If you have a yahoo account
…you can use the rss feature in my.yahoo.com to track your favorite blogs. Including this one:
Thanks, it’s working!
My ebook The Bootstrapper’s Bible is now the most popular pdf in the short history of changethis.com. Not only is it #1 in downloads, but it got there in half the time as any other title.
And it’s free.
But they’re all free, so that doesn’t explain it.
We’re still trying to figure out what makes one manifesto pop faster than another, but you can see the popular ones here: ChangeThis :: View manifestos by popularity and draw your own conclusions.
Free to read, free to print, free to email to your friends and to people who need shaking up.
[YIKES… so many people are visiting changethis.com that it is running slow or even crashing. If you run into trouble, please try again later. Sorry, but that’s what happens (sometimes) when it’s free.]
Hoodia!
Stopped by the Yahoo! Buzz Index – Buzz Log for the first time in a while today. Biggest breakout new idea? Hoodia. I had no idea.
The index is organized primarily around actors and media, which is pretty trivial stuff, easily explained. I’m far more interested in the larger trends, the stuff that represents what people are paying attention to that might actually have a half life.
So what’s the most interesting takeaway? For me, it’s that the stuff that changes the most is banal. The teen star of the moment and the sports team of yesterday. People don’t like big changes but they obsess about the little ones.
PS according to the BBC, all those Hoodia ads you see online are frauds. They don’t have real Hoodia in them. Just thought you’d want to know.
Summer Camp?
It’s the beginning of winter and this is a blog about marketing and respect and ideas, but a few of you will end up being grateful for this link.
If you’ve got kids between 8 and 15, I’d really like to recommend Camp Arowhon. I used to work there and count the director as one of my closest friends. Joanne has built an extraordinary place and has been rewarded by being completely sold out every year no later than November.
But, she’s interested in finding kids from outside her usual area. So if you’re from New York or Cleveland or even Dubai, drop her line. I think she’s holding on to a few slots.
Sorry for the off-topic interruption. We now return to our regular programming.
The limits of ecommerce?
Sanj asks, “I wonder how many Amazon sells?” Link: Amazon.com: Jewelry: Ladies Diamond Cut Bezel Link Necklace With Princess Cut Diamonds Diamond 21.08cttw.
Notice that you can’t buy it with one click shopping. Prevents real impulse purchases, I guess.
What’s neat for me about this is that it highlights what people really buy when they buy a necklace for $169,575. And it’s not the necklace.
private goes public, again
I’ve been talking a lot about this phenomenon… turning previously private stuff public.
Now comes ringbacks, which allow you to change the way your phone sounds in the ear of the person calling you.
Too cool. Link: T-Mobile introducing ringback tones soon – Engadget – www.engadget.com.
Grilled Cheese
I’m tempted to riff and riff about culture mores, memes, ideaviruses and the way ideas spread.
But instead, I’ll just tell the few among you who haven’t done this yet: Go to ebay and do a search on grilled cheese. (while it’s active: Link: eBay – grilled cheese, Metaphysical, Weird Stuff, and Men’s Clothing items at low prices.)
Thank you.
Thinking about digital media
So, here’s an interesting head to head comparison of how an idea works its way through the food chain.
About 7 years ago I wrote a book called, Link: The Bootstrapper’s Bible. For a bunch of reasons, it didn’t do very well. It probably sold about 10,000 copies at about $12.
I got the rights back from the publisher and turned it into a PDF which was sold on Amazon. (Link: Amazon.com: Books: The Bootstrapper’s Bible : Volume 1.) For a surprisingly long time, it was either the #1 bestselling ebook on the entire Amazon website or in the top 100. It costs less than $3. Yet, after 18 months of strong sales on Amazon, it has sold fewer copies than the paperback did.
Yesterday, we announced that for just two weeks, a ChangeThis edition of the ebook (Link: ChangeThis :: The Bootstrapper’s Bible ) is available for free. And in twenty four hours, it has already “outsold” the Amazon eBook and will quite likely surpass the printed edition within a week or so.
Can you make any money giving away an ebook? I think you can. I think you do when the idea spreads and people want to interact with you in other ways. And those interactions are the currency of the future.
A cow in more ways than one
Courtesy of Alex Godin.
Free Godin ebook
This is a better formatted, limited edition ebook edition of The Bootstrapper’s Bible, which used to come free when you bought a copy of Purple Cow.
Blog readers get a headstart: Link: ChangeThis :: The Bootstrapper’s Bible .
Money back guarantee if you don’t like it.