Mr.
Matt
Spangler

37Signals Valuation Tops $100 Billion

Hilarious and timely. Well played Jason.

via heyitsnoah

PRESS RELEASE: 37SIGNALS VALUATION TOPS $100 BILLION AFTER BOLD VC INVESTMENT

“37signals is now a $100 billion dollar company, according to a group of investors who have agreed to purchase 0.000000001% of the company in exchange for $1.”

Also see this and this.

Apple’s Big Missed Opportunity?

I published an article on the Huffington Post today. Look forward to hearing your thoughts.

Apple’s Big Missed Opportunity?

Thanks to Colin Nagy for his editorial guidance.

A marketing budget mission statement

This is hard to do all the time…but worth fighting for.

via soupsoup:

“Unlike some, I don’t argue that the advent of the internet means advertising is dead. But I do think that companies can’t simply buy attention on the internet.

Banner ads that just get in your way, commercial emails you’re tricked into receiving, even clever newer generation ads that use your data to be more targeted or relevant are still interruptions we crossly brush aside. By age 20, young people born after 1982 will have spent 20,000 hours online – the same amount of time a professional piano player would have spent practising. So we immediately see through gimickry like “viral” videos that are riddled with product placement, communities where companies don’t act like humans or allow us to be human either, or microsites where we’re expected to wait for Flash to buffer while we could be making our own videos with our friends. These are all trying to take trap or lure us into paying attention, but we can see straight through it.

Companies have to try and tap into the excitement - or at least the autonomy, positivity and limitless opportunity - that most of us feel when we sit down in front of the internet. Is what they produce genuinely fascinating, detailed enough for fans to stick their teeth into, flexible enough for us to play with and co-create? Does it allow us to bolster our image or develop our personalities? Can we connect with others through using it, or have our say in its development? That’s how they can genuinely earn our attention and engagement.”

- We Are The Digital Kids.: Why I love the internet