Wednesday, June 21, 2006
Living Life on the Edge
Business experts often say that a certain amount of risk is needed, when you work for yourself or run a company. In fact, I've interviewed a lot of those experts.
For a long time, I've sort of grumbled to myself that I should take more risks. After all, I don't really do investigative journalism, where one moment I'm making a phone call to a suspicious meat packing plant, and the next moment, I'm clinging to the side of a train, trying to fight off thugs and get a story in by deadline. Usually, as I'm often fond of saying, about the only danger I contend with is possibly dropping a stapler on my foot.
But I feel better now. It recently occurred to me that every day, I take a risk, a gamble that most entrepreneurs, executives and self-employed people never would dare. In fact, most mere mortals don't try it either. Maybe, if you're the nervous type, you should sit down.
I don't have Caller ID.
I do for my house, but not my home office. I guess I wanted to save money six years ago, when I set up the line and bought my residence, and ever since, I've just never bothered to do it, in part because so many people email me versus calls, that it almost seems silly. Almost.
But then earlier this week, my office phone rang, and as usual, I picked it up. I can't say who it was or what it was about--but it was a call I wasn't thrilled to get, from someone--not an editor or publicist, which are most of the people I work with--but someone who I speak to fairly regularly, and it led to a series of calls and emails throughout the day, in which I had to put out minor fires. It was a major distraction that day.
For not the first time, I found myself thinking, "Geez, I need to get Caller ID."
Then I thought about it and realized if I had Caller ID and had used it to avoid the caller, it would have meant that later, I'd have wasted time listening to the message, and then I'd still have ended up calling the person back and putting out those fires. While it is nice to know who you're about to talk to, there's something kind of exciting, knowing that the person on the other line could be an editor with a big story for me, or it could be a bill collector, or someone wanting me to trap me into taking a 19-minute survey or some long lost business contact wanting to chat for half an hour or so, when I have a deadline in the next two hours.
So, yeah, maybe the business experts mean something else when they tell us to take risks. Maybe they're thinking of something a little more edgy than not getting Caller ID, like networking in social settings that are out of your comfort zone or expanding your business. Or maybe my risky way of doing business is exactly what would make them applaud. I'll bet all of the business experts have Caller ID.
For a long time, I've sort of grumbled to myself that I should take more risks. After all, I don't really do investigative journalism, where one moment I'm making a phone call to a suspicious meat packing plant, and the next moment, I'm clinging to the side of a train, trying to fight off thugs and get a story in by deadline. Usually, as I'm often fond of saying, about the only danger I contend with is possibly dropping a stapler on my foot.
But I feel better now. It recently occurred to me that every day, I take a risk, a gamble that most entrepreneurs, executives and self-employed people never would dare. In fact, most mere mortals don't try it either. Maybe, if you're the nervous type, you should sit down.
I don't have Caller ID.
I do for my house, but not my home office. I guess I wanted to save money six years ago, when I set up the line and bought my residence, and ever since, I've just never bothered to do it, in part because so many people email me versus calls, that it almost seems silly. Almost.
But then earlier this week, my office phone rang, and as usual, I picked it up. I can't say who it was or what it was about--but it was a call I wasn't thrilled to get, from someone--not an editor or publicist, which are most of the people I work with--but someone who I speak to fairly regularly, and it led to a series of calls and emails throughout the day, in which I had to put out minor fires. It was a major distraction that day.
For not the first time, I found myself thinking, "Geez, I need to get Caller ID."
Then I thought about it and realized if I had Caller ID and had used it to avoid the caller, it would have meant that later, I'd have wasted time listening to the message, and then I'd still have ended up calling the person back and putting out those fires. While it is nice to know who you're about to talk to, there's something kind of exciting, knowing that the person on the other line could be an editor with a big story for me, or it could be a bill collector, or someone wanting me to trap me into taking a 19-minute survey or some long lost business contact wanting to chat for half an hour or so, when I have a deadline in the next two hours.
So, yeah, maybe the business experts mean something else when they tell us to take risks. Maybe they're thinking of something a little more edgy than not getting Caller ID, like networking in social settings that are out of your comfort zone or expanding your business. Or maybe my risky way of doing business is exactly what would make them applaud. I'll bet all of the business experts have Caller ID.
Thursday, June 15, 2006
Blast From the Past
Earlier this morning, a friend of mine from Milwaukee sent me an email, with a link to an article about a former child star, whose life hasn't exactly turned out as he had planned. He's made some big mistakes, but unlike some other actors out there, he's at least taking an ingenious and (assuming he isn't breaking copyright laws) a legal approach to fixing his problems.
The article was in Milwaukee's newspaper, which I believe you have to subscribe to, if you want to read it, so I'll just summarize: 29-year-old Dustin Diamond, also known as that annoying goofball Screech from NBC's Saved By the Bell, is going to lose his house soon, if he can't find a way to pay for all of it at once--to the tune of $250,000. He doesn't have a regular mortgage loan. He has some arrangement called a land contract, which is an agreement between the landowner and buyer. The buyer makes a hefty payment and then smaller, regular payments afterwards until the house is paid for. But something went wrong, financially speaking, and Diamond's house is currently in the foreclosure process.
So Diamond, still an actor, came up with a Hail Mary pass, though, that might save him. It's something very entrepreneurial, which I suppose shouldn't be a surprise, given that many performers become entrepreneurs, and a lot of entrepreneurs have actor-like qualities. Diamond has set up a web site, telling of his plight and from which he's selling T-shirts for $15 each, hoping in the next few weeks to earn $250,000. The shirt shows his picture, and the back of the shirt reads, "I paid $15 to save Screech's House." Only it doesn't quite say that. Because he's nervous about infringing on a copyrighted character, it actually read, "I paid $15 to Save Screeech's House." Note the extra "e."
For me, it was kind of a jolt to read the article. I don't know the guy personally, but I did talk to him once, over the telephone. A million years ago, when I was at my second magazine job, as an associate editor for a teen entertainment magazine, I interviewed Dustin Diamond on the telephone. It was my first celebrity interview ever, and I was excited, although my editor tempered my enthusiasm by telling me that he was giving me the assignment, because if I screwed this up, it really didn't matter. "And, hey, when you interview him, ask him about all of his co-stars. That's really what we want this interview for." Poor Screech, and as a consequence, Dustin Diamond. He never got much respect.
But no matter how desperate his situation, and how self-inflicted his problems are--he could only do the land contract because his credit has been reeking ever since a bankruptcy a few years ago, according to the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel--I have to respect what he's doing. He's taking a crisis, and he's trying to resolve it by using all of his resources available--a little fame, some marketing skills and a lot of humility. Isn't that the American way?
His web site is www.getdshirts.com, for anyone who is interested in checking it out, though I'd check it out soon, since it sounds like he has a matter of weeks left. He won't get my $15--we freelance writers aren't exactly rolling in money, and as a parent of two, I think my priorities should be with diapers or food or something else right now. And while I'm not sure how many people out there are really clamoring for a Dustin Diamond T-shirt, I wish the man well. And maybe this marketing gimmick will even help his career, inspiring a casting agent to hire him in a cameo part, or somehow causing another Saved By the Bell reunion movie to be filmed. But if he ever decides to finally depart the stage, I have a feeling he may just do okay working for some publicity firm.
The article was in Milwaukee's newspaper, which I believe you have to subscribe to, if you want to read it, so I'll just summarize: 29-year-old Dustin Diamond, also known as that annoying goofball Screech from NBC's Saved By the Bell, is going to lose his house soon, if he can't find a way to pay for all of it at once--to the tune of $250,000. He doesn't have a regular mortgage loan. He has some arrangement called a land contract, which is an agreement between the landowner and buyer. The buyer makes a hefty payment and then smaller, regular payments afterwards until the house is paid for. But something went wrong, financially speaking, and Diamond's house is currently in the foreclosure process.
So Diamond, still an actor, came up with a Hail Mary pass, though, that might save him. It's something very entrepreneurial, which I suppose shouldn't be a surprise, given that many performers become entrepreneurs, and a lot of entrepreneurs have actor-like qualities. Diamond has set up a web site, telling of his plight and from which he's selling T-shirts for $15 each, hoping in the next few weeks to earn $250,000. The shirt shows his picture, and the back of the shirt reads, "I paid $15 to save Screech's House." Only it doesn't quite say that. Because he's nervous about infringing on a copyrighted character, it actually read, "I paid $15 to Save Screeech's House." Note the extra "e."
For me, it was kind of a jolt to read the article. I don't know the guy personally, but I did talk to him once, over the telephone. A million years ago, when I was at my second magazine job, as an associate editor for a teen entertainment magazine, I interviewed Dustin Diamond on the telephone. It was my first celebrity interview ever, and I was excited, although my editor tempered my enthusiasm by telling me that he was giving me the assignment, because if I screwed this up, it really didn't matter. "And, hey, when you interview him, ask him about all of his co-stars. That's really what we want this interview for." Poor Screech, and as a consequence, Dustin Diamond. He never got much respect.
But no matter how desperate his situation, and how self-inflicted his problems are--he could only do the land contract because his credit has been reeking ever since a bankruptcy a few years ago, according to the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel--I have to respect what he's doing. He's taking a crisis, and he's trying to resolve it by using all of his resources available--a little fame, some marketing skills and a lot of humility. Isn't that the American way?
His web site is www.getdshirts.com, for anyone who is interested in checking it out, though I'd check it out soon, since it sounds like he has a matter of weeks left. He won't get my $15--we freelance writers aren't exactly rolling in money, and as a parent of two, I think my priorities should be with diapers or food or something else right now. And while I'm not sure how many people out there are really clamoring for a Dustin Diamond T-shirt, I wish the man well. And maybe this marketing gimmick will even help his career, inspiring a casting agent to hire him in a cameo part, or somehow causing another Saved By the Bell reunion movie to be filmed. But if he ever decides to finally depart the stage, I have a feeling he may just do okay working for some publicity firm.
Thursday, June 08, 2006
The Facts about the Fax
I called the phone company today and asked them to cancel my fax phone number. I did it with a heavy heart, and since I've had the number for about six years, I felt like I was sneaking behind a friend and, without warning, clubbing him over the head. But it had to be done. I was spending about $15 a month for that number, and I probably now use the fax machine about three times a year. And the only people who fax me are companies trying to sell me something like a trip to the Bahamas and printing ink for--what else?--fax machines.
$15 a month doesn't sound like a much, but it adds up to $180 a year.
While I'm sure that large corporations will have fax machines for some time--after all, if you have 100 employees or more, your staff is bound to be using the fax machine quite frequently--I'm kind of guessing that a lot of smaller businesses are quietly doing away with their machines. After all, you can fax over the Internet--and have been able to for years now--and so much business is done over email and the phone, I'm guessing that I'm not the only one who has found my fax machine almost useless.
But the fax, interestingly enough, will live on. It's just got to. In some form or another, it's been around since 1843. Seriously, I read up on this, and it turns out a man named Alexander Bain invited a technology that transmitted images across wires--using the technology of the telegraph--although the first fax machine didn't come around until the 1860s. The fax machine we're all used to, though, came on the scene in Japan in the 1970s and spread to the rest of the world by the 1980s. So I'm confident that the fax machine will live on, in a way, though I'm sure the scanner and email will eventually make the need for the actual machines and phone numbers obsolete. That's my prediction, which I realize isn't going out on much of a limb. It's like my predicting that the year 2007 will follow 2006.
Anyway, my fax phone number is gone. Farewell old friend. I shall miss ye, and I will gaze upon my now-useless fax machine and put it in a prominent spot in my office and think about the march of progress and the good times we once had.
Or maybe I'll just sell it on eBay.
$15 a month doesn't sound like a much, but it adds up to $180 a year.
While I'm sure that large corporations will have fax machines for some time--after all, if you have 100 employees or more, your staff is bound to be using the fax machine quite frequently--I'm kind of guessing that a lot of smaller businesses are quietly doing away with their machines. After all, you can fax over the Internet--and have been able to for years now--and so much business is done over email and the phone, I'm guessing that I'm not the only one who has found my fax machine almost useless.
But the fax, interestingly enough, will live on. It's just got to. In some form or another, it's been around since 1843. Seriously, I read up on this, and it turns out a man named Alexander Bain invited a technology that transmitted images across wires--using the technology of the telegraph--although the first fax machine didn't come around until the 1860s. The fax machine we're all used to, though, came on the scene in Japan in the 1970s and spread to the rest of the world by the 1980s. So I'm confident that the fax machine will live on, in a way, though I'm sure the scanner and email will eventually make the need for the actual machines and phone numbers obsolete. That's my prediction, which I realize isn't going out on much of a limb. It's like my predicting that the year 2007 will follow 2006.
Anyway, my fax phone number is gone. Farewell old friend. I shall miss ye, and I will gaze upon my now-useless fax machine and put it in a prominent spot in my office and think about the march of progress and the good times we once had.
Or maybe I'll just sell it on eBay.
Tuesday, June 06, 2006
Tuesdays
I used to hate Tuesdays, back when I was disenchanted with a desk job that I had in my 20s, and during parts of high school. In both situations, I couldn't wait for the weekend, and so I hated Tuesdays. Mondays, at least, were a new start to the week and might bring something interesting. Wednesdays were hump days, Thursdays were the day before Fridays, and Fridays, everybody loves. But Tuesday? What to do with Tuesdays? I thought they were worthless.
But now I love my career, and I find that Tuesday's are one of the best days of the week. Often, I haven't hit my stride on Monday, and I'm getting used to coming back to work after a nice weekend. Wednesday-Friday, I'm actually dreading the weekend (a little) if I'm behind on work. So Tuesday feels safe, with still plenty of time in the week to get things done, and I'm no longer sluggish, like I am some Mondays. It's sort of the best time of the work week for me.
Maybe I'm a workaholic, yes, but I do love the weekends, so I think I'm a healthy workaholic. More to the point, and the point I'm trying to make is that it may be a good barometer to use, if you want to know how your life is going. Do you dread Tuesdays in general, or enjoy them? Is there any day you dread? If so, you might want to ask why. If not, then you're probably in good shape.
But now I love my career, and I find that Tuesday's are one of the best days of the week. Often, I haven't hit my stride on Monday, and I'm getting used to coming back to work after a nice weekend. Wednesday-Friday, I'm actually dreading the weekend (a little) if I'm behind on work. So Tuesday feels safe, with still plenty of time in the week to get things done, and I'm no longer sluggish, like I am some Mondays. It's sort of the best time of the work week for me.
Maybe I'm a workaholic, yes, but I do love the weekends, so I think I'm a healthy workaholic. More to the point, and the point I'm trying to make is that it may be a good barometer to use, if you want to know how your life is going. Do you dread Tuesdays in general, or enjoy them? Is there any day you dread? If so, you might want to ask why. If not, then you're probably in good shape.
Monday, June 05, 2006
Weird Businesses
Just a few thoughts. I'm writing an article about weird businesses my byline often frequents, and I put the word out that I need to hear from companies that are a little odd. You'd think that maybe people wouldn't write in and declare their company weird, but I've heard from at least 2 dozen PR guys so far. Only a few businesses have really been weird (I'll refrain from saying what they are, but when the story runs in a month on a business web site, I'll include the link to the article), and that's the weird thing about this: a lot of perfectly normal businesses are perfectly content to label themselves as "weird," if it means getting free press.
And I guess, considering the cost of advertising, that isn't so weird, after all.
And I guess, considering the cost of advertising, that isn't so weird, after all.
Friday, June 02, 2006
One Particular Friday, Part 3
Friday night is not the time to be doing a business blog, so I'll make this short. As for this particular Friday, it went well. Maybe karma was working out, because after writing that article for free, I ended up getting three new assignments about an hour later... or, of course, maybe it was just coincidence. At any rate, the three assignments was a nice way to end the work week.
I'm not always going to make these posts so chatty, and just ramble on about my day. I do want the posts to have some significance to other people, than just me. But as I've said, I'm trying to find my rhythm on this blog, and part of finding one's rhythm, at least in writing, is just throwing a bunch of words down until you start seeing what you like... I'll likely go into hiding for the rest of the weekend, but Monday, I'll post, and I'm going to try to start making this the type of business blog that I want it to be. If anyone's reading this, I hope you have a great weekend.
I'm not always going to make these posts so chatty, and just ramble on about my day. I do want the posts to have some significance to other people, than just me. But as I've said, I'm trying to find my rhythm on this blog, and part of finding one's rhythm, at least in writing, is just throwing a bunch of words down until you start seeing what you like... I'll likely go into hiding for the rest of the weekend, but Monday, I'll post, and I'm going to try to start making this the type of business blog that I want it to be. If anyone's reading this, I hope you have a great weekend.
One Particular Friday Part 2
The one bad thing about blogs is that this is Part 2, and so the reader will either read this out of order, or they have to scroll down, read Part 1, and then go back up to Part 2. Oh, well. I finished my article for the energy magazine. I have to say, I can recommend doing this pro bono work thing--although in my financial case, once a year is probably about all I can handle. Still, I felt good writing the story, and I felt good sending it off to the editor. And that's what happened. What a boring post. But I'm just too wiped out to reflect intelligently on this right now. Maybe I'll have to have a Part 3 in a little while.
One Particular Friday
Since this blog is new, and since hopefully almost nobody is reading this, as I write this--my wife directed some people to this, but I've tried to discourage people from coming here to find anything pertinent, because I'm still trying to figure out what this blog should be about (serious business issues? humorous business issues? maybe a blog about the business of freelance writing?), and so right now, I just thought I'd talk a little about what I'm going to be doing today, which is something completely opposite of what most capitalist freelance business journalists would ever think of doing.
I'm going to write an article for free.
On a subject I know almost nothing about.
It should be interesting.
In a nutshell, the details are this, I met somebody last year at a conference in the far-flung land of India--my first visit there--and my first trip out of the country in about five years, unless you count a weekend in Canada. Anyway, an editor in Bangladesh asked me to contribute an article to his energy magazine, and I didn't feel like I could say no.
And I'm honored he asked.
But I know almost nothing about energy, just that it's a precious commodity, and that I never seem to have enough of it, especially when I'm trying to keep up with my two daughters.
He asked me to do this over a month ago, but I stalled, and, well, here I am. He wants it by Monday, and it's Friday. It's time to get started.
I'll fill in all of my fans of this blog (nobody right now, as far as I know) how this goes, either at the end of the day or over the weekend.
I'm going to write an article for free.
On a subject I know almost nothing about.
It should be interesting.
In a nutshell, the details are this, I met somebody last year at a conference in the far-flung land of India--my first visit there--and my first trip out of the country in about five years, unless you count a weekend in Canada. Anyway, an editor in Bangladesh asked me to contribute an article to his energy magazine, and I didn't feel like I could say no.
And I'm honored he asked.
But I know almost nothing about energy, just that it's a precious commodity, and that I never seem to have enough of it, especially when I'm trying to keep up with my two daughters.
He asked me to do this over a month ago, but I stalled, and, well, here I am. He wants it by Monday, and it's Friday. It's time to get started.
I'll fill in all of my fans of this blog (nobody right now, as far as I know) how this goes, either at the end of the day or over the weekend.
