Tribes & Misdemeanors (Updated 10/19/2009)

I’ve been online since the dial-up days, long before internetworking or email exchange was possible on computers with dissimilar operating systems. Working for a company with military contracts provided access to something called Arpanet which preceded the internet, as we know it today. When personal computers came on the scene in the late 1980s, we initially shared files using a technology called sneaker net. This involved copying files to a 5.25 inch floppy disk and delivering to the person who needed to access the file.

At that time, online tribes gathered in Usenet Groups where discussions could occur or news could be read with minimal lag time. As well, if someone had an axe to grind or was biased by some other affiliation, online and unofficially declared social etiquette was to indicate your position in the posted replies or at the end of one’s signature. Participants used telnet to visit these “chat rooms” and dial up speeds were a whopping 1200bps.

Bulletin boards were along the evolutionary chain of online tribe building. During their heyday period from the late 1970s to the early 1990s, these venues were maintained by hobbyists or corporate system administrators and the application software was hosted on dedicated computers. Operating costs sometimes translated to a fee based service. Because dial-up access often included expensive long distance calling rates, these sorts of tribes were geographically localized and members of the BBSes tended socialize in person on a somewhat regular basis.

Fast forward to now. These days, it is an anomaly for someone to not have high speed internet access. Bulletin boards have progressed to become forums and free internet messaging tools make it painlessly simple to gather into online tribes in a heartbeat. Skype Chat rooms are a great place to get connected and interact with like-minded people and I have learned a lot from my involvement with some of them.

Most Skype chat rooms have clear guidelines posted and all of them have hosts and co-hosts to monitor discussions and ensure that members adhere to the rules. Friendships can develop quickly when you can get a feeling about things that people think and care about in the rooms. Some friendships evolve on a more personal level which may even lead to conducting business together in profitable partnerships or JV endeavors.

Over time, I have observed that all Skype Chat Rooms are not created equally and that room owners, hosts, or members don’t always play nice. Unlike face-to-face friends, you do not have the benefit of body language, voice tone, or inflections behind the words. Even when you voice chat with someone, the anonymity factor of distance permits people to misrepresent themselves. If you are a guest in a Skype Chat, you will soon learn that room hosts can be arbitrary about who remains a member. Since it is their room, I guess this is their perfect right but, if you are the victim of a random ejection for no apparent reason, it can be disconcerting.

I approach all new memberships with caution and tend to leave or distance myself from Skype Chats where the room owners are only intent on pontification of their own professional worth, seem to bully members, or where the overall intention seems to be gossip, belligerence or unfocused conversations leading nowhere. We attract what we are thinking and, if we are embroiled in mean-spirited conversations, interacting with vulgar and opinionated people, or wasting our precious time on non-productive conversations, what will we attract?

This post is mainly written to recommend two of my long-time favorite chat rooms:

1. GutzMedia Training 24/7 Chat
2. Julie’s Skype Tips Chat

My evaluation is primarily based on these observations:

1. Quality of content & member interaction
2. Spirit of mutual support
3. Lack of spammy affiliate links
4. Membership exhibits common courtesies we learned in Kindergarten such as: play nice, don’t push each other on the playground and share your toys.

Skype is a remarkable online business meeting place and Skype chat rooms can facilitate great learning. The two rooms recommended in this post have never publicly disparaged anyone and I’ve found their membership to be very helpful. If you’re looking for interaction and friendship, I do suggest checking them out. These chat room owners are good people with superior online reputations whom I have come to know, respect and like. I believe that you will like them too.

Feel free to look me up on Skype if you have any questions. I can introduce you to these rooms too. My Skype ID is marj.wyatt.

I have an addendum to this post. Gutz 7/24 Skype chat has recently made a business decision to come off of Skype Public Chat and adjourn to their free Social Network hosted at Ning. Membership is free and getting involved with the Gutz Media Live community can only serve to improve your connections and business mindset.

As of October 19, 2009, the value obtained from participation in Julie’s Skype Tips chat room has become questionable.  This room appears to be absorbed in conversations that will only help brand new Skype users, business owners in Message Magic, or people whose Skype Accounts have been hijacked.  Thus, even though the information about the history of online chats remains of some value, there are NO Skype Chat Rooms that can be recommended.

The Size of Spokane

This post is not about business or marketing in any sense other than we have to pursue our passions to live our life dreams. Sometimes, we are so caught up in our material pursuits, we do not take the time to pause and consider what we may be missing by choosing to not be aware of what is beautiful in our midst.

This poem arrived in an email subscription from The Writer’s Almanac years ago. I have never forgotten how this profound poem affected me when I first read it and have since shared it with many of my friends and colleagues.

 
The Size of Spokane 
The baby isn’t cute.
In fact he’s a homely little pale and headlong stumbler.
Still, he’s one of us-the human beings stuck on flight 295 (Chicago to Spokane);
and when he passes my seat twice at full tilt this then that direction,
I look down from Lethal Weapon 3 to see just why.
He’s running back and forth across a sunblazed circle on the carpet-something brilliant,
fallen from a porthole.
So! it’s light amazing him, it’s only light,
despite some three and one half hundred people, propped in rows for him to wonder at;
it’s light he can’t get over, light he can’t investigate enough, however many zones he runs across it, flickering himself.
The umpteenth time I see him coming,
I’ve had just about enough;
but then he notices me noticing and stops-one fat hand on my armrest-to inspect the oddities of me.
****
Some people cannot hear.
Some people cannot walk.
But everyone was sunstruck once, and set adrift.
Have we forgotten how astonishing this is?
so practiced all our senses we cannot imagine them?
foreseen instead of seeing all the all there is?
Each spectral port, each human eye is shot through with a hole,
and everything we know goes in there, where it feeds a blaze.
In a flash the baby’s old;
Mel Gibson’s hundredth comeback seems less clever;
all his chases and embraces narrow down, while we fly on (in our plain radiance of vehicle)
toward what cannot stay small forever.
 

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Internet Marketing Sharks

Among the circles that I frequent, there has been a lot of recent discussion about all of the internet marketing scams. Each of us have our own opinions about what constitutes a scam but one thing is certain, new internet marketers are easy prey for Internet Marketing Sharks.

As a Realtor®, I was acquainted with many sharks. Although I found them difficult to work with, I understood their bravado and learned a lot from observing them. Unlike Internet Marketers, all Realtors® are bound by similar ethical guidelines that are policed by regional and local boards. One of the first things that good Realtors® do when they connect with a potential buyer is to qualify them for their ability to purchase in the price range they wish to shop.

Internet marketing has no enforced guidelines or regulations and the ethical choices are left up to the marketer. Internet Marketers rarely, if ever, provide a phone number to call but a credible marketer will and, if it is there and the marketer is credible, it will lead to more than a recorded call from some opportunity meeting in the past.

When considering the Reverse Funnel System years ago, I decided to use Google to locate all the people promoting the product. I found a page with a phone number and called to ask how much one REALLY needed to invest in this system to obtain the fantastic earnings that were described on their page. Not surprisingly, the cash outlay was vastly understated, as well as the amount of time that it would take to be in profit. I will always be grateful to these Internet Marketers for their honesty.

It is up to the individual to perform due diligence for any purchase. Not everyone will persevere at this task for the amount of time it takes to gather all the facts about a product that has captured their interest. New internet marketers may not be savvy enough to read between the lines of the product or service claims. When I hear stories about new internet marketers who have over-extended their credit resources to purchase a program they could not afford, it is heart wrenching.

All too often, a website owner may have only recently stumbled upon the business opportunity and are using a replicated page to position themselves as experts in a field they know nothing about. Tiny print might include language that stipulates no earnings guarantees or cautions that income results from the testimonials are not typical. This is only good information if someone takes the time to read it.

Internet Marketers are taught that people are looking for solutions. As an authority in our niches, I feel it is important to be sincere about all our offers, regardless of the impact to our sales volumes. We know that most shoppers choose to buy on an emotional level and that our carefully crafted sales letters are specifically designed to overcome any objections. Some marketers circumvent rational judgment by imposing a fear of loss system to enforce immediate action on the part of the buyer. Sadly, as P.T. Barnum observed, there is a sucker born every minute. Even more tragic is the fact that some internet marketers will not stand behind their products or promises.

I sometimes pull pearls of wisdom from entertainment sources and confess to being an avid fan of Star Trek Next Generation so I hope you will appreciate what I feel is a relevant reference from that show. In one episode, Data criticized his captor by saying, “It is a pity that you have used your superior language skills for mere hucksterism and the advancement of your greed.”

There is a reason that people distrust internet marketers. Do your business practices support of debunk this point of view?

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Twitter: Top Twitter Tools Exposed & Explained at Lightning Speed!

My friend, Zeb Olsen is a Twitter Wizard. He has helped me tremendously, over time, and I am sure you can benefit from learning more from him as well. I am sharing a video he produced recently that describes tactics and tools you can use immediately to get a handle on different ways to use Twitter in your business.

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The Internet Overdose Song

These marketers have come up with another brilliant YouTube video that is fun as well as being informative.