Tech consultant for Olympia, Lacey, And Tumwater

I am always shocked at how easy it is to fool people into giving up not only their own personal data, but their friends and loved ones as well. I just saw an online friend post a link to a cute little Christmas E-card. It looks so innocent until you look in the upper right corner. There is where you give them your friends email. This is an age old scam people. It is as old as the internet itself.

This is called harvesting data. They trick you into giving them all your friends contact info. Then they sell that info so that your friend can get tons of spam. Follow the money! How do you think they pay for this crap? They sell the data collected. Do you see a “privacy policy” anywhere? There is a reason. You have no privacy when it comes to an online greeting. E-cards are all scams! Do not send them to me. Do not send them at all! Do you like spam? Then by all means keep this up.

Oh yeah, Farmville (and games like it) are a scam as well.

So there are several podcasts I listen to religiously. I think I should start blogging about the best ones and tell you people why I care about these shows. Many of the readers of this blog will have no clue who @jason is or why he is so damn important. Well, he has kicked off tons of tech companies and made more money than most of us will ever see. He is addicted to starting new companies and kicking maximum ass. He is also just as addicted to helping others gain the level of success that he has. He is never one to hold back information, tips, and tricks to us dreamers. Unlike 99% of the people who like to spew advice, he actually knows what he is talking about! I have learned a ton from listening to his 2 hour weekly (sometimes twice a week) podcast This Week In Start Ups. If you see me use the hashtag #twist on Twitter, that is what I am talking about.

Grain Of Salt
He is more about tech companies that have tech product, so not everything will apply to you bands and music industry types that read this blog. However, a ton of it does! It is about doing business on the internet. His advice centers around helping people create the next Google, YouTube, or Facebook type company. So doing the Hard Rock and Metal websites I end up releasing don’t fit everything he says. But because it is about doing business on the internet a ton of it can be used. In fact most of it should be heard by anyone trying to run any business on the internet. He tells people they have to move to Silicon Valley. Well, that is one of the rare things I don’t think fit me. My “start up” is more of a music site than a tech site. Silicon Valley can’t give two shits about Hard Rock and Metal. Honestly there is probably only a few other things that he says (on a regular basis) that I dismiss.

Cut The B.S.
There are several that prefer to dismiss him as an arrogant ass, but I think they do this out of insecurity. Jason is a man who will make you feel a little insecure if you do not have your shit together. If you have not done your research he will call you on it! He pulls no punches and some misconstrue that as arrogance. But think about this. If there is someone who knows a ton about business and is willing to guide you, how would you want them to act? Would you want them to spare your feelings? Would you really want kid gloves? Not if you want to succeed! He is brash, harsh, and sometimes over confident about things. In the end though, you know where he stands. People talk all the time about how they want to cut through the bullshit, but when someone does they call them an asshole. Jason cuts through the bullshit and you know where he stands. I respect that.

So why should you all start listening?
I don’t care if you are a band, webzine, record label, music press agent, or whatever else. You run a business! He talks about business. He knows what he is talking about. If more people in the music industry listened to guys like Jason the music industry would not be having the problems they are. So please just listen to a few episodes and see what you think. His podcast feed seems to be the slowest download on the net, but it is worth it. It also seems to kind of mess up when using some podcatchers. My podcatcher keeps trying to download episodes I listened to weeks ago. But it doesn’t download a single byte. It just lists it as trying to download it. Small price to pay for such great content though. Highly recommended to anyone doing business online. As with all the podcasts I listen to, it is free. There is also a great video version that is even better if you have the time.

Important Links:

• This Week In Start Ups – The point of this entire post
• The Jason Calacanis Weblog – His personal site
• Mahalo – His current web start up company
• TechCrunch50 – Great Start Up conferance he co-hosts
• Open Angel Forum – Another tool for Start Ups he founded
• @jason – His Twitter account

Top Ten Companies that have burnt bridges with me:

1. Sprint
Too bad since Sprint is known for both the least reliable connections as well as the worst customer service. All mobile phone company’s are evil, but Sprint is by far the worst.

2. Real Networks/Rhapsody
They used to be ok, but it looks like their current business model is to pay companies like Verizon to crap on their customers and re-brand it as “VMusic”. Even Best Buy has sold out their customers because of a little payola. Tricking people into using your service is a really bad business model.

3. The New York Times
I made a huge rant about this one last week at this location.

4. Tom Hanks
I know he isn’t a company per se, but let’s get real for a second. Since the movie Big all he has done was kneel down and give Oscar oral gratification. He has zero interest in making a good movie. It’s more about getting another award. And if you have paid attention at all you would know that winning an Oscar says nothing about the quality of a movie. It is because he acts more like a company that I boycott everything he does.

5. Wal-Mart
Ok, I’ve never been a big fan of this store chain. Before they even had a store in my area I did pay $200 for a computer. That was about 7 years ago though. If more people had my Wal-Mart shopping habits that place would crawl; back for the hell it came. They are killing off some o the greatest things about America. The mom and pop stores for one. Some of you may remember when you could go down to the local hardware store and there would be three generations working it. The really old guy whose only job was to put up the American flag in the morning and chit chat to the customers. He started the store when he was young and is pretty much retired now. Then there is that guys son who pretty much ran the store at that point. Of course you would have the young son who was being trained to take over as his father did. Now grandpa is humiliated with a “greeter” job, dad is a stock boy, and the kid is trying his best to hold off his depressing future as long as he can.  They are killing America and if you shop there you are too!

6. Dell
Now I know that most geeks seem to love this company and I don’t know why. I had a Dell and it was a nightmare.  The USB ports fried out soon after we got the thing. Customer service pretty much didn’t exsist. My wife’s HP has lasted longer than my Dell ever did and with zero problems. So my last laptop was an HP as well. Have not had a single issue with it either. Horrid customer service and crappy products means you will never get another penny from me.  I have told millions already and will continue to do so. You still owe me a new laptop you bastards!

7. Progressive Insurance
Under the advice of my attorney I can’t say anything about why they are on this list.

8. 5 Hour Energy Drink
Sorry, but I gave it a good try and I noticed no difference at all. My strongest feeling is that it is a total placebo. However, there are a few smart people whose word I trust that swear by it. So maybe it is a body chemistry thing. Either way it doesn’t work on me at all. Plus it tastes nasty as hell.

9. Fandango
I used to love to buy my tickets through this site. I will never do this again though. This company has proven that they have no problem with screwing over their customers for a cheap buck. 1-800-Flowers, Buy.com, Classmates.com, Columbia House, Expedia, Hotels.com, FTD, Hotwire, Orbitz, Priceline, Travelocity, Tiger Direct, True.com, Live Nation, 1-800-petmeds, AllPosters.com, American Greetings, eToys, eHarmony, eTix, Bizrate, Barnes And Noble, Pizza Hut, and tons more were also involved in this shocking scam. Please Click Here for info on that. I might check movie listings, but I will never give them my credit card number ever again. They can’t be trusted!

10. AVG Anti-Virus
Ok, I have only used the free version, but I’m not big on anti-virus software in the first place. I have obsessively used computers for well over a decade and I have not once had a virus. I know enough about computers to not get them. I don’t use the preview pane on my email, I don’t ever open exe files that are sent to me before calling the person to make sure they really sent them, I never open any exe file I am not 100% confident about, I don’t go to sites I don’t trust 100%.

So why will I never use AVG ever again? Too much bloatware now. I don’t want the stupid Yahoo toolbar and you should have given people a choice on that. Yahoo isn’t too high on my list either, but I never used them much anyways. So now I use Microsoft Security Essentials on all my computers. It’s free too, but doesn’t come with all the crap AVG puts on there. It was as bad as getting a virus!

I am sure there are more, but these are the ones I came up with over the several months I have been working on this damn article. To be honest, every time I went to add someone to the list I realized the bridge wasn’t burnt bad enough for me to boycott the company for life. These ten however are dead to me unless they contact me directly, promise they will change their evil ways, and do something major to make up for being evil.

What companies are dead to you and why?

The Music Industry is more staged than you think

Remember a few years ago when Nine Inch Nails And Radiohead both came up with very similar innovative ideas to get their music out? NIN made tons of money by giving the cd away and selling several limited editions. Radiohead sold their cd for “Whatever you want” through their website. Ever wonder how they both came up with two ideas that are basically giving away their music? Well, I’m not saying this is for sure the reason, but they (at least at the time) were handled by Nasty Little Man I found that to be a rather interesting coincidence. Remember not too long ago when Taylor Swift had that little incident with Kanye West? They both have the same agent. Coincidence? Maybe.

Now to be clear, I am not saying that either of these are anything other than interesting coincidences. However, they are very interesting coincidences. How much of the music industry is staged? Most of the things that the public thinks of as spontaneous events are actually totally well planned and well staged events. The bigger the artist, the more “handlers” they have. These handlers work very hard to make sure their artists get the most press. Press means cd sales. How much press did Kanye West get out of his “outlandish behavior” at that awards show? There is no such thing as bad press. Remember the fire at that Great White show a few years ago where several fans (and one band member) ended up burned to death? Right after wards the band had better sales than they had in about a decade. Now even I would be shocked if any part of that was planned, but that “bad press” made the band a ton of money. There is no such thing as bad press. So even events where it seems the artist end up with tons of egg on their face are good for them.

What is my point of this article? The bigger the artist, the more fake everything about them is. If you think for a second that the Adam Lambert kiss controversy was a spontaneous decision that he regretted, you are dumber than a rock! It was just the shock that his handlers needed. Him getting kicked off of one morning show was the greatest thing that could have happened. Think about how much more press he got because of it all. The bigger the artist, the more fake and planned out everything they do is. Is Lady Gaga a hermaphrodite? She has said so a few times. Her people have denied it and people close to her have said it is not true. However, it doesn’t matter. What matters is that even I am talking about it! If it’s shocking to the general public, and gets the artist tons of press, it was staged. The music industry is more staged than you think.

In this era of the Internet many bands are trying to do their own everything. I think this is pretty awesome and I encourage it. Sure it’s great if you can afford a few grand a week to hire some powerhouse press agent. The biggest value they have is in relationships they have with journalists all over the place. There have been times that a press agent will forget to send the email to the BCC (blind carbon copy) and expose their entire email list. I can grab that info and use it to send out my next press release. This will not do me near as much good as if I pay to have the exact same press release, sent to the exact same list of people, with everything done exactly the same way. Those contacts do not have relationships with me. So I will not get the same results as Chipster, Mazur, HerPR, HelloWendy, or any of the dozens of PR firms I work with on a regular basis. But if you can’t afford the money, have the email lists, and really need to get a message out do it yourself (DIY)!

There are a few key things to remember though. First off, the very top should have “FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE”. Yeah, I know it looks silly to do that in all caps but it is one of the many music industry standards none of us seem to have the power to stop. Put the date directly underneath that. Both of those should be in standard size text.

Second thing is to put the headline in bold and in larger text than anything else. Keep it short, sensationalistic, but honest and factual.

Third, put the body of your message. Most press releases I read blow so many proverbial flowers up the artists butt that I can’t help but dismiss the entire press release. I only read about 10% of the ones sent to me at best. So try to keep yours interesting, but full of information about your band. Most of the press releases contain zero information about the band. It drives me nuts!

Fourth thing is to put three pound signs (the tic tac toe symbol that is on the number 3 key) at the end of the information you want made public.

Lastly you can put any other information you want only press people to see. Like if you have a website to download the cd, get high rez images, or anything else. Under all of that put your name, address, phone, fax (if you have one of your own), an email address they can contact you at for further questions.

Keep your press release short, but detailed. Make it clear right away what style of music you play. In the world of Internet journalism your press release will hit the trash bin quickly if you don’t make it clear right away that the artist fits their format. We don’t want to tread through a ton of weak adjectives to find out the band plays polka. Don’t just describe the sound! That makes us think you are trying to hide something…like they play polka. Don’t tell the band’s entire life story, but cram in the important facts so they fly rapid fire when the press release is being vetted. Add links to video, graphics, and whatever else that the press can use to “pretty” up the posting.

Good luck. You’re going to need it.

Ok, so I have touched on this subject before HERE and HERE. However, I have never posted about this from the approach of the regular user. Some of it has been mentioned on these pages before, but again those articles are not specifically directed at the regular user. So here are the top ten mistakes I see people make. These rules work for metalheads, bands, fans, labels, online magazines, and anyone else.

1. Begging for followers.
I see people making tons of posts asking for followers. Why should people follow you? Give them a reason! Post good content. This could mean things that make people laugh, great articles you come across, or anything else interesting. See an article you like? Post a link!

2. Not filling out the bio
Just like rule number one, give people a reason to follow you. Tell us the things you are into that might be interesting to others. You enjoy metal? Saying so in the bio will get you metal fans. Are you an obsessive gammer? List your favorite games and you will get followers that also like those games. As you can see this isn’t brain surgery.

3. Use the link in the bio wisely
I have seen people post a URL shortener link in the spot where you should put a link to your website. This makes it look like a total spam account. Use the real url. I have also seen people post the link to the same Twitter account. What is the purpose of that? Of course nothing looks worse than no link at all. Post a link. Post a real link. It can be your MySpace profile, Facebook profile, or a website all your own. Just be open and honest about it.

4. Change the avatar
Using the default avatar is the worst! Of course the best is to use a photo of what the account represents. If it is an online magazine make it the magazines logo, mascot, or editor. If it is a person make it a nice close up, a cartoon head of the person, or something else that represents that person. Slightly better than the default is a photo of a pet, your favorite band, or your favorite celebrity. Just please do not use the default!

5. Using a URL shortener at all
Now don’t get me wrong, I use a URL shortener from time to time. However I only use it if I absolutely have to. Many people will never trust a shortened link at all. If it comes from a trusted person they fear it is a hacked account. Hacked accounts are getting VERY common, so it’s a well informed paranoia. If I am looking at accounts on Tweet Chart for people to follow, I will be hesitant to follow an account flooded with Bit.ly links for this very reason. I will assume it is either a hacked account or just a spammer. So only use a shortener if you absolutely have to. It makes you look like a spammer.

6. Getting your account hacked
Now of course the way to avoid getting your account hacked is to be very careful about the links you click on Twitter. That is the number one way accounts get hacked. However there are ways to make sure your account hasn’t been hacked. The best way is to look at the sent tab in your direct messages. If your account has been hacked it will be sending out spam to your followers direct message boxes and pissing them off. Check that DM sent tab often!

7. Auto DM thank you messages are spammy
Sending out a thank you for someone following you ticks off more people than it doesn’t. So don’t do it. The path to being labeled a spammer is paved with good intentions. The worst is if you include a link.

8. Auto-Follow only if you have to
Are you a multi-platinum band selling out arenas? You don’t have time to sift through your followers to make sure you only follow back legit people. So you’re forgiven for using the auto-follow. Also, bands and webzines that have very limited staff. Obviously some bands are so small that they doon’t have room for a netbook with it’s own portable internet connection in the overly cramped tour van. I have to use auto-follow for the RockMyMonkey.com account. I’m lucky if I have time to sift through the followers of my personal account. There is no way I could do that for RMM too. But there is no excuse for doing the auto-follow on a personal account. That’s just spammy.

9. Letting your following and follower ratio get to far to one side
A spammer will almost always have way less followers than the amount you are following. Noobs to Twitter will come in like a lion and start following every account they can find in a lame attempt to get followers. This is a major mistake for many reasons. First it makes you look like a spammer. This will cause the highest quality people to not follow you back. The second reason would be of course that you end up with a ton of low quality people. So if it is just a numbers game to you and the only thing that matters is getting the number up go right ahead and do this. Your amount of followers will indeed go up. The problem is that it will be nothing but spammers, bots, and dead accounts with auto-follow turned on. This is also how you get hacked. You get a bunch of phishing scams in your feed tempting you to click links that take over your account! Don’t just blind follow to get followers, because you will only get the worst followers this way.

10. Never forget the social part of social networking
Twitter is a social networking site. So many forget the social part of that. It’s a community. Watch the people who use the #metal hash tag a lot. We are a small but passionate group of people. Sometimes we talk a lot of smack to each other, but we also support each other. It’s a very high quality group of people that follow back, re-tweet, and follow Friday like crazy. We talk back and forth too. We are very social. I spent a ton of time with a friend to create the Tweet Chart for a few hundred people. Why not do something more trendy like Twilight that would have got me ten times more followers? Because I don’t give a rats ass what Twilight fans have to say or care about. I would rather have way less followers if those are not only quality people, but also people I care about. We follow each other because we want to be social with each other. It’s all about the social!

There are new people coming into Twitter all the time. Send them this top ten list. There are tons of people that have been on Twitter for months and still make these mistakes. Send them this list too. Better habits make it a better place for all.