Waze Brings Back Treasure Chests for Valentines
A few days ago Daniel from Waze sent me an email to let me know that Waze is bringing back their Treasure Chests in a Valentine’s Day themed promotion. This promotion is pretty cool, let’s say you are driving along and you open up a treasure chest, it might be filled with tickets to the movies for 2 or a heart shaped box of chocolates. How cool is that? The themed goodies are also going to look like cupids arrows and love balloons.
If you are unfamiliar with the Waze app for the iPhone, I strongly recommend you check them out. I have reviewed this app twice on my blog and talked about it extensively on my podcast, The Cotton Club. If you missed those posts you can find them here and here…
Here’s a press release from the company about this new promotion:
Palo Alto, Calif. — February 8, 2009 — Waze, the first free provider of driver-generated maps and real-time road information geared towards everyday driving, today announced a Valentine’s Day treasure hunt to help save the day for techies who might have forgotten to consider their sweethearts this February 14th.
Waze’s ‘Valentine’s Treasure Hunt’ will feature ‘road goodies’ as well as virtual treasure chests that, when driven over, have the potential to reward users with a real-world prizes – Valentine’s ‘movie night for two’ gift cards or heart-shaped boxes of chocolate. From February 8 to February 14, 2010, users in the US and Canada, should start looking for treasure chests along their daily commute for their chance to win. More details can be found on the waze blog.
Waze’s holiday-themed ‘road goodies’ – small icons worth bonus points – will be implemented on the map, internationally. The Valentine’s ‘road goodies’ include a cupid’s arrow, worth 15 points, as well as heart-shaped love balloons, worth 10 points, scattered all over the map. Users can use these road goodies to increase their point totals, in prep for waze’s next version which will include a scoreboard, allowing users to check out where they stand among their local driving communities.
I am hoping to have a representative on my podcast from Waze in the very near future so stay tuned for that. Also, Daniel sent along some screengrabs that I thought I would share:
EP:000 – The Cotton Club Podcast
In the next couple of days I will be launching the first installment of The Cotton Club Podcast. The Cotton Club is one of two podcasts that I am going to be a part of this year, the other is a project that I am going to be working w/ Keith Crawford on called The Social Radar, stay tuned for details on that podcast in the very near future.
Unlike The Social Radar Podcast project, The Cotton Club is going to be a lot less focused and a lot more laid back. The Social Radar will deal mostly with the topic of Social Media and Marketing as to where The Cotton Club could end up being a free for all! I am pretty passionate about what I do so it’s probably a safe bet that a large portion of each show will be dedicated to the web in general, including development, blogging, social media, seo, etc., but since I am also passionate about things such as NASCAR and Football, there is a high probability that there will be a certain amount of trash talking as well.
If you know me very well, you will probably know that I am also somewhat of a joker, and no matter how hard I try, weird occurrences seem to find me. Highlights from these occurrences as well as some older stories will also be a big part of this project.
If you have iTunes and would like to subscribe to The Cotton Club, you may do so by clicking here (iTunes will open in a new window, just hit the subscribe button).
Some Personal, Business, & Development Goals for 2010
The other day I was looking over my personal goals that I had set going into 2009. I feel really good about what I was able to accomplish in 2009 but unfortunately there are still a few things that I am going to carry over into 2010.
This is not to say that 2009 was a bad year, in fact I would say that 2009 was probably one of the best years I have had in a long time, especially in terms of business and personal development.
Personal Goals for 2010
I have set some pretty high goals for myself personally going into 2010 as compared to what I set for 2009. I have learned that I respond well when I put pressure on myself. Hopefully by setting the bar high I will be able to motivate myself to another level personally.
- Private Pilots License: One of the goals that I had for myself coming into 2009 was to get my pilots license. While I did manage to get a few lessons in I didn’t really devote a lot of time to accomplishing this goal. I am going to try to put forth a little more effort this year to get my license. I have checked into some classes offered by UCA for private pilot certification.
- Business Networking: One of the things I am most proud of in 2009 was helping to organize the Central Arkansas Refresh user group. I reflected on the #Refresh group a few weeks ago and gave some insight into how it all came together. Basically social media powered the group, but the group itself and our monthly meetings allowed me to make some awesome business contacts in the Central Arkansas area. I hope to continue growing my personal network in 2010 through outlets like the #RefreshCA group as well as attending various conferences.
- Speaking: I was fortunate enough to have been asked to speak at couple of events this past year on a variety of topics, primarily interactive marketing and social media. I really enjoyed being a part of these events and I hope to continue to take advantage of these opportunities when they present themselves.
- Diversify: While my passion is, and always will be, the internet, I plan on becoming involved in a few areas outside the web in 2010 as well. I have a lot of irons in the fire right now and I am not ready to make any announcements regarding any projects or anything just yet but I can assure you this, whatever business deals I get involved in 2010, they will strictly be sideline projects. I plan on staying actively involved doing what I am doing until I retire, these side projects will just hopefully help me retire a little bit sooner.
- Run in a 5k: Another one of my goals coming into 2009 was to become more healthy but I obviously didn’t do as well in that department as I would have liked. Hopefully I can do a lot better job in 2010. In order to push myself toward this goal I am going to try to run in at least one 5k this year. I haven’t decided on where or when yet, but after the first of the year I am going to start running and try to make this happen by at least the end of the summer.
- Build my Personal Brand: In a lot of ways I have already been building my personal brand by blogging here at The Cotton Club and by staying pretty active on social networks like Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn, but I am going to try to take things to another level in 2010 by adding some exciting new things. One of the things that I will be adding is a podcast. I haven’t worked on the specifics just yet as to how often it’s going to be released or even when the first episode will air but I can assure you that it will happen in the first quarter of 2010.
Business Goals for 2010
My partners and I had a great year in 2009 despite the economic downturn that plagued the nation. We managed to pick up some great new accounts as well as further refine the focus of our business. I would like to build upon some of the products and services that we had a lot of success with this past year. Here’s the list of business goals I have put together so far…
- Email Outsourcing / Archiving: I have blogged a lot the past few months about our premium email products and archival solutions because a lot of attention has been placed on regulatory compliance in a lot of industries. I think that we have a very competitive solution that will continue to do well for us in 2010.
- Shared & VPS Solutions: Over the years my partners and I have made a tremendous investment in our hosting infrastructure. Today, thanks to virtualization, we are able to provide VPS, or virtual private server, solutions to development firms for a very competitive rate, even on a national scale. I am going to try to make an effort to promote our hosting solutions a lot more in 2010 than I did in 2009.
- Ministry Web Solutions: This past year we launched Powersite ministry solutions to showcase our web design and development packages geared toward churches or non-profit organizations. We have had a great response so far from the Powersite launch and I hope to continue that momentum going into 2010.
- Social Media / Interactive Marketing: My partners and I had a lot of success this year steering a lot of our clients into the realm of social media. We also saw some tremendous results from our efforts. I hope to make social media an even-more integral part of what we provide for our clients in 2010.
Development Goals for 2010
I didn’t do a lot of custom application development this past year so I have come up with some goals for the upcoming year to get me back into the development mindset. Here’s what I have come up with so far…
- Develop 2 iPhone Apps: I have two ideas that I think could be profitable, I just have to finalize my project parameters and complete the markup models for each project, which I should be able to do by the first quarter of next year, then I have the rest of the year to familiarize myself with Objective C programming and knock these projects out.
- Develop 2 Wordpress Plugins: I also have two ideas for Wordpress plugins that I want to release in 2010. I already have started coding on both of these projects but haven’t had the spare time to devote to wrapping them up. I typically code on these types of projects after hours in between client projects. Hopefully I will find the time in 2010, stay tuned to this blog for info on both of these plugins.
- Develop 2 Web Applications: I also have two web applications, both geared toward the agriculture industry, that I should be able to launch in 2010. Both applications are 75% complete, I am just waiting on some regulatory guidelines to be handed down by a few more states and then I can wrap everything up. I won’t go into a lot of detail about these apps right now but will when we finally roll them out.
- Develop a MODx Project: My business partner Greg primarily works in MODx while I develop most of my projects in Wordpress. While both solutions are great for content management, they are both very different in terms of their core foundation. I would like to develop a project this next year in MODx so I can become more familiar with it’s operation and functionality.
Checkout the O’Reilly Answers Social Network
I am typically not one to recommend a social network to my clients w/ the exception, of course, of the already established networks such as Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Tumblr, etc. My whole philosophy regarding social networking at this stage of the game is that if you want to build a community, build upon what’s already out there as much as possible (Facebook API, Twitter API) and don’t try to re-invent the wheel.
However, I have always felt that strong, reputable Niche networks could exist externally if they were packaged correctly. A good example of such a network that is currently in Beta right now is O’Reilly Answers. O’Reilly has a good vision with this network, and of course they have some really positive things in their favor already such as Awesome Reputation, an Established Following, and a Trusted Name, what more could you ask for?
You can also look at the Network and tell that there were some clear objectives put into place while developing this solution. They obviously wanted it to be user friendly, functional, and interactive. There are basically three ways you can interact inside O’Reilly Answers:
Share Your Knowledge
You can actually enter in blog posts and tag them according to your subject matter and other users can comment you on your posts. This is one area that I think they could have done a little differently. We all manage our own blogs externally, why would we want to post our content on their website as well and have 2 comment systems running at the same time to follow up w/ readers? My thoughts on this part are that they could have put into place some sort of RSS option where you could aggregate your content from your blog and have your friends inside the network click out to read your posts. Maybe I am not seeing the big picture on this, but as a workaround I posted about 3/4 of 2 blog posts into their network along w/ a link at the bottom to get to the remainder of my post on my blog.
Ask A Question
Since O’Reilly has been catering to the Technically Minded community for so long, you can rest assured that some pretty sharp folks are going to be hanging around in this community. Well, let’s say you have a question about a project you are working on, you can post that question to the community, tag it, and before you know it some of the sharpest minds in the world are answering your question. This is an area where I really see this network having value for a lot of us…
Answer a Question
Let’s say someone asks a question and you know the answer, you can provide them w/ your insight w/ ease. I think that this networking model is going to speed up the “obstacle to solution process” once the network get’s off the ground.
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Also, just a few notes regarding the Network as it is right now. There are obviously some bugs, I had a couple of errors pop up on me when I was setting up my profile, this is to be expected w/ a new release like this. Give them time, I am sure that O’Reilly will iron out all of the kinks very soon. Here’s some basic information that was forwarded to me today from our Account Rep at O’Reilly…
We’re launching the beta of O’Reilly Answers, and I’m inviting you to be part of it. In brief, O’Reilly Answers is a community site for sharing knowledge, asking questions, and providing answers that brings together our customers, authors, editors, conference speakers, and Foo (Friends of O’Reilly).
Why Answers, and why now?
O’Reilly is at the center of an amazing exchange of knowledge sharing and idea generation. We’ve created the usual means of facilitating communication between customers, O’Reilly folks, and the outside experts we call "alpha geeks" who contribute to O’Reilly books, conferences, and websites. We can connect through reader reviews, errata submissions, book forums, blog comments, Get Satisfaction, our customer service department, and more. But too much of this conversation is siloed, and not enough is public (e.g., discussions on our internal mailing list for editors, or personal responses to customer questions). O’Reilly Answers will be the place where much of that communication happens from this point forward.Why participate?
The lofty reason: Like O’Reilly, you want to "change the world by spreading the knowledge of innovators." That’s our mission, and we’ve been fortunate enough to build a community of passionate, committed people who love to learn and share their knowledge as they work towards a better world for us all.The "nice, but what’s in it for me" reasons: reputation, recognition, and rewards.
Get Recognized: "Find interesting people" is a core activity at O’Reilly, and an important component of our success. We see Answers as an important way to discover and connect with our next authors, online instructors, videographers, and speakers.
Build Your Reputation: You’ve learned a lot, why not get credit for all that knowledge? As your submissions to Answers are voted up, your personal reputation on the site increases. At launch, your reputation will be based solely on your participation in O’Reilly Answers. Soon, we’re expanding across oreilly.com, so the book errata and book reviews you’ve submitted, books you’ve registered, and conferences you’ve attended, will add reputation points. You’ll also earn badges to mark accomplishments and milestones.
Earn Rewards: Glory is great, but discounts and deals are nice, too. We want to reward your contributions to the O’Reilly community. Shortly we’ll have a point-based system in place that you can redeem for books, training, courses, and conferences. Details soon, but in the meantime, any actions you take now will count towards your total points.
This is just v.1: The best part of any project on the web is watching it take on a life of its own. With that in mind, we’re looking forward to *your* suggestions about where O’Reilly Answers should go, what features should be added, and what benefits and rewards we can offer all of you.
I’d like to acknowledge the projects that have proceeded Answers and inspired us, such as SitePoint Forums (we distribute their books), StackOverflow, Yahoo! Answers, Knol, and many others. They’re great resources, and we think the O’Reilly community can create a useful site that’s, well, a different kind of animal.
One last thing: O’Reilly Answers is in beta and you may encounter bugs. We’re still working on many improvements to the site, such as feeds for each tag, but would love to hear your suggestions for features and improvements. Please send any suggestions/questions/bug reports to answers@oreilly.com.
Until next time–
Marsee Henon
Also, if you should signup, be sure to add me as a friend, http://people.oreilly.com/cotton
Advantages to Outsourcing Business Class Email
This past weekend my business partners and I went away on our annual corporate retreat to discuss our existing business model and to evaluate each of our products and services. We each agreed that our most popular solution is one that we don’t spend a lot of time promoting, our premium email solution. There are several advantages to businesses that chose to outsource their email to us, in this post I plan to cover a few of these bullet points.
I am also including a presentation that I put together regarding our solution, click on the play button below to start the presentation. If you would like to learn more about business class email solutions, please feel free to drop me a note and I will be glad to schedule a time w/ you to discuss your needs in more detail…
- You Get Our Team of Experts - When you turn to a hosted solution, it’s as though you suddenly have an entire staff of experts working for you—serving as an extension of your IT department and allowing your in-house team to focus on the other critical aspects of your infrastructure.
- Our Cutting Edge Technology - Since hosted solutions, like ours, focus on their specific area of expertise, we can stay on top of the latest advances in their industry. We also have the resources to implement and maintain a variety of technologies.
- Reliable Access - We guarantee 100% satisfaction. If you’re not satisfied, we’re not satisfied. This is why we won’t force you into long-term contracts. If we fail you, we’ll give you your money back and help you take your business elsewhere.
- No Setup or Maintenance Concerns - When you turn to a hosted solution like ours, you immediately have a fully equipped, top-of-the-line system that will be continually updated and maintained. This saves you thousands of dollars in server hardware, software, upgrades, and the expertise to run it all.
- Reduced Costs - You can take these system deployment and maintenance expenses out of the budget. You will always benefit from the latest in hardware and software technology, managed by experienced engineers, with no additional costs and no unexpected fees.
- Scalability - When your company grows, your infrastructure must also grow even faster. Since hosting providers, like Pleth, have extensive hardware and software resources, we can scale smoothly and easily. Cloud hosting, in particular, is especially designed for scalability—since you use only the infrastructure resources you need.
- Scalability: Cloud Computing Advantage - We’re always ready for your growth. Thanks to the elastic nature of cloud computing, we can automatically add hardware and adjust settings from the cloud so that you don’t miss a beat—and you only pay for what you need, and nothing you don’t.
- Automatic Backups & Data Recovery – As Hosting Providers we know that you have entrusted us with your invaluable data—so we design their systems to protect that data. We have the resources to implement exhaustive backup and data recovery systems. We back up your data every night, in multiple geographic locations, in our top-tier data centers. And if a user accidentally deletes an email or email folder, you can restore it easily through our control panel at no cost—even up to 14 days after the data was deleted.
- Storage & Transmission Security - Businesses can spend thousands of dollars to protect their data—or they can save thousands by turning to a hosted system like ours. We integrate extensive security measures to protect your data from physical threats—such as theft, overheating, power outages, and fire—as well as technical threats from hackers or prying eyes. Our data centers are designed to protect your data from all physical and technical threats. And to secure your data during its journey through cyberspace, our system uses DoD standards-based protocols, as well as extended SSL encryption, and we meet all PCI DSS data security requirements for information security.
- Automatic Software Upgrades - When you choose hosted apps like ours, you don’t need to worry about downloading and installing software upgrades or security patches. Your system will always be up-to-date. We stay on top of upgrades and security patches around the clock, so you’ll always be using the latest versions of all system software. And we partner with leaders in the security industry, to give you the strongest level of protection available.
- Data Access - With hosted apps like ours, you benefit from having a wide range of data access options. This flexibility helps your employees to be more productive, compared to employees who are limited to using only a specific computer or specific software. Location is no longer an issue. You can access and manage data from any Internet-connected computer or mobile device. And your data transmissions are secured, to avoid any possibility of data leakage.
- Federal Regulations & Compliance – We stay on top of the regulations so you don’t have to. We provide the storage, compliance, and retrieval features needed for audits, legal requests, and other business needs. Our optional archiving service is designed to meet e-discovery, regulatory, and industry guidelines for data retention, and is ideal even for companies that need to adhere to the highest levels of compliance.
Agile Messenger for the iPhone
My business partners and I frequently jump in between Google Talk and Microsoft Messenger to discuss projects during the day. When we are out of the office however we usually are forced to call one another if we need to ask a question about a project. In the past I have used a few mobile messenger applications that allowed me to connect to my partners at their computers using my MSN Messenger account or my Google account but I haven’t found one yet that does as good of a job as the Agile Messenger for the iPhone.
The Agile Messenger allows you to plug in your account information from MSN®, Yahoo!®, ICQ®, AIM®, GoogleTalk® and Jabber. It also does a good job importing your buddy lists from each of these services so you can easily see who’s online. The application also utilizes push technology so even if you are not in the application it will alert you if someone is trying to reach you for instant messaging.
With the Agile Messenger you can also do photo and video messaging. There is also a push to talk feature that allows you to use your phone as a walkie-talkie to send instant voice messages while on the road. It’s a little pricey but if you rely on messenger to connect to your co-workers, it’s pretty easy to justify. Here are some screenshots from the app that I have installed on my phone:
Click here to Learn More Agile Messenger in the App Store
AT&T Media Kit for iPhone 3GS
Until I got an iPhone I didn’t realize how big of a deal the whole MMS thing was going to be but now that I have one I know it’s going to be. Apparently the big day for the release of the MMS (multimedia messaging service) is going to fall on September 25th. I can only imagine the amount of bandwidth consumed that day…
We know many of our iPhone customers are eager for an update on our rollout schedule for Multimedia Messaging Service (MMS). We’ve been working for the past several months to prepare our systems and network to ensure the best possible experience with MMS when it launches – and that launch date is: September 25 for iPhone 3G and 3GS customers. MMS will be enabled through a software update on that day.
We know that iPhone users will embrace MMS. The unique capabilities and high usage of the iPhone’s multimedia capabilities required us to work on our network MMS architecture to carry the expected record volumes of MMS traffic and ensure an excellent experience from Day One. We appreciate your patience as we work toward that end.
We’re riding the leading edge of smartphone growth that’s resulted in an explosion of traffic over the AT&T network. Wireless use on our network has grown an average of 350 percent year-over-year for the past two years, and is projected to continue at a rapid pace in 2009 and beyond. The volume of smartphone data traffic the AT&T network is handling is unmatched in the wireless industry. We want you to know that we’re working relentlessly to innovate and invest in our network to anticipate this growth in usage and to stay ahead of the anticipated growth in data demand, new devices and applications for years to come.
We thank you for your business and look forward to keeping you updated on our initiatives.
ESPN’s Fantasy Draft Kit for the iPhone
Last night close to 20 of my buddies all came over and we had a live draft using one of those boards you can order online. Granted the process was a little more drawn out and less efficient than simply doing the draft online but we had a really good time doing it and I guess that’s all that matters.
Of course w/ everyone needing to research out their roster it seemed like we had 2 laptops setup for every one person in attendance. It looked like a genuine nerdfest. To make things even nerdier, we had constructed a podium from cardboard that our commissioner JT had decorated up just for this occassion. By the time the Dominoes pizza delivery guy got here the tension in the room could be cut w/ a knife…
We went on our way of setting up our teams and researching out available talent. I was extremely pleased to get my normal QB Peyton Manning early in round one, I usually build my team around him if possible. Instead of using my laptop to track the players, I downloaded the iPhone app from ESPN’s fantasy draft kit and used that instead. I was amazed at how easy it was to navigate between players and find just the right ones to make up my lineup. Here are some screenshots of the players I selected for my roster. I know it’s late in the game for drafts but if you still haven’t had yours yet, be sure to checkout this app for the iPhone.
So far this has to be my favorite iPhone application of the week…
My First Month w/ the iPhone
Okay, I have had my iPhone for a month now, I know I am a late adopter, but I was so hesitant to get an iPhone for a couple of reasons I have mentioned here before but left with little option I decided to give it a try. As I have mentioned in the past, I have always been pretty hung up on the Palm products (not the ones using Windows, but using the PalmOS) and always have had great luck w/ my Treo. AT&T informed me that it was going to likely be January or February before the Pre came out, which is the Treo’s predecessor and the biggest challenger to the iPhone in my opinion. It’s already available for Sprint but they have the deal locked in w/ Palm kind of like AT&T has with Apple.
Once I brought the phone home and realized that it would indeed synchronize my Outlook calendar and contacts I was very relieved. I had heard a lot of rumors that it wouldn’t talk to Outlook and that was a deal killer for me if that was true. Once I loaded iTunes and synchronized it asked me to point out Outlook for my calendar and contacts so I knew from that point on that things were going to be okay.
I went into the App store and quickly grabbed up some Apps that I knew I was going to be needing, for instance Basecamp. I will launch a post soon with a list of iPhone apps that I am using and how I like them, that will likely become a weekly feature here if I keep discovering new apps that can bring value or productivity. I am not much of a gamer so don’t expect a lot of cool game recommendations.
After having been with this iPhone for a month now I am ashamed that I didn’t make this jump sooner. Don’t get me wrong, the Palm Treo served my needs well for several years now (I have had 3 different models) but the versatility that the iPhone has for my business is incredible. Not only can I stay linked up to all of the important social locations on the web (Facebook, Twitter, FriendFeed, LinkedIn, etc.) but I can also connect to my Basecamp and utilize some handy PHP reference tools and cheatsheets as well.
I have to thank all of you that recommended the iPhone, it has definitely been a blessing just getting acquainted with it. More to follow on this topic I am sure…
Otterbox iPhone Case
When I got my iPhone I looked at every case option they had in the store because one of the things I knew going into this thing was that I am pretty OCD, especially when it comes to finger prints on touch screen devices. Well, after checking out the cases I decided on the Otterbox Defender case.
In the past I have never had a phone case that I was crazy about, probably because they were either too bulky or didn’t feel right clipped to my belt. There was also a case that I found for my Palm Treo once that literally cut me one day while I was climbing into my car so comfort and functionality are both huge factors for me.
The Otterbox was a little bit more than the other case I was looking at but it was like a sealed enclosure and the belt clip looked to be a little more durable. I have had this case for a week or so now and I love it. If you are looking for a case for your iPhone I can’t recommend the Otterbox case enough…
