What’s Hip Hapnin?

Inspired by this Seth Godin post I have done some brainstorming of my own on how the book industry could save itself.  First of all they should change the name so that people stop thinking inside of the constraints of books as we know them.

1.    Allow passengers on airplanes to reserve a book any book when they purchase their ticket and when they arrive it is waiting for them on their seat for free.  Chances are they won’t be able to finish it so give them an insanely simply way to buy the book. Take it with you and they automatically charge your credit card, leave it in the seat and your not charged.  The airline can get a cut on the up sell and passengers are happy.  You could also implement a system that allows the book to be purchased and sent to their home, a friend, or the Kindle.
2.    Still on the airplane? Why not supply pre loaded ipods? Full of audio books consume all you want while in the air.  Send the flyer an email when they land telling them what they listened to and where to buy it.

3.    Free channel on satellite radio that plays audible audio books.  Again chances are you won’t be able to finish a book during your commute but that does give you enough time to get really into it and then you can go download the rest.

BTW: you don’t have to wait for Audible to do this if you want to start a podcast you could sign up as an affiliate with Amazon and Audible and then read a chapter from a book you recommend as your podcast.  People can then go back to your website to buy the books you are recommending. There is a lot of money in filtering content (think google, trip advisor)

4.    Print on Demand – If I am a local small bookstore and I have been able to survive the big box bookstore craze I can now strike back. Begin printing books on demand in that backroom.  Anyone who doesn’t want to wait for Amazon to deliver some weird long tail title can just walk into your store and you will have a warm of the press copy for them in 30 minutes or less.  You could start a whole new experience “there is nothing like sitting down in a big comfy chair with a warm book.”

Hey everyone I am sure you are all very sad that I haven’t posted in a while.  I am sure you didn’t know what to do with yourself when my crappy posts aren’t interrupting your day

I haven’t said anything for about a week because my old host finally got so terrible I couldn’t take it anymore.

I was with powweb and have been for years.  They were dirt cheap and had great performance.  Now they are just cheap.  I don’t know what changed (JR said they were sold) but they have been terrible since about December and I finally gave up.  It would take forever for my blog to load and forever to write a post.  At first I thought it was my problem so I tried to modify the page streamline it reduce the image sizes etc etc. nothing worked.  So then I was thinking “well I am getting way more traffic these days maybe I just need to upgrade my hosting”.  Guess what powweb is so simple that they have one hosting plan that sucks equally for everyone. No upgrades to your sucky slow hosting.

So I spent last week moving all of my websites to media temple hosting.  It isn’t cheap anymore but it works.  I am trying to convince Jeff Nemelka and JR Dansie to move all of their sites as well.

Anyway I will be producing more lousy content soon!

Ok so after reading this post on social analytics I decided to see what I have been recording on myself.

Don’t bother me on Wednesday nights at 10pm because that is when I am catching up on my blogs.

Blog Traffic - my ego wishes these numbers were higher

I am not very popular on Twitter…I probably don’t say anything worth reading.

This is from Linked In and is pretty surprising.

Well that was some interesting trivia but probably a total waste of time.

Justin Stephens is Jenn’s Cousin and a good friend of ours.  His latest film Push Process is being screened at x-dance film festival on Saturday the 19th. If you are looking for something to do next Saturday you can join us here.  We went two years ago and had a great time.  I haven’t seen this years film yet but I have heard great things.

Watch the Push Process Trailer

Oakley’s 1st wake film Push Process will lead off the X-Dance action
sports film festival in Salt Lake City, UT Saturday January 19 from 2:00
- 3:00 P.M. This is an amazing story for the project! We are nominated
as a finalist in the Awards Ceremony to be held Wednesday January 23.
Oakley won the 2006 Best Core Film award with The Community Project, and
Justin Stephens our Push Process Director won Best Core Film Award with
The Truth in 2007. We are hoping the judges are pleased with our
contribution in 2008 and will award the films according to their
strengths.

It is an honor to be the 1st production company to screen a film at the
festival. And we are asking for your assistance in making this an
amazing screening. Please call on your accounts, contacts, friends and
family to pack the theatre. There are 250 seats and we want this event
to sell out.

The screening will start with opening statements from the Director,
producers, and athletes. A quick photo opportunity of the entire Push
Process group, a slide show and then we will show the movie.

What: Push Process leads off X-Dance
When: 2:00 - 3:00 P.M. Saturday January 19
Where: X-Dance Theatre (aka Off-Broadway Theatre)
272 South Main Street
Salt Lake City, Utah 84101
801-355-4628
http://www.theobt.com/
Tickets: $5 per screening. $10 day pass, $30 festival pass

For the complete screenings schedule
http://www.x-dance.com/news/17/36

What: Awards Ceremony & Closing Party
When: Wednesday, January 23, 2008
Time:TBD
Where: The Depot
13 N 400 W
Salt Lake City, UT 84101
(801) 456-2800
http://www.depotslc.com/
Music Acts: TBD
VIP List and Tickets Available at The Depot Box Office
For more information go to: http://www.x-dance.com/  or call media director Ann
Wycoff: 310-291-1255

I decided that every time I explained something to a client I would put the same Explanation here.  I hope this helps somebody.

Launching a website is much like raising children.  You try to do everything perfect and no matter what you do something is going to go haywire.  Sometimes everything works out and when it does it probably has more to do with luck than ambition.  I think this happens because at some point you lose control of your baby and it is at the mercy of the web.  Somewhere there is some old lady still using Windows 95 on an 800×600 resolution.  Or some super geek using his homemade browser that is designed to be so amazing that it kills some other browser nobody has ever heard of.  No matter how hard you try the site is not going to look right for everyone all of the time.  One of these examples are fonts.  Here is a great reference for web safe fonts  I have use the chart on that page many times for creating or altering style sheets. 

You see the problem is that even though you have some really cute font with hearts and puppies on it chances are really good that I don’t.  So it might look great on your computer but it will look totally different on mine.

Now the other thing that you have to accept is that even if you choose fonts that “should” be on every computer in America there is somebody somewhere who doesn’t have them.  Sorry these are just the facts your kids when they go off to college are going to drink and your font when they are launched on the web might occasionally look drunk.

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