Archive for March, 2007

A few days ago, liveinyourlivingroom.com launched. So what? you say. Well, the site is owned by a fellow Irishman, located close to me, which has received – to the best of my knowledge – significant funding. It’s also a new social networking type site, so i’ll be comparing it with BeerChief – funded only with a few hundred dollars.

The concept is unique, it has potential:

“Our channel is the world’s first dedicated live stage for musicians from around the globe. A music site where you see your favourite artists, discover new talent, interact with them and share your passion with fans like you.”

The site looks good and is well presented, obviously a lot of design work gone in. That’s where my love affair ends. I’ve previously talked about delivering a ‘world-class’ social networking site in BeerChief and that hasn’t changed. The more i stumble across similar sites, the more confident i become BeerChief can make it big.

• liveinyourlivingroom.com‘s homepage is flash based. BIG mistake. Firstly, flash is out of date, people don’t like it, and it’s only a stage to show off for designers which people by in large don’t like. Try loading a flash based site on a 56k dial up connection

• Secondly, despite launching, it only has literally 4 or 5 backlinks according to yahoo. Woeful. When BeerChief launches, i’ll make damn sure everybody knows about it. There’ll be press releases, forum notices, links on related sites, emails, texts, bulletins, blog posts, plugs all over the place.. the full works. I’ll personally see to it.

• Thirdly, it’s not SEO’d. The meta tags are not filled in. No description, no keywords. Speaks for itself.

• Fourthly, the dark colour scheme doesn’t work imo. It’s a well known fact people prefer light colour schemes. Name me a big successful site with a gray/black background Google, Youtube, Bebo, Myspace, Digg… all have one thing in common – light backgrounds. I think it’s a subconscious thing to do with space. White has the effect of space and freedom, black/gray is depressing and claustrophobic. For example, blue skies and sun, are much more inspiring than rain and thunderstorms.

• Fifthly, the .org and .net extensions are available. With BeerChief, i decided to snap up the big 3 extensions. The likes of bebo and myspace don’t have the .net’s and .org’s, and now they’re worth small fortunes. With the big 3 extensions all pointing to your site, it gives you dominance and power and shows people that you really own the terms ‘BeerChief’ or ‘live in your living room’. It also saves domain squatters from cashing in on YOUR success or perhaps holding you to ranson if in the future you decide to buy them. At $8 a piece it won’t break the bank now. Once the .com is established and successful, the others will be worth 3,4 or perhaps 5 figure sums.

Ok, i’ve torn it to shreds perhaps unfairly and nitpicked over small things. But in it’s current state, it won’t take off globally. There’ll be no organic traffic, or no links to it. People will be put off by it’s colour scheme and over the top flash animation. Like i said, it has potential. The concept is unique and fairly solid on paper. It *should* go viral, provided they keep improving it, but unless some of the above issues are sorted out, it won’t be getting maximum traffic and exposure.

Recently, when i was in dublin at the Ireland -v- Slovakia match, i went for lunch in Burger King – as you do – in a city centre shopping centre.

So i’m eating my bacon and cheese burger when i notice some guy coming from behind me, placing a small sheet and a few keyrings on the table. I’m like WTF Before i had time to say, no i’m not interested (as i thought he was selling them), he had walked on and gave out the same keyrings and sheet to other tables.

On the laminated sheet, were a few sentences strung together. I should have taken a picture of it, but anyway, it basically said “i’m deaf and from china, i do not beg, but i find it very difficult to live in your country as i have no job, please buy one of these keyrings for €2 or a teddy bear for €4″.

My gut instinct was ‘scam’. But if it was a scam, it was extremely clever and well worked. The laminated sheet showed about 20 small thumbnails in sign language for various answers. The fact it was laminated also added a degree of professionalism to the whole thing. As i was pondering whether or not to give him anything, other people had already taken out their wallets, purses etc.. and now i’m feeling under pressure and a bit guilty in case this guy really is deaf.

So i end up giving him €2 and taking a keyring off him. About 70% of 20 tables or so, all gave him something. He was in and out in 5 minutes. So i reckon he gathered about €30. Not bad for 5 minutes ‘work’. Obviously he didn’t speak a word but did make a few gestures with his hands – waving them about quickly – as a real deaf person would.

So either this guy was genuinely broke and trying to make a buck or else he was an evil piece of work taking advantage of people’s generousity. Either way, i thought he deserved the cash for having the balls and brains to come up with such a project. I never give anything to beggars, and rarely to collectors for sports clubs or hospitals etc… but this guy managed to get to me.

What do you guys think? Scam or no scam?

As you’ll know, im not a fan of ‘work’ in the typical 9-5 monday-friday sense of the word.

So i thought i’d compile my own 9-5 day – in my regular job at the minute, what it involves and how much time is wasted.. here’s a typical 24 hour day for me, when working.

0000 - on internet, go to bed as i’m thinking of work in the morning. (time wasted thinking about work – 5 mins)

0100 – go to sleep as i know i need to get up early for work. (time wasted thinking about work – 5 mins)

0800 – get up, even though i don’t start work until 0900. (time wasted preparing for work – 1 hour)

0900 – in work, getting paid. (time wasted – nothing).

1300 – 1 hour unpaid lunch (time wasted – 1hour, as im just eating and waiting for time to tick by)

1400 – back to work from lunch (time wasted – none)

1700 – clock out. begin drive home and walk to car (time wasted – 30mins)

1730 – get home, need to change out of uniform and relax after work (time wasted recovering from work – 1hour)

1830 – 0000 – waste about 10 mins thinking about work.

Total time Paid for work = 7 hours

Total time Non-paid work, but thinking/preparing/relaxing after work = 3 hours 40 mins

So i get paid for just 70% of? my work related time. This is on a good day also. On a bad day, there could be inspectors/new roles/new managers etc.. and i could be thinking about that for a lot longer.

Plus, all of that doesn’t take into account the stress in driving, getting parked etc..

This is a huge reason why i’ll be leaving my job in May. The amount of time i spend on work, without getting paid for it. At home, when online – it’s a different story. 100% of the time i spend working will get me paid. Maybe not today or tomorrow, but i will get paid for it due to pagerank increasing, better search engine results etc… all of that doesn’t happen overnight.

I’d imagine most people are in the same position as me. They get paid for 70% or less of their work-related time. Hell, i’ve been in my job almost 4 years, it’s just above minimum wage and i know everyone there and get on with the managers. Imagine how much time a new/inexperienced guy would spend on worrying

In my first week, i’d probably get paid for less than 50% of my time invested in work-related things.

Two wins from two games. Last night’s 1-0 victory over Slovakia, has us breathing down the Czech’s necks. Last night, Croke Park was rocking. As i anticipated, the atmosphere was much better than Saturday’s match.

Mid-week, night time kick-offs mean families and kids have school and work in the mornings and don’t want the hassle of travelling around a gridlocked city. So all the fair weather fans were at home, and the hardcore fans were at the match – the way it should be.

With the Czech Republic and Slovakia both away, yet to play, plus Germany at home, it’s still a mountain to climb. We need a minimum 6 points from those 3 games to stand any chance. Ireland have a woeful record away from home, always have done.. but these two recent victories have given us a lifeline.

As usual, here’s a few snaps and video which i took…

Below are the the Slovakian fans.. They were pretty lively despite their team playing very poorly.

We were 1-0 up after about 12 mins.

end of match celebrations…

Finally, here’s video of the kick-off – atmosphere was fantastic

Tomorrow sees Ireland take on Slovakia in another must-win match. Following our 1-0 victory over Wales on Saturday, another win would put us joint 2nd place in the group.

With Germany the run away leaders, beating the Czech’s to second spot is our best chance of qualification for euro 2008. We are currently level with them on points, but they have a game in hand over us.

In order to keep pressure on the Czech’s and possibly take advantage if they slip up somewhere, we can’t afford to lose matches, and tomorrow, nothing less than 3 points will be enough. It should eb a cracking atmosphere – night time fixtures are always more exciting as there is build up all day and people have a chance to get one or two pints in after work before kick-off at 7.30pm.

So i’m expecting a better atmosphere than Saturday, hopefully capped with a convincing victory. As usual, i’ll be posting pics and video when i get back.