If you’ve ever wondered how to make ExpressionEngine work better for you in your job, this is the event for you.
If you’ve ever wondered how the other developers make EE jump through hoops and rool over, this is your event.
And if you also happen to wonder what EE developers look like in person, well, don’t miss the EE Roadshow.
EE Roadshow is an event for ExpressionEngine users and developers. It is part training, part brainstorming, part networking and all wonderful. ExpressionEngine’s online community is friendly and productive and supportive, one of the best on the Internet. EE Roadshow is our way of bringing ExpressionEngine users and developers together in a real-world way.
EE Roadshow Event Details
Friday, September 26th
Vancouver, BC
1-5 p.m. (then stay for the part-ee!)
$50 per person
Yup, you can make it here from out of town, you can get out of the office on a Friday, and you can come to a great event for the low price of $50. Why wait? Register today!
There has never been an EE Roadshow before so come be part of the inaugural one!
About EE Roadshow
EE Roadshow is brought to you by Boxcar Marketing, Venn Communications and Hop Studios, three passionate EE development companies who want to help bring ExpressionEngine to every Web site in the world.
I must say that July has been a hectic month. I have been in 4 different cities. A new place each week.
My favourite was Portus 2008 in Dallas where I spoke about the phenomenon of podcasting and participatory culture within the Harry Potter fandom.
(Do you know about Wizard Rock? Rock music based on books ... that is another post. But if you want to divert your attention, you can see my guest post on TechVibes where I give a quick summary of my presentation.)
After a month of travel, with all the best intentions of posting a great Underwire Newsletter ... I am stumped. So here are 3 things that I do when I need to pull a blog post out
of a hat or generate a press release out of thin air.
1. I scan the daily news headlines
Is there anything going on in the world that is vaguely related to my clients’ products or services? If yes, I can usually get enough inspiration to write a blog post or press release.
2. I go through my clippings folder
Ok, I do not have a physical folder, it is an electronic folder. But throughout the day, as I find interesting newsletters or blog posts, I make a note of them for writer’s block moments.
3. I look at my site traffic and the most popular sections
This can provide interesting points for casual conversation (like the fact that our post on graphical user interface prototyping tools continues to draw strong traffic). And it means that I can recycle some content. Check out our nerdy list of Graphical User Interface prototyping tools. See how fun that was.
Bonus Tip. I research silly quotes.
As Terry Pratchett says: Writing is the most fun you can have by yourself.
Online press releases can be an effective way of reaching journalists, bloggers and industry-related media sites. With online distribution your press release
may also end up on popular news aggregator sites like Google News and Yahoo News.
Still unclear about why you want to write an online press release?
1. To Drive Traffic to Your Site
A well-optimized press release can show up in organic search results as well as news results. And some services also distribute press releases as RSS feeds, which can get pulled as headlines into other subject-related websites. This means that someone searching for your type of products or services might discover you through organic listings, news listings or by RSS.
2. To Write the Stories You Want Told
As traditional print media struggles with cutbacks to funding, which means the loss of reporters and original, local news coverage, companies writing good press releases, with interesting and compelling stories, have an opportunity to attract online coverage as well as interest from journalists using online resources for story ideas and research.
Here are a couple of Online Distribution Services
PR Newswire: Big name, good reputation. Costs is $500+.
Business Wire: 8-10 percent less than PR Newswire. Also a big name with a good rep.
PRWeb.com: My favourite so far. This is an email-based service. Journalists and bloggers get a daily email with industry-specific or interest-specific headlines. Approx. $100+ depending on what type of features you want.
OpenPR.com: A free service. Ads are displayed beside your press release, which is okay unless your competitors advertise online.
Have a press release service to recommend? Post it here.
July 10-13, 2008, I was invited to Portus 2008: A Harry Potter Symposium for academics, educators, students and fans. Dr. Henry Jenkins of MIT and I gave the two luncheon keynotes.
When it comes to Harry Potter, the big question among the media is whether Pottermania is dead. Among booksellers and publishers, the question is who will be the next JK Rowling? And will there be another series as popular as Harry Potter?
As the former internet marketing manager at Raincoast Books, the Canadian publisher of the Harry Potter series, and as a book reviewer at SoMisguided.com, I’m interested in the answer to those questions. In fact, they were two questions posed to me at Portus 2008 in Dallas, TX .
Sponsored by the Harry Potter Education Fanon, Portus 2008 (July 10-13) was the fifth gathering of Harry Potter scholars, students and fans. Over 700 people were in attendance, which answers the first question. Is Pottermania dead? No.
The game of finding lower-priced gas is just a diversion from the pain of having to buy it in the first place. Maybe we kid ourselves that we make out ahead of the game. Maybe we do make out ahead by playing the game. I don’t think that matters, I haven’t seen a lot of gas companies go out of business.
At the same time all the gas companies are trying to find ways to keep customers loyal. They offer a commodity product and try to differentiate it with fancy tech-sounding additives. They have a schizophrenia. They want customers to pay at the pump for convenience, yet they also want customers to come into the store to stock up on chips and pop. But it’s a gas station. People pull in for gas or to use the bathroom. That’s about it. There doesn’t seem to be a lot of opportunity for building the business based on the site.
Now I have an idea for how gas stations can make their customers loyal: selling gas futures. What are gas futures? They’re essentially price speculation in the present on the future price of gas. It’s what commodity traders do all the time. Buy at one price and exercise at another.
Now someone has gone out and done it, Springwise reports. A company called MyGallons (ouch, I guess they’re doing business only in Imperial-measuring countries?) has launched that lets its members buy gas in bulk today at today’s prices, then decrement their account in the future. Sounds close to what I described, but not as interesting and not strategically with the same benefit for gas stations.
Also, the comments on the Springwise post make MyGallons’ reputation look a little smelly, so buyers beware.
So what do you think? Would you pay today to lock in a price for gas that you could redeem tomorrow?
We did a fun interview with Nicole Tomlinson for a story about Dancing Matt‘s internet video phenomena for the Vancouver Sun. Nicole did a really nice job of summarizing our chats and emails and the Dancing Matt phenomena.
And just in case you’re not one of the 15-million+ people who’ve watched one of Matt’s dancing videos, please let the one below load and enjoy 4 minutes of delight.
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