Fake Plastic Noodles

Found this at The Bad Pitch Blog…

On his personal blog, Chris Anderson has published a ridiculously long list of e-mail addresses that have officially been blocked from his Outlook address book. Most are from PR companies who spam him with random press releases and the like. I’m not sure how I feel about outing people like that, but if I got 300 unnecessary e-mails a day, I’d be pretty frustrated too.

Lazy flacks send press releases to the Editor in Chief of Wired because they can’t be bothered to find out who on my staff, if anyone, might actually be interested in what they’re pitching. Fact: I am an actual person, not a team assigned to read press releases and distribute them to the right editors and writers (that’s editor@wired.com).

So fair warning: I only want two kinds of email: those from people I know, and those from people who have taken the time to find out what I’m interested in and composed a note meant to appeal to that (I love those emails; indeed, that’s why my email address is public).

It just goes to show you how important it is to do your research. How many times does this sort of thing have to happen before people catch on? It’s been said that you need to treat bloggers like journalists, but I think it goes farther than that - you have to treat bloggers like people too.

Tis a tradition in our office to dress up for Halloween. Surprisingly, most people actually do. Does anyone else happen to dress up? What are you going as this year?

So far we have a Shriner, a mad scientist and a severed head on table.

I’m Stevie Nicks circa 1979 (and if had brought my USB cable for my camera, I’d be able to show you).

Considering I’ll be spending a fair amount of time in Brooklyn next week, I figured I would share what will surely be my entertainment.

Viva la Hipster Olympics!

Forgot to mention… I’ll be at Womma’s Word of Mouth Marketing Summit on the 14th and 15th of November in Vegas. Any State-side industry people planning on being there? I’m really looking forward to it (and hey, I don’t even really gamble!)

I’ll write more as the time approaches, but I’m knee-deep in work already and it’s only Monday.

Nathalie very kindly shared this video link with me.  Her firm put together a little mash-up of the Flackenhack awards last week. It’s a quick watch, nicely edited and makes me wish I could have been there myself. *Le sigh* I miss London.

I meant to write a bit about ArbCamp yesterday, but for some reason sitting around in my fleece pants in front of a space heater watching old episodes of Arrested Development seemed more productive (at least for my mental health).

ArbCamp 2007 was worthwhile, most definitely, even if a bit harried. There were a couple great sessions, but one in particular I’d like to focus on. I’ll disclose now that the discussion was lead by one of my colleagues.

Basically it was a conversation on how to keep your personal and professional lives separate in the online world – or even if you should. It’s a topic that I’ve been struggling with a bit on this blog and I think it’s a worthwhile subject for anyone who writes even a smidgen about his or her career.

We all know that employers and curious colleagues Google new and perspective employees. The only hiring experience I’ve had is with our current intern, and I can tell you we Googled him before we even interviewed him. Surely we were looking for “bad” things, but we also wanted to find out who he was as a person and not just the smiling, suit-wearing interviewee that eventually would sit across the table.

I was told recently by a colleague that her fiancé’s company banned him from blogging, despite the fact that his blog had absolutely nothing to do with work. I’m lucky enough to work at a job where I can blog about what I do, you could even argue that blogging is encouraged, but I do have a few ground rules.

• I will not write about clients Broken with disclosure Jan. 31
• I will not write about friendly bloggers Broken with disclosure Nov. 20 and Feb. 11
• I will not focus solely on PR
• I will not focus solely on my personal life.

While the first two are crystal clear, I think the last two deserve some explanation.

PR doesn’t define me. It is what I do and what I am passionate about, but it’s something that I try not to think about on the weekends (ArbCamp aside, of course). The second reason is that when I move to London I would like a way to keep in touch with my States-side friends and family. I won’t have time to talk to everyone every day, so this can be a way to let them know about what will become the daily minutia of my new English life. The third reason, inextricably tied to the first, is that I want people to know me. I’ve mentioned before that while I don’t let my clients or friendlies know about my blog personally, I always like it when they find it on their own. Nothing pleases me more to see the search term “Melanie Seasons PR campaign” in my stats. It means that people are curious about my company, what I do and me.

Even though I hide behind a computer screen all day and am a little afraid to talk to people on the phone because of it, I realise that nothing beats face-to-face communication. I have much better relationships with the colleagues and clients that I’ve met in person than the ones I haven’t. So if I can’t meet someone in person, the next best thing is for them to meet me through my blog.

This means that my personal and professional life has to be tied together in some way. I haven’t seen too many blogs that write about their professional and professional lives at the same time. It’s a bit taboo, isn’t it? I’m still trying to figure out the balance between the two, but I’d be curious to see how others are tackling the situation or whether anyone actually thinks it’s a good idea.

I had an “Overheard in Ann Arbor” moment this week.  I want to submit it, but the last one I sent in never made it on the site, despite its brilliance.  This week, on the corner of Huron and 1st, I passed a trio of gothy punk kids.  As the only female of the group lights up a cigarette, she asks “Oh shit!  You know what I forgot?”  One of the guys reply “That you’re pregnant and killing your unborn child?”  You can’t make this stuff up.  Brilliant.

—-

I’ve stopped buying things for my apartment.  Wall art, kitchen gadgets (with the exception of a cookie sheet today), larger electronics because I don’t really want to have to sell or get rid them when I move.  I think it’s because of this that I keep seeing across item after item of things that would make my living space even more hospitable.

This week, I’ve been noticing that Casa Sugar has been highlighting some fantastic artists that specialise in home decor.  Two favourites so far are Lee Gainer and Ashley Goldberg.  Lee’s speciality is circles, which sounds funny until you see what he can do with them:

Ashley’s art is a less abstract.  She draws these almost child-like characters that remind me of the Lenore comics I used to read in my semi-gothy high school days:

Their respective Etsy shops are here and here.

Found at Apartment Therapy, the garage from the future.  For the space-cramped city of New York, parking can be a problem.  Yes, there are parking garages around, but those you actually have drive in.  For those who just can’t be bothered with such a chore and have A LOT of money, 14 of these luxury condos in Chelsea some complete with sky garage/elevator.  Something tells me I will never ever make enough money to live in a place like this, but at least a girl can dream.

And even though this isn’t apartment-related, it’s just plain cool.  Nothing could make a Halloween better than a Trick-or-Tini.

This is very last minute, but if any fellow Ann Arbor digital lackeys are interested, tomorrow (Oct. 27) is ArbCamp 2007. It’s a one-day meeting gathering for Michiganders to talk and learn about the wonder that is social media. There will be sessions on all the usual suspects: wikis, mobile marketing, social networks, etc. The keynote speaker is Joseph Jaffe of Jaffe Juice (which sort of sounds like Jamba Juice to me, but I’m sure he’s never heard that before).

The best part is that it’s quite inexpensive. ArbCamp sessions with breakfast and lunch is only $15; with the keynote, it’s $50. There are student discounts as well, $35 for the sessions and keynote.

To recap:

Saturday, Oct. 27
MoLo/Morris Lawrence building at Washtenaw Community College
9 am - 4 pm, Arb Camp 2007
3:30 pm - 5:30 pm, Keynote with Joseph Jaffe

I’m pretty sure you can register last minute if you’re interested. Methinks I should have plugged this earlier…

Thanks to Nichole for pointing this one out.

I fear I may fall into the category as my telephone is  teaming with cobwebs.

Well, as for much as my colleague Dave Binkowski rants, he does occasionally have some decent points (just kidding, Dave). This latest post for example on what he calls the censorship of pay-per-post. Apparently, PayPerPost “will not let it’s employees, or ‘Posties’ as they’re called, write about anything they don’t purchase.” Dave learned this from another colleagues who was told by a blogger that he/she (not sure which) had a post removed by the PPP people for “violating the terms of service.” Dave goes on to say…

In the era of transparency, authenticity and credibility, PayPerPost is clearly not interested in participating in the aforementioned values but instead asking bloggers to destroy their credibility through nondisclosure and controlling their content.

I think it can be argued that PPP has never been interested in values, but that’s a post in and of itself.

One of the deeper issues here is that because the blogosphere is so saturated with product reviews, everyone is starting to get nastily territorial. The lines are drawn on the battlefield and bloggers are choosing sides between PPP and PR. I just wonder how soon it will be until the war actually starts. Hey, maybe we can call it World Wide Web War 2.0!

Important side note: I want to mention here that we have never and will never pay a blogger in exchange for a review. If a blogger accepts something from us, he or she is under no obligation to even write about the product. I just have to throw that out there :-)