(After writing this, I was inspired to create the image below)

It’s been a long, long time fellow thinker. For those keeping score, since the last post- this blog has been neglected, hacked, infected with malware, cleaned up (thanks Nick!), redesigned, and relaunched. Now, not everything made it through. Inexplicably close to 20% of posts, and over 90% of the comments are just simply gone. I failed to back-up anything (and despite my best efforts) will probably fail to do so again. But enough about the past. As soon as this blog post is up the focus will be primarily on the present and future.

It’s time once again to share thought provoking questions, topics, and ideas.

So stick around, stay tuned, and speak up!

I’m thankful for all of you.

J

In part 1 we discuss on of his latest projects, HelloThere, and how it helped him (and countless others) achieve success.

Part 2 takes more of a behind the scenes look at ‘HelloThere’. We discuss what’s on the way with version 2.0, How he created the product, and the importance of finding the right team.

Enjoy!

When I have a new idea, one of two things happen.  Most commonly ( 99.99% of the time) it get shot down in the early stages, or later on, by the obvious pitfalls that I could not see from my ‘head-in-the-clouds-hyper-optimistic’ point of view (thanks to my friends and wife who keep me at least partially grounded).

But every once in a while something magical happens.

The last idea like this entered my head July of 2008, and I danced with it until January of last year. Though the project ultimately failed it was the complete consumption, sun up to sun down, all consuming, nature of it that was unparalleled.  There is something about learning, knowing, understanding every nook, every angle, every facet of an idea that I crave.

Having said all that, I’m happy to say the next idea has taken hold. It is a project very near and dear to my heart. Things are lining up, and I am surrounded by support unparalleled in past endeavors, and though I am not (quite) at liberty to discuss the project in detail I can say this-

The image you see below was created by me, it has everything to do with my upcoming announcment. I am an artist, please god forgive me.

At SXSW, Gary said something to the notion of “The worst thing that ever happened to ‘Social’ was adding the word ‘media’ to it” and I agree. Those using “social” for the focus of ‘campaigns’ as opposed to taking a longer term strategy are playing the wrong game. Social is the tool, the mentality, the LONG TERM strategy. Truly buying into social, committing to that kind of transparency, and setting it into a different category than the one you use to record click through rates, open rates, and conversion rates is not an easy task.

It is not about friends, or likes, or views. It is about truly caring and too few companies (and people for that matter) do.  I meet business owners and social media “gurus” alike almost daily who fail to recognize this.  The “yeah, yeah, that is nice, but….” mentality will not last.

Stop, look at what you are posting, creating, and sharing. Ask yourself “Why am I really doing this?” Do you really care?

If not, that’s fine. Just accept that this is a game you will not be playing for very much longer.

I sit down with  Gary Vaynerchuk, founder of VaynerMedia, WineLibrary TV, and Daily Grape for a quick chat about his new book, The Thank You Economy (Which just landed the #2 spot on the New York Times Best Seller List!)

A Panel’s take on sharing-

Average home has $3,000 worth of things sitting around unused.

People do not need to purchase the object, but the use of an object.

Libraries are struggling with accountability.  Panelist suggests they take it beyond books. The library could serve as the existing hub for sharing.

Tony Schwartz on 90 Minutes-

For the first time in human history demand is beginning to exceed our capacity.

Until recently we have relied on an external resource (time) to get things done.

If you want to run a refrigerator, car, etc. you just need one source.  Humans NEED 4.

Because energy is inside us we have undervalued the clutivation of this energy.

Quantity, quality, focus, purpose.

1. Physical Energy – Nutrition, Sleep, Fitness, Rest

2. Emotional Energy- The quality of your energy. How you feel is how you perform. (How do you feel when you are performing at your best?)

3. Mental Energy- Best way to get things done is to do one thing at a time, at an absorbed period of time.  Never has it been so difficult to do this.

4. Purposeful Energy – The Human Spirit. This is passion.

*NOTE: MUCH MORE ON THIS IN THE COMING WEEKS.

Seth Priebatsch on Gaming-

Facebook owns the “Social Layer”. The last decade was the “Social Decade”

This decade is the “Game Decade”

School is a poorly designed game, students are not engaged.

The mechanic of cheating is a misapplied dissincentive.  We don’t punish cheating, we punish getting caught.

There is almost no cheating at Princeton.  When you take a test there is no one in the room to provide oversight.

Use an honor code. Students must report each other. –> Went from 400 cheating occurrences per year to 2.

Location Based Services have had huge partners and money poured into them, but small results.

Government uses “Quantative Easing” to “loosen the rules” when the “Game has become too hard”, could LBS loosen the “location based” rules?

Main Idea is to create engagement WITH places… not at them.

Are ‘rewards’ hurting or helping LBS?

On a lighter note…

I had the pleasure of catching a quick bite with Jason Sadler from ‘I Wear Your Shirt‘, rode a solar powered carousel, and played a truly epic social game (more details on THAT soon).

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That’s all for now. Again, if you want to follow along live, I am tweeting here. Otherwise, stay tuned for SXSWi Recap: Day 3 & 4 (as well as an extensive look into a few of the ideas briefly discussed here in the coming weeks.

Tim O’Reilly- On Brands

Great brands have a core.  They mean something. Big ideas pull a train. It has to be inclusive.  It has to be about more than just you and your company.

Brands need to MAKE heroes of new people.  Create an identity that people can say “yeah, I’m a _______, I’m proud!”

Matt Mullenweg- On WordPress

12% of the web is ‘powered by wordpress’. Blogging is not dead. What is changing is that there are different mechanisms for publishing.

Tumblr is a fantastic product for photos. It is replacing untold flickr use. Tumblr pulls 90 pages per unique. WordPress gets 12.

Code is the new literacy benchmark.

Clay Shirky- On Social Tools

The end stage of a long process is what Western media sees. Disciplined non violence does not come from facebook. The “enough” movement started as a political blogging movement in 2004. The groups on this site did not all agree on the same thing, but the ONE THING THEY AGREED ON was to Get Mubarak out. (more about that here.)

On a lighter note…

I had the pleasure of finally meeting up Laura Kimball (@lamiki) for the first time and Mouyyad Abdulhadi (@MouyyadA) for the second time.  Together we became an incredible force of egg saving goodness. Pitted in fierce competition we emerged victorious. See this image as proof that with five sheets of paper and two feet of masking tape you can drop an egg over 20 feet without breaking it.

Stay tuned and as always…

THINK on.

As many of you know, today marks the start of SXSW 2011. From now until the Interactive portion wraps up  here on the 15th I will be sharing notes, updates, and photos from the event daily. This blog wil serve as a general repository for the top take aways from each days talks, events, and workshops.

For all in-between and post talk coverage I will be tweeting here.  Whether you are a long time reader of think here, or discovering it today for the first time, I would love to meet you.

Stay tuned, and as always, THINK on.