Mr. Lacy Archive

Spring Cleaning

It's been a rough 2009 so far, at least for my health. Between the cold that wouldn't leave for nearly two months, some pretty severe sleep deprivation, and more stress than usual, I've turned to comfort foods and comfort wine a bit more than I probably should. Author-Sarah would hardly care about a few extra pounds. I am, after all, in my 30s and married. Isn't that when we're all allowed to get fat?

But on-camera Sarah has to care. About a week ago, I decided to go back to what's always helped me slim down and feel happier before: The South Beach Diet and a few hours a week sweating on the elliptical listening to loud rock music. But no sooner did I Twitter something about these plans, then a trove of friends all told me I should try a juice cleanse instead.

I had one initial objection: That just sounds way too California. I already do Pilates three times a week and eat more tofu than I do red meat. I have to keep true to some of my Memphis roots, or they may not let me back in for BBQ-fest.

As I did more research on BluePrint Cleanse-- the company that everyone from Julia Allison to Michael Arrington have gone to for cleansing needs-- there were a few other red flags.

I'm Alive, BTW

Just wanted to say a quick blog hai. Things have been nuts for me lately, and now that I'm officially off Michael Arrington-duty, I am trying to dig out of a swamp of logistical things I've been putting off for weeks. Like, getting emails working on my BlackBerry and getting AT&T out here to fix my phone line so I can do radio interviews and have my TiVo back. I'm very proud I finally found time to call the bank and let them know it was indeed me in Africa logging onto my account, not some fraudster, so I can finally pay my bills online again. My various bill collectors are probably glad too. (Yes, I do need a new assistant. I know.)

Long time readers might remember that I'm neurotic and goal-obsessed enough that I not only make a very well thought-out list of New Years Resolutions, but every month I grade myself on how well I do. In January I scored a lousy 61 out of 100. In February I upped that to a 72, partially because i scored higher on the "Be Nicer to Mr. Lacy" category. I'm up to a C-student!

Speaking of goals, I should have some cool news soon. In the meantime, here's the coverage I did for TechCrunch in February, a link to the last two Press:Here shows I was on, my latest ValleyGirl column on unsexy but profitable eNewsletters, and, below, a few segments on gadgets I did with BusinessWeek review honcho Steve Wildstrom for TechTicker last week.

I am still lusting after the Palm Pre more than any other gadget, but the Kindle 2 is a close second.  With all the international travel I'm doing these days Bose Noise Reduction Headsets are a close third. And Mr. Lacy and I have been close to caving on a huge new flat panel for more than a year, but we're taking Mr. Wildstrom's advice in clip #2 below instead. Not that we can afford any of these indulgences. Oh to be back in pre-recession days!

The Morning Don't: "Malaria is no joke"

Who knew that Skype was the best way into Africa? Or, better yet, the best method for filming a sarahcuda on a rampage?

The Morning Don't Episode 18 from sarah lacy on Vimeo.

Morning Don't: Tips on Vitamins and Pimps

Increasingly, I think our morning show just speaks for itself...but in case you need a teaser, listen until the end to hear what pimps and babies have in common.

Morning Don't: Episode 16 from sarah lacy on Vimeo.

The Morning Don't: SHAMELESS PLUG

For all you non Super-Bowl-ers, THIS is going to be awesome. All the cool kids (and sadkids) will be there!

The Morning Don't: Episode 15 from sarah lacy on Vimeo.

The Morning Don't: All By Myself

Wherein I experiment with camera tricks (not focusing on my entire face...again), re-enact Chicken Little ("the world is ending!" is the new "the sky is falling!"), and grumpily talk about really pertinent subject matter (Scarlett Jo).

And on top of everything, Vimeo won't let me change the thumbnail. Yep, the face says it all, folks.



The Morning Don't: Episode 14 from sarah lacy on Vimeo.

Has Twitter (Finally) Tipped?

Ignore my byline. This is a guest post by my husband Geoffrey "Mr. Lacy" Ellis. If you'd like to write a guest post for sarahlacy.com, email me at sarah at sarahlacy dot com.

Twitter has tipped. This may seem like an obvious statement to those who have been using Twitter for a while. But even though I live in San Francisco and have to hear about startups all day long, I'm not really a Web insider. I'm an artist. And many of the people who I know are just now getting it.

It's a familiar story, only one I'm more excited about this time around. Back in 2005, when I joined MySpace, I felt like I was late to the game. I had to play catch up with dozens of people and build my friends up. I made a lot of connections there and found it useful for promoting my photography and keeping people up to date on my shows and zine releases. A while later, when Facebook opened up to old people like me - who didn't have a school network - I joined as soon as I had the chance. I saw a few friends make the jump from MySpace to Facebook, but in the early days I only had about 12 friends. I couldn't find anyone my age (37) and especially not anyone I had gone to high school or college with. Most everyone else I know told me it was a site for kids they'd never join. (And most of them are on there now.)

I joined Twitter in April 2007 after meeting Evan Williams and his now wife Sara at a conference in Phoenix. I wasn't sure how to use it or what I was joining for, but I decided to give it a try, mostly because I liked Evan. I didn't use it very much until we spent time with Evan and Sara again in November in Paris. I got to see how it could be useful - especially in a foreign country where our phones didn't work very well for calling, but worked fine for direct message and tweets. I became a more regular user, but I wasn't sure it would ever catch on. It was hard to explain to people and most of them had no interest in using it anyway. I began to feel the same way about Twitter as I did about Facebook. If people only understood why it was a useful tool, they would end up loving it. But you had to use it to know. And the concept sounded hopelessly trivial to non-Web friends.

I knew the shift was on from early adopters to medium adopters (is there such a thing?) when companies and political candidates started Twittering. Comcast, Barack Obama, Southwest Airlines, Rick Sanchez on CNN, etc. I was excited every time I started seeing Twitter mentioned in the mainstream media. It was even more interesting to me when people stopped having to explain what Twitter was. It was like a younger sibling who was becoming successful. Flash forward to the past 2 weeks. I have friends joining and following me at an alarming rate. By that I mean 3-4 per week, but these are people I never thought I'd see on Twitter. People I figured had no interest; people I figured never would get it.

Interestingly, my friends have been migrating, not just adopting more daily must-reads. I haven't gotten a legitimate MySpace friend request in more than three months, and my own interest in Facebook is waning as more friends join Twitter. People accuse early adopters of rushing to the next shiny site, but it turns out my friends do it too, only later than everyone in the Web scene.

Others may not be, but I'm convinced that Twitter has finally tipped and is about to explode. For someone like me, who is outside of the Web 2.0 demographic and has "regular" friends outside of Silicon Valley and the web scene, it's an amazing thing to see.