pulsememe.com/" target="_blank">on my Pulse Posterous feed</a>.</p>
<div class="zemanta-img zemanta-action-dragged" style="margin: 1em; display: block;">
<div class="wp-caption alignleft" style="width: 310px"><a href="http://commons.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Raymond_Kurzweil%2C_Stanford_2006_%28square_crop%29.jpg"><img title="Raymond Kurzweil, an American academicand author." src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/9/98/Raymond_Kurzweil%2C_Stanford_2006_%28square_crop%29.jpg/300px-Raymond_Kurzweil%2C_Stanford_2006_%28square_crop%29.jpg" alt="Raymond Kurzweil, an American academicand author." width="300" height="300" /></a><p class="wp-caption-text">Image via Wikipedia</p></div>
</div>
<h2><a href="http://www.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,2048138,00.html" target="_blank">2045: The Year Man Becomes Immortal</a></h2>
<p>&nbsp;</p>
<p><a class="zem_slink freebase/en/lev_grossman" title="Lev Grossman" rel="homepage" href="http://www.levgrossman.com/">Lev Grossman</a> writes this <a class="zem_slink freebase/en/time" title="Time (magazine)" rel="homepage" href="http://www.time.com/">TIME Magazine</a> article about futurist <a class="zem_slink freebase/en/raymond_kurzweil" title="Raymond Kurzweil" rel="myspaceeverything" href="http://www.myspace.com/everything/raymond-kurzweil">Ray Kurzweil</a> and his predictions for the coming <a class="zem_slink freebase/en/the_singularity_is_near" title="The Singularity Is Near" rel="wikipedia" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Singularity_Is_Near">Singularity</a>. It&#8217;s a very comprehensive and thorough look into the implications of Kurzweil&#8217;s thinking, from <a class="zem_slink freebase/en/life_extension" title="Life extension" rel="wikipedia" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Life_extension">life extension</a> to machine awareness. What struck me most about the piece, however, was how Kurzweil&#8217;s impetus for his work boiled down to his overriding desire to bring his deceased father back to life. Kurzweil believes wholeheartedly that humans will be able to resurrect the dead at some near point in the future, possibly from as little as preserved DNA. Thus, he has taken to extending his own life via any means necessary, like consuming a massive amount of nutrient and supplement pills per day. It really speaks to me that Kurzweil believes in such a rapid explosion of technology and why he wants to be around to see it. This is a must-read for all you futurists, singularitarians and transhumanists out there.</p>
<h2><a href="http://trailers.apple.com/trailers/fox/anotherearth/" target="_blank">Trailer: Another Earth</a></h2>
<p>Here&#8217;s a trailer for an intriguing film I first heard about from some friends who caught its premier at Sundance this year. The buzz around this indie sci-fi movie has been lighting up the internet in recent months, and this trailer should give you all the rationale you need to find it when it releases.</p>
<h2><a href="http://gizmodo.com/#!5793612/watching-people-skydive-in-slow-motion-is-absolutely-mesmerizing" target="_blank">Watching People Skydive in Slow Motion Is Absolutely Mesmerizing</a></h2>
<p>Seriously. This video is just magical. Click through it for a larger hi-res version&#8230; and prepare to be amazed.</p>
<p style="text-align: center;"><object width="400" height="225"><param name="allowfullscreen" value="true" /><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always" /><param name="movie" value="http://vimeo.com/moogaloop.swf?clip_id=22428395&amp;server=vimeo.com&amp;show_title=0&amp;show_byline=0&amp;show_portrait=0&amp;color=&amp;fullscreen=1&amp;autoplay=0&amp;loop=0" /><embed type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width="400" height="225" src="http://vimeo.com/moogaloop.swf?clip_id=22428395&amp;server=vimeo.com&amp;show_title=0&amp;show_byline=0&amp;show_portrait=0&amp;color=&amp;fullscreen=1&amp;autoplay=0&amp;loop=0" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true"></embed></object></p>
<p style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://vimeo.com/22428395">Experience Human Flight</a> from <a href="http://vimeo.com/bettywantsin">Betty Wants In</a> on <a href="http://vimeo.com">Vimeo</a>.</p>
<h2><a href="http://darmano.typepad.com/logic_emotion/2011/04/currency.html?utm_source=feedburner&amp;utm_medium=feed&amp;utm_campaign=Feed%3A+Logicemotion+%28Logic%2BEmotion%29" target="_blank">Is a Social Currency System The Next Big Thing?</a></h2>
<p>Dave Armano poses some questions about <a class="zem_slink" title="Empire Avenue" rel="homepage" href="http://www.empireavenue.com">Empire Avenue</a>, a new &#8220;social currency&#8221; system that&#8217;s part game, part stock market, part influencer metrics ecosystem. I&#8217;ve been playing around with Empire Ave for a while now, and its potential as a measurable environment for influencers &#8211; based on their social connections via networks like Facebook and Twitter &#8211; is immense. Be sure to check out the comments for good discussion on Armano&#8217;s post, and if you&#8217;re interested in trying out Empire Ave, <a href="http://www.empireavenue.com/DU4" target="_blank">make sure you buy several shares in yours truly, Du4</a>. <img src='http://www.mustbeawesome.com/wp-includes/images/smilies/icon_smile.gif' alt=':)' class='wp-smiley' /> </p>
<h2><a rel="bookmark" href="http://edelmandigital.com/2011/04/08/friday-five-what-gamification-means-for-digital-marketers/?utm_source=feedburner&amp;utm_medium=feed&amp;utm_campaign=Feed%3A+EdelmanDigital+%28Edelman+Digital%29#">Friday Five: What Gamification means for Digital Marketers</a></h2>
<p>Edelman Digital gives a pretty succinct summary about the concept of &#8220;gamification&#8221; that&#8217;s been buzzing around digital circles since SXSW.</p>
<h2><a href="http://io9.com/#!5787256/hidden-camera-photos-reveal-the-secret-lives-of-scifi-toys" target="_blank">Hidden camera photos reveal the secret lives of scifi toys</a></h2>
<div class="wp-caption aligncenter" style="width: 546px"><a href="http://thurstonroscoe.bigcartel.com/"><img title="heman" src="http://cache1.bigcartel.com/product_images/33184512/byThePowerPelletsOfGrayskull.jpg" alt="" width="536" height="800" /></a><p class="wp-caption-text">Image by Thurston Roscoe</p></div>
<p>Leave it to io9 to find <a href="http://thurstonroscoe.bigcartel.com/" target="_blank">Thurston Roscoe&#8217;s hilariously staged photos</a> of toys from our youth and what they do when we&#8217;re not looking. More fun photos at the links.</p>
<h2><a href="http://www.bleedingcool.com/2011/03/30/many-more-clips-from-the-new-looney-tunes-marvin-the-martian-yosemite-sam-road-runner-and-more/?utm_source=feedburner&amp;utm_medium=feed&amp;utm_campaign=Feed%3A+BleedingCool+%28Bleeding+Cool+Comic+News+%26+Rumors%29" target="_blank">Many More Clips From The New Looney Tunes: Marvin The Martian, Yosemite Sam, Road Runner And More</a></h2>
<p>I had no idea that Warner Brothers was working on a brand new Looney Tunes cartoon starring all our favorite WB cartoon characters from the Friz Freleng / Mel Blanc era. The animation looks SOLID too. Check out this clip of Foghorn Leghorn and Daffy Duck, which features some pretty advanced humor I was not expecting from a Cartoon Network show aimed (presumably) at kids. As an unabashed fan of classic Looney Tunes, I am SO EXCITED for this show&#8217;s premier on May 3rd. More vids at the link courtesy of Bleeding Cool.</p>
<p style="text-align: center;"><object width="640" height="390"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/VrvC8HmnKpY&amp;rel=0&amp;hl=en_US&amp;feature=player_embedded&amp;version=3" /><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true" /><param name="allowScriptAccess" value="always" /><embed type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width="640" height="390" src="http://www.youtube.com/v/VrvC8HmnKpY&amp;rel=0&amp;hl=en_US&amp;feature=player_embedded&amp;version=3" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true"></embed></object></p>
<h2><a title="Yakuza to the rescue?" href="http://blog.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2011/03/29/yakuza_to_the_rescue">Yakuza to the rescue?</a></h2>
<p>Apparently, Yakuza gangsters in Japan are pitching in to help dig out people trapped and injured in the recent Japan earthquake. Code of honor indeed.</p>
<h6 class="zemanta-related-title" style="font-size: 1em;">Related articles</h6>
<ul class="zemanta-article-ul">
<li class="zemanta-article-ul-li"><a href="http://susansayler.wordpress.com/2011/04/13/ray-kurzweil-on-the-colbert-report/">Ray Kurzweil on the Colbert Report</a> (susansayler.wordpress.com)</li>
<li class="zemanta-article-ul-li"><a href="http://singularityhub.com/2011/04/06/exclusive-interview-with-barry-ptolemy-director-of-kurzweil-documentary-transcendent-man/">Exclusive Interview With Barry Ptolemy, Director of Kurzweil Documentary Transcendent Man</a> (singularityhub.com)</li>
<li class="zemanta-article-ul-li"><a href="http://singularityhub.com/2011/04/18/transcendent-man-plays-in-san-francisco-heres-a-transcript-of-qa-session/">Transcendent Man Plays In San Francisco. Here&#8217;s A Transcript of Q&amp;A Session</a> (singularityhub.com)</li>
</ul>
<div class="zemanta-pixie" style="margin-top: 10px; height: 15px;"><a class="zemanta-pixie-a" title="Enhanced by Zemanta" href="http://www.zemanta.com/"><img class="zemanta-pixie-img" style="border: none; float: right;" src="http://img.zemanta.com/zemified_e.png?x-id=de90fb9c-d670-4daa-9e62-daa07f2c590b" alt="Enhanced by Zemanta" /></a><span class="zem-script more-related more-info pretty-attribution paragraph-reblog"><script src="http://static.zemanta.com/readside/loader.js" type="text/javascript"></script></span></div>
]]></content:encoded>
			<wfw:commentRss>http://www.mustbeawesome.com/2011/04/links-of-the-week-april-22-2011-edition/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
		</item>
		<item>
		<title>Links of the Week: April Fool&#8217;s Edition</title>
		<link>http://www.mustbeawesome.com/2011/04/links-of-the-week-april-fools-edition/</link>
		<comments>http://www.mustbeawesome.com/2011/04/links-of-the-week-april-fools-edition/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Fri, 01 Apr 2011 17:15:55 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Du4</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Links]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[awesome]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[comics]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[cool]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[funny]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[new thinking]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[TV]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[vids]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.mustbeawesome.com/?p=1408</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Top Shelf Announces &#8220;League of Extraordinary Gentlemen: 1988&#8221; Alan Moore&#8217;s titular comics title organizing popular characters in Victorian and British literature follows to its logical conclusion as Moore and O&#8217;Neill bring it to the States: Gmail Motion A new way to communicate: send your email by simply licking a stamp! The Aurors Trailer (Harry Potter TV [...]]]></description>
			<content:encoded><![CDATA[<div class="tweetmeme_button" style="float: right; margin-left: 10px;">
			<a href="http://api.tweetmeme.com/share?url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mustbeawesome.com%2F2011%2F04%2Flinks-of-the-week-april-fools-edition%2F"><br />
				<img src="http://api.tweetmeme.com/imagebutton.gif?url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mustbeawesome.com%2F2011%2F04%2Flinks-of-the-week-april-fools-edition%2F&amp;source=Du4&amp;style=normal&amp;service=bit.ly&amp;b=2" height="61" width="50" /><br />
			</a>
		</div>
<h2><a href="http://www.comicsalliance.com/2010/04/01/top-shelf-announces-league-of-extraordinary-gentlemen-1988/" target="_blank">Top Shelf Announces &#8220;League of Extraordinary Gentlemen: 1988&#8221;</a></h2>
<p>Alan Moore&#8217;s titular comics title organizing popular characters in Victorian and British literature follows to its logical conclusion as Moore and O&#8217;Neill bring it to the States:</p>
<p><img class="aligncenter" title="awesome" src="http://www.blogcdn.com/www.comicsalliance.com/media/2010/03/loeg88.jpg" alt="" width="584" height="903" /></p>
<h2><a href="http://mail.google.com/mail/help/motion.html" target="_blank">Gmail Motion</a></h2>
<p>A new way to communicate: send your email by simply licking a stamp!</p>
<p><object width="640" height="390"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/Bu927_ul_X0?fs=1&amp;hl=en_US" /><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true" /><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always" /><embed type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width="640" height="390" src="http://www.youtube.com/v/Bu927_ul_X0?fs=1&amp;hl=en_US" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true"></embed></object></p>
<h2><a href="http://www.ign.com/videos/2011/04/01/harry-potter-the-aurors-tv-show-trailer" target="_blank">The Aurors Trailer (Harry Potter TV Show)</a></h2>
<p>Looks like a strong effort from FX Networks now that the film franchise is coming to an end.</p>
<p style="text-align: center;"><object id="vid_4d950d3a0457bf09ce00000f" class="ign-videoplayer" width="480" height="270" data="http://media.ign.com/ev/prod/embed.swf" type="application/x-shockwave-flash"><param name="movie" value="http://media.ign.com/ev/prod/embed.swf" /><param name="allowfullscreen" value="true" /><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always" /><param name="bgcolor" value="#000000" /><param name="flashvars" value="url=http://www.ign.com/videos/2011/04/01/harry-potter-the-aurors-tv-show-trailer" /></object></p>
<div style="width: 480px; text-align: center;"><a href="http://www.ign.com/videos/2011/04/01/harry-potter-the-aurors-tv-show-trailer">More The Aurors Videos</a></div>
<h2><a title="In Baffling Move, The Huffington Post Erects Paywall Solely For NYT Employees" rel="bookmark" href="http://techcrunch.com/2011/04/01/in-baffling-move-huffington-post-erects-paywall-solely-for-nyt-employees/" target="_blank">In Baffling Move, The Huffington Post Erects Paywall Solely For NYT Employees</a></h2>
<p>I don&#8217;t like &#8216;em either.</p>
<p><span style="font-size: 20px; font-weight: bold;"><a href="http://blog.zap2it.com/pop2it/2011/04/helvetica-goes-comic-sans-googles-april-fools-day-prank.html" target="_blank">Google Changes Helvetica Font to Comic Sans</a></span></p>
<p>There are no words.</p>
<div class="wp-caption aligncenter" style="width: 569px"><a href="http://blog.zap2it.com/pop2it/2011/04/helvetica-goes-comic-sans-googles-april-fools-day-prank.html"><img title="omg" src="http://blog.zap2it.com/pop2it/helvetica-april-fools.jpg" alt="" width="559" height="318" /></a><p class="wp-caption-text">Image courtesy of Zp2it</p></div>
<p>Regularly scheduled linksharing returns next week. <img src='http://www.mustbeawesome.com/wp-includes/images/smilies/icon_wink.gif' alt=';)' class='wp-smiley' /> </p>
]]></content:encoded>
			<wfw:commentRss>http://www.mustbeawesome.com/2011/04/links-of-the-week-april-fools-edition/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
		</item>
		<item>
		<title>Links of the Week: March 25, 2011 Edition</title>
		<link>http://www.mustbeawesome.com/2011/03/links-of-the-week-march-25-2011-edition/</link>
		<comments>http://www.mustbeawesome.com/2011/03/links-of-the-week-march-25-2011-edition/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Fri, 25 Mar 2011 18:42:47 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Du4</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Links]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[awesome]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[badass]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Business]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[cool]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[ebooks]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[exercise]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[foursquare]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[futurism]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[geolocation]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Gowalla]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[innovation]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[music]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[new thinking]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Philosophy]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[posthuman]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[science]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[scifi]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Social media]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[vids]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[writing]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.mustbeawesome.com/?p=1394</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Roqbot Reinvents the Jukebox as Social Game &#160; Here&#8217;s a more detailed article from Wired on the coolest app I discovered at SXSW 2011. Roqbot puts control of internet enabled jukeboxes in your hands via your mobile device. You become a DJ with your own list of music that follows you around to participating locations [...]]]></description>
			<content:encoded><![CDATA[<div class="tweetmeme_button" style="float: right; margin-left: 10px;">
			<a href="http://api.tweetmeme.com/share?url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mustbeawesome.com%2F2011%2F03%2Flinks-of-the-week-march-25-2011-edition%2F"><br />
				<img src="http://api.tweetmeme.com/imagebutton.gif?url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mustbeawesome.com%2F2011%2F03%2Flinks-of-the-week-march-25-2011-edition%2F&amp;source=Du4&amp;style=normal&amp;service=bit.ly&amp;b=2" height="61" width="50" /><br />
			</a>
		</div>
<h2><a href="http://www.wired.com/epicenter/2011/03/roqbot-reinvents-the-jukebox-as-social-game/" target="_blank">Roqbot Reinvents the Jukebox as Social Game</a></h2>
<p>&nbsp;</p>
<div class="zemanta-img zemanta-action-dragged" style="margin: 1em; display: block;">
<div class="wp-caption alignleft" style="width: 310px"><a href="http://commons.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Midcentury_24-disc_Wurlitzer_jukebox_02.jpg"><img title="A mid-20th-century 24-disc Wurlitzer jukebox. ..." src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/3/3c/Midcentury_24-disc_Wurlitzer_jukebox_02.jpg/300px-Midcentury_24-disc_Wurlitzer_jukebox_02.jpg" alt="A mid-20th-century 24-disc Wurlitzer jukebox. ..." width="300" height="400" /></a><p class="wp-caption-text">Image via Wikipedia</p></div>
</div>
<p>Here&#8217;s a more detailed article from Wired on the coolest app I discovered at SXSW 2011. Roqbot puts control of internet enabled jukeboxes in your hands via your mobile device. You become a DJ with your own list of music that follows you around to participating locations with Rocqbot enabled jukeboxes. When you check into those venues, you can then control the jukebox&#8217;s playlist with a system of credits and rewards. Pretty great solution for all those bars you go to that keep playing &#8220;Freebird.&#8221;</p>
<h2><a title="Norman Spinrad’s QUARANTINE" href="http://www.warrenellis.com/?p=12207">Norman Spinrad’s QUARANTINE</a></h2>
<p>Only <a class="zem_slink freebase/en/warren_ellis" title="Warren Ellis" rel="homepage" href="http://warrenellis.com">Warren Ellis</a> could send a link to a sci-fi story about a bio-attack on New York that makes everyone have uncontrollable diarrhea. Spinrad&#8217;s latest novella deserves a look for that concept alone, but I&#8217;m also intrigued by Spinrad&#8217;s publishing model for this story. He&#8217;s going direct-to-reader via Amazon for a $3 mini-ebook. Worth checking out.</p>
<h2><a title="In The Midst Of A Massively Successful SXSW, Foursquare Tackles Venue Harmonization" rel="bookmark" href="http://techcrunch.com/2011/03/14/foursquare-social-places/">In The Midst Of A Massively Successful SXSW, Foursquare Tackles Venue Harmonization</a></h2>
<p><a class="zem_slink freebase/en/techcrunch" title="TechCrunch" rel="homepage" href="http://www.techcrunch.com">TechCrunch</a> has a good rundown of who I saw as the SXSW 2011 &#8220;winner,&#8221; Foursquare, and why. <a class="zem_slink" title="Dennis Crowley" rel="homepage" href="http://www.denniscrowley.com/">Dennis Crowley</a>&#8216;s plans to open up Foursquare&#8217;s checkin data to local businesses, with which they can create dashboards of customer information, is a brilliant application for the location-based service. Where this social tool was once seen as a frivolous game, I think the data built from its users is going to change the way brick and mortar business works in the future, particularly if those businesses are having a hard time staying open due to online competition. Even more importantly, as TechCrunch notes here, Foursquare is going to try and crack the nut of venue harmonization: developing a single online data set for each physical location someone could check into, regardless of what geolocation service they prefer (Foursquare, Gowalla, Facebook, etc).</p>
<h2><a href="http://singularityblog.singularitysymposium.com/question-everything-max-more-on-singularity-1-on-1/?utm_source=feedburner&amp;utm_medium=feed&amp;utm_campaign=Feed%3A+SingularityBlog+%28Singularity+Weblog%29" target="_blank">Question Everything: Max More on Singularity 1 on 1</a></h2>
<p>One of my new favorite regular reads via Pulsememe is Socrates&#8217; Singularity Blog. This latest post features a 50-minute long interview with &#8220;futurist and strategic philosopher&#8221; Max More. This is my first exposure to More, and I&#8217;m an instant fan. More is the CEO of the Alcor Life Extension Institute, a private sector entity dedicated to preserving one&#8217;s body past its normal lifespan. This basically involves employing cryonics technologies to freeze one&#8217;s brain (they even offer full body suspended animation!) on the hedge that in the future, humans will invent technology to resurrect the dying or dead tissue.</p>
<p>That&#8217;s not even the interesting part of the interview though. More &#8211; a name self-chosen based on his predilection toward transhumanism &#8211; offers tons of different insights into how one can immediately begin living a posthuman life. The most interesting piece of this interview to me was how More describes his diet and exercise regime, which are based on the &#8220;paleo&#8221; system:</p>
<p style="text-align: center;"><object width="640" height="390"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/6MlaSWisUuw&amp;rel=0&amp;hl=en_US&amp;feature=player_embedded&amp;version=3" /><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true" /><param name="allowScriptAccess" value="always" /><embed type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width="640" height="390" src="http://www.youtube.com/v/6MlaSWisUuw&amp;rel=0&amp;hl=en_US&amp;feature=player_embedded&amp;version=3" allowfullscreen="true" allowscriptaccess="always"></embed></object></p>
<p>The <a class="zem_slink freebase/en/paleolithic_diet" title="Paleolithic diet" rel="wikipedia" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paleolithic_diet">Paleo diet</a> throwback as a model for transhuman evolution poses so many cool discussions. But the thing that&#8217;s so inspiring about this is that Max More is actually <em>living</em> the posthuman life NOW. More (whom I was surprised to learn is the husband of fellow transhumanist and futurist <a class="zem_slink freebase/en/natasha_vita-more" title="Natasha Vita-More" rel="wikipedia" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natasha_Vita-More">Natasha Vita-More</a>, whose talk at SXSW sent chills down my spine) speaks with a wonderful degree of belief and authority for transhumanism, and he espouses a message that should kick even the laziest of armchair futurists out of their chairs and into action. Check out the three previous videos of his talk with Socrates at the link or listen to the podcast.</p>
<p>&nbsp;</p>
<p>&nbsp;</p>
<h6 class="zemanta-related-title" style="font-size: 1em;">Related articles</h6>
<ul class="zemanta-article-ul">
<li class="zemanta-article-ul-li"><a href="http://www.acceleratingfuture.com/michael/blog/2011/03/natasha-vita-more-doug-lenat-and-michael-vassar-to-speak-at-sxsw/">Natasha Vita-More, Doug Lenat, and Michael Vassar to Speak at SXSW</a> (acceleratingfuture.com)</li>
<li class="zemanta-article-ul-li"><a href="http://3p1alloymok.wordpress.com/2011/03/16/transhumanism-the-most-dangerous-idea/">Transhumanism: The Most Dangerous Idea?</a> (3p1alloymok.wordpress.com)</li>
<li class="zemanta-article-ul-li"><a href="http://techcrunch.com/2011/02/15/roqbot/">Roqbot Is A Jukebox On Your iPhone</a> (techcrunch.com)</li>
<li class="zemanta-article-ul-li"><a href="http://www.indiemusictech.com/music_marketing_for_indie/2011/03/video-demo-of-roqbot-a-virtual-digital-jukebox.html">Video Demo of Roqbot: a virtual, digital jukebox</a> (indiemusictech.com)</li>
</ul>
<div class="zemanta-pixie" style="margin-top: 10px; height: 15px;"><a class="zemanta-pixie-a" title="Enhanced by Zemanta" href="http://www.zemanta.com/"><img class="zemanta-pixie-img" style="border: none; float: right;" src="http://img.zemanta.com/zemified_e.png?x-id=ab2aca62-d22e-43d2-b43e-cc7776befe14" alt="Enhanced by Zemanta" /></a><span class="zem-script more-related more-info pretty-attribution paragraph-reblog"><script src="http://static.zemanta.com/readside/loader.js" type="text/javascript"></script></span></div>
]]></content:encoded>
			<wfw:commentRss>http://www.mustbeawesome.com/2011/03/links-of-the-week-march-25-2011-edition/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
		</item>
		<item>
		<title>Conversations at American University: The Double Facepalm</title>
		<link>http://www.mustbeawesome.com/2011/03/conversations-at-american-university-the-double-facepalm/</link>
		<comments>http://www.mustbeawesome.com/2011/03/conversations-at-american-university-the-double-facepalm/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Wed, 02 Mar 2011 15:49:41 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Du4</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Communication]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Events]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Government]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Media]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Philosophy]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[au]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[awesome]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[badass]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[cool]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[DC]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[DOD]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[du4]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[du4.llc]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[education]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[gov 2.0]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[influence]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[innovation]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[interagency]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[lame]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[not awesome]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Politics]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[public diplomacy]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Social media]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[State Department]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[strategic communication]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[vids]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.mustbeawesome.com/?p=1335</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[I had a great time last week talking with my buddy Dr. Craig Hayden in his Public Diplomacy class at American University in DC. Craig and I are sometimes-partners-in-crime at the MountainRunner Institute (along with His AWESOMEness, Matt Armstrong, and &#8220;Georgia Peach&#8221; Shawn Powers). We have a lot of interesting discussions about public diplomacy, strategic [...]]]></description>
			<content:encoded><![CDATA[<div class="tweetmeme_button" style="float: right; margin-left: 10px;">
			<a href="http://api.tweetmeme.com/share?url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mustbeawesome.com%2F2011%2F03%2Fconversations-at-american-university-the-double-facepalm%2F"><br />
				<img src="http://api.tweetmeme.com/imagebutton.gif?url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mustbeawesome.com%2F2011%2F03%2Fconversations-at-american-university-the-double-facepalm%2F&amp;source=Du4&amp;style=normal&amp;service=bit.ly&amp;b=2" height="61" width="50" /><br />
			</a>
		</div>
<p>I had a great time last week talking with my buddy Dr. Craig Hayden in his <a class="zem_slink freebase/en/public_diplomacy" title="Public diplomacy" rel="wikipedia" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_diplomacy">Public Diplomacy</a> class at <a class="zem_slink freebase/en/american_university" title="American University" rel="homepage" href="http://www.american.edu">American University</a> in DC. Craig and I are sometimes-partners-in-crime at the <a href="http://mountainrunner.us" target="_blank">MountainRunner</a> Institute (along with His <strong><em>AWESOME</em></strong>ness, Matt Armstrong, and &#8220;Georgia Peach&#8221; Shawn Powers). We have a lot of interesting discussions about public diplomacy, <a class="zem_slink freebase/en/strategic_communication" title="Strategic Communication" rel="wikipedia" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strategic_Communication">strategic communication</a>, and the nature of information and influence in today&#8217;s post-digital world.</p>
<p>Craig asked me to bring my perspective on those discussions to his class. We managed to film parts of the conversation, so I&#8217;m going to be chopping them up into bite-sized morsels of BADASS <strong><em>AWESOME</em></strong> for you, my loving public, to digest. In the first of these videos (all of which will be hosted <a href="http://www.youtube.com/user/cpdu4" target="_blank">here on my YouTube channel as well</a>), Craig asks why I chose <a href="http://www.mustbeawesome.com/2011/02/public-diplomacy-for-awesome-people-the-du4-way/" target="_blank">the metaphor of the &#8220;double facepalm&#8221; in last week&#8217;s introductory blog post about my experiences in public diplomacy and government</a>. (Larger, HD versions of the video are available via the YouTube link.)</p>
<p style="text-align: center;"><object width="560" height="349"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/kKec1qYQLGI?fs=1&amp;hl=en_US&amp;hd=1" /><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true" /><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always" /><embed type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width="560" height="349" src="http://www.youtube.com/v/kKec1qYQLGI?fs=1&amp;hl=en_US&amp;hd=1" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true"></embed></object></p>
<p class="zemanta-related-title" style="font-size: 1em;">I&#8217;d like to give a great big THANK YOU to all the AU students I met during this discussion. It&#8217;s really heartening to me to see so many potential citizen diplomat rockstars in this soul-sucking town. Great talking with you, and I hope we can continue the conversation outside the classroom.</p>
<p class="zemanta-related-title" style="font-size: 1em;">Speaking of which: I know a lot of you are blogging as part of Craig&#8217;s class and on your own. <strong><em>Please be sure to call yourselves out in the comments section of these video posts.</em></strong> I&#8217;d really like to promote some of the student-led commentary I&#8217;ve seen since the in-class discussion. We build our audiences socially, so I&#8217;d love to feature some of your opinions and content on <em>Must. Be. <strong>AWESOME</strong>!!!</em> dot com.</p>
<h6 class="zemanta-related-title" style="font-size: 1em;">Related articles</h6>
<ul class="zemanta-article-ul">
<li class="zemanta-article-ul-li"><a href="http://www.mustbeawesome.com/2011/02/public-diplomacy-for-awesome-people-the-du4-way/">Public Diplomacy for AWESOME People&#8230; the Du4 Way!</a> (mustbeawesome.com)</li>
<li class="zemanta-article-ul-li"><a href="http://mountainrunner.us/2010/07/hayden.html">In the interest of informed debate on Public Diplomacy</a> (mountainrunner.us)</li>
</ul>
<div class="zemanta-pixie" style="margin-top: 10px; height: 15px;"><a class="zemanta-pixie-a" title="Enhanced by Zemanta" href="http://www.zemanta.com/"><img class="zemanta-pixie-img" style="border: none; float: right;" src="http://img.zemanta.com/zemified_e.png?x-id=37e13df4-1870-44ce-a642-105007747850" alt="Enhanced by Zemanta" /></a><span class="zem-script more-related more-info pretty-attribution paragraph-reblog"><script src="http://static.zemanta.com/readside/loader.js" type="text/javascript"></script></span></div>
]]></content:encoded>
			<wfw:commentRss>http://www.mustbeawesome.com/2011/03/conversations-at-american-university-the-double-facepalm/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>1</slash:comments>
		</item>
		<item>
		<title>SXSW: The Adventure Begins</title>
		<link>http://www.mustbeawesome.com/2011/02/sxsw-the-adventure-begins/</link>
		<comments>http://www.mustbeawesome.com/2011/02/sxsw-the-adventure-begins/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Thu, 24 Feb 2011 15:00:12 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Du4</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Events]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[austin]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[awesome]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[badass]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Business]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[cool]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[foursquare]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[gaming]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[geolocation]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Gowalla]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[innovation]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Instagram]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[ipad]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[IPhone]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[love]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[new thinking]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[pics]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Plancast]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[social business design]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Social media]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[strategic communication]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[SXSW]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Texas]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[TV]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Twitter]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[vids]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.mustbeawesome.com/?p=1284</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[I finally bit the bullet this year and bought a full conference pass to South by Southwest, Austin&#8217;s long-AWESOME music, film, and tech festival. Having suffered through years of Twitter and Facebook friends broadcasting the varying degrees of AWESOMEness emanating from one of my favorite towns in Texas, I&#8217;m taking the @Du4.llc plunge. While I [...]]]></description>
			<content:encoded><![CDATA[<div class="tweetmeme_button" style="float: right; margin-left: 10px;">
			<a href="http://api.tweetmeme.com/share?url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mustbeawesome.com%2F2011%2F02%2Fsxsw-the-adventure-begins%2F"><br />
				<img src="http://api.tweetmeme.com/imagebutton.gif?url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mustbeawesome.com%2F2011%2F02%2Fsxsw-the-adventure-begins%2F&amp;source=Du4&amp;style=normal&amp;service=bit.ly&amp;b=2" height="61" width="50" /><br />
			</a>
		</div>
<p>I finally bit the bullet this year and bought a full conference pass to <a class="zem_slink freebase/en/south_by_southwest" title="South by Southwest" rel="homepage" href="http://www.sxsw.com">South by Southwest</a>, Austin&#8217;s long-<em><strong>AWESOME</strong></em> music, film, and tech festival. Having suffered through years of Twitter and Facebook friends broadcasting the varying degrees of <strong><em>AWESOME</em></strong>ness emanating from one of my favorite towns in Texas, I&#8217;m taking the @Du4.llc plunge.</p>
<p>While I do have a few specific goals for my trip, a large part of it remains unplanned. I intend to broadcast my experiences often, and I thought this would be a great opportunity to develop a publication strategy for a single event. Granted, it&#8217;s a media-heavy event, so separating out fun content from crappy stuff could be dicey. So here&#8217;s a quick breakdown of how you can find the different Du4 media that I&#8217;ll be pumping out from <strong><em>AWESOME</em></strong>ville.</p>
<h2>Where I&#8217;m Gonna Be: <a href="http://plancast.com/Du4" target="_blank">Plancast</a></h2>
<p><a href="http://plancast.com/Du4" target="_blank">Here&#8217;s a new social stream with which I&#8217;m experimenting: Plancast. </a>The idea is similar to a calendar except you organize your plans socially around what your friends are doing. You can also link into several existing tags for types of events, like I&#8217;m doing for SXSW. I&#8217;ve been invited to and RSVP&#8217;d to a staggering number of parties and events at SXSW, so keeping track of everything via my email inbox has just become too tedious and confusing. I&#8217;m hoping to use Plancast to organize my plans (duh) for Austin and share them with folks via <a href="http://plancast.com/Du4" target="_blank">my Plancast stream</a> so if you do want to link up with me, it&#8217;ll be easier to sync schedules.</p>
<p>However, let us all remember the special operator&#8217;s maxim: <em>&#8220;No plan survives first contact with the enemy&#8230;&#8221;</em></p>
<h2><a href="http://twitter.com/du4" target="_blank">Twitter: @Du4</a></h2>
<p>I&#8217;ll be broadcasting my hour-to-hour activities at <a class="zem_slink" title="SXSW" rel="homepage" href="http://sxsw.com/">SXSW</a> via Twitter. The <a href="http://twitter.com/#!/search?q=%23SXSW" target="_blank">#SXSW</a> hashtag will probably be overloaded with people tweeting on it, so follow me for direct updates. I&#8217;ll also be retweeting cool content I find on Twitter throughout SXSW. I&#8217;d also encourage anyone who&#8217;s doing remote listening of the event using tools like TweetDeck, Hootsuite, Radian6, or whatever, please hit me up with any emerging hashtags you see coming out of SXSW so I can find &#8216;em &#8220;on the ground.&#8221;</p>
<p>Twitter is also my go-to service for preferred commo. If you need to get ahold me right away, @reply or DM me and I&#8217;ll get back to you fast. Even better, if you&#8217;re attending SXSW, be sure to hit me up so I can follow you around too!</p>
<h2>Locations: <a href="http://foursquare.com/du4" target="_blank">Foursquare</a> and <a href="http://gowalla.com/users/Du4" target="_blank">Gowalla</a></h2>
<p>I&#8217;m a dual geolocation user: Foursquare for the badges, Gowalla for the items. There will be a TON of SXSW specific checkin rewards for 2011, so I&#8217;m going to have a ball checking in and sampling all the <em><strong>AWESOME</strong></em> places and things to do during the week. I have both accounts connected to my Twitter stream, so just follow me on Twitter to see where I am and what exclusive badges and achievements I unlock as I roll through Austin. I will probably post some pics and tips for various places too. Where Plancast is a proposed schedule of where I am planning to be, Foursquare and Gowalla will show where I actually end up.</p>
<p>Pro tip: you can click on the link in each checkin tweet I make to bring you to my Foursquare or Gowalla page and see everywhere I&#8217;ve been.</p>
<h2>Photos: <a href="http://du4.posterous.com/" target="_blank">Posterous</a> and Instagram</h2>
<p>I&#8217;ve been noodling with how to use a Posterous page for a while now. For those who don&#8217;t know, Posterous is a dead simple, email-based blogging system. You have a couple simple commands that you set up via your preferred email account, and then you just publish content to your Posterous stream via email or SMS. It works best when you&#8217;re on the go and want to share something or capture something quickly form your mobile device and get it online and visible. You&#8217;ll also receive every comment on your posts via email and be able to reply back via email.</p>
<p>For SXSW, I&#8217;ve developed <a href="http://du4.posterous.com/" target="_blank">a brand new Posterous page</a> where I can instantly upload content. I&#8217;ve found this is the simplest way to upload HD photos from my iPhone to a website where people can view them without a corresponding account. You just click on that link and BOOM: <em><strong>AWESOME</strong></em> shit direct from Du4. Because I can gin up other content and get it quickly published as well, I may use this Posterous page for snap, on-the-street blogging or &#8220;scrapbooking.&#8221;</p>
<p>(Aside: I got the idea for said use of Posterous from &#8220;vigilante pundit&#8221; and comedian <a class="zem_slink freebase/en/baratunde_thurston" title="Baratunde Thurston" rel="homepage" href="http://www.baratunde.com">Baratunde Thurston</a>, who uses <a href="http://baratunde.posterous.com/" target="_blank">his Posterous as &#8220;an internet scratch pad.&#8221;</a> I love that description of the service, and you can see from Baratunde&#8217;s updates exactly how well such usage of Posterous suits him.)</p>
<div class="zemanta-img zemanta-action-dragged" style="margin: 1em; display: block;">
<div class="wp-caption alignright" style="width: 310px"><a href="http://commons.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Baratunde_Thurston_at_ROFLCon_II.jpg"><img title="Baratunde Thurston at ROFLCon II" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/f/ff/Baratunde_Thurston_at_ROFLCon_II.jpg/300px-Baratunde_Thurston_at_ROFLCon_II.jpg" alt="Baratunde Thurston at ROFLCon II" width="300" height="200" /></a><p class="wp-caption-text">Baratunde Thurston (image via Wikipedia)</p></div>
</div>
<p>(Aside 2: <a href="http://cpdu4.pulsememe.com/" target="_blank">I&#8217;ve also got a Pulsememe stream</a> I&#8217;ve been using via Posterous to share stories and other content I view through the Pulse iPad app. Pulse is a cool reader-like app that I use now for ALL of my daily reading; Google Reader is dead to me after playing with this. Pulse connects to <a href="http://cpdu4.pulsememe.com/" target="_blank">a separate Posterous URL</a> where I share any interesting articles, links, and other stuff that comes across my ADD-addled eyes via the Pulse app. I also pull my <a href="http://www.mustbeawesome.com/category/links/" target="_blank">Links of the Week</a> directly from this Pulsememe stream.)</p>
<p>For those of you on Instagram, you can follow my feed (my username is du4) there for any photos I upload and touch up using Instagram&#8217;s color tools. Instagram does not have a web-based version of its users&#8217; streams so you can only view it from your smartphone.</p>
<h2>Longer-form Reporting: Must. Be. <em>AWESOME</em>!!! dot com</h2>
<p>If SXSW is social media nerd heaven, then I wouldn&#8217;t be a crown prince in the nerd host of angels without a blog. So every couple of days, I&#8217;ll throw together something more thoughtful than a mere tweet or photo upload can convey here at http://mustbeawesome.com. You can also expect some video blogging, interviews with rad people I meet, and other video clownishness posted here.</p>
<h2>Stay Mobile, Stay Flexible, Stay Alive</h2>
<p>SXSW is going to be a good opportunity for me to really put the gas pedal down on developing and sharing content online. I may get part way through the experience and realize that I don&#8217;t need all the streams I&#8217;ve talked about above. I figure this will be a supercool learning experience though. Let me know what you think by leaving a comment here or anywhere on one of the social streams I&#8217;ve described above. If there&#8217;s something I&#8217;m missing, I wanna know about it!</p>
<h6 class="zemanta-related-title" style="font-size: 1em;">Related articles</h6>
<ul class="zemanta-article-ul">
<li class="zemanta-article-ul-li"><a href="http://shegeeks.net/tips-on-surviving-and-thriving-during-sxsw-interactive-2011/">Tips On Surviving and Thriving During SxSW Interactive 2011</a> (shegeeks.net)</li>
<li class="zemanta-article-ul-li"><a href="http://jasonkeath.com/advice-for-sxsw-rookies/">Advice For SXSW Rookies</a> (jasonkeath.com)</li>
<li class="zemanta-article-ul-li"><a href="http://staticphotography.com/blog/kk/road-again-sxsw-2011-festival-austin-tx">On the Road Again to SXSW 2011 Festival in Austin, TX</a> (staticphotography.com)</li>
</ul>
<div class="zemanta-pixie" style="margin-top: 10px; height: 15px;"><a class="zemanta-pixie-a" title="Enhanced by Zemanta" href="http://www.zemanta.com/"><img class="zemanta-pixie-img" style="border: none; float: right;" src="http://img.zemanta.com/zemified_e.png?x-id=f000482b-4c25-4d57-82c6-e591ef860e44" alt="Enhanced by Zemanta" /></a><span class="zem-script more-related more-info pretty-attribution paragraph-reblog"><script src="http://static.zemanta.com/readside/loader.js" type="text/javascript"></script></span></div>
]]></content:encoded>
			<wfw:commentRss>http://www.mustbeawesome.com/2011/02/sxsw-the-adventure-begins/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>1</slash:comments>
		</item>
		<item>
		<title>AWESOME Things To Watch in 2011</title>
		<link>http://www.mustbeawesome.com/2011/02/awesome-things-to-watch-in-2011/</link>
		<comments>http://www.mustbeawesome.com/2011/02/awesome-things-to-watch-in-2011/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Tue, 22 Feb 2011 13:00:20 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Du4</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Business]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Communication]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Esoteria]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Futurism]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Government]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Media]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Philosophy]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[awesome]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[badass]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Cloud seeding]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[comics]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[cool]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[creativity]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[culture]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[digital comics]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[du4]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[du4.llc]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Facebook]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[foursquare]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[futurism]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[gaming]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[gov 2.0]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[innovation]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[ipad]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[islam]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[leadership]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[movies]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[new thinking]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Politics]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[public diplomacy]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Social media]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[State Department]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[strategic communication]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[vids]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.mustbeawesome.com/?p=1123</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[After enjoying JWT&#8216;s roundup of radness from their 2011 predictive trendspotting BIZINT department, I inferred a couple of times that they my have missed some things to watch in the coming year. I struggled with whether or not I was going to do a 2011 predictions post of my own (especially with all of the [...]]]></description>
			<content:encoded><![CDATA[<div class="tweetmeme_button" style="float: right; margin-left: 10px;">
			<a href="http://api.tweetmeme.com/share?url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mustbeawesome.com%2F2011%2F02%2Fawesome-things-to-watch-in-2011%2F"><br />
				<img src="http://api.tweetmeme.com/imagebutton.gif?url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mustbeawesome.com%2F2011%2F02%2Fawesome-things-to-watch-in-2011%2F&amp;source=Du4&amp;style=normal&amp;service=bit.ly&amp;b=2" height="61" width="50" /><br />
			</a>
		</div>
<p>After enjoying <a class="zem_slink freebase/en/jwt" title="JWT" rel="homepage" href="http://www.jwt.com/">JWT</a>&#8216;s roundup of radness from their 2011 predictive trendspotting BIZINT department, I inferred a couple of times that they my have missed some things to watch in the coming year. I struggled with whether or not I was going to do a 2011 predictions post of my own (especially with all of the other great [and TERRIBLE] ones out there). As I intimated in the JWT post though, it&#8217;s tough to maintain your street cred as an armchair futurist if you don&#8217;t make some play calls &#8211; good or bad. It&#8217;s not like I can go on TV and just fry motherfuckers with my brain like <a class="zem_slink freebase/en/jamais_cascio" title="Jamais Cascio" rel="wikipedia" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jamais_Cascio">Jamais Cascio</a>:</p>
<div class="wp-caption aligncenter" style="width: 425px"><img title="jamais" src="http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4105/5017749301_7c739fc63a_o.png" alt="" width="415" height="315" /><p class="wp-caption-text">Image courtesy of orderofchaos.soup.io</p></div>
<p>Here then is the Must. Be. <em><strong>AWESOME</strong>!!! </em>2011 Predictive Tapdance:</p>
<h1>The Elephant in the Room: <a class="zem_slink freebase/en/islam" title="Islam" rel="wikipedia" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islam">Islam</a></h1>
<p>For all the loveliness that &#8220;hope&#8221; and &#8220;change&#8221; brought us in 2009, 2010 saw a whole lot of retrenching when it came to comprehending and engaging Islam. Look for the debate about what constitutes Islam, Islam<em>ism, </em>what various groups of modern Muslims want in today&#8217;s world, and popular revolutions in the Middle East to ratchet up. Also keep an eye on what the <a class="zem_slink freebase/en/muslim_brotherhood" title="Muslim Brotherhood" rel="wikipedia" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muslim_Brotherhood">Muslim Brotherhood</a> does in the wake of Mubarak&#8217;s resignation: they will telegraph a lot of the conflict about modern Islam.</p>
<h1>More Mashups, More Memes</h1>
<p>I don&#8217;t care what anybody says: mashups and memes will continue to provide ample entertainment to We People of the Internetz. Look for advertisers to begin capitalizing on meme-trending and mashup-producing. Performance indicators: the next acquisition/website startup from the I Can Has Cheezburger collective AND <a class="zem_slink freebase/en/wiedenpluskennedy" title="Wieden+Kennedy" rel="homepage" href="http://www.wk.com/">Wieden &amp; Kennedy</a> after hiring the creator of this <em><strong>AWESOME</strong></em> video&#8211;</p>
<p style="text-align: center;"><object classid="clsid:d27cdb6e-ae6d-11cf-96b8-444553540000" width="480" height="390" codebase="http://download.macromedia.com/pub/shockwave/cabs/flash/swflash.cab#version=6,0,40,0"><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true" /><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always" /><param name="src" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/JJQcJBjObEc?fs=1&amp;hl=en_US" /><param name="allowfullscreen" value="true" /><embed type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width="480" height="390" src="http://www.youtube.com/v/JJQcJBjObEc?fs=1&amp;hl=en_US" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true"></embed></object></p>
<h1>Cloud Seeding</h1>
<p>As gaming continues to seep into the popular consciousness through applications like competitive geolocation (i.e. Foursquare and Gowalla) and passive social gaming (i.e. Farmville), look for more creative approaches to &#8220;seeding&#8221; the cloud with various types of content. Be it for advertising or grassroots mobilization purposes, effective influence and content promotion campaigns of the future will unfold via a variety of platforms. <a class="zem_slink" title="Stickybits" rel="homepage" href="http://www.stickybits.com/">StickyBits</a> and other QR code scanning apps are good indicators of tactical implementations of a cloud seeding strategy.</p>
<h1>Hacktivism Triumphant</h1>
<p>If WikiLeaks has taught us anything, masses of anonymous hackers can make or break online footprints. With Anonymous&#8217; mobilization against Amazon and other deniers of service against WikiLeaks, it is apparent that all-out online cyberwar can and will occur at a rate of minutes and hours. Government will continue to play catch-up to the independent entities playing havoc with cybersecurity. <a class="zem_slink freebase/en/denial-of-service_attack" title="Denial-of-service attack" rel="wikipedia" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Denial-of-service_attack">DDoS</a> attacks will become typical tools of the trade, and countermeasures against such attacks will demonstrate a new &#8220;arms race&#8221; in evolving security and attack technology. We will also see cyberwars play out in days between entities if not hours and minutes, the extent of which will run the gamut from mere inconvenience to full-on revolution (there&#8217;s a reason why Mubarak shut off the Internet, yo). It is possible that a wild 4channer will crack U.S. cyber defenses in 2011 and perhaps provide a 9/11-like impetus for government to begin getting serious with policy and legislation to operate in the digital age.</p>
<h1>Nobody Cares About <a class="zem_slink freebase/en/public_diplomacy" title="Public diplomacy" rel="wikipedia" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_diplomacy">Public Diplomacy</a></h1>
<p>Barack Obama&#8217;s <a class="zem_slink freebase/m/05zx0nk" title="President Obama Speaks to the Muslim World from Cairo, Egypt" rel="youtube" href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NaxZPiiKyMw">2009 Cairo speech</a> demonstrated that the U.S. government will continue to centralize public diplomacy initiatives in the White House, leaving State Department assets twisting in the wind as hollow emperors in the field. U.S. legislators will increase the depths to which they could give a shit less in 2011 about PD because PD does not create jobs for Americans. Meanwhile, 20th century institutions of public diplomacy like <a class="zem_slink freebase/en/radio_free_europe" title="Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty" rel="homepage" href="http://www.rferl.org">Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty</a> and the <a class="zem_slink freebase/en/broadcasting_board_of_governors" title="Broadcasting Board of Governors" rel="homepage" href="http://www.bbg.gov/">Broadcasting Board of Governors</a> will continue to wither and die in the digital age as on-the-minute social reporting and citizen journalism make them further irrelevant. Funding for PD initiatives will continue to stagnate while implementers will find more creative methods of achieving strategic PD goals, mostly via the private sector tech sector and citizen diplomacy organizations. China and some European countries will continue to lead with non-obvious but concerted national efforts in global influence, the effects of which will remain undiscovered by their targets (i.e., US) for years.</p>
<h1>Passive Social Gaming EXPLODES</h1>
<p>Related to my concept of &#8220;cloud seeding,&#8221; 2011 will see an explosion of social games in the vein of Farmville. Already, 2011 has seen Zynga publish a suster game to its masses-tranquilizing hit called Cityville. Transmedia, alternate reality gaming, and other episodic social gaming entities will experiment further with audience acquisition, retention, and profit conversion this year. Advertisers will cash in on these mechanisms en masse, driving ad-tired audiences from game to game and forcing ad strategists to begin thinking in different ways about social advertising. We will also see a continued harmonization of transmedia and ARGs cross-platform, online and offline, for social gaming experiences that will, for example, weave in and out of Facebook, Twitter, iPad and other mobile apps, and in-person performance art. More and more people will join longer term games socially as new genres are introduced on social networks. Performance indicator: keep your eyes peeled on LinkedIn for a business-based social game that trains executives in a number of administrivial and professional functions.</p>
<h1>Location-based Services Get Profitable</h1>
<p>Also related to &#8220;cloud seeding,&#8221; location-based app services such as Foursquare and Gowalla will rapidly get profitable this year. While many detractors continue to ridicule the small audience size these services carry, their growth will continue by orders of magnitude in 2011, so much so that advertisers and marketers for brick-and-mortar businesses will pay oodles of dough to access their users. Look for more unique rewards for users who check in to local places and events as well as the beginning of an actual value system based on fictional goods (i.e. Gowalla&#8217;s items).</p>
<h1>People Begin To Realize All This Social Stuff Really IS Creating Socialism 2.0</h1>
<p>Marx said it would take capitalism to run its course and fall out of favor before true socialism could take hold of the world. Macro-philosophers and economists will slowly begin to see that that is happening on a mass scale in 2011. Group buying services like Groupon and <a class="zem_slink" title="LivingSocial" rel="homepage" href="http://www.livingsocial.com/">Living Social</a>, crowdfunded charity programs, realtime crowdsourced news reporting, and near-realtime media curation will continue to prove that power really is all about the people. Democratization of content and price will, therefore, produce The New Socialism or Socialism 2.0. This will freak out conservatives and create performance indicators on conservative news networks that decry not only a socialist presidency but a socialist economy beginning to develop. Look for influencers that combat these conservative perceptions as the emerging leaders of the Socialist 2.0 movement (which in and of itself will never be referred to as an organized, network movement with a solid objective&#8230; it will just <em>happen</em>). Parallel to this, fortunes will begin to change hands as sales for various product areas crash: for example, the comics industry will continue to lose sales in print as consumers demand more digital, interactive content.</p>
<h1>We Need a New Narrative</h1>
<p>No more <em>Harry Potter</em>. No more <em>Lord of the Rings</em>. No more <em>Star Wars</em>. What&#8217;s the next big franchise? 2011 will see experimental repurposing of old ideas into new franchises. My money is on <em>Thor</em> and <em>Captain America</em> to be the starting point for a huge <em>Avengers </em>movie<em> </em>franchise in 2011 and 2012 (with reams of associated multimedia content) while <em>Green Lantern</em> and <em>Transformers: Dark of the Moon</em> tank.</p>
<h2>What Do You Think?</h2>
<p>Got some predictions of your own? Think I&#8217;m off-base about some of these things to watch? Let me know in the comments.</p>
<div class="zemanta-pixie" style="margin-top: 10px; height: 15px;"><a class="zemanta-pixie-a" title="Enhanced by Zemanta" href="http://www.zemanta.com/"><img class="zemanta-pixie-img" style="border: none; float: right;" src="http://img.zemanta.com/zemified_e.png?x-id=cd1d25a1-c4f5-4743-aa7b-8f19f714cdff" alt="Enhanced by Zemanta" /></a><span class="zem-script more-related more-info pretty-attribution paragraph-reblog"><script src="http://static.zemanta.com/readside/loader.js" type="text/javascript"></script></span></div>
]]></content:encoded>
			<wfw:commentRss>http://www.mustbeawesome.com/2011/02/awesome-things-to-watch-in-2011/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>2</slash:comments>
		</item>
		<item>
		<title>Links of the Week: January 28, 2011 Edition</title>
		<link>http://www.mustbeawesome.com/2011/01/links-of-the-week-january-28-2011-edition/</link>
		<comments>http://www.mustbeawesome.com/2011/01/links-of-the-week-january-28-2011-edition/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Fri, 28 Jan 2011 12:00:25 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Du4</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Links]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[awesome]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[books]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Business]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[china]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[ebooks]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[futurism]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[innovation]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[islam]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[not awesome]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[social business design]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Social media]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[vids]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[weak]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.mustbeawesome.com/?p=1117</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Neil Pasricha: The 3 A&#8217;s of Awesome I love me some TED Talks. Here&#8217;s the author of 1000 Awesome Things describing how he came up with that blog and subsequent book. As purveyor of all things AWESOME, I feel for the guy and get where he&#8217;s coming from. The downer part of this is that [...]]]></description>
			<content:encoded><![CDATA[<div class="tweetmeme_button" style="float: right; margin-left: 10px;">
			<a href="http://api.tweetmeme.com/share?url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mustbeawesome.com%2F2011%2F01%2Flinks-of-the-week-january-28-2011-edition%2F"><br />
				<img src="http://api.tweetmeme.com/imagebutton.gif?url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mustbeawesome.com%2F2011%2F01%2Flinks-of-the-week-january-28-2011-edition%2F&amp;source=Du4&amp;style=normal&amp;service=bit.ly&amp;b=2" height="61" width="50" /><br />
			</a>
		</div>
<h2><a href="http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/eng/neil_pasricha_the_3_a_s_of_awesome.html" target="_blank">Neil Pasricha: The 3 A&#8217;s of Awesome</a></h2>
<p>I love me some <a class="zem_slink freebase/en/ted" title="TED (conference)" rel="wikipedia" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TED_%28conference%29">TED</a> Talks. Here&#8217;s the author of <em><a class="zem_slink freebase/en/1000_awesome_things" title="1000 Awesome Things" rel="homepage" href="http://1000awesomethings.com">1000 Awesome Things</a></em> describing how he came up with that blog and subsequent book. As purveyor of all things <em><strong>AWESOME</strong></em>, I feel for the guy and get where he&#8217;s coming from. The downer part of this is that Neil&#8217;s presentation isn&#8217;t terribly&#8230; <em><strong>AWESOME</strong></em>. In fact, it&#8217;s kinda weak. If you&#8217;re gonna go <em><strong>AWESOME</strong></em>, bro-han, you gotta go BIG. Get some pep and CRUSH that sucker.</p>
<p style="text-align: center;"><object classid="clsid:d27cdb6e-ae6d-11cf-96b8-444553540000" width="446" height="326" codebase="http://download.macromedia.com/pub/shockwave/cabs/flash/swflash.cab#version=6,0,40,0"><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true" /><param name="allowScriptAccess" value="always" /><param name="wmode" value="transparent" /><param name="bgColor" value="#ffffff" /><param name="flashvars" value="vu=http://video.ted.com/talks/dynamic/NeilPasricha_2010X-medium.flv&amp;su=http://images.ted.com/images/ted/tedindex/embed-posters/NeilPasricha-2010X.embed_thumbnail.jpg&amp;vw=432&amp;vh=240&amp;ap=0&amp;ti=1048&amp;introDuration=15330&amp;adDuration=4000&amp;postAdDuration=830&amp;adKeys=talk=neil_pasricha_the_3_a_s_of_awesome;year=2010;theme=what_makes_us_happy;theme=a_taste_of_tedx;theme=master_storytellers;event=TEDxToronto+2010;&amp;preAdTag=tconf.ted/embed;tile=1;sz=512x288;" /><param name="src" value="http://video.ted.com/assets/player/swf/EmbedPlayer.swf" /><param name="bgcolor" value="#ffffff" /><param name="allowfullscreen" value="true" /><embed type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width="446" height="326" src="http://video.ted.com/assets/player/swf/EmbedPlayer.swf" flashvars="vu=http://video.ted.com/talks/dynamic/NeilPasricha_2010X-medium.flv&amp;su=http://images.ted.com/images/ted/tedindex/embed-posters/NeilPasricha-2010X.embed_thumbnail.jpg&amp;vw=432&amp;vh=240&amp;ap=0&amp;ti=1048&amp;introDuration=15330&amp;adDuration=4000&amp;postAdDuration=830&amp;adKeys=talk=neil_pasricha_the_3_a_s_of_awesome;year=2010;theme=what_makes_us_happy;theme=a_taste_of_tedx;theme=master_storytellers;event=TEDxToronto+2010;&amp;preAdTag=tconf.ted/embed;tile=1;sz=512x288;" bgcolor="#ffffff" wmode="transparent" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true"></embed></object></p>
<p style="text-align: left;"><em>[Bit of an aside: I actually think that while his concept is pretty rad, the actual content leaves something to be desired. He should aim for 1000 <strong>AWESOME</strong> Things instead of 1000 Awesome Things.]</em></p>
<h2><a href="http://bigthink.com/series/58" target="_blank">Why You Can&#8217;t Work At Work</a></h2>
<p style="text-align: left;">What? More videos? Send the <em><strong>AWESOME</strong></em>, son!</p>
<p style="text-align: center;"><object id="flashObj" classid="clsid:d27cdb6e-ae6d-11cf-96b8-444553540000" width="480" height="270" codebase="http://download.macromedia.com/pub/shockwave/cabs/flash/swflash.cab#version=6,0,40,0"><param name="bgcolor" value="#FFFFFF" /><param name="flashVars" value="videoId=724893522001&amp;playerID=651017566001&amp;playerKey=AQ~~,AAAAGuNzXFE~,qu1BWJRU7c26MMkbB19ukwmFB5ysvYz5&amp;domain=embed&amp;dynamicStreaming=true" /><param name="base" value="http://admin.brightcove.com" /><param name="seamlesstabbing" value="false" /><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true" /><param name="swLiveConnect" value="true" /><param name="allowScriptAccess" value="always" /><param name="src" value="http://c.brightcove.com/services/viewer/federated_f9?isVid=1&amp;isUI=1" /><param name="name" value="flashObj" /><param name="flashvars" value="videoId=724893522001&amp;playerID=651017566001&amp;playerKey=AQ~~,AAAAGuNzXFE~,qu1BWJRU7c26MMkbB19ukwmFB5ysvYz5&amp;domain=embed&amp;dynamicStreaming=true" /><param name="allowfullscreen" value="true" /><embed id="flashObj" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width="480" height="270" src="http://c.brightcove.com/services/viewer/federated_f9?isVid=1&amp;isUI=1" name="flashObj" allowscriptaccess="always" swliveconnect="true" allowfullscreen="true" seamlesstabbing="false" base="http://admin.brightcove.com" flashvars="videoId=724893522001&amp;playerID=651017566001&amp;playerKey=AQ~~,AAAAGuNzXFE~,qu1BWJRU7c26MMkbB19ukwmFB5ysvYz5&amp;domain=embed&amp;dynamicStreaming=true" bgcolor="#FFFFFF"></embed></object></p>
<p style="text-align: left;">Jason Fried&#8217;s frustration is shared by many, but I think a lot of that frustration comes from the tension that springing up in the modern workplace between <a class="zem_slink freebase/en/social_business" title="Social business" rel="wikipedia" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_business">social business</a> and the 1.0 workplace of collaboration. People confuse meetings with collaboration and hierarchy with order.</p>
<h2><a href="http://www.brasstackthinking.com/2010/12/the-5-critical-social-media-skills-you-need-to-disperse/?utm_source=feedburner&amp;utm_medium=feed&amp;utm_campaign=Feed:+TheBrandBox+(Brass+Tack+Thinking)&amp;utm_content=Twitter" target="_blank">The 5 Critical Social Media Skills You Need To Disperse</a></h2>
<p>I saw Jay Baer speak at BOLO 2010 in Scottsdale last year, and he touched on these skills before codifying them (with Amber Naslund) in this post and his forthcoming book <em><a href="http://www.nowrevolutionbook.com/" target="_blank">The NOW Revolution: 7 Shifts to Make Your Business Faster, Smarter, and More Social.</a> </em>He&#8217;s right on the money with every one, from Listening to Brand Immersion to Engagement. Business MUST understand that their people will ALWAYS BE MARKETING. A.B.M. <strong style="font-style: italic;">ALWAYS! BE! MARKETING! </strong>If these businesses miss the boat on empowering their people to become marketers on the brand&#8217;s behalf, then they will risk those same people talking negatively about the selfsame brand. Be human, people!</p>
<h2 id="hdr_article-headline"><a href="http://www.fastcompany.com/1712515/china-rides-global-dominance-next-stop-muslim-world" target="_blank">China&#8217;s Global Dominance Tour: Next Stop Muslim World</a></h2>
<p>This is more than a little significant. <a class="zem_slink freebase/m/074rdk" title="Fast Company (magazine)" rel="homepage" href="http://www.fastcompany.com">Fast Company</a>&#8216;s article is short on the details, but I HIGHLY encourage people to start paying attention to what China&#8217;s up to internationally. If you combined the entire population of China with the total number of professed Muslims, you would get a number worth paying attention to.</p>
<h2><a href="http://www.wired.com/epicenter/2011/01/amazon-launches-kindle-singles-saves-long-form-journalism/" target="_blank">Amazon Launches Kindle Singles, Saves Long-Form Journalism</a></h2>
<p>Long-form journalism that&#8217;s not book length? Not a bad business model here. At $1-$5 a pop, this is a GREAT way for writers and reporters to make some scratch off magazine-plus length journalism that&#8217;s too short for book distribution and too long for magazine inclusion. Further, it sets up a direct-to-consumer relationship, which is good for journalists and bad for journalism companies that can no longer charge a percentage against the writer for any work he publishes. I think you&#8217;re about to see a ton of for-profit writers start generating some <em><strong>AWESOME</strong></em> work this way.</p>
<h2>Have a Great Weekend!</h2>
<h6 class="zemanta-related-title" style="font-size: 1em;">Related articles</h6>
<ul class="zemanta-article-ul">
<li class="zemanta-article-ul-li"><a href="http://www.mustbeawesome.com/2011/01/links-of-the-week-january-7-2011-edition/">Links of the Week: January 7, 2011 Edition</a> (mustbeawesome.com)</li>
</ul>
<div class="zemanta-pixie" style="margin-top: 10px; height: 15px;"><a class="zemanta-pixie-a" title="Enhanced by Zemanta" href="http://www.zemanta.com/"><img class="zemanta-pixie-img" style="border: none; float: right;" src="http://img.zemanta.com/zemified_e.png?x-id=d76f94df-d6d9-4fe1-bb33-1c582e7de289" alt="Enhanced by Zemanta" /></a><span class="zem-script more-related more-info pretty-attribution paragraph-reblog"><script src="http://static.zemanta.com/readside/loader.js" type="text/javascript"></script></span></div>
]]></content:encoded>
			<wfw:commentRss>http://www.mustbeawesome.com/2011/01/links-of-the-week-january-28-2011-edition/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>1</slash:comments>
		</item>
	</channel>
</rss>

