Jasmin Tragas is a woman on a mission to help provide opportunities for other women to succeed. And for many women that means first of all getting themselves out of poverty.
As a Women’s Opportunity Ambassador with Opportunity International, Jasmin set herself an ambitious goal of raising AU$10,000 to enable a Trust Bank to be established for currently poor women in the Philippines.
In recent days, with the help of a sponsor inspired by her campaign and the suppport of a number of bloggers and Twitter users, Jasmin’s fund-raising efforts have received a much appreciated boost.
You can read the full story and link to various blogs where people have posted to help the project, at Jasmin’s A Woman’s Investment blog.
And in this interview which I recorded last night, Jasmin talks in further detail about the project and how the Trust Bank will work.
Today I seized an opportunity to have a chat with my friend and colleague, Professor Lonnie B. Hodge. We discussed the workshop which, with some esteemed colleagues, we will be leading in Guangzhou, just a few weeks from now, on March 26th (China time).
Social Media Optimization and PR 2.o is subtitled “Practical Tools in an Economic Downturn”. While the world at large frets about what has happened to the global economy, we will be focusing on how the low-cost or no cost tools of social media can help companies, organizations and individual entrepreneurs to go on the front foot in their marketing and communications.
We believe it is a serious enough topic. We also believe in helping people have fun while they (and we) learn.
For more information about the workshop, including, location, times, how to register (for participation in the live event or online) go to the event Facebook page.
The audio of our chat lasts about 36 minutes: you can listen here or download the MP3 file to your iPod or other MP3 player.
“Charming Frenchman” is such a cliche, but last year at the inaugural BlogWorld and New Media Expo I met one, Francois Planque – charming in the best way, open, thoughtful, humorous, informative – and learned from him about his blogging platform, b2evolution. We had intended to record an interview for the Social Media Show, but time slipped by and there we were again at BlogWorld Expo 2008, just over a week ago, and no interview.
But that has been remedied today and now we have our interview. I spoke with Francois at length and learned some fascinating details about the history of b2evolution and how it is being deployed today, for both relatively small and very large, complex sites.
If you have any interest in blogging platforms, especially in the open source category, you owe it to yourself to listen to this interview. It’s just over 30 minutes.
How can people in the West go on assembling for conferences and seminars about new media and online marketing and decline to look at China?
That’s the picture as seen by Lonnie B. Hodge, The American Professor (see Google screenshot below). A blogger and search engine optimization (SEO) specialist living and working in China, Lonnie can’t understand the lack of interest. Why, he asks, are people so uninterested in “the biggest Internet market in the world”?
In this conversation, Lonnie talks about blogging and online marketing in China and shares tips on
how even people who do not speak or read Chinese can tap into the China blogosphere
how bloggers whose blogs are in English or other non-Chinese languages can establish their presence on the dominant China search engine (yes, bigger than the Big G).
Lonnie also mentions his trip to the US for a lecture tour later this month and offers a face to face briefing on China for folks who might like to spring for a cup of coffee in one of the places he is planning to visit, including Colorado, California and Chicago, Illinois.
If you have the slightest interest in or curiosity about accessing marketing online in China, you will find in this recording invaluable clues to start you on your journey of discovery.
Disclaimer: Lonnie and I are business associates and we do provide a couple of plugs for our business in the course of the conversation – but you could think of them as “organic” plugs.
I love meeting visionary people who have the determination and the smarts to turn their visions into business realities.
One such person is Jalali Hartman, Founder and CEO of the Yovia network, whom I met last year at the Blogworld and New Media Expo in Las Vegas, where Yovia had a stand. From talking with Jalali I was inspired enough to join the Yovia network.
Now, several months later, I’ve at last had the pleasure of interviewing Jalali for this Social Media Show.
In the conversation we touched on a number of subjects, including:
how even experienced tech hotshots can learn from high school kids about the possibilities of the Web
how to deal with corporate resistance to the introduction of social media
why the Yovia motto is “Spread the Word”
why some 2,000 bloggers and even whole villages in Africa are part of the Yovia network
how to keep a human balance in the midst of the pressures of a tech startup
how to get paid to blog by hooking up with Yovia
and more.
Listen to the interview here or download the MP3 file for your iPod or other player.
This podcast incorporates a fairly impromptu, 30 minute conversation I had on June 4 with Professor Lonnie B. Hodge, CEO of culturefish Media, a Guangzhou, China based company specializing in online marketing, seo and reputation management in the China market. I’m an Associate of culturefish Media.
The conversation is about the four one-day workshops on digital media releases which Lonnie and I are presenting in July this year, in Hong Kong, Shanghai, Beijing and Guangzhou.
(UPDATE: due to the current restrictive regime on travel into China and related challenges in obtaining visas, it was necessary to postpone the arrangements for the workshops. We are working on alternative plans now.)
One of my aims in establishing this podcast site was to find and interview people who have wide-ranging and profound knowledge of the technical side of Enterprise 2.0 issues and can relate the application of the technology simply and clearly to how real people operate and work. One such person is Peter Evans-Greenwood, a Chief Technology Officer with leading consulting firm, Capgemini Australia.
cultural change issues that come up with the introduction of Web 2.0 technology in the enterprise
the emerging role of Enterprise 2.0 in the government sector
how the technology helps companies get measurable business value from their knowledge work processes.
In the interview we make reference to a document available as a free download from the Capgemini website – Enterprise 2.0 For the Rest of Us – which I found well worth the read.
What’s the business case for a company researching and even investing human/financial resources in Second Life or other virtual worlds?
Does the potential upside outweigh the risk?
What will peers – or shareholders – have to say about executives who argue for more engagement with the metaverse?
This interview with David Holloway, Editor-in-Chief of The Metaverse Journal, touches directly or indirectly on these and related questions. Of course, in the space of a 30 minute or so interview it does not provide all the answers. But it does provide some context and illustrations for a sensible discussion on the subject.
This is the second interview to be posted here on the Social Media Show and the second in a series relating to the upcoming Enterprise 2.0 Executive Forum – Sydney, February 19, 2008.
The idea of setting up this site was inspired by my attending the superb keynote by award-winning podcaster Leo Laporte, at last October’s BlogWorld and New Media Expo in Las Vegas.
Up till then I’d had the idea of doing interviews and other podcasts and posting them on my deswalsh.com site. But after listening to Leo I decided that I would either start a show on an existing network or else set up my own site. That firmed up into a decision to start my own site. More work in setting up, but I like the idea of being answerable to myself on this project.
It won’t stop me looking at network podcasting later.
Interviews galore
As part of the process of thinking about the site, I sat down one day last year and, over a cup of coffee and off the top of my head jotted down the names of about fifty people I would like to interview for this show and whom I felt confident would be willing to be interviewed. So I don’t see myself running out of people or topics any time soon. And looking at some of the names, I know there are going to be some stimulating and informative conversations.
An initial round of interviews is already underway, in connection with the Enterprise 2.0 Executive Forum next Tuesday, February 19, primarily in Sydney, Australia, and with speakers also via streaming video from the USA and Europe.
Inaugural interview
I’ve already done one of those interviews, with knowledge management expert Stephen Collins. So Stephen is the inaugural interviewee. Here is the interview:
Tonight I’m interviewing someone who is very knowledgeable about Second Life and the metaverse story generally. That should be fun as well as being informative.
If you have topics you would like addressed, and/or people you would like to hear interviewed, please leave a comment here or drop me an email to deswalsh (at) gmail (dot) com. Yes, you can nominate yourself if you feel you have a good story to tell about social media and business.
But that has been remedied today and now we have our interview. I spoke with Francois at length and learned some fascinating details about the history of b2evolution and how it is being deployed today, for both relatively small and very large, complex sites.
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