Forty-eight hours of CSDC: from the happy hour on Friday evening; to getting up early Saturday morning to set up, greet registrants, then chat with Telligent Partners while anticipating my presentation and the end of the day (only to get bumped to the next morning); to Dave and Busters with more great Partner meetings and a ton of fun with fellow Telligenti; to another early morning on Sunday with a pending presentation, where it was made known that I mean business (inside joke with CSDC attendees and Telligenti); to more fabulous opportunities to get to know existing Telligent Partners better; and finally to sitting back with Rob and taking it all in as the event wound down–what a thrill ride!

I’ve literally “worked” all day for seven days straight and I’d do it all over again in a second. An honorable mention goes out to Amy Wood, Delia Johnson, Adonis Bitar, and most of the Product Team, who also put in some serious hours to the end of a memorable event. 

Thanks to everyone who came out—especially Partners and international attendees. You were a large contribution to our success. If you’d like to learn more about Telligent’s Partner Program and weren’t able to catch me at the CSDC, please email me!
 

I hope everyone had as much fun as I did—can’t wait for next year!

W00t! CSDC is here! It seemed like a distant reality when Scott Watermasysk first gave me the news about three months ago. That's when I started thinking about what to present from the Partner Program. Things really kicked into high gear about 8 weeks ago when registration for the CSDC reached 60 people and we had little more than the agenda and location planned. With the help of Amy Wood and Delia Johnson, we are now 100% ready with premier sponsors, fun give-aways, and no last-minute stresses (remarkably)! Also, having secured time to present on Telligent's Partner Program just this Monday, I've been working literally non-stop all week (ask my husband) to finalize my presentation--luckily I'd been thinking about the presentation for 3 months :)

I'm extremely excited for this weekend: meeting Partners I've been working with for months, learning a little bit more about Community Server, and having a lot of fun on the side ;) See you there! 

Here I am working on a laptop without a battery. I knew it was coming but had to wait until the battery was almost completely drained to notify Chris, the IT Director, who promptly extracted it. Now the extra utility of a laptop is essentially eliminated--soon after the old battery was garnered, I thoughtlessly yanked the power cord on my way to a meeting and got an involuntary power down; having rebooted in the conference room, I was tethered to the wall unless I chose to power down again (so I claimed the room for the rest of the day); and just moments ago at home, I had to strategically plan computer placement for the evening: the living room sofa. No alternating between the office and the sofa. No documentation on the front step with my cat. No bedtime email … I mean, sure I could do these things, but restarting the machine is a major deterrent.  

Ah, well Chris is on it. Overnight is tolerable, but the marked disutility of a laptop without a battery is worth a second thought for the sake of appreciating a fully charged machine.

As Partner Account Manager at Telligent, the topic of the Partner Program is obligatory, but not at all boring. Over the past few years, more and more businesses are realizing the advantage of partners—not in the legal sense, but as a relationship of mutual cooperation and responsibility to achieve a common goal*. And it works on all levels.

The old mentality was that other businesses are your competitors. That you should know who they are but keep a safe distance; you don’t want them stealing your business. But that doesn’t make sense in today’s highly segmented market. Savvy customers are looking for specific expertise, and businesses are catching on that other businesses with different areas of expertise—Partners—can provide an extra service to their customers.  An architect specializing in log cabins may refer a client who would like a cottage to another architect who happens to be passionate about cottages. The first architect is still credited with providing a perfect solution by making the connection—especially if he retains the construction contract-- and the second architect is likely to return the favor.

Telligent is a Partner and Telligent has Partners. Telligent is a Microsoft Gold Certified Partner (again, not in the legal sense) and benefits Microsoft by developing in Microsoft’s .NET environment, requiring the use of Microsoft Windows Server and SQL Server. Similarly, Telligent Partners recommend and develop on the Community Server platform; not only does Telligent enjoy higher use of the product, but Telligent provides the platform and drives demand for custom service providers. One might think this is a conflict of interest since Telligent has its own Professional Services, but Telligent focuses on very involved, highly customized Community Server solutions; if a client has a simple, quick-turn requirement, it benefits everyone for a Telligent Partner to step in.

Again, it’s the element of specialization that allows like companies to mutually benefit from a customer.  And don’t forget—the customer is truly getting the most benefit by receiving the whole product solution through these specialized partnerships. It’s rewarding to facilitate this full circle exchange.

That’s just a smidgen about partners in business today. If you’re interested in Telligent’s Partner Program, please contact me: nkeith at Telligent …

I am bipolar when it comes to my preferred television programming: I tend to
either seek out scientific documentaries for passive learning or allow brain
atrophy via such vapid shows as The Flavor of Love (I'm only slightly ashamed
to admit that I'm looking forward to the new episodes). Unfortunately there's
much more selection when it comes to junk TV than educational programming.

As a child, I really enjoyed shows like 3-2-1 Contact  and Mr. Wizard (not to
be confused with The Wizard, though I could learn a lot from him too). As I am
an audio/visual learner, these programs materially contributed to my education
at a young age; I specifically recall an early geometry class where I produced a
parallelogram, shocking my teacher because the shape hadn't been introduced in the
curriculum. Television provided supplementary education for me through middle
school.

Eighth grade. That's the intellectual target of general programming. It's the
greatest common denominator, and supposedly viewing falls off when you start
introducing vocabulary and concepts at a 9th grade level or better (I majored
in broadcasting before taking up marketing at ETSU). Yup, and 8th grade is about
the age when television quit teaching me.

In the early days of television, the Hatfield-Wagner amendment sought to
allocate a quarter of the broadcast spectrum for educational purposes.  But
capitalism eventually prevailed as universities sold their broadcast rights to
commercial broadcasters for a double whopper of financial gain. Today, the FCC
mandates television stations air at least 3 hours of educational television per
week between the hours of 7am and 10pm, targeted at kids age 16 and under. So
out of the 105 hours per week within that timeframe, less than 3% of time is
dedicated to educational programming--a far cry from the 25% target of the
visionaries.

Thanks to those who continued to advocate educational television, the
under-funded educational stations evolved into public television, subsidized by
"The Corporation for Public Television" and "Viewers like You." Thank God for
NOVA.

Oh, but we have TLC: The Learning Channel. Really? I tune in to TLC and learn:
that I can make my neighbor's living room look cheap for cheap, that you can't
hem jeans unless they are straight-legged, and that I'm not sure I ever want to
give birth. Okay, so Stacy and Clinton are pseudo-heroes to me, but their show
borders train wreck sometimes too.

The Science and Discovery Channels, often in cooperation with the BBC, have
succeeded in producing the type of scientific documentaries I crave: string
theory, savants, and the classic Cosmos. If only the programming were more
varied and consistent ... string theory once: outstanding; string theory
twice: reinforcing; string theory all weekend: seriously, it's just a theory! I
need more content, not content more often.

But I digress. Let's get back to the children.

Today’s obligatory 3 hours per week of educational children's programming
isn’t close to the quality of 1980's science delivered by 3-2-1
Contact and Mr. Wizard. They've been replaced by Beakman's World--lessons from
a man in a rat suit. And the explanations are as thorough as a selected radial
on a multiple choice test. For example, in answering a viewer's question about
how to reproduce seedless grape plants, Beakman states they root a cutting of
the original plant as the guy in the rat suit makes not-so-clever plays on
words like "thanks a 'bunch' for the question." I think this would be a nice
opportunity to discuss splicing, but the opportunity was missed.  (Ironic note: "Beakman's World paid homage to [Mr. Wizard] by naming its two penguin puppet characters "Don" and "Herb" after him.”)

Granted, you gotta keep the kids' attention, but when you consider the
attention-retaining filler in “educational” programming, how much verifiably
educational content is there?

And--getting back to me--what about adults who want to get beyond remedial math
and infinite Cosmos reruns? Sure I'm a bit geekier than the average American,
but there's more like me, right?

It all comes back to eighth grade and commercialism. The advertisers buy the
slots with the greatest reach, the highest numbers; the numbers drop off when
you start talking about light refraction and using words like ... refraction.

And I'll just leave it at that. I could continue the monologue for quite a bit longer and still not find the meaning of television, but I think you see my perspective. Educational television died with Don Herbert. 

As mentioned in an earlier post, I’ve been doing a lot of yard work lately. It really kicked into full gear when my parents visited us for July 4^th: Mom helped landscape the front yard, and Dad built two stone steps out back to bridge an awkward gap between a concrete patio and some existing steps built into a stone retaining wall. From there, I planted a bed between the patio and the rock wall, and that was just the beginning …
 

I’d take daily trips to The Home Depot for shrubs and bags of potting soil. Rose bushes and landscaping fabric. Trees and urns. And they all went into my Mustang.
 

People would laugh at me for squeezing a 3-foot plant and five bags of mulch in my red sports car, and I’d smirk. The ’99 Mustang is a nice car, but after 140,000+ miles and a few repairs, it’s not exactly in showroom condition. The dirt in the backseat left behind from a flat of annuals just adds to the charm.
 

I’m simply satisfied the ‘Stang does the job; I feel loyal to the car, the way people do about their trucks. That car has been from Maine to Texas with me, and will still haul my dirt. In my Mustang SUV, I get both speeding tickets and shrubbery. What’s not to love?

As a Dallas Stars fan, I was initially fond of the Dallas Stars Ice Girls because, unlike some other NHL Team Girls, they wore hockey skates and didn't have pompoms. Before this season started, I had heard that they would be incorporating dance routines into the Ice Girls' repertories and was instantly curious on how this would be executed: if they can pull off a dance routine on ice, I’ll be impressed.
 

My husband and I attended a pre-season game in mid-September, where it was apparent that these new dance routines were a side show taking place on a concrete clearing in the stands. I became firmly skeptical of this new format when a new Ice Girl introduced herself and admitted she wasn’t a hockey fan and had never ice skated before but was excited to learn--I couldn’t help but wonder if she’s only there because the Mavs audition didn’t go as well …
 

So last night we attended the official season home opener at the AAC. It was a great game besides an incredibly frustrating wait in the concession line during the first intermission, and one other detail …
 

The Ice Girls had pompoms.
 

I was appalled. What place do pompoms have in hockey? I can’t even believe I just used those two words in the same sentence. I hope you understand this is not an issue with cheerleaders; dance routines are expected and enjoyed in professional football and basketball. But there are not commonly cheerleaders for baseball—so what gives adding pompoms to hockey? I know other NHL Teams have their own girls with pompoms—and figure skates! But I had been proud that the Dallas Stars Ice Girls didn’t.
 

I’m a bit disappointed. I’ll still go to Stars games and have a good time, but the new dancers will have do pull off quite a feat for me to accept them as part of the hockey game.

While doing some intranets research recently, I observed an apparent trend of older blogs being more conversational than newer blogs. Of course there’s casual blogs and AP blogs with their own style, but it seemed to be more than that. Are we getting too uptight about our blogs? Admittedly, I’ll proof read my blog several times before hitting that sometimes intimidating “Publish” button, but that’s not what blogging is about. Blogging is about getting your thoughts out there without concern about grammar and punctuation—but this is a pseudo quote from Deryl Dorsett who doesn’t even blog so what does he know!?!

The point is, if you can just put it all out there and let your thoughts flow, you should. Proofreading and refining is for PR releases. And that’s why I’m hitting “Publish” (and when I say that I mean setting this blog to be published automatically tomorrow to satisfy my blog a day for a week commitment to you, my love) without so much as a re-read

It’s ridiculous how long it’s been since I’ve blogged. The past two months have zipped by so fast, I actually asked Jose if we had August this year (while implying August comes after September—he had a good laugh at me). It’s not that I didn’t want to or thought about blogging; it’s a combination of being super busy at work and preoccupied at the house.

Yes, my husband and I bought a house in April, and I’ve had a weekend project almost every week since. I’ve really enjoyed landscaping and just generally poking around the yard—sitting on the step with my cat, watching birds chase grasshoppers, and smelling the roses. Less than half a mile from our house are the Denton trails, so we got a couple mountain bikes and have enjoyed that as well.

Work has been consistently busy with the occasional eerily quiet day (the calm before the storm?). While managing Telligent’s Partner Program and keeping up with my Professional Services accounts, I also have a hand in planning for two conferences at the end of this month. Though it is sometimes challenging managing my time among the variety of tasks, I appreciate that variety. I’d much rather be busy than bored.

So, sorry to y’all who’ve missed me! I promise to do better! I’ve actually had many blog topics on my mind just waiting to manifest (I predict a rant or two) so I hereby commit to <god-like announcer voice> a blog a day </god-like announcer voice> for a week beginning today.

 Growing up in Small Town Maine, I really enjoyed the solitude of visiting nature trails frequented only enough not to grow over. There are nature trails and parks in Dallas, but no guarantee of solitude; plus, man-made nature isn’t really nature. Spend a few moments with me as I reflect on moments in a rustic state …

·            The slow trickle of melting snow joining the larger stream

·            The smell of dry leaves and humid air under the forest canopy

·           The way a sapling can split a boulder

·           Watching river water detour in an eddy … there goes a beaver!

·           The wind carries news of distant burning leaves through the oak trees

·              I think that squirrel is mad at me

·              Hop-scotching over mud and puddles

·           Wolf tracks!

·             Inspecting tiny wild flowers for all-too-often overlooked wonders

·           Deer graze a family meal as the sky turns dusk

·           Chewing teaberry leaves found trailside

·             Hello, Mr. Butterfly

·            The frog pond stinks, but there are many tadpoles and dragonflies to catch

·           Get to the wild blackberries before the birds do!

·            Where’s a good skipping rock?

·           When I rejoin the neighborhood kids, rotten crab apple fight!

It’s been a few since I last posted. I’ve been thinking about blogging about email a lot recently, though, and I’m quite sure I could write a lengthy—hence boring—breakdown of several specific aspects of email and the various ways it helps or erodes communication. But for now, we’ll settle for a shorter rant on “Reply to All.”

There is great power in the “Reply to All” button. With a single mouse click and a few strokes of the keyboard, your voice can be heard by dozens of people in an instant. But beware: with the wrong use, this great power can work against you. You must consider your recipients, Young Jedi, before sending the message.

If all your recipients don’t need to know what you are about to say, consider not replying to all. If a receiving party is too busy to read every reply or simply doesn’t care, the email is clutter and just another piece to sort.

If your message could be taken negatively, don’t reply to all—or anyone, really. Any sentiment even perceived as being negative will only be amplified through text. (There is an abundance of non-verbal communication lost though test, but that is another rant.) A phone call would be a more effective way of potentially delivering a sensitive message.

Related to “Reply to All” is adding recipients which I’ll go ahead and include now. Again--very useful in many situations, but also potentially irritating. Two scenarios are particularly irritating to me …

First, the sender includes my boss(es). The proper use of this power would be to praise or criticize my work habits, but that’s actually a rare occurrence.  More often it seems to be a desire for attention or an attempt at adding urgency to the request. There’s no need for this: I respond to all (relevant) emails as promptly as possible. If I slack, you may include my boss :)

The second scenario is adding recipients to CYA. I get it—you want people to see that you’re working … Okay, I don’t have any constructive criticism here; it’s just annoying. It has potential to fall into that first bucket of clutter.

Now for a CYA of my own: These are all generalizations. Obviously, there is a time and a place for all this. But thanks for letting me vent :)

“I don’t know.” I say it fairly often during a work week. It doesn’t mean I’m not smart; it simply means I know what I don’t know and I’m not willing to substitute a guess or an assumption for an answer. This is a virtue that is true to Telligent in general; I value that there is no place for BS or salesy blabber at Telligent. It helps the company work more effectively as a team because saying ‘I don’t know’ makes everything else you say more credible.

You’ve probably noticed a trend of user-generated content. It works well on the Internet, but lately the trend has spread to TV, borrowing Internet-produced content to fill 30 minutes of airtime. VH1’s Web Junk pulled it off—that is, if you’re not a big Internet surfer and/or happened to miss a particular clip. (I’d say I’d seen 60% of the junk they dished out.) More recently, CNN’s Headline News jumped on the bandwagon with News to Me: a “news” program dedicated to stories submitted by viewers.

News to Me (which I watched over the weekend and which prompted this post) is a good concept in theory—though MTV tried a similar show format several years back that apparently didn’t stand the test of time. However, the bulk of the show was filled with Internet clips. They showed a portion of a Flash fight animation which was definitely entertaining—when I watched it on my computer a year ago—but is that newsworthy? 

They also referenced a clip available on YouTube about an unexpectedly moving high school speech titled “The ‘R’ Word.” At no time did they mention what the speech was about. The “news” story centered around the popularity of the clip rather than the content of the clip (which I inferred was about the often insensitive use of the word “retard”). I had hoped that this was a well-planned strategy to generate interest and pull traffic to the website, but there was no reference to the clip on the show’s page. Very disappointing.

So why bother broadcasting an Internet clip that has already been viewed by millions of people if you’re not going to communicate the point of the video? Are the simple facts that the popularity of the clip spread like wildfire and millions of people have viewed the clip online enough to call it news? If I managed to get a few million people to click on a link to a picture of my cat, would they put it on the news? Sadly, it seems they would!

Look, I know the Internet is still evolving, but by design millions of people are likely to consume any given content. If you’re gonna bridge the gap for the mere hundreds of thousands of people who don’t connect on a daily basis, at least make an attempt at making it informative. Or don’t call it news.

This past Thursday I surprised my husband Jonathan with tickets to the Dallas Symphony. That’s all I told him, and he didn’t take it as a happy surprise because the President of his company called a developer meeting that very day putting the pressure on the team to work harder and because he was seemingly unprepared for the symphony in cut-off cargo shorts. But the show that evening was Video Games Live.

What a mixed bag of symphony-goers! Classy couples in black suits and dresses sat aside rebellious teens in black tees screen printed with the acronym RTFM. Link waited his turn in the Will Call line. Ages ranged from six to sixty—but they were all gamers (potentially except for the symphony season ticket holders, likely those in suits?).

I observed a Guitar Hero II tournament while sipping a gin and tonic. I asked Jonathan, “Do you get it yet?”

“Yeah, we’re at the symphony and there are video games here,” he replied, still distracted by the work that awaited him at the office.

We took our seats amongst an enthusiastic crowd. The conductor took the stage like a rock star as the audience howled. The symphony commenced in sync with lasers and a big screen projector. For most of the show, I found myself contemplating which was more amazing: the simplicity of the millennia-old technology of air movement though a metal tube to create a multitude of color and emotion through sound, or the still-evolving composition of basal zeros and ones to form a visual symphony of game play.  The juxtaposition of the two was elegant.

Jonathan warmed up and relaxed after the intermission and a stiff Crown and Coke when the must-hear scores began to play. The Internet-famed Martin Leung performed the Super Mario Bros. theme on the piano while blind folded and also checked the Tetris theme off the must-hear list. The Dallas Symphony delighted the crowd with the Final Fantasy VII score, and affirmed the outing by performing the World of Warcraft theme—Jonathan’s favorite.

Overall, I give the show 4 out of 5 stars. I had high expectations of being overwhelmed; I was merely entertained. The audience participation bit was slightly disappointing as the motion feedback device was frustratingly sluggish; however, the second audience participation piece rectified the first when a 15-year-old girl totally pwnd an 18-year-old boy at classic Fogger—which was released 10 years before she was born, by the way--winning herself a $2500 AMD-powered Acer Ferarri laptop (which Jonathan says is awesome … a year and a half ago).

In closing, the next time Video Games Live comes to your town, definitely check it out—and leave the tie at home!

You might be surprised to hear that Dallas has a great hockey program, with five Dr. Pepper Star Centers and a few more independent rinks across the metroplex. They have kids’ leagues, women’s leagues, and all levels of adult leagues; I have been playing in I-League (instructional—or not-awesome-yet) with True.com, my husband’s employer, for about 9 months.

In my third career game, I blocked a slap shot with my thumb and cracked it at the very base. I ignored my gut feeling that it was broken and played out the period. From that experience, I realized a one-handed hockey player is pretty useless and sat the bench the remainder of the game. Beers and ice did not dull the pain over night, and I confirmed my suspicions of a full-on break at the ER the next day.

Following up with the orthopedic specialist, I found out Doc is also a hockey player--and come to find out, he gets a lot of work from the Euless rink. It was nice to be treated by a fellow hockey player; upon asking when I can compete again, Doc said 6 weeks … but he’s not likely to follow his own recommendation.

So … this Friday’s game … during warm-up … I got taken out by a team member (not sure why I am admitting this publicly)… he lost an edge and slid into my feet, inverting me. I landed on my shoulder. Heard a little pop. “Manned” up and played three periods. Survived for a couple days on a left-over prescription from my wisdom teeth extraction before being urged by my husband to visit the hospital. Confirmed that that pop was the separation of my shoulder (torn ligaments). Now I get to follow up with the Doc again. My orthopedic specialist loves hockey.