Twitter Community -- How I use Twitter; love and hate.

So, Twitter is an amazing micro-blogging, social phenomena the idea that peoples thoughts would be streaming on to the Internet in a way that is searchable and with an open API is amazing. (Think single consciousness of mankind)

Bahá'í Faith
Quran -- Mankind Oneness
Bible -- Mankind Oneness (Please pay special attention to this one, considering the Internet--smile).

So, this morning; I was communicating with someone I met through odesk about doing some programming work with me through email. I saw they had experience with TestComplete, so I read about it; and did a little question/research of it compared to Selenium (especially for Silverlight). Anyway, I did a search on twitter for TestComplete and boom, JonKruger's tweet popped up. So, I sent him a reply tweet asking if he got any responses and what he knows. A couple notes: 1) Jon lives in the same cityI live in (Columbus, Ohio); we have met once or twice; and I see him several times a year (and a lot more if you count codemash.org--smile) he works at QSI with a very good friend of mine (SteveHorn). 2) I am not following Jon on Twitter, I just randomaly found him by doing a search for "TestCompete" amongst the millions of users using search.twitter.com. I think this experience is a good example of showing the power of twitter for an individual to jump into the mankind consciousness that is the Internet; and for it to return connections to you locally.

Now a little bit of disappointment, I have not figured out the following/friend thing yet. I am an open networker in the sense I agree with Tim Sanders book, Love is the Killer App. I must always give away my network, knowledge and compassion; but I can't really "follow" even 33 people on twitter; let alone the thousands and tens of thousands some people follow. So, I started using TweetDeck some, and I follow only four people closely, and others I categorized by interest and commonality (is that the definition of different communities?). What's even more interesting is most of my closest friends are not even on twitter (my wife, my children--except for the photo of me with them--a little young for twitter--smile, and even most work colleagues). So, I am still trying to figure it out; how do I do, who do I follow--and am I really following them--or am I just lucky to read something they post sometimes before it scrolls on by in the other tweets I get.

I met someone the other day, I introduced myself to him in Panera (because I overheard him talking about Drupal with someone else, and the opportunity came up to strike up a conversation). The interesting part was once he handed me his business card, I recognized the company from the Columbus Tech Life community and then after we said good-bye and I went to send him my contact information by email I realized he was following me on twitter already (but I wasn't following him at the time). I think the best use of social software and twitter is when the use of the internet intersects with real world.

It is fascinating and engaging to think about social software and how it is useful and it intersects with real life, and at the same time a little scary--there are many thoughts out there from me in blog and twitter--that people could research to speak to my personal side and potentially manipulate conversations. There is no way for me to remember all that I have put out into the internet (blog, twitter, linkedin, facebook); that could be used to manipulate (or better sounding--direct) a conversation and decision.

I don't understand how it (Internet, social software, community) all works, and where it is going, but I am trying to figure it out, if anyone else is reading this, and you are trying to figure it out also, leave a comment and let me know your thoughts.

Best wishes!
Pete Gordon

Invest locally; better yet Invest in yourself!

So, I was watching one of those meaningless "money" talk shows on CNN. Although, I liked listening to Robert Reich on the show say "prepare for the worst, hope for the best".

I started thinking, maybe I should put some money into Columbus, Ohio Fortune 500 companies (Large Cap Stocks); or maybe in the State of Ohio fortune 500 companies So I looked at this list on USA today, to find the Central Ohio Fortune 500 companies from 2004....

Cardinal Health
Nationwide Mutual Insurance
American Electric Power
Limited Brands
Big Lots

Then I found that of these Fortune 500 companies in Central Ohio; Nationwide Mutual Insurance is no longer a public company (NFS, as of January 1st, 2009). That made me immediately think why invest in "public" companies, seeing that Nationwide just took their $2.4 billion subsidiary private. Which made me think, why are companies public. Well, the basics are that a company goes public to raise capital it could not raise in a private market, and it is often an exit strategy for the founders and original investors of a company. Wait a minute if that is the reason to go public than why would I spend so much time looking to invest in public companies, wouldn't it be more valuable to invest in private companies that I have transparancy into; or, even better, to invest in myself and my own work/companies/businesses.

Hmm, lots to think about.

With all of that said, if you are looking for a small investor or worker in your ideas and/or are interested in becoming a small investor, worker in my ideas; drop me an email, and let's talk about working and investing together.

Best Wishes!
Pete Gordon

2009.....

10 Goals for 2009... (in no particularly special order)

More International Exposure. Visit Africa and Amsterdam. This should be a definite; because we have already been planning it for hearthecry.org. Take a course in Mandarin Chinese http://www.columbus-occs.org. Deepen my international relationships, in my field of expertise (sofware, hardware, technology, health care) and outside of my field of expertise.

Organize and Automate my business more. Business filings, taxes, structure must get automated this year. So that everything is submitted on-time, and the process flows! This may mean, I get a new accountant--if they don't get with the 21st century! And, I am thinking my daughter is now old enough at eight that she can maybe start doing some minor paperwork, scanning and emailing. That just occurred to me; and that would be great; maybe I can hire her as my assistant, perfect!

Do Video on the Internet. I am going to use video to communicate with others this year. I have neglected it, and don't have a good video camera. Kinda funny, since I have a software portable usability lab that uses Apple iSight cameras (iSights are now no longer available). But, I am thinking about maybe video taping interviews with Film/Television Producers, Building Architects, General Contractors, Professional Engineers; and then maybe getting them transcribed; and using them as resources for publishing an industry comparison for the software industry compared to other industries (Steve and I had talked about it; see earlier blog entry). The bottom line, there is a lot of value in communicating with video and I am going to do more of it this year.

Repeatable Sales Model. Repeatable Sales for Critical Systems; selling Health Care Managed IT Services and increasing Critical Systems revenue by 100%, with 2-5 new clients.

Time with family. Have a wonderful vacation, with my family. And, take Blake and Rachel to school at least once a week.

Lose 10 pounds. And exercise consistently. (wii fit, recumbant bike, and treadmill)

Dress more professionally. I'm still a little uncertain on this one; I love my t-shirt and jeans.

Spend time daily in worship and prayer. I'm pretty good at this, but some days and then some weeks--it slips away from me and that is when things fall apart.

Give more away. I'm really thinking of time and software here, but it is true across every area of life. I want to give more away in open source, like codeplex.com/edf. I want to have a couple open source projects that I am committed to, and see them grow in momentum and value. I want to see open source succeed in a sustainable business model, they are not mutually exclusive. It makes me thinking of communities of needs, creating mutually beneficial software and making it open source. Open Source Polysomnography software anyone?

Listen more and talk less. Enough said.