lonnie b hodge › Comments

Paddy Fields. - Robert Scoble

Any shopping done ? - imran

imran: Guinness. :-) - Robert Scoble

where is my vuitton purse? - Francine Hardaway

Francine: in Hong Kong! We will be there Monday. - Robert Scoble

The only police that are here asked me to pay the bill. - Robert Scoble

The two secret police officers waiting outside to take you in :-P - Amit Morson

Now that's good police work. Did they ask you to pay their bill as well? :) - Shmoe

EEP. Be careful! - Tanya

My credit is getting crunched! Damn communists! :-) - Robert Scoble

Hi Robert, I've been following your posts from China and I'm quite impressed. Are we witnessing a radical change in China ? Should we be worried that this change will bring a major impact to our economies (bigger than the one we have already witnessed) ? - Miguel Albano

They are probably not as concerned about foreigners saying that. It's kind of expected really. It can be easy to think situation is better than it is, but undeniably I share your belief that the democratic situation is slowly improving. We shall not forget that democracy and freedom of speech must be reached by willing people in their own tempo. - Monia

There's always a work-around - paul mooney

It reminds me what Roger Waters once said "Fear Builds Walls" chinese government must be afraid on giving power to the people... - Peter Palatnik

Is there a moo.com competitors there? I can't find any. - adolfo foronda

Damn, Scoble's charm always saves him ;) - Pranav Bhasin

the Chinese are at a cross-rounds, the fred exchange of ideas is good for the country but bad for the government. I'm sure they'll find a work around, the Chinese have been the ultimate pragmatist for centuries. - Robert Hafer

The question is, can locals do that? You're a foreigner, and in the foreign media. They want you to be happy with your stay and report good things about China. I'm not sure, until they become a non-Communistic country, that the locals have complete freedom over there. - Jesse Stay

you will never leave the country alive - sofarsoShawn

You have 30 seconds... - Carlos Granier-Phelps

Imagine if they did stomp on Scoble. He would get tons of press for it, they would look bad, and only Robert wins. So I'm sure it's a strategic reason he is being left alone. I used to get emails from a record label in China. Haven't for years. He just disappeared. - MarkCarras

It's in their best interest to make an American think things are becoming freer, really. See if you can talk to some locals about this stuff, maybe then you'll start getting some pushback. - Victor Ganata

News of the day. Blogger Robert Scoble mysteriously disappeared, never to be heard from again. - gfurry

Wait, wait, wait.... Hold on here... Irish giving anything away for free? - MVB (Grinch of FF)

They don't monitor everyone, trust me. You have to be a person of interest (well, I FIND YOU interesting). - Claudia Cragg

Those are good questions, can a local do the same thing? - Daltonsbriefs

can locals get together in China and blog about stuff that's on their mind? a reminder that Scoble is at CNBloggercon. 500 of China's top bloggers getting together. are there still limitations and restrictions. yes. positive change in China has been an evolution, not revolution. the former requiring patience. the latter being the quickest way to shut down positive change. - Christine Lu

But can a Chinese blogger openly criticize the central government? - Victor Ganata

Can locals do this? What I've heard is that they have and they often get away with it. But once in a while someone gets thrown into prison for speaking out too much, or too harshly, so they've learned to be nuanced with their criticism, or use humor. Several people were wearing shirts with river crabs on them. That is a direct criticism of the government, but in a way that no government official would be able to throw them in jail for. People are very resourceful in coming up with ways around stupid rules. - Robert Scoble

When I was in China a couple of years ago, except for momentary censoring on CNN, I saw no incursions into my freedom - Francine Hardaway from IM

And, yes, locals discuss this, and many other items very openly. The newspapers here have tons of news about the milk poisoning. That is a huge change from when I was last here (the state-owned media would have never discussed something like that here). Is it perfect? No way. Far from it. But it's a lot better than most people realize and it's changing fast. - Robert Scoble

I want to buy some of these subversive river crab shorts. Or possibly a river crab tie. Can't we all get behind subtly sticking it to the man? - Andrew

Occasional: I want one that says "I've been harmonized." (Blocked by Chinese censors). A river crab one would be fun too. - Robert Scoble

Perfect! And for those of you who did not catch Headbanger's reference to River Crab: rconversation.blogs.com/rconversation/2007/09/eating-river-cr.html - lonnie b hodge

Yesterday, I was interviewed by a European TV station after my Bloggercon presentation and they harped on the political ramifications of the event. I am far more interested in the global connections that will come of you and Shel Israel, David Feng and others being part of an amazing gathering of bloggers from across Asia. - lonnie b hodge

Lonnie - I wasn't referencing that, but Robert's comment previous to mine, but that is completely awesome. Thanks for the info! - Andrew

When you can read my blog of reviews for newer software that works on old slow 9x machines, from China (without using a proxy), we'll talk about it. Even my software site was blocked in China till I changed hosting at the beginning of this year. There is a whole lot of completely harmless non-political stuff that is blocked just to make sure other stuff on the same host can't be viewed. And this is how their actions affect ALL of us...not just people living in China. - April Russo (app103)

know the feeling, sorry.... - lonnie b hodge

there are days I have to do this too. - imabonehead

chris wins hands down & bonus, he's a real person ;) - mike "glemak" dunn

@andy you don't have to "trust/believe" Amanda. I'm not really on either party's "side" here, but I will say that her points are extremely salient and anyone in marketing should be paying attention, period. Nothing against Chris at all - this is about the content, not the people. - Jeremy Toeman

@jeremy fair enough, it does inspire discussion, but content without voice / face just increases the B.S. factor for me. - Andy Sternberg

Blogging started, in part, due to a reaction to several things. One was committee-based marketing and its inability to actually tell us what we needed to know about the products we were considering (one reason why long videos with developers are actually popular). Two, we were mostly laid off and felt that the system had mislead us (which is why you see so many blog posts about bubbles and stuff). Three, the journalists didn't know how to talk about technology and didn't really care about it. - Robert Scoble

Amanda (er, Brian and supposed other "team") loves to throw bricks through our front window but she/it/him doesn't explain how we got 4 million unique visitors a month with a crapily-produced video site at Microsoft. Nor does she explain how I told 15 people I was quitting Microsoft and within three days I had tens of millions of media impressions. It's not about ROI. It's about communicating with people in a human way (which is why I agree with Andy above). - Robert Scoble

It's funny. Companies spend millions going on press tours yet Amanda doesn't question that. Why cross the country to visit, say, Walt Mossberg and show off your wares? Where is the ROI in that? He probably won't write about you (he rejects 99% of the pitches he gets). Yet Amanda questions writing a Tweet or doing a blog post? Those have far lower cost and far better chance of reaching an interested audience. - Robert Scoble

Robert - companies don't spend "millions" on press tours. The ROI on a successful press tour is actually pretty impressive... - Jeremy Toeman

the trouble is that any value amanda and brian could bring to the conversation is diminished by their cowardly need to hide behind the character and their sociopathic attacks on anyone they believe has different values. Thankfully I have learned to laugh it all off because they dont have the guts to come out in person to debate the topics - they would rather stay under their bridge throwing stones at people, waiting for them to engage with them - Chris Heuer

They bring up some good points and it will educate some and annoy the rest that think there was little substance here to begin with. But two-way conversation and debate that produces some kind of value is what this is all about and for that reason, it's worth mentioning. - Dion Hinchcliffe

I asked "Amanda" for the interview because I felt the questions raised are important, especially to mass market advertisers who sell consumer packaged goods and are curious about social media. I asked Chris Brogan to rebut because he seems like a genuinely thoughtful guy who'd be able to respond to the substance without getting furious at the style. I agree social media can hugely... more... - Tom Cunniff

Wow, now that Social media has become popular, and has marketing potential for those trying to re-invent themselves after blogging and podcasting began to flag, I am stunned by the politics and accompanying territoriality this kind of post implies has emerged..I have watched a lot of people come and go since 1978 when I started conferencing via computer..I have seen good marketing ideas flourish and worse ones go viral...Neither bothers me as I learn what works best for the good of clients and the community - lonnie b hodge

Gregory and Faboo Mama, thanks, interesting, could you also tell me how you would see it. Read: what would you do if you were in my shoes to make it happen? - Loic Le Meur

whether you hire staff or just try to get users credentialed, that's up to you. but across all subject matter, it would be nice to have an "authority" on there. so say for politics, you should have tried to credentialed some people for the DNC and RNC conventions. real time conversations with delegates, politicians and all that stuff. locally, i use seesmic to get a take on angelenos state of mind. i am going to interview local politicians via seesmic that sort of stuff. - Admiral Anika

but anything your 'citizen journalists' create can be edited in your office and posted like seesmix or newspop. imo, creating this under newspop would give you a lot more content from places that rachael can't get to. - Admiral Anika

Agree with Faboo Mama. kind of a Mahalo-like news emission. Also, if there would be a way for users to specify keywords like "business," "politics" etc which would become topics of those news emissions.. like watch-words when they pop-up in some news or media outlet, they are somehow vblogged by volunteer Seesmic users or dedicated stuff and put on Seesmic. - Hayk H.

Loic talk to David C of SPot.us he heads up a crowd sourcing journalist effort - Fred Grott

Hi Loic, does moving from Paris to SF really help in your web venture in your opinion? .. just curious.. - Mark L from twhirl

sounds a bit controlled. I don't like this newsroom idea even though I know it will make you a lot of money Loic. It has too much pretension towards interactivity when the reality is television on demand. On a theoretical playing field this is the lowest common denominator... but then again so in porn. Have fun kids! - Noah David Simon

Faboo and Hayk interesting, would you pay them or just promote them? I don't have an investment budget for that... This business model has been tried by many and failed up to now. Mahalo is a good example (not failed) where everybody is just doing it for fun I guess. - Loic Le Meur

Why not partner with journalism schools? Also second the motion to talk to digitaldave@twitter (David Cohn) - Howard Rheingold

Mark, yes, will write a blog post about this soon - Loic Le Meur

Loic also check out Current.TV - they have user-generated news shows too. An Al Gore company. I can introduce you to the CEO and COO if you are interested - Chris Saad

I mean that Micro interactions with brands are very powerful tools for marketers to engage with users. Not only News and press release can do but also seesmic release can do. - Ejang

that's the beauty of it, there's so many people online willing to whore themselves out for a logo behind them, they'll do it for free as long as they get promoted, credentialed and have access to contacts. As Chris said, look at CurrentTV. There's a lot of good content there being generated by users. Granted a lot of those users are film school students, rich kids, or people with gov't backing, but for the most part, the content is good. There's just nothing really "current", nor is there conversation. - Admiral Anika

thank you so much all, I am digesting all your comments please keep them coming! - Loic Le Meur

i am working on a news information sharing idea and have a site WOT News being finalised, a citizen journalism site so to speak. Would love to have a chat sometime...if you are interested. - Don

I think you & Pitch Engine could find a way to revolutionize social releases.I was thinking the other day,you'd be a great fit! - lonnie b hodge

good meme here, investigative journalism is in crisis due to budget crunches - ishak from twhirl

Don, would love it. lonnie, will definitely talk to pitch engine - Loic Le Meur

Loic, do you think about adding a Skype-like calling feat to Seesmic: calling real time/ video conferencing? and surely someone must have mentionned the topical videos. Not only crowd sourcing journalism volunteers - BE sure there are many who would willingly do that off their work and time. Topical videos like social media issues, leadership, how to start a company, etc. IMO there is a HUGE cash-in possibility. Say a video of 5mins feating advice from some VC (?) for 99cents or smth like that? - Hayk H.

Loic: it's not that complicated: just read this article http://is.gd/DIQ and you'll be an SEO expert - Jorge Escobar

Make sure content has a unique url that accurately describes the content, unique titles, unique descriptions, make sure the content matches the url which matches the title. Don't use tables when you don't need to, don't replicate content at other urls if you can help it. Write interesting and compelling content, then get people to link to you! Easy as pie ;) - Clint Ecker

@Loic Le Meur (loic): The SEO advice from Tolle is spot on - Title tag, url string and text in harmony - Cheryl Allin from NoiseRiver

what about troubleshooting google issues -- my blog recently dropped off google.com (was 1st), but still first on google.ca. I don't even know where to start to fix it... (if anyone's so inclined google search "craig ritchie" on .com and .ca) I'm stumped. - Craig Ritchie from twhirl

Prioritize the most significant part of the page title first. The page title is the first thing people see in search results. Better for people scanning it to see the page subject rather than your site's name, in most cases. Use semantic markup for headings (h1, h2, etc) rather than styles because google may prioritize those terms. If you use images for navigation or headings, look into SEO friendly techniques for doing so. Don't stuff hidden text into the page. Read the google webmaster guidelines. - Erik S

Say really nice things about Matt Cutts' Cat on Seesmic. get with a provider who "gets" organic, and paid search as well as up-to-date social media and IWOM--better be someone who knows IWOM as well as you with your gift for link baiting. And hire a crew that optimizes for foreign content even if you don't have immediate plans to expand into markets like China. - lonnie b hodge