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Last night was the season premier of MadMen, a look at the ad men of Madison avenue in the 50′s and 60′s. The story follows Don Draper, who is the up-and-coming ad star, who has skeletons in his closet.

As I was watching, I thought: What would happen if these characters were in today’s environment? How would their lives be changed?

Of course, no smoking in the office, the attire would be slightly different, and there would be a lot of technology. IBM selectrics would be replaced with laptops and tablets.

I started thinking of social networking, and how they would change it. That brought me to this idea; what social network do the main characters really fit? It was interesting, because they all seemed to fit perfectly in their square holes.

Bertram Cooper: BBS

Bertram Cooper has seen the birth of Madison Avenue, and has built an empire through tradition, and meticulous planning.Now, as the senior parnter, he gives his wisdom and knowledge to the new generation.

Roger Sterling: MySpace

Roger Sterling epitomized the next era, but is now overshadowed by Don. He was the man behind Lucky Strike. Now that his star is gone, he is trying to find his way. Sometimes, trying to glaum on to Pete Campbell’s work.

Don Draper: Facebook

With a questionable past, Don Draper turned it to his advantage to create an empire. Businesses want his leadership and know- ledge, although he is as lost as the rest of us.

Joan Halloway: Twitter

Joan Halloway knows what is going on. She likes to keep her finger on the pulse of the office and hates when she is not part of it. She works well with everyone, and brings a certain “jena se qua” to the group.

Peter Campbell: Google+

As the new gun, Peter Campbell is hungry for stature in the office. He continues to climb the ladder, looking for respect from his elders. He will eventually rise to the top, but not without making some mistakes first.

Lane Pryce: LinkedIn

The CFO of Sterling Cooper Draper Price, Lane Pryce keeps the company on track. He tries to show his professional side at all times, while still being a trusted colleague. Originally from England, he was (and still is) an embassador to overseas relations.

Peggy Olson: Pinterest

Peggy Olson is the modern day woman – working hard to gain aknowledgement. She has her issues, but does not openly express them. She is outgoing, and visualizes what she wants.

Other notable characters would be Kevin Cosgrove: Yelp, Harry Crane: Get Glue, and Salvatore Romano: Instagram (a character no longer on the show, but would be cool if he came back).

What are your thoughts? Twitter me @geekazine, or comment below.

If MadMen Were Social Networks Infographic

President Barack Obama - State of the Union Address

So I listened to the State of the Union address last night, which was pretty uneventful. There were many themes that were brought to issue. One of them is not losing jobs to overseas workers and not giving tax breaks to those who do. Yet, President Barack Obama singled out one entrepreneur for his integrity in Steve Jobs. While that was a “Feel good” moment, we have to reflect that your Apple product is not really made in the USA. Do we have a conundrum here?

During President Barack Obama’s speech last night, he said:

You see, an economy built to last is one where we encourage the talent and ingenuity of every person in this country. That means women should earn equal pay for equal work. It means we should support everyone who’s willing to work; and every risk-taker and entrepreneur who aspires to become the next Steve Jobs.

It’s a pretty inspiring line. It makes me feel that I am going to be taken seriously and I might just get help for starting my job. However, Obama also said this:

We should start with our tax code.  Right now, companies get tax breaks for moving jobs and profits overseas.  Meanwhile, companies that choose to stay in America get hit with one of the highest tax rates in the world.  It makes no sense, and everyone knows it.  So let’s change it.

First, if you’re a business that wants to outsource jobs, you shouldn’t get a tax deduction for doing it.  That money should be used to cover moving expenses for companies like Master Lock that decide to bring jobs home.

But wait a minute. Apple doesn’t make their products here. They have a plant in China that works people to the point where they continually have negative news coming back to the US. Most recently – a group of 300 announcing they would commit suicide over wages, and a chairman that calls their workers “Animals”.

Steve Jobs said it himself to President Obama. He takes jobs overseas because there are no skilled workers. Further, in the Steve Jobs book, he tells Obama that he might be a one-term president if the business owners needs are not met and they continue to take jobs outside the US.

Skilled Labor, or Slave Labor?

I remember one Apple exec stating that China can get 3,000 workers overnight. They would stay in dorm rooms and work feverishly for the low-wage.

In fact, is “Skilled labor” the real reason why jobs are ported overseas? It’s not the fact that you can get a worker for a fraction of the price overseas than in the US?

We have heard many stories from the Foxconn plant. Scandals about the workers and reports over working conditions. For $17 a day, you can work over 12 hours and get a nice cot in a dormitory…

Americans did live like that – back in the 1900′s. When Hoover Dam was constructed, people lived in communes. They had their own currency for rations, and they worked long hours for little pay. They had 112 fatalities, but more deaths to pneumonia which were unaccounted for due to the fact it wasn’t work related.

What Should Have Obama Said About Jobs?

I am not a politician, so I am not sure what would have been said better. Maybe something to effect of those aspiring to be Steve Jobs that are confident the US has the talent right now to do the job. Not that we are a bunch of un-educated misfits that need to stay in school.

After all, Steve Jobs dropped out of school. Bill Gates did, too. How many different entrepreneurs dropped out, started a company and were successful?

In the grand scheme of things, keeping jobs in the US is an important fact. However, to do it, will we have to accept 12 hour days at $17 an hour? Will we have to pay higher taxes to keep our jobs?

All good questions that really didn’t get answers to. And while tens-of-thousands visit the Hoover Dam every year, do we want to live like those who built it?

So I was watching Twitter today, and a post from Ashton Kutcher shows up:

It’s official @MrJonCryer is on twitter! #twoandahalfmen

Now I’ve been a fan of Jon Cryer for years. Not as much a Two and a half men fan, but more in the 80′s movies like “Hiding Out“. So I decide to friend him. 35 others had friended him at the time, but that number changed very quick.

Jon Cryer

In fact, in under 5 minutes, Jon Cryer got 5,000 followers.

The number is starting to settle a bit. 8852 is where he is at only 16 minutes after Kutcher made the announcement. What was more interesting was Jon Cryer has been on Twitter since December 16th (getting verified a few days later).

But it took someone with 90 million followers to give Jon 9572 followers and growing.

Of course, Jon hasn’t really posted anything, so I can see why his counts are low. We’ve also seen celebrities endorse someone and their Twitter counts shoot through the roof. A great example was almost 2 years ago when Conan O’Brien followed one random person. Now, Sarah Slowik has an audience of 87,000.

So now you can see the power of Twitter in a interesting way. in 23 minutes, 10,881 followed this profile.

Social Media Eggs

Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Google Plus. Yammer, Plurk, Bebo, Flickr. Foursquare, Instagram, Friendster, StumbleUpon. Digg, Delicious, Orkut, Ning. This is one tenth of all the social networks you can belong to. But the question is – Which one should I belong to?

Tomorrow, another “Have to be on” social network could pop up. They will offer friends lists, ways to communicate, ways to post on your wall, pictures, video and an API to connect to. They will also be dealing with privacy concerns, Opt-in, scams and phishing sites. They may have a simple look, or a full graphical interface. They might have ways to run contests, or place advertisements.

We learn that social media is becoming an important factor in our business and personal lives. That fine line – which, by the way, we just muddled – shows us that we can work and play in the same sandbox.

But what do you mean by that? There are several different sandboxes out there!?! Which one should I play in?

That is what we are going to determine. Let’s find your social media strategy.

Social Media Egg: Last.fm

What is your pleasure?

The real question is: What do you do? This is important because that can determine where you go in this social world.

Eventually, we won’t have 800 million users on one social network. There will be a dominant network, a competing network, a supporting network and a “I’ve heard of it, but really haven’t spent time on it” network.

Oh yeah. Can’t forget the “That’s a social network? Who would’ve thunk it?”

The “Dominant” Social Media Site

This is going to be what Facebook technically is right now (and Google Plus is gunning for). Maybe five years from now it will still be Facebook. Maybe five years from now, some new kid from Harvard will steal an idea from twins and come up with something ten times better. You never know.

The dominant site will have a good mix of the two. Businesses will want to work with the dominant site, because they know the customers are there. Companies like Coke or Pepsi, Ford or Chevy, Nike or Adidas, will have a desire to grab as many customers they can.

They will put together campaigns that collect names and information – for we know that information is king. They will know what percentage of kids 18-25 will drink their soda, and in return, one lucky person will win an iPad or some other trinket.

That’s the power of social network marketing.

The dominant site will be in the news on a daily basis. Whether it be on a privacy concern, or a lawsuit brought on by someone you’ve never heard of before. The rumor mill will also be buzzing with “Did you hear about…” stories, on every social network site they can think of.

Social Media Egg: Reverb Nation

The “Niche” Social Media Site

The niche social media site is what’s started to take shape in the last year or so. This doesn’t look at how many people overall they can get. More to the point – how many focused users they can get. With a niche, you can focus on that group with investors or companies that want to send messages only to interested parties.

For example: Reverb Nation is a social media network for musicians. Bands and fans go to the site to find out about one thing – Music: who and where a band playing. They can hear indy music and even put together a schedule of events.

Still, a site like that needs the other social media sites to drive traffic.

LinkedIn is considered a social media site for business. You won’t find too many posts of drunken escapades on it, but you will get great information. If you are building a business and don’t belong to any groups on LinkedIn, or you don’t have your profile filled out, then you should really spend an hour or so on this social business networking website.

Amazon is another niche social media network. You can not only communicate through this online mall, but also send it’s links through to other sites. If you are an affiliate, you could make some money off the deal.

Social Media Egg: Foursquare

The Companion Social Media Site

This would be a site you go to when reminded or directed. Twitter can be considered a companion site. You read your Twitter stream for about 2 minutes and move on.

I still believe that the average Twitter user reads about 187 tweets in a day. This can be from Twitter itself, a comment that is on a blog, or a Tweet that comes from a media source.

Social Media Egg: YouTube

The Hidden Social Network – An Easter Egg in itself…

Did you know that YouTube is a social media network? No? Well you should.

Anyone that “Avoids” YouTube is not making the most of their online social media presence. Yeah, I know. It’s video. But it’s also a way to drive traffic.

Viral videos can be boosts in any campaign. If you follow that YouTube playbook – keep a video short and to the point – you might find a new avenue to promote.

Don’t feel comfortable in front of a camera? Well maybe someone else is! Ask a friend to help you out. You can also pay someone to make a video. Heck – I’ve done it for others.

Don’t Forget: Your Website is a Social Media Site, too

If you treat your blog or website as a social media site, it will help. Even if it only gets a couple people a day. As long as you stick to a focus on the site, people will come.

Make sure you have the website linked to the social media sites. There are plug-ins that will help you do that. Like buttons, tweet buttons and +1 buttons, along with Digg, SumbleUpon, Delicious, reddit, Tumblr and more.

Disqus is a great way to turn your comments into social comments. You can share those comments on other social sites with the check of a box.

Social Media Egg: Instagram

Driving Traffic: It can Come from Different Places

Example: Geekazine’s sister site – Dorkazine – sees moderate traffic. Yesterday, I posted a video – Cello Wars. I got a great spike for the day, which then subsided. Still, I got a couple hits today. A couple tomorrow, too.

In the grand scheme of things, you might about 5 hits to that article a week for a couple years. That is about 500 hits in a 2 year span. Now, if you posted 100 articles that also bring 5 hits a week, you have 500 hits a week, or 26,000 hits in a year.

If I do the math on Geekazine, my article count brings an average of 20 people per article I’ve written since 2007. In the grand scheme of things, that is low. A site like TechCrunch might see 10,000 – 100,000 people per article written.

Now remember: that is only on my website.

I get 3 times more traffic by distributing video and audio. So, if I had 1,000 unique visits on a particular video, I can have 3,000 unique visits on my media outlets.

Why? Because my media is not just on my website. It’s on Blip.tv, YouTube, and other video sources. It plays on Roku, Boxee, Apple TV through Geekazine, and through other sources like TechPodcasts and Mediafly.

The Day in Tech History get a 20% boost because I am on Sticher – Internet radio for your mobile device. Every day, the Day in Tech History posts show up on Twitter, Facebook, Google Plus, LinkedIn and other social networks. I have a Google Group that also aggregates the show to your email box.

So, if you don’t get the email, and you don’t subscribe on Facebook, you might see it on Twitter, LinkedIn or Google+. Not to mention a host of other locations I automatically post to.

Bam! I just built a social network.

Social Media Egg: WordPress

How Do You Keep Up with All the Social Networks?

Good question! The only thing you can do is if you hear of one, sign up for it. Spend some time to see who else is on that network. If 3 people posted in the last year, then you can put that on the back burner.

We’ve actually seen 2 types of social media networks fall to the wayside. The Bullitin Board System (BBS) and the Internet Forums (although there are still some of these around). MySpace fell off a lot of people’s radars. It has been retooled and you can still create a profile. I still post to Geekazine on MySpace.

There are some automation tools you can use, too. A website like Ping.fm really helps with that. Using it to replicate your post can help you keep your sanity.

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Social Media Egg: Flickr

In Summary, ignoring social media outlets might be a bad idea. If you are on Facebook, then you need to be on Twitter. If you are on Twitter, you need to be on Google +. If you are on Google Plus, you need to be on LinkedIn. If you are on LinkedIn, you need to be on YouTube. If you are on YouTube, then you need to be on Facebook.

If you don’t have a website, you might just need one so you can tell everybody you are on Facebook, Twitter, Google Plus, LinkedIn, YouTube and a host of other “niche” social media networks.

Your social media profile needs to be webbed out. That way, if someone has Facebook and not Twitter, they still get updates from you. The more you evenly put your eggs in different baskets, the more people will see what you do.

Jeff is Sad

Whenever I think of those two words, I think of a professional wrestling match. An “I Quit” match is where the two men beat each other up until one of them has had enough. Usually both men fight valiantly and a lot of blood has been spilled. Then, when you are on the edge of your seat, and one wrestler has the other in a Cross-Legged Stepover Toehold Facelock, blood streaming from both opponents, applying the most amount of pressure possible, the other wrestler chants “I Quit!”

I felt that way last night. So I will share with you my resignation letter (sort of)

We’ll start off with a touch of history: I have been in this business of Technology in a professional nature for over 15 years. I have done a lot in my time. My profession started in 1995 as a live phone support agent for Microsoft Windows 95, then moved on to support other technologies. I built desktops on the side, which was a lucrative business back then.

I moved from phone support to desktop suport, then server support. I got my first MCP (Microsoft Certified Professional) in 2003 and since then, obtained a few certifications in multiple fields. At the prime I was maintaining everything from Exchange, Citrix and VMWare environments, the on-comming Voice over IP (VoIP) revolution, and even a couple mainframe systems.

In 2005, I saw a new shiny coin – Social Media.

Jeff is Tired

At first, it was going to be just a weekly podcast. However, after a couple life changing events, I found myself running 2 podcasts that would become “The Geek Smack!” and “Day in Tech History” full time. It was becoming a pretty profitable business. I was maintaining websites for local businesses, doing side – audio and video roundtables with the TechPodcast Network, and starting the next phase of Geekazine – the Special Media Feed (whenever I interview someone, go on a trip or demonstrate technology, the video appeared there).

The Setbacks – Sponsors, Health issues, Breaking Banks.

Continue reading “I Quit. Here is My Resignation.” »