Falling in love at work

I just finishing watching Mandy Len Carton's Ted Talk on Falling in love. She was a small-time blogger who participated in a educational study about love, wrote a piece about how her and her significant other fell in love in the laboratory, and the article ended up making it into the New York Times.

You can read it here: To fall in love with anyone, do this.

Talk about clickbait! It's no surprise she admits the title of the article was the only part of the post she didn't write.

The Ted Talk isn't on Youtube yet so I can't embed it, but if you have 13 min to spare, check it out here: Falling in love is the easy part.

The reason this is so interesting to me is because I'm curious to know if these 36 questions would be applicable and even beneficial for startup teams to ask one another.

I was in a Fraternity and even then, you basically just do a bunch of "secret" stuff that helps you get to know each other on a more intimate level. (Shared experiences creating a bond of significant meaning)

As I go through the current job hunting process I find myself having conflicting feelings about how long the process can take. On one side of the coin it's just my ego getting wrapped up in the process, "why is it taking so long for me to find the right fit?" When I've only been back and actively seeking new gigs for a month. The other truth that I understand and agree with is that it would be foolish to hire and invest in someone without attempting to get to know the person as much as possible.

When we first started OnlyTheBeat.com, I would literally let anyone join the team as long as I felt they were as excited about it as I was. That turned out to be a huge mistake. And one of the biggest lessons I've learned over the last 3 and a half years hiring writers.

There has to be some sort of interview process that breaks down walls and allows you to get to know a person...you know, like, more personally. (We now have a 3 step process that includes providing a "Your Story" writing example)

But where do you draw the line?

At one of my recent employers where I got to interview candidates we had an interview question, "what is the hardest decision you've ever had to make?" And I was thrilled that I got it ask this in an interview one time...Only to have the other people in the room interviewing with me laugh nervously and add "he means the hardest decision in the work place of course!"

No I didn't.

I meant the hardest decision you've ever had to make. How did you make it. That's literally more important to me than anything else we might have asked. It tells you so much about a person and what they value, what they've lost, and how they've bounced back.

And I get it, some people want to keep work and their personal lives separate, but if you don't want to open up about your personal life, then what are we really doing here? The meaning that we derive from our relationships dictates the meaning in our lives, and if you're going to spend 1/3 of your day with someone, don't you want to get to know them on a deeper personal level before you spend all that time with them?

This is a real interview: Agency Wants Its Next Art Director to Be Cool, So the Interview Will Be Over Two Days in Vegas

Now that's what I'm talking about. Except I think 3 or 4 days in Vegas would REALLY allow you to see who that person is. You can survive Vegas for 48 hours and still be at 70-80% if you know you're being watched, but come hour 73 or 84, you better believe you're going to have some insight into who the other person is and how they handle stress. Lol.

I don't necessarily like the title of the article, I don't think it has to do with being cool. I think it has more to do with putting someone out into the wild and seeing how they react to precarious situations, which is, like, all day everyday in real life.

And again, there it is.

Real life. Real people.

Real recognize real.

It's the same reason Donald Trump is getting so much love, because he is way too real.

But people are responding to it because even if it is preposterous and ridiculous, at least it isn't clearly, obviously, and insanely fake. It doesn't sound good, but it doesn't sound like he's lying either.

(Uneducated, insensitive, and making things up, well, that's another story, he definitely makes a bunch of BS up).

It's just more like insanely too real. Which makes for great entertainment. (key word, entertainment).

So here are the 36 questions from the love experiment.

It's also worth noting that at the end, if you are doing this with someone in the pursuit of love, you're supposed to finish by staring into each others eyes for four minutes without speaking:

Set I

1. Given the choice of anyone in the world, whom would you want as a dinner guest?

2. Would you like to be famous? In what way?

3. Before making a telephone call, do you ever rehearse what you are going to say? Why?

4. What would constitute a “perfect” day for you?

5. When did you last sing to yourself? To someone else?

6. If you were able to live to the age of 90 and retain either the mind or body of a 30-year-old for the last 60 years of your life, which would you want?

7. Do you have a secret hunch about how you will die?

8. Name three things you and your partner appear to have in common.

9. For what in your life do you feel most grateful?

10. If you could change anything about the way you were raised, what would it be?

11. Take four minutes and tell your partner your life story in as much detail as possible.

12. If you could wake up tomorrow having gained any one quality or ability, what would it be?

Set II

13. If a crystal ball could tell you the truth about yourself, your life, the future or anything else, what would you want to know?

14. Is there something that you’ve dreamed of doing for a long time? Why haven’t you done it?

15. What is the greatest accomplishment of your life?

16. What do you value most in a friendship?

17. What is your most treasured memory?

18. What is your most terrible memory?

19. If you knew that in one year you would die suddenly, would you change anything about the way you are now living? Why?

20. What does friendship mean to you?

21. What roles do love and affection play in your life?

22. Alternate sharing something you consider a positive characteristic of your partner. Share a total of five items.

23. How close and warm is your family? Do you feel your childhood was happier than most other people’s?

24. How do you feel about your relationship with your mother?

Set III

25. Make three true “we” statements each. For instance, “We are both in this room feeling ... “

26. Complete this sentence: “I wish I had someone with whom I could share ... “

27. If you were going to become a close friend with your partner, please share what would be important for him or her to know.

28. Tell your partner what you like about them; be very honest this time, saying things that you might not say to someone you’ve just met.

29. Share with your partner an embarrassing moment in your life.

30. When did you last cry in front of another person? By yourself?

31. Tell your partner something that you like about them already.

32. What, if anything, is too serious to be joked about?

33. If you were to die this evening with no opportunity to communicate with anyone, what would you most regret not having told someone? Why haven’t you told them yet?

34. Your house, containing everything you own, catches fire. After saving your loved ones and pets, you have time to safely make a final dash to save any one item. What would it be? Why?

35. Of all the people in your family, whose death would you find most disturbing? Why?

36. Share a personal problem and ask your partner’s advice on how he or she might handle it. Also, ask your partner to reflect back to you how you seem to be feeling about the problem you have chosen.

OKAY PHEW.

Those were intense. But if we're working together at a startup...shouldn't we know a lot of these things about our coworkers?...Aren't these questions two startup founders have unintentionally asked one another during their conversations before deciding to start a company together? I sure hope so...Because starting a company together IS like getting married!

If you want to look at it from the opposite side of the table, I think I'd have a hard time investing in a startup where the founders didn't know what their co-founder felt was "too serious to be joked about" (question #32).

No where in this list of questions is anyone asked to reveal anything about their sex life or answer questions of a sexual nature...but the question remains...do you think they're too personal for the work place? Or would you adopt something like this for your own startup, pairing co-workers together one evening to sit down and have a heart to heart? Would you ask these questions in an interview?

Even if the person ended up not being a good fit for the team, or taking a job elsewhere, I have a hard time believing you wouldn't walk away with a new friend.

Crowdfire

Whether we like to admit it or not, social media followings continue to hold a lot clout (in every industry) because they give us a common benchmark with which to compare ourselves to our competitors.

Who you should compare yourself to, and in what capacity, is a completely different post all together...But if you're looking for some great personal development articles about how NOT to compare yourself to the wrong people, check out this recent post on The Art of Charm blog: Enjoying Success at Your Own Pace

Back to social.

There is something weird happening in the social media ecosystem. Generations are fractioning at ever-increasing rates and each new generation is differentiating and defining themselves by the social apps they're adopting and choosing to engage with. I've heard that Facebook is a 22-year-old and up platform, and from what I've experienced that seems to be a pretty legit generalization (caveat: I preach that we should never to make large sweeping generalizations). I was in High School when Facebook came out and was still exclusive to University students but because the school I went to gave us ".edu" email addresses we were able to create accounts and I'll be honest, that changed everything. I was pretty obsessed with Facebook all the way through college and it's been eye opening to meet younger kids that didn't even care about it.

The reason this is a big deal is because I've let my own passion for specific platforms affect my business decisions in the past.

I even let myself get talked OUT of using YouTube in exchange for Vimeo when I first started Only The Beat. Of course Vimeo had better video quality...but the discovery for your videos on the platform is zilch. Don't worry, not only have I learned from that mistake, I'm planning on making YouTube the center of our new strategy moving forward until we decide whether we're going to build out our own player or go for a turn key solution like Lessthan3.com is doing...but of course, the CEO of the video player they're using is also the CEO of Lessthan3...aka...he's just a really smart dude and realized that the video player he needed to create for his site could also be a turn-key product and completely separate viable business (since video is the future).

We make jokes like ROI (RADIO ON INTERNET) on TV shows like Silicon Valley...but it IS interesting that it really took so long for us to come full circle and bring video to the internet and make it front and center. We're talking about video on Facebook like it's some new insane thing when the first TV was invented in 1927, but I guess that's a testament to the complexity of serving millions of hours of video a day to billions of people all over the world.

I'm determined not to let this happen again. Instagram is another platform that I've shied away from personally, I've never been big on posting pictures (leaving evidence!), but there's no denying the power it has over Millennial's.

I'm going to make Instagram a focus of my work over the next few weeks, learn the in's and out's, figure out how to generate successful creative, and really learn to harness it as a marketing tool. The first step? Crowdfire. My friend has used it to gain over 7k followers on his company's Instagram in a month. All real, engaged followers. That was enough to convince me to spend the $20 a month to have 2 team members and manage 5 accounts.

Sitting at 1,796 followers as of 9/11/2015

I thought I'd give it a go and let you guys know how it works out. After just a few days of dinking around we've added ~100 followers with minimal effort. So I'm looking forward to seeing how this pans out. Don't drink the coolaid just yet, I'll keep you guys posted.

He's also advised me to use iconosquare.com for Instagram analytics and comment management, which I will also be doing and reporting back on. The yearly subscription only runs you $28.80. I'm excited to get started.

Better Than a Pitch

I get pitched a lot.

20-30 promos a day. Track submissions, contact form submissions, messages from publicists to my personal Facebook inbox, and the worst, in public places.

There are a ton of good articles out there on the internet about "How to write a better pitch email." If you want advice about how to write a better pitch email, great, Google "How to write a better pitch email" and read everything you can.

(Want a quicker path to success? Simply be genuine and use empathy to determine what matters most to the person to you're emailing, steer the conversation in that direction, find out what motivates them.)

Here's an even better idea...before you go out and read 100 articles about how to craft a better pitch email, determine which writer you are going to reach out to.

That's right, not which publication or blog, but the specific writer.

If you send me an email pitching me a new song, my typical response is something along the lines of:

Hey XYZ, 

Thanks for sending over the new track...But honestly, I'm not the best person to reach out to, you'd be better off befriending a writer on the team that posts about a similar genre as the track you want reviewed. Or, go find a writer who has already covered your artist and hit them up :)  

Good luck! 

Yes I am the CEO of Onlythebeat.com and yes I am ultimately the gatekeeper on content...but I need you to pitch writers that have covered the same topics before, the same artists. I need you to make the connection for yourself. Especially if you're a publicist working with a specific artist...If you haven't searched the site to see if we've covered your artist before, then you're just making life harder on yourself by cold-pitching me instead of contacting someone who's already clearly passionate about your artist.

Here's another way to think about it....If you didn't know President Obama, you wouldn't email President Obama to get the email address of his Chief of Staff.

You will be 100 times more successful reaching out to one of my House Music writers than pitching me a single House Music track because I don't have time to do the track write up. If you wanted to catch my eye then reach out to me about doing exclusive video content with your artist (or yourself) when you're in Seattle. I like the sound of that. Until then, really try to think about who in the organization would benefit the most from doing the thing that you're asking for, contact them.

And always follow up until you get a no.

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Are you marketing like it's 2015?

Content is king. 

Let's refine that statement: Amazing content with even better context is king. 

Should we refine it even more? Or is it time for marketers to stop talking about how "content is king" move the conversation forward in a more mature direction? 

I feel like the saying "content is king" has been around since the TV was invented. Duh. Hellllllo. We know content is king. 

Maybe what we should really be saying is: Having a well defined, thoughtful, and daftly executed content strategy is king. 

And content strategy isn't just "what blog posts should we write this month?"

Don't get me wrong, that is a very real part of content strategy. When it's done right it can have a massive effect for a brand of any size. But it's just one small part of the game. The content strategy role is a role that is no longer ignorable within marketing departments at any organization. Content strategy is applicable to every piece of creative that a brand produces. 

Most people don't have an intricate knowledge of the organizational structure of an ad agency, so the role of "content strategist" might sound foreign, but I view it as a hybrid of the account planning and copywriter positions. A role that lives in both worlds, strategic planning and creative. A role that requires a deep understanding of what makes the consumer tick as well as a deep understanding of the tools and resources available to execute on a given strategy. 

That means constant psychology/consumer research and a healthy does of Techcrunch and product hunt.  

The point is it's 2015. There are smarter ways for brands to be spending their money. New technology and innovation has opened new doors to help you reach THE RIGHT consumers more effectively and with more efficiency. 

Now ask yourself, is that what you're doing? 

If you want to see what the most innovative digital brands are doing, check out theAmplify. 

When Will Marketers Talk About Attention, Not Impressions?

I came across a blog post from Gary Vaynerchuk this week that I've been waiting to share with you. His blog post covers a topic that he actually discusses quite frequently, the idea of attention rather than impressions.

The advertising/marketing community, or anyone that really knows what they're doing, for example a small business owner who manages their own PPC ads, knows that the system is flawed. They know that 10%, 20%, even up to 50% of their digital marketing budget is going to circle the toilet bowl; wasted due to improper reporting, fraud, and a variety of other flaws in the marketing/advertising ecosystem that we're too quick to sweep under the rug. Or as Gary says:

"The entire marketing world is obsessed with impressions. You might hear someone say "40,000 people saw this video." But the truth is, they didn't. They didn't because as soon as the ad came up in video form, they clicked away to a new tab to look at something they actually wanted to see. But they count as an impression. They count as "seeing it."

And he's right.

We're too quick to accept impressions as a industry wide metric because it allows us to keep reporting these massive numbers to our clients who in turn continue to pay us.

But we should be smarter than that. And people like Gary are smarter than that.

If you're video got viewed 1 million times, but no one watched more than 10% of it, you probably missed the mark with the creative.

We need to measure attention because the simple fact is attention (read as: time focused) has become our most precious commodity.

1) The way we spend our time 2) Who we spend it with...those are the two most important things that will determine the outcome of our lives.

And it's not like it's rocket science to get the attention data, it's sitting there for you in google your Google Analytics.

But before we get any deeper, the purpose of this particular post is to share Gary's article with you as well as my response, a comment on his site that I've taken a screen shot of and shared below.

Read: When Will Marketers Talk About Attention, Not Impressions?

My comment:

The reality is: The reason YouTube is such a success is because the content lives and dies by the sword of attention. People either watch your videos or they don't. If advertisers and marketers would approach their creative with the same intensity (mindset), they'd be more apt to produce higher quality work. Ultimately saving clients money in the long run while building a stronger brand (advertisements....shouldn't look like ads anymore). We see this happening already on the creative side with brands like Red Bull that just seem to get it. I mean, come on, they literally just show us dope clips from extreme sports athletes to sell us an energy drink that even THEY admit tastes horrible unless chilled to the perfect temperature. And we also see brands like Taco Bell extorting every last oz out of social media attention hotspots to further their cause. Taco Bell is disgusting. But I still like/respect the brand. I have no idea why. A little reminder that we don't think rationally 100% of the time. And that the correct use of media truly can sway the public.

Finally, if you're an entrepreneur or aspiring entrepreneur and you haven't seen this video....thank me later. Stop what you're doing or set aside 45 minutes this weekend for a life changing (SUPER REAL) one-way conversation with Gary Vaynerchuk.

Gary Vaynerchuk | USC Entrepreneur Talk | 2015

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Twitter, Isis, and the unintended consequences of changing the world

What do you do when the most important work you've ever done is hijacked from you and used for evil?

Imagine toiling for years, Chinese food, dim lights, late nights, and painstaking decisions about whether or not to pivot. Imagine pouring everything you have into a project that you fundamentally believe is going to change the world, only to have its ethos ripped away and twisted by the users into a dark and powerful tool of hate.

An article from the associated press ran in today's Seattle Times detailing the destruction of ancient history in Syria by the Islamic state. They're saying it's the "most brutal, systematic destruction of ancient sites since World War II." Not only are they destroying some of the world's oldest and most historic mosques, churches, and archaeological sites, the Islamic military state is beheading people who dedicated their lives to preserving our shared history. Isis is a hot button topic. I don't think I need to go any further into detail to get your blood boiling. It bothers me deeply that human are stilling killing one another over religious differences, and I have no idea how this is going to play out on a global scale.

Now imagine that you are one of the founders of Twitter. You've created a product that I love. A product that I use daily. A product that's been used to overthrow governments, lead revolutions, and champion justice. You've also created a product that terrorists use to post pictures of Nutella chocolate in attempt to recruit new members. Apparently having a fondness for Nutella is an axiom of humanity, we simply cannot refuse the delicious combination of hazelnuts and chocolate.

And it bothers me. It really bothers me that I'm using the same app as a terrorist. I know that's irrational. I use the app for news while they use it to spread hate...but it still bothers me. I also want to acknowledge It's unfair of me to pick on Twitter, almost any social networking app can and is (most likely) being used by 'terrorists.'

Where do we draw the line when it comes to free speech on the internet? Especially when the 1st Amendment sets the precedent for protecting the rights of the people who created the company and product but not those who are using the product to galvanize a segment of the global population that is willing to kill themselves to see our Constitution burned and our Country in ruins? Dramatic, I know. Our laws of the land aren't simple, and they're even harder to enforce on the internet. For an internal example all we have to do is take a glance at Reddit and ask ourselves: "How much hate are we going to allow ourselves to perpetuate when when know it's having a detrimental effect on our society?" This leads into a much longer conversation about who gets to make that call, why they get to, and how it will be done. And it's conversation I'm confident will continue to play out as long as humans and the internet co-exist.

Twitter has done an amazing job responding to this situation. Cracking down on accounts associated with Isis and continuing to cull thousands more. But the facts stand that The Islamic State "has been astonishingly successful at spreading its message using 21st-century social media," moving to new social platforms like Diaspora according to ROYT.org.

Terrorism is an extreme case. And I'll admit that I've used it to grab your attention.

Getting back to business 

Being able to foresee unintended consequences is one of the big differences between bourgeoning and veteran entrepreneurs. Luckily it is a process that can be learned through meticulous practice and repetition. Your brain is a muscle and one that needs to be flexed. Especially in the arena of business.

Forcing yourself to sit down and think about the potential unintended consequences of your product will help you discover holes in your business plan as well as ideas for product improvement and new streams of revenue. The challenging part is that we live in a global economy, but we don't always feel the forces of the global economy until it's too late and disaster has already struck. Entrepreneurs will need to become increasingly educated, up-to-date, and empathetic in order to use their imagination to fill in the gaps about any potential repercussions of their business decisions. And keeping your finger on the pulse of the world, that's really hard. Capitalism doesn't care about empathy, but todays consumers do. And we're seeing it reflected in the market all the time. Consumers are voting with their dollars, choosing to support brands that support their employees, healthy lifestyles, and different humanitarian causes around the world. For the first time in a long time, it feels like empathy has become a part of the equation again. This makes it even more important to operate your business with integrity and stick to your values. Every decision you make will be scrutinized, and remember, it's always the interim.

I'm the first one to admit that keeping up with the world's business can be overwhelming. I feel like I have so much to learn and I wish I learned it all yesterday. Unfortunately that's just not possible, and accepting that reality has brought me peace of mind.

We have to have focus in life in order to be successful. Or as John Lee Dumas of Entrepreneur on fire says, "F.O.C.U.S: Follow one course until success." You shouldn't spend two hours a day reading about the fish markets in Japan if you aren't in the fish business. But you can choose to set aside 10 minutes each day to study something new and give it 100% of your focus. One thing at a time, one day at a time.

Magical things will start to happen for you when you start approaching your life with this mindset: "Have I given the task at hand 100% of my focus? And if I have, has it moved me one step closer to accomplishing my goal?" Even if you only spend 10 minutes a day on a task, it's an extremely empowering feeling to be able to answer "Yes" to both of those questions.

We're always trying to bite off more than we can chew. We live in a society that condones instant gratification and we forget that so many of our most revolutionary discoveries came from painstakingly boring, routine tasks that took deadly intense focus (for example, Pickering’s Harem, a group of women who worked at the Harvard Observatory combing through hundreds of thousands of photos of stars in order to produce data that lead to the empirical foundation of astronomical theory). The good news? None of us are tasked with solving the mysteries of the universe (I just like to think about them in my free time).

My advice for entrepreneurs is to adopt the compound effect. Do little things each day that add up over time to give you a slight advantage. Do 100 pushups a day. Set aside 5 minutes to mediate. And in regards to keeping your find on the pulse of the global economy? Listen to APM's Marketplace podcast everyday. It's a small, easy win that will have a huge impact on the way you think about business and the global economy. Not to mention, it will make you a more interesting person.

I really want to stress that I'm not saying entrepreneurs should spend an in-proportionate amount of time thinking about unintended consequences of every business decision they make. It would be preposterous to suggest that you spend your days fretting over the ways that your product could be used for evil. But taking some calculated time at the beginning of a new project to suss out the potential pitfalls and unintended consequences of a new venture? Now that sounds like a seasoned professional to me.

So how can you learn to foresee the unintended consequences of your product or business decisions? Well, If you want to create a new product or service that disrupts the market, you're going to need to be able to think like a hacker. Here are some questions you might want to consider:

• Who did I build this product for and why? 
• Who else will see value in what I've created?
• Does this product help people see the commonalities in one another? Or the differences?  
• Who will spot an opportunity for manipulation? And if I do see an opportunity: How can I block it? Can I add a feature that will enhance security? Can I get people to pay for this added feature? 
• How can my product can be manipulated? 
• Am I accounting for advances in technology? 
• Is my security as good as it needs to be? 
• Is identity verification going to be central to the success of the product? 
• Does my business model depend on the success and/or failure of other businesses? And if so, who and what does their business model depend on. 
• What kind of influence could climate change have on my business? War? 
• Am I building this product for one specific group of people? Or a global community?
• What are my values, and where will I draw the line with censorship? 
• Do I have the time and money necessary to fight back against the inevitable misuse of my product? 

The good news? This will become easier over time as you continue to repeat the process and ask yourself the hard questions. It is the process of asking those hard questions that will open your mind to new ways of thinking, new information, and ultimately, make you a better entrepreneur.

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A personal message from a CEO to his team

I've always wished that I had a crystal ball that would allow me to see into the minds of other CEO's. How do they make decisions? How do they approach and communicate with their teams? I've always found that one of the most difficult decisions one makes as a manager is "how much do I tell my team?" How do all of the people I look up to make decisions about who in their companies are on a "need to know" basis? And what level of clearance do they have? Is there a secret tipping point at which you realize as a member of upper management that someone knows "too much," or "just enough," that it's time to clue them in on the companies grander plans? 

This has happened to me in startup situations and in mid-sized digital agency settings. Do you tell everyone on the team about a potential deal that might go through? Or do you keep it close to your chest, in fear that a botched deal could lead to a downturn in morale?

Steli Efti, who I will be writing about later this weekend, has a great quote: "Startups run on morale." And I believe his statement to be true. I believe that positive morale is a bi-product of strong leadership, based in action and adherence to values. The questions I've posed above are not easy to answer because like so many frustrating things in life, the answers are always going to be situational. The relationship you have with your employees or your manager is just that....a real relationship. One of the best managers I've ever had (and one of the most amazing people I've ever met) beat this lesson into me. She knew that if I didn't have a sense of what the companies overarching strategy was I would easily become distracted and disengaged so she would go the extra mile and set time aside for us to talk about the abstract. I wanted to know what the CEO's were doing, and why. I feel like asking "why?" is a very fair thing of employees to ask their employers. Especially because I don't want to follow someone who hasn't asked that question of themselves first.

Most of my management experience has come in the form of trial and error. Learning to manage and communicate with people in businesses that I've started on my own without much direction. And boy, have I learned A LOT. There's nothing quite like feeling the rush of adrenaline you get when you know you've screwed something up with your own business. Said the wrong thing. Lost a deal because of your own hubris. It has a way of teaching you tough lessons in a very short amount of time (shame is one of the most powerful human emotions). I encourage anyone who's never owned their own business to go out and start one. I'm looking forward to putting together a post about some of the biggest business lessons I've learned from my own entrepreneurial ventures. I'm positive that at the very least you'll get a kick of my failures, because they haven't been pretty.

I sent out a message today on Slack to the entire OTB team about future direction of Only The Beat. It's extremely personal, but I'm hoping that giving you a window into my world can provide you with some new perspective about how you approach your business relationships in the future. I want you to see what this type of communication looks like. I want you to see how much I care about each and every one of the passionate people who've chosen to become a part of my world, our world. I want to hold myself accountable by putting this into the world where others have the opportunity to tear me apart and question my ability to follow through. I want you to provide me with feedback about my style and methods of communication with my team. I want to get better. I want us all to get better. And I'm hoping that the message blow is helpful for you in any way that you need it to be:

@channel: Hi Team, I couple announcements to make. I wanted to let everyone know that John Jensen, co-founder and CTO of OTB has stepped away from the business to pursue his own ventures with a new company here in Seattle. For any of you who are into vaping, check out his new line of e-vapor liquids at artisanclouds.com. I wanted to thank him for all of blood, sweat, and tears he's put into this blog over the last three years, and believe me, there have been all three. It's been a pleasure getting to watch him grow personally and professional and I'm confident that he will accomplish great things in both business and in life. I would encourage each of your to reach out to him and build your own relationship with him as he's an extremely valuable guy to know. I learn something new from him every time we talk, and that type of knowledge is something I truly value and look for in a friend. Feel free to hit me up via personal message to get his personal email (or add him as a friend on Facebook). 

This being said, I now retain full ownership of the business, but that might not be for long, I know that I can't get OTB to that NEXT level with out the help and support of others, you included. I've gone ahead and taken the steps necessary to move OTB in a new positive direction that I believe is in line with the demands of the EDM market, so I'm asking you to be open to change while we enter a period of transition over the next 2 months. 

The first step was finding someone new to help me on the technology side, I've done that with @imjustinbraun. Beginning Monday, Justin will begin leading a team of freelance developers that we've hired to build out a new platform for OTB.  This is something that I've been wanting to do for the last 8 months, and I just wanted to give you my sincerest apology for not making better decisions that could have allowed this to move forward more quickly. But as you know, life is all about timing. In the last 8 months I started a new job, left that job, went through a break up, and moved home to Seattle after 4 years in Arizona to be closer to my 3-year-old son. I'm not bringing any of this up to make you feel sorry for me. I'm telling you because I'm embarrassed and ashamed that I let my personal life get in the way of the company's success. I'm also telling you because all of the things that have happened, all of the choices and decisions I've had to make, have reminded me about what's most important to me. What I need to focus on and how I need to get it done. It's given me new perspective and a new found sense of hope for Only The Beat. A sense of hope that I want to pass on to you. I want you to know that I'm more dedicated than ever to helping you accomplish your personal goals and the goals you have within the company. 

Again, I'm asking you to bear with me during this time of transition. Continue writing with confidence and fostering important relationships. Don't forget that YOU are the reason people keep coming back to the site everyday.  I'm extremely grateful for everyone's loyalty and dedication. I'll be the first to admit that it's been hard to be proud of the site lately. We haven't given users the experience they deserve. This note to you, and the work that will start Monday morning, is the first step of many in a new direction. I'm so thankful to have you along for the ride. Let's have some fun and share the music we love with the world. 

Sincerely, 

Daniel Taibleson 

I hope you found this post enlightening. Maybe you even like the way I do business. If that's true, then make sure you connect with me on Linkedin. I'm always looking for passionate people to share intellectually stimulating conversation with. Now go out there and leave the world a better place than you found it.

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Trollz

Google continues to enforce it's unspoken role as the omnipotent ruler of the internet and its content. (although there are a few Loki's out there). This time they have decided to act on their relationship with Youtube. For those of your out there who don't know, Google controls all things Youtube and Blogger,  and basically they have attempted to integrate Google+ into both of these platforms. Which honestly, has really rubbed me the wrong way. The only reason I even use a blogger account is because I made it before I knew how to use/create wordpress sites. This doesn't mean I hate Blogger, or Youtube, but I do strongly dislike Google+. For a rational reason? Not particularly, I even use Google+ for its hang outs when I want to get on a few on my OTB writers together to talk biz, but its just such a hassle to maintain a whole other social network when everyone is already on facebook and twitter.

Anyways, Google is continuing to force their will on users by "offering" people the choice to post youtube comments as their Google+ profile. I threw quotes around the word offer because I feel more like they are coercing people into this plot Google+ integration. I consider myself a I'm a pretty computer savvy guy and even I had to really stop and read all of the directions as to figure out how NOT to post as my Google+ account.

But! There are a few good things this could do for the internet. Mainly Trolling.

No not those troll's! The act of, well, being an internet dick in comment threads. As a poly sci minor in college, I'm not one to step on your first amendment rights, (if you want to hide behind an avatar and talk sh*t so be it) but I think there is something to be said about making the world a less hateful place, and I really detest the amount of poisonous content that surfaces in Youtube comments. I'm not necessarily apposed to the idea of people have to be responsible for the actions...since that's the way things work in the real world.

The reason this is a problem at all is because the solution would be to allow people to post comments through any one of their social media outlets, but because Google owns youtube, that's never going to happen. It's like this weird on-going social media/search battle that I see ending in three ways.

1) Facebook creates its own search algorithm and buys Vimeo, which is way better than Youtube anyways. Realistically? Not a chance

2) Google+ becomes the #1 social media site online and facebook crumbles into nothingness, allowing Google complete World (Wide Web) domination. Realistically? I just don't see it happening. There will always be an incoming class of freshman at universities to supply a new batch of facebook users. facebook has rooted itself so deeply in our society that not even a Zuckerberg sex scandal could knock it off its pedestal now. And come on, Zuckerburg? a sex scandal? puh-lease.

3) Complete government take over of the internet by a world governing Hegemon. Most realistic for sure, but in like 1k years.

Until then, you have to be thankful for the internet's capitalist free market system full of competition (except China! eek!). We might not love everything about a product or service we use/signed up for, but at least we have options. At least the companies that own/run those products/services we are using have to continually improve and innovate to keep us involved/intrigued. As for me, I think I'll remain anonymous on Youtube for as long as possible (as anonymous as the user name DTaibleson will keep me).

Collapsing Towers

I love this video, and the message....

I'm a huge proponent of renewable energy and green technology/design. The quicker we move away from fossile fuels the better. I'm a bit idealistic when discussing this topic, but personally, I feel like the only reason we are still using oil, or nuclear power, whatever, is because someone is making money off of it. It's extremely frustrating to know that there are better, cleaner, safer ways to power our lives and instead people are fighting wars and dying over resources that we won't need or deem necessary/valuable in a few hundred years. Yes, I said a few hundred years, and it's mind boggling to me that people aren't able to think on a grander scale that surpasses their own lifetime. Why are we waiting? I guess I just expect more out of the human race. It's crazy that we have these huge issues, we have the answers, and yet we choose not to implement them. Yet I remain optimistic.  I'm thrilled to see all of the new energy ideas that are surfacing on the internet and that my peers are taking notice. With all of the advancements in technology and modern medicine that lead me to believe I'll live to ~ 130 years old, I can't wait to see what happens in the next 50 years. 

What Does Email Even Stand For?

Did you know that MIT developed the first email system in 1961?! I just looked up the word email on wikipedia and realized I had no real idea how email was developed. I instantly started to feel guilty! Almost all of our business communication (aka money) now revolves around email, and I've been taking it for granted. But what else have I been taking for granted...what have we been taking for granted...

Perhaps, we've forgotten why we're sending emails in the first place. I have a firm belief that as humans we are strongly instinctual animals. I have made it a point over the last year to listen to my gut, and it turns out, it's usually right. I went to a high school that had a laptop program, so I was using outlook at the age of 14, but nothing in that world would prepare me for the way that I've witnessed organizations and the people who work for them use email (or internal electronic mail systems).

You might think I'm being a little dramatic, but then again, there is no class on how often check your email. Am I supposed to check every email I get right when I get it? What is a proper timeline for response? Does a quicker more detailed response mean that I am doing a better job at my...job? Of course, each situation is different, there are priority settings on email, and the answers to those questions come with experience. But experience takes time, and time is money! Do you see where I'm going with this? I've witnessed colleagues and peers on the verge of insanity due to their overflowing inboxes. I've seen the negative energy that is created in the office from receiving too many emails from a vendor/rep, not enough from a client, or just plain tasteless shit talking from co-workers. But most of all, I've seen the crazy way that email leads to miscommunications. Which in business, results in a lack of trust, setting the two (or 100) parties involved into a state of negative competition instead of collaboration.

Seth Godin has created an email check list that you can read by clicking this link...but thought I would skip to the very last thing on his list and share it with you: If I had to pay 42 cent to send this email, would I? 

I can answer that question for about 50% of the emails you send. No. I remember being an intern and wondering why people were emailing each other when they worked 5 desks away? It just didn't seem like something my ancestors would do. And not to sound obvious but there is something inherently human about communicating that cannot be replaced by words on a screen. Body language, facial expressions, distinct tones in our voice, allow us to turn that interaction into a form of art. The results are always the same, we either succeed with the goal we set out to accomplish by communicating, or we fail, there is no middle ground, a "maybe" almost always becomes a "no". Yet, we constantly choose the least human form of communication that leaves so much room for wiggle. 

Do you like me? circle one...yes, no, maybe...would you date someone that circled "maybe"? Would you trust someone enough to do business with them if they circled "maybe"?

With that being said, I have two hopes and dreams (thoughts) for the future of communication in the office place. The first, and the most simple, is that we are strong enough and courageous enough to put our fears of failure/embarrassment in the past and talk face to face as much as possible. Imagine the impact that would have on your business relationships. Make the extra effort, and stop sending 5 emails to schedule a meeting. Of course location is also a factor in this business equation, so face to face communication is not always possible. So my second hope/thought is that in order to reduce the amount of the "message" that becomes lost in translation by email communication, we begin a paradigm shift towards video messaging, or video email messages, something we can already utilize on our mobile devices. I'm just wondering who will come out with it first....Apple or Microsoft? 

Make sure you check out Seth Godin's email check list that I linked above, it should give you some solid advice and a good chuckle or two.