July 2005
Commentary by blog and social media consultant Josh Hallett on the use of blogs for public relations, media, marketing, communication & branding and from time-to-time the unsolicited opinion.
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Overall I think it was a great discussion at the Atlanta Media Bloggers social/discussion this evening. I didn't get full names and URLs from everybody that was there but here's a list of a few (sorry to those I did not list):
- Toby: Diva Marketing Blog
- Teresa: Caro Consulting Blog
- Dana: Moore's Lore
- Michelle: Happiness Blog
Most of the evening centered on building traffic and readership with a little SEO thrown in.
Quite a few of the bloggers were consultants in various sectors and the issue they face is how much personal content do you post? The answer really depends on the individual, but for the most part consultants are selling themselves. The majority of the 'selling' is for their knowledge but the X factor is their personality. Providing some endearing personal content on a blog can help you connect with potential customers and maintain relationships with existing clients. I'll post some more thoughts on this later.
I'll also keep an eye out to see if any of the attendees post follow-ups on their blogs.
Shel Holtz posts again about the press release is dead meme. He offers some good insight/retrospective into this never-ending issue with a story from his days at Allergan in the early 90's. Here's the key line though:
The release is targeted at the media, not at everyone else.
To those of you who think that blogs are the new press release do this (as I have done many times). Go down to you local paper and ask anybody in the newsroom if they are using RSS or blogs to receive information, let alone press releases. Chances are you will get some blank stares.
Now you can go back and tell your client that this great press release replacement you've created isn't being used by a single reporter at the paper. They'll be thrilled about that.
Tax Free holiday started today in Georgia. Not being a Georgia native I was unaware of this, until I visited the Apple Store at Lenox Square. The place was crazy. Long lines, people buying machines left and right.
One guy bought three iBooks for his kids while I was waiting to checkout. I bought a new Shure microphone and recorded a quick podcast.
This is one of those things you can only find on the web. A discussion about the economics of movie popcorn over at Kottke. There are currently 92 comments discussing the pricing structure and profit involved with movie popcorn.
Jason set the discussion:
This "Super Combo" costs a lot less than ordering a L popcorn and a L soda separately from the menu but often it will actually cost you less than a L popcorn/M soda, M popcorn/L soda, or even a M popcorn/M soda (?!??). Why such a steep discount when the theaters make so much of their money on concessions? I've developed a few theories over the years but would like to hear your thoughts before sharing them.
I have a similar retail pricing/sales story to share about convincing people to spend more for the same product. I just might do it as a podcast.
I will be attending a meeting of the Atlanta Media Bloggers this evening in Atlanta, Georgia. The social/networking/discussion event will be held at Manuel's Tavern from 6:30 - 9:30 p.m. The topics of discussion will be blogging of course, but more from a business and media perspective. We're expecting anywhere from 12 to 25 people to show up.
Kevin Howarth of TechLINKS is the organizer of the group. If you are planning on showing up let him know.
I'll post a wrap-up of the event late tonight or on Friday.
I am in the process of updating my Guide to Media Monitoring I wrote back in January of this year. I am planning on including all the new blog search tools and custom RSS watchlists/feed services. There will also be some information about tags, specifically dealing with monitoring tags via Technorati/del.icio.us/Flickr, etc.
The guide is mostly geared towards communicators, but just about any user can learn something from it. Anything you think I should include? Perhaps some service that I might not have heard of? Leave a comment.
A few friends have been having some issues including Technorati tags in their blogs so I thought I would put together a how-to of what I've done.
The simple modifications I have made to my MovableType software makes sure that any tags I include are quickly indexed by Technorati and other services that utilize tags. Using Blogger? Richard Massoner sent me a link to a Greasemonkey script that helps put tags in Blogger.com blogs.
Common Mistakes
- Include Tags in Your Post (RSS): The tags must be included in the post and not just a part of your blog template. That's the problem that MindComet has with their blog. They've just listed the tags on the blog template and not the individual post. Only content that is part of your post is included in your RSS feed. Items that are part of your blog template are not included in your RSS feed.
- Publish Full Text in RSS: If you are not including the full text of your post in your RSS feed the blog index tools will not see your tags. This is because most people put the tag code at the end of the post which is often not included in a partial feed.
- Failure to Ping: You have your tags coded correctly, you're publishing a full text feed but still nothing? You might not be pinging the blog index tools each time you publish a new post. If you are using MovableType of TypePad your blog should be configured to automatically ping Technorati. If you are unsure you can always use Ping-o-Matic!
- Technorati is Not the Only Game in Town: There are other blog search tools that are starting to use tags. IceRocket is another blog search that you can ping with your tagged posts.
Background Info
You can review Technorati's help page on Tags to get the basics. The two most important items are:
1. Including the proper code in your RSS feed or blog post
2. Pinging the blog index such as Technorati
Failure to do both of these will result in your tags not being indexed. Every time a friend contacts me with an issue it's because they have a problem with one of those items.
Continue reading "How-To Include Tags in Your MovableType Blog" »
Living in Central Florida can spoil you when it comes to shuttle launches. Each time the shuttle would launch I could walk out the door and look towards the east coast and see the tell-tale smoke trail. Of course it was about 100 miles away, but you could still see it.
This morning, in Atlanta, I caught myself thinking, 'Where am I going to be at 10:38 am? Will I be able to sneak out for a second and watch the launch? ... No wait, I'm in Atlanta, I won't be able to see it."
The Orlando Sentinel has their Shuttle Discovery Blog up and running for the launch attempt today. Robyn Shelton is live-blogging right now with posts every few minutes.
I get to Savannah on Thursday and find out that the Marriott Riverside does not get OLN. Where to watch the Tour?
I called Quailty Bike Shop and asked them for some advice. They suggested Sorry Charlies in downtown Savannah. I went there for a late lunch on Friday and asked if I could come by in the morning and watch the final time trial. The waitress told me they did not open until 11:00am, but that she would be there before 10:00am and that I could come by and watch.
Saturday morning I arrived shortly before 10:00am and couldn't find the girl I talked to. At first I thought I was out of luck. I told Brian, the manager, that one of the waitresses told me that I could come by early. His inital response was, "oh really, who told you that?" Luckily, Brian was really cool and turned on all the TVs and let me sit at the bar to watch Lance win the stage.
Thanx to Brian and the crew from Sorry Charlies. I have nothing but good things to say about them.
One problem with virtual offices is that somebody can always 'squat' in your office :-) I came back to the same location I worked at yesterday, but somebody was sitting at my desk (actually couch).
What happens when somebody over six feet tall visits Japan?
One of the interesting features of NetNewsWire is that it tracks the changes to items in RSS feeds. If an author edits a post the new items are presented in green and the deleted items in red. Most of the time the changes are spelling corrections or minor edits. Mark Cuban is one great example. Mark will usually make a number of small edits shortly after he originally posts an item.
Every once and a while a major edit will take place. The following screen shot is Dave Winer's post about the Technorati situation.
Click photo for full size
As you can see there have been quite a few changes to the post. At first is was a rant by Dave against Technorati.
We've all cut them an enormous amount of slack for a long, long time, Doc. I don't know about the rest of you, but they've been taking my data, and snarking behind my back. Everyone says they like Technorati, until you admint that you don't really, then they fess up that they don't really either. One too many stabs in the back. Too much snark, not enough perf. They take from the commons and don't put back.
Now it just quotes Doc Searl's post. Should Dave have made this major change? Obviously he was a bit upset when he wrote the original post, then thought about it, and made the edit. Perhaps he should have kept the original item up and posted a 'further thougths' in the same post?
A while back VeloNews added an RSS feed for their web content. I added the feed to my reader, but have had problems with it from day one. It looks like they've simply added RSS to their existing content management system and it's not a very intelligent solution. I think each time they create a news item in the CMS it posts to the RSS feed, even if there is nothing in the news item. On a daily basis I get these blank items in my RSS reader:
Larger screen shot on Flickr.
Robin Sloan has pointed to the story behind EPIC.
For those of you who have not heard of EPIC, it was a Flash-presentation on the 'future of news' developed by Robin Sloan and Matt Thompson while they both worked at the Poynter Institute. The presentation spread like wildfire on the net. I hosted one of the original mirrors of the file and was averaging over 10GB per day in transfer. One day saw close to 40GB in traffic for this little 'project'. It was fun looking at my web server logs. The standard practice would be a person in the office viewing EPIC then forwarding the URL on to everyone else, i.e. 1 request from xx.com shortly followed by 45 requests from xx.com.
The story-behind-the-story is an interesting read.
USAToday had an article in Friday's edition about bloggers being paid by tourism offices (or CVBs) to blog about local attactions or events to promote the area. One of the blogs mentioned in the article is Play in the City by Erin Leffelman. Erin blogs about events in Milwaukee, Wisconson. The Milwaukee Tourism Office provided her with a year's worth of high-speed Internet access, $1,700 in computer and camera equipment and free access to many of the outdoor diversions she'll be describing in her twice-weekly musings.
The big issue is that she does not disclose the fact that she's receiving support from the tourism office for her blog. Should she? I think so.
If I read on her blog that she was supported by the local tourism office I would take it under advisement, but I don't think it would change my view of her posts that much. Knowing that she does not disclose her sponsoship suddenly casts a little bit of doubt. According to her about page it says that Erin just received a degree in Journalism from UW-Milwaukee. Not disclosing sponsorship for her blog doesn't really show great journalistic ethics so far.
From the VCB's perspective:
The Milwaukee blog is "a hands-off relationship, and if Erin has a negative experience, we expect her to record that," spokesman David Fantle says.
I wonder what David defines as a 'negative experience'? There is a big difference between saying that an event didn't have enough port-o-potties and saying that it was a 'rip-off' or a 'waste of time'.
The USAToday article also mentions the blog effort that VisitPA is sponsoring. VisitPA has done a smart thing by selecting a number of blogger-tourists from various demographic backgrounds. Chances are that you will identify with one or more of the bloggers. It's also refreshing to see 'actual' people in tourism photos instead of models.
Here is the view from my office today, the Savannah Coffeehouse Cafe. The window overlooks this square in historic Savannah.
The wifi from the coffeehouse reaches out into the street just a bit. A few more shots.
We arrived early evening yesterday and joined the family for dinner at the Shrimp Factory on the waterfront. Our server, Pamela, seemed to have a bit of an attitude, but other than that the food was good.
Joan McCain has created a new writing blog, Where The Comma Goes: Tips, tools, and techniques to be a faster, clearer and stronger writer. No grammar geek stuff, but fun hints for making your writing correct, reader-friendly and easy on you, too.
There are only three posts so far, but it looks like a good resource. She has a good sense of humor in her writing:
I will not make you learn grammar. I won't even bore you with too many grammar rules. I will share ways you can be a clear, to-the-point writer (of e-mail, of proposals, of thank you notes to your Aunt May) and spend less time doing it--mostly by avoiding the issues that cause grammar guffaws in the first place.
Here's how it will work. At the first of each month, I'll post a lesson of sorts. A topic-specific blog on reader-friendly writing. Then each week I'll post a writer-on-the-street perspective and comment on the mistakes and misuses I see. And most importantly, how to recognize and avoid them.
I promise it will be fun. So log on, blog on and write on.
Check it out. (Thanx Chris)
On Monday I had lunch with Mark Russell and Anthony Moor of the Orlando Sentinel. Here are some notes from that meeting.
Like many of the other newspapers/journalists/media I have met with they are slowly taking steps to embrace this new medium. How many of the newsroom staff are using RSS or blogs to assist with stories? Almost none. But that's something they are going to work on changing.
On the web side they're moving towards integrating external RSS feeds into their content offerings. These external feeds will be topic driven, i.e. business feeds in the business section. The next step would be to integrate the branded RSS reader that the LA Times is beta-testing.
The Sentinel has created a few blogs utilizing TypePad for special projects. The most recent was a Shuttle Discovery Blog to cover the return to flight. A staff reporter live-blogged the recent launch attempt. If you look at the blog you'll see they were posting quite frequently. They had quite a bit of traffic to the blog but asked how I thought they could expand their readership of an event-driven blog such as a shuttle launch. My two quick suggestions were:
1. Utilize Technorati Tags: Recent events such as Live8 and the London terror attacks have shown that information on breaking news can quickly be found via Technorati and other blog search tools. News junkies and bloggers know to use these new tools since they search the 'live' web. The Sentinel should determine the optimum tags for their shuttle posts, i.e. shuttle, NASA, spaceshuttle, etc.
2. Crosslink with other Blogs: Yes it's a basic principle of blogs, but when you tell a newspaper to link to another content source that might compete with them, they usually don't jump right on it. The day before the shuttle launch they should do some searches to find out who else might be live-blogging or providing other good content, then link to them. Chances are, those blogs will link back. I found this to be true during my Super Bowl live-blogging Experiment.
There are a few other things they can do as well, but we don't want to give away all the goods just yet :-)
Continue reading "Orlando Sentinel Lunch Follow-Up" »
A recent post by Jeremy Pepper addresses some of the issues I am debating about the blogging path I should take. These decisions also coincide with a re-design I am currently undertaking. Should I blog what I want or what my readers want? In a perfect world those two items would match perfectly, but that is not always the case.
One of the issues I face is that my readership is mixed with respect to their level of blog-awareness. Some readers are rather savvy, while others who might have started reading my blog after hearing me speak are just new to the medium. I have thought about starting another blog for beginners, sort of a Blog 101. But the idea of managing two blogs is something I don't want to deal with.
I try to avoid the meta-blogging trap, but sometimes there are things that I feel would be interesting to my readers. What to do, what to do :-) One part of the blog design update will be a meta-blog sidebar. Similar to what Jeremy Harrington has done with his 'Recent Finds' sidebar; just a link with a sentence.
I plan to launch the revamp sometime in August. For now if you have any comments or suggestions let me know.
A few weeks ago there was a release about the new BlogStar Network. The 'network' is a new offering of MindComet, an Orlando-area web firm. A few colleagues and I have had some offline discussions about the validity of this type of network. According to the BlogStar site the service:
...recognizes and utilizes the power of Consumer Generated Media to allow corporations to communicate their message through Blogs by way of advertising, testimonials and product reviews. Bloggers and Blog owners are compensated for their participation in corporate communications based on reach and involvement.
it goes on to say:
Each campaign and project is customized based on the needs of the advertiser or sponsor. Members of the network are selected and approached based on the content and reach of their individual blogs. Compensation ranges from free products to thousands of dollars per month depending on the blog, scope and objectives of the campaign.
There is an 'Apply' link on the site, but no other information on how to contact them directly (other than a link to MindComet) for questions or comments. The main question I have is will the 'paid' bloggers notify their readers that they are being paid to pitch a product. How transparent will they be (ahh my favorite word)? It not, I imagine there is the possibility the paid bloggers could be outed by the blogosphere.
Continue reading "Some Questions About the BlogStar Network" »
Church of the Customer blogs about the Whole Foods marketing philosophy. In the post Jackie Huba discusses some marketing budget numbers and compares Whole Foods to Safeway. It's the last comment that really tells the story though:
If we were to simply compare the two supermarket giants:
* Safeway: Spend money on ads telling customers we're great
* Whole Foods: Spend money on being great
Well said. When I speak to marketing and PR groups one of my initial slides is a quote from Jeff Bezos of Amazon.com. Jeff was interviewed by Wired about the changes in Amazon's advertising campaigns.
Is this a trend?
Yes, more and more money will go into making a great customer experience, and less will go into shouting about the service. Word of mouth is becoming more powerful. If you offer a great service, people find out.
In the magazine world, we rely on ads. Should we be terrified?
I'm not saying that advertising is going away. But the balance is shifting. If today the successful recipe is to put 70 percent of your energy into shouting about your service and 30 percent into making it great, over the next 20 years I think that's going to invert.
Think about how many times you go out of your way to tell a friend about a good experience you had with a company? Or a bad one?
CyclingNews.com has posted an interview with Lenny Futura. Who is Lenny Futura? He's the artist that created the unique icon set for Lance Armstrong's Time Trial Bike.
The cool icon set received quite a bit of press when Lance rode the bike to second place in Stage 1 of Le Tour. Nike has had some details of the bike at WearYellow and NikeCycling.com. (See also TDF Blog post)
The article points out that Lenny also created some of the graphics for Lance's 10//2 clothing line.
I am having lunch today with two editors at the Orlando Sentinel. Specifically, Mark Russell - Managing Editor and Anthony Moor - OrlandoSentinel.com Editor. We'll be talking blogs, podcasting, participatory journalism/citizen's media and other such topics. Any specific questions you would like to ask? Leave a comment or e-mail me.
Here are some links to some recent blog articles in traditional publications. Why am I linking to these two articles? Because I was quoted in them. How's that for transparency!
- Ragan's Media Relations Report - Making the case for ‘ghost-blogging’
- Orlando Business Journal - Corporate quandary: To blog or not to blog
The Ragan article discusses whether blog posts should be ghost-written. I did that interview quite a while ago and I think the writer perfectly captured what I said. The subject is a touchy one, and something that I am being asked about quite a bit; actually, the comment is, "can't you write this?" I have helped a few clients with initial thoughts or subject areas, but I make sure the content is in their own words. My only complaint about the Ragan article is that all the other firms mentioned received links, while I did not. (Quick thanks to Morgan McLintic for sending the Ragan ProfNet lead my way)
The OBJ article was a bit different. The writer, Chris Kauffmann, knew very little about blogs. The majority of the interview was spent doing background on the medium. As usual, an hour interview turned into a few select quotes. Most notable was: "It is extremely important that blogs not be done by a company's public relations or marketing personnel, but by 'the people who do the real work'." My friend Matt Gomez of Channel Intelligence (who was also featured in the article), jokingly pointed out that I made it sound like PR and marketing people don't do 'real work'.
The OBJ writer was looking for a number of local business blogs in the Orlando market, but there aren't that many. I told Chris to contact Buzz Bruggeman of ActiveWords fame. Buzz wasn't featured in the article. I'll have to check with Buzz to see if he got a call or e-mail.
As I mentioned earlier, the OBJ article talked about the blogs Channel Intelligence is creating as well as a new service called Blogstar Network from Mind Comet. More on that in a bit....
I'll be in Atlanta the week of the 25th. If you want to get together while I am in the area, let me know. Currently scheduled:
- Dinner on Tuesday night with Frank Steele of the TDF Blog
- Atlanta Media Bloggers meeting on Thursday night.
Unfortunately, I will not be in town early enough to make the Scoble meetup on Saturday night.
Just doing some test posting from the Tampa AdFed meeting. :-)
For the past three days I have been flooded with comment and trackback spam that contains links to Google and Yahoo. It's not the normal pills/porn/mortgage stuff that's full of URLs. This recent spam is just a simple comment like:
I come from the best search engine: google.com
OR
I come from the best search engine: yahoo.com
The e-mail address provided is something like, google@yahoo.com or vice-versa. The spam is not coming from Yahoo or Google (a quick check of the IP addresses confirms that). Since the comment is not linking to a spammer site, I can only assume it is an attempt to flood my blog with links to the major search engines to prompt a de-listing???
Anybody else seeing this?
Neville Hobson posted about a disgruntled Land Rover 3 owner and his blog campaign to get a replacement vehicle from Land Rover. We're seeing more and more of these 'upset customer' blogs, heard about Dell's problems?
What's interesting about The Truth About the Land Rover Discovery 3 blog is that Adrian Melrose says he purchased Google AdWords to get his blog noticed. Not many bloggers will go to the expense of an AdWords campaign to promote their blog, but in Adrian's case a few hundred spent to get a new vehicle might be worth it.
Last month I posted about another blog that was using AdWords. The Gaylord Palms Resort and Convention Center had created a blog to discuss the issues related to proposed convention center. The campaign is still active. Do a search for: oseola county convention center and you'll see the ad.
A number of years ago I had a Volvo S80 T6 that was a total lemon. Numerous visits to the shop for power steering failures. In three cases I had the power steering go out while on a high-speed interstate on/off-ramp. Turns out the car was one of the first off the production line. I wish I had a blog back then.
In a recent Dell Hell post from Jeff Jarvis he makes a plea to Dell to allow him to show them how blogs work. But this line jumped out at me:
Dell: If you're reading this, I'll come and explain it to you. PowerPoint primed and ready.
How can you effectively demonstrate blogs with PowerPoint? That's like when they try to show you the 'wonder' and 'clarity' of HDTV on your regular TV set. The power of blogs is the ever-changing and evolving conversation.
During my presentations I use two screens. One screen is for a machine connected to the internet where I use: browser, news reader, pod-catcher and any other software I am demonstrating. The second screen is for a Keynote (Apple's version of PowerPoint) slide show. The slides are only used for visual cues and are titled 'Lame PowerPoint'.
The majority of my presentation is done via the browser, showing a variety of blogs and search tools. Interactivity is great when we get to Technorati or BlogPulse. Being able to enter a search for a current event (BlogPulse: London) or the company name of a brave attendee and show real-time results is much more engaging than a PowerPoint slide.
Check out this BlogPulse trend for 'pope' over the past six months. Two spikes; death and election.
Poor Ketchum.
Constantin Basturea has posted an update on 'Ketchum-Gate' following a Q&A with Adam Brown director of eKetchum.
If I were Ketchum, I'd hire Constantin and put him in charge of their blogging initiative.
The small size of the iPod Shuffle is a pro and a con. This morning was a con. While getting ready to throw my jeans in the washing machine I did one final 'pocket-check', which I usually don't do. Glad I did. My Shuffle was in one of the pockets. Since it's plastic it doesn't make a rattle like change or keys.
It would have been interesting to see how it would have survived the wash cycle, but I'll let somebody else test that out.
I will be speaking on Thursday to the Tampa Bay Advertising Federation about blogs. Next week, I am in West Palm Beach for a PRSA luncheon.
I have quite a busy week this week so posting will be less than normal. I am working on quite a few IA and blog projects.
A few links from the past few days:
- Jen has started her blog. One of the things she'll be blogging about is her volunteer PR work at NASA for the launch this week. That should be cool to read.
- Stephen talks about the paid model for various online services, i.e. Flickr, Feedburner and FeedLounge.
- Business Week blogs about the battle between the web edition and the blog, where to post a story?
- I pointed Frank to a clueless Sports Illustrated columnist. Also SI should not call their online columns blogs. They offer no comments, or any other feedback mechanism.
Robert French has posted a series of questions about transparency in PR/blogging, specifically directed at Steve Rubel. Robert brings up some interesting points, which I assume Steve will respond to.
Back in April, I talked about 'claims of transparency' related to some of the public records laws we have in Florida. My original post stirred some interest from Neville Hobson, who I mentioned. I told Neville that I wasn't calling him out; I just knew that he often talked about the perceived transparency of other blogs.
Here are a few quotes from that post:
when a blogger or company say they are being transparent are they really? Let's take a look at your e-mail? phone logs? how about your financial transactions?
...For now I will take any claim of 'transparency' with a grain of salt. Sort of a "look over here!" distraction. Making a big deal out of the fact that you are "transparent" only makes me suspicious that you are hiding something.
It's sort of like when somebody says, 'Trust me.' So you're saying you weren't telling me the truth before?
Here are 10 Google headlines you don't want to read at Google's Press Center. (via Kraneland)
August 22, 2006
Google Says "Sorry" for Giant Gmail Data Leak
July 18, 2006
Google Closing Down 50,000 servers; "Not much interesting stuff on the web today," Brin says
May 21, 2006
Google Share Climbs to $500; Company Has Little Incentive to Innovate
May 13, 2006
Google Admits Satellite Imagery "Mostly Fake"
April 21, 2006
Google No Longer Indexing Non-Adult Content; Larry Page: "We focus on the top 10 search words now"
April 18, 2006
Google Engineer Caught Artificially Slowing Down Search Results for Years; "Only a nasty prank", Engineer Says
April 2, 2006
Google Sells to Yahoo, Which Sells to Microsoft; "Search-scape less heterogeneous," Gates Triumphs
March 2, 2006
Google Shuts Down Services Outside US; "Need to better target home market," Schmidt Says
March 1, 2006
Page and Brin Lose Valuable PageRank Algorithm in Train; $10,000 Finder's Fee
January 20, 2006
Google Announces Motto Change; Now "Only evil when necessary."
Living in Florida we have the benefit of a smoking ban in restaurants. When I travel, I am quickly reminded that not all areas have the same ban. Dave Winer has posted a few notes along these lines in his trip up the coast.
It's amazing when you haven't been around smokers how sensitive you become. Last year I was in Louisville for a weekend and everywhere smelled like smoke.
In our area, Cypress Gardens Adventure Park does not have designated smoking areas (like Disney). When I visit the park all I can notice is the smokers walking around. I am told they are working on this.
Steve Rubel is talking about something I predicted back in February. People will not even know that they are using RSS. Here is part of what I said earlier this year. The quote is part of a larger article comparing newspapers integrating RSS with newspapers becoming ISPs in the mid 90's"
For many net users their first introduction to RSS will be via a newspapers 'new subscription service' (RSS to the rest of us). I assume that many of the papers will make some mention of RSS, but for the most part they will come up with a catchy name for their news readers. Users will not even know they are using RSS. Ask a tech novice what ISP they use and you may get a blank stare, ask them what online service they use and you'll get an answer.
Yet another Tour podcast. This one is produced by the Discovery Channel Cycling Team and features Dan Osipow calling in twice a day with updates from the Tour.
The podcasts are less than three minutes long and are recordings of Dan calling in via phone. The quality is a bit rough so far, but I think that's a result of calling via cell from Europe.
For those that are new to podcasts, Team Discovery even has a quick guide to get you started. It even has instructions for adding the podcast to iTunes, so they are on top of things.
The Tour de France is only on its first day and there is already tag spam on Technorati. The tag, Tour de France should be rather popular over the next few weeks. This makes it an obvious target for spammers. A search earlier today gave me these results:
The first result (which I will not link to) is a post that has nothing to do with le Tour. It is a site promoting DVR software for your Mac. Unfortunately this will probably get worse as the Tour progresses.
Spoke Radio is offering daily audio updates from the Tour de France, but it is not a podcast. There is no RSS feed for the MP3 files recorded by former Tour/US Postal rider and OLN commentator Frankie Andreu. In order to keep up-to-date you need to visit the site each day and download the file.
I e-mailed Patrick Bulger with Spoke Radio and asked him if he was planning on adding an RSS feed. Patrick didn't know too much about podcasting or RSS so I pointed him to some good online resources. Hopefully Patrick will get an RSS feed up in the next few days.
For now I will stick with the Sirius Tour podcast and check the Spoke Radio site when I get around to it.
So much for a 'soft launch' - Outdoor Life Network (OLN) launched a new web site today to correspond with the start of the Tour de France. There is also an all-new OLN logo as part of the re-branding. On-air coverage of the Tour features the new look as well. I would have probably soft-launched the new site yesterday or perhaps the day before.
The chatter in Bicycling.com's Forum is that the site is not fully operational yet:
I can't believe the decided to do a major overhaul of the site on the day of the TdF! Is it working for anyone else?
Update: Velochimp has some more technical notes about the new OLN site.
Update 2: This is strange, olntv.com works, but www.olntv.com gives you this:
