With Stephen on vacation this week, Myke is joined by Shawn Blanc. They discuss WWDC and how 2013 could pan out for Apple.
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Here are some of my key takeaways from this quarter, from the eyes of a consumer with no real insight:
It wasn’t a hit all-round this quarter, but I don’t believe Apple are doomed. Of course they’re not. I shall look forward to the next quarter — the same as I always do — with my eyes on the most exciting company in tech.
This is a guest post by Myke Hurley, as Stephen and his family are on a much-needed break.
Only Apple earnings days could cause such disgusting link-bait articles. The NME ( New Musical Express) has just posted this story, detailing how Apple may post a loss in profits today.
I mean, seriously? I know that iTunes sells music, but does this really fit the beat of a music magazine’s news website?
Buckle up everyone, it’s going that be that sort of day.
This is a guest post by Myke Hurley, as Stephen and his family are on a much-needed break.
As those who visit the site can see, it now reads “This is Pat Dryburgh.” This is who I am; this is what I love, what I hate, what inspires me, what challenges me, the questions I am asking myself and the answers I’m discovering. I could go and scour the internet again to fill another “Top 10 Best Websites with a Green Background and Sans Serif Type” post, but that’s not me.
This is an older post from the wonderful Mr Dryburgh, it sums up exactly what I was getting at yesterday. He let himself explore more creative avenues once he was able to free himself from constantly checking his numbers.
This is a guest post by Myke Hurley, as Stephen and his family are on a much-needed break.
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I’m not a writer. So please forgive the multitude of grammatical errors that may follow. I am a podcaster, so I speak on the internet. Frame this article in the mind of someone who is writing from a stream of consciousness, rather than a meticulous outline.
When Stephen asked me to help him out this week – whilst he is taking a much-needed break – I started to think about what I could share with his handsome readers. So, I decided that I would talk about the most important thing I have learned over the last three years of being a podcaster:
Audience Quality > Audience Quantity.
This simple statement is quite often overlooked by people trying to be a success on the internet and is quite often thought about in the reverse. But I have had much greater success in my endeavours since I considered things this way.
A lot of this thinking stemmed from my annual listen of Merlin Mann and John Gruber’s 2009 SXSW talk (something you need to hear if you haven’t before). In this talk they discuss a lot about their ‘ideal readers’, who are the people they dream about reading their work and therefore ensure is good enough that they would enjoy it. Along with this, there is a lot of discussion around why they do the things they do and how important it is that they really care about what they do.
As with most online endeavours, podcasting is seen to be all about the numbers and statistics. To be a success I need to get sponsors. Sponsorship allows me to justify the amount of hours I put in to my shows, as it covers my costs and ensures I can continue to do this long into the future. I perceived that large download numbers were the only way I could secure these sponsors and I was transfixed on this for a long time.
At one point, 70Decibels had 12 active shows. At the time, I was checking performance for each one – logging into separate hosting accounts – multiple times per day. I was consumed by the numbers. I obsessed daily, weekly and monthly—desperately trying to find some sort of formula or correlation to achieving success.
Even after we were able to get long-term sponsors on board, I was still meticulously checking these numbers—it became a habit. I wanted to ensure that I was doing the right thing and I felt like I could only find vindication and answers in the graphs.
But then something changed. After listening to that SXSW talk earlier this year I started to consider things differently.
I re-launched one of our shows – CMD+Space – in August and it has been a great success. The numbers for this show are not astronomical but they are consistent and good. But this isn’t what’s important to me anymore. As this show (and our network) continued to grow it became easier for me to book guests with many people being aware of the shows and the network itself.
This is what changed things for me. People that I have been a fan of for years – people I look up to and admire – were now listening to the shows I create. This allowed me to think differently about what I was trying to do. Instead of blindly following trends and download statistics, I started to think deeply about what my goals were and how I could influence matters to those ends. I spent a lot more time researching and considering discussions, a lot less on ‘hot topics’ and more on things that I found exciting or interesting. I tried to engage people in more thoughtful conversation, all the time honing my craft.
And the funny thing about all this, is that download numbers are higher now than they’ve ever been. But now I only check them all once a month.
What I have tried to build and continue to develop is a core audience of people that really care. I want our listeners to really enjoy what we do, to miss a show if it’s late and to be fully engaged. I love to receive feedback and I get more now that I ever have. I honestly believe that this is because of my renewed focus.
I have spoken with a handful of people that operate in the podcasting world about this and they all seem to agree with me — even though they all came to this conclusion long before me — it is important to create work you are proud of and if you are consistent and you keep working hard at it, you’ll get the outcome it deserves.
And guess what? For sponsorship, an engaged and targeted audience is much more effective than a large one. Who knew?!
Audience Quality > Audience Quantity
I feel like this notion can be applied to so many mediums; I don’t believe that this will just work with podcasting. I’m sure that if you write on lovely sites like this one and you follow this simple idea, you’d achieve similar results. Of course there is a limited amount of space on the internet for success, but those that get there will be the ones that produce good quality work, on a regular basis.
Quality over quantity. I hope this piece has lived up to that.
This is a guest post by Myke Hurley, as Stephen and his family are on a much-needed break.
The guys over at App.net were cool enough to give me a pile of App.net invites. If you haven’t played with the service yet, go check it out.
This episode of Generational is required listening.
Hearing about how Federico Viticci battled cancer whilst managing to run and build Macstories is incredibly inspiring.
There’s a lot to take out of this episode. It really made me contemplate how I operate what I do online; hearing how he refocused himself is very interesting indeed.
Federico also details how he is now working primarily with iOS and how being stuck in a hospital bed helped him discover the power of the platform and make that change.
Gabe is doing great work with Generational. If you’re not currently listening, this is a great place to start.
This is a guest post by Myke Hurley, as Stephen and his family are on a much-needed break.
As I wrote about in March, my family and I are headed to Florida for a week at Disney and Give Kids the World, thanks to Make a Wish.
While I’m gone, Shawn Blanc and Myke Hurley will be filling in for me on the site.
I owe a big thanks to those two guys for keeping the lights on, and to all of you wonderful readers for supporting me over the years, but for now, I’m turning my phone off and am going to spend a week in the sun with my wife and kids.
Macworld’s Joel Mathis, on Osito, a Google Now clone for iOS:
If your schedule or routine is fairly clutter-free, or if you stick close to home in most of your daily doings, Osito won’t offer you much you can’t already gain from a quick look at the iPhone’s native Calendar and Weather apps. And certainly, its list of features isn’t quite as lengthy as what’s offered by Google Now. For many iPhone users, though, Osito might prove the best defense—for now—against the temptation to go buy a Galaxy phone.
Is Google Now why people switch to Android Galaxy? Can this app save Apple’s skin?
I spent most of the morning fighting back tears as our son was awarded a Make-a-Wish trip to Disney World.
Israel Ganot:
As a Boston-based company, our hearts go out to all those impacted by the explosions at the finish line of the Boston Marathon. For some of us, it has hit very close to home. And we’ve been thinking hard about how Gazelle can help.
For the remainder of April, we will be collecting donations in support of the One Fund Boston, the victims’ relief fund established by Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick and Boston Mayor Thomas Menino.
100% of the proceeds will be donated to the One Fund Boston. That means not just 100% of the cash value you would have received for your donated item, but also 100% of Gazelle’s profit from those devices.
Super classy. If you’ve never used this service, now’s the time.