Henriette Weber

I get to say I am on the same page as Umair Haque. I am today though =) – Im not writing today because I am sick so a picture that tells it all:

=)

This is something that touches me very deeply and it’s a constant annoyance for me even though it’s a minor detail, and then again, it’s not.

Inhumanity online.

The perfect example is an event on facebook where you are hosting as a company but it has a personal mailadress attached. Another great example is when a person sends out a mail from a personal emailadress and signs it as a company. Or somebody who makes a personal profile in a forum and then insist on making your forum identity a corporate one.

And the internet these days is made to be some kind of human, meaning that even though you are an online identity somewhere by a handle (a name you pick out yourself, but not the same as your real name) or your identity is the same as your inreallife person (with your own name you also use on the streets =).

I would claim that the social media today is builded in a way that you need to state who you are in person. You need to be human, and not a company.

So stop stating your a company in a social media if they haven’t build a specific company profile (facebook has. f.eks with their pages).

The same on Twitter – you can be a company, but it’s better that it’s one person that is actually being the company (and the other people on twitter actually knows who it is, instead of just communicating with a brand.

I would communicate with a brand, but the marketing perspectives of choosing the inhuman touch to social simply makes your possibilities within the communities too limited.

Picture from flickr by Khe

There’s something I really hate as an entrepreneur and as women who runs a business – phonecalls. Not just the chatty cool conversations you have with people you have already met and like and stuff, but the ones with people you have never even seen in person. Outbound or inbound it doesn’t matter – if it’s not arranged in a mail or something I hate them.

The other day I had a guy calling me up on the phone, telling me that he wanted to arrange a social media marketing speech at the executive network he was employed in. That’s something that makes me really happy normally because I love speaking and I am darn passionate about what I do – so thumbs up.

BUT as the conversation progressed, I found out that

1. it was in the other end of the country and

2. they didn’t want to pay me to actually do the speech.

Hm. They would pay for  travelling cost. Hm hm. I decided to tell the guy nicely that I like to get payed for what I do, and since I have a lot of clients paying for speeches, I would really think I was freeloading on them, because they actually pay me to work. The problem was that this was for a business that charged somewhere between 10.000 kr and 16.000 kr for a yearly membersship, and they had no intention of paying me. It wasn’t an NGO, it wasn’t a good cause or an excellent conference, this was hard work.

Today something like the same happened again, which I also politely declined and told the women on the phone that I didn’t work for free.

I don’t work for free. I think the free phoners are rude people who has no respect for me or my work.

Don’t call me if you want me to do stuff for free. hmpf.

SXSW has been great. Yesterday Bruce Sterling took the stage and did a keynote – and it was an absolutely amazing keynote. He also mentioned the “global microbrand” a term that Hugh Macleod has been discussing for a couple of years now.

Global Microbrands are or companies without space and time, that everybody know of, in small fragments of a much bigger industry. So people behind these microbrands are extremely valuable speakers at conferences, advisors etc.

I have actually been thinking about it for a while – I love my work. I love running Toothless Tiger, but sometimes it seems like I don’t “do” anything. I talk. I tell people what to do to make things work on the web. My clients think I rock.

Yesterday I even caught myself considering a really great joboffer for a fulltime job. Something I don’t do normally.

I think that even though I like the might and glory of being somewhat of a global microbrand (I don’t see myself as a global microbrand – im probably a mutation of it =) I really want to do something. Because in my head it feels like Im not doing anything. I don’t work. I talk. I write. I help people do kickass projects. But I don’t have a project of my own that I can take to webheaven, a project that is useful for other people and that I have time to work on.

My project is so far going to involve geekculture, sustainability, action instead of talking and is going to be based on community and the now-open-sourced-former-fantastic-rockstar-client jaiku.com. I think I might toy around with it since even though with all this twittering, my heart still belongs to jaiku. Maybe I’ll even do two projects. A geekculture one and a actionpacked sustainable community based on Jaiku.

I dunno yet. In my honest opinion Jaiku is the best functional microblogging service out there. It’s just not being developed anymore and I want to change that.

Just a quick word from me. This morning I am still at home packing a light suitcase and getting ready to go the the airport. I will leave a bit after noon for Austin, Texas where I will attend the SXSW interactive conference. I am looking so much forward to it, and have high expectations. I will be flying for about a whole day and I am looking so much forward to this adventure – yey!

It is a theory that I back, that people can only handle a certain amount of connections in a community – you might have 1000 friends but you only have a daily interaction with a dusin of them. a sociologist from facebook confirms that in this blogpost.

So very interesting=)

It has been decided upon – I need a new computer. My macbook pro is turning 3 this march and it is very noisy (the fan and HD) – Today I was aftraid that it might explode and I started to think about looking into getting a new one.  I know I want a mac again – but I am thinking that I should get a macbook pro again – even though I don’t like the black uplit keyboard or the size. A Macbook would also be great, but I am afraid that a macbook won’t be able to run the programs I need it to run. Those programmes are adobe cs and a couple of pretty heavy games (like WoW).

Also I am wondering if theres anyway that I can buy an ipod nano, a nike + kit and a holder on the company account ? – probably not, it would be nice though

So I have been wanting to make this list for a while. Now I had to research for a speech I am giving later this month – so this is what inspired me this time around in the company/socialmedia’sphere, either because they are new, or because they keep on going =)

My Starbucks Idea is based on that the customers knows better than everyone else, what they want from Starbucks. They created a community around these ideas with a login.

The danish bank Nykredit has a “think new” (“tænk nyt”) blog where you can actually shape the future products of Nykredit.

Nike doesn’t only have a mashup community (pictured), they have several Nike Women blogs, a Nike Basketball blog, the Nike + community, an official Nike running blog and a Jordan Training community. They also have several different applications and pages on facebook. a real social media treat =)

Absolute Vodka’s “ABSOLUTworld” channel on youtube.
They also have a facebook page for their  “ABSOLUT top bartender” campaign.

And then I will strongly encourage all you small companies out there to create social marketing with a blog and a facebook page in addition to your webpage.

A company that I have adviced in starting up their social marketing is Just Business, who began by lurking the social media space, then created a facebook page and a blog to their website. Just remember that it is not really the tools that are important, it’s the mindset and the frequency of being a part of the community.

oh a last inspirational big company piece.

- Daimler has putted all of their online presence on Friendfeed.

I have had this blogpost on my to-do list for a long time. To write the story of the megaman tattoo I have on my arm.

Basically because people really likes it and it is quite extraordinary in itself.

So last year for Thomas birthday party he got a gift certificate for a tattoo for 1500 DKR ( which is something like 250 dollars),And because our birthdays only are 4 days apart I also got a gift certificate, but for a slightly less amount 300 DKR (40 dollars approx.).

I was exstatic – also because I love tattoos and I really wanted one badly ( had promised myself one after a really big weightloss – which I am still going to have – when I am slimmer beyong recognition =)

So a couple of months went by and I drew this tattoo for TK:

‘

Which turned out like this:

Now I knew that I wanted a pixelated Tattoo and when I saw this I just knew that it was what I was looking for.

Megaman means a lot to me.

1. it resembled my childhood playing computergames, my geekness and my nothing usual approach to everything.

2. he’s pixelated – I am a fan of pixelart.

3. he’s cool and blue =)

I was also sure that I should make it on my underarm. My tattooist (old friend of mine I used to work with at apple computers in Cork, Ireland, who somehow ended up in Elsinore of all places, who I met again after not being in touch with him for around 10 years) Told me that there was no way that I could have a “small” pixelated tattoo made especially not 40 dollars small.

I booked a time with him at Royal Tattoo anyway. Kind of knowing what I went into ( it was my second tattoo) but also knowing that it would be very painful having a tattoo on my underarm)

The above was what the tattoo looked like after 1,5 hours of defining the patterns and the blacks. When Theo said ” now for the colors”  I almost told him that I liked the way it was right at that moment.

The awesome part about this is that i was sitting next to all these rather large people have koi’s and kobra’s tattooed on their back.

I was having a pure hard artwork made on my underarm. Oh the envy from those guys =)

So after 4 hours of pain of having a tattooist creating something within around 15 cm on your underarm constant color and tattoo, I was done- I almost screamed in the end – it was that bad.

But the result was

a: breathtaking – nothing less

b: a “bit” more that the 40 dollars – actually it was something around 4000 DKR which is 500 dollars…

But just look at it – it’s so pretty and out of this world. I am also planing an addition to it: I want him to have a barcamp logo fired out of his gun.

Anyway that will happen later. here’s the story though =) for all of you who has asked.