pyrosarco

Good People Day 2008 is an idea from Gary Vaynerchuk–whom most of you know, I have been following–that recognizes good people and what they have done.  There have been a lot of good people in my life, so here is a shout out to them:

My girlfriend:  Awesome girl.  Smart, fun, intelligent, outgoing, huge brained, kind, clever, patient, witty, good looking, everything you want in a girlfriend.  Thanks for putting up with me.

Alex Hillman:  Thanks for being a mentor to me and continuing to be in the future.  Thank you for helping me delve further into the web and inspiring me to do what I am passionate about.  You are dangerously awesome.

Bart Mroz: Thanks for your input the day Alex and I were talking about where I was going.

Gary Vaynerchuk:  Awesome person for all the ideas you throw at me via your videos.  After all it is you that has me doing this, and you probably haven’t even looked at my blog.

Felipe Tofani, Thiago Santana, Fabio Sasso, Johnny Bilotta, and anyone else who has inspired me or taken a few minutes out of their day to get back to me on design questions.

My parents: For being supportive and patient with me.  For helping me follow my dreams.

Mario Leone:  For being super cool by coming and knocking on my door the first day of college.  Man we had some good times that first week haning out meeting all the peeps.  Thanks for all the help you gave me with the filming and what not.  Thanks for all the cool events you got us into at the Franklin Institute.  Man good times.  Hey do you have a sauce recipie that I can get?

Bethany Shumaker:  Thanks for putting up with my complaining at school when I really had nothing to complain about.  Thanks for missing me and stuff.  Leave the cup on the fridge, I might come back and have to use it.

Courtney D’Entremont: Thanks for those fun times we had staying up late and talking about religion.  That one night we were up until 6 am and then Hershey Park four hours later.

Karin Tsai: For all those cool times we had in high school and should still be having if you weren’t too busy with your new friends.  I HATE YOU! Just kidding.  Please call me, I miss seeing you and yeah.  We definately need to have some good conversations again.  Thanks for being there for me.

Kevin Brodbeck: Yeah, you’re becoming a bit more evil and mellow, but that’s how everyone likes you.  It’s a good thing.  Thanks for all the math help you gave me in Calculus 2 and all the cool times we had wandering around Penn.

Cory Blasdell: We definitely need that camping trip this summer to hang out some more.  Listen to some good music, drink some, uh water, because I don’t drink and neither do you.  Maybe some Sobe’s if were feeling risky.  Thanks for all the good times with the movies and just chilling with everybody.

Dan Zimmerman: Everybody do the! Do the Barracuda!  Need I say more?  I miss you man.

Gunnar Benediktsson: My one professor who I had Honors 200 with.  Thanks for the interesting readings on Transcendentalism, I really enjoyed learning from you.  Here’s hoping that this comes up someday when you Google your name.

Pavel Grinfeld: Linear Algebra professor. Thanks for being patient and helping me out when I was really confused.

Everyone else such as: Brian Stacy, Sarah Strickler, Cameron Spurlock, Abbie Heller, Becky Atland, George Stolakis, Jared Stiffler, Ian Hoffman, Dylan Rutter, my sister, Colette Smyser, Michelle Renn, my old roommates, Poonam Sharma, everyone at Drexel.

So heres to all the good people out there that I havent met.  Keep on making the world go round and you will be recognized too.

I have had the idea of this post for awhile now, however, what Gary Vaynerchuk talked about today has prompted me to write it.  In his video, Gary talks about the kids of today and how they are embracing technology.  Everyone wants to be a part of Twitter, Flickr, whatever to get their name out there and then they wait for the world to recognize them.  He then goes on to speak about them seven to fifteen years down the road, that they will be the people buying things, people that will be choosing the advertisements, what comes and what goes.  Here is the problem.

While we as kids of today may embrace new technology–email, text, Twitter, Flickr, Facebook, whatever social network is hot; we can do it all from our cell phones–the real facts are society has not.  The people who matter now, right at this instant are in their late 30’s, 40’s, 50’s and above.  These are all the people who have equity, these are the people that–for lack of a better word–yuppies will be come.  Those who are in their late teens and early 20’s challenging the brands will eventually mature and move their business plans in a more conservative direction.  Playing as if you have nothing to lose is fun when your young, you can bounce back.  Playing with everything at 50 is a scarier concept.

My point is, society has not accepted the Twitters and the Facebook.  The phone is still in, have you heard of it?  That is, or was, the primary function of the device you hold in your hand.  Not to surf the web, not to send text, not to check out what your girlfriend is doing on Facebook; it is to call people.  When some one who is influential wants answers, and wants them now, they call.  Kids today have a problem interacting with people over the phone; I know I do or did.  I am slowly coming to terms that the way to get things done in this society is to call.  Pick up the phone, make the call, you will have an answer in seconds, not minutes, not hours, not days.  You just need to learn to talk to people, interact, adjust to the new social skill that has been around for 100 years.  Kids can’t be so scared to do anything that doesn’t involve the typed word.

To jump back to what Gary said about being patient, waiting and developing your brand takes time.  I feel that it only takes this time because we have become complacent.  Complacent with the time it takes.  We have adapted to a society that comes to us.  To develop ourselves, we need to put ourselves out there in the real world.  Not just through social networks.  We need to live them, make the contacts, establish the connection in real life.  That’s how they did it before SMS.  That’s how companies were started and brands were made.  They did it then, and I bet it took a lot less time via word of mouth.

This blog is as much about thoughts, ideas, and sharing, as it is about personal outlet for myself.  Today I woke up with a vengeance to do extraordinary things with my life; then I watched TV for a good 4 hours today–wow.  I did, however, learn several new things today.  I began to conquer my qualms about calling people on the phone and even wrote a blog post about that.  After that didn’t work, I sent an email to the person–I couldn’t get him on the phone, just voice mail.  Common!

I also sent an email out about a job that doesn’t actually exist but I would like it to.  I can dream.  I don’t want to be stuck doing crap labor at some retailer that will only pay me 15 cents more than minimum wage.  Besides that, I cooked dinner for four–well most of it.  I didn’t put the spaghetti in to boil and I didn’t chop up the carrots for the salad, but I did make the garlic bread.  I learned how to 180 ollie and am pretty pysced about that, even though it really isn’t a big deal.  I gained some interesting information from Gary Vaynerchuk, see above post.  I was almost fooled by Google’s April fools joke, and was fooled by Alex Hillman’s.  Plus I got some transcripts sent.

I also found a video, thanks to Viddler, of Rick Astley–Never Gonna Give You Up.  I must say that I am really atracted to the way the girls dress in the video.  It could be my 1980’s blood, the girls themselves, Rick Astley, or just the amazing music that it is.  Perhaps it is a combination.  Hope they girlfriend isn’t mad about that.

I am also upset that Google took away the sweet drop down menu when you started typing something.  What was that?  Ajax?  Anyway, it was really cool and now it’s gone from the main search.  Now, enjoy Rick Astley–I command it.

I will figure out how to post the video code in a minute.

I couldn’t get the Viddler plugin to work at the moment so click here.  Rick Roll’d!