Has Gary Vaynerchuk Sold Out?

Everyone keeps reading about social media.  That’s the buzz word in much the same way that ‘blogs’ were a few years ago (wasn’t it picked as Oxford’s Word of the Year?).  And the million dollar question is how does someone monetize it? I’ve been following Gary Vaynerchuk for a while now, first as a huge…

Who Owns My Opinions?

I read an article today about how a 16 year old office worker from Essex was fired after she described her office job as ‘boring’ on her Facebook page. Details were passed to her employers after she allowed colleagues access to her page, Miss Swann said, adding that she was not given the chance to…

Mind the Wage Gap Please

With all the craziness in the economy and (justified) outrage at CEO and financial sector compensation packages, I’ve been thinking about income distribution and the wage gap – and how it relates to younger professionals who are used to working in a faster leaner environment. Most people look at CEO and higher up executive compensation…

A Do No Evil code for marketers?

I was reading Seth Godin’s post today about whether ‘marketing is evil’ or not.  His answer was that while marketing itself isn’t usually evil, market-ers sometimes are, and that can lead to bad things. While I’d agree, I’d also take a step back and try to look at the business or marketing and advertising.  One…

Did My Senator Do a Kegstand?

With all the discussion of the changing (and subsequent resetting) of the Terms of Service on Facebook I’ve been thinking about our digital lives and who owns all this content.  And what are the implications of that? Let’s face it – if you have a Facebook or MySpace or Flickr or any social network account,…

I Wanted Bad Service

When was the last time you received bad service?  Whether its customer service or a long wait on hold to speak to a live person or having to go through 5 people via phone until you reach someone who can help you with your issue?  When’s the last time you had that happen?  It probably…