How I Used Social Media to Buy a Car

Wow, my first post since moving to San Diego and it only took 52 days to do it! That’s pretty horrible, I must admit. Here I thought moving to a new city would inspire me to be more active in my photography and blogging. Nope. Turns out moving and starting a new job means you have next to no free time. When you do find yourself void of responsibilities, all you really want to do is relax with your iPad and new season of Nikita on Netflix. Perhaps I’m projecting a bit… Clearly I really love that show.

For all the years I lived in San Francisco I never owned a car. It just wasn’t necessary. I walked almost everywhere in that city, and loved it. It was a healthy way to get around and it allowed me a little time to myself. When I needed to go further than a say a mile, I’d take the Muni. And despite what many of the locals might say, we have a stellar mass transit system.

My apartment had a Walk Score of 98 and a Bike Score of 95. My office had a Walk Score of 92, a Transit Score of 100 and a Bike Score of 89. Basically I had the world, just steps away. San Diego, well it isn’t quite the same here. Continue reading

Chill Out Y’all, it’s Just Instagram “Ruining” Itself Again

All this talk today about Instagram adding video and how that is going to ruin it reminded me of all the talk about Facebook acquiring Instagram and how that was going to ruin it. It didn’t just in case you were wondering. Also it reminds me of that Instagram added Android devices and how that was going to ruin it. Hell, remember when people remarked that Instagram changed some filters and how it was going to ruin it?

justex07 Justin Scott on Instagram

Let’s go over that again.

  • Did filter changes ruined Instagram? — No
  • Did adding Android ruin Instagram? — No
  • Did Facebook’s acquisition ruin Instagram? — No
  • Will the addition of video ruin Instagram? — No

Instagram adding video is not an Instagram decision. It isn’t about expanding features within the app answering a feature request from its 100 million users. It’s simply about Facebook’s continued battle with Twitter as the dominant social network.

Instagram-Is-Not-VineThey battled over acquiring Instagram, Twitter lost. Twitter births Vine as a response (6 seconds long video service, no filters) so Facebook’s natural response is to add video to Instagram (3 to 15 seconds long video with filters). This just a week after Facebook added hashtags, a Twitter staple, to their network. Don’t even get me started on URL shorteners, Google+ and “firehoses.” Continue reading

Quickly – Facebook Quietly Updates Events RSVP Options

Facebook-Like-IconWhen Facebook first rolled out their “Events” section ages ago it gave invited guests three options with which to RSVP.

  1. Going
  2. Maybe
  3. Not Going

Seemed like enough. But people who RSVP “Maybe” to events kind of suck at life. I can’t maybe make more food on the fly. I can’t maybe have enough alcohol. I can’t maybe have enough room for everyone. These are things that I have to have. Ryan and I host parties from time to time and often get as much as 50% of our RSVPs as “Maybe” and it drives me crazy.

Facebook seemed to understand this and for a period of time you could remove the “Maybe” option. People were either there at your party or not there. No longer were there these Schrödinger’s cat guests! (I love making physics jokes…)

Sadly this option was taken away but today I noticed a new option in place of the “Maybe”. Now invitees can select “Interested”.

Facebook Events Interested

This doesn’t bring back the ability to disable all those indecisive people from not committing to your event. However, the wording change might prevent people from abusing the selection like they abuse “Maybe”.

If someone is interested in coming over they should understand that it doesn’t mean they have said they are or aren’t going. It’s a non-commital option that should tell everyone involved that at this point, you’re not going but the event interests you.

Do you think this will make a difference? I sure hope so. Also, properly RSVP to events people. It’s the civilized thing to do. Just ask Violet Crawley, Dowager Countess of Grantham.

I’ve got KIXEYE in my crosshairs

Very few people who read this blog, and even most of my friends, have no idea what it is that I actually do for a living. I kind of like this, it makes me artificially mysterious. The fact that I flew around 150,000 miles last year only increases the rumors that I’m a covert agent, rumors I may have spread myself. Here’s what most people think I do:

  • Photographer – because I studied it in college, have had gallery shows and some know that I shot for the New York Times as well as a few national magazines.
  • Videographer – because I have reviewed video equipment, regularly yell at Final Cut and its render times on Twitter and because videography is big in my family.
  • Marketing – because I did work for a marketing agency back in Missouri and I’ve been known to kvetch about horrible marketing campaigns I see online.
  • Public Relations – because it is known that I represent a few non-profits and it’s what just about everyone in my family does or has done at some point in their lives.
  • Internet Celebrity – because, well I’m still trying to figure this one out.
  • Technology/Gadget blogger – because of this site, though I hardly make a living off of it. It pays for itself, like a hobby that breaks even. I’d love to make it more profitable but that hasn’t happened for me, yet.

In reality, it’s a little bit of all of the above. I do marketing and public relations for food commodity boards, resort communities, restaurants and chefs. In the past I’ve also done this sort of work for political campaigns, pharmaceutical companies and the military, among others.

But now that I’m in San Francisco, I’m looking at other options, especially options that put me in the heart of the technology sector. It’s always been a dream of mine to work for one of these companies. As a kid I wanted to work along side Steve Jobs or Bill Gates. These days it’s the small, scrappy startups and the cutting edge companies that catch my eye. KIXEYE is the latest to enrapture me.

Continue reading

Twitter Still Down

I remember when Twitter being down was a regular thing. Then for nearly two years we got used to Twitter being pretty rock solid. I’m not sure what is going on these days over at Twitter HQ but we are once again without their service. Social site Twitter is down

At least they’ve given us a good reason for being down. “<=%reason %>. In all honesty, at least they have a homepage again. Earlier today you got nothing when going to www.twitter.com. So this is a step in the right direction from what appears on the surface to be a DDoS attack.

Beyond the fact that people aren’t able to update us on the every nuance of their lives, Twitter being down can cause even more severe problems across the web. Continue reading

We’re having a Seattle Tweetup!

I arrived from Texas and Orlando into San Francisco around midnight last night. Eight and a half hours later I was back at the airport but this time headed to Seattle. And this time for the sole purpose of having a great time going on adventures in the Emerald City.

Klout #2daysinseattle

The great people from the Seattle Department of Tourism and Klout have provided Ryan and I, along with Aaron and his friend, a free, all-expense trip to Seattle to explore the city and share our experiences with everyone we know. It’s called Two Days in Seattle. Ryan and I have already arrived at the Silver Cloud Hotel and Aaron is on his way!

Tomorrow night we’re hoping to get a group of people together for a meetup. Aaron’s got the details on his blog post here, but I’ll paste them below as well. Hope to see you all there!

Saturday, July 21st 7:30pm
Grim’s, Butterfly Lounge & The Woods
1512 11th Avenue, Seattle, CA 98122

We’ll also be doing dinner ahead of the meetup. If you want to join, just shoot me or Aaron a tweet and we’ll let you know where and when! Can’t wait to meet and explore your city.

You’re welcome to RSVP to the Facebook event. Follow the hashtag #2DaysinSeattle and the @2DaysinSeattle account to keep up with what we’re doing up here. Also you can follow Aaron (what you aren’t already?!) on Twitter.

Real danger of a new media addiction

Last Saturday I went to brunch with Jimmy to Dottie’s True Blue Cafe. Brunch in San Francisco is a different animal than brunch most anywhere else. Actually, dining in San Francisco is unlike anything I’ve experienced most other places. That is to say, we are totally comfortable waiting an hour to get a table at a restaurant. Should the place have enough Yelp reviews, or bottomless mimosas, we’ll happily wait a few hours!

Dottie's True Blue CafeWe hit up Dottie’s True Blue Cafe, which only had a 45 minute wait, and made ourselves comfortable in line by updating Facebook, Twitter and Foursquare to share that we were trying a new brunch place, and that even at 9:15 AM there was a wait.  Continue reading