#and some of the best streams of tour so far have been on fb

[hope-ur-ok]

facebook livestreams my beloved

[chrisstevenson]

The Lows of High Book Prices

A thousand pardons if I come off like a rant. I'm a mashup between J.A. Konrath and Harlan Ellison. I'm a writer advocate and defender of the written word. I also watch the industry like a stealthy Sasquatch. These articles are always meant for Guerrilla Warfare for Writers, my down and dirty blog. There is no BS here. Maybe some inaccuracies. I don't even like posting these articles to my YA website--no one reads me there anyway. I hope you suffer me well.  

First and foremost, if you are a celebrity author you don't need to be reading this. If you are an A-list author, pass on by. If you are a very popular author with a huge reader fan base and have a enormous mailing list that draws purchasing customers in like flies, audios. If you have a break-out or bestseller, you can kindly leave by through back door. There will also be some outlier exceptions. This article is not a call to arms for you. You are profitable, consistent and probably comfortably set in the mighty realm of book sales.

If you are new to writing with a minimum number of releases, an old-time mid-lister like me with a ton of books out there, or a new writer launching your first book, I think you better read this and make some grave determinations. It's unlikely a publisher is going to read this, but I've been with and seen too many that need to know what is working and what is not as far as ad pricing. This warning goes double for authors who just don't care that their e-book prices are going to be placed high regardless. It goes triple (as of this writing) because of the corona virus and the financially stressed atmosphere it has created.  People are buying essentials. As far as entertainment, they are streaming movies and playing games. Who started the the rumor that they were buying books hand over fist? Do you remember when this news was sent out on the wings of doves at the very beginning of the pandemic spread?

I would like you to read three paragraphs (below) which come straight from the keys of most of the advertisers I know and have dealt with. The wording might not be the same but the implications all point to the same conclusion. They don't want your high-priced book. They want rock-bottom cover prices and freebies. The reason is twofold; Shoppers want bargains, plain and simple. That's why W-Mart and Amazon rule the nest. Yet the second reason is that the company itself doesn't want to lose a potential customer. That means you won't be coming back for seconds if there are flat sales. They are also competing with other promotion and marketing sites that have the same mindset policies.

Here's my statistics for two YA fantasy/thrillers that had excellent covers and blurbs. Both of these ads were run before and during a Halloween special (the horror factor was quite evident).. Both books were priced at $2.99.

Book one ran for 15 days on a $45 budget. It received 5,391 impressions; total clicks--5--and a CTR of 0.09%

Book two ran for seven days on a $100 budget. It received 10,195 impressions; total clicks --13 and a CTR of  0.13%.

I don't think I have to do the math for you. Except for the takeaway, which was $145.00 from me and some wide-eyed experience. I later changed companies, dropped the e-book price to .99 cents, and still fell flat--no sales. We could argue all day long about what I did wrong with these two companies. I did not stop there. I enlisted in seven of the companies listed below, with very low, rock-bottom prices. Please excuse my spelling on the names.

Just Kindle Books

Fiverr--bkknights

Fussy Librarian

FreeBooksie

E-book Hounds

Robin Reads

Kindlebook Review

Book Barbarian

Booksends

BookDealio

Ebookdiscovery

Ereader IQ

Ent

Book Reader Magazine

Pretty Hot books.

Out of my promotions, I received three apologies and full refunds. I think I sold two books from Ent. That was it. I won't go into which seven, but I did do my research beforehand. They were my best picks.  

Have you ever heard that it wasn't the gold miners who made money off their digs, but the merchants who sold them the supplies, tools, products and other services? We basically have the same thing going on here, with grandiose claims of the promotion and marketing companies talking about going to the top of the sales charts, breakouts, unlimited exposure and guaranteed results. Results. Not sales. Impressions and clicks are a normal state of business and you'll see them. What you won't see are voluminous click-throughs--buys, sales, mullah.

There are many Indie writers who are exceptions to this rule because they have targeted outfits that payoff for them. Might be some trade published out there too. This comes from a lot of trial and error--R & D--and it NEVER ends because the books can go through an insufferable amount of tweaking to fine-tune the results. This happens when an author watches his/her ups, downs and in betweens--the stats that govern peak sales. Self-published authors also get a larger percentage cut of the royalties than the small trade-house authors. Many of the elite Indie authors pay thousands for ads a months, but they reaps thousands plus in return. So it is a revolving door for them--huge investments that garner huge profits. You want to make money, you have to spend it. That's not my quote, lol.

Look, all I'm saying is be wise and careful with your expenditures. You are going to see, if you already haven't, self-proclaimed experts that can do all forms of editing, covers, formatting, book tours, pod-casts, trailers, page ads, listings, book-to-movie deals, screenwriting, agent introductions, publisher submissions, blurbs, illustrations, writing courses, query letters, one-on-one instruction, translations, ghostwriting, expedited (paid) reviews, synopsis's, proof reading, evaluations and all other manner of Internet blasting services. Can you pay for some of these services without losing your shirt or blouse? Sure you can! It's up to you. But be aware, unless you really need and believe in any of them, you'll lose out every time.

I often wonder if we are just giving our books away because the sea is awash with them. So many tens of thousands of books are published each year that the numbers keeps compounding and burying the authors under tons of pixels. Nobody can find you, lest you post on FB that you will commit suicide if somebody, anybody doesn't buy one of your books before you take that leap. Well, if it goes viral and you were bluffing, it would work. I think you get the idea. Dear gawd, I've often entertained the idea.

1. Your deal price should be as competitive as possible (This is a company motto BTW).

"We promise our subscribers the best deals available. The better the deal, the more appealing it is to our subscribers, and therefore the more likely it is to be selected by our editors/readers. We rarely feature books priced above $2.99, and even $2.99 is an unusually high price for many of our categories.(I JUST LOVE IT WHEN THEY SAY $2.99 IS UNUSUALLY HIGH).

"While your deal price should be based on your book marketing goals, pricing as low as possible will entice more readers to download your book. The lower the price, the higher the conversion rate of a Deal. Knowing this, our editors prefer books that are competitively priced, since those will drive a higher volume of reader engagement. They’re also able to select a higher percentage of discounted books. If you’re not selected for a deal between $0.99 and $3.99, consider resubmitting your book for a free promotion, as this can be a really effective way to increase your chances of getting selected.

"Keep in mind that the competitiveness of your price depends on your category. While it’s normal to see a higher priced book in Cooking, for example, prices are usually lower in the Mysteries or Romance categories (THOSE TWO ARE THE BEST-SELLING GENRES, BTW).. Browse through books in your category to see what’s competitive in your own genre. Again, if your book is not selected at one price, try resubmitting at a lower price or for free. Your chances of being selected will be higher."

Note the last sentence. They are going to select you in accordance with how profitable they think you can be.Sounds to me if you don't go low enough to suit them, they'll politely blow you off.

I've heard some positive news about AMS, BookBub featured ads, and in a blue moon, FB and Twitter boosters. I've used all but the grand daddy feature ad. While these might still show some profit, they certainly aren't working like they used to. Profit has measurably declined, and I mean this in a general sense.

What does my crystal ball tell me for the future? I can only take a wild stab at it and say that the heavy visual sites like Pinterest, Instagram, Tumblr and others are driving a wedge between the other competitors. They could be the wave for future book exposure. I know their swords are drawn against Amazon

Anybody have any solutions or ideas about gaining some profitability in this industry? I'd love to hear it. Or any promo/marketing site that has fulfilled your dreams. BTW, just like FB put the whammy on My Space, do you see another FB type site in the future? I dooooo,

Blessed wishes, please stay safe and healthy.

Chris and Christy.  

[dipulb3]

Bands try 'virtual tours' as the reality of a summer with no concerts settles in | Foxton News

New Post has been published on https://appradab.com/bands-try-virtual-tours-as-the-reality-of-a-summer-with-no-concerts-settles-in-foxton-news/

Bands try 'virtual tours' as the reality of a summer with no concerts settles in | Foxton News

Now, after three months of their respective bunkers, the 4 musicians are venturing again out. Just about, after all.

For the following 10 days, Goose shall be holed up at a barn in Fairfield County, the place, beginning final night time, they will be broadcasting their distinctive mix of improv-inspired rock ‘n’ roll by means of eight units of reside music.

Some acts, like Marc Rebillet, Garth Brooks and Spafford, have tried drive-in film theaters. Others, like Dropkick Murphy’s and the Disco Biscuits, booked empty stadiums.

However for street warriors like Goose, who spend the majority of their time enjoying small or medium-sized venues in cities throughout the US, rising their fanbase with each present, the following smartest thing they will do is play on-line and hope the followers present up.

“The demand for reside, new content material hasn’t actually gone anyplace, by way of what individuals need to see,” stated Peter Anspach, who performs keys and guitar. “Perhaps they don’t seem to be going out to a present, however we nonetheless discovered the demand for individuals watching new never-before-seen units from the lounge is simply as large as a present.”

Twiddle, a Vermont rock band with 15 years of relentless touring behind them, is gearing up for the same run. Theirs is “Roots Tour 2020,” they usually’re promising 9 units of reside music carried out at numerous areas round their residence state at venues instrumental to their profession — all streamed reside for followers to look at at residence.

“That is going to be one thing actually particular for us and really excited to relive a few of these particular moments from our profession,” Mihali Savoulidis, Twiddle’s guitarist and lead singer, stated in saying the occasion, which begins at $75 for the package deal deal.

Each bands’ digital excursions are being produced by Dwell From Out There, an internet music & content material collection below the 11E1even Group that started producing live performance streams within the early days of the pandemic.

“Lots of people are going up on Fb Dwell simply sitting on the sofa with their acoustic guitar. We wished to offer our followers one thing that was far more participating that changed what a ‘tour’ is for us and our followers,” Dwell From Out There co-founder Dave DiCianni instructed Appradab. “Goose, and each band that we work with, type of got here up with their very own idea.”

Recreating a neighborhood on-line

Part of the problem these bands face is making an attempt to recreate the neighborhood expertise that usually revolves round their exhibits on the street.

“Everybody’s residence quarantining. All we wish is to be related,” stated Ben Atkind, the band’s drummer, of the reside Fb Q&A’s they’ve tried in current weeks. “Our fan base may be very lively, and on the market, so we’re positively making an effort to communicate — for his or her sake and ours.”

For Goose’s digital tour, there shall be a number of extra possibilities to attach.

Followers who purchased tickets to stream the exhibits can play alongside as balls are pulled on the stream, every one dictating what music the band will play subsequent, giving followers an opportunity to win prizes if these songs match their supplied boards.

There will even be merch, VIP meet-and-greets with the band (over Zoom after all), and even a neighborhood expertise present.

“That is only a complete different ingredient of randomness,” stated Anspach. “It form of makes it extra entertaining for us, in addition to the followers.”

Rick Mitarotonda, who sings and performs guitar, agreed.

“It is going to be enjoyable. It is going to be a unique expertise. It is going to hold us on edge,” he stated.

Goose usually drafts out a set proper earlier than they take the stage, or lets the music take them the place they need to go. However now? “We gotta go along with the balls,” he stated.

The query stays of what a interval of retreat from the stage will imply for a band like Goose, whose momentum appeared to be unstoppable within the jam music world earlier this 12 months.

Some may by no means make it by means of the opposite aspect. Different bands may change for good.

Mitarotonda is not too anxious.

“Having house from issues is very nice. There’s all the time a renewed vitality if you come again, particularly if it is taken on function or not,” he stated, including that by having slightly breath “improvisation goes to new locations.”

Anspach agreed. “I really feel like after we get again we’ll have far more concepts and be way more impressed, and we’ll respect the truth that we’re enjoying collectively a lot extra,” he stated. “I am positively stoked for it.”

“I hope we alter,” added Mitarotonda. “As a result of if it simply stays the identical for too lengthy then it is — it isn’t good. The very best bands, the best bands, change loads. I hope there’s some components of change.”

[vice-s-assistant]

Voices of the FGC: Andre/Dream Boy Purple of Skullgirls Latin American (SG LATAM)

Over the last five years, Skullgirls has been the “Lil’ Darling” of the Indie movement in Fighting Games. It the game that’s thrived when people said it was “dead”, multiple setbacks, from its former publisher, and various other hay-makers that come with its game development. Through all of that though, it has not only survived, but grown. Now as the actual final patch for the game comes out, the current call for the game, it’s a good time to look back and see it lasting effect on the fighting game landscape. I sat down with a friend of mine, Andre/Dream Boy Purple, who was the lead organizer for SG LATAM, a Skullgirls Latin American group, for his thoughts on Skullgirls, its effect on him, and his organization.

Vice’s Assistant: Alright let's start off with your name for the folks who don't know and what you do with Skullgirls?

Andre/Dream Boy Purple: Name is André, well basically I created and have been running SG LATAM a Latin American focused community for Skullgirls, as well as trying to use the group itself as a medium to spread the word of SG on other LATAM communities.

Banner from SG LATAM Facebook page

VA: How did you find out about Skullgirls?

Andre: Well, back in the day of 2011, I happened to stumble upon a trailer for Double, a character in the game before the game came out. It honestly left me pretty surprised: just the sight of the animation was pretty cool on itself, but it also looked like a really fun fighting game, especially considering I was into Marvel at the time. It was a no brainer (sic) that I soon got it for the 360 when it released.

VA: And when you first got the game, did it just "click" with you, or did that just come on later down the line?

Andre: Ha ha, that's actually a curious question. When I first got the game, I had my fun with it, but I guess there were a bunch of things that I didn't really enjoy with it. Things like the speed, the constant touch of death combos, the animation having to display the hitboxes for it to run smoothly, and even the netcode even though it was still rollback. It was in a rougher state than the one we have now, I endend (sic) up playing it casually during that time and no thinking much about it.

VA: After you spent time with it though, when did things start to feel like "I really dig this game"?

Andre: That was way down the line, after the whole fiasco with Reverge Labs having to dismantle and reform into Lab Zero, and the launching of their crowdfunding campaign. I started to take interest in the game again after all there were a lot of things that were issues of mine adressed (sic) on the game since then like the speed or balance patches (we didn't get those on the 360 at the time sadly), plus new characters and a PC port after hearing that I made up my mind of giving the game a second chance and ended up falling in love with it then.

VA: Nice. I kind of started to dig the game after I've spent time with a few months later. Skullgirls was my "burnout" game after I would do long sets in SSF IV AE. After a while started fooling around with Fortune and started to realized I like her rush down stuff...even though I was probably abusing some of her nasty damage stuff she had in Vanilla Skullgirls.

Andre: Yeah, damage was kinda ridiculous in vainilla (sic) I remember seeing some videos of Severin back in the day of him killing characters anywhere on the screen with just one bar.

Couldn’t find a combo of Severine killing with one bar but here’s a 100% combo. These were common (and annoying) in Vanilla Skullgirls.

VA: I couldn't do that kind of stuff, and still can't, but I remember basically using the head to trip someone, going to rekkas, blockbuster. It was super easy to do and boy howdy you could get some nice chunks of damage off.

Moving forward, what in you decided that you wanted to foster your local community to get more people into the game?

Andre: Well when I really started to get into the game once again I started wanting to play more against people and Quick Match did only so much. So I searched around forums and Facebook groups for a LATAM community only to find out there were really none. I found a couple that talked about the game, it's (sic) lore, and played casually but not really one focused to compete with each other. So I quickly took action into it. After all if you want something done you should do it yourself. I created a very basic logo in PS and started a FB group which I tried to promote constantly to friends and in FGC groups. Thinking back to it, it was probably annoying for them to see me do that but I was determined. Ha ha.

VA: Since starting it, how has thing’s gone?

Andre: Well it has been growing pretty nicely and steadily. We're around 600-700 unique members between the FB, Discord, and Steam groups. The Discord is pretty active every day and people are constantly talking and playing on it. We got an actual logo for our group and not just a photoshopped SG logo. We have done plenty of tournaments now under the name "Trifulca en el Ring" with custom flyers for each edition. We've also since have partnered up with Arcade Rumble (a FGC Latin American group) and they have helped us do things like have better production streams, bigger audience to announce our stuff, and in ocassions (sic) even give out money prizes for our tournaments.

Poster done by Abraham Rodriguez

VA: Beyond just the SG LA community, how do you think Skullgirls has grown within the last 5 years? The prevailing joke is "Skullgirls is dead," but the truth is the opposite: Skullgirls is one of Steam's best selling fighting games (CORRECTION: Skullgirl is not one Steam’s best selling fighting games, far from it, but there are a lot more people who have then you think) , showings a plenty tournies, and even a "mini" convention at AX in Phoenix, AZ  (Correction AX is in Los Angeles, California, not Phoenix, AZ).

Andre: The SGC (Skullgirls Community) has grown a lot, right now we have things like the Skullgirls Tour which is basically or own version of CPT or KI's world cup with 12 tournaments both offline and online. A lot of people have also joined through the PC community, thanks to it being a complete steal at just 15 bucks for the game, having one of the if not the smoothest online in a fighting game beautiful animation, great gameplay, and the low specs it has. You see new people trying out the game constantly, be it the Skullheart* or Steam forums, as well as in the SG LATAM community. We get people who are new all the time and it also helps the abundance of helpful people and events that are run online by the community. Things like Skullbats, Monday Night Blockbusters, SG Brazil weeklies, and even our own "Trifulca en el Ring" series just goes to show that SG was never or ever will be dead. You'll always have people to play with, you just gotta look for them.

VA: With the last patch finally out, do you feel the game has finally reached its ideal state? Or are there things to feel still need worked on?

Andre: Well considering how Mike Z is, he will always find something to work on, but as it stands, the game is really balanced to the point where tier list are pretty universaly (sic) thought as a matter of opinion, and even then there isn't that much of a diff (sic) from the bottom to the top. Considering SG is pretty unique with it's (sic) focus on resets, I think in it's (sic) current state it will pass the test of time just fine.

VA: What do you think Skullgirls' lasting legacy will be?

Andre: That a community and it's game can last and grow as long as they keep pouring love into it. There's only so many big tournaments for SG (biggest being Combo Breaker) since the whole EVO ordeal of 2013, and barely losing to Smash SG hasn't really been a mainstream fighting game at all. Which to my eyes only makes more impressive what it has been able to acomplish (sic) thanks to the developer support and the constant effort by the community to run events; making tech, helping the devs find bugs, the community being so inclusive. I think SG will still be played many years from now, and until the eventual SG 2, I doubt the constant income of players will slow down anytime soon.

VA: Finally, do you have any advice for people still timid about getting into Skullgirls?

Andre: Well SG is a fighting game, and like any of them, it's not easy to get to certain competitive level. That's the first fact that you have to accept but there's so many resources and people willing to help: on Discord and the Skullheart forums as well as groups targeted towards new players that you'll have people around your level to play against. A lot of people get discouraged because they jump online first thing, and they get massacred since SG is a fast game, and also focused heavily on resets. Even people with past fighting game experience have a hard time when they first play against experienced people, but it really doesn't take that long to get the hang of it, and SG having such an amazing training mode also helps. To sum it up, I know it may seem overwhelming now, but there's so many people willing to help you, and it really is worth it to form (sic) part of such an amazing community.

VA: One last thing: Where can people reach you and be a part of SG LATAM?

Andre: People can reach me personally through my Tumblr or Twitter

http://dreamboypurple.tumblr.com/

https://twitter.com/DreamBoyPurple

For SG LATAM they can reach either through our (sic) FB group or Discord, Discord being the more active one of the 2

https://www.facebook.com/groups/SGLATAM

To both Andre for the interview and Yahoo’s E-sports’ Michael Martin (https://twitter.com/Bizarro_Mike) for advice with interviews

You can also watch Andre attempt to go against the world in a 100-man quick match kumite in Skullgirls today at 6 CDT on his Twitch channel:

https://www.twitch.tv/dreamboypurple

[asdfjklsemi]

Mark,

Thank you for sharing a very personal moment with us last night. I was laying in bed scrolling through YouTube as I normally do trying to fall asleep when I noticed you posted a late night video.

I was brought to tears with you. Not just because some of it resonated with me personally but just knowing how much this has plagued you to the point where you felt like you needed to talk to us about it. I often feel most vulnerable and reflective late at night, in the dark, as I’m trying to fall asleep as that so often happens to most people. And when I realized you were having an existential moment too, for once I didn’t feel so alone in having them. So, thank you for that – your video couldn’t have been posted at a more appropriate time.

All of your vlogs are very sincere and heartfelt, but this one struck a chord with me because of where I’m currently at in life too. While you’re at a very high point in life, I am not so fortunate. But like you, I feel stuck and in limbo and I’m working on wiggling my way out of it. We are also close in age as I am 26. And the reason I mention age is because I feel that at our age, we often have many moments where we feel like we don’t know what big choices to make because we just want them to be the best, most fruitful ones we can make. We often feel nostalgic and look back at times when we were “looking up” and reanalyze where we are now and ask ourselves, “is this where I want to be?” We could be living our dream and STILL feel unsure of where we are in our young lives because we know we can still do so much more and we want to do it when we’re still young and able.

It’s okay to feel like you’re not “looking up” as much as you used to in terms of YouTube or that you’ve lost some of that drive you once had first making videos. I think you’re realizing/you have realized that you’ve “made it” or that you’re happy with where your channel is and how far it’s come. Perhaps you’ve reached a lot of your YouTube goals without even realizing it and are ready to try new things. Everyone goes through cycles of, “I have a goal!” and then “Oh, now I reached my goal, so.. where do I go next? What comes next?” But know that your talent and success is being recognized beyond YouTube and you deserve all of it.

It’s really easy to get stuck in a routine, even if it’s fun and enjoyable and seemingly the best career choice. People are ever-growing, ever-changing, and ever-curious though. And our lives aren’t ever meant to be static. So when we finally accomplish something big it’s normal to feel like you’re stuck and lost and not sure where to go next. We understand that you love being a creator on YouTube and that you wouldn’t want anything to detract from it. We understand your fear of not wanting to forsake us or disappoint us, but you won’t. I won’t be disappointed. Your truest fans won’t be. And it’s difficult to know where everything will balance out but you won’t know until you try. And we know you will. And we’re here for you when you do.

You made a YouTube video awhile ago where you mentioned using your platform to help you branch out and try new things knowing that YouTube won’t last forever. You owe it to your future, and your creative, ambitious nature to take advantage of as many opportunities that come your way that you want to make room for in your life. Please don’t be afraid to take that step. We love YOU, every facet of who you are, and what you share of your life with us. Your truest of fans would not want you to be unhappy wandering aimlessly when you’re craving new experiences. We want you to be happy. And you deserve all of your success. You deserve every opportunity presented to you. You REALLY do.

“If I want to be where I want to be I have to take the right steps, and I have to make the right choices, and I have to make a conscious effort every day to be better.” You’re right! We should always strive to be a better version of ourselves every day. However, if we get too caught up in trying to make the right choices and trying to take the right steps we may over-think everything and end up not making a choice at all. If you were to find a passion for something that takes up so much of your time that you could barely do YouTube anymore, the MOST I would ask from you is to make a Fb post or a tumblr post updating us (just to touch base) every now and then because we care about you! :D But most importantly we would be supportive and happy for you no matter what.

I also want to say that I’m an introvert too and while I don’t have a large following of people to connect with, I do know that introverts value deep, admirable connections with others. We take other people’s stories to heart. And when we can’t connect with them like how we want to, it can make us feel really isolated from what matters. We know how badly you want to connect with your fans on a more intimate level and I’m sorry that that is difficult for you to achieve given your position. But we know you care about us. We know you care through your vlogs, charity live streams, conventions, the tour you’re going on, your live videos, and physically going out to neighborhood parks on a whim just to chase people around in an inflatable deer suit or to dance with them! We can see that you make an effort to try to connect with us the best that you can and we are SO appreciative of it.

We love you just as much as you love us, Mark! And we can tell from these vlogs that you haven’t lost sight of that. Now show us what you can do because you are deserving and because we know you can do it! And we know that whatever decisions you make are going to be the best for you and we just want you to be happy. We’re here with you every step of the way and aren’t going anywhere! I can’t WAIT to see what paths you choose to take! I look forward to getting to know you even better. Even if one day you’re still doing YouTube but you have a family of your own and all you’re doing is making vlogs about your kids with some Let’s Plays thrown into the mix we. would. be. a. fan. of. that. too. Because we care about YOU over anything else. At least I do. <3

Anyway, I know you weren’t asking for advice, and I’m sorry this was hella wordy (it took me hours to cohesively write and even posting this now it’s still questionable). But we appreciate you sharing these raw moments inside your heart with us. It makes us feel especially close to you, like we’re really your friends. We know you genuinely care. And I know these words come from just a single fan but I know a lot of others who feel the same way I do.

Sending virtual hugs, good vibes, and all of my support,

Your fan,

Kim. <3

@markiplier 

[theokbrowne]

RESO Datacomp 30-Day Hackathon Recap

The first hackathon I ever participated in was actually just in 2013 when I built an app called Curb Call at the Retsly / Realogy Hackathon in SF.  I got second place at that one which won me an oversized novelty check (plus a smaller sized real one) but it also was a nice excuse to sit down for about 30 straight hours and build an app that I had an idea for. I ended up actually launching that app, raised some VC for it, signed up some brokerages and sold it all a couple of years later. Needless to say, it was a positive experience and I rarely miss a real estate related hackathon now.

When Retsly co-founder, Josh Lopour told me about a new one that he was helping to organize, I immediately knew that I would be in. RESO, the real estate data standards organization, was partnering with technology providers who offer RESO standard compliant MLS data API’s to offer a total purse of $25k and a full 30 days to build something (more info here). Presentations would need to be made in-person at the RESO conference in San Diego on Oct 17th and there were four categories that could be won: best use of listings data, best use of public records data, crowd favorite and overall winner. The prizes were $5k each except for the overall winner category which was a $10k prize.

As luck would have it, I happen to live in San Diego, so that part would work out nicely. As luck would NOT have it, my wife and I were expecting our first baby and her due date was October 16th, the day before the presentation. I knew that there was a very good possibility that I was not going to be able to present my build but decided that it was worth it to build something anyway, just in case.

Data was available from Bridge Interactive, RPR and Spark by FBS and we were required to use at least one of the listings feeds from one of these providers. The $25 entry fees were donated to Coder Dojo in Los Angeles where they teach young people to code. Win-win for everyone!

The Build(s)

When deciding on a hackathon project, I like to try to do something with technology I’ve never used before but been meaning to try. This time, I wanted to do something with blockchain. I had recently built a mining rig for mining cryptocurrencies (Monero or Ethereum, depending on their current values and difficulty levels) so I have been pretty immersed in the technology surrounding them, namely blockchain. It seemed so buzz-wordy though but it actually is pretty cool. I’m not interested in doing anything with transactions, which is really blockchain’s wheelhouse. I settled on trying to build a different take on an MLS itself but making it run on a private version of the Ethereum blockchain, utilizing the built-in storage decentralized module called Swarm. It was massively technical, geeky and super hard. I spent about two weeks building it which involved learning a lot about the Go language, which is quite popular in that community. I got pretty far and then abruptly abandoned the entire thing…

After re-visiting the scoring criteria, I knew that it was a bit of a stretch to use data from an MLS API (which was a requirement) while building an MLS… I didn’t think there would be a way to make it look flashy or cool either.

Luckily I had another idea. Unfortunately I only had about 10 days left until the presentation date and I also knew that our baby could be coming at any moment now. So I might miss some of those 10 days… My new idea would have to be built in ruby on rails and iOS, which are the things I do best and most frequently. One reason I like hackathons is because I think I can get a lot of work done in a short amount of time. I was off and running, again…

I decided to build a tool for real estate agents to do a remote showing for buyers living overseas. The idea is agents would use an iphone app to stream video during a home tour to buyers who can watch the video from their browser while they are in their home country. In addition to the p2p video stream, I wanted to do something about the language barrier so I planned some realtime language translation (so the agent can effectively talk to the buyer during the remote tour) and of course, integration of MLS data via one of the sponsor api’s to show details about the listing that they’re remotely touring. I called it “Inflection”.

I started working on it at about 4:00 pm and worked deep into the night on that first day. I knew I needed to get as far as I could each day before I inevitably got the call from my wife that she was going into labor. Days went by though and I was able to check all the boxes on my functionality list. I used WebRTC protocol for the video streaming and a complicated menagerie of api’s to make the language translation work. I built the web and API parts in rails 5 (I actually hadn’t used v5 of rails yet!) and built the iOS app in swift, which was a nice departure from rubymotion, which I always lazily default to if I’m in a rush. One cool thing about Rails 5 is that it has a built-in socket / pub-sub sort of thing now called Action Cable. This worked well for connecting the iOS app to the api without having to poll for changes.

I had a very, very un-styled, working platform and about 3 days left. Being a 30-day hackathon, I knew a polished front end would be important. Sadly, front end work tends to take me way longer than back end work. Also, as I began my quest to make it look good for the judges, I found myself adding more features. And still, I had one even larger potential issue… since the baby wasn’t here yet, it was looking more and more likely that he could arrive on the day of the presentations.

Presentation Day

Though early contractions had begun, luck was smiling upon us and my wife was still not in labor, even though our due date was the day before. Our baby was officially late BUT I had a shot to present!

I made my way to the very cool Pendry hotel in downtown San Diego, checked into the event, got my free t-shirt and drew the fourth presentation slot (of 12). When I test ran my demo, of course it didn’t work. There was some crazy issue with the SSL certificate that I installed the day before and that was stopping the video from streaming. I quickly changed a few things in my code, pushed it to the server and hoped for the best.

While the first three demos were going on, I kept checking my phone, hoping not to get “the” call from my wife. “Stay in there for another hour, future son!” As luck would have it, one of the first three presenters showed off a blockchain app. It wasn’t visually stunning but of course, I liked it. Hopefully I had made the right choice though..

When it was my turn to go, I walked towards the stage and spent that time wishing I had a bit more time to have practiced my actual pitch. I tend to present best with a minimal structure though and hoped that that was still the case. We had seven minutes to present at this event – way longer than usual.

I started with a caveat that I might bolt in the middle of my presentation if I get the call from my wife and the crowd’s chuckle chilled me out a little bit. Then I began my demo and noticed that my computer had disconnected itself from the wifi. Good start…

In the end, my demo went okay but I think my very last second SSL fix broke a tiny something in my real-time translation layer and people didn’t get to hear the voices speaking what I was saying, post-translation. That was a serious bummer.

But after I sat back down, I heard some mumblings from people in the audience about it being a good idea, which was validating. And at the end of the day, I was super lucky to have been able to actually get to build this thing in 10 uninterrupted (by a baby) days and make it to the prezo day.

The winners list did not include me or my project. The Blockchian app (doh!) won the “best use of listings data” category, a beautiful mobile app called My Butterfly (which made CMA’s) won the “crowd choice” category, and a cool web app that allowed investors for large commercial buildings to find opportunities won the overall prize and the “best use of public data” category.

Now What?

As I said, I tend to use hackathons to learn about a new technology and also to build an idea I’ve had on the shelf. This was one I thought about with my parents in mind. They’re agents in Miami and deal with overseas investor clients all the time. They could really use something like this and so I plan to finish it up in the coming weeks and put it out there for agents and brokerages to sign up. So though I didn’t win any novelty sized checks, hopefully I can still provide some value for agents and earn some service fees in exchange.

Oh, and that baby finally arrived on Oct 22nd. A beautiful little boy named Bowie

[celtfather]

Getting Things Done | Celtfather Monthly: December 2019

Greetings Gunn Runner

It’s hard to believe we’re entering the final month of the year. Where has the time gone? What will next year bring?

I suppose it is time to start planning for 2020. It’s time to settle on the next CDs. Time to review all that I have accomplished this year. And it’s time to decide what changes to make.

I don’t ever remember doing that when I was younger. I focused on creating. I never understood how important it was to truly review my successes and failures. I’ve been doing it for a decade or so. But I still felt like I was flying by the seat of my pants.

I am nearly done with the audiobook, Getting Things Done. I am trying to unlock all of the ideas and thoughts that are in my brain, get them down on paper, and figure out what I will do next.

What about you. What kind of future planning rituals do you do each year?

All right, let’s get on with the monthly news, starting with...

PODCASTS

The Pub Songs Podcast is doing pretty well staying on schedule. The new simplified format works for me. Hopefully, it works for you too.

I announced my new CD in November. I shared a cool way to vote, be it for the Celtic Top 20 or in general. And I encouraged listeners to remember success is best measured by how much you help others.

I have two episodes planned for December. Both have Christmas names. But I haven’t solidified the themes yet.

Stories from the Road is successfully coming out twice a week. I feel eventually I’m gonna get behind. That seems like a LOT of content. But so far, I’m ahead. And I have lots to talk about in the run up to the Selcouth Kickstarter.

Irish & Celtic Music Podcast is doing fantastic as usual. I have so much feedback. I did a two hour special to highlight all the feedback I missed over the past couple years.

I’m ending the Year of the Celtic Woman on that show. However, I decided I will not stop my quarterly Celtic women episodes. I feel that’s important. So it will be a regular part of the content that I release into the future.

The first episode of the Celtic Christmas Podcast is now online. And I put it into the hands of listeners as to whether there will be more than one.

That’s because I started a Patreon page for the podcast. You see, I’ve been losing money with the Celtic Christmas podcast for as long as it’s been running. And I was OK with that. It was sort of like my gift for the holiday.

The trouble is I spend a lot of time and mental effort to create and release episodes, especially in December. That takes me away from things that I should be doing. Ultimately, it was not a smart marketing move to run that podcast, even if it made me happy.

And so in comes patreon once again. I started a new fundraiser for the show to help pay for the production and my time producing the show. Patrons sponsored the first episode of the season. If we hit our next goal, then we will get either one or two more episodes this year. Depends on when or if the next milestone is hit.

There is a new episode of In the ‘Verse with Mikey Mason. We discuss themes from the episode, "Out of Gas". It has one of my new favorite songs to sing. That's a song called "Breathing".

The next one will tackle the episode "Ariel". We are also going to try to get back onto a monthly schedule. So this episode will come out on December 1.

8:04 - VIDEOS

Season 4 of Coffee with the Celtfather comes to close on December 11. The show did does not have a huge number of viewers. But it seems a favorite nevertheless. There's a steady stream of 15-20 people watching each week. So I’m going to run it for at least one more season, restarting in January.

The show will continue at 10:30 AM Eastern on Wednesday. However, It will be exclusively available on Facebook.

I tried a web service that allowed me to broadcast on Facebook, YouTube, and Twitter. I was hoping that would increase my reach, which would also mean more tips or more patrons signing up in the Gunn Runners Club. It didn't make an impact sadly, at least not enough to really justify paying $20 a month.

It was a good test nevertheless. I learned that Facebook is a good busking platform. And YouTube is probably better for video singles. So next season, I might try release one video every week or two and make them line up with the coffee show.

Oh! And Patreon Heroes get the full audio recordings of the coffee show. I also record a couple extra songs for that audio. I will continue to do that next season. But I’m not sure if anyone enjoys that. The feedback has been limited. So if you like it or if you don't bother listening, especially if you don't listen, let me know. That will help decide if I should keep it going.

10:05 - MERCH

Selcouth is the name of my next album. I’m planning a kickstarter for January.  The CD features my uniquely strange yet marvelous mode of music. You will enjoy many of the songs that I have played but not released over the past year.

There will be several Firefly songs, some traditional Irish songs and tunes, some comedic songs, some sci-fi and fantasy and cats, and some uniquely Marc Gunn songs. This is the mixed bag that I promised myself for a long time.

I will have more details coming on future podcasts and definitely in January.

I skipped the Black Friday sales this year. Even though I have a bunch of new products in my store at magerecords.com. I also have some great special offers. Visit my home page for details.

I also have THREE NEW SINGLES that you can look for in the days to come.

The first is the Brobdingnagian Bards' "The Last Jedi Drinking Song". That comes out on December 13. Just in time for the release of the last Star Wars episode.

The second is "Slainte Mhaith Christmas". Basically, I re-recorded my song "Slainte Mhaith" and gave it a Christmas twist when I realized it could easily work for that. I don't have a release date yet. But it'll be ASAP.

The last one was an even more last minute Christmas release. That is "Hero of Christmas". This is one of the songs that Mikey Mason and I wrote last year for our Blue Sun Holiday Tour. It's a parody of "Hero of Canton" all about Santa Claus. Again, I don't have a release date for that. I'm gonna aim for December 15th. But I should've released these two songs sooner. Oh well...

TRAVEL

I still have space for my Celtic Invasion of Venice. You can listen to the Celtic Invasion Vacations itinerary. To find out how amazing this trip will be. Email me if you have questions.

13:00 - SHOWS PLANNED FOR NOVEMBER

Dec 12: Public YouTube Show Dec 14: Tucker Brewing Company, Tucker GA

Jan 10-12: GaFilk, Atlanta, GA (not a guest) Jan 24: Interstellar Ginger Beer & Exploration Co, Alabaster, AL Jan 25: Maggie McGuinness Pub, Huntsville, AL Mar 20-22: Cleveland ConCoction, Cleveland, OH May 14-17: California Autoharp Gathering, Dunlap, CA Sep 30-Oct 4: ALEP 5, Shakerstown, KY

Dec 4 & 11, Weds 10:30 AM EDT: Coffee with The Celtfather, Facebook, YouTube

14:20 - STATS

Mailing list subscribers = 1077 is up from 1015

YouTube Subscribers = 4324 is up 39 from 4285 YouTube Watch Time = 27.1 is up from 26.3 YouTube Views = 11.6K is up from 9.4K

Facebook Likes = 3646 is up from 3642 FB Page Views = 434 is down from 481 FB Reach = 5684 is down from 5808 FB Video Views = 1883 is down from 3386

Spotify Latest Single Stats: "When She Held Me in Her Arms": 661 is up from 647 Spotify followers: 1400 is up from 1375 # Number of listens on Spotify: 4237 is up from 2053 Most-popular songs on Spotify: Christmas in the Shire (1.4K), The Widow and the Devil (1.3K), Frosty the Irish Snowman (1.2K), Jingle Bells (707), Celtic Christmas Elf (451), Scottish King of Christmas (400)

Top Irish & Celtic Music: 416 is up from 398 Fun Christmas Songs for Kids & Families: 1573 is up from 1433 (already more than 1539 in February) Firefly Drinking Songs: 99 Joyful Celtic Christmas Music: 58 Christmas Drinking Songs: 24

Patreon Subscribers: 158 is the same Patreon Monthly Income: $968 is up from $962

Thanks as always for supporting my music. Remember. You can help me create and release more music. Join the Gunn Runners Club to step behind-the-scenes with bonus podcasts, new music, videos, and live concerts. Slainte!

#CFMonthly

Check out this episode!

[avaliveradio]

Rock Mania Rises Again with New Music hosted by Jacqueline Jax

The best new rock and roll hosted by Jacqueline Jax on AVA Live Radio

Show starts at 9 am et across all channels:

Anchor FM: https://anchor.fm/ava-live-radio Spotify : https://open.spotify.com/show/2toX0f3dPmI8gmUSOKZicx?si=TGb4QHaSRSu-JIcfWZ_WHQ

spotify:show:2toX0f3dPmI8gmUSOKZicx

iHeartRadio station page : https://www.iheart.com/podcast/269-AVA-Live-Radio-Musi-29336730/

Radio Public: https://radiopublic.com/ava-live-radio-music-6913mD

Overcast Fm: https://overcast.fm/itunes1307621014/a-v-a-live-radio-music

Pocket Casts: http://pca.st/0Skw

iTunes: https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/a-v-a-live-radio-music-marketing/id1307621014

Google Play: https://play.google.com/music/listen?u=0#/ps/Ixl4ww7zxmhv2mfymrzj3abikja

Sticher: https://www.stitcher.com/podcast/ava-live-radio

BTalkRadio: www.blogtalkradio.com/avaliveradio

Apple CarPlay: https://www.apple.com/ios/carplay/

Android Auto : https://www.android.com/auto/

Podbean: https://www.podbean.com/podcast-detail/5x3w7-61273/A.V.A-Live-Radio-Music-Podcas

Breaker: https://www.breaker.audio/ava-live-radio-music-marketing

Apple Podcasts: https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/a-v-a-live-radio-music-marketing/id1307621014

Google Podcasts:  https://podcasts.google.com/?feed=aHR0cHM6Ly9hbmNob3IuZm0vcy8xNmUxNWY4L3BvZGNhc3QvcnNz

Artist: Vix 20

New Release: Hashtag Change

Genre: Power pop

Located in: London

‘Hashtag Change’ is a song that’s a tongue in cheek look at President Trump. Unashamed Power Pop that doesn't take it self too seriously. We love all music from Abba to Zeppelin and everything in between.

We have been in the music business for along time we have had releases in Metal, rock and pop. We now only release what we like and have no pressures from labels etc. Video for Hashtag has just been completed, can’t wait to show it to the world!

https://open.spotify.com/artist/01fEKKUsAN1pp9jguVrTQG?si=NFhUnkuCTJW9hmHE83nZXw

LINKS:  https://www.vix20.com https://www.instagram.com/vixtwenty https://www.facebook.com/vixtwentymusic @vixtwenty (twitter)

Artist: Ugly Melon

New Release: 'If you're wrong'

Genre: Rock /Hard Rock

Located in: : Toronto Ontario Canada

Have you ever questioned your faith? The new single ''If you're wrong' by Candian band Ugly melons is a song that challenges your religious beliefs. It's telling 'believers' ...' if you're wrong about all this shit, then this is where you'll end up'. 

The song can also be interpreted in such a way that it will force us to challenge all the things we think we believe in. Be open-minded. Look at things from many different angles, and be accepting of others, and their beliefs. 

'If you're wrong' is saying, you're not always right. And we all need to accept that at some point in our lives.

Our brand is old school - new school Hard Rock Music. Music with yesterday’s melodic writing and vocal style with today’s modern production.

Ugly Melon is influenced by the best British Bands in the World, Black Sabbath Iron Maiden Judas Priest White Snake with today’s bands like Disturbed. If you are looking for a new band to listen to with the elements of great classic rock and today’s modern edge, then look no further, Ugly Melon is your band.

Lu Cachie Guitars, Tony LaSelva Lead Vocals, John Libs on Bass, JT on Guitar and our secret weapon Biagio Diblassi on keys.

"I used to try and create what was considered mainstream and had some great success but never felt it was me. In 2015, I called up Tony LaSelva my very first singer as a teenager. He would be the only singer I’d call cause we are always on the same page with our musical direction. In 2017 we released our first album self titled. In 2018 we released Just a man a real Gem in my ears. What makes this band special is we are all original members. From our first band in our teen years, we know each other like a book. All on the same page and that’s very important.”

New video coming out soon too if your Wrong, Concert coming this fall and We currently working on the third album.

LINKS:  Website: www.uglymelon.com Music Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=42Q2HbxK6CA Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/uglymelon/ Instagram: ugly_melons Twitter: https://twitter.com/Ugly_Melon

Artist: Heavy AmericA

New Release: Motor Honey (Peace)

Genre: Rock

Located in: : Boston, MA, USA

Calling out to an age of classic rock where heavy, fractured guitars and snarling vocals rallied like war-torn battle cries, ‘Motor Honey (Peace)’ speaks to the more primal side of rock, capturing the energy and sounds of bands like Guns ‘n’ Roses, AC/DC and Queens of the Stone Age. Offering glimmers at heartier heavy metal that are swept aside by a more pronounced, melodic edge. "Motor Honey (Peace)" is a bellowing, rumbling, pedal to the metal anthem.

This is track number two in a series of Singles we plan to release over the next year. It's also the first track we have released with an accompanying video.

The Single and the video were released within two hours of each other. It made a huge impact on the song's release and reflected in more traction among the fans. We plan on making this a habit for the rest of the releases in the series.

Right now we are in full-on work mode!

Most of our summer has been spent in the recording studio tracking our Singles Series. We've got four completed and two more to go. Then it's on to developing the videos for each Single. Most of the footage has been collected but there's still a lot of production to do. We'll be back into full-on gig mode in October starting with two benefit concerts in the Boston area. Release number three will soon follow!

LINKS:  * https://www.reverbnation.com/heavyamerica/song/31047682-heavy-america-motor-honey-peace * https://open.spotify.com/track/1Vm2AW3kGdjYu1whRJKzVL?si=eaDi4j3bT7OmrJGmgPMBGg * https://www.twitter.com/heavyamerica * https://www.facebook.com/heavyamerica * http://www.heavyamerica.us

Artist: idly by

New Release: Concerned Realists Vs M&M's ft. Bec Stevens

Genre: Punk Rock, Indie

Located in:  Adelaide, Australia

Lyrically weaving through the difficult terrain of maintaining meaningful human connection and keeping one's self afloat, this sonically bouncy track, much like the rest of the album, takes a journey through some darker places. At a glance, idly by are making some high energy, fun, and catchy punk rock. In a closer inspection, there are stories to be heard in the lyrics of personal struggle and deep dissatisfaction with the status quo.

The band hopes that “throwing a saddle on these dark and personal themes might help people find a commonality in their struggles and broaden the platform from which people can speak openly about their issues”.

This deeply personal album has been a stepping stone. After such intensive introspection, the band is now looking outward and creating music to help inspire the human race to stop being such mindless twats hell-bent on fueling their extinction and causing the collateral damage associated with this selfish, consumptive path we are on.

Right now we are set your phasers to party mode because Idly By are climbing aboard Lil' blue Betsy and rolling into your town with all the swagger they can muster from the inside of a hatchback.

Their dark lyrical overtones are something you’ll have to mull over in your own time because their live show is a vivaciously eruptive spectacle and you’ll need all your faculties for dancing.

They’ve hand selected supports around the country and look forward to being a guest in your scene. Check out @idlyby on FB and insta for their Australian tour dates - announcements coming soon - Album available NOW on all major streaming services and idlyby.bandcamp.com

LINKS:  Reverbnation: https://www.reverbnation.com/idlyby/song/31058288-concerned-realists-vs-mms-ft-bec Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/album/1fJNO5DAjINY6GCyMWqFxL Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/idlybyband Instagram: https://publicinsta.com/user/idlyby

Artist: 6 Speed Supernova

New Release: Groovy Stars

Genre: Rock / Alt-Rock / Classic-Rock

Located in: San Francisco, CA

A testament to the notion that it's never to late. Age is just a number. If you want something bad enough, you'll find a way to make you're dream a reality.

https://open.spotify.com/album/6HReqwEeVNhH3PLZSmxPH6

The music we are creating is... a rock and roll explosion infused with flavors of jazz, punk, blues, metal and a little bit of this and that sprinkled in between. It is said that music in the soul can be heard in the universe. 6 Speed Supernova's galactic compositions will expand your mind, tug on your heart strings and throw you tumbling into the cosmos.

Right now we are... getting ready to go back into the studio to record our album in October. We will be taking a mini Southern CA tour in December and will be opening for Steven Adler of Guns 'N Roses. https://open.spotify.com/track/7hRLjs77RxMl5ipvXTgMYH?si=IiFn_7arRCqI95KtU-nizA

Website & social media links: https://www.6speedsupernova.com https://www.instagram.com/6speedsupernova https://twitter.com/6SpeedSupernova https://www.facebook.com/6speedsupernova

Artist: FireBrand

New Release: Single Eye (Recharged)

Genre: Metal - Industrial Metal

Located in: : Murray, Ky USA

Combining 90s style synthesizer dance grooves with aggressive guitars, drums, and vocals, I sing (and scream) about how our priorities direct the course of our lives and why it's important to focus on the right thing(s).

The song's lyrics contain loose metaphors and Bible references to eyes to convey that our lives will be well when our focus is on the truth and what is pure.

This song is a revamped version of the original song that I released on an album around eight months ago. Back then, the idea seemed to be in its adolescence, like some more work was needed to fully develop its potential. Since stepping up the track's arrangement, and recording and mixing quality, this song has come to be my favorite out of all the songs I've done so far. The influences of Circle of Dust, Klank, and Death Therapy come out in the groovy guitar riffs, harsh vocals, and the sporadic synth melodies.

The music... 

I am revamping the songs I've released at the beginning of 2019 to make updated impressions as to how I sound before working on new material. The "Overcomer- Re: charged" EP will feature rearranged and re-recorded versions of songs found on the original "Overcomer" album, with also some mashups. I loved how "Single Eye (Recharged)" turned out and felt that it did such a great job making an impression that I decided to make it the opening track on the upcoming EP.

The full EP will be released on September 13th of this year! Pre-orders are available on iTunes, Google Play, and Amazon MP3.

LINKS:  My website: https://www.firebrandcybermetal.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/FireBrandIndustrialMetal Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/firebrandmusic Song from Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/track/5vjJCtrdCxsXwrao2IUXrK?si=ZMeD-3QQTB-SX9orB2RPBQ

Artist: Tough On Fridays

New Release: Little Italy

Genre: Rock: Alternative Rock

Located in: Georgetown, TX

Tough On Fridays is a rising alternative rock duo from Georgetown, Texas. Comprised of best friends Katie and Caleigh, the two have turned their shared passion for music into an exciting blend of pop and rock sounds! Inspired by iconic alternative bands like Paramore, Green Day, Basement, and Nirvana, Katie and Caleigh work together to bring a refreshing new sound to the alternative rock genre.

The band’s unique attitude and exciting new sound have garnered serious attention from fans everywhere. As one of 10 songs recorded, the recording of "Little Italy" further defines Tough On Fridays sound as something unique. While many reviewers have tried to categorize the band, the one thing they seem to agree on is that Tough On Fridays, with their edgy, hooky, anthemic songs, may have the ability to bridge the gap between rock and pop in a way that hasn't been done in some time. They refuse to be categorized as a "female-fronted band" as these two can write and play every bit as well as the boys. They have the look, but refuse to let that be the stepping stone that takes them away from the music.

Right now... Tough On Fridays just reached its initial crowdfunding goal to fund the recording of an album in 2020 with the help of a contribution from a local radio station.

LINKS:  https://www.reverbnation.com/toughonfridays/song/30698131-little-italy https://open.spotify.com/track/19ljJUXcw6D91AkxCZNDKf?si=SSJqc9XPRg6QF3hXp0qV5A https://www.twitter.com/toughonfridays https://www.facebook.com/toughonfridays https://www.instagram.com/toughonfridays

Artist: Black Cadillac Kings

New Release: Upside The Wall

Genre: Southern Style Rock

Located in: Klamath Falls, Oregon

This song is fast moving, quick pit stop structured song meaning it has the feeling of rolling down the highway at high speeds. Very catchy/bluesy guitar riffs and ultra southern slide Guitar lead licks mixed with thunderous drums and a stand-up bass that helps it keep a down-home southern rock groove combined with a rockabilly twist. The vocals lend a unique style in the originality of the sound of Shane Thornton (Lead) and Chris Garrett’s (Harmony) voices give them a sound all their own.

The name of this album is called 4 On The Floor. We took a harder, grittier, darker approach to this record both musically and lyrically. It is definitely the hardest rocking record that Black Cadillac Kings has released thus far compared to our 3 previous records 1. Self-titled Black Cadillac Kings 2. 2nd GEAR 3. 3 On The Tree

Right now we are gearing up for a mini-tour across the country starting off in our home town of Klamath Falls, Oregon at the Basin Brew & Que festival. Then we are off to Atlanta, GA to attend the 2019 ISSA AWARDS where Black Cadillac Kings have been nominated to the finals in 3 categories: Entertainer Of The Year, Band Of The Year and Single Of The Year!

LINKS: https://www.reverbnation.com/blackcadillackings/song/30902191-upside-the-wall

https://open.spotify.com/track/2J6lHCf1DhcvTIg1cgwbO6?si=ObXaRB4ZS9KLQCO95Cuq5g

Twitter handle @BlackCaddyKings www.twitter.com/BlackCaddyKings

www.facebook.com/BlackCaddyKings

www.Instagram.com/blackcadillackings

Artist: Black Rose Reception

New Release: Up jumped the devil

Genre: Hard rock

Located in: Indiana

The music we are creating is old and new school music mix. The message in this song is you can overcome the demons of depression, suicide, and stress that we all deal with. There are great and professional people out there who can help. Right now we are going in studio recording more new tracks.

LINKS:  https://open.spotify.com/album/0HEOkTc5fXQyYCr1jwFSeF https://twitter.com/blackroserecept https://www.facebook.com/BlackRoseReceptionMusic https://www.instagram.com/blackrosereceptio https://store.cdbaby.com/Artist/BlackRoseReception

Artist: Radio Drive

New Release: Sweet Thing

Genre: Alternative Pop Rock

Located in: St Paul, MN

The song is a sweet, simple, catchy, pop, love song. I've always loved pop love songs, like the early Beatles and Monkees. My older friends played that all the time when I was a kid. I just released a music video for my song "Sweet Thing".

LINKS:  http://www.radiodrive.net http://www.facebook.com/radiodrive http://www.twitter.com/radiodrivemusic http://www.youtube.com/RadioDriveMusic http://www.instagram.com/radio_drive

Artist: Paul J. Clark

New Release: Afterglow

Genre: Alternative rock

Located in: Nashville, TN, USA

The latest single from songwriter Paul J Clark, this song is about the longing to return home while searching for the fulfillment found in the responsibilities of life. Inspired by the Voyager space probe, the golden record it carries containing a time capsule of information about all of us, and a picture it took of Earth from over 4 billion miles away.

Written in the first person from the perspective of Voyager (a satellite of sorts), it’s an abstract metaphor grounded in very real human experience. This song is heavily influenced by the sounds from the ’90s. There are two conflicting emotions battling for resolution throughout the song. This is reflected in the song instrumentation and structure. It combines driving rock guitars with symphonic instrumentation to effortlessly weave together genres into something both nostalgic and new. Musically, it brings to mind guitar-driven songs from the likes of Collective Soul, Linkin Park, Train, Weezer, and Tom Petty.

LINKS: www.reverbnation.com/pauljclark/song/30867506-afterglow https://open.spotify.com/track/1Em507nTXfm2s2GsR5NZY7 Twitter: @PaulClarkMusic www.facebook.com/pauljclarkmusic www.instagram.com/pauljclarkmusic

Artist: Weather

New Release: Silent Approach

Genre: Indie Pop, Post Punk, Alternative Rock,

Located in: : Tabor (Czechia)

This song was written a month ago and it displays my feeling. It is an abstract form of writing lyrics. But the main theme of this song is the tiredness of our wasted society. There is a huge expectation of all of us that we can not fulfill during our short life. Weather is a one-man band whose music is influenced by the 90s DIY scene of Olympia, by new wave of post-punk and DIY hardcore punk from Czechia.

I made my studio at home and finally, I am completely independent to release my songs how they are coming out of me.

I am currently recording a full-length album probably released just online. If there is some independent record label which is interested in my music and wants to help me spread my music around, I will be very glad... Just contact me.

LINKS:  https://soundcloud.com/amweather/silent-approach https://diederdasmensch.bandcamp.com/track/silent-approach https://www.instagram.com/mnsch._/?hl=cs https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCXAqbWmRkxzC0V_AMIOrr_A?view_as=subscriber

[minnievirizarry]

Lights, camera, Instagram TV: Everything you need to know about IGTV

Video is a content goldmine.

500 million people watch Facebook videos every day.

More than a billion people are active on YouTube

Snapchat users tune into 10 billion clips each day.

As the most popular image-based social platform in the world, it’s no wonder that Instagram wants its piece of the video pie.

From Instagram Stories to Instagram Live, the channel offers a multitude of ways to stream your life to followers. Now, the ‘gram team is kicking things up a notch with the arrival of “Instagram TV,” a long-form video app accessible inside your Instagram profile.

IGTV gives users access to video content up to an hour long, ideal for YouTube inspired binge-watching sessions.

Here’s everything you need to know about the new Instagram phenomenon.

The basics: What is Instagram TV?

IGTV is a new Instagram feature and app for sharing and viewing video.

The format is similar to Instagram Stories, with the significant differences being that it’s possible to upload long-form content of up to an hour and that your videos won’t disappear after 24 hours.

Instagram TV is accessible either from the standard Instagram app, or from the separate IGTV app.  On the original Instagram app, you’ll see it as a TV icon in the top right, and it will be highlighted if there is new content for you.

No matter which app you log into, when you access Instagram TV, video starts playing instantly based on what the IG algorithm knows about your browsing preferences.

Every IGTV account links to a corresponding Instagram account. The relationship between IGTV and Instagram is a lot like Facebook and FB Messenger. You’ve got two separate apps on your phone, but they both work together to make up that a complete package.

Like good ol’ fashioned television, IGTV has channels, which brands use however they like. You could create hour-long episodes of a long-term series, or use Instagram TV as an extension of your standard Instagram profile. Here are a few facts to keep in mind:

Videos are vertical and full screen.

The full 60-minute recording time is only available to verified or large accounts.

IGTV videos play both in the IGTV app and Instagram app.

Swipe up call-to-actions are available in videos.

No ad options are available yet, but Instagram may be working on this.

How to use Instagram TV

Instagram is now the third largest social network.

If you want to connect with a billion visually-driven individuals, then you need to know how to use all of Instagram’s many assets, including IGTV.

To begin, download the IGTV app from Google Play or the App Store. If you’re already logged into your Instagram account, the app will find your profile automatically. From there, click the gear icon in the top right corner and choose “create channel.”

When you’re ready to start posting videos, tap your avatar from the main IGTV page and click on the “+” in the right corner to select a video from your camera roll. You can also post to Instagram TV in the same exact way if you access IGTV from the Instagram app instead. Remember to add hashtags before you publish and link your video to external pages like your website, or other social channels. Then, simply hit “post.”

Ideas for your Instagram TV strategy

So, you know how to set yourself up on Instagram TV.

Now, you just need to figure out how to create a channel that keeps your audience tuned in.

IGTV connects brands with a whole new audience. With long videos, businesses will really start to tap into the value of video – a medium which should account for 78% of all mobile traffic by 2021. Here are a few ideas to inspire your launch your Instagram TV strategy.

1.     Show exclusive content

Want to give your viewers a reason to keep coming back? Give them something new.

Take advantage of the mobile-focused vertical format to establish your company as a thought leader and delight your audience with something exciting.

For instance, Louis Vuitton truly embraced the power of vertical video in their twelve-minute snapshot of the Men’s Spring/Summer fashion show for 2019. From start to finish, this compelling content is a fantastic example of how brands highlight their knowledge and industry expertise on Instagram TV.

View this post on Instagram

The Men’s Spring-Summer 2019 Fashion Show by Louis Vuitton’s new men’s artistic director Virgil Abloh.

A post shared by Louis Vuitton Official (@louisvuitton) on Jun 25, 2018 at 1:35am PDT

Aside from showing off new products and releases, you could also consider interviews with special guests or social influencer take-over posts.

2.     Create a video series

With a little luck, you’ll already have a regular posting schedule for Instagram, a website and a frequently updated blog page. An Instagram TV Series is another way to give depth to your content strategy.

Buzzfeed is an example of a company killing it on IGTV. It’s no big surprise since Buzzfeed has been making vertical videos on Snapchat Discover for years now. However, the company demonstrates how businesses easily add IG video to their online presence.

View this post on Instagram

Maybe the cutest hamster win! 😍

A post shared by BuzzFeed (@buzzfeed) on Jun 28, 2018 at 10:06am PDT

3.     Share the latest news

Do you have the kind of brand that’s always reporting on the latest #trending gossip? Instagram TV is an excellent way for you to get ahead of the curve with industry news engagingly and authentically.

News posts are tricky, as they’ll require you to keep a close eye on your sector and make sure you have your facts straight before you post. However, get your updates right and you could become the go-to-source of must-have insights for your customers.

For example, CBS This Morning was one of the first major network channels to jump into an Instagram TV strategy. The story footage is designed explicitly for vertical viewing and it’s an excellent way for CBS to engage their audience.

View this post on Instagram

Steamboat Geyser, the world's tallest and far more powerful than Old Faithful, is roaring back to life. Often dormant for decades, it has now erupted nine times in the past few months. It can do what Kilauea has done on Hawaii's Big Island, only much bigger.

A post shared by CBS This Morning (@cbsthismorning) on Jun 21, 2018 at 3:13pm PDT

4.     Go behind the scenes

Everyone loves a sneak peek of what goes on behind closed doors.

Instagram Live is a great way to give depth to your behind-the-scenes stories. Rather than just giving your audience a peek, provide them with as much or as little information as you like.

For instance, the Food Network used IGTV to provide a quick video on how Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups are made.

View this post on Instagram

The first step in making Reese's Peanut Butter Cups starts with a 2,500 pound bag of peanuts! Watch and be amazed.

A post shared by Food Network (@foodnetwork) on Jun 25, 2018 at 11:51am PDT

The great thing about behind-the-scenes videos is that they don’t need any extra editing. People want to see the real, authentic you. Be as raw and genuine as you like and you’ll still earn the respect of your followers.

Best practices for your Instagram TV strategy

Now that you know the basics, it’s time to start using IGTV to your advantage.

Here are some of the best ways to make your channel binge-worthy.

1.     Promote your Instagram TV video

Promotion is key to any Instagram strategy.

If you want to connect with your target audience, then you need a promotional strategy long before you hit “record.”

When you upload your video to Instagram TV, remember to promote in various ways, including linking it to an Instagram Story. Click on the link icon at the top of your Stories screen, here:

This will take you to a page which allows you to choose between adding a link to an URL, or an Instagram TV post:

Click on the “+” button next to IGTV video to include a teaser of the content and a direct link in your Instagram Story.

Remember to cross-promote your content across your other social channels too, like Facebook and Twitter, to draw as much attention back to your page as possible. In the “description” section of your video, you’ll be able to add branded hashtags to make your content more searchable.

2.     Make your content exciting

While Instagram TV gives you more opportunities for posting long-form content, you still only have a few seconds to earn your audience’s attention. Make sure that you create videos that will capture their attention instantly.

First, choose a theme for your content. For instance:

Give your audience the full TV experience by taking ideas from popular TV genres like quiz shoes or cooking channels.

Offer a “How-to” tutorial like the kind you’d find on YouTube.

Conduct “unboxings” or introductory videos exploring new products.

Introduce your team or give your audience a tour of the office.

Invite your audience to events or launch parties through IGTV.

Once you have your idea, start each video with a bang. This video from Cheddar begins with a shot of a delicious freakshake to grab your attention.

View this post on Instagram

Black Tap Craft Burgers and Beer is known for their crazy, over-the-top milkshakes. Within 72 hours of their first Instagram post, they had gone viral, with a line that was over 250 people. They went from a mom and pop shop to multiple locations around the globe.

A post shared by Cheddar (@cheddar) on Jun 20, 2018 at 2:39pm PDT

3.     Know your brand

On Instagram, the aesthetic of your posts is crucial.

The best brands know how crucial it is to maintain a cohesive brand identity across all channels. Just because IGTV gives you more freedom to play with video length, doesn’t mean you should lose track of your personality. Consistent branding improves revenue by up to 23%!

When you upload an Instagram TV video, the app will automatically use the first frame as your video as a cover photo. However, it’s possible to change this by editing the cover before you upload. Also, remember to:

Maintain a consistent tone of voice in your content.

Use branded hashtags and links.

Share relevant content that highlights your brand.

4.     Choose the right length

Just because Instagram TV gives you the option to post content up to an hour long – doesn’t mean that you need to use that full 60 minutes. The idea is that you have more flexibility to create immersive content – whether it’s 10 minutes, 50 minutes, or 1 minute long.

Instagram wants IGTV to be more of an alternative to YouTube, than a Netflix replacement. Typically, the shorter and sweeter these videos are, the better.

The key is to keep your mind on your brand and create content that’s no longer than it needs to be. Remember, the “…” button on your IGTV app will show you some essential metrics about your videos – including your retention rate and when people start to lose interest. This might help you to figure out what kind of length your customers like best.

5.     Stick to a schedule

Finally, all great social media marketers know how important it is to maintain a consistent posting schedule when it comes to keeping audiences engaged. As you start to embed your Instagram TV strategy into your social media plan, make sure you have some kind of schedule in place.

With a tool like Sprout Social, you can review your overall Instagram strategy and gather insights on how your audience engages, and when they might want to see long form content.  This will help you schedule your IGTV posts accordingly.

Not only will scheduling help keep your brand growth on track, but it could assist with your Instagram fame too. The IGTV algorithm is likely to work in a similar way to the traditional Instagram algorithm, which relies heavily on post frequency.

Ready for Instagram TV?

As video continues to thrive as one of the most potent content formats, Instagram TV offers an excellent opportunity for brands looking to engage with their customers.

If you want to make the most out of your Instagram plan, IGTV could be the next stage in your strategy.

Have you started using Instagram TV yet? How do you feel about the new app? Let us know in the comments below!

 This post Lights, camera, Instagram TV: Everything you need to know about IGTV originally appeared on Sprout Social.

from SM Tips By Minnie https://sproutsocial.com/insights/instagram-tv/

[netunleashed-blog]

Jordan Smith ready for Porsche European Open title defence | Golf News

http://www.internetunleashed.co.uk/?p=18139 Jordan Smith ready for Porsche European Open title defence | Golf News - http://www.internetunleashed.co.uk/?p=18139 Last Updated: 24/07/18 4:49pm Jordan Smith is looking forward to defending the Porsche European Open title in Germany this week. The 25-year-old Englishman claimed his first, and so far only, European Tour victory when he won at Green Eagle Golf Courses in Hamburg last year, edging out Frenchman Alexander Levy, who had won the tournament in 2016, at the second play-off hole.World No 129 Smith, who is 58th in the Race to Dubai this season with a best finish of joint-third in the China Open, told the European Tour's official website: "I'm really looking forward to it. Obviously it's a whole new experience for me, coming back to a tournament and defending it, so I think it's going to be a lot of fun. Jordan Smith has good memories from last year's victory "The win last year just gave me that boost of confidence. I had been knocking on the door leading up to the event and I knew it was around the corner at some point and it just came at the right time."Obviously the aim is get this trophy back again. I have a lot of good memories here and I like the course, it suits my game, so only good vibes and good memories this week." Highlights from Jordan Smith's maiden European Tour victory at the Porsche European Open. Highlights from Jordan Smith's maiden European Tour victory at the Porsche European Open. Smith, who missed the cut in The Open last week by two shots after rounds of 74 and 73, will play alongside Masters champion Patrick Reed and South African Charl Schwartzel, who won the 2011 Masters, in the first two rounds.Paul Casey will play in the tournament for the first time since 2006 as he seeks valuable Ryder Cup qualifying points, while American duo Pat Perez and Bryson DeChambeau have both travelled to Germany after playing at Carnoustie. Live European Tour Golf July 26, 2018, 10:00am Live on 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[cleancutpage]

RESO Datacomp 30-Day Hackathon Recap

The first hackathon I ever participated in was actually just in 2013 when I built an app called Curb Call at the Retsly / Realogy Hackathon in SF.  I got second place at that one which won me an oversized novelty check (plus a smaller sized real one) but it also was a nice excuse to sit down for about 30 straight hours and build an app that I had an idea for. I ended up actually launching that app, raised some VC for it, signed up some brokerages and sold it all a couple of years later. Needless to say, it was a positive experience and I rarely miss a real estate related hackathon now.

When Retsly co-founder, Josh Lopour told me about a new one that he was helping to organize, I immediately knew that I would be in. RESO, the real estate data standards organization, was partnering with technology providers who offer RESO standard compliant MLS data API’s to offer a total purse of $25k and a full 30 days to build something (more info here). Presentations would need to be made in-person at the RESO conference in San Diego on Oct 17th and there were four categories that could be won: best use of listings data, best use of public records data, crowd favorite and overall winner. The prizes were $5k each except for the overall winner category which was a $10k prize.

As luck would have it, I happen to live in San Diego, so that part would work out nicely. As luck would NOT have it, my wife and I were expecting our first baby and her due date was October 16th, the day before the presentation. I knew that there was a very good possibility that I was not going to be able to present my build but decided that it was worth it to build something anyway, just in case.

Data was available from Bridge Interactive, RPR and Spark by FBS and we were required to use at least one of the listings feeds from one of these providers. The $25 entry fees were donated to Coder Dojo in Los Angeles where they teach young people to code. Win-win for everyone!

The Build(s)

When deciding on a hackathon project, I like to try to do something with technology I’ve never used before but been meaning to try. This time, I wanted to do something with blockchain. I had recently built a mining rig for mining cryptocurrencies (Monero or Ethereum, depending on their current values and difficulty levels) so I have been pretty immersed in the technology surrounding them, namely blockchain. It seemed so buzz-wordy though but it actually is pretty cool. I’m not interested in doing anything with transactions, which is really blockchain’s wheelhouse. I settled on trying to build a different take on an MLS itself but making it run on a private version of the Ethereum blockchain, utilizing the built-in storage decentralized module called Swarm. It was massively technical, geeky and super hard. I spent about two weeks building it which involved learning a lot about the Go language, which is quite popular in that community. I got pretty far and then abruptly abandoned the entire thing…

After re-visiting the scoring criteria, I knew that it was a bit of a stretch to use data from an MLS API (which was a requirement) while building an MLS… I didn’t think there would be a way to make it look flashy or cool either.

Luckily I had another idea. Unfortunately I only had about 10 days left until the presentation date and I also knew that our baby could be coming at any moment now. So I might miss some of those 10 days… My new idea would have to be built in ruby on rails and iOS, which are the things I do best and most frequently. One reason I like hackathons is because I think I can get a lot of work done in a short amount of time. I was off and running, again…

I decided to build a tool for real estate agents to do a remote showing for buyers living overseas. The idea is agents would use an iphone app to stream video during a home tour to buyers who can watch the video from their browser while they are in their home country. In addition to the p2p video stream, I wanted to do something about the language barrier so I planned some realtime language translation (so the agent can effectively talk to the buyer during the remote tour) and of course, integration of MLS data via one of the sponsor api’s to show details about the listing that they’re remotely touring. I called it “Inflection”.

I started working on it at about 4:00 pm and worked deep into the night on that first day. I knew I needed to get as far as I could each day before I inevitably got the call from my wife that she was going into labor. Days went by though and I was able to check all the boxes on my functionality list. I used WebRTC protocol for the video streaming and a complicated menagerie of api’s to make the language translation work. I built the web and API parts in rails 5 (I actually hadn’t used v5 of rails yet!) and built the iOS app in swift, which was a nice departure from rubymotion, which I always lazily default to if I’m in a rush. One cool thing about Rails 5 is that it has a built-in socket / pub-sub sort of thing now called Action Cable. This worked well for connecting the iOS app to the api without having to poll for changes.

I had a very, very un-styled, working platform and about 3 days left. Being a 30-day hackathon, I knew a polished front end would be important. Sadly, front end work tends to take me way longer than back end work. Also, as I began my quest to make it look good for the judges, I found myself adding more features. And still, I had one even larger potential issue… since the baby wasn’t here yet, it was looking more and more likely that he could arrive on the day of the presentations.

Presentation Day

Though early contractions had begun, luck was smiling upon us and my wife was still not in labor, even though our due date was the day before. Our baby was officially late BUT I had a shot to present!

I made my way to the very cool Pendry hotel in downtown San Diego, checked into the event, got my free t-shirt and drew the fourth presentation slot (of 12). When I test ran my demo, of course it didn’t work. There was some crazy issue with the SSL certificate that I installed the day before and that was stopping the video from streaming. I quickly changed a few things in my code, pushed it to the server and hoped for the best.

While the first three demos were going on, I kept checking my phone, hoping not to get “the” call from my wife. “Stay in there for another hour, future son!” As luck would have it, one of the first three presenters showed off a blockchain app. It wasn’t visually stunning but of course, I liked it. Hopefully I had made the right choice though..

When it was my turn to go, I walked towards the stage and spent that time wishing I had a bit more time to have practiced my actual pitch. I tend to present best with a minimal structure though and hoped that that was still the case. We had seven minutes to present at this event – way longer than usual.

I started with a caveat that I might bolt in the middle of my presentation if I get the call from my wife and the crowd’s chuckle chilled me out a little bit. Then I began my demo and noticed that my computer had disconnected itself from the wifi. Good start…

In the end, my demo went okay but I think my very last second SSL fix broke a tiny something in my real-time translation layer and people didn’t get to hear the voices speaking what I was saying, post-translation. That was a serious bummer.

But after I sat back down, I heard some mumblings from people in the audience about it being a good idea, which was validating. And at the end of the day, I was super lucky to have been able to actually get to build this thing in 10 uninterrupted (by a baby) days and make it to the prezo day.

The winners list did not include me or my project. The Blockchian app (doh!) won the “best use of listings data” category, a beautiful mobile app called My Butterfly (which made CMA’s) won the “crowd choice” category, and a cool web app that allowed investors for large commercial buildings to find opportunities won the overall prize and the “best use of public data” category.

Now What?

As I said, I tend to use hackathons to learn about a new technology and also to build an idea I’ve had on the shelf. This was one I thought about with my parents in mind. They’re agents in Miami and deal with overseas investor clients all the time. They could really use something like this and so I plan to finish it up in the coming weeks and put it out there for agents and brokerages to sign up. So though I didn’t win any novelty sized checks, hopefully I can still provide some value for agents and earn some service fees in exchange.

Oh, and that baby finally arrived on Oct 22nd. A beautiful little boy named Bowie

See you at the next hackathon!

The post RESO Datacomp 30-Day Hackathon Recap appeared first on GeekEstate Blog.

RESO Datacomp 30-Day Hackathon Recap published first on http://ift.tt/2hkHhkP

[yourchoicepage]

RESO Datacomp 30-Day Hackathon Recap

The first hackathon I ever participated in was actually just in 2013 when I built an app called Curb Call at the Retsly / Realogy Hackathon in SF.  I got second place at that one which won me an oversized novelty check (plus a smaller sized real one) but it also was a nice excuse to sit down for about 30 straight hours and build an app that I had an idea for. I ended up actually launching that app, raised some VC for it, signed up some brokerages and sold it all a couple of years later. Needless to say, it was a positive experience and I rarely miss a real estate related hackathon now.

When Retsly co-founder, Josh Lopour told me about a new one that he was helping to organize, I immediately knew that I would be in. RESO, the real estate data standards organization, was partnering with technology providers who offer RESO standard compliant MLS data API’s to offer a total purse of $25k and a full 30 days to build something (more info here). Presentations would need to be made in-person at the RESO conference in San Diego on Oct 17th and there were four categories that could be won: best use of listings data, best use of public records data, crowd favorite and overall winner. The prizes were $5k each except for the overall winner category which was a $10k prize.

As luck would have it, I happen to live in San Diego, so that part would work out nicely. As luck would NOT have it, my wife and I were expecting our first baby and her due date was October 16th, the day before the presentation. I knew that there was a very good possibility that I was not going to be able to present my build but decided that it was worth it to build something anyway, just in case.

Data was available from Bridge Interactive, RPR and Spark by FBS and we were required to use at least one of the listings feeds from one of these providers. The $25 entry fees were donated to Coder Dojo in Los Angeles where they teach young people to code. Win-win for everyone!

The Build(s)

When deciding on a hackathon project, I like to try to do something with technology I’ve never used before but been meaning to try. This time, I wanted to do something with blockchain. I had recently built a mining rig for mining cryptocurrencies (Monero or Ethereum, depending on their current values and difficulty levels) so I have been pretty immersed in the technology surrounding them, namely blockchain. It seemed so buzz-wordy though but it actually is pretty cool. I’m not interested in doing anything with transactions, which is really blockchain’s wheelhouse. I settled on trying to build a different take on an MLS itself but making it run on a private version of the Ethereum blockchain, utilizing the built-in storage decentralized module called Swarm. It was massively technical, geeky and super hard. I spent about two weeks building it which involved learning a lot about the Go language, which is quite popular in that community. I got pretty far and then abruptly abandoned the entire thing…

After re-visiting the scoring criteria, I knew that it was a bit of a stretch to use data from an MLS API (which was a requirement) while building an MLS… I didn’t think there would be a way to make it look flashy or cool either.

Luckily I had another idea. Unfortunately I only had about 10 days left until the presentation date and I also knew that our baby could be coming at any moment now. So I might miss some of those 10 days… My new idea would have to be built in ruby on rails and iOS, which are the things I do best and most frequently. One reason I like hackathons is because I think I can get a lot of work done in a short amount of time. I was off and running, again…

I decided to build a tool for real estate agents to do a remote showing for buyers living overseas. The idea is agents would use an iphone app to stream video during a home tour to buyers who can watch the video from their browser while they are in their home country. In addition to the p2p video stream, I wanted to do something about the language barrier so I planned some realtime language translation (so the agent can effectively talk to the buyer during the remote tour) and of course, integration of MLS data via one of the sponsor api’s to show details about the listing that they’re remotely touring. I called it “Inflection”.

I started working on it at about 4:00 pm and worked deep into the night on that first day. I knew I needed to get as far as I could each day before I inevitably got the call from my wife that she was going into labor. Days went by though and I was able to check all the boxes on my functionality list. I used WebRTC protocol for the video streaming and a complicated menagerie of api’s to make the language translation work. I built the web and API parts in rails 5 (I actually hadn’t used v5 of rails yet!) and built the iOS app in swift, which was a nice departure from rubymotion, which I always lazily default to if I’m in a rush. One cool thing about Rails 5 is that it has a built-in socket / pub-sub sort of thing now called Action Cable. This worked well for connecting the iOS app to the api without having to poll for changes.

I had a very, very un-styled, working platform and about 3 days left. Being a 30-day hackathon, I knew a polished front end would be important. Sadly, front end work tends to take me way longer than back end work. Also, as I began my quest to make it look good for the judges, I found myself adding more features. And still, I had one even larger potential issue… since the baby wasn’t here yet, it was looking more and more likely that he could arrive on the day of the presentations.

Presentation Day

Though early contractions had begun, luck was smiling upon us and my wife was still not in labor, even though our due date was the day before. Our baby was officially late BUT I had a shot to present!

I made my way to the very cool Pendry hotel in downtown San Diego, checked into the event, got my free t-shirt and drew the fourth presentation slot (of 12). When I test ran my demo, of course it didn’t work. There was some crazy issue with the SSL certificate that I installed the day before and that was stopping the video from streaming. I quickly changed a few things in my code, pushed it to the server and hoped for the best.

While the first three demos were going on, I kept checking my phone, hoping not to get “the” call from my wife. “Stay in there for another hour, future son!” As luck would have it, one of the first three presenters showed off a blockchain app. It wasn’t visually stunning but of course, I liked it. Hopefully I had made the right choice though..

When it was my turn to go, I walked towards the stage and spent that time wishing I had a bit more time to have practiced my actual pitch. I tend to present best with a minimal structure though and hoped that that was still the case. We had seven minutes to present at this event – way longer than usual.

I started with a caveat that I might bolt in the middle of my presentation if I get the call from my wife and the crowd’s chuckle chilled me out a little bit. Then I began my demo and noticed that my computer had disconnected itself from the wifi. Good start…

In the end, my demo went okay but I think my very last second SSL fix broke a tiny something in my real-time translation layer and people didn’t get to hear the voices speaking what I was saying, post-translation. That was a serious bummer.

But after I sat back down, I heard some mumblings from people in the audience about it being a good idea, which was validating. And at the end of the day, I was super lucky to have been able to actually get to build this thing in 10 uninterrupted (by a baby) days and make it to the prezo day.

The winners list did not include me or my project. The Blockchian app (doh!) won the “best use of listings data” category, a beautiful mobile app called My Butterfly (which made CMA’s) won the “crowd choice” category, and a cool web app that allowed investors for large commercial buildings to find opportunities won the overall prize and the “best use of public data” category.

Now What?

As I said, I tend to use hackathons to learn about a new technology and also to build an idea I’ve had on the shelf. This was one I thought about with my parents in mind. They’re agents in Miami and deal with overseas investor clients all the time. They could really use something like this and so I plan to finish it up in the coming weeks and put it out there for agents and brokerages to sign up. So though I didn’t win any novelty sized checks, hopefully I can still provide some value for agents and earn some service fees in exchange.

Oh, and that baby finally arrived on Oct 22nd. A beautiful little boy named Bowie

See you at the next hackathon!

The post RESO Datacomp 30-Day Hackathon Recap appeared first on GeekEstate Blog.

RESO Datacomp 30-Day Hackathon Recap published first on http://ift.tt/2vfDHOG

[clarencevancleave]

RESO Datacomp 30-Day Hackathon Recap

The first hackathon I ever participated in was actually just in 2013 when I built an app called Curb Call at the Retsly / Realogy Hackathon in SF.  I got second place at that one which won me an oversized novelty check (plus a smaller sized real one) but it also was a nice excuse to sit down for about 30 straight hours and build an app that I had an idea for. I ended up actually launching that app, raised some VC for it, signed up some brokerages and sold it all a couple of years later. Needless to say, it was a positive experience and I rarely miss a real estate related hackathon now.

When Retsly co-founder, Josh Lopour told me about a new one that he was helping to organize, I immediately knew that I would be in. RESO, the real estate data standards organization, was partnering with technology providers who offer RESO standard compliant MLS data API’s to offer a total purse of $25k and a full 30 days to build something (more info here). Presentations would need to be made in-person at the RESO conference in San Diego on Oct 17th and there were four categories that could be won: best use of listings data, best use of public records data, crowd favorite and overall winner. The prizes were $5k each except for the overall winner category which was a $10k prize.

As luck would have it, I happen to live in San Diego, so that part would work out nicely. As luck would NOT have it, my wife and I were expecting our first baby and her due date was October 16th, the day before the presentation. I knew that there was a very good possibility that I was not going to be able to present my build but decided that it was worth it to build something anyway, just in case.

Data was available from Bridge Interactive, RPR and Spark by FBS and we were required to use at least one of the listings feeds from one of these providers. The $25 entry fees were donated to Coder Dojo in Los Angeles where they teach young people to code. Win-win for everyone!

The Build(s)

When deciding on a hackathon project, I like to try to do something with technology I’ve never used before but been meaning to try. This time, I wanted to do something with blockchain. I had recently built a mining rig for mining cryptocurrencies (Monero or Ethereum, depending on their current values and difficulty levels) so I have been pretty immersed in the technology surrounding them, namely blockchain. It seemed so buzz-wordy though but it actually is pretty cool. I’m not interested in doing anything with transactions, which is really blockchain’s wheelhouse. I settled on trying to build a different take on an MLS itself but making it run on a private version of the Ethereum blockchain, utilizing the built-in storage decentralized module called Swarm. It was massively technical, geeky and super hard. I spent about two weeks building it which involved learning a lot about the Go language, which is quite popular in that community. I got pretty far and then abruptly abandoned the entire thing…

After re-visiting the scoring criteria, I knew that it was a bit of a stretch to use data from an MLS API (which was a requirement) while building an MLS… I didn’t think there would be a way to make it look flashy or cool either.

Luckily I had another idea. Unfortunately I only had about 10 days left until the presentation date and I also knew that our baby could be coming at any moment now. So I might miss some of those 10 days… My new idea would have to be built in ruby on rails and iOS, which are the things I do best and most frequently. One reason I like hackathons is because I think I can get a lot of work done in a short amount of time. I was off and running, again…

I decided to build a tool for real estate agents to do a remote showing for buyers living overseas. The idea is agents would use an iphone app to stream video during a home tour to buyers who can watch the video from their browser while they are in their home country. In addition to the p2p video stream, I wanted to do something about the language barrier so I planned some realtime language translation (so the agent can effectively talk to the buyer during the remote tour) and of course, integration of MLS data via one of the sponsor api’s to show details about the listing that they’re remotely touring. I called it “Inflection”.

I started working on it at about 4:00 pm and worked deep into the night on that first day. I knew I needed to get as far as I could each day before I inevitably got the call from my wife that she was going into labor. Days went by though and I was able to check all the boxes on my functionality list. I used WebRTC protocol for the video streaming and a complicated menagerie of api’s to make the language translation work. I built the web and API parts in rails 5 (I actually hadn’t used v5 of rails yet!) and built the iOS app in swift, which was a nice departure from rubymotion, which I always lazily default to if I’m in a rush. One cool thing about Rails 5 is that it has a built-in socket / pub-sub sort of thing now called Action Cable. This worked well for connecting the iOS app to the api without having to poll for changes.

I had a very, very un-styled, working platform and about 3 days left. Being a 30-day hackathon, I knew a polished front end would be important. Sadly, front end work tends to take me way longer than back end work. Also, as I began my quest to make it look good for the judges, I found myself adding more features. And still, I had one even larger potential issue… since the baby wasn’t here yet, it was looking more and more likely that he could arrive on the day of the presentations.

Presentation Day

Though early contractions had begun, luck was smiling upon us and my wife was still not in labor, even though our due date was the day before. Our baby was officially late BUT I had a shot to present!

I made my way to the very cool Pendry hotel in downtown San Diego, checked into the event, got my free t-shirt and drew the fourth presentation slot (of 12). When I test ran my demo, of course it didn’t work. There was some crazy issue with the SSL certificate that I installed the day before and that was stopping the video from streaming. I quickly changed a few things in my code, pushed it to the server and hoped for the best.

While the first three demos were going on, I kept checking my phone, hoping not to get “the” call from my wife. “Stay in there for another hour, future son!” As luck would have it, one of the first three presenters showed off a blockchain app. It wasn’t visually stunning but of course, I liked it. Hopefully I had made the right choice though..

When it was my turn to go, I walked towards the stage and spent that time wishing I had a bit more time to have practiced my actual pitch. I tend to present best with a minimal structure though and hoped that that was still the case. We had seven minutes to present at this event – way longer than usual.

I started with a caveat that I might bolt in the middle of my presentation if I get the call from my wife and the crowd’s chuckle chilled me out a little bit. Then I began my demo and noticed that my computer had disconnected itself from the wifi. Good start…

In the end, my demo went okay but I think my very last second SSL fix broke a tiny something in my real-time translation layer and people didn’t get to hear the voices speaking what I was saying, post-translation. That was a serious bummer.

But after I sat back down, I heard some mumblings from people in the audience about it being a good idea, which was validating. And at the end of the day, I was super lucky to have been able to actually get to build this thing in 10 uninterrupted (by a baby) days and make it to the prezo day.

The winners list did not include me or my project. The Blockchian app (doh!) won the “best use of listings data” category, a beautiful mobile app called My Butterfly (which made CMA’s) won the “crowd choice” category, and a cool web app that allowed investors for large commercial buildings to find opportunities won the overall prize and the “best use of public data” category.

Now What?

As I said, I tend to use hackathons to learn about a new technology and also to build an idea I’ve had on the shelf. This was one I thought about with my parents in mind. They’re agents in Miami and deal with overseas investor clients all the time. They could really use something like this and so I plan to finish it up in the coming weeks and put it out there for agents and brokerages to sign up. So though I didn’t win any novelty sized checks, hopefully I can still provide some value for agents and earn some service fees in exchange.

Oh, and that baby finally arrived on Oct 22nd. A beautiful little boy named Bowie

See you at the next hackathon!

The post RESO Datacomp 30-Day Hackathon Recap appeared first on GeekEstate Blog.

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[garynsmith]

RESO Datacomp 30-Day Hackathon Recap

http://ift.tt/2e59wBq

The first hackathon I ever participated in was actually just in 2013 when I built an app called Curb Call at the Retsly / Realogy Hackathon in SF.  I got second place at that one which won me an oversized novelty check (plus a smaller sized real one) but it also was a nice excuse to sit down for about 30 straight hours and build an app that I had an idea for. I ended up actually launching that app, raised some VC for it, signed up some brokerages and sold it all a couple of years later. Needless to say, it was a positive experience and I rarely miss a real estate related hackathon now.

When Retsly co-founder, Josh Lopour told me about a new one that he was helping to organize, I immediately knew that I would be in. RESO, the real estate data standards organization, was partnering with technology providers who offer RESO standard compliant MLS data API’s to offer a total purse of $25k and a full 30 days to build something (more info here). Presentations would need to be made in-person at the RESO conference in San Diego on Oct 17th and there were four categories that could be won: best use of listings data, best use of public records data, crowd favorite and overall winner. The prizes were $5k each except for the overall winner category which was a $10k prize.

As luck would have it, I happen to live in San Diego, so that part would work out nicely. As luck would NOT have it, my wife and I were expecting our first baby and her due date was October 16th, the day before the presentation. I knew that there was a very good possibility that I was not going to be able to present my build but decided that it was worth it to build something anyway, just in case.

Data was available from Bridge Interactive, RPR and Spark by FBS and we were required to use at least one of the listings feeds from one of these providers. The $25 entry fees were donated to Coder Dojo in Los Angeles where they teach young people to code. Win-win for everyone!

The Build(s)

When deciding on a hackathon project, I like to try to do something with technology I’ve never used before but been meaning to try. This time, I wanted to do something with blockchain. I had recently built a mining rig for mining cryptocurrencies (Monero or Ethereum, depending on their current values and difficulty levels) so I have been pretty immersed in the technology surrounding them, namely blockchain. It seemed so buzz-wordy though but it actually is pretty cool. I’m not interested in doing anything with transactions, which is really blockchain’s wheelhouse. I settled on trying to build a different take on an MLS itself but making it run on a private version of the Ethereum blockchain, utilizing the built-in storage decentralized module called Swarm. It was massively technical, geeky and super hard. I spent about two weeks building it which involved learning a lot about the Go language, which is quite popular in that community. I got pretty far and then abruptly abandoned the entire thing…

After re-visiting the scoring criteria, I knew that it was a bit of a stretch to use data from an MLS API (which was a requirement) while building an MLS… I didn’t think there would be a way to make it look flashy or cool either.

Luckily I had another idea. Unfortunately I only had about 10 days left until the presentation date and I also knew that our baby could be coming at any moment now. So I might miss some of those 10 days… My new idea would have to be built in ruby on rails and iOS, which are the things I do best and most frequently. One reason I like hackathons is because I think I can get a lot of work done in a short amount of time. I was off and running, again…

I decided to build a tool for real estate agents to do a remote showing for buyers living overseas. The idea is agents would use an iphone app to stream video during a home tour to buyers who can watch the video from their browser while they are in their home country. In addition to the p2p video stream, I wanted to do something about the language barrier so I planned some realtime language translation (so the agent can effectively talk to the buyer during the remote tour) and of course, integration of MLS data via one of the sponsor api’s to show details about the listing that they’re remotely touring. I called it “Inflection”.

I started working on it at about 4:00 pm and worked deep into the night on that first day. I knew I needed to get as far as I could each day before I inevitably got the call from my wife that she was going into labor. Days went by though and I was able to check all the boxes on my functionality list. I used WebRTC protocol for the video streaming and a complicated menagerie of api’s to make the language translation work. I built the web and API parts in rails 5 (I actually hadn’t used v5 of rails yet!) and built the iOS app in swift, which was a nice departure from rubymotion, which I always lazily default to if I’m in a rush. One cool thing about Rails 5 is that it has a built-in socket / pub-sub sort of thing now called Action Cable. This worked well for connecting the iOS app to the api without having to poll for changes.

I had a very, very un-styled, working platform and about 3 days left. Being a 30-day hackathon, I knew a polished front end would be important. Sadly, front end work tends to take me way longer than back end work. Also, as I began my quest to make it look good for the judges, I found myself adding more features. And still, I had one even larger potential issue… since the baby wasn’t here yet, it was looking more and more likely that he could arrive on the day of the presentations.

Presentation Day

Though early contractions had begun, luck was smiling upon us and my wife was still not in labor, even though our due date was the day before. Our baby was officially late BUT I had a shot to present!

I made my way to the very cool Pendry hotel in downtown San Diego, checked into the event, got my free t-shirt and drew the fourth presentation slot (of 12). When I test ran my demo, of course it didn’t work. There was some crazy issue with the SSL certificate that I installed the day before and that was stopping the video from streaming. I quickly changed a few things in my code, pushed it to the server and hoped for the best.

While the first three demos were going on, I kept checking my phone, hoping not to get “the” call from my wife. “Stay in there for another hour, future son!” As luck would have it, one of the first three presenters showed off a blockchain app. It wasn’t visually stunning but of course, I liked it. Hopefully I had made the right choice though..

When it was my turn to go, I walked towards the stage and spent that time wishing I had a bit more time to have practiced my actual pitch. I tend to present best with a minimal structure though and hoped that that was still the case. We had seven minutes to present at this event – way longer than usual.

I started with a caveat that I might bolt in the middle of my presentation if I get the call from my wife and the crowd’s chuckle chilled me out a little bit. Then I began my demo and noticed that my computer had disconnected itself from the wifi. Good start…

In the end, my demo went okay but I think my very last second SSL fix broke a tiny something in my real-time translation layer and people didn’t get to hear the voices speaking what I was saying, post-translation. That was a serious bummer.

But after I sat back down, I heard some mumblings from people in the audience about it being a good idea, which was validating. And at the end of the day, I was super lucky to have been able to actually get to build this thing in 10 uninterrupted (by a baby) days and make it to the prezo day.

The winners list did not include me or my project. The Blockchian app (doh!) won the “best use of listings data” category, a beautiful mobile app called My Butterfly (which made CMA’s) won the “crowd choice” category, and a cool web app that allowed investors for large commercial buildings to find opportunities won the overall prize and the “best use of public data” category.

Now What?

As I said, I tend to use hackathons to learn about a new technology and also to build an idea I’ve had on the shelf. This was one I thought about with my parents in mind. They’re agents in Miami and deal with overseas investor clients all the time. They could really use something like this and so I plan to finish it up in the coming weeks and put it out there for agents and brokerages to sign up. So though I didn’t win any novelty sized checks, hopefully I can still provide some value for agents and earn some service fees in exchange.

Oh, and that baby finally arrived on Oct 22nd. A beautiful little boy named Bowie

See you at the next hackathon!

The post RESO Datacomp 30-Day Hackathon Recap appeared first on GeekEstate Blog.

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[fadingfartconnoisseur]

Making Money On The Road: An Inspirational Interview With The Motoroamers

Do you want to travel the world, but aren’t sure how to make money while doing so? In this article we have an inspirational interview from Karen who shares her experience working as an online life coach, and as a travel blogger with her husband. Karen and Myles are currently travelling around Europe in their RV, working online as they go.

They have diversified their earning streams in order to be able to travel in a financially sustainable way. Not only are they earning an income abroad, while being totally location-independent, but they are doing what they love! Read on to learn more.

Hi Karen & Myles! Please Tell Us a Little Bit About Yourselves

We are Karen and Myles, aka, The Motoroamers and after 30 years of corporate stress and self-employed submersion, we decided to take up the reigns of our lives and make some massive changes.

Within a four-year period we had sold our property on Isle of Man, UK, relinquished the hold on our business interests and relocated to Somerset to live the ‘good life’. Finally we could heal from our burnout. Yet despite for me, retraining and committing to a meaningful volunteering role, there was something missing. Even Myles’ valiant efforts to reduce his golfing handicap was not enough to soothe his soul.

It took a six-week tour of New Zealand to show us the missing piece of our jigsaw. TRAVEL!

New Zealand taught us how much exploration needed to be part of our lives and that we needed to feed our adventurous spirits. We wanted to empower our right to freedom from a system that tries to control us.

When we got home, it was no surprise to hear Myles suggest that we buy an RV and go travelling for a year, whilst we sold property on Isle of Man. After battling my fears and ‘what if’s’, we bought our new travelling companion and by March 2016 we had packed up, packed in and headed off into the European sunset.

Two weeks into our ‘gap-year’ we realised this was more than just a year out – this was what we craved in our lives – forever. A life that nurtures my creative soul and feeds our adventurous spirits. Free to expand our minds with culture, language and life outside of the daily grind.

Tell Us About Your Online Jobs

Part of being on the road for us, is not just a holiday, that became clear within our first month. Certainly being tourists has its place, although what was more significant was our transition into digital nomads.

Having run our own businesses, we recognised that we couldn’t simply stop working. We just needed to work in a different way that was more balanced, heart-centred and meaningful. So we started to explore how we could work whilst travelling and earn an income that sustained our lifestyle. After all, we moved from a six figure annual income to significantly less, almost overnight. I must add that we’re ‘not there’ yet – it’s a work in progress as we create a structure that flows with our hearts and not just the purse-strings.

Our work platform centres around our skills, desires and what our potential audience might want from us. Combining this trio enables us to build something that nourishes us and helps others. Given our totally different personalities and skills, it was imperative to tackle this from two angles, exploring our expertise individually and collectively.

First and most foremost, we needed our base-line! The essential income that we needed to feed our account so we could live day-to-day. This is primarily Myles’ domain as he has a really good eye for property and investment. So after selling our house in Isle of Man, we invested in three rental properties; two are still located on the Island and the third in the U.K. being managed by a property agent.

The remainder of our capital Myles has invested into a share portfolio which includes Tax-free ISAs offered by UK government and medium risk FTSE100 businesses, which give us regular dividends.

For me, my expertise lies in coaching and creative writing, both of which have served me well for over 25 years. Finding my niche in our new nomadic lives was easy when I stopped to reflect on the story of stress and burnout that led to our life-change. I had a ‘stress to happiness’ story to share and a huge audience to work with, suffering the same plight.

Over the last year, with Myles’ technical capability, we built a new website that features my love for helping women find their inner happiness. Using my meditation teachings and my own personal insights, I focus my energies on publishing books, which give me bi-annual royalties, creating on-line programmes and coaching, which I do through email, telephone and Skype. I also use Social Media and a Facebook Group, Wake up to Happiness, to create a presence in the virtual marketplace and am currently allowing this to develop organically.

Secondly, having these baseline elements in place, we now have the foundation to build the most exciting aspect of our remote working – how we turn our travels into a credible brand and income stream.

Myles, with his humorous view on the world and my creativity makes us a formidable team and so The Motoroamers and our Seriously Entertaining Travel brand was conceived. We are still building our profile in this new arena and we have a way to go, although with approaching 1.7k followers on our FB page and affiliate marketing partnerships on our website, we are beginning, slowly to build our infrastructure. We focus on writing valuable content, sharing funny, ‘on the road’ insights and taking Drone videos that inspire our audience.

The best bit about the framework we are creating is that our primary income allows us to do what we love without any stress. So different to the life we had before.

Why Did You Decide to Leave Your “Regular” Jobs Behind?

My love for helping people and making a difference drove my corporate work and my personal development and coaching consultancy. Yet as an introvert, whilst I was good at my job, it didn’t nourish my heart. I fought a constant battle with my need for financial security, on the one hand, forcing me to never turn a contract down, and my people-pleasing, perfectionist traits on the other. These two beasts pulled me into burnout with a thriving bank account. This did not bring the happiness and freedom I strived for, and something had to change – that something was me!

So at breaking point, I pulled out of a $80,000 contract and started to put my needs first. It was one of the hardest things I’ve ever done although letting go of my business was vital to my survival. Over three years I pulled back until eventually I released my final client. Now it was time to find a role that nourished my introvert. I retrained in meditation and I started to find a more anonymous route to meeting my need to help others than the very public one I had been used to. This became the central part of my story and my realisation of how I could channel this into my virtual coaching services.

As a partnership Myles and I knew we needed to be active and seized the opportunity to work in a different way that gave more meaning to us and the people we were looking to reach. And what better way than to blend our skills and our travels?

Where in The World Have You Worked?

The beauty of our approach is that we have been able to work in every country we’ve visited, that’s 11 so far in Europe, since March 2016. The rest of the world will wait for another year.

We’ve been fortunate enough to call our office the beach, with sand between our toes, the swimming pool dressed in, not much to be honest, certainly no suits to be seen. We have worked in towns like Annecy, France armed with only a camera and a video or out in the wilds of Crete, Greece as we converse with nature rather than listening to the sound of corporate wheel churning. We are privileged to have gorge walls that frame our work space and the open, blue skies as our ceiling.

Whether we stay for one day or one week depends on our need to rest from our travels and how much internet we can get. We can sometimes work solidly for days and then we play. Although this really doesn’t feel like work, at least not in the traditional paradigm.

And when I say work, let me be clear what that looks like; we film, we walk, we park up and watch the locals go about their lives, we cycle in the name of research and we photograph. And let’s not get too martyr like – this is as much about filling our own memory bank of experiences as it is creating a work output. What a joy; that we can live this life, travel and share our experiences to inspire others to fulfil their own travel dreams.

Our philosophy is, travel when you can, for as long as you can and in whatever way you can – just travel.

I can’t say that it’s creating a luxury level income, although we see the potential as we build partnerships, connections and profile. And we’re having a blast whilst we’re doing it. This really is the meaningful, heart-centred work we’ve dreamt about all our lives.

Can You Tell Us a Bit About Your Certifications & Qualifications?

Certification is a really interesting topic as it has shades of the system that we left behind. Although we have learnt in our 17 months on the road (and I know we’re still babies in this game), that you cannot escape the system completely. There are just some rules that you need to follow and certification, in some fields, is one of them. Tax is another, although let’s not go there.

As a newbie coach, back in 2001, I decided to get my qualification with the UK’s Coaching Academy. I managed to secure a bursary, which gave me free access to the weekend residential course and the follow-up Diploma assessment process. These days their foundation weekend is now free to all, although the Diploma enrolment is now $5,100 +vat. If you are paying for the programme yourself, 5-10 bursaries are available generally awarding $1,275 towards the costs.

To add to this, I found an accredited, on-line Life Coaching Diploma with the Newcastle College of Further Education that was sponsored by author and coach, Fiona Harrold. This course now runs at $765 and has multiple entry levels throughout the year. Achieving my two Diplomas, I received the credibility I need as a fledgling coach to set foot in a potentially massive market.

Interestingly as I sit on the sidelines of some ‘coaching’ FB groups, I feel concerned, with my traditional coaching hat on, about the modern take on coaching. Today’s market is flooded with wanna-be coaches who are influenced by this ‘Get rich quick’, ‘Earn six figures a month’ coaching philosophy that misses the heart of what a coach is and does.

My perspective is that to be a coach is a privilege and a skill, and the modern wave of fix-it-all coaches worries me. Although before I get on my soap box, I would like to emphasise that training in the basic coaching concepts is vital, if this is a route you’re considering. Learning and embedding coaching’s core values are imperative if you are going to harness the power to help shift someone’s life. So find a course that’s run in your own country and arm yourself with the core skills and build from there.

To become an investor really needs no qualification, in Myles’ opinion. Although when asking him the characteristics of a successful investor who can sleep at night, he said you needed three key things amongst a long list of attributes; be conservative – there is no ‘Get rich quick’ scheme in this field; time is your best friend and your worst enemy – so patience is the virtue and finally, invest in low-cost index funds, because if it’s good for U.S investment guru, Warren Buffet, it’s good enough for him. To develop your expertise and, more importantly your confidence, then read:

The Snowball; Warren Buffett and the Business of Life, by Alice Schroeder The Intelligent Investor, by Benjamin Graham The Little Book of Behavioural Investing; How not to be your own worst enemy, by James Montier

For our travel blogging, there are no exams, just passion and art combined. There are courses you can take to learn about travel photography or to be a travel writer, although I think much of this is about a love for expressing what you experience, through words, lens or recording.

I guess if you want to be taken seriously in the industry, then advancing your skills is necessary and we are painfully aware of our gaps with, say Social Media. Although our rewards so far have been due to hard work, content creation and persistence.

Our work strategy is, on the whole not work we have to find. In many ways we are fortunate, as it finds us. My coaching is the only one where it would benefit from a more direct marketing approach. Although, as I said earlier, with the latest FB groups being deluged with wannabe coaches, it’s not the place I want to pick up clients. I want to find authentic sources of work that nourish me and not get caught up in this ‘Jump on a discovery call’ approach which seriously doesn’t work for me.

How Do You Find Clients For Your Coaching Business?

So where will my clients come from? Well, today I follow the exact same pattern as 17 years ago; I write articles for magazines, either as advertorial, which I pay for or editorial that is mostly free. It’s about creating good quality, free content that builds up a virtual relationship with my potential audience.

I also create articles for on-line magazines that raise my profile and I get in touch regularly with the official magazine industry offering my stress to happiness angle to publish to their readers. This is a frustrating aspect of our work because you rarely get the courtesy of a reply, let alone an article published.

So I guess it’s not an exact science. You have to show up with the right message, to the right people and be in the space that they occupy. Keep resilient, hold the faith and persevere.

What About a Working Visa? Do You Need One Where You’re Travelling?

For us as U.K. Residents there are no visa requirements to do our work in Europe. Being resident whilst still travelling full-time abroad means that as long as we pay our due taxes, have significant family ties in U.K. and own property, we are operating legitimately within the system. What will happen post-Brexit is another story. All our content for the moment is free for people to access and all income generated from our website are from advertising sales based in U.K. My coaching clients and book royalties all go through the UK tax system.

The only issue that needs to be considered is whether the role you choose needs professional insurance. My last professional indemnity and personal liability insurance was cancelled because I wasn’t spending 6 months in England. So I have had to change my supplier to Hiscox Insurance who have given me the coverage I need for my coaching business anywhere in the world.

What Does Working as Online As Bloggers and a Coach Entail?

So what does a ‘Day in the life of The Motoroamers’ and a life coach look like? I’m an early riser, so by 9:00 I have already done my Social Media postings, so that my followers have a daily inspiration ready when they wake up. 60% of our followers are based in UK so we’re pretty much always at least an hour ahead.

Then what we do next depends on where we are and how the rest of the week is panning out (and I include weekends in that week as there is little daily differentiation for us). If we have good internet, then we concentrate on uploading video and Drone footage to YouTube, writing and publishing blogs and researching our next destination.

If we have limited or no internet, then we may head off to ‘work’ in a gorge, a local heritage site or cycle and explore the countryside. And weather and light permitting we will take photos and film what we see and experience.

If we’ve saturated exploring an area, then we will do offline work, such as drafting blogs, writing my books and articles for publications. Some days may just involve travelling to our next destination.

How Much Does Are You Able to Earn With Your Online Ventures?

To answer this, I’ll take each of our two digital income streams in turn as they have different income features.

For my coaching work, I charge per session and my philosophy has always been my USP. Clients have the opportunity to pay me what they can either afford, or what value they place on our session together. I set some parameters and then they choose the final payment.

Each session is 60-90 minutes and in return they pay anything from $64-$115. They electronically wire money into my business account either at the end of a session, if we have an ongoing relationship, or upfront if they are new. For my book sales, I get a 12% commission on each eBook sold (www.bookboon.com) which nets me $1275 pa. This figure is steadily growing each year, as more readers get to know my work and as I develop more books in my portfolio.

For The Motoroamers, our affiliate’s income is an average of $77 / month. We’ve only been doing this for three months, so it is still a fledgling aspect of the business. Although getting a consistent income since Christmas gives us hope, and as we develop our profile and readership we know we can only build on this. Our Social Media following is growing all the time and as we now begin to get some commissioned articles that pay up to $320 per piece, this is the side of our work we really want to develop.

How Many Hours a Day Do You Work?

I think some of the biggest challenges we face after 30 years in the corporate world is how we manage our time and the hours we work. When you love what you do, it can be hard to stop when you have no office structures in place. We’ve always been conscientious and we don’t do anything unless with complete effort. That can work against us in a digital and remote context as we MUST self-manage. There’s no definitive on this for us, as sometimes we don’t work more than a couple of hours a day, whilst others we may work 12. It’s in our own hands.

What Are The Pros & Cons Of Working Online?

So how do we sell our life and work-style? Well, this bit is easy; imagine wandering around the world experiencing its magic, breathing in its beauty and then sharing that with others. How cool is that? Then add the bonus of being able to sit by a pool or on a beach with sand between your toes as you write your latest book or blog post.

How about the value you would get from inspiring others to live their dreams and live beyond their fears, surely that has to be high on the Pros list? And we can’t miss freedom off the list. The ability and choice to work when we want, on what we love, for as long as we want, is a joy. And we are so much happier now than we were back in our old lives. And for a vast majority of the time, we are meeting amazing people, living outdoors and getting to see some of the most amazing scenery in the world. That takes some beating.

The cons? Well that’s quite easy too. We’re not earning as much as we were back in the system. We were earning a six figure annual income and whilst that paid the bills, it didn’t give us the freedom or health, more importantly, that we now have. There is no quick win in this game. It’s a bit like Myles’ stocks and shares, we’re in it for the long-haul. It takes dedication, hard work and positivity to keep going and keep building. This can be tricky when you’re remote. So you might need to make some sacrifices, although if you can keep an eye on the end game and remind yourself why you have committed to this lifestyle, then you can make it work.

And that’s another Con to our chosen work-style – it’s just us. We live in a 7.5m RV and after 27 years of marriage, we do quite well. although not having anyone else to bounce off can be difficult for some. We’re both introverts so doing our own thing isn’t out of our comfort zone, although it’s not for everyone. Be careful of this, if you’re an extrovert and need to be around others, as it can be lonely. And sometimes this work is frustrating when you don’t get the feedback you hope from a piece of work that has taken you hours to create.

If you’re someone who struggles with self-discipline, patience or who needs a high degree of security or certainty, then this work-style will be a challenge. There is little structure, except the boundaries we set. So you can become obsessive over your work, or conversely lack the motivation to do what you need.

The Cons might be shaded black or grey, although it’s so important to know what you’re walking into. We’ve run our own business for twenty years, so we had a pretty good idea what to expect when we started this from scratch.

Why Do You Love This Lifestyle?

I love my life. After too many years of feeling stuck, stressed and ill, making some big life-changes was essential to mine and our well-being. I can do what I love, creatively, with freedom and for the ultimate purpose of helping others fulfil their dreams, there is nothing better about that life. I have grown so much in the last 15 months and I will surely continue to do so. Whether it be through my work contribution or by throwing myself into a country’s culture, I am richer for the choices we made. I have no regrets.

To coin a phrase that seems a bit glib, ‘We are living our dreams’. And we are still working our dreams too, putting back something into this fabulous world that we are so privileged to walk around.

Any Final Advice For Someone Wanting to Give Up The 9-5 to Work Online

If there is one piece of advice that we would both give you, it would be to just do it. Don’t try, because as Star War’s Yoda says, “Do or don’t do, there is no try.” Life is short, the world large and beautiful and your life’s purpose too important not to give this a whirl. Don’t let your fears, uncertainty and doubts squash your dreams and aspirations. Live your life beyond fear, follow your heart and trust what happens. If it doesn’t work out, at least you can say you gave it a go. Put your courageous armour on, put your excitement in the reigns and set your wheels in motion.

Karen and Myles are a middle-aged, fun-loving couple who swapped The Matrix, for a life of travel, fuelled by curiosity and adventure. In our chariot, Scoobie, we roam the world looking to capture culture, nature and diversity so that others may experience the joys, through our eyes or their own. As travel commentators we are committed to delivering seriously entertaining travel and help you live the life you deserve. Follow their journey on their websites Love My Happy Heart and Motoroaming. Check them out on social as well at Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and Pinterest.

The post Making Money On The Road: An Inspirational Interview With The Motoroamers appeared first on Goats On The Road.

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Premier League 2018/19: Reasons to be excited for the new season | Football News

http://www.internetunleashed.co.uk/?p=10343 Premier League 2018/19: Reasons to be excited for the new season | Football News - http://www.internetunleashed.co.uk/?p=10343 Last Updated: 17/07/18 10:26pm Unai Emery and Maurizio Sarri are among the newcomers to the Premier League The Premier League returns on August 10 when Manchester United and Leicester City kick off the new season live on Sky Sports. With the familiar array of new signings and new managers there are plenty of reasons to be excited.Here, we take a look at why every club has cause for optimism... ArsenalWith Arsene Wenger gone, the new era begins with a bang - at home to Manchester City and away to Chelsea. It will be a new-look Arsenal this season and there is optimism that Unai Emery's work on the training ground will reap rewards. Fans can't wait to find out. How good is Torreira? We take a look at why the Uruguay midfielder is precisely the type of player that the Gunners have been missing. BournemouthEddie Howe is now the longest-serving manager in the Premier League and it is continuity rather than change that Bournemouth offer right now. But as well as the usual scalps, has the time come for a cup run? Excitement, as well as excellence, will be the target this season.BrightonThe novelty of Premier League football has not worn off just yet and with new signings from Mainz, Deportivo and RB Leipzig already on board, these are exciting times to be a Brighton fan. The club has never finished in the top 12 of English football. Could that soon change?BurnleyFor the first time in 51 years, European football is back at Turf Moor. Sean Dyche took Burnley to seventh spot last season and the reward is the chance to take the Clarets on tour. Burnley are building something special and there will be high hopes of another fine season.CardiffBack in the top flight after four seasons away, Cardiff are the sole Welsh representatives following Swansea's relegation and they will be loud and proud. Neil Warnock will be looking to ruffle a few feathers in the Premier League with his unique brand of football.ChelseaAntonio Conte used up his goodwill in a fraught campaign last time out so Chelsea fans will be re-energised by the arrival of Maurizio Sarri and the promise of much more entertaining football in 2018/19. Key players could be on their way out but a new cycle looks set to start. What will Jorginho bring? With the help of his former coaches, we look at why Jorginho could help to transform Chelsea. Crystal PalaceAfter losing the first seven games of last season without scoring, both Roy Hodgson and the Crystal Palace fans will welcome the opportunity to have parity once more. When Wilfried Zaha is fit and in the form of his life, Selhurst Park always offers the prospect of thrills.EvertonMarco Silva made good starts at Hull and Watford but there will be bigger expectations at Everton. After supporters were left underwhelmed by Sam Allardyce's best efforts, there is a far greater appetite for the style of football that Silva could bring to Goodison Park.FulhamFulham fans were excited already following their return to the Premier League but Jean Michael Seri is a huge coup for the club. What's more, after a 43-year wait to get back to Wembley, they are there again for their first away game of the season against Tottenham. Why did Fulham sign Seri? Find out why Fulham have pulled off a transfer coup in signing Jean Michael Seri. HuddersfieldHuddersfield shocked the Premier League by staying up and beating some big clubs along the way but is there more to come? David Wagner says the club made "a big statement" in breaking the club record to sign Terence Kongolo. They go again come August.LeicesterRiyad Mahrez will take some replacing but Jamie Vardy remains and maybe the time is right for Leicester to refresh the team anyway. With James Maddison perhaps the most promising player in the Championship last term, the Foxes are still not in the mood to quit.LiverpoolAfter going so close to Champions League glory, Liverpool look an even stronger proposition for the forthcoming campaign. Naby Keita and Fabinho bring added strength to midfield, while Xherdan Shaqiri means Jurgen Klopp now has depth in attack too. Is this the year?Manchester CityCan you make the best even better? Pep Guardiola thinks so. With Mahrez on board and Leroy Sane well rested there are enough exciting players at Manchester City to believe this could be the start of a dynasty. This side looks ready for a serious tilt at the Champions League. Riyad Mahrez has become Manchester City's record signing Manchester UnitedPaul Pogba returns as a World Cup winner and with Fred in midfield, is the platform now there to get the best from him at Old Trafford? Alexis Sanchez begins his first full season with the club and with Romelu Lukaku improving too, it's a big year for Jose Mourinho.NewcastleThe summer signings have yet to come to fruition at Newcastle but supporters are well used to that. While there is Rafa Benitez there is hope and if the proposed takeover does finally go through then the chance to build on last season's top-half finish remains.SouthamptonAfter a dramatic escape from the drop, Southampton are ready to put that behind them and embark on a new era under Mark Hughes. The goalkeeper problem has been addressed with the signing of Angus Gunn and with more arrivals promised, improvement is expected.TottenhamSpurs fans are looking forward to a third successive season of Champions League football and aspirations remain that they can challenge domestically too. Kieran Trippier even returns as a national hero. Time for Mauricio Pochettino's young guns to deliver trophies. England heroes Kieran Trippier and Harry Kane are back in action for Spurs WatfordAfter the upheaval of last season, Javi Gracia will be hoping to instil a little calm at Vicarage Road but they have the players to excite as well. Gerard Deulofeu has signed permanently and a fit-again Nathaniel Chalobah will help. Could Will Hughes and Richarlison kick on too?West HamThe familiar sight of West Ham making major moves in the transfer market has not always left supporters enthused but this summer feels a bit different. Record signing Felipe Anderson has real quality and in Manuel Pellegrini, there is a proven winner at the helm too.WolvesSuch is the buzz at Molineux after their Championship title win, there is a waiting list for season tickets. In Ruben Neves and Diogo Jota, they have players of Premier League quality and Rui Patricio has now joined them. Fans are hoping for much more than mere survival. Fantasy Football is back! Fantasy just got real. Pick your Sky Sports Fantasy Football team for free here. 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