March 25, 2010 by admin.

Thanks for visiting the Good Thang blog, and for joining.

This post is to let you know that I will no longer be updating this blog: I have moved the content to my other blog, Impact for Good.

I would like to encourage you to visit the new blog, join if you want to comment, or subscribe to the RSS Feed.

Posted in marketing | 1 Comment »

July 8, 2009 by admin.

In a move to increase the power of Facebook Pages, Facebook has just released a new widget that allows brands and businesses to share status updates from their Facebook Page - and get new Facebook fans - on any website.The new “Fan Box” widget, built on Facebook Connect, allows Page owners to put a piece of their Facebook Page anywhere on the web.

Facebook says the Fan Box widget is designed to help convert website visitors into Facebook fans. It’s a smart move by Facebook to make it easier for brands and businesses to encourage more of their customers to become fans of their Facebook Pages.

Unfortunately there is still no API for soliciting fans directly through applications on Facebook.  (more…)

Posted in Facebook, web 2.0, media, development, marketing | 1 Comment »

June 4, 2009 by admin.

Brainstorming responses to the Katrina disaster gave me license to research low-cost housing. I had already been musing about the possibility of opening-up and exploiting new markets, finding new ways to use this huge mortgage lending (mortgage banking) machine that was Countrywide.

Nobody around me took the idea of low-cost housing seriously. Nobody wanted to talk about mortgages in developing countries. I was uninformed, they said. “There’s no money in it.” Hmmm.

Still, I wondered about it.

Well, since that time, lo and behold – microcredit (peer-to-peer lending or P2P lending) has taken-off, and traditional financing has, well… collapsed.

So, uh… I guess I’ll bring it up again: where’s the money being made these days? What was only a “whacky idea” a few years ago now doesn’t look so crazy. (Thanks to Richard Weddle for recommending The Starfish and the Spider.)

When you’ve got a huge demand, low production costs, ample financing, job-creation, ultimate “portability” (the building system and micro-lending model can be replicated just about anywhere), you’ve got the makings of an economic boom — or a bonanza, at the very least). This is a great example of “the unstoppable power of leaderless organizations.”

Low Cost Construction Housing Affordable Building System

The man interviewed in the above video is Associate Professor Bernard Lefebvre (Domtec Company Ltd), affiliated with the Asian Institute of Technology in Bangkok, Thailand.

Background on Habitech

Conceived at the Habitech Center of AIT the Self-Contained Housing Delivery System is an inexpensive, quickly and easily erected building system, the cost of which consistently undercuts conventional construction systems. Components have been added to create a complete modular interlocking building system especially suited for construction by unskilled labour which eliminates the need for construction equipment as the components are lightweight. The system has been disseminated in Asia since 1987 when research and development started up to 1995 when the building system was made available through private sector equipment suppliers.

The technology was demonstrated through housing projects (75) in Thailand, Vietnam, Cambodia, Malaysia, Indonesia, Philippines, Laos, Myanmar, Sri Lanka, Papua New Guinea, Nepal and Fiji, where small scale building material industries have been set-up creating employment, generating income and producing affordable housing for middle and low income groups.

As the building system spreads through Asia, the beneficial reduction in the consumption of timber products for construction will lead to a salutary effect upon the environment and help reduce the depletion of forest.

Habitech Center was awarded the Matsushita Award by the Japan Housing Association in 1994 “in recognition of excellent achievements in improving human settlements in Asian countries by promoting research and development related to technologies for low cost housing as well as providing educational programs and facilities to disseminate the results of their research efforts”.(Source: UNESCO Most Clearinghouse)

Posted in city planning, community development, urban renewal, public policy, NPR, suburban infill, infill development, microcredit, homelessness, poverty, redevelopment, social ventures, ventures, P2P, development, investing, philanthropy, politics, Linkedin, finance, jobs, shelter, affordable housing, small business, marketing | 1 Comment »

June 3, 2009 by admin.

Building sophisticated educational tools out of cheap parts, Johnny Lee demos his cool Wii Remote hacks, which turn the $40 video game controller into a digital whiteboard, a touchscreen and a head-mounted 3-D viewer.

 

About Johnny Lee

Researcher Johnny Lee became a YouTube star with his demo of Wii Remote hacks — bending the low-cost game piece to power an interactive whiteboard, a multitouch surface, a head-mounted display … Full bio and more links

Posted in media, public policy, social ventures, ventures, web 2.0, education, techthang, innovation, maker, just for fun, jobs, small business, development, nonprofit, investing, marketing, video, Linkedin, stimulus, schools, finance, design | No Comments »

May 29, 2009 by Robert.

I applied for a job at Google yesterday that I found posted online. I copied-and-pasted parts of my resume into their forms, and then attached a cover letter and a .doc version of my resume according to the instructions.

“Microsoft Word format, huh?” I thought to myself, “That’s awfully magnanimous of them.”

They could have invented an entirely new Google Resume Format (.GRF) and announced it with great fanfare at the latest SXSW. They could have forced prospective Google applicants to find and purchase and register an entire suite of applications, download a bunch of drivers (along with a development kit) in order to install a special Google Resume Tool (included).

Mac format? Forget it — buy a cheap PC. Or an Android phone for that matter. If you were truly serious about working at Google, you’d do it in a heartbeat, right? Er — I mean, you’d already be using an Android.

But no. They didn’t do all that.

Google just instructed me to use the common standard .doc format, which I did. Then they asked me a few optional survey questions — beyond the mandatory racial/sexist questions — which of course I dutifully answered. (What happens if you decline to answer?)

“Have you ever operated a profitable business that was not a technology buisness?” Ha! Good question! Yep, done that.

“Have you ever started a nonprofit?” Hmmm. Another interesting question. Yes — as a matter of fact — yes, I have. (Well, I was part of a group that founded a nonprofit. That counts, right?)

And then they asked me if I’ve ever set a record (local/state/national). And I paused.

And then dread crept over me. “Holy cow — they caught me! Here I was thinking that this was just a survey, answering the questions candidly from memory.” But I now see that they were just messing with me!

Have I ever held a record? Google wants to know if Robert Marston ever held a record? Like they don’t know?

For crying out loud, why would Google ask me for information about me in a job application? What more could Google possibly want to know about me that Google doesn’t already know?

“Crud!” Panic started to set in. “This is no job application survey — it’s fodder for a new database that they’re building. Or worse, an authentication process to see if I’m really Robert Marston! Oops! The casual wording and ease-of-use lulled me into dropping my guard.

“What have I told them already? Have I said too much? I shoulda recorded every one of my answers. If there’s a cross-examination later, I might slip-up under pressure or over-think the answer…”

Ahhh! It’s not fair! They’re way too good!

Then I calmed down and realized that they’re really not asking for information. They’re simply measuring variability in my answers and my ability to recall facts. And probably measuring my typing speed, too, to see if I’m hestitating or slowing down. I wonder what they can tell from all that biofeedback? (I saw the The Matrix — I know how it works.)

They want me to believe that this is a job application like any other. They want it to appear as though it was my idea to apply for this job. And if/when they respond to my so-called application and grant me a so-called interview, I’ll go along with the whole charade. I’ll pretend like I’m a candidate and that I’m being evaluated against other candidates and all that. (wink-wink, nudge-nudge)

As though Google doesn’t already know the outcome.

Awesome. Bring it on — I’m ready.

Posted in just for fun, jobs, Linkedin, development, marketing | 1 Comment »

May 29, 2009 by Robert.

This video is a very clever presentation and whimsical commentary on New Media, posted by Michael Wesch, professor of cultural anthropology at Kansas State University in 2007.Don’t read the comments on YouTube — they’re mostly vulgar spam.I find it humorous to see that the YouTube video attracted a storm of comments *protesting* and *correcting* the author on factual matters, leading the author to post a quick revision and promise a new version “soon.” Ahem.And now the YouTube video is an epithet to good intentions in a web 2.0 world.Notice that the author was also apparently inundated with inquiries about the music in the background. I wonder if that was their intention. Many indy bands have been made famous over the years by licensing their music to be used in videos that “go viral.”Note to self: be sure to prominently credit the source of all content, or at least post a companion website somewhere which leaves a breadcrumb-trail to the information, providing Wikipedia with a verifiable “source.” And remember to use a disposable email address.

Note that the project was:

If only they’d used a more “nimble” tool for producing video, they could have responded more rapidly and continued the conversation (affordably, or even profitably) rather than being overwhelmed/bored/whatever (used-up by The Machine).But it’s still interesting, effective and fun as anthropology, if not profound.Already, the “crowd” has taken ownership, and is advising, crafting, revising, innovating, and even promoting (as I’m doing here). With 9 million+ views and counting, copied-and-translated into many languages, could this “modern antiquity” become a classic?

Posted in media, web 2.0, education, Linkedin, video, design, wordpress, marketing, RSS | 1 Comment »

May 22, 2009 by Robert.

 I’ve been tracking the dollars in the $3 million give-away and thought I’d share an interesting graph.  It tells a story about the organizations involved… but perhaps you see it differently?

 Here’s what I did.  Each time I voted at Target’s Facebook profile, the site replied with a tally of the current stats.  The first couple of days I didn’t bother to grab the numbers.  But after a while (as is my custom) I started to get curious about how the numbers are changing over time, and what it might mean.  So I started to collect samples.

 Now, these are not scientific samples — the samples are not evenly-spaced.  That is, they were taken at different times of the day, sometimes with a day-and-a-half inbetween.

 FYI, the sampling interval is roughly between 24 and 30 hours.The above Fig. 1 shows a sample of performance data from the Target Bullseye Gives Challenge on Facebook, in which Target is splitting $3 million between 10 organizations.

 Sample 1 was taken at about the 4th day of the challenge (40K+ votes).  Box 1 suggests that even after 40K votes, the Red Cross shared climbed steeply for 2-3 days while all other organizations declined in %-share.  Box 2 shows that St. Jude CRH surged back to regain the largest share of votes. The number of total daily votes at Sample 1 was about 10K, and it has increased to about 20K per day.

 The chart clearly shows that 2 of the organizations stand out from all the rest.

  The top 2, St. Jude and Red Cross, have demonstrated the ability to rally Facebook voters.  There are interesting implications, and it would be very telling to map spikes in actual votes against campaign pushes (emails, ads, etc.).  Hopefully, Target or Facebook will release the statistics.

 Without the details, some assumptions must be made.  We may assume, for example, that some people are “one-time-voters” and other people continue to vote every day, at every opportunity.  Since we don’t know exactly how that plays-out, we can assume that the ratio/trend is constant across all organizations.  But it would be interesting to know.

 Is the daily increase in votes due to a growing base of “repeat” voters, or lots of “one-time” voters?

 In boxes 1 & 2 above, the slope of the lines indicates that one of the top 2 organizations was adding new votes very quickly during those periods.  The other organizations show a gradual decline, suggesting that most organizations are “holding steady” while the organizations with a larger voting base are taking a bigger and bigger share.

 Implications for Operation Gratitude At this point, with the gap in total votes so wide (and widening), it would take a SIGNIFICANT boost in daily votes for OpGrat to make much of a dent in the final “% share” of total votes.  For example, at the current pace, OpGrat will end-up with about 7.1% of the total ($214K).  (The top 2 are on pace to capture more than 26% each.)

 If OpGrat were to add 10,000 new votes over the Memorial Day weekend (all other trends holding steady), it would increase OpGrat’s share to roughly 7.8% ($297K).  At that rate, each new vote is worth approximately $8!

Posted in finance, military, social ventures, Linkedin, nonprofit, CSR, philanthropy, marketing | No Comments »

May 13, 2009 by Robert.

May 2009 is the 11th annual “Military Appreciation Month” in the USA.In honor of Military Appreciation Month, here’s a plug to help raise a good chunk of money for Operation Gratitude:  

 http://beam.to/vote_for_operation_gratitude_on_facebook  

 Target Corporation donates $3 million each week to their communities.  In a clever Facebook campaign, Target has setup a challenge to Facebook users to vote for one of 10 charities.  The split of the votes will determine the portion of the $3 million that each organization gets. 

 Here are some suggested ways for businesses to participate, from the National Military Appreciation Month organization website: 

• Offer specials, incentives, and discounts to active and retired military ID Card holders.
• Offer special discounts to the public in honor of NMAM.
• Display the Flag and POW/MIA flag during May through June 14, Flag Day.
• Interview military personnel for in-house newsletters.
• Recognize veteran and/or active duty employees and their families.
• Offer bumper stickers, flags, pins and ribbons for employees and customers.
• Make use of Chamber of Commerce, city business committees, and organizations – get them to participate.
• Recite Pledge of Allegiance before meetings.
• Decorate with patriot themes.
• Luncheons to honor employed Guard, Reservists and Retirees.
• Use military themes during meetings.
• Display large banners at employee entrances to reflect pride and thanks for employees called to active duty.
• Place NMAM banners to your website, flyers newspaper ads and inserts (See links page).
• Contribute to the Armed Forces Children’s Education Fund, Inc.
• Contribute to FreedomPens.org
• Seek media recognition regarding your NMAM events – Let others know what you are doing.

National Military Appreciation Month (NMAM), as designated by Congress, provides a period encompassing both the history and recognition of our armed services with an in-depth look at the diversity of its individuals and achievements.  It allows Americans to educate each generation on the historical impact of our military through the participation of the community with those who serve encouraging patriotism and love for America.

 This month gives the nation a time and place on which to focus and draw attention to our many expressions of appreciation and recognition of our armed services via numerous venues and also to recall and learn about our fast American history.  

National Military Appreciation Month (May 2009) includes Loyalty Day (1st), VE Day(8th), Military Spouse Appreciation Day (8th), Armed Forces Day (16th), and Memorial Day (25th).  

This very important month honors, remembers, recognizes and appreciates all military personnel; those men and women who have served throughout our history and all who now serve in uniform and their families as well as those Americans who have given their lives in defense of our freedoms we all enjoy today.  

It recognizes those on active duty in all branches of the services, the National Guard and Reserves plus retirees, veterans, and all of their families - well over 90 million Americans and more than 230 years of our nation’s history.  Let us celebrate them just as we celebrate the other important entities that make up this wonderful country of ours.

Posted in social ventures, military, Linkedin, nonprofit, marketing | No Comments »

April 28, 2009 by Robert.

“…A new generation of changemakers is emerging that sees for-profit ventures as intrinsically more scalable than nonprofit entities.” – John Elkington, co-author of The Power of Unreasonable People: How Social Entrepreneurs Create Markets That Change the World     

…Consider Rubicon Programs, a Richmond, Calif., nonprofit that provides jobs, housing, and life skills to poverty-stricken, formerly incarcerated and disabled individuals. The organization, which was founded in 1973, has started two businesses and helped more than 40,000 individuals find jobs and live independently… [and] helped Rubicon build 200 units of affordable housing and operate mental health and workforce services in a dozen cities throughout the San Francisco Bay Area … 

 Thinking outside the box?  Now is the time to disregard the box, and start thinking creatively and practically. Nonprofits are in a great position to create small enterprises (tax-free, with low break-even), take limited risks, and create jobs.

Posted in stimulus, affordable housing, jobs, ventures, finance, Linkedin, philanthropy, investing, nonprofit, development, marketing | No Comments »

April 14, 2009 by Robert.

Among the many “good thangs” I could write about here, I am particulary pleased to report that Ventura County now has its first wind turbine.  And I am tickled to be able to say that my work with Prevailing Wind Power, LLC (PWP) was instrumental in making that first installation happen. Here’s a front page story from the Fillmore Gazette (Fillmore, CA) dated Feb. 11, 2009: http://www.fillmoregazette.com/front-page/farming-wind  Sales for wind turbines are not rolling-in quickly (yet), but I am confident that in the 2009 we’ll see several more turbines installed.For many months, I fielded phone inquiries from residents in Los Angeles, Ventura, and Santa Barbara Counties asking for information about turbines from Southwest WindPower (SWWP).  SWWP is one of the oldest and most popular brands of “Small Wind” turbines, and has tens of thousands of turbines installed worldwide.  Yet, there were no turbines in the local area to which I could point prospective customers.  The closest (to my knowledge) were in the Big Bear / Arrowhead area, over 100 miles away.These “residential” turbines like the SkyStream 3.7 are larger than Air-X turbines common with boats and RVs.  But they are far smaller than thewind turbines that most people associate with Palm Springs or Tehachapi in Southern California or Altamont Pass in Northern California.Concerns over noise or performance or maintenance costs are real and legitimate.  Assuring a prospective buyer that the wind in the trees is louder than a SkyStream, or that ‘we have plenty of wind here’ in California, or that ‘these things last and last’ only goes so far.  For my money, I would want to see/hear for myself.  So, being able to point to a local Skystream unit and an owner that is high-profile and approachable is fantastic.  It’s going to really help sales here in Ventura County, CA.  The SkyStream website has a link for “SkyStreams Near Me” which lets you see if there are any units in your local area.  The new owner, like so many others, is happy to show off their new residential power plant and to tell about the process. Hats-off to the Hammonds for pressing Ventura County, writing letters to local legislators and getting the local media involved.   And hats-off to the Fillmore Gazette for following-up on the issue and getting local legislators “off the dime” and getting the wheelsblades turning.

Posted in SWWP, Linkedin, VCwind, PWP, politics, renewable energy, marketing, wind | No Comments »