You’re a Comic Sans Criminal

comicsanscriminal Matt Dempsey is far kinder than I – wanting to educate and transform those who wantonly and willingly use Comic Sans in their presentations and other documents.

If it was up to me, you people would be the first to the wall when the typography revolution comes.

But in the spirit of the season, I’m willing to forgive and forget. Have a great holiday – even all you evil comic sans geniuses out there.

Via @trib.

Obama-me

Chaos
I remember when I first saw the Obama posters and thinking how great it would be to have one. Paul McEnany sent me in the right direction … but it was clear that these were going to be collectors pieces at some future date.

The folks at Paste Magazine have this neat little application that lets you create your own Shepard Fairey inspired Obama-style icon. And since the originals are hugely expensive, this may be the closest I get.

Make your own here.

Hat tip to Eaon Pritchard.

Sponsor Me This Movember

movember08-1 For the last two years, each November, I take part in an unusual ritual. It begins at the beginning of the month and it lasts right through to the last itchy moments before the year-end whirlwind of December hits. The participants in this ritual signal each other with a knowing smirk, a casual glance and scratch of the chin. That’s right, it is Movember — a time to build awareness of prostate cancer and raise money to fund research projects. After all, this is a disease that affects 1 in 6 men.

Last year, the Movember campaign – a month long commitment from men around the world to grow a moustache (while also seeking sponsorship) – raised around $21 million. Over 131,000 men around the world took to the “tash” … and this year we hope for even more. (I believe that the majority of this money was raised by the families of these men who promised to pay as soon as their faces were shaved clean.)

This year, I have joined a team of wannabe-beardies. In other words, we may take this “Mo” too far – to the fear and disgust of our families and friends. We ably led in this endeavour by Jye Smith. My other team mates include Matt Fitzsimmons, Scott Drummond, Tom Voirol and Tim Longhurst. And while it is early days and our confidence is high, Scott admitted a secret fear at coffee on Friday. He is concerned that his facial growth will be less than stellar. But there is a solution … the Build a Beard Workshop. You simply select the beard of your choice, Photoshop it onto a picture of your face, and voila! Not only do you get the beard of your choice, you also raise money for a Kiva project.

Remember this Movember, even the smallest amount of sponsorship will make a difference – and donations over $2 are tax deductible. By using this link, you will immediately be issued with a tax deductible receipt.

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Get Into Your Groove with the KaiserMix

Kaisermixbanner1
Have you ever wondered what social media is all about? Here, I will let you into a trade secret. It is just TWO things.

  • Being social — reaching out, activating, participating and exciting people
  • Doing things — creating content, sharing ideas, holding events

Now, you might think that this sounds easy. But you see, the challenge is, in a digital landscape and in a social world that crosses borders, timezones (and sometimes even boundaries of common decency – jokes), the crafting of a compelling offer and the telling of an enlivening story requires a broad array of skills and expertise. And you will find that the bloggers and social media participants who do this well have a breadth of expertise that normally resides in a TEAM of people.

Now, Marcus Brown is one such person. I profiled Marcus in my first Mining the Gold post, but that was a retrospective. Tomorrow night (Australia time), we all have the opportunity to actually PARTICIPATE in one of Marcus’ creations. It is called the KaiserMix and it will be a heady mix of music, streaming, photography and live bar action direct from Munich. It is easy to participate, as Marcus explains:

Twitter:
I’ve set up a twitter account (robbed myself of a former Character’s Twitter account) called TheKaiserMix
which you can of course follow. I’ll only be using this twitter account
on the evening and it’ll be tweeting my blips – and through that odd @
functionality the blips of everyone following me. If you’re on the road
and want a song played just send an @TheKaiserMix to me on twitter –
and I’ll play it.

Flickr:

I’ll be taking lots of photos during the evening which will be appearing in the slide show widget you can see above over on The Kaiser Mix
blog (the charming Gentleman in the slide show above is Snoop – and
along with Joseph runs The Schwarzer Hahn). If you’re there, like in
“The Hahn” on the night and you have a flickr account you can upload
photos and if you tag them thekaisermix (just that tag) they
automatically appear in the slide show. Likewise if you’re not going to
be in Munich but you’re listening or watching (see below) you can
upload your version/experience of The Kaiser Mix.

Blip:

For those of you who are not going to make it to Munich, there is of
course blip itself. If you follow me and use the @thekaiser function
you can send me songs you want played. If I play your blip it’s goes
into the kaiser’s playlist.

Yahoo Live:

OK, as some of you know I’ve been playing around with the video
streaming stuff – and think I’ve got it nailed. You can either watch
the event, live (starts around 21:00hrs C.E.T) on The Kaiser Mix channel (where you can chat with me during the evening – and if you’ve got a video camera stream on the channel as well) or on the The Kaiser Mix.
If you’re especially excited by all of this you can actually embed the
yahoo live widget on your blog.

Hope to see you in Munich … or a screen a bit closer to home!

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Kiss and the Cognitive Surplus

Sometimes "user generated content" astounds me — not only in its quantity but in its quality. In those instances, it is a pleasure to see Clay Shirky‘s "cognitive surplus" in action. Clearly, a great deal of effort, focus and skill has gone into this video clip. One viewing and you will be as amazed as I was.


Who Really Gets Social Media?

PlurkChat Sometimes you just have to ask a question and see where it takes you. Twitter started off with the same premise. What are you doing? Eliciting a variety of responses and prompting a banal moment-by-moment commentary before the community kicked-in and reshaped Twitter’s reason for being.

But while I have a great affinity with Twitter, it is feeling more and more like a broadcast medium every day. Sure there are some small-scale discussions occurring but they are hardly conversational. Plurk, on the other hand, have placed conversation right at the heart of their design.

This post is continued over at MarketingProfs Daily Fix. Hope you enjoy!