« October 2006 Entries »

eComm Woes

I get odd looks from people when I tell them I make it a general policy not to order goods online. Sure, I pay for services and registration fees and the sort, but actual physical tangible goods? No way. And I realize that’s ironic for somebody who works on the web, but there’s a reason for it.

Continue Reading… | Comments Closed (42) | posted to The Industry

WDN Registration Open

When we initially announced the conference just over a month ago, we weren’t quite ready at that time to take registrations. Between the Sydney event happening that same week and the pain it has been working with Canadian banks thus far, it’s been a long haul.

So it’s with great relief I can say that today, finally, everyone can now go and register for Web Directions North. We’re going to extend the pre-registration special discount as well, so if you book your ticket between now and November 3rd, you qualify for $200 off our standard pricing. And if you’re among the first 50 people to book a room at the hotel (through our site), we’ll even throw in free in-room wifi and long distance during the conference. You can get more details on the official site, but I’d also suggest taking a quick peek at John Allsopp’s post for a bit more detail about our planning.

Come for the workshops, come for the great speakers, and come for the Whistler ski trip. It’ll be a great learning and networking opportunity, and no doubt tons of fun. I can’t wait to welcome the world to my backyard; despite the typical dreary February weather, I think you’ll like it here.

comments off | posted to Events

Re-mail

Not that I’m the first person to think this way, but I’m becoming more and more convinced that email is a dead medium.

I’m up to 150 new messages or so everytime I check certain accounts. Two or three are legit, and generally only 1 is even remotely useful. My junk folder fills up with thousands and thousands of useless messages between cleanings, and it’s not even remotely plausible to browse through it looking for false positives anymore.

The latest development is that I’m beginning to lose the ability to communicate with people. Twice in as many weeks, I have had to run through a list of email addresses with the other party on the phone, trying to find one that hasn’t been blacklisted by their mail server yet. I’ve been able to make a backup address work, but for how long? Thanks for trying, SpamCop, but please go away now. You’re making my ability to do business very difficult.

I’d ask if anyone has any fixes, but well… This is starting to feel like a pretty futile war. When do we all just give up and try something else instead?

Comments Closed (78) | posted to Technology

Mooching 2.0

Today, on the day when I found a site that had no less than 43 social bookmarking icon links to add articles to your service of choice — most of which I’ve never heard of before, most of which I’ll never visit — can we all please, please agree that this trend has officially jumped the shark?

(While we’re at it, let’s kill “Email To A Friend!” too. No? It was worth a try.)

Comments Closed (80) | posted to Ephemeral, Publishing