Susan Mernit's Blog

Quote of Day

2008-07-03T20:30:11Z

"Bad management is cancer. Bad managers tend to promote other bad managers for similar skills: brown-nosing and covering their asses. The best, most competent managers generally get held down at the bottom level (managers who have line employees as direct reports); the director level is usually the glass ceiling for good managers in a company infected by bad management."

--Valleywag commentator BartKela, commenting on a post about Yahoo! staffers departing.

Congrats to Christine Herron

2008-07-02T13:24:09Z

Reading this this am just made me get that big smile--Christine is so smart, and so shrewed--and First Round is a great team--this is wonderful news--and smart hiring on Josh's part, IMHO:

" Big personal announcement today! I'm officially joining First Round Capital. (Thanks very much to Josh for his warm welcome.) I'll be working closely with Rob Hayes in the San Francisco office."

Way to go, folks. Want to show you all what we're working on at Peoples Software.

Another year of change ahead, wow--and whether to join the RC Club

2008-06-29T22:57:27Z

So I am at the United RedCarpet Club in Chicago, waiting for a flight to Denver after lots of delays from TVC.. Got smart and used miles for a daypass, so am nibbling cheese and using free wifi for a couple hours.

My United miles, for the most part, are left over from the years I spent travelling cross country for AOL and as a consultant; during the time I spent at Yahoo, I travelled little (that was the idea).

However, I know I am going to be travelling regularly this year--both for Peoples Software and for the work I am doing for the Knight News Challenge. So--

Does anyone have an airport club they prefer?
Day pass vs. membership for a moderate traveller?
Other thoughts on success at the road warrior thing circa 2008, layover version?

Thanks, lazyweb!

Quoted, not noted

2008-06-29T13:29:38Z

From around the twittersphere, blogosphere, etc this weekend:

Loren Feldman: "People like the puppet more than you because he is more real than you are. More honest than you are, smarter than you are. More human than you are. People want the Shel puppet to win. The same can't be said for you my friend."

Dave Winer: "They let Shel Israel off the hook. He gets his name back, the puppet is retired. The mock trial they were planning for the TechCrunch summer party, that I learned of this morning, is cancelled."

Dave Winer: "All I could think about is how mean this community had become."

Susan sez: Mean, indeed.

Heading back to Boulder, reflections on past 2 weeks

2008-06-29T02:12:36Z

So, this is the last night in Michigan, heading back to Boulder tomorrow. It's been a interesting two weeks--I spent more than hald of it working, mostly from a little cafe and on stolen, faint wi-fi on the porch of the cottage, the rest of the time trying to have the vacation we had so long planned.

Thanks go to the team at PSCO for their support through all this--and the work they've done so well--as well as to A, who was supportive of turning time off into remote work. In many ways, choosing to work remotely during a summer program this intense seemed like madness. On the other hand, as someone whose been around dot com frenzy a number of times, I knew this stint of time would not be a make or break for our success if we all agreed to it and handled it well.

Or, to be more blunt, what I really mean is:

In some ways it was audacious to leave the team at this moment.
But not going away would have meant canceling the whole trip.
I've made those kinds of personal sacrifices before and they helped scuttle an important relationship..and turned out not to be as make or break as I'd thought.
So this time I wanted to balance the work commitment and the family commitment
And I think I did.

So now I've had this great trip, I've observed a few things:

I am both compulsively connected to the net and an obsessive worker
I have to have vacations where I balance work and fun or there are no vacations (this may be sad but true right now)
Technology makes it easy to be this way now, hallelujah!

Lots more posting to come as I get back to a decent net connection.

Dumped my blackberry in the river, phone doesn't work

2008-06-26T22:17:46Z

My Blackberry is currently non-operative; I managed to dump it in the Crystal River and am now waiting to see if it works any better (like, at all), after it dries out.

So, if you were going to call me--don't.

New post over at Peoples Software

2008-06-25T13:58:47Z

Thirty days into the new company and TechStars.
Details here.

Vacation/work/vacation/work/vacation

2008-06-24T15:55:56Z

So I haven't posted here for 2 days. I want to say it's because I've been on vacation, but the realtty is that I haven't posted because I've been so busy balancing work with being on vacation.
If you look at this picture of the overlook for the great sand dunes on Lake Michigan, what you won't see is that my friends and family all went up ahead, and I did two calls with one of my c-founders and then with a TechStars mentor, asking questions and making plans for next week. (And then there was the morning on the machine in the wi-fi coffee shop, and the daily conference call with the team, and the marketing and distribution planning, and....)

Geeze!

Help promote the 2008-09 Knight News Challenge this summer/fall

2008-06-21T14:02:12Z

Are you someone passionate about social media--and an online marketing and/or relationship management person?
The Knight Foundation is looking for someone to help the team (which includes me and some very cool Knight staffers) manage and evangelize the upcoming series of grants, which start with new proposals (which means starting with promoting that we need and want proposals).

Here's the job description:

For the 2009 round of the Knight News Challenge, the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation is looking to contract with a highly networked Web 2.0 marketing and account management freelancer to:

Manage programs designed to increase the visibility for the Knight News Challenge,
Traffic, coordinate, and measure deliverables for third party relationships that will help build on the established audiences (journalists and bloggers) and increase the number of high-quality applications from the following "growth area target groups"
Run email and blogging marketing and outreach campaigns
Assist in event planning for town halls and awards programs
Support community growth

Scope:

25 hours per week for $30 / hr
On monthly basis, from July 1 -September 30, 2008
Contract-basis only. This is not an employed position.

Profile:

The ideal candidate will be able to:

Understand Web 2.0 and have relationships in the community to draw on
Take direction to organize stakeholders (Knight staff, grantees, KNC winners, etc) to carry out email campaigns promoting the KNC
Manage email campaigns, media partnerships and online marketing for the KNC.
Support engaging the Web 2.0 community in innovative ways, through meet-ups and other events and documenting results
Work with Knight Foundation's Program Manager, Program Association and online community manager to deliver on goals
Manage data and analytics for marketing and PR campaigns and report on effectiveness.

Goals:

The marketing goals for the 2009 Knight News Challenge:

Receive a higher percentage of Knight News Challenge applications from:
- Young people (<26)
- Non-traditional journalists
- Non-students
- Web 2.0 and social media developers and strategists, including those working with new platforms and mobile platforms
Generate 3,000+ high quality applications
Have at least 500 applicants from the "growth area target groups"

nterested?

Please contact Marc Fest,
href="mailto:knc-marketing@abcdelta.com">knc-marketing@abcdelta.com, with your resume and proposal.

About the Knight News Challenge

The Knight News Challenge (KNC) funds ideas that use digital media to deliver news and information to geographically defined communities. The 2007 Knight News Challenge attracted 1,600 applicants. The 2008 contest drew more than 3,000, with a significant increase in the percentage of young and non-US participants. For more visit www.newschallenge.org

About Knight Foundation

The John S. and James L. Knight Foundation promotes excellence in journalism worldwide and invests in the vitality of 26 U.S. communities. Knight Foundation focuses on ideas and projects that create transformational change. To learn more, visit www.knightfoundation.org.

Make mine multi tasking

2008-06-21T03:26:12Z

On "vacation", working remotely, preparing for BlogHer and supporting Knight News Challenge.
Great and terrible.

(On the other hand, it is not 102 degrees here,)

Melissa gets Quote of the Day--and then some

2008-06-21T02:23:42Z

"When I enter a room of suits (like the conference last week, which was called Supernova and was concerned with the business of the internet and which I was covering for Valleywag), it's never the women who put me at instant ease. It's the the other freaks: the femmey guys, the queers, the girl with the lip ring, the boy with the crazy boots. The women in tech I once looked to for support, though they may have once thought I was a cute enough anomaly to tolerate when I could be their Token Whore Speaker, are not the instant allies the web sisterhood wants you to believe they are. It's not okay to say this, but I'm scared that for most women, period, feminism is no longer about breaking the rules men have set, but learning men's rules well enough to seem like they're playing along. But that's probably exactly what some women think I'm doing when I take (or took) my clothes off for money. I'm out of reasons to explain why it wasn't. I can point to my home, my city, my lovers, my friends, my community, my work as reasons, as proof -- that I made it in my own fucking Sinatra way, and that my voice is worthy."

--Melissa Grant Gira, writing about both the much commented on paucity of women at SuperNova, and the fact that identifying as a feminist and a subversive, political queer does not align, much of the time, with being a Web 2.0 digital elitist, whether you are pro women in tech or not.

Susan sez: In other words, there's more than one status quo. As you can see through Meilissa's questioning, feminist identity politics and alt gender politics are not exactly the same thing. Here's some of my thoughts on this--

One could argue that the right to be sexual (and have Zivity take your picture), the right to be a woman and not feel like--or be--a minority--at a major conference are tied to identity and people's rights and abilities to own and control their own identities.

However, one could also say that there's a second set of issue here that are as much a part of gender politics as personal identity.-I'd name them as the right to be openly alt or queer, to be frank about sexuality and sexual values, to be open and accepting of those with other sexual orientations and values--that are as much a part of gender politics as personal identity and that are just as threatening to the status quo as feminism.

Melissa, I don't think the women I know wish you ill, or fear you.

I think they, like me, want all of us to find a way to do the right thing, for it to not take so much effort and, as you say, for everyone to have joy.

I think that what feels like rejection is plain old repression, the need for so many of us to take a deep breath, face what is different and then ask the honest question "Can we find this truth in ourselves?"

What creates change is the will to change. What creates knowledge--and insight--is listening.
I hope people hear your words, Melissa--this is a beautiful and disturbing post.

Another data point that shows how much local--and community--matter

2008-06-19T17:10:34Z

Jeremy Zawodny's going to work at Craigslist!!!!!

Not LinkedIn, not Facebook, not a little start-up, but the little local engine that could and did go big time--Craigslist!

Jeremy writes: "

But this time it was different. Over the course of about three seconds, something clicked in my little brain and I realized that craigslist is a pretty unique combination of things: a small company with a solid financial base, a great service that I use myself, a focused groups of people who really care about doing things well, and an open-source friendly environment.

I replied that I might be interested myself and things kind of took on a life of their own from there. In the weeks that followed, I got the chance to meet much of the team (including CEO Jim Bukmaster and Craig himself). Each time I came away liking more and more about the team. I've also been impressed at how well the company takes care of its people and how thoughtful they are about making important decisions."

I think this is awesome.

Yahoo: The circle game

2008-06-18T14:41:46Z

So with the departure of Caterina and Stewart from Yahoo, I don't think much of anyone from the gang of pirates, as Caterina dubbed the ADD team back in 2005/6, is left.

This is a large turn-over of the social media experts, not that anyone in the main product teams ever tapped any of their knowledge much, anyway, and it says a lot about how the Y! culture is heavily focused on things other than product innovation (getting people to land on their "start pages" and the ad platform for the newspaper partners and small business people would be where I'd guess all the efforts are going right now--in other words, a replay of the equally successful Knight Ridder and AOL schemes of 2003-06.)

When I joined Yahoo! in 2006, it was to the highly meat and potatoes Personals, but I was so excited at the chance to work in parallel, and learn from, the brilliant people who'd developed flickr, upcoming, delicious and so on.

I did learn, but not because I recall Yahoo! packaging up their expertise across the org in any way, more because I sought them out--and very little of what I learned actually made it into our product, truth be told--we had to push so hard to rebuild a 2004 platform and tired interface to make our numbers that the virtual gifting, identity badging and other possibly game-changing stuff we hoped to release never happened.

And now Stewart and Caterina are gone, too.

There are tons of other bright, talented people I know who are still at Yahoo! but those two had a special light I hope the company is sad to miss.

Quote of Day

2008-06-17T14:15:22Z

"We found that 63% of women in science, engineering and technology have experienced sexual harassment. That's a really high figure. They talk about demeaning and condescending attitudes, lots of off-color jokes, sexual innuendo, arrogance; colleagues, particularly in the tech culture, who genuinely think women don't have what it takes -- who see them as genetically inferior."

--Athena factor researchers Sylvia Ann Hewlett, Carolyn Buck Luce and Lisa J. Servon , explaining the reasons women leave technology careers in their mid-30s and early 40s. This Computerworld article is part of the promotion around a HBS article on their research.

Yahoo: Who could replace Jerry Yang?

2008-06-17T13:57:03Z

Kara Swisher's got a good piece on possible Yahoo! CEO replacements, with usual suspects Sue Deck, Meg Whitman, Dan Rosensweig trotted out. She also suggests Mac Andressen (interesting) and Mark Cuban (interesting as well.)

Let me add a couple more prospects I think would be strong candidates:
Michael Wolf , ex MTV president. Wolf is smart, nice, focused and well connected. A New Yorker with Valley ties, he'd bring good operating skills and a breath of fresh air.

Hilary Schneider, Yahoo EVP. Hilary might be stretched to lead such a big business, but she has an ability to make decisions the other big Ys lack. As a former publishing person in a software world, she has a rounded point of view, and she's ambitious, therefore p
resumably willing to stretch.

Jim Bankoff, former AOL guy. Jim's been out of AOL for 2-3 years, and while he is young, he's a good businessman, and a focused negotiator. He's done the big company thing, but gets technology development. And he works hard.

Omiru named one of the 50 best web sites of 2008

2008-06-16T20:38:14Z

Who says small can't be beautiful? And powerful, for that matter? My friend Trish's lovechild, fashion site Omiru, was just named one of Time magazines 50 best web sites of 2008. "Omiru's laser focus on practical fashion advice makes it a don't-miss."

This totally rocks!

Quote of the Day

2008-06-16T14:06:35Z

"June seems like a pretty quiet month for me. Selling my house, renting a place up in the city, moving up to the city, quitting Yahoo!, securing life insurance (apparently Yahoo! cuts you off the day you leave - heads up woulda been great) - oh yeah, and starting a new job as VP of Product Management at Zynga. Yeah, I can definitely squeeze in an album release party. So I will!!"

--Cool beans from the blog of a master of understatement, ex-Yahoo Scott Derringer, whose life just kicked up another notch, and who is part of the much-loved soulpatch and heading to gaming platforms company zynga.

Okay, I'm back--and why mobile devices rule the earth

2008-06-16T13:39:49Z

So I spent three days on the road to Northern Michigan, in a house with no wireless, reuniting with the BF and friends and..hiking...and sleeping. The whole time, my Blackberry kept me posted on the world: email, NYTimes, twitter, friendfeed, techmeme, and so on. The fact I could, even while I was on the road and in transition, do what I think of as continuous partial attention monitoring--ie looking at data more than I was contributing--is why I consider my mobile device as attached to my person forever (of course, as I write this, I then realize I left it in the car. Dooh!)

On the other hand, I've missed blogging...terribly. For me, blogging is part of a process of thinking, communicating, articulating, observing...just stopping would be a real shocker, so it feel so good to get back to the machine, coffee beside me, and start writing again.

For the next week or so, I am going to be in juggling mode--balancing working remotely on two projects--with taking a long-planned, long-awaited vacation by a lake with family and friends. If I had no wireless, no mobile devices, no laptop--I couldn't have made this trip, even if we'd been planning this for a year (as we have.). Even now, I feel like its the strength and support of the teams I am working with that got me here. And I am grateful. For the colleagues and friends I have--and for those mobile, portable devices.

A rare moment away from the computer

2008-06-13T03:28:33Z

Andrew Hyde snuck up and took this at some odd hour when we'd both been work for, uh, days.

The moment when Loopt stopped working for me

2008-06-12T19:24:24Z

So when I saw that Loopt was going to be on all the new iPhones, I ran to try it. I love mobile apps, especially web to mobile apps. So, I installed it, right on my phone, but couldn't figure out how to see it, on the phone, I mean. (Dooh!)

So I just got a message that basically says "Reminder! You're using Loopt to share you phone's location with friends."

So you mean I just installed a tracking device on my phone for stalkers I know and this thing can't ever be shut off?

FAIL. uninstall imminemt.

Noted (and transitions)

2008-06-12T17:26:49Z

Jeremy Zawodny leaving Yahoo: Just saw that my friend Jeremy Z is leaving Yahoo for a compelling opportunity with another company; I am excited for him, and wish him all the best.

San Jose Mercury News: Knight Foundation is awarding aq set of organization in San Jose $1.5 million dollars to "help the community find its soul." ( Susan sez: I continued to be impressed--and thrilled--by Knight projects and investments (and am honored to be helping them with the Knight News Challenge.)

Amy Gahran: Is community news a nice-to-have? At The Future of News conference at MIT, Lisa Williams and other discuss whether local news is the holy grail local residents crave (verdict: Not.)

Rejected from Facebook ads

2008-06-12T13:35:30Z

A friend of mine tried to place an ad to promote a FB app, and got the following rejection notice:

* The text of this ad contains excessive or incorrect capitalization. All ads must use appropriate, grammatically correct capitalization. The title of your ad, as well as the first word in each sentence, must begin with a capital letter. Lastly, all proper nouns and acronyms should be capitalized. As per section 4 of Facebook's Advertising Guidelines, all ads should include standard and proper capitalization.

* The text of this ad does not contain proper sentence structure or correct spacing. As per section 4 of Facebook's Advertising Guidelines, all ad text must be in logical sentence form and contain grammatically correct spacing."

WOOT!

Exit velocity: Rumors, Weiner, Yahoo & AOL

2008-06-12T00:07:51Z

Just saw Mike Arrington's TechCrunch post that Jeff Weiner's departure from Yahoo is a done deal and it accelerated a question I have been asking myself since this morning (for reasons that I can't go into but make some sense):

When these companies started their downward spiral, did the talented employees peel out of AOL or Yahoo faster?
And what was the rate of departure of the albatrosses who hung on until the carcass was almost bone dry?
Which company kept those folks longer?
And what does this say about the current culture and health?

I left Yahoo just 5 months ago, but the rate of departure of people I know and worked with in the past 5 months seems way, way higher than it was when I left AOL. Even now, I still have friends hanging on in Dulles and NY, but at Big Purple, so few people I felt close to remain, and more and more seem to depart every week.

Seems to be that the moment you have a kid if a good inflection point to reconsider the flow of the whole of your life, so Jeff Weiner's departure, if it is true, makes some sense, but then there is that question, so now, what will Yahoo do?

Curious, me.

Weds Food Porn: Chocolate cupcakes

2008-06-11T16:50:03Z

(Via The Brooklyn Kitchen Blog)

How TechStars and Tech meetups remind me of MFA programs and sewing circles

2008-06-11T14:53:19Z

So we're heading to week three at TechStars, and while the problems we want to solve have changed, the products wer're building have shifted 180 degrees.On one hand, this is marvelous--we're going to get real products into the market and used by customers sooner than we thought; on the other hand.

But as we narrow and focus our ideas to deliver something small, I am also working to make sure our product strategy and our actual roadmap remain large, so that we don't narrow our business as we focus our releases. Managing this process in myself makes me wonder if companies who are successful through TechStars will end up with very similar approaches to development and iteration, and that in turn, makes me think about the days when I thought of goiing to grad school to get an MFA in Poetry(which I never did.) Back then, one of my concerns was that I'd lose my own voice and sound like an "Iowa" writer. Will this be a similar thing? I don't think so, but the comparison--and how influenced I am by the very smart, common sense feedback and great perspectives the mentors share--does make me smile.

On a similar note, I'm thinking about how the kind of meet up I am in the middle of right now, hanging with a bunch of programmers and their Apple machines, around a big table in the back of The Cup, is like a digital sewing circle (sorry, guys.) We're all working, focused on our machines, and yet there is an easy comraderie and some shared talk and chatter. It's good energy, lightening the load of the day with companionship and shared purpose, and a change of scenery (some of these folks work together and this is the satellite office.)