Micro Persuasion

Sirius Opens Its Doors to the Orbitcast Blogger

Sirius is serious about blogging. Today they gladly opened their doors to Ryan Saghir of the Orbitcast satellite radio blog, giving him an all access pass. Now that's smart PR!

Coffee with a Living Legend

Today I had coffee with Mike Kaltschnee of Hacking Netflix, Ryan Saghir of Orbitcast (a great satellite radio blog I never heard of) and living legend Dave Winer. Dave virtually invented blogging way back in the late 1990s and RSS in 1999. It was great to finally meet Dave in person. The three of us spent about 45 minutes chatting about PR, podcasting, RSS, blogging and more. You can listen to the full podcast here.

Location-Based Moblogging

A startup project called "Rabble" will streamline the process for publishing text or images from a cell phone to a blog, according to the Merc. It will create a way to search mobile blogs for items of interest - from homes for sale in a particular neighborhood to updated tour information for a favorite band.

Transparency at MSN Works

MediaPost reports that when MSN unveiled its new search engine, it put up a Web page, Inside MSN, which collects user comments on the product and posts them for all to see. Unfortunately for MSN, many of the comments are less than flattering.

I comment in the piece that I actually feel this is a good thing, provided that Microsoft listens and responds. What I am unclear on, however, is how this integrates with the feedback they are soliciting through their blog.

Newsgator Digs Into RSS Usage Patterns to Solve Info Overload

Bud Gibson says that Newsgator - a popular RSS aggregator - has hired a taxonomist to use its Newgator Online feed archive to create user profiles based on usage patterns. According to the post, this would help Newsgator better target consumers using a sort of collaborative filtering approach. Newsgator is also considering adding folksonomic features. I wonder if Newsgator will also use this data to try to court advertisers via behavioral targeting. (Via del.icio.us/tag/micropersuasion)

A Visual Look at "Inter-blog-dialogue"

My colleague, Meredith Topalanchik, today coined a new word that describes how word spreads - "inter-blog-dialogue." Now Tim Leberecht, MindJet's Corporate Communications Manager, has created a visual inter-blog-dialogue analysis showing how their new blog propagated throughout the blogosphere. MindJet makes an awesome mind-mapping product called MindManager that I highly recommend. We have started using MindManager at our agency for visually oriented group brainstorming. MindManager also has a nice set of RSS features.

Turnkey Podcasting for Radio Stations

New evidence that podcasting is gaining steam. First, CNN covered it. Next, Billboard Radio Monitor reports that Loyal Ears, a Michigan-based radio vendor that specializes in listener rewards programs, announced a new service that will enable stations to offer free or revenue-generating podcasts for their audience.

The Long Tail Will Rise If the Media Charge for Online Content

According to Reuters, a Dow Jones & Co. Inc. executive predicted yesterday that more U.S. publishers likely will try to wean readers off free Internet versions of their newspapers by starting to charge online subscription fees. If this happens, then you can be sure that more consumers will gravitate down the Long Tail of Content to blogs for free, unfiltered content. Newspapers who go down this arrogant path may not be able to return to prominence online ever again. New media brands will emerge in their wake as leaders. Just look at how MarketingVOX and AdRants are already eroding the walled gardens of AdAge.com and AdWeek.com

What the Heck Is This?

I smell a blog PR stunt in the making. (via David Parmet and del.icio.us/tag/micropersuasion)

del.icio.u$

Congrats to Joshua Schachter at del.icio.us. His folksonomic link-sharing project has secured VC funding.

Podcasting Now Mainstream

PC World: Simple Web audio broadcasting adopted by some media giants.

Yahoo! 360 Reviewed

Here's my mini review of Yahoo! 360. If you want an invite, email me. I have 99 of them left. Tristan Lewis offers a deeper look, including a thorough examination of Yahoo! 360's RSS copyright limitations.

UPDATE: Some readers have noted that you need a Yahoo ID to access my review. So here it is in full...

So begins my experiment using Yahoo! 360. While, I like what I see so far and I think 360 is very compelling as a personal blogging tool, it has some serious shortcomings that most veterans will not like. Also, I am wondering if I gave Yahoo! the idea for this project way back last June when I speculated how Google might merge Blogger and Orkut into a "trusted network" of bloggers. Hmmm...

Anyway, what I like about 360 is how how I can easily use it to share photos, moblog, connect with friends and family and find new friends. I also like how I can share my music, my reviews and more. It's a perfect tool for consumer expression. It's also relatively easy to use. However, some of the navigation is confusing.

As compelling as Yahoo! 360 is for newbies, it has virtually zero application as a professional/business blogging tool. It's far too simple. You can't easily turn features on or off and it lacks trackbacks and customization. I guess we can't expect it do everything that the big platforms do.

In short, Yahoo!'s first blogging effort builds on MSN Spaces thanks to its nice social networking features. However, to me it really feels more like Geocities on steroids rather than a true blogging platform I can recommend. The recent Friendster/TypePad tie-up seems more on the right track because that was a marriage of two best-of-breed platforms.

Yahoo! 360 Pluses:
* Yahoo makes it easy to find fellow birds of a feather and it ties blogging and social networking
* 360 is tightly integrated with other Yahoo services

Minuses:
* The integration of social networking and blogging is confusing. Some people may only want one, not the other, and this might lead them to gravitate to one-trick pony's like TypePad and/or LinkedIn
* Yahoo! 360 lacks trackbacks and customization features

Blogging Like a Druken Sailor

Captain Morgan - the cartoon character behind the rum - has started a blog. Hugh Macleod sums up why it's so lame. Follow the conversation here.

Trying Out Yahoo! 360

Today I received an invite to try out Yahoo! 360 - Yahoo's new blog/social networking platform. I will play in the sandbox tonight and post some thoughts. If you have specific questions, please leave a comment on this post.

Rosie the Riveting

Broadwayworld.com interviews Rosie O'Donnell on, among other topics, why she no longer permits readers to comment on her blog.

We the Pedia

David Weinberger points to a brand new new open-source encyclopedia for consumer products called Consumerpedia. Here's more info.

Isn't a Blog Just a Personal Web Site?

I get this question all the time. Finally, Rex Hammock explains the difference between a personal website and a weblog.

MSNBC Deploys Citizen Journalists in Quake's Wake

MSNBC.com has launched a special earthquake eyewitness weblog written by readers that bolsters its coverage of the massive quake that struck Indonesia today with on-the-ground reports. They also have an entire section of their site for citizen journalism.

Dispatches from the Front

Just in case you can't get to sleep and you left your copy of Beowulf at school, here are four lengthy articles that summarize my POV on citizen marketing, blogging and PR. iMedia Connection has transcribed a session I led on citizen marketing at their Brand Summit back in February (Part I, Part II, Part III) . Meanwhile, Neville Hobson has meticulously compiled the entire transcript of our recent podcast interview down to every er, um and ah.

General Blogger

MarketingVOX: "General James Cartwright, the man in charge of America's nuclear arms, has a blog, according to a defense industry publication that summarized reports and commentary from military blogs. And he wants his sprawling command to read it and react directly to him, regardless of the chain of command."