Colin Mercer on the Inter-Web - interview with Colin

Here's the second of my blogger interviews. Check Colin's site before you read it:)

Sylwia: How did you start your adventure with blogging? When? Why?
Colin: A multi thread question, a lovely place to start, at the beginning. My first experience of blogging came from being called into my boss's office and being told that I had to start blogging and that was that. This was a corporate blog which I was the sole person contributing on for around 6-8 months. I probably shouldn't say much more about it, a quick Google search for "colinm blog" should make it pretty obvious though.

That’s the boring, accurate answer out the way, onto why I started blogging at colinmercer.co.uk. I honestly don't remember, I have had the domain for a little while, then the opportunity of hosting came up so I thought why not give it a go again. Being back involved in the industry after uni meant that I had some time on my hands to experiment and get involved so I did and Colin Mercer on the inter-web is the outcome.

Syl:Does your blog reflect your private life? Does your blog affect it?
Colin:Almost entirely, everything I blog about is private life related. I am a keen lifeblogger, which means that when something happens I like to blog about it instantly. Whether this is a picture of me in the pub with some mates, or whatever, I like to throw it straight up. Until very recently I have kept my blog based entirely on my personal/private life, now I have started to add in some more things about work and other topics.

The only affect the blog has had on my private life is positive, opening the door to meeting a wealth of new and wonderful people who previously I would not have had any contact with.

Syl:You post a lot about your company’s projects/events. Am I right you are a fan of full transparency when it comes to marketing?
Colin:This is something which has changed a fair amount in the recent weeks, until now I have stayed away from posting about what I do with work. Previously I would post about work situations, or happenings at work, or places I was going with work without a reference to who I work for. This I suspect will continue as I want to keep up some separation from my blog and my work.

Full transparency in marketing is something I am 100% behind, as you know, I spend a good whack of my time at work striving to achieve this. I feel that this does not affect my decision not to post about work on the blog as I am far from running a marketing blog.

Syl:You have several presences on-line. What is their role in relation to your blog? Which one is your favourite and why?
Colin:I do indeed have several presences, my latest challenge is to tick all the boxes on usernamecheck.org, and undoubtedly I will get bored very quickly. Their role I guess is to try and increase the awareness people have of my blog, the overall aim would be to get my opinions in front of as many people as I can. However, in practice, the blog merely acts as a tag to link all the presences together, and gives people I encounter on individual sites the opportunity to find out a bit more about me.

My favourite site is clearly Twitter, I find it very easy to update and keep up with the people I want to keep up to date with. I also love the Jaiku, but find this much harder to follow than Twitter is.

Syl:How about your friends, do they blog? Do they use Twitter?
Colin:I have a few friends who blog, this number is ever growing as I slowly but surely convince my existing friends to start blogging, and make friends with people who are already blogging. I would say a higher percentage of my existing friends use Twitter than blog, coincidentally, in the last few days I have had a number of people ask me to explain "this Twitter thing" to them, which is encouraging.

Syl:What does the blogging mean to you (in three key words)?
Colin:Meaningful, empowering, brain-splat

Syl:I want to publish part of this interview on bar mleczny (www.barmleczny.blogspot.com) if that’s OK, hence my next question:
Colin:What is your favourite dish? Do you cook?
Being an English male, Steak, Chips, Peas, Green Beans and English Mustard wins the day. Yes I love to cook, I wouldn't say I'm great but I like to experiment and find great satisfaction in accomplishing an edible meal.

Syl:What is you favourite foreign cuisine?
Colin:Curry, however I'm pretty sure that the curry I like isn't actually foreign cuisine, just our version of foreign cuisine. So I will also say Mexican, things like Fajitas, Tacos, etc.

Syl:If we were to have a Polish cuisine evening once based around cooking and eating and possibly drinking Polish shizzle, would you join us?
Colin:YES - you bring the vodka, I'll get the cucumber!

Thank you, Colin!

Is this ethical? Few words on female blogging…

PR Girl is asking that question when referring to women bloggers who and earn money with their sites. I think it is a very complicated issue, and I understand the concerns of well established voices of the blogosphere, still – did we not join it because the internet gave us the eternal freedom of speech? I would rather like to look at the results of those blogging activities that were mentioned during the blogher.com event.
I am currently very much occupied with the reasons for all of us to blog and I understand we all have different ones. Still, in the light of current law in the UK, it is against the law for a company to conduct any marketing activities (=pay bloggers to express their opinions as well) affecting and CHANGING financial behaviour of the brand consumers. I think it’s a brilliant way of judging blogger ethics too.
As far as the writing itself is concerned, we cannot ask every single blogging person to forget about projects based around earning money. It’s just a different type of blogging with its own issues. Isn’t?

blogging ethics and 'One Nation Under Blog' - new book about bloging ethics

ted i:I wanted to talk about it since few weeks, but somehow I felt I am not educated enough in the subject of blogging ethics. I read all the main books (Manifesto, Scoble, etc) and followed all the ethical and unethical issues comming up on-line to be able to express my own opinion. Today I was challenged myself, so I think it's good time to put is up.
I think it's a must.
As some of you well know I work in WOM Marketing and my position is very much connected to marketing ethics (engouh if you do a proper Google search) so I really need to separate my private life from the proffesional aspects of it. Nevertheless I blog since 2004 and was always interested in social media to certain extend, so it's dificult to find the balance between work and private interest. I actually think it's great to be able to work in a place where you can use your interest and enhance both your performance, as well as you own knowledge.
This blog however, as well as all other presences of mine on-line are devoted to my private interests and I want to keep it this way. As TechWag is putting it righttly, my blogging is about ambition and 'talks about the things that are important to him (me:)), without advertising, and without an obvious money motive'. Even though some of the topics might correlate with my work, I always make it clear that it's my private place.
So...
Today I was contacted by a very friendly blogger to take part in a project which - based on the first short (via Twitter) description sounded interesting. I like taking parts in different projects, especially when we talk about creativity, activism or social media. I cannot and I do not feel comfortable about taking part in projects involving any material reward and/or sponsored campaigns. I am glad that the approach taken today was personal, friendly and understanding and I am happy that I can use it as an excuse to make this statement.

So yes, feel free to contact me, but be prepared I might have to say 'no' to keep my presence the way I want it to be:)

Blogging ethics is a complicated issue. Each of us has different incetives for blogging and we have different standards too. The gurus of web tried to put together different codes of cunduct and we all learn and try to stay flexible with all the new technologies coming up. Our perception of privacy changes too. I personally think that the blogging ethics has, is and will always stay in the region of common understanding and respect, and will be based on personal agreement.
I also hope we will all stay open for new ideas, and choose the ones we actually find suitable for ourselves.

Talking of new ideas...

I am looking forward to see new publication on this topic, book titled 'One Nation Under Blog' described by Jason Falls here. I keep the track of political blogging in the US and I hope we will all come out of it with few learnings. I wonder what this book will suggest...

Update: just found this policy, good to see other bloggers -actually involved in piching - state their ways on-line. Very, very clear!

Tweader, 'a tool for Twitter'

It is an interesting tool indeed. It allows you to track back conversations (@...) on Twitter. See loiclemeur's conversation here for instance. It does not always pick it all up, but in principle it's great to actually pick only those tweets that are conversational.

This tool makes me think about the Twitter itself. We all started using it probably just to try it out, to see how it goes...and at the back of my head I had the thought of 'just another social media bit, surprise me!'. And it did indeed! I grew more and more interested in microblogging simply because my presence on Twitter started to turn into something serious. After few weeks I got to the stage where Twitter was:
1. Providing me with insights on what the leading web 2.0 personalities use, do, suggest - and where form can you learn it, if not from them?
2.Serving as secondary to my blogs tool to network/communicate with my old and new friends.
3.Giving me the flexibility to be present on-line while I am away from my PC (I must admit I am sceptical about mobile blogging, and I know I will have to face it soon, still:/)
4.Most of all meeting extremely interesting people!
As I am getting into more and more apps and tools based on Twitter I really think it's a great platform, simply because it matches our busy lifestyle!
Blogging will not die, obviously we all need it and always will, but microblogging is a great appendix, intro and wrap up of all we do on our blogs.

Twestival

What a great idea! It's one of those events that makes me really, really sad that I cannot attend! Damn! It looks like few of my friends are going so at least I can be happy for them and have a chat afterwards, but it really annoys me that I am stuck at home that night. (I feel like a bad teenager who needs to do the homework instead...that annoyed). Anyway, do have a look at their website, and do try to sign up for it. It really looks like a cool place to be for all Twitter and social media fans. And to meet people like @ihatemorningsdotcom:

Happy Blog Day everyone!

It's your day, so accept my best wishes! Happy Blog Day everyone!
I am happy to have the chance to mention my current the best 5, so here they are:)

1. Chris Brogan - social media guru, whose tips and advice are crucial for my work and my blogging.
2. Blog Till You Drop - Lolly is not only a friendly person, but also a very professional blogger - her insights are always valuable!
3. Cementum - It's amazing to see Rich not only working very hard on his book, but also blogging about the process - it must be so hard to be able to look at yourself and be so disciplined! I am impressed!
4. The Girl - I am very impressed by her work as a blogger and writer too. This one is a must!
5. PR Blogger - good study of current situation in PR, very helpful!

Now, this list reflect my UK, English speakign life. My Polish list was published here.
No Hungarian this time - I am not reading Hungarian blogs (apart from few friends, like Planet Damage) after discouragement of a few Nazi sites, brrr...

I wonder how those lists change in one year time:)
Happy BD again!

I am...

'I am neither, I am both. I took my path, I took my cards, I tore at them, unflinching, and moved onward, and upward. I decide to make decisions that are already predetermined. How can I have this. My path had been set out, I had no choice but to follow it, but there was always hope, there was always a belief, a speck of doubt about it all, that made me...me. I am torn." His mind's eye had calmed, he was beginning to come to terms with the unknown, his past as it had been before the crash, his being, his absolute self belief in himself, and how he was a product of his own decisions which he was free to make as he chose. And after the crash, his coping mechanism that gave the whole thing purpose and clarity, there was a reason behind his pain, he was on a path and he would strive along, that path to kill everyRiRithing he hated, it had been decided for him and it freed him from the responsibility for the murders'

What do you think? To see my responses, click on the links in the text or posts below. To read more about this novel, check Richard Galbraith's blog.

I am very interested to see the progress of his writing on the blog, but also read the comments of other fans.

In some points I do not agree with Richard (I am a post-modernist), but generally speaking I agree that one can be so self-defined that everything can be justified - it's human nature. Luckily some of us have strength to choose stronger, more difficult paths and educated enough to see through lies.

I think the truth is in between - in the harmony between the pre-defined and the chosen. At least that is how it works for me.

Blogged with the Flock Browser

Alcopop!

Once again I discover the pure talent in my fellow bloggers!


I have been given a link to this charming blog of a label promoting very good music, so do check it out!

Blogged with the Flock Browser

1st

Started just to try it out, so let's see...