Adam-Jackson

The Time 100 voting is open where we get to submit and vote people in as the top 100 people in the world of 2009 or something like that. It’s a very serious contest organized by a large media corporation and the results are published in Time Magazine and hundreds of other publications also cover the people who make the list.

Some anonymous cowards on a popular site, 4Chan have decided to “hack” the results and vote up 4Chan’s creator “moot” as the top of the list and completely ruin the top 20 finalists with fake voting. You can read the full report at TechCrunch. First of all, 4Chan is one of the primary sites that is fueled by anonymity and their mob hacking isn’t funny or cute. I blame Time for not implementing Facebook Connect or OpenID to reduce the anonymity. Sure Time would be narrowing the voting to users of Facebook only but it’s a solid 200 million people which isn’t too shabby. Furthermore, I’m sure Facebook would be happy with the news and help Time promote the voting on Facebook.com.

If Facebook isn’t the answer, Time could use systems that call the voter and the vote has to give a verbal confirmation code that they saw on the site. Each number was logged and an even better method is auto-mailers that go to homes with a code that the voter enters on Time.com. All three of these would reduce voting but I think the Time 100 can deal with a 15% drop in votes because it would barely make a dent in the amount of people that do vote in this if this system meant that there was zero anonymity to the voting process.

Time basically screwed themselves by allowing this system to be used so I don’t blame 4chan. If you put a piece of candy in front of a child and close the door, he’s going to eat it because no one is looking and that’s just human nature. The web is crawling with children that feed their egos because no one is looking but if more and more websites expose the children and put them under a microscope, it will reduce a ton of this tom foolery on the web. Take a stand, unmask the cowards and let’s kill anonymity on the web.

Tonight went very well as I drove down to Mountain View to be a part of a panel consisting of Tara and Clara. Both women are highly respected authors and I was lucky to be a part of the panel. My friend Chris Heuer moderated the panel and John Hagel, who I had never met before was simply fantastic. His insight and vision of technology in the past decade is astounding and I can’t wait to read his books. It was great because Tara’s book just came out today so this was her first speaking engagement with a book that is on store shelves so I’m sure she was excited as well.

The conversation only inspired me to write and blog some new things for you guys so stay tuned for that. I always leave these panels feeling inspired and with sparks that contain new ideas and perspective and this panel was no exception. Laura was kind of enough to record it for me. The talk lasted 49 minutes. My part was only 5 minutes and I embedded it below. Thanks everyone for your support and I can’t wait to do more of these.

I began using The Internet at a very young age. I think I visited my first porn site at the age of 10. Well, that’s certainly a great way to start a blog post. Maybe I should start over.

I was 10 when I first discovered The Internet. That was 12 years ago which means it was 1997 which isn’t really that long ago and I find myself referring to 1997 all of the time so it’s odd that my career, life and many of my choices leverage on something that I only discovered 12 years ago. Well, The Internet was  AOL 2.0 and pay by the minute Dial-Up connections which means that I really focused on making my Internet time valuable. The days of BBS and chat rooms were really beginning to fade and I was lucky because RSS, Podcasting and Forums were really getting big when I truly got into The Internet (2003, 2004). I actually regret not becoming a part of this movement earlier on.

By the way, I’d like to preface that I just consumed an entire bottle of wine so this entry might be a little confusing. Laura usually splits it with me but she chickened out halfway through so I’m stuck finishing the bottle which means this blog entry is going to probably suck.

Anyway, Twitter is king these days when it comes to self promotion but I was reading Merlin Mann’s About Page on 43Folders when i realized that he started the site in 2004 which is when I just got started with mastering the web. He has 137K RSS feed subscribers which is remarkable and I have just under 30. Granted I launched this site 3 months ago but It’s very interesting. What is more interesting that 300 of my daily readers come from Twitter, Facebook or FriendFeed. That’s a lot of visitors (for me) but it’s not 137K visitors. Merlin Mann has 40 thousand Twitter Followers which is a “crap-ton” but it’s not 137K like his RSS subscribers.

My point is, we’re in a different time. My 2,700 followers on Twitter means that I have 300+ visits to my blog every time I post a blog entry but Merlin has 137K RSS subscribers which have a lot more recognition than my one tweet saying, “I have a new blog post” His RSS feed goes to 137 thousand feed readers like NetNewsWire, Google Reader or NewsFire and mine goes to a Twitter stream among hundreds of other people and I’m lucky to get 200 clicks in the hour.

These days, you have to collect a huge number of followers to really compare to the power of RSS and I regret not entering the game when RSS was on the rise because if I had 2,700 RSS subscribers, I wouldn’t tweet out the links to blog posts on because 200 clicks wouldn’t mean shit. An RSS subscriber list like that has real value because your post shows as unread in their feed reader. Twitter is built for A.D.D. and far less valuable. I’d give up Twitter for that many RSS subscribers but it will be a long time before I have that many. Twitter is great for thoughts, sharing and collaborating but for building your website, it’s not the best tool and jumping on the RSS bandwagon these days might not be as useful as it was 4 years ago.

UPDATE: Blogging pays off sometimes. I received notification from someone at YouTube that my account was disabled by error. They have resolved the problem and my YouTube channel is back in action! Subscribe Here.

I need some help with this one. A lot of people ask me why I don’t use more cloud based services. Why I don’t use WordPress.com or store all of my photos on Google or MobileMe or why I don’t use Gmail exclusively or even why I don’t use Google Calendar, Last.FM or Google Reader. it’s simple. I come from a background where everything is stored locally or at least its synchronized with the cloud on my computer so in the event that a service dies, is bought or suffers from a natural disaster, my data is still protected. I’ve never had to experience the horror of losing data because a web based service deleted it but today I did.

I was going to favorite a YouTube channel that I thought was pretty hilarious. I logged in to YouTube and received an error, “Account disabled, please use a different email.” That’s odd but I ignored it and spent the next 25 minutes, resetting account passwords with the thought that I had just forgotten my password. When I simply tried to go to my YouTube page directly (http://www.youtube.com/adamjackson1984). I received the notification embedded above. What?

For some reason, my YouTube account and channel was simply deleted. All of the videos I’ve edited and placed on YouTube or simple videos shot with my Qik camera and even things that were recorded directly to YouTube via my MacBook’s webcam were completely deleted. I even have Qik setup so when I stream from my iPhone, those are transferred to YouTube via the cloud automatically. Only 10 of my 40+ videos are saved locally because I trusted YouTube. Why would my videos suddenly vanish or be deleted and if I did do something that broke copyright, wouldn’t they simply remove that video?

I checked for any emails received from YouTube within my spam folder and saw nothing. This is incredibly frustrating because all of my comments, friends, uploads, favorite channels and more are just gone. I have all of my Flickr uploads stored locally and I even download all of my Twitter posts weekly to ensure I have every last one of them but the one service I trust just takes it all away.

My only guess is that one single video caused this problem. It was Twitter’s spot on Nightline and it was even embedded on this popular blog. The video was viewed nearly 7 thousand times and now it’s gone.

I’ve had a YouTube account since early 2006 and I’ve been linked to hundreds of times and now those links are broken. My page rank for “adamjackson1984” is also ruined.

I have a video where my friend consumed a gallon of milk and a 24oz. energy drink back in 2006. It amassed over 30K views and it’s gone as well.

Starting over on YouTube is going to be very challenging and I hope I can remember the dozens of subscriptions and hundreds of favorites that I’ve collected over the years. YouTube. Fuck you.

Thursday night, I went home at 4PM and I watched television with @LauraW. She and I watched SouthLand, South Park, 30 Rock and The Office. All four of these shows are really good! I have never watched them before and I have to say that there are some awesome television programs that really help to clear my mind after a long day at work. I went to see Jes in concert that night. She’s amazing and does vocals for some of the best DJs in the world! I danced my heart out for 2 hours and it was amazing.

Friday I went to work but took an afternoon break to go to 21st Amendment and enjoy some Twitter Beer. Technically it’s called, “spring tweets” but it was lovely and I had the best time! Friday night, well it’s @Lauraw’s birthday this weekend so I took her to the exquisite Redwood Room for some $18 cocktails. She was wearing her nicest dress and I was wearing slacks. It was great and we had a lot of fun faking “the good life”.

This morning, I slept until 9AM. I bought a digital camera (well maybe two) but don’t tell Laura. She’s going to be so pissed. I found some money and our Flickr Streams (Laura‘s & Adam‘s) are EFFING BARE with zero content these days so I bought cameras for us. It’s time to begin exploring photography again and I cut into my slim savings to buy these. By the way, I haven’t slept in that late in a very long time. It was nice! I drank a Gin & tonic while watching the people on the streets and I began clearing my mind. I stretched for an hour and then I went for a run. Now I’m going to a cafe with Laura but I won’t be bringing my laptop. We’re going to sip lattes and talk about random things.

I’m so used to a very strict schedule with some form of technology being brought along and it’s always business or it was a waste of time. I’m ignoring that. Tonight, I grab a backpack and tent and I go to Angel Island with my bicycle. I’m going to camp out in solitude even though I’ll have a great view of the city. It’s just going to be me and I’m not even taking my phone. For years, prior to moving to SF, I would start every day with green tea and meditation. I’ve been a total fuck face since moving here and I haven’t done that. (sorry dad) and I’m going to spend the night at a campsite by myself practicing my martial arts, stretching, meditating and possibly breaking out my old black Gi for some midnight sneaking around angel island. It’s going to rock!

Tomorrow, Laura’s mom and brother are in town and I’ll be having dinner with them. I generally bathe once a week because I’m too busy and work until 3AM and then crash at the office. The past 3 days, I’ve showered every day! It’s really amazing how clean I feel and some of my dry skin on my face and scalp have really cleared up. It’s amazing what daily baths can do for you.j

I also went to the doctor and finally took care of my feet which have been an issue for a while. Yep, I’m pretty stoked. I regret that I have this to-do list that isn’t getting any shorter and 200 RSS feeds that I haven’t read but fuck it. I’m taking a break and Email + RSS can go fuck itself. Right now…I’m dancing alone in my apartment to The Prodigy’s latest album. They’ll be in town next month and I just bought tickets.

I’m going to finish my G&T and hold my girlfriend’s hand while walking to the cafe which is unusually because I’m usually responding to emails on my iPhone when we walk places together. It’s the start of a new Adam and I’m just happy to be alive with a fantastic life with my amazing girlfriend. I have a wonderful family and wonderful friends and after a year of living in San Francisco, I needed this. Sorry for not being around but it was time for a break and I thank all of you for your support!

PS. The camera(s) I bought.
A Canon G10 Camera (Thanks Liana for the recommendation. I fell in love with your G9)
A Canon Rebel XSi (A Cheap-entry level SLR but it will grow as I grow)

FULL PHOTOSET

Exactly one year ago, Laura and I began solidifying our idea of moving to San Francisco. It was on May 12th, 2008 that we made that decision. We touched down in San Francisco on May 31st which means that in 18 days, we sold our cars, all of our belongings and broke our lease in an apartment. I didn’t leave anything with family and we only had 4 suitcases when we moved to San Francisco.

A year is a long time and although it’s gone by very fast, I feel that I’ve been doing too much lately. I’ve been stretched very thin and I need to rethink things. Twitter, a service I fell in love with is growing larger and I have less faith in the community than I did before. My career helping companies market themselves online isn’t doing very well and my efforts to make enough money to get a larger apartment and actually buy a piece of furniture just isn’t working.

I’m tired of the grind and I’m going to focus on two things. My day job and one single project I have on the side. I’ll add on more things soon but right now, it’s time to simplify, add value, lead and master what I have going on in life and what I want to do going forward. I recently found $400. No it wasn’t from taxes but from something else. I didn’t even tell Laura I found this. I’m going to do something with it even though I should be paying off credit cards.

What’s Adam going to do? I have no clue. I want to get away to somewhere different, somewhere with trees and somewhere that I can just be alone. Looking back, I haven’t had a single moment to myself since moving to San Francisco. Out my window, almost 100 cars and pedestrians pass by every minute and this is the same at home and work. At night I have Laura and she’s great but I’m not ever alone to talk out loud and work out things just myself.

If there’s one thing I miss about living in Florida, it’s the quiet time and at night you can step outside to 10 acres of fields and see the stars without any cars or people to distract you. I miss that and I think it’s time to experience that again. Since I was 15 years old, I’ve never gone to spring break. Many of you that read my blog posts, you know how I feel about partying with a bunch of people and how I don’t find that appealing. Every year until I moved to San Francisco I would take Spring Break and spend 6 days in the woods with only what I needed. This has been a hard year and it’s been over a year since I made that kind of trip.

I’m looking for suggestions and I think I’m just going to get a pup-tent, a sleeping bag and some beans  & franks and rough it for 2 nights. Where can I go? I need some suggestions. $400 doesn’t go very far considering I don’t have any camping gear or a car to get me where I want to go but I think this is the first step to realizing where I want to go next and what I need to do next.

Things aren’t going to get any easier if I continue this downward spiral of working for a paycheck and taking on projects that ultimately don’t go anywhere. I’m feeling defeated, lost and confused and I want to take a fresh look at the world and that all starts with a mute button on the noise.

Please leave suggestions below or click this link to generate a Twitter reply.

In late October, someone told me about Magpie and I think it was a post on TechCrunch. At the time, Magpie would analyze the amount of followers you had and you’d allow them to tweet an ad every 5, 10, 20 or 50 tweets. I think I started out making around 3.5 euros per tweet. There was no minimum clicks or any referral program and on January 1st, I received a PayPal deposit of 50 euros (which is the minimum credit you need to cash out).

As the amount of followers I had grew larger, the amount increased. These days I get 6.50 euros per tweet which means I can cash out ever 10 tweets (on average). It’s pretty cool and at the rate I tweet (35-100 a day), I can set Magpie to post every 20-50 tweets and I’m making roughly $75 every 3 days. This is how it was until Magpie changed things.

Advertising inventories have been dropping since we’ve had a bit of a recession. Lately, Magpie has become overrun with ads that are based on referrals. Your followers click an advertisement and buy the product in the ad and you get 4-20% of a kickback from that purchase. I can be more lucrative than the original pricing model but with my 2700 followers, it hasn’t cashed out ONCE.

I switched Magpie to automatically block any ads that require a click or require a purchase. Only ads that pay out just for being posted and this means that my setting of an advertisement every 20 tweets ends up as an advertisement every 12-20 days. That’s right. Ad inventories are so low for this unique model that an advertisement doesn’t come down the pipe to me but every 2 weeks. That’s fine because I don’t need the money and I don’t like having my Twitter stream full of ads with zero guarantee of actually making any money for me.

Magpie has been great at working with me. I once transferred my earnings into an advertiser account meaning that I can spend the earnings as credits toward advertising on other Twitter profiles but I asked them to move the money back to my account and they did with zero fuss. I’ve also pinged them about my gripes with referral and kickback advertising that requires my followers purchase something for me to see money. Magpie kindly listened to feedback from users like me and made it easy to moderate the kind of ads that go to our stream.

The company has been top notch, very professional and I’ve never had any problems taking money out of their service. Hell, they even sent me a tax form for money they paid out to me in 2008 so I could file taxes as earned income from Magpie LTD. Pretty Snazzy!

I think Magpie is great but I have friends at Twitter who hate the service and would like to see it die. Other people hate the concept of advertisements on people they follow but my efforts in ensuring that only tweets I approve go to my followers and my use of a hashtag #advertisement before a Magpie tweet. Finally, the fact that I have it setup so you won’t see more than 1 advertisement per page of my tweets will make sure that it keeps my account looking good and chock full of content as new followers asses my Twitter account.

At the end of the day, $9.00 per advertisement can really add up and Magpie continues to improve their service and their customer support is top notch. I’ve made nearly $400 with Magpie since October. I’m a big fan of Magpie and wish them the best of luck.

Christopher Gardner: It was right then that I started thinking about Thomas Jefferson on the Declaration of Independence and the part about our right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. And I remember thinking how did he know to put the pursuit part in there? That maybe happiness is something that we can only pursue and maybe we can actually never have it. No matter what. How did he know that?

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0454921/quotes

Two days in a row that I’ve spoken about this but a video today made by the crew at College Humor honestly upset me to the point where I have to link to it and once again state my case for the toilet bowl that is user generated content on the web.

This is going to get worse as more and more people join the web and contribute their anonymous crap. There are some amazing minds out there contribute great content to the web and sharing their videos, photos, life experiences and opinions and the majority of comments coming from anonymous cowards are completely negative and they lack grammar or common English principles.

The answer to this is requiring tools like Facebook Connect be used to ensure that people commenting are who they say they are. Today, add Disqus or Facebook Connect to your blog and force your readers to be human and be real. Your comments will improve, a community will thrive and you will get fair and respectful commentary instead of the shit that people exclaim without thinking.

If you need help, let me know and I’ll set it up for you. This has to be stopped and the answer is forcing people to be who they really are. If they won’t come out behind the curtain, you don’t want them commenting anyway.

I’d like to share a quote to start this post. The quote is by Miyamoto Musashi.

It may seem difficult at first, but everything is difficult at first.

Today I was given a choice and I haven’t made a decision yet. Generally, it’s best to write things out loud. Don’t worry, I’m going to keep this vague enough to protect all parties but specific enough that you can learn something and I can come to a realization that will affect my decision. Are you ready to get started?

Looking back at my life, I’ve never finished a project. It’s true. I’ve had many opportunities in life to follow through with something, to change a life and I’ve let it slip. I did this recently with one of my stealth projects. I’ll let you guess which one but I have 12 right now so I say to you, “good luck.” I don’t work well with others and I generally take on projects that, if I fail, no one will notice. My style is hype and failure and I do it a lot.

The great thing is, my projects just need hype sometimes. You have a product that you want hyped, okay I’ll do it but don’t expect me to continue that run for 1+ years. I need some coaching along the way or some pep talks to continue to path I was on. I’ve always gotten by on pep talks.

I realized this about my character as a young boy. I would start the school year with C and D grades. Nine weeks after the year started, Dad would tell me “what’s up” and the next quarter would see improved grades in the C and B range. I was always a B student if it was a topic that excited me. Let’s fast forward nine weeks and there would be Ds on the report card again and Dad being forced to scare me into studying once again. This trend would continue until the day I walked across the stage with a funny hat and a diploma in my hand. My High School GPA: 2.3.

After years of up and down, Dad still has faith in me. His love for me is eternal and I’ve had my chance to repay him for being an amazing Father and a wonderful friend and each time I have followed through for him. No request from him is too small and I will always be there for him not because he was there for me nor is it because I owe him but he’s my friend and now I get a chance to impress him with my passion,  knowledge of technology and my pursuit of being the best son I can be. Where i fell short in school, I rock in everyday life.

One constant that remains is my inability to finish what I started. I’m not going to list these things off but I did a post on January 1st where I listed my new years resolutions. It’s my prerogative to list things that I know can be easily attained but I always keep one to myself which is generally broken by April or May.

My secret resolution was to finish what I started. It doesn’t matter what “it” is and I had a feeling that the one thing would present itself at some point and I would make it my duty to not only realize I was breaking my resolution but to actually do something about it.

What drives me? Passion toward the subject matter, a love of the idea and a drive to feel a completed product in my hand or see it on my computer screen. This is what drives me and somewhere along the way I let people’s opinions, criticisms and negativity get to me. I also don’t fight for things.

I’ve never been much of a fighter. Oddly enough, this is something that kept Dad pushing me to do martial arts with him. Fighting physically, yeah I can do that because I’ve spent the last 20 years doing it with my Father. I was 14 and an Army Lieutenant and I were wearing very lightweight helmets and Dad was giving the gentleman private lessons. Dad asked that I fight the guy. it was a controlled environment and yes there were a couple of rules but the general idea was to see if the guy had learned anything after his time with Dad over the past few months. The “fight” lasted for over an hour. My body had no more liquid as I had stopped sweating and my nose began bleeding from the stress and from holding my breath. We would have kept going except the gentleman said that he was too tired to go on and he gave up.

This was all due to my Dad’s drive and push for me to be a fighter. Rewind 8 years and I was the boy who didn’t want to wrestle with little boys or play football or arm wrestle or even reclaim my place in line in the cafeteria as a kid cut in front of me and sadly, that part in me hasn’t changed. Push me or take a swing at me and I’ll fight and I will give it my all. Hell, I will bring a gun to a knife fight but if you skip in front of me for a promotion, cut me in line at the grocery store or cheat me out of anything, I’m not the kind of guy to stand up for what I believe is right.

I’ve always had an excuse saying that that guy isn’t worth it or it’s just one spot in line but it is important and it does mean something to me and every time I let someone skip in front of me, I lose a piece of myself. I’ve had projects in the past that I’ve been very passionate about and I almost let one go recently. I was going to let it go to someone else and now that this blog entry is done, I’ve decided to sacrifice every piece of my soul and everything that I’m involved with to see this through to the finish.

As I virtually breathe out this last sentence, I’ve decided that I will finish what I started and no I won’t be cut in line by someone else. I know they’re better and I know I don’t deserve to get chocolate milk before they do but I have to tap them on the shoulder and reclaim my spot.

This isn’t for Dad or my teachers and this isn’t even for Adam Jackson. This is for my soul. A lifetime of “yes” and it’s time to put one “no” in there. Of course, I’m not just going to reclaim my place in line because “I deserve it”. I know that I have to prove myself and pour my soul into it and show the other kid that I do have what it takes. This is the start of something new and I’m going to change everything to see that I “finish what I started.”

Thank you for reading.

[UPDATED]: So it looks like I gave up anyway. I conceded and here’s why.

• I’m too young
• I’m not smart enough.
• I’m not responsible enough.
• I’m forced to do work that only pays the bills.
• I can’t work at the level that is required of me.
• I can’t dedicate enough time to it.
• Oh and I’m a wimp that doesn’t stand up for what he believes in.

This is basically what I’ve been told so I’m going to believe it and give up. Hell, I should just move back to Florida and work at my grandfather’s farm.