New Stuff! New Stuff!
It’s been an action-packed month. So action-packed, it took my grandma to remind me to update this site.
I know, my grandma chiding me to “update your blog” via my Facebook wall… I get it, I’m a cliche.
OK, so here’s what happened this month.
YouTube partnered with the good folks from TED on Ads Worth Spreading, a global contest to recognize exciting, poignant, and touching ads. Because how do ideas get spread in 2011? You guessed it.
The program was a smash, including some very kind coverage in the New York Times (including my first ever quote in the Gray Lady). Plus, I got to go to TED, where I had a three-hour dinner chat with the director of Napoleon Dynamite, and I saw someone print a human kidney out of cultured tissue. I am unworthy.
Why did YouTube enter into this partnership, besides for the free trip to Long Beach? Because online video is about not watching ads. At YouTube we’re finding ways of creating an entirely opt-in advertising experience for our users. And it takes great creative to make that work.
I also made my podcast debut on Earwolf’s “Wolf Den,” which focuses on the business of podcasting and emerging media. I’m a huge fanboy of Earwolf’s podcasts, including their flagship Comedy Death Ray. I think I got a little ranty at times, but it’s only because I’m so excited about the business models that are springing out of the booming podcast/streaming media ecosystem. No, really.
Finally, I got my kid into a good San Francisco public elementary school, and I think my wife and I bought a house. Negotiations are in progress.
How’s that, grandma?