Kudos john you made me laugh.

p.s. read from bottom to top… I’ve numbered them for you.

A few short hours later my Facebook desktop notification bliped at me I went to my inbox to see that I had recieved a note from Maya Heart, her avatar as Joan from mad men caught me offguard, her note however took me even more by surprise. Below is our correspondence.

Wow! I was shocked, I had done something so little as like and comment on their video on Facebook. This was awesome I thought, and plus I love getting free stuff. So, I replied and then set out to Twitter to tell them how awesome this whole thing was.

No later than an hour later my iphone buzzed to let me know that I had a new follower from twitter. Lately I’ve been getting some strange followers, so I took it with a grain of salt when a fellow named tombed was following me.

A quick profile check showed me that Tom was infact the CEO of AKQA. Now this type of thing has happened to me before with the good folks at popeyes chicken. I dont expect that I’ll be interesting to Tom but the real deal with this is that they are looking out for people that talk about AKQA. They are in tune to whats out there and are monitoring and then taking some action in the social space, and I have to give them props for doing that. I even followed tom back just to see what kind of CEO he was in relation to other CEO’s I follow ( i do follow a couple)

Today I got a call from Emily while I was at work. A package had arrived. I honestly thought it was from somebody else, heck for a second I thought it might have been the books I ordered this morning. ( a dude can hope right?) But no Emily informed me it was from AKQA, in the best of her 3 year old ability and I mentioned it must be my shirt I got from liking their video, something I’m still a bit shocked by.

Below you’ll find a flickr set of my unboxing. A seemingly hand wrapped box from over the pond. Containing a fancy frosted plastic box containing one Nike sportswear t-shirt with embroidered chest logo. the 5 stars representing the 5 awards they won this year “Creative Review magazine: Advertising Agency of the Year, Campaign magazine: Digital Agency of the Year, Revolution magazine: Agency of the Year, British Interactive Multimedia Asc.: Agency of the Year, IAB: Creative Agency of the Year, Cannes Grand Prix” and a small screened AKQA logo on the lower right of the front of the shirt. Included with the shirt was a letter thanking me and letting me know that my shirt was # 20 of 250 total. That was something that was even more unexpected than getting a shirt in the firstplace.

So whats the big deal right? Wrong, to me this was simply put something that I’ll remember forever an experience that will make AKQA and their work, their smarts and their passion shine above the rest of the digital agencies out there. They not only took the time to do this but they did it with great style that makes me feel like they actually understand the interactions between the online social realm and the real world importance of bringing that experience to you life. Was it hard to do? No. But the fact that they thought enough to do this and it in turn made me blog about it and subsequently I’ll tweet about it, leaves such a great impact of how I view their agency that I’m sure to talk about this many times over.

It’s no doubt to me that the folks at AKQA have great passion for what they do, their execution has proven themselves in all the major awards shows. For me i’m not an awards kinda guy, but what I do love is when somebody in my industry gives me props for doing rad work, so to AKQA I say good on you. I look forward to more.

Kickstarter is “a new way to fund ideas & endeavors” Its a micro financing site where people can pledge money on different projects that people have set-up. You can pledge as little as 1 dollar and you might even get something in return, most times its a mention in the credits sometimes its a party when the project is launched.

Motivated people have started all kinds of projects, everything from creating a communal book, to getting funding to spend time building an offline wikipedia iPhone app. Project owners can leave updates for everybody about their project, or offer to communicate solely to their backers.

The whole system is neat and clean with the premis that if your financial goal is not met in your set timeframe, dollars to days if you will. Nobodys credit card gets charged. It’s up to the individual project owner to get people interested enough to pledge enough money so the project can move forward before their cut off date.

If you have a project that needs some micro funding I would suggest you head on over to kickstarter and sign up.

I’ve really been enjoying tweeting as of late but I’ve come to realize that 140 characters isn’t good for getting quality thoughts out for the handful of people that might read this.

Btw here is a pic of emily cause she’s the greatest kid alive. Bar none!

Vol 2.

Jen Matthews – http://twitter.com/jenmatthews

Yep thats my dear wife, I left her out of the first list, honestly not thinking anybody would care. apparently she did. Shucks. SO yeah she tweets about her love of all things Edward Cullen, people who fart on the train and an assortment of other stuff.. dance related as well as rantings about work. Doesnt tweet that much, but quality I suppose over quantity. I suppose you could follow her if you are friends with her. Tho I dont think most of the people she knows are on twitter, BB messenger maybe but twitter … no… Love ya.

Cheryl McKenzie – http://twitter.com/cherylmckenzie

I work with Cheryl, she takes the same trains I complain about all the time. I didnt even know she was on twitter and tweets quite a bit. She likes to make cupcakes and not bring them to work to share. She has also invented her own language and its documentation can be found on http://www.cherylese.com want to learn a new language or stuff about cupcakes and the weather then follow her up.

Wil Wheaton – http://twitter.com/wilw

Yes that Wil Wheaton. Wesley Crusher himself is on the internest and on twitter. If you liked TNG then you should follow him. Do you enjoy reading stories about being a nerd? Follow him. Enjoy play by play commentary about Kings games? Follow him. Nuff said. Engage!

Chris Hardwik – http://twitter.com/nerdist

Chris Hardwick is a musician, television host, stand up comic, and actor. I know him from G4′s Attack of the Show. Where he co-hosts from time to time. One of the funniest people I watch on TV which isnt saying much since I rarely watch something with hosts. He was also the host of PBS’s Wired Science which was an awesome show. Tweets about travelling and general nerdyness. Will converse with Wil Wheaton from time to time about TNG and hockey etc… Generally a fun follow if your up for it and especially if you watch AOTS.

Notorious BIG – http://twitter.com/NotoriousBIG

Its biggie speaking to you. Hes alive you know it. Hilarious. One of the premiere tweeters that makes me chuckle constantly. Did you love Juicy in high school. Did you want a shiny ass suit? Did you think MA$E was just crazy. Follow him up.

Well thats it. pretty straight forward. As of this I’m currently following 130 tweeters. Not bad way more that I thought I would. More next week!

So i’ve been meening to do this type of post for a while and thought that I would do it today or rather I would start it today. I’m going to go through my list of who I follow and write a bit on why I follow them, things I’ve learned etc. I’ll link back to their profile so you can check them out if they sound interesting to you. I’ll also rate their tweeting style on a personal level, that relates to me, you might find this interesting or not.

Lets get the Show on the road

Vol – 1.

micah barrett – http://twitter.com/micahmicah

Micah is a friend of mine. Brilliant designer and avid seahawks fan, which can be proven by his often tweets “fucking seahawks”. Sometimes I wish he tweeted more so I knew what was going on in Seattle, but maybe it just rains all the time? I value his tweets and his random thoughts, since hes a friend its good to know hes still alive when he does tweet.

veronica belmont – http://twitter.com/Veronica

Veronica is a co host of the revision3 show tekzilla. Honestly bonus points in my book for having a show with “zilla” in it. Smart and whitty she tweets about gadgets (which I like) and other technology things she covers (again I like that) also inserts ramblings about cats (which are funny even tho I’m allergic) and links and updates about the various things shes involved in like tekzilla and posting on her blog. A good follow if your into tech and especially if you enjoy tekzilla.

cobra commander – http://twitter.com/CobraCommander

Honestly who doesnt love cobra commander. Get insight on how to run your own evil organization. Witness the glory and the luster of having access to weapons that are far superior to that of your enemies. One of the funniest and therefore awesomest twitter accounts to follow and while the updates arent often, this is a good case of quality over quantity. If you are a fan of GI JOE then folow em up.

popeyes chicken – http://twitter.com/popeyeschicken

I have a warm spot in my heart for fried chicken, especially if its popeyes. I found out about this twitter account after twittering about enjoying some popeyes for lunch. Less that 3 hours later I had a personal message from popeyes and they had a follower instantly. The way that popeyes chicken is handling their social media responsibilities is in my book almost without fault. Tweets on brand and just generally great content for its followers, many companies could learn from the likes of these guys. If you enjoy bonafied chicken then follow.

al gore – http://twitter.com/algore

Yes this is the “REAL” al gore. At first his twiter account was squatted by and imposter and now the real al gore tweets semi weekly about the environment and things hes doing. Al started twittering shortly after his current interview with digg’s kevin rose. His non so often tweets are a nice break for me from the randomness that comes through my tweet stream. If you enjoy the outdoors and want to know whats going on with al specifically then a follow might be a good idea.

ok so thats it, a quick run down of 5 people I’m following on twitter. Another 5 shortly.

I did this a while ago. figured I should post it.

so I killed it basically.

5 out of 5.

0 min -4 seconds.

1. Stop including Word documents that you could have easily pasted in the e-mail.
2. When you are organizing a party, please BCC the invite, I don’t really care about most your friends (who I don’t even know) telling me they can’t make it.
3. Stop e-mailing me back with “Thanks”. Only e-mail me back if you have more questions or if there are any problems.
4. When you change e-mail address, don’t inform me from your old address, send it from your new e-mail address!
5. We’ve been e-mailing each other for a while now, you can stop being formal. Stop opening with my name and stop signing off with yours, I already know who we are.
6. If you’re going to have to use a signature, please keep it short without any fruity fonts, colors or logos.
7. Why include your email address in your signature? I received the mail from you, so I already got your e-mail address.
8. When resending an e-mail or attachment, please use the same subject so the e-mail thread stays intact.
9. CAPS IS CONSIDERED YELLING, YOU SHOULD KNOW THIS BY NOW!
10. Stop asking if I got you’re email. Yes, I got it. Did I read it? That’s the question you should have asked.