Ian On The Red Dot

Is Joe Augustin awesome? Or rather is he a good radio DJ? I mean, how does a good DJ get fired again? Stupid bosses?

Joe was the host for TDM’s Blogout09 and to be honest, he was an amazing host. He was also an absolutely effective moderator for the Q&A sessions.

Joe was plugging his possibly regular podcast show throughout the two days. You can hear a test episode here. Password: morningjamfan

Joe shared an absolute peach of a joke on Day 1:

Singaporeans love lucky draws. It’s because we were founded by Raffles.

If the joke isn’t that funny, it is because of the presentation. Joe’s delivery was perfect and he got the whole room laughing. You got to hear him say it.

The image above shows an ad on the ‘Morning Jam‘ site. Not sure if Joe really actually uses such a tool to trade but if he does, I can’t imagine why he would need to earn money from advertising it or still try to host a podcast. He should already be rolling in the cash.

Where am I going with this?

The truth is, I’ve never been much of a radio listener. My family never had the habit of turning on the radio. I don’t drive to work nor do I carry a portable FM receiver so listening to radio programs while commuting has never been part of my life. I’ve never really been a fan of any DJ. However, over the course of the two days, I can imagine myself listening to the works produced by Joe. After listening to the podcast, I’m more inclined to continue listening if they do get a regular show going. I can only imagine the kind of content that will be available when they start discussing the real good stuff happening in the world instead of using ‘made-up’ situations.

Kevin Kelly shared his concept of ’1000 True Fans’ as a means of supporting an artist. I loved the concept and have been trying to get my gf to use such a concept to support her art.

Here’s the thing. I’ve never really been a true fan myself. Well, at least not in the sense where I contribute to the finances of an artist directly and regularly.

I think Yongfook is right when he shared about how there seems to be a feeling of entitlement for free content.

Do you know that Lester Chan who developed a bunch of really useful plugins for WordPress has received a paltry sum in donations. He is a guy who has written a bunch of useful tools that have empowered a good number of us (judging from the downloads) and we don’t even have the basic decency to donate.

We have such a disgusting tendency to expect something from nothing.

Came home and immediately donated what little I had left in my PayPal account to Lester.

I won’t pretend to be a true fan but I do appreciate what Joe is trying to do. I love it when the little guy (in Joe’s case, maybe not so little) sticks it to the man and I’ve decided that, although I’m not willing to pay a lot, if Joe wants to setup some sort of monthly basic subscription to get his podcast show going, I’m willing to signup to give the show a chance to live.

If you are a fan, you should to. Speaking for myself, it is time to be on the other side of the ’1000 True Fans’ equation.

And maybe if Joe and Shareen can get enough, there won’t be (what looks like) dubious ads on the blog that frankly spoils the brand.

All the best Joe and Shareen, and I do hope you guys (or rather you guy and gal) get something successful going.

Today, I met Yongfook. I don’t think there is anything wrong being a fanboi, especially if you are worshiping the awesomeness which is Megan Fox, but it is slightly worrying when the object of fandom is a male web developer.

The problem is there is a lot to like about Yongfook. He is rather handsome, has a great sense of aesthetic as evidenced from his sites, seems like a decent web developer ( who can get people excited about his products ) and after today, an eloquent presenter that can get his ideas across effectively and able to actually teach people something. His presentation’s sample case studies were not just an enlightening lesson in what to do but also how to approach the problem of social media metrics.

Incidentally, his site was down for a while. Or at least impossible to connect. I think lots of women are checking out his site after his presentation today. In case you are doing research, he is single. Join the fan club here.

The truth is, from the information that can be gleamed from his sites alone, the story of Yongfook the web personality is a rather interesting one. Like all things good on the web recently, I learned of Yongfook from litford. Earlier this evening, during a dinner which was hosted by IDA and TDM, I managed to learn a little more of Yongfook the person beyond the web personality while sharing a table with him and a few other folks.

Interesting conversation all round and he shared a side of Singapore I can’t get to see as a local.

Did I mention there is a fan club.

A little more of the awesomeness of Megan Fox.

And yes, I do feel I need to overcompensate in a post on what seems like an awesome dude with an even more awesome babe.