Fluffy Links – Tuesday September 22nd 2009

September 22nd, 2009

Ian Healy’s take on filesharing. This is your consumers talking dear record company.

The IDA had a blogger’s briefing about their new campaign last week. The Business Post covers the €2M ad campaign they showed us. (Diclaimer, their ad agency and I worked on the briefing) Resulting from this though the IDA are starting to embrace online communities. First stop is a LinkedIn discussion group they’re facilitating called Innovation Ireland. Name is a clue to the content. Contributions welcome.

Modest Mouse are back to Ireland in December. Nothing on ticketbastard yet but soon…

Rosemary Maccabe‘s site is live and a-kicking.

Phantom of the Opera (the old movie), in a Church with an organist. In Bandon.

Ogra Fianna Fáil do a Ronseal on Lisbon.

Entreprenural Internships with NDRC.

Nice tips on how to maintain being inspired.

Love it. Enterprise 2.0 sounds so rough but Social Business explains it better.

Genius. Wispa uses their advertising spaces to allow customers to have fun with messages.

This is a Coke Can I want.

Readers of FoodFight.ie say this is their fav Julia Child clip. Julia and her chickens:
[youtube 2ohiUbQyDhk]

Hockey – Song Away (Looking forward to seeing them tonight)
[youtube ZHBBDkWN0OI]

Posted in Fluffy, irishblogs | 4 Comments »

Let’s dance

September 21st, 2009

This blog post on design houses have entrepreneurs got me thinking about businesses and how they should always be in an adapting frame of mind. It made me think of dancing and specifically of dancing at weddings. We start off with the bride and groom and the traditional waltzy dance and move there to the “classics” and pop hits with the wedding band and then as the DJ comes along we wobble our extremities to all different songs, rhythms and so on. Some businesses are perfect at the traditional stuff, no stamping on feet at all while others are shit and do their best not to crash into others as they spin about. The ones good at the waltzes sometimes find themselves in foreign land at this “modern” stuff and leave the dance floor.

I often think that while being fantastic at one style of dancing is great, the ones that are rough around the edges and will stand in the middle of a dance floor and give it a bash have the better attitudes. Trying different things out, being game for something new is a survival skill. I’m reminded of this by three tech companies in particular: Odeo, Seesmic and Game Neverending.

Barbara and Uncle Pat
Photo owned by edenpictures (cc)

Odeo created a tool called Twittr which became Twitter and Odeo the shell got sold on. Seesmic started as a video service and now their main product is an aggregator for Twitter and more and Game Neverending had a photosharing tool that turned into Flickr. Sometimes if you do join the dancefloor after watching the ebb and flow and studying the dance moves you’ll be grand, sometimes the music changes without notice and you’ll need to improvise and adapt.

It seems this year more companies than ever had to adapt and yet still haven’t. Taxi drivers are a great example. All complaining there are too many plates. That can’t be changed but they won’t adapt in other ways. Offer premium services. Create a driving standard way higher than the regulator enforces and push that as a selling point. New music, they sit in chairs and grumble. Any other examples of Irish industries that are not dancing to different tunes when they could be?

You dancing? I’m asking. And an all too serious video to end the post with:

[youtube 0XFHASLS6G8]

Posted in business, irishblogs | 3 Comments »

Fluffy Links – Monday September 21st 2009

September 21st, 2009

Coming to the 2009 Realex Payments Web Awards? Register in advance. Tickets on sale soon.

On that topic. Pat O’Neill has a list of hotels on the night of October 10th that are cheaper than the rest.

This post from Karen is my favourite in a while. You are the best at what you do. If you like it, send it around to others.

Lots of camps, now this one from IBM Ireland. SmartCamp Ireland. Money and support for companies.

Everyone and their droopy ass are writing posts about NAMA but this post on the Property Pin (best site evar) will anger and sadden you as it gets to the facts.

Twitter and those selling it. Badly.

Via Paul Watson: TOG is a hacker space in Dublin.

New blog(to me): Farmer Simon.

Situations Vacant – Irish movie about job hunting
[youtube g4c5aBhQ2k4]

Julia Child on David Letterman:
[youtube SHX0pv8_JOE]

Posted in Fluffy, irishblogs | 5 Comments »

it@Cork 2009 Tech in Business conference – Wedn. 18 Nov

September 20th, 2009

Details are up for the 2009 it@Cork conference. Liam Casey opens the conference, Dr. Ed Walsh closes it. Lots of good talks jammed in between.

The theme for the conference is “Recovery Through Technology”.

it@cork 2009 Conference

I’m part of the organising committee and it’s very interesting working on a conference that needs to watch costs while getting good speakers to encourage enough people to come along to make the conference work. 2009 and the state of the economy and business in a way is making the talks at this conference very relevant to those attending and those organising. There are probably more opportunities now than ever before and hopefully we’ll have the speakers show all the possibilities out there.

Here’s an interview with Liam Casey on Morning Ireland.

Posted in business, technology | 2 Comments »

Fluffy Links – Thursday 17th September 2009

September 17th, 2009

Want some Julie and Julia books? Partake.

Loving the website for McCann Erickson.

New blog. White Rabbit.

And another: The Mire.

National Campaign for the Arts.

Good reasons why all councils should get involved in online communities.

Facebook Advertising Webinar on September 29th.

Anarctica in January, fly from Ireland. Only 6-7k or so…

Charlie Higson has a new kids book on zombies, loving trailers for books:
[youtube 1jUXsJOlmoY]

Posted in Fluffy, irishblogs | 3 Comments »

Shared experiences and the Princess Bride

September 16th, 2009

So a good while back now we had the Princess Bride #asyouwish event on Twitter. The basic idea was that you could be part of a group experiencing an event, even if you were not physically near the group. People watching the Eurovision, Rose of Tralee and texting back and forth. Now we’re on Twitter doing it.

We tweeted, we had a liveblog. SoundCheck tuned in from their event. Simon McGarr stuck up some LiveBlog.ie stats too: Total visitors: 409 Number of posts: 885 Number of comments: 281

Mostly super positive reaction to the event and some negative ones complaining that if you want to watch a movie you shouldn’t be tweeting. Or maybe eating. Or moving. And maybe on your own. But you don’t watch Princess Bride for the 5th or 10th time in silence. It’s very participatory. Even on first viewing.

People who have never gone to a concert and sung along to some songs probably would find this foreign and shocking. Maybe people who didn’t partake in a Rocky Horror night with all the props. Shared experiences are here to stay in digital format just like they’ve been around in analog for possibly thousands of years. Christian masses are like this when everyone sings and claps, right?

Then we see this from Fox and Fringe.

On Thursday at 9 p.m., the penultimate episode of Fringe will be accompanied by Twitter commentary from two of the show’s cast and producers.

If you’re a Helge Tennø fan you’ll know his take on marketing and earned media and how companies now need to not broadcast or disrupt and instead contribute and provide. I think vehicles like running shared experience events is one way companies can work with the general public and people from various online communities and have a little bit of fun in the process. Much better than advertising/spamming by asking people to mention your company name on Twitter.

So Princess Bride was the first in a series. People want another Twitter Movie Night soon and we’ll have one alright but also on the way are other participatory events using online communities.

Posted in business, irishblogs, online marketing | 7 Comments »

Unite and build

September 16th, 2009

An article in the Business Post a while back covered the fact that RTE, Today FM and the regional radio stations are uniting to do an ad campaign to promote radio ads. This is the first time ever it’s happened. Shame it took a recession and many of them on deathwatch for it.

Why aren’t companies in the same industry doing this? Why aren’t hotels in a certain tourist location uniting and talking up their area? Why are so many companies now doggedly fighting over a smaller and smaller patch instead of making the patch bigger? Cooperation works if you want it to. The businesses in Washington Street in Cork did this a while back as did a number of other pubs running “decades’ nights in various pubs.

Do businesses in Ireland take things too personally so much that they couldn’t be a uniting force to build their whole industry? Thoughts?

Project 365 #258: 150909 Nice Chopper!
Photo owned by comedy_nose (cc)

Posted in business, Ireland, irishblogs | 9 Comments »

Bianoconi’s the best pizza in Dublin? Oh Hell..

September 15th, 2009

As people know I’m a massive fan of Hell Pizza, even Sunday Times employees have accused me that I’m on their payroll but I’m not. However I am on the payroll of WhoseView.ie who had me help them organise a blogger/Twitterer/rantAndRaver event where we came, saw and pizzaed.

We were there to not be very sciencey but to sample pizzas from 6 different pizzerias and see which ones we liked and disliked the most. It was a blind taste test, nobody knew until after which pizza was from where and to my surprise and slight shock, Hell didn’t finish too well in the list.

It was my first time sampling Bianconi’s and I liked them a lot. They also apparently came out the cheapest. I heard from a few people that they do really good pizza and they’ve won some world pizza awards too but taste is subjective. Some of those on the night loved some pizza that others hated and vice-versa. So, have to head to Bianconi’s. Also the Steps of Rome? was mentioned. Where else is good in Dublin. Was our small focus group of foodies way off, near to reality, bang on? Sorry Hell 🙁

Posted in business, food, Ireland | 14 Comments »

Fluffy Links – Tuesday September 15th 2009

September 15th, 2009

I was in London for Interesting and this is a nice summary of who and what was on.

Some nice online stats for Ireland.

Dublin bikes Twitter app. Darragh gets Dublin tikes fiddling with bikes.

And on that, I want this bubble blowing robot that hooks into Twitter.

Danish Tourism is edgy. Unmarried mothers selling the country.

Countermeasures.

Glee – Gold digger
[youtube EgZ7e-FDeac]

Parenthetical Girls – A Song For Ellie Greenwich
[youtube h19KnjDqS5M]

Posted in Fluffy, irishblogs | 2 Comments »

Fluffy Links – Monday September 14th 2009

September 13th, 2009

New blog (at least to me) Nicky’s Rag Tales.

Election Literature blog. Super-niche!

Jaysus, another one. Bloggers for Europe.

myHome.ie now have an iPhone App. Handy.

UCC is on Twitter too, ok.

T-shirts and mini-Gardai do not mix.

Creativity/Madness. Line.

List of journos on Twitter. (UK Centric)

Genius from the Facebook folks, messing with TechCrunch.

This is what people look like and get up to on that Plinth thing in Trafalgar Square. 3am on a Friday night must be fun with all the drunks.
[youtube WxqH3RXznIU]

Posted in Fluffy, irishblogs | Comments Closed

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