User Generated Book Tour Archive

Good Wishes for Drew and Blame for His Cancer

Last year on my 15-city book tour, we were lucky enough to get to know Drew Olanoff in Seattle. He's a larger-than-life Web personality whose addiction to hats and tatoos is only eclipsed by one of taking care of anyone and everyone he meets. He helped turn one of the most *yawn* events on the tour into a fun discussion about the Web, followed by a late night at a local diner. (Ahem, the photos. Drew is sporting the bad electric blue drink we had, after Olivia, Danille Morrill and I indulged in individual "champagne" bottles, below.) Later that trip, he convinced Olivia and I to go parasailing, despite his own fear of heights.

Even if I'd never hung out with him since, I would know from those two instances that Drew Olanoff will absolutely beat his cancer. He's one of the most positive, resourceful, enthusiastic and fearless people I've ever met.

True to form, he's turning his diagnosis into something positive. He created a site called "Blame Drew's Cancer," and he's asking people to use Twitter to blame his cancer on anything and everything, by hash-tagging it #blamedrewscancer. He's hoping some large companies will step up and donate $1 for every Tweet, with proceeds going to the American Cancer Society or Make a Wish Foundation. Given the electric branding potential of Twitter, this seems like a no-brainer for someone's charity budget.

 Get well soon Drew, and let us know when you want to hit the skies in a parasail again post-treatment.

A Prolific Little Valley Girl...

Trying to get back to some regularity with my BusinessWeek columns. This one posted tonight for tomorrow, and I'm quite proud of it. It keys off a lot of things I've been writing about on this blog: The hollowness of engineering traffic, obnoxiousness of sites like Twply, and my frustration with too many people trying to game the system versus just build a good product or create good content. It all came together around this idea of Web 2.0 killing the last metric that matters for advertisers: The unique user.

It was an observation Roger McNamee made in the Yahoo greenroom when he came by the studio a few weeks ago, and it's been working its way around my head since, so I fully credit him.

Speaking of Valley Girl, here's my previous column in case you missed it. It has to do with corporate layoffs and features a shout out to Mr. Nathan Wright of Des Moines who I met on the book tour!

If you read the blog a lot, you probably notice a lot of similar themes work themselves out here, then later wind up in a column or on TechTicker. Writing is like thinking, and my commenters always help me sharpen my thinking. You let me know when I'm on to something and push me on another angle when I'm blind to it. So thanks, everyone. Instead of cutting you in on my paycheck, I'll just refrain from annoying you with ads on this site. Deal?

NOW, speaking of Roger McNamee, I have some news. He cut his hair! Background: Roger's hair ignited quite an uproar among TechTicker commenters. I'm sorry-- he's Roger McNamee, a former top fund manager and one of the most successful Valley investors and he's giving you investing advice and you're upset about his hair??? As I Twittered at the time it was an act of civil disobedience against the policies of the Bush administration. Roger says once he got confirmation that Bush was safely back in Texas he cut off a whopping 14 inches giving it to Locks of Love. I don't have an "after" picture, but below is the before, in video form:

Typhoid Sarah

It's another one of those up-early-because-I-can't-sleep-but-yay!-the-house-is- quiet-enough-to-blog mornings. The reason I'm up too early is because I was horribly ill last night from taking the pill form of the Typhoid vaccine. I'd felt so bad-ass that I'd found a way to avoid the Typhoid shot several days ago. Now, I'm dreading the fact that I have three more to take this week and wondering if the shot might have been a better option. Hint: When they say drink several large glasses of water; they mean it. Every bit of moisture seems to be sapped from my body. I can barely even blink without my eyelids sticking! (TMI?)

All the vaccines signify a change in my travel plans for 2009. While I'm having to be coy on exactly what they are, let's say there's a significant project or two brewing that's going to involve some extended international travel. While some of the projects are new, the growing obsession with studying entrepreneurship around the world isn't.

I grew up in a family of seven with parents who are teachers; we had no money for international travel. When I got my first reporter job for $21,000 a year-- I wasn't exactly flush with funds either. More than ten years of being a beat reporter with two weeks vacation hasn't helped matters. So ever since I quit BusinessWeek to write my book, I've been making up for all that lost travel time. Last year, I went to Israel, Cannes, London (twice) and Mexico, but the bulk of my traveling was my 15-city-book tour.

That book tour was amazing, but exhausting. Part of what made it so exhausting was that I was wedging tons of small trips into my already packed schedule. So I'd wake up at 5 a.m., go shoot at Yahoo all day, hop on a plane to, say, Omaha, go to a late night tweet up, get up for a few more events the next day, stay out talking to entrepreneurs until 2 a.m., wake up at 4 a.m. for a flight home, write a BusinessWeek column on the plane, then race into Yahoo to shoot more. I'm not exaggerating.

So this year, as my job switches from book promotion back to reporting, my new travel plan is focus, especially because most of my travel is self-funded. I am only doing two types of trips: Ones where there is a very specific reporting ROI-- where I am following a specific, amazing story that has not been written-- or ones with a more literal ROI-- ie, where I'm getting paid to speak to support the former travel.

This means, I'm cutting out most conferences. It's a hard call, because conferences are fun. I'm sad watching via Twitter right now as all my friends arrive in Munich for DLD while I suffer through mini-Typhoid fever on my couch. But I can't be on the road as much as I was in 2008, for the sake of sanity, health, my marriage and my work and that means something has to go. And if I study my travel in 2008, I got way more out of trips where I filled my time meeting with new people without all the distraction and noise of a conference around us. Conferences are great for connecting with people and deepening relationships with people I already know. But increasingly I don't meet a lot of great new sources at them, and I don't get great new stories ideas. By definition, being at an event with a hundred other reporters keeps you in the echo-chamber.

That was the reason I reluctantly skipped Le Web in December. And why I'm on my couch, not in Munich right now. It also means I won't be attending SXSW; I'll be in another country instead. If you read my BusinessWeek columns you know I never attend Ted, and this year is no different. I will still attend AllThingsD and The Lobby (assuming there is a third Lobby), but those are two of the only ones set in stone on my calendar.

So you won't be getting conference circuit news, fun videos and photos here in 2009. But you will (eventually) get genuinely new and different stories that could never come out of a conference. Some of those will appear on the blog, some may appear in my BusinessWeek column, and some you won't read about for quite a while. But I'm pretty sure you also won't read about them anywhere else. And that sort of makes the Typhoid stomach-ache worthwhile.

My Crazy, Crazy 2008

The end of the year is naturally a time for reflection, and it's even more so for me, what with my birthday wedged in between Christmas and New Years. Two years ago at this time, I'd just quit BusinessWeek-- a job I'd slaved for some eight years to get-- to write my first book. A lot of people thought I was crazy on both counts: It's not like we're swimming in media jobs these days and back in 2006 a lot of people didn't even think the companies in my book would still be in business by 2008. 2007 was a year I had to deliver and prove them all wrong. At least professionally, it was the most exhilarating year of my life. 2008 on the other hand was, well....it was amazing, exhausting, transformative, exciting, terrifying, emotional and well....how the hell was it just one year?

All reporters have to do these dorky year end surveys, quizzes and lists this time of year. I know-- because my SXSW interview has been on seemingly ALL of them. But believe it or not other stuff happened to me too! As I look back on 2008 and get ready for 2009, here's my list of the biggest moments of what I can only call one of the most unimaginable years of my life.

10. Buying a house. I know that sounds materialistic, but my husband is an artist and I'm a writer. We never thought we'd be able to buy a house in San Francisco. The second we saw the house we knew. I sent a note to my realtor that said "We are in love" in the subject line with the address in the body. She replied, "Well, do you want propose or just flirt with it a while?" We wrote up an offer later that day. There were a million points where the deal should have fallen apart-- not the least of which was an exploding credit market.

9. Taking my family and my in laws to Mexico for Thanksgiving. Again, this was one of those things we'd never assume we could do-- for one thing I have a big family! We'll probably never be able to afford it again, but it was worth every penny. I'm incredibly lucky that my family and my in-laws get along so well. It was an idyllic week with perfect weather, water and food.

8. My first grownup keynote. I've been on stage a zillion times but never doing a paid, Power Pointy keynote. I don't know why, but it was terrifying!!! I've sat through so many bad keynotes and I didn't want to be that guy. Also, I kinda felt like a fraud. Why am I up here? I'm just a reporter. I freaked out for months and was so happy when it was done! Huge props to Olivia for helping me through it and to Al Campa for hiring me to do it!

7. April. Before 2008, I'd barely been outside the country. Growing up in a family of seven with parents who are teachers means no cushy summers abroad, unfortunately. But that's only made me appreciate the opportunity to travel more. I spent most of April in London, Cannes and Israel-- three places I'd never been before. London was just pure fun, thanks in no small part to Mr. Robert Loch who I met for the first time on that trip. In Cannes, I was speaking at a conference and had a near-panic attack when the car picked me up at the airport and drove me to a comped 400-euro-a-night hotel. "Who do these people think I am?" Israel was even more amazing, particularly touring Old Jerusalem.  (Even with near-pneumonia.)

6. Launching this blog. Yeah, it's even weird to me: I've been blogging since 2005, but never on my own site. Granted, the blog is a weird mis-mash of a personal diary (ahem, including this navel-gracing post!), a legitimate news blog, and a lifecast. You never quite know what you're going to get here. But it's mine and I love it and I don't care if it ever produces a dime of revenue. Huge props to my illustrator Sophie Askew and web designer Stephanie Chu for building such a beautiful site.

5. SXSW-- really. I've already talked about it in nearly 100 interviews, on stage, on this blog and everywhere else, so I won't belabor it. First off, it was huge in the name recognition department, driving tons of people-- even people who hate me-- to my site, to buy my book, and to every event I hosted. Second, there's something great about low expectations. You have no idea how many times I've heard someone say in a stunned voice, "You know. You're actually not horrible in person!" Third, I've never been one of those people who wished for mind reading abilities. I really just don't want to know. But there is something powerful in knowing every horrible, sexist, offensive, mean thought a mob of people are having about you. There's no mystery and whether you agree or not, you can always learn from it, and become a better person as a result. Fourth, you learn a lot about who your real friends are when it's fashionable to trash you. And last, before SXSW I was getting a lot of accolades. The best way not to believe your own hype is to get publicly brutalized.

4. User Generated Book Tour. In the up-and-down year that was 2008, my book had a great launch and then sales started to slip. I decided on a whim to do a book tour, and it was probably the best business decision I made all year. I've already written a ton about why, but in short I got to meet thousands of entrepreneurs and spend the bulk of my fall outside the Valley's echo chamber after nearly a decade inside of it. Oh, and I sold a bunch of books too.

3. TechTicker launch. It was terrifying and exhilarating all at once. We'd worked so hard for so many months, and it was so great to finally show people how we were reinventing financial video news. I developed a whole new appreciation for the way you can tell a story visually that you never can in words. Also, I gained valuable lessons in hair and makeup. I'm not kidding-- some mornings at 6 a.m. I walk into Yahoo looking homeless, yet somehow manage to look sunny on camera. I'll always remember the first day I shot at the Nasdaq with Henry Blodget. I'd never met him before and was completely charmed within minutes. They also had a big, fancy New York hair and makeup girl who put such heavy eyelashes on me I could barely open my eyes. And after years of watching financial news shows, actually filming at the Nasdaq was surreal. I kept thinking, "I'm just a print reporter! What am I doing here?"

2. Geoff's art auction moment. For all the time I spent putting myself out there in 2008, I never actually had to watch people publicly bid on my work. But my husband did. He killed at SF Camera Work's annual art auction-- one of the only pieces that went for more than the list price. I was so proud of him.

1. Debut of the book. (Duh!) Walking into the opening night party to see so many friends, do all my first signings, and eat "Once You're Lucky" or "Twice You're Good" cupcakes-- that was all just magic and a moment I never thought I'd be lucky (har, har) enough to have. It will always be one of the best moments of my life, probably second only to my wedding.

Thanks to everyone who stood by me, challenged me and defended me in what was an unbelievable year. I'd say, "Here's to a calm 2009," but who am I kidding?

[Photos: Me blogging before my birthday dinner by Geoffrey Ellis; me on the beach in Israel by JD Lasica; screen grab from TT and me walking into my book party by Jim Merithew for Wired.com] 

Busy Little Valley Bee

SO. After a whirlwind 2008 where I met entrepreneurs in about 25 cities or more, I am finally back in San Francisco for a while.

I feel very torn. It's been an amazing year, and I've met so many amazing people. My entire concept of entrepreneurship has been forever changed, and I am, of course, so grateful for the outpouring of support for the book. It's been one of the toughest book-buying markets in publishers' memories and it was no small feat to keep copies moving!

On the plus side of being home, I've barely gotten to live in the house that's continually draining my bank account lately, and it's always nice to see my husband. I also feel like meeting so many entrepreneurs around the world has come at the cost of not staying in better touch with entrepreneurs in the Valley. So it'll be nice to stay put for a bit and reconnect. And what better time than a month with a zillion Holiday parties? Headed to the Zynga party tonight, and of course, there's the sarahlacy.com happy hour at the Beauty Bar in one week! RSVP, y'all!

Here are Olivia and I after the spectacular Get Satisfaction party last Friday, inhaling some Arinell's pizza. (Just a few blocks from my house-- another win to being home!) [photo credit: Geoffrey Ellis]

Of course, another *huge* plus in being home is that I can focus more on my actual job: reporting. I forgot to mention it, but I re-upped my columnist contract with BusinessWeek in November. I was incredibly flattered to even get it renewed given the macro state of the economy and how hard hit media has been already. (And how flaky I've been on deadlines. Doh.)

I wrote two columns that detailed *why* things are going to be far worse for Venture Capitalists in this downturn, even as the Valley will have an easier time than in 2001-ish. You can read them here and here. Then, this week, I wrote about everything that's wrong with eCommerce and why I think we're about to see an explosion of innovation. (And why I can't wait!) I've got a lot of great ideas for the next few months, but as always hit me up if there's a topic you want me to tackle!

I've also been pretty busy at TechTicker. A few recent videos I liked on the jump!

A whole slew of other changes are in store for my various jobs and include a few new projects that I can't wait to tell you guys about. But more details on all that later... Bottom line is I'm mostly out of promotion mode (FINALLY!) and solidly back in reporter mode so more great content coming your way this month and in 2009.

And now, to some videos...

Planes, Hunger Pains, and Irate Cabbies: A Travel Reflection

This past summer, while dilly dallying my days away in my college town, I still managed to do an inordinate amount of travel. Living in central Virginia without a car made these trips very complicated. In fact, I rode the Greyhound bus so many times I had a favorite driver. Earl liked to get sassy over the PA system as we barreled down back roads late at night.

So when I signed on to help Sarah plan the UGBT, I was elated. Instead of an Earl, I had direct non-stop flights at my disposal! For the most part, the UGBT was a pretty smooth ride, save for a tornado, emergency doctor's visit, food overload, British invasion, and taxi cab insanity. Yet, after crisscrossing the country 10 times (and over the pond once) there are two major lessons I've had to learn in the process:

1. Changing/canceling/switching the times of flights sucks your soul and drains your wallet. Which is why I will avoid cheaptickets.com and orbitz.com like the plague and deal directly with airlines from now on. Virgin, Southwest, and United are the only ones left standing since I have verbally eviscerated the poor phone associates of every other airline involved through these "hassle-free" travel sites. This includes AeroMexico too. No se puede.

Over the phone charges, re-booking fees, hidden ticket credits that can only be retrieved by the first person on the reservation and not the second- Ninth layer. Of Hell. Also, the student in me originally balked at refundable tickets because of price, but for extensive, multi-city travel, they are the most cost-effective choice. That's a no-brainer, which I now realize in hindsight. Sorry sarahcuda. I owe you approximately 147 snack boxes to make up for this. (the ones with the cheese and crackers of course)

2. Outsourcing is not a cry for help. It is, in fact, a life saver. I want to personally thank UGBT organizers, friends, and followers of this blog for helpful hotel, venue, and restaurant recommendations. I didn't think it feasible to visit 10 cities and become intimately acquainted with each one in such short stops, but y'all made that possible.

Also, a special thanks goes out to my darling buddy Eli for hitting up every single contact in his iphone to book us some prime hotel reservations. (Attending a school specializing in restaurant and hospitality management sure does have it's perks...) Puffin, I owe you a bottle of Veuve, a rooftop dance, and a 3 am drive to the airport in the snow.

But WAIT. Our traveling days are far from over, so if you have any additional revelations/tips/shortcuts leave them in the comments!

Entrepreneurs: Know What Game You're Playing

Wanted to highlight a post by Micah Baldwin-- one of my favorite people I met during my far-too-quick trip to Boulder. In it, he takes issue with my observations that Boulder entrepreneurs are the only ones on the planet that I've found who refuse to be self-promotional. And, further, my take that while charming, this isn't a luxury a startup can afford. Micah's comments definitely gave me pause. He makes a compelling case that self-promotion in the end doesn't really matter.

But at the end of the day he notes, "Boulder entrepreneurs don't have to be wild self promoters, because unlike Silicon Valley, there isn't a deafening amount of noise to battle through." That mindset is entirely my point! Boulder entrepreneurs design companies for Boulder, they don't look outside what Matt Galligan calls the "Boulder Bubble." If you at all have a good idea, there are competitors, and you do have to cut through the noise of them to reach your audience and paying customers, whether they are subscribers or advertisers. If you are outside the Valley, that is harder. That's why a company like FriendFeed seems to have so much traction, while in some metrics as Micah points out, it has just as much as his company Legit. (Although sheer page views aren't equal in value in and of themselves, but that's another discussion.)

But, more to the point is the issue of "success." I don't think FriendFeed would consider itself a success by Valley terms, but rather a work still in progress. At the end of his post, Micah says, "Boulder entrepreneurs are doing just fine in the success department." I agreed initially, as I met several entrepreneurs and companies I'd deem successful. But then I thought, well, it all depends on what you mean by "success."

This is the point I've made over and over again on this tour: Know what game you are playing. In the Valley, success at the venture level and serial entrepreneur level is creating a $1 billion company. You *do not* do that by nose-down-working-hard when your goal is to build a consumer brand. Media and consumer attention is your market share and you have to steal it the same way an Oracle sales rep will snatch a deal away from SAP.

If you want to build something of interest and sell it to a larger player for sub-$100 million, Micah is probably right. You probably don't have to play that game. Or, if you're like me, and building a business that can largely be a nice lifestyle, you probably don't have to either. But the key is knowing your game, and it's crucial when it comes to the Web because you don't need venture funding to build something of value. In fact, if you are not playing that game, funding could handicap you, as could-- to Micah's point-- wasting a lot of time yelling about how awesome you are.

To be clear, I am in no way dismissing anyone who isn't trying to build the next Google. I didn't take funding when I started working for myself, because I knew my game. I know what I am building long-term. I have a plan, and it would probably surprise a lot of people. And I think my company will be of great value. But it's a media business. It takes time. And I wanted to build it right, not on an artificial, high-growth time table. I don't think that makes me any less an "entrepreneur" than friends of mine whose companies are worth billions. We're just playing different games.

Now, in my case, I still think self-promotion is crucial. I have the luxury of knowing some of the most successful entrepreneurs in the world, and they've all stressed to me the importance of this. At the end of the day, you are your best evangelist and you can't count on anyone to do it for you. I would be insane not to take their advice.

So my question for any Boulder entrepreneurs reading this is: Which game are you playing? If it's to build the next Google, I doubt it'd hurt to step outside the bubble and your comfort zone.

Boulder: A Redemption Post

Yeah, so yesterday's trek to Boulder could have been a recipe for disaster:

-Waking up at 4:30 am for an early morning flight (woof)
- Wandering aimlessly around the confusing Denver airport (two levels and four "islands" for passenger pick-up? seriously?)
- Walking in circles for 30 minutes in search of a burger joint. That was 300 feet away (left means right at 5400 feet apparently)
- Waiting on the street corner like idiots for a taxi cab that was dispatched to Denver by mistake (and accidentally clotheslining a monk with a heavy bag of books...yay karma)

Mix in some preconceived notions (which Sarah touched on here) and things were not looking so good. That is, until Matt Galligan changed our minds and stepped up to bat for a little one on one with the Sarahcuda (video after the jump)

Pssst. Hello, It's Boulder Calling. Just Don't Tell Anyone.

OK. Boulder. What a roller coaster!

Let's set aside the lack of sleep, charmingly odd doll house we stayed in, and continuation of bizarre UGBT cab drivers for a minute. As I've said, it was our last stop on the whirlwind, and honestly career-changing, User Generated Book Tour.   I already had mixed feelings about it coming to a close, but I'll save all that for another post. And as we've detailed even more I was getting a less-than enthusiastic response to my impending arrival. Still, I knew there was something in Boulder. And I was right.

Here's the thing. Boulder has a ton to offer. The companies that presented at New Tech were pretty amazing, and the people we hung out with where smart, confident, collegial and surprisingly effortless to be around. They just, um, don't want anyone to know?

This is what puzzles me about Boulder. It's a very, very tight-knit community. While entrepreneurs from London, D.C., Memphis, Los Angeles and several other cities have complained that it is hard to develop a regular startup "crew" because the cities were so spread apart geographically, Boulder is only a cuddly 100,000 people or so. There are twice as many bikes as people, so either people have calves of steel or everyone is just a quick cycle away. The New Tech event itself was like a more earth-conscious, savvy version of a Town Hall meeting in Stars Hollow. There was something so genuine and non-poser about it. It was unlike another one I've seen.

But for whatever reason, there's a general desire to protect that unique vibe by fencing out everyone else. More on this in the next post, which features a point-counterpoint between Matt Galligan of Social Thing/AOL and me, so I won't belabor my thoughts now.

But while my gut still tells me that kind of thinking inherently limits companies in Boulder, I love that the scene is its own animal and it feels utterly different than any other stop on the tour. As I've written throughout the tour, the single most important thing is that cities play to their own strengths. In Boulder, a core strength is clearly this community, cooperative vibe. After all, one of the biggest entrepreneur success stories is Celestial Seasonings-- right down to the early days when town's folk helped the founder pick herbs from around the town to go in our teas. (Which I'm inhaling as I write, thanks to a nasty cold.)

I'll be interested to see what develops out of Boulder over the next few years. Hopefully, some new hot shot will actually return a Silicon Valley call...

Now to that dollhouse...this video was shot before our pleasant surprise of an evening, hence the apprehension. (and Olivia's hair in progress)

Stop. Boulder Time.

There are a lot of reasons why our last User Generated Book Tour stop isn't as epic as it really should be. None of them are good.

In other cities we've had several events-- usually culminating in at least one 50-to-400 person bash/signing-- letting me sell books, yes, but also get a great sense of the entrepreneurial climate in the midwest, west, south, northeast and even Canada. I've met thousands of entrepreneurs from all industries and daily keep in touch with many of them. I couldn't have asked for a better tour.

But here we are in Boulder with nothing planned aside from a short cameo at the New Tech Event tonight and wild hopes of some sort of TweetUp. This is largely our fault. For a lot of reasons, outside of anyone's control, the Boulder stop has been continually pushed back from August to September to October then November to now. But I'm putting some onus on Boulder too. For all I've heard about how entrepreneurial it is here, I'm frankly hearing dead silence when I've suggested Tweetups or asked for suggested locations or even cool people to meet.

Now, some have suggested people in Boulder are just busy working hard. OK, but so are people in the 14 other cities I've gone to, right? And part of an entrepreneur's job is to be self-promotional. Here I am, a reporter with two huge platforms in Yahoo Finance and BusinessWeek wanting-- nay begging-- to meet you and hear about your company, and there are, at best, crickets chirping? This isn't an ego thing on my part-- the reason other entrepreneurs have come out has little to do with me. The UGBT has mostly served as an excuse to get like-minded people together. It's just the sharp difference in the response from Boulder and 14 other cities that's got me puzzled. Nevertheless, here I am in Boulder-- even with a nasty cold-- about to go out and hoping to be wowed.

Fortunately, the fabulous Matt Galligan of SocialThing has taken Olivia and I under his Boulder wing and we're about to hit The Med for some drinks and tapas, then New Tech and then we'll be at Hapa will Micah Baldwin and some New Tech folks, so even if you're not coming to the event, come there to say hi! I'll Twitter any change in plans. (Twitter name: Sarahcuda)

I only brought ten books -- which seems wishful thinking giving the rousing interest in my arrival! As usual, they are $20 and come signed with pretty much any inscription you want. Also in the UGBT tradition, if you show up with a pre-bought copy of the book, you get a signature and a free drink at Hapa or wherever we hit next.

So, come on, Boulder! Let's be friends!