Nick Douglas Has Earned Star Status…Snarky Style

Nick Douglas just earned star status. He left Valleywag. He has joined the leagues of Amanda Congdon (who has her own news today) and others in the Internet circle of fame. Nick just launched into a world where his every move will raise speculation about his allegiances, his enemies and what really happened between him and Nick Denton. It’s not quite on the same par as Amanda’s departure from Rocketboom but the chatter is evidence of a changing world where the stars of the new Internet culture are talked about, debated and analyzed.

I should have know sonething was up when I was in on a conversation about Denton coming into San Francisco last weekend. Why was he coming into town after the Web 2.0 Summit? I guess in hindsight the reason was pretty obvious. Douglas was on his way out. And Denton was in town to tend to the clean up.

The other significance? It’s evidence that people like Douglas, Congdon and others like Ze Frank are getting discovered for the media that they create online. They are getting their big breaks for the media that they make. And that in turn is evolving into what we do with all our stars. We examine them, debate their strengths and weaknesses and speculate about what is next. That’s the saucy side of Internet fame. Sure is fun, huh?

Good luck, Nick Douglas. I love your snarky style. May you find a new home where we can get your latest takes on love and fame, valley style.

TechCrunch Party

TechCrunch 8 is in New York Thursday night and I’ll be there. I hear these TechCrunch parties get going. The cops shut down the TechCrunch gig at August Capital. They had crashers. The party in New York is at a place called BED. It should be interesting.

I will be on the look out for bloggers, podcasters, folks who work with social networks. Let me know if that fits who you are and I’ll be sure we meet at TechCrunch 8.

See you in New York!

Love Those Users

I read at snipperoo today that today is world usability day. Snipperoo, I hear you on that one. We’re getting ready for our beta and usability is a word that comes up a lot around here. Will Splashcast be easy enough for people? How can we make it more simple?

Snipperoo has these nuggets for us to consider:

Imagine if you couldn’t figure out how to upload videos on YouTube
Imagine if Google seemed too complex
Imagine if using Tivo was as hard as using your VCR
Imagine if your iPod intimidated you
Imagine if customizing your Avatar wasn’t any fun
Imagine if you couldn’t figure out how to comment on this post
Imagine if buying offline was more convenient
Imagine if classifieds were easier than Craigslist
Imagine if the buttons on your mobile device didn’t work
Imagine if running a blog was only for techies
Imagine if your bank teller was faster than your ATM
Imagine if del.icio.us wasn’t
Imagine if I couldn’t figure out how to publish this post

Imagine if all agencies and our clients took usability seriously?

A product, service or brand experience that isn’t usable is like a barking dog without teeth.  All bark, no bite and highly annoying.

We’ll do our first usability testing in a few weeks. We’ll have our fair share of geeks coming in to check out Splashcast. But I want people who know nothing about tech to give Splashcast a try. People who say: “Well,  is that what you mean when I click send and it goes off into space?”

Exactly. Space. Rocket ships. Distant planets. That’s where it goes. Your Splashcast goes off in a rocket ship and lands on web sites. If we can make it easy enough for people so they get it and use galactic metaphors to get their head around the concept, well, that’s fine by me.

Beam me up, Scotty. .