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Shut Up, Twitter
Twitter Hack Briefly Renders Self-Promoter's Tweets Comprehensible
Guy Kawasaki, a former Apple executive famous for popularizing the practice of "evangelism" in tech marketing, loves Twitter, like every good self-promoting hack. But how can you tell when a hack gets hacked? More » -
blogging for dollars
Guy Kawasaki writes his own blog — well, except that one really popular post
This is why people love Apple executive turned venture capitalist Guy Kawasaki, whether or not he knows what he's talking about. At a Commonwealth Club event, Kawasaki was asked about his insanely popular "Ten Ways to use LinkedIn." Watch him squirm for a minute before 'fessing up: LinkedIn flack Kay Luo provided Guy with his talking points for the post. "I really needed a post — it was four days!" Guy, next time feel free to raid our inbox. We get more helpfully-already-written posts than we'd ever imagined possible. -
alltop
Guy Kawasaki swoops in on crippled Valleywag
This is no coincidence, folks. Nick Denton soft-shutters our site and boom, we're added to Guy Kawasaki's "online magazine rack" Alltop within 24 hours. Guy's not afraid to play hockey with us anymore. Slapshot to the face! Guy, I'm a French-Canadian goalie. You'll be surprised how many of those I can take. -
guy kawasaki
Dude, you could've had Jerry Yang's job
I haven't had a chance to read Mr. Evangelism's latest book, Reality Check, but there's a tidy profile of Guy Kawasaki, the Apple marketer turned startup cheerleader, in USA Today. His biggest flub: Sequoia Capital partner Michael Moritz tried to hire him as CEO of Yahoo in the '90s. "I'd say that was a $2 billion or $3 billion mistake," the Hawaiian-born hockey nut admits. "Now Michael doesn't call me. I can't say I blame him." Yeah, and I'll bet Carl Icahn hates you now, too. (Photo by USA Today / Michael Mullady) -
book review
Guy Kawasaki's new book — an excerpt from the foreword
Yesterday, as Web 2.0's bubble burst in slow motion at 30,000 feet over downtown San Francisco, I received a preview copy of Reality Check, by Guy Kawasaki. Someone had stuck a Post-it on the cover: "See inside for foreword by The Fake Steve Jobs!" Awesome. I'm never going to read Kawasaki's book, even though he's way more successful than I'll ever be. I skipped to Dan Lyons's foreword, written in his Fake Steve persona. Here's the best parts: More » -
we read twitter so you don't have to
Guy Kawasaki is kind of long-winded, but good with the perks
Serial list-maker Guy Kawasaki's latest attempt at a hit startup is Alltop, an "online magazine rack." Kawasaki has promised Popurls creator Thomas Marban a $109,000 Audi R8 if Alltop takes off. Alas, twenty minutes of cruising the site — yet another techie's attempt to aggregate media sites by stripping their headlines into a bland common format, rather than creating a new rollup brand like Drudge or Huffington — makes me think Marban should ask for a new MacBook and call it a day. -
nowpublic
Robert Scoble, other Valley bon vivants subject of latest ego-stroking linkbait
Vancouver-based NowPublic is ostensibly all about citizen journalism. But since Guy Kawasaki sold Truemors to it and signed up as an advisor, it's becoming better known for publishing flattering lists of "influencers," supposedly ranking them according to various social media metrics. The first "Most Public" list focused on New York, but a new list for the Valley and San Francisco is "coming soon." And by virtue of being included in the latest edition, we received an early copy as a press release. Who comes out on top? Ubiquitous attention slut Robert Scoble, naturally. Full list after the jump. More » -
the 250
Citizen journalists rush to fill Internet's shortage of A-lists
I blame Guy Kawasaki. Ten days after the relentless listmaker joined the advisory board of Vancouver-based citizen journalism hub NowPublic, the site published a link-baiting "The 50 most influential people in New York." We've had this piece in our inboxes since Friday morning, but we couldn't figure out how to get anyone in the Valley to care about a list topped by Noah Brier and Jeff Jarvis. More interesting is me-blogger Anil Dash's take on the genre: "First and foremost, organizations create these lists to promote their own authority." Exactly. We've been pitched to do a Valleywag 100 or Valleywag 40 or whatever by consultants who crank out marketing events for a living. But they balk when we ask for a deck of playing cards emblazoned with the faces of 52 People We Want Gone. -
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guy kawasaki
FriendFeed not cliquey enough for you? Try Frienderati
Guy Kawasaki's A-list generator Alltop has spawned a new A-list: Frienderati is an aggregated feed of the latest five entries from the 101 most followed users of FriendFeed. My browser can't find an RSS feed for the page yet, but I'm sure there'll be one. Just as I'm sure someone will figure out how to sort this thing by popularity rather than alphabetically. While you're at it, can you strip out the posts and just post the pecking order of names? That seems easier. -
corrections
Truemors back up
Guy Kawasaki's $12,107.09 rumor site has indeed been bought by NowPublic, a citizen journalism enterprise. But NowPublic hasn't, as we incorrectly presumed yesterday, shuttered Truemors. Sorry, Guy, and what a relief: Every time I try to read NowPublic's self-important essays such as "An Open Letter to Senator Barack Obama Concerning Talk of an Asassination," I find myself back-buttoning to Truemors for a chaser like "Public Toilet in India Pays to Pee." -
acquisitions
Guy Kawasaki's $12,107.09 rumor site bought, buried
Update: Truemors is back up, though occassionally throwing errors, according our former colleague Jordan Golson over at the Industry Standard. More » -
alltop
Guy Kawasaki inflates egos that don't need inflating with Alltop
Alltop is Guy Kawasaki's latest project: a news aggregator which shows the titles of the last few posts from a number of different blogs in various categories including Politics, Sports, Fashion and the very aptly named Egos. The top of the Egos section includes feeds from inflated-head, Internet-famous writers like Robert Scoble, Michael Arrington, Dave Winer, Jason Calacanis, and, of course, Guy Kawasaki. In other words, it's an overblown blogroll, if a well-designed one. Nice work, Guy! We asked Fake Steve Jobs what he thought about being included in the Egos list: "I'm not sure what this site is all about, but I'm deeply honored to be included. Guy Kawasaki is a personal hero." Guy, be warned: You do not have a lock on the ego-inflation market. -
geeks gone plastic
Seth Godin, action figure
It's not every day that a Silicon Valley titan is cast into 5.375" of plastic. Marketing guru Seth Godin unearthed the real secret to self-evangelist success: Get yourself turned into an action figure. There's no better way to promote your name than to sell yourself for a mere $8.95 to every wannabe entrepreneur looking for a false idol to consult. Oddball toy store Archie McPhee has recreated Godin's baldpated goodness, complete with mismatched socks and a Little Book of Marketing Secrets. If only it carried the full line of self-promotional cultmongers, we'd finally be able to pit Godin, Guy Kawasaki, Jason Calacanis, and Robert Scoble against one another in a battle for biggest ego — right before Megatron decapitates them. -
truemors
PR guy misses PR lesson from Guy Kawasaki
PR blogger Vince Bank is peeved that tech evangelist Guy Kawasaki is using Twitter to promote his startup Truemors, instead of giving him "personal insights." And he calls himself a PR guy? Kawasaki's fanboys accept and defend his self-promotion. Bank even misses the valuable lesson Kawasaki taught him when Bank's self-promoting post to Truemors was banned. He asks, "Is this a classic case of 'Do as I say, but not as I do?'" The answer is yes. Unlike Kawasaki, Bank just isn't brassy enough to get away with it. -
dan lyons
Fake Steve Jobs talk turns into on-stage three-way
The Q&A session at the Computer History Museum last night was billed as a talk between former Apple evangelist turned venture capitalist Guy Kawasaki and former anonymous blogger turned book shill Dan Lyons, better known as Fake Steve Jobs. But it quickly turned into a sordid three-way. Brad Stone, the New York Times scribe who outed Lyons as Fake Steve joined the two on stage, and what was billed as the "Confessions of Fake Steve Jobs" turned into a celebration of Apple, blogging, and Dan Lyons's massive mancrush on the real Steve Jobs. More » -
valleywag calendar
Fake Steve meets a Real Guy
Guy Kawasaki does an FSJ Q&A in Mountain View, semantic search gets a little sexy in Palo Alto, and you get a chance to control the government, all in today's Valleywag Calendar. More » -
fake steve jobs
Fake Steve Jobs, Guy Kawasaki to mud-wrestle on stage
Ever since studly Timesman Brad Stone outed Forbes editor Dan Lyons as Fake Steve Jobs, the author of the faux-Apple CEO Web diary, I've been waiting to see what happens when Lyons meets up with some of the folks he's savaged as the blog's anonymous auteur. I'll get my first chance when Lyons gets interviewed by former Apple evangelist Guy Kawasaki, who's been repeatedly ridiculed by Lyons as Fake Steve. But why would Kawasaki display any hard feelings when he can use the notoriety of a feud to elevate his rapidly sinking profile? Dignity doesn't move units. The interview, sponsored by LinkedIn, takes place November 6 at the Computer History Museum in Mountain View. (Photos by hyku) -
guy kawasaki
Wishing Truemors were Twitter
Guy Kawasaki blogs that Twitter has made his rumor site Truemors a better Web site. If only that were so. Kawasaki manages to stretch three well-known aspects of Twitter into nine purported improvements to his own site. (What, the relentless marketer couldn't stretch the list all the way to ten?) The post boils down to these truisms: Twitter is fast, good for networking, and good for promoting yourself. None of which makes Truemors a better site. Why doesn't Kawasaki just admit he wished he'd started Twitter instead of Truemors? -
guy kawasaki
Twitter spreads Truemors — but is it malignant or benign?
Startup advisor Guy Kawasaki has added a new, useless feature to rumor-submission site Truemors. Exploiting the popularity of microblogging site Twitter, the devilishly unsuccessful angel investor has created a Twitter profile for the site and a tab displaying submissions to that profile, making it easier for text-message users — or the merely lazy — to participate. Clearly, Kawasaki hopes this "Twitter News Network" will metastasize Truemors throughout Silicon Valley's body impolitic. At least Kawasaki practices what he preaches: This is surely one of the stupid things you can do with less money. Unfortunately, the rumors, while perhaps more rapid, remain random and uninteresting, drawn on rereported news, not real gossip. Even Kawasaki may realize this: he doesn't allow users to vote, Digg-style, on Twittered Truemors. -
interviews
Guy Kawasaki interviews Frank Warren, the guy behind the fantastic PostSecret website and author of four spinoff books. Here's my nasty secret: I own several of Guy's books. [How to Change the World] -
guy kawasaki
Can't spot a good investment, but he can run his mouth
In an interview with the San Jose Mercury News, conducted from his home office in ritzy Atherton, Calif., Guy Kawasaki drops a couple of gems. On defending the poor response to his investments while turning down Valley successes:The only thing you can conclude is that it's a crap shoot. You have no idea what is going to succeed.
One can conclude that, if one is a self-serving, self-promoting, quasi-successful angel investor. Or rather, one can conclude that Kawasaki has no idea of what is going to succeed. The Silicon Valley Tool's attempts to befuddle his interviewer with truisms only gets worse when he starts defending his startup Truemors. More » -
guy kawasaki
Promoting the unpopular Truemors via the widely popular Stevenote
Leeching on the success that gadget sites Engadget and Gizmodo and numerous Mac fan sites have had covering live Steve Jobs keynotes, Guy Kawasaki, former Apple evangelist, hopes to pump some page views into his belittled rumor site, Truemors. Kawasaki will be gracing us with his own live coverage of Apple's WWDC keynote event Monday morning. More » -
guy kawasaki
'You can do a lot more stupid things'
TIM FAULKNER — Guy Kawasaki, evangelist and entrepreneur, stretches his defense of his ill-received startup, Truemors, to unparalleled proportions in this new video interview by Andy Sernovitz. Not only does he continue to downplay the cost and value of his site: "Before it would cost $5 million to do something stupid. Now it costs $12 thousand to do something stupid. You can do a lot more stupid things," Kawasaki appears to be shifting his defense by indicting venture capitalists willing to fund startups with millions. Of course, Kawasaki has done the same and failed more often than not, but now he knows better. Truemors wasn't a startup, it was an experiment to determine how much capital is needed to build a new company: $12,000 should do since it worked so well with Truemors. More » -
guy kawasaki
By the numbers
TIM FAULKNER — Guy Kawasaki, former Mac evangelist, venture capitalist, and startupper, defends his new site, Truemors, "by the numbers." We are supposed to take from "the numbers" that Guy was just trying to learn some lessons about Web 2.0 startups, but Truemors does not reveal new lessons, it shows Guy needing to rationalize bad PR, something he hasn't faced so acutely before. Counterpoint to some of Guy's "numbers" after the jump. More » -
pic of the day
Guy Kawasaki: male model
Guy Kawasaki, former Apple evangelist and startup investor, now embattled founder of the belittled Truemors and shameless self-promoter, knows how to keep his options open in case the rumor-voting site does not work out. Guy Kawasaki: male t-shirt model. [Photo: Threadless T-shirts] -
guy kawasaki
"I love to read what people are saying about me."
NICK DOUGLAS — So says Guy Kawasaki in a video interview (embedded below). The man who marketed the first Mac now markets himself on his blog, which is the only blog he regularly reads. In fact, the only way to get read by Guy is to talk about him: "I do, obviously, have my reader set up to check for instances when [blogs] mention me." The self-evangelist even admits to religiously checking his rank on the blog search site Technorati. "I really care... I don't think it's because I'm insecure, because I'm not insecure." More » -
auctions
Bid on "prize" of hockey game with Guy Kawasaki
One of the events taking place during Stanford University's "Entrepreneurship Week" — already in progress! — is the Innovation Challenge. Participants have a few days to maximize value from a pad of 100 3"x3" Post-it notes. Prizes include various meetings and activities with Silicon Valley bigwigs, including a hockey game with Guy Kawasaki and "deathball" with Tim Draper. On team of playas has decided to pre-emptively auction the prize on eBay as a way to actually win said prize; the auction lot is a set of ten Post-its, each of which will be a "ticket" to hockey with Kawasaki. No bids yet (auction closes Mar-02-07 01:47:14 PST), but that's potentially a good thing, as the prize may also be won by the team who demonstrates the "most dramatic failure." If only venture capital investing had such a fallback reward. -
comments
Commentating on commententarating
Sure, we made a little impish fun of VCer Guy Kawasaki's "Golden Touch" in our post about the demise of Filmloop. Apparently this moved Kawasaki to remark disapprovingly on Valleywag's fascist comments policy. What hurts is that Valleywag's name is cut from his post, referred to merely as "a blog." A blog! (Amusingly, many comments on Kawasaki's own post devolved into carping about his site's comment system displaying their email addresses.) Anyway, Guy, we sent you a comment invite, so let's hang out and stuff. -
china
Loose wires: China wants to clog YouTube
- The Secret Diary of Steve Jobs decides to actually be funny, writing a scathing review of last weekend's debaucherous Yelp party. Aw, Steve, let 'em have their fun. Weren't you ever young and loaded with millions in funding? [Fake Steve]
- Guy Kawasaki, father of modern corporate evangelism, writes a fantastically thorough, helpful, and meticulously detailed guide to finding a job in Silicon Valley. For instance: "Think: Plug and play, plug and play, plug and play. Sorry, but Silicon Valley companies do not develop employees. ('Management trainee' is an oxymoron in Silicon Valley.)" [Guy Kawasaki's blog]
- Did AOL release your search records? The Electronic Frontier Foundation wants to help you fight back. [EFF]
- Hey look, free Amazon schwag! Actually worn! Actually dorky! [Shmula.com]
- AOL's Weblogs, Inc. team gets caught spamming Digg. Digg users bite back with schoolyard insults. Much drama. Digg vs. AOL: It's like LiveJournal fights, but with boys. [Digg]
- Is China's government about to ban YouTube? Can't YouTube make a peace offering, like turning over those lip-synching boys as political prisoners? [Billsdue]
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thomas hawk
Worst Corporate Evangelists Ever
After official Zooomr evangelist Thomas Hawk got all bitchy at a blogger for criticizing the photo sharing site that employs him, a reader asked me if he was the worst corporate evangelist ever. Not by a long shot! He's just one in a long tradition of awful evangelists. After the jump, we list them all. More » -
to-do
To-Do this week: Shake your money-maker
- Tuesday night: See if you can't sneak into NetSquared's reception at the Hilton Santa Clara. Bonus points for anyone who tapes a drunk demo and sends it to Valleywag. [NetSquared]
- Wednesday afternoon: INBOX 2006 (a conference about e-mail. yay) hosts a reception at the San Jose Marriott. Now's the time to meet dynamic ex-Apple exec Guy Kawasaki. A free conference registration should get you in. [Inbox]
- Wednesday night: Dine with Winer at a Blogger Dinner. Co-organizer Niall Kennedy promises a dinner bill of about $15 or less. No discounts for food flung at your blogging nemeses. [Niall Kennedy]
- Friday through Sunday: The can't-miss event of the weekend — and it's all weekend — is Super Happy Dev House X. David Weekly's irregular coding fest commemorates its tenth iteration with a startup contest: Teams code dot-coms in one weekend, then see which one rakes in the most cash without human intervention. It's up to the winner to finagle those VC-bought lunches. [SHDH]
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guy kawasaki
How bozofied is your company?
Mega-blogger Guy Kawasaki lays out the Bozofication Aptitude Test that the the Valley's begging for. Browse the ex-Apple-marketer's test and take a point each for anything true about your company. Items include: More » -
remainders
Remainders: Search engines hate you.
Google won't let Americans watch a bomb video. Maybe it would reveal military secrets like "Iraqi bombs tend to go 'boom.'" [Google Video] More »
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