There is a lot going on in Kansas City, these days. Google has launched it’s “Google Fiber” product and the entrepreneur community is buzzing with activity. It’s a hot bed for startups, and it’s being coined as “Silicon Prairie”. In 2008, Silicon Prairie News was founded to discuss the developments in the startup scene in the flyover states of Missouri, Iowa, Nebraska and Kansas. SPN, launched Big Omaha a couple years ago, and today was the inaugural Big Kansas City conference kickoff, where top innovators, startup founders and digital disrupters share their wisdom in an old school airplane hanger, that is now the Airline History Museum.
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Posts in category Technology
Innovation and Inspiration at Big Kansas City
My Experience Working With Yahoo! And Why Marissa Mayer is Right about Not Letting Employees Work from Home.
Everyone has been busting Marissa Mayer’s proverbial balls over the past week over her decision to make Yahoo employees work at a corporate office and stop working from home. My work commute is approximately 66 steps from bed to work chair. It works for me. I work for a silicon valley company from my basement office in my Kansas City home. Living and working in Silicon Valley is too damn expensive so living there isn’t really an option. Having said that, I understand why Yahoo! totally needs to do it.
In the past summer, the company that I consult with was working on a partnership with a well known movie producer on a joint venture with Yahoo and my company. Meaning, we had to work together closely to make it happen. They had a distribution partnership with Yahoo! Screen and we had to work with it.
11 of the Best TED Talks Every Human Should Watch
TED stands for Technology, Education and Design and if you’re not familiar with them, by now… LOL, you sux0rs at the interwebs. This is only the greatest repository of speeches and presentations by the most brilliant minds, most fascinating people, education radicals, tech geniuses, medical mavericks, business gurus, and music legends of our time.
Awhile back, I made a goal to watch every TED Talk. So, I watch at least one daily. The more good shit that goes into your mind, the more good shit comes out. Feel free to bookmark this so you can come back and watch each one of these.
Best Android Apps to Install on your New Android Phone
So Travis, why should we listen to you about which apps are the best Android apps to install on our new Android devices?
Well, good question. I got my first Android device when the original Motorola Droid came out. And since then, I’ve had a Samsung Charge, Samsung Galaxy SIII and now, I’m rocking the Samsung Galaxy Note 2. Since this is my 4th Android device, let’s just say that I’ve had plenty of time to figure out which apps are a must to install when your get your phone and which apps you should probably pass on.
As a general rule of thumb, only download apps that have good reviews and comments. If an app has only 1,000 downloads… pass. There are many, many apps out there that have viruses, malware and madware on them. So, be smart and diligent when installing any Android apps. It’s a jungle out there. I’d definitely recommend checking into some mobile security for your Android device.
There are tons of sites that recommend Android games, but I won’t be doing that here. I try not to waste much time playing games on video consoles or my phone. So here goes, 35 of the Best Android Apps! Enjoy and please share! READ MORE »
The Hidden Benefits of the @BurgerKing Twitter Hack for Burger King
If you were watching the interwebs this morning, you may have heard that Anonymous hacked the official Burger King Twitter handle @BurgerKing and changed all of it’s branding to McDonald’s logos and imagery. This could be catastrophic for the agency or the BK Social Media team who manages these accounts.
While I watched this play out in real time, I was astounded at the sheer velocity of growth that the @burgerking Twitter account was experiencing. From my estimation, @BurgerKing was at about 77,000 followers to start the day.
Once “Anonymous” hacked the profile due to an alleged “whopper123” password, the buzz started spreading, the amount of @burgerking twitter followers begin to grow.
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Travis ‘Rides Bitch’ on a Big Wheel in Video Edited in Each of the Past 5 Decades.
I’m turning 40 in May and I have had no video footage of me as a little kid. My mom just gave me a Super 8mm tape a couple of weeks ago, of some footage that my grandparents had of my biological father holding me when I was 2 weeks old. Haven’t figured out where to go to get this footage converted yet. Yesterday, my Uncle Jeff sent me a Facebook message informing me of some some additional footage that he had of me as a little kid. Awesome news! And what’s really interesting to me about this footage is this footage has been edited every decade since the 70s… and transferred to many platforms.
The original was a Super 8MM movie shot in the 1970s. copied to VHS in the 1980s, copied to DVD in the 1990s, copied to Windows Media by DV camera, then converted to MPG in the 2000s. and my uncle sent it to me via a Facebook message attachment today. Here in the 2010s, I edited the .MPG in iMovie and did the voiceover with my Macbook Mic. And now it’s exported it to YouTube… This movie has been edited and stored on products and tools of Kodak, Microsoft, Sony, Apple and Google.
Verizon Early Upgrade for Samsung Note 2 is a Win for Amazon.
Let’s face it, gadgets make the world go around now. After all of my extensive research, it was time to upgrade my phone to the Samsung Galaxy Note II. I looked online at my Verizon Wireless account and noticed that on Feb 17th, my main line became eligible for the upgrade. I figured that I could use my charm and good looks to get the hook up and get my phone a week early. The following chain of events showcases how poorly different divisions of corporations speak with one another.
First of all, I admit that I’m a geek. My line of work entails that I interact with technology, online, mobile, social, search… you name it. I need a phone that allows for effective multi-tasking.
Business Relationship Optimization – BRO!
It’s no secret that the road between social media and SEO is becoming one connected entity that needs to be dealt with in an overarching content strategy. No more separate silos of operation, search and social is clearly now about relationships and the strategy behind building those business relationships. I call this, “Business Relationship Optimization” or BRO.
Every person on Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, Instagram or Google+ has an audience. So, how can we identify the brightest thought leaders to connect with and how can we use these relationships to drive buzz, increase SEO back links and rankings, along with providing the search engines with strong social signals? These following tactics and resources will help you optimize these business relationships over time. SEO is about your Bro’s. It’s Brocial Media! (Wait, that was horrible, wasn’t it? let’s just roll with it.)
After 17 years of trying, Travis Wright finally owns TravisWright.com
I first got online in 1996, and immediately I saw the potential of owning the URL of my name, Travis Wright. At that time, some other Travis Wright had owned TravisWright.com and he would own it for the next 12 years.
When those 12 years were up, some cyber squatter bought it quickly and held onto it for a few years… Recently, I was able to purchase it from the domain broker. After all of these years, I am finally the “REAL” Travis Wright.
The site is uploaded and ready to go. Still making some final tweaks to the site design. Thanks for embarking on this new journey with me!
