Category: Random Thoughts
Ahh good old social media, how it dominates our lives these days. One of the questions I often find myself asking is how do you say no to someone who requests to connect to you with social media when you really have no reason to. This is not so much a problem for platforms like Twitter where everything you say is public, but more a problem for platforms like Facebook where I like to personally restrict my circle to family and close friends.
Anyone who knows me on Facebook will know that around once a year I do a Facebook “Culling” to trim the fat off the list. As a little amusement I post everyone letting them know it is coming then a “YAAY, if you are reading this you survived” before and after the cull. As a quick sidebar for some reason these are ALWAYS the posts that get the most discussion and laughs on my facebook… go figure. 
This time I did it however the one person who was the biggest reason for me doing the cull chimed in and said “oh I hope you won’t be getting rid of me”, LOL I had to be frank, “yea I will, sorry”. But this raises the point, should you straight up reject friend requests when they come in, or do you accept them, wait for a while and then silently remove them.
The people who you haven’t seen in years, who barely even knew you at school, or you are no longer friends with due to a falling out, how do you manage this unpleasant area of cutting the Facebook knot?
I am curious to hear other’s thoughts, leave a comment if you have a suggestion 
Stuart
With all the writing and posting we do, we bloggers often find spreading the word can be a significant challenge. When the stars align, our fingers strike the keyboard in juuuuust the right way and we manage to hit that awesome note and write a perfect post, the challenge of sharing that with the world can be the hardest tasks for a blogger.
Often we rely on friends, readers, and people who find our sites via search engines to help us spread the word if they find a post interesting or informative, helpful or hilarious. Most blogs you will see have like buttons (similar to those on the left) or at the bottom of the post to help make it easy for those that appreciate what we have written to spread the word.
The other thing that greatly drives a blogger is when people comment on his or her posts. Be it feedback, constructive criticism or even just someone letting us know that we put a smile on their face, that is what brings us back to keep writing time and time again.
So if you ever find a post that you are reading on any writers blog that particularly tickles your fancy don’t hesitate to let the blogger know with a comment, or like it with Facebook to help spread the word and share the post with your friends.
Stuart
(or if you are really bored I totally understand if you just want to poke, prod and tickle me in comments also… can’t blame you for that)
Created on 28 July 2012
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The key thing to remember in life is that sometimes you have to just take a leap of faith and ask. Remember that there is never any harm in asking and as the simple saying goes… If you don’t ask the answer WILL be no.
Often people say to me “How on EARTH did you arrange that… no seriously?”, or “How the heck do you manage to do things like that?”. Often as crazy as it sounds, my simple response is that I just asked, I figure when you’ve got nothing, you’ve got nothing to lose (so to speak). Take the case and point of last week. I saw that Samsung had a new vacuum cleaner on the market called the Navibot SR8980. Being the geek that I am I thought that the product looked awesome and I wanted to get my hands dirty with it and see just how well it perfomed. Luckily for me the PR contacts details were on the bottom of the article which made my life significantly easier.
I dropped Alexandria an email and mentioned that I had participated in a blogger product review program previously (by Canon Australia), and while it had been some time I would really like the opportunity to get my hands on a unit to do some real, in home domestic testing of the unit and to do a review of the Navibot on my technical blog.
A few days later I received a lovely email from Alexandria, while all the units are currently out for review, she kindly offered to send me one in two weeks time so that I could get my hands dirty. While not *everyone* would be able to do this, having a tech blog that I am posting on regularly again certainly helped my case, it does re-iterate the point of… you really do just have to ask.
So never be afraid to put your feelers out and simply ask the question, when you are polite, friendly and chirpy it really does work wonders for building rapport and working your way towards a YES!
Stuart
P.S. Keep an eye out on TechnicalNotebook in about a month’s time for the review of the Navibot SR8980.
Every day we see, hear, and consume advertisements in an ever increasing number of formats. I will be the first to recognise the irony of me writing this post on a blog that itself serves advertisements via Google Adsense. However, one thing I have come to realise, is that advertising is an unfortunate, necessary evil and one first has to acknowledge that lest they lose their minds.
With the advent of personal TV recorders and time shifting devices such as TiVo which have now been on Australian shores for a few years, control has begun to fall back to the consumer to be able to skip over these advertisements and help to manage at least a portion of what we are consuming. However, the waters are not always as clear as that, in the current season of Masterchef, for example, Channel 10 has started showing ’Masterchef Moments’ about half way through an adbreak. These are clearly designed to confuse the watcher who is fast forwarding through an ad break to think that the show was back on, when in fact, the ‘Moment’ was followed by a sponsor message and then more ads.
When you add these attempts to trick the user to the almost constant product placement throughout shows like Masterchef it becomes almost increasingly difficult (and nigh on impossible) for the average consumer to avoid being bombarded by all these messages. At times this can be overwhelming and stressful, not to mention confusing, especially when mixed messages are being received.
You will note that earlier on I said advertisements are a necessary evil as unfortunately it is something that we have to accept. In order to pay for content (in the context of radio and television) and to ensure the business gets sales and is profitable it is essential for businesses to use advertising and to disseminate their message. However I do feel that businesses need to manage more effectively, the fine line between getting their message across and overloading consumers to the point of pushing them away.
One perfect example of this comes from Neil (a.k.a. @en_gy on Twitter) in which he stated recently: “Dear @Coles. Just left the Waterloo store with a third of what I was going to buy after the #DownDown ad started playing twice in a row”. I too have had a similar experience when at the Coles Concord store in which I just wanted to leave the premises due to the sheer annoyance of the constant flooding of the #DownDown campaign. This bombards the customer within the store, whereby adding to the already large marketing campaign outside the stores via any and all forms of media that Coles seem to be able to get their hands on.
Some of you might say that Coles has themselves a winning mix here, as in fact here I am writing about the very campaign which annoys so many of us, but with Coles and as with Masterchef’s constant bombardment I can happily say that I am starting to vote with my feet. If companies are overloading the customer, like Neil and myself, people will start to vote with their feet, by either leaving the store, or simply changing the channel (as I have done more regularly during Masterchef when I have just been frustrated by blatant product placement).
I think it time companies took a page out of campaigns such as Qantas ‘I still call Australia home’ campaign. I remember reading some time back in an in-flight magasine that the reason we see this ad so infrequently, is to ensure that on the rare occasion we do see the ad it has that same effect that it had had the first time we saw it (and in some cases a more profound effect).
So what are you thoughts?
Do you find that the overload of advertisements from every possible media format is becoming too overwhelming? Furthermore are individual campaigns losing their effect by their sheer saturation of use and beginning to drive customers away? I would love if you could post your thoughts below, and if you are bored and could spare a minute to share on Twitter or Facebook that would be AWESOME!
Stuart
As strange as it sounds when she is smoking! I notice it so often these days, a stunningly gorgeous lady that suddenly pulls out a cigarette and instantly goes from hot, to not. What I cannot believe is in this day and age people know the medical issues that can result from smoking and yet they still do it?
I remember back in the days of high school, people offered me cigarettes on more occasions than I care to remember, luckily I had seen more than enough people that were trying to quit and therefore had the sense never to start in the first place. I do wonder however, why to this day people insist on smoking.
As far as I can tell, it is expensive, dirty, there are less and less places you can do it, and thankfully it is becoming less socially acceptable. I also know more and more people are finding it an extremely unattractive trait in a potential partner, due to both short and long term factors.
So I pose to you smokers out there:
- Why do you do it, what is the actual benefit in smoking a cigarette?
- Are you starting to feel like you are outcast because it is falling on the social acceptance ladder? and…
- Do you wish you had never started?
For those of you that don’t smoke, what are your thoughts:
- Have you ever been a smoker before? If so why did you quit?
- Do you hate smoking or does it not bother you?
#CuriousRandomThoughtOfTheDay
Stuart
Created on 14 July 2012
2 Comments
It doesn’t matter if you are laughing at me or with me, so long as you are laughing.
This is definitely something that I try to live each day by. If I can make one other person a day smile, that is something that puts a huge grin on my face, and lets me know that I have done some good in my day. This brings me to the theme of today’s post. I am known within my workplace for being fun loving and always there to put a smile on someones face. While work definitely requires a strong focus and direction there is also a time, place and benefit in being able to have a laugh and put a smile on others faces too (namely productivity and morale).
During a recent meeting with our new CIO who has just started out at our workplace, in which she suggested that our department will be recognising international talk like a pirate day, I noticed many eyes turned to me when this was said. My simple response was “Yep, you’ll see me there” and yes I will likely be in a rented costume. This is the way I like to live, I like to make other people smile as it makes them feel good and in turn I do as well.
When it comes to something crazy, something out there or something that other people would be ashamed to do, such as shaving only HALF of the hair off ones head, or getting your face on a big screen dating ad at the State of Origin, you can be sure that I will be there with bells on for a laugh.
Some people ask me why I do this, why I do things that other people would consider embarrassing or stupid. Most of all it is because I am unique and I like to be unique. If I wanted to be like every other person on the planet I could, but then I wouldn’t have had experiences such as meeting Merrick, Dools and Monty from Nova 969, I wouldn’t have walked around for three days looking like a punk (which erm, for the record won’t be happening again). I like that I am unique and I like that some people get a laugh out of it.
I know, and am well aware, that some people sometimes laugh AT me, and not in a humorous way. The biggest thing is that I can accept that, and most of all, I am comforted knowing that they would never have the cojones to do some of the things I have done. I know that all my friends get a great laugh, and that they are laughing right along with me.
So what I wanted to say here, is be yourself, be unique and most of all be the most amazing you that you can be, because if you can’t be yourself then you will never be happy.
Stuart
