[SJKPDX] Travel Portland Features My Mt Hood Sunrise Pic

3253.

Yesterday, of course, amongst other postings, I shared my picture of that amazing sunrise where the sun was throwing a shadow of Mount Hood on the bottom of clouds over Portland.

I wasn't the only one, of course, but I think I hit it pretty well.
 
Naturally I shared it on Twitter and Facebook, it's what you do.

#MountHood from NE 122nd Ave at Rossi Farms today in #portland #pdx #pdxtst pic.twitter.com/mXPaRPFIjJ

— Samuel John Klein (@SJKPDX) February 3, 2016

One of the accounts which follow me on Twitter is that of Travel Portland's (@travelportland), which noticed it, liked it, and did me the incredible compliment of featuring it on their page of nifty, Portland is happening Now. Click on that link there to go to the recent pictures, http://www.travelportland.com/pdxnow/#/a/8-tw-694949240309583872-3 should be a direct link to the picture embedded within the page, and they let me know with the friendliest of pats on the back:

@SJKPDX Love your photo! We love it so much we featured it on our site: https://t.co/pgNRI2dKS5

— Travel Portland (@travelportland) February 3, 2016

So, it helps to get around. And we get by with a little help from our friends.

[branding] Bodyform: The Best Feminine Hygiene Advertising … Period.

2870.

There's a joke I learned as a kid. A version went something like this:

Did you hear the one about the kid who found a fiver on the street? He went to the drug store and bought a box of Tampax. When his friends heard, they made fun of him, but he said "Don't laugh! With Tampax, I can go horse-riding, water-skiing, bicycling …"

Yeah. I guess you had to be there.

I kind of wish I was in the room when the Branding Zen Masters™ came up with the following thing …

It's said (can ye believe everything that falls out of the intertuebz?) that a person who we shall regard as "Richard Neill" posted a rant to the page of Bodyform, manufacturers of a line of things we used to call 'sanitary napkins', which gave my mind no end of fits as a kid, because I know what sanitary is, and I knew what napkins were, but … well, anywhozzle … It was a soliloquy apparently on the reproach of a man who, upon learning the ins and outs of living with That Special Someone™and hoping to see the joy of woman from a closer vantage, instead, feels wronged. The whole rant is here, and it ends on the plaintive note:

Instead I had to fight against every male urge I had to resist screaming wooaaahhhhh bodddyyyyyyfooorrrmmm bodyformed for youuuuuuu as my lady changed from the loving , gentle, normal skin coloured lady to the little girl from the exorcist with added venom and extra 360 degree head spin. Thanks for setting me up for a fall bodyform , you crafty bugger

Damn you, Bodyform! A pox upon your house (but just a small one, understand). 

Added venom and 360 degree headspin, it must be said, at no extra charge. Such a deal.

Forging ahead: the trajectory of the thing seems to be thus; the Bodyform company saw the rant and decided to embrace it with humor and aplomb befitting the finest in fine comedy. As the company said here, Unfortunately Bodyform doesn't have a CEO. But if it did she'd be called Caroline Williams. And she'd say …

Well, she'd say this: 




Yes, my friends, we have finally learned how to joke effectively about when Aunt Flo comes to visit. To think that I'd have lived to see the day. But it's an effective lesson in social marketing, and great comedy to boot.

The rant spread to Mashable, as did the reply, and the rest, as they say, is hystery. 

There are some, though, who wonder at the timing and the quick, highly polished response to the rant. Some of the posters at AdWeek, in the reply stream, think the whole thing is a bit pat. And maybe it is. I myself am torn about advertising these days. It's true, as Orwell has said, that advertising is "a stick rattling in a swill bucket", but another side of me says If you're going to waste my time, at least entertain me.

Well, I'm entertained.

Well played, Bodyform … well played. You earned a "like" from me.

How Do You Say Blellow?

2139.Blellow's Sean Loyless and Veronica Jorden explain, a la classic Electric Company:

Independent designer? Get to know Blellow.

You'll find me there under the monicker zehnkatzen.

Technorati Tags: ZehnKatzen, blellow, social media, microblogging

Join The Campaign! Get Blellow Added To TweetDeck

2118.A few missives ago I waxed enthusiastic about Blellow, the new microblogging site for creatives and freelance professionals. I'll admit, I've rarely been as excited about something like this. It creates good community. What Twitter does for everyone, Blellow does for us designers.

I've helped inaugurate a drive to get addition of Blellow to the client app TweetDeck, and it's going rather smashingly. Blellow's good, but being able to view it in TweetDeck (which is the most popular Twitter desktop client) would be amazing. There are a lot of wired designers, there are a lot who use Twitter, and there are a lot who use TweetDeck. So far, that hypothesis is being born out; after less than a week of campaigning, the issue has garnered 101 votes and is the 64th ranked new feature request out of 3328 on the TweetDeck UserVoice forum.

If you believe in right, sunshine, spring showers, and kittehs, you need to help us vote this up! The page to vote is here; you can be anonymous if you want. Registration is possible. Please vote, and leave a friendly comment if you can.

Blellow has all the community and connections that you could want as a designer. This is a Good Thing!

The community is at http://www.bellow.com. I am ZehnKatzen there.

Technorati Tags: blellow, tweetdeck, twitter

Creatives? Designers? Get To Know Blellow

2111.For the last week or so I've been exploring the social web with Twitter. For a very long time I scoffed at it, but once I dipped my toe in I found it did something that nothing else in my life right now does: allows me to stay connected with people on my own terms – something working 3rd shift weekend and 10-hour days pretty much prevents you from doing. So for me, it's been a boon.

Twitter's "microblogging" paradigm needs no introduction here. Once on Twitter and into the swim of the social I was invited by an old ally, Pariah Burke, to a new microblogging service designed especially for creatives and independent designers called Blellow.

The site, http://www.blellow.com, is, if I had to sketch you a thumbnail, a sort of Twitter especially for creatives and freelancers (I prefer the word "independents"). Instead of asking you "What Are You Doing?", though, the question is "What Are You Working On?". Creatives are always working on something, trying to accomplish a goal, doing something for a client, or simply trying to find something out. Blellow hinges on a behavior that all creatives have in spades: the need to collaborate. With Blellow at your back, you always have a helping hand, because the other thing creatives can't stop doing is helping each other.

The biggest improvement that I value in Blellow so far is that the messages can be up to 300 characters, a little more than twice as long as the Twitter limit; 140 characters is just too little room for creatives to communicate in. The interface is intuitive; if you've used Twitter you already know the basics to get by on Blellow. Moreover, if someone has helped you out, you can give each other public pats on the back via Kudos; the number of Kudos you've collected are featured in a little badge on your thumbnail.

I'm enjoying Blellow quite a bit and wholeheartedly recommend it to others. The connections you make there are to quality people who enjoy collaboration, and what more could a creative need?

One of my self-appointed missions is to spread the word about Bellow.

Check it out!

(Updated 0954 Sat; Title fixed. It's too easy to type "bellow" when you mean "blellow!" Still! Go there!)

Technorati Tags: twitter, blellow, the social, social networking