The Association Innovation Blog by Jeff De Cagna

Google Talk is up!

There has been much speculation for the last few days about the arrival of Google Talk.  Well, it's now up, and Skype has a new competitor!  More soon...

UPDATE:  Upon closer inspection, I now see that Google Talk actually is not VoIP, but audio chat.  It does not offer anything comparable to Skype Out (the ability to call landlines from your Skype account) or Skype In (the ability for people on landlines to call you on Skype using a telephone number).  So, I jumped the gun a little bit.  Sorry!

Google Logo Maker

Wanted to make you aware of a useful site that will generate text in a Google-style font, as you see below.

I've added it to the Just for Fun list on the right side of the blog.  As it says above, try to have fun!

Why do I love Google?

I love Google because they know how to be serious and playful, smart and fun at the same time.  Read on to see what I mean...it's a very cool thing actually!

Google Hungry For Executive Chefs

MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif. - August 4, 2005 - Google Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOG) today announced a worldwide search for two executive chefs with the experience to creatively manage the preparation of thousands of quality breakfast, lunch, and dinner meals each day at the company's Mountain View, Calif. headquarters. The executive chefs will oversee the development and continual refinement of an eclectic menu capable of suiting every Googler palate, from vegan entrées to pad thai, grilled
burgers, and wood-fired pizza-all while using organic ingredients whenever possible.

An update on my adventures in podcasting

Just a few updates on my current podcasting activities in which you might be interested:

+I am now serving as a volunteer contributor to Corante's blog on podcasting.  Corante has various blogs covering technology, science and business, and I am very excited to have the opportunity to share my non-techie perspective on podcasting.  I have made a couple of posts in the last week and I will be posting more often going forward.  Please check it out to learn more about both podcasting practice and business.

+I am writing an article on podcasting for FORUM, the magazine of Association Forum of Chicagoland, that will appear in the publication's July issue.  I will explain what podcasting is, how simple and inexpensive it is to do and why it is a fantastic new tool for associations to use.

+Tomorrow, I am flying to California to attend the Google shareholders meeting, which is on Thursday.  I'm very excited about this opportunity to learn more about a company I've been studying for awhile now, and I will be doing an Associations Unorthodox podcast this weekend to share some of my impressions.  I hope you'll check it out!

BTW, if you're a subscriber to The Association Innovation Blog, I hope you will consider subscribing to updates for the podcast.  You will only receive an e-mail on the podcast once a week, since my show is weekly, typically on Saturday or Sunday.  You can subscribe right on the Associations Unorthodox website!

My adventures in podcasting are great fun for me and I hope you enjoy them as well!  Please share your feedback!

March 15 Google session

This past Tuesday, I presented a free session on Google and innovation for the association community.  The session was hosted by the Special Libraries Association and I want to thank Janice Lachance, SLA's executive director, my friend and colleague John Crosby, and all of the staff at SLA for their great help and support!

I've led many sessions over the course of my career and I've grown accustomed to having my photograph taken from the back of the room.  But I've always wanted to take a picture of an audience from my vantage point, so we can see the learning experience from a new perspective.  It just so happens that we had a great group of association professionals and learners assembled for this session who were more than willing to participate in this small experiment.  Thanks to all of you for your participation and engagement, not only in this photo but in the session as a whole.

I'm looking forward to writing and talking about Google and innovation going forward, as well as to delivering more free learning sessions for our association community.  If your association would like to organize this kind of "thought leader" session for its staff or the community at large, please send me an e-mail.  I'd be happy to chat with you about it.   

FREE Learning Opportunity: March 15 session on Google

I'm pleased to announce that on the morning of March 15, 2005, I'll be facilitating a free session for association leaders on Google and innovation that will take place at the headquarters of the Special Libraries Association in Alexandria, Virginia.  If you're going to be in the DC area that day, I hope you'll consider attending.  You do need to register online, and when you visit that page you'll find more information on the session, as well as a link to detailed directions to SLA.

If you have any questions, send me an e-mail.  I look forward to seeing you there!

New TAIB poll

Please take note that I have posted a new poll today on the right side of the blog.  The poll asks, "Which company do you most associate with innovation?" and offers five choices:

• Apple
• Dell
• Google
• Southwest
• 3M

If you have other companies/organizations you would like to have considered for future polls, just post a comment with the name of that company and your arguments on its behalf!  And please vote!

Google's at it again...

Google announced today its test of Google Video, a new service that allows users to search TV content online.  At the moment, the company has signed up only a few content providers including PBS, the NBA, Fox News and C-SPAN.  As Google's press release explains:

The Google Video beta enables users to search across the closed captioning content of a growing number of TV programs that Google began indexing in December, 2004. Entering a query such as iPod will return a list of relevant television programs with still images and text excerpts from the exact point in the program where the search phrase was spoken.

Since this is only a beta, you won't be able to view actual video excerpts online, although Google says it is working with content providers to provide this additional benefit going forward. 

Google Video is just the latest in a series of recent initiatives from Google, including Picasa (organizing and sharing photos), Keyhole (accessing satellite images) Google Print (making library books from leading universities searchable online), Google Scholar (searching academic journals and papers) and Google Desktop Search.  These applications are simply the first few elements of an emerging Google "search ecology" grounded in the company's mission "to organize the world's information and make it universally accessible and useful."  In addition, while Picasa and Keyhole were Google acquisitions, the other tools are products of the company's on-going innovation effort which is so integral to their continued success..

FYI:  Yahoo has also launched its own video search tool as well...

And one more thing...I have posted a new poll about Google on the right hand side of the blog.  Please vote!

T5/05: Innovation (#1 and #100)

Happy New Year from The Association Innovation Blog! I want to wish everyone who reads this blog, everyone in the association community and everyone, everywhere for that matter a very happy 2005.  I hope those of us who really care about the future of associations and who share a concern about the way things are going can find a way to work together to make 2005 a remarkable year for this extraordinarily important community of ours!  I look forward to using TAIB as a vehicle for advancing those efforts.

Before I get to the actual post, let me just add a quick plug for my 100th post to TAIB.  Tomorrow, I will have been blogging for exactly 16 months (my first post was September 2, 2003) and I am going to keep on blogging in 2005.  In fact, I hope I will spend more time writing (and recording...sorry text lovers!) this blog, because it is something that I genuinely enjoy.  Thank you all for reading and listening.  I greatly appreciate your continued support. 

I don't think anyone will be shocked by my choice of innovation as the top issue for the association community in 2005.  Perhaps the first four issues--the (impending) death of best practices, competition, new science and technology and intangibles--were actually clues designed to guide you toward this final choice.  (Hmm...am I that clever? ;>)  And I suppose it might seem like a bit of self-serving choice, since innovation is "my thing."  I might even willingly plead guilty to that charge.  But I know deep inside that this is the work we must do and that we're meant to do.  I know that in the 21st Century, associations are destined to transform the landscape of society for the better, and our only hope for seizing the initiative and setting that agenda is devoting ourselves to the whats, whys and hows of innovation today.

2004 Google Zeitgeist Timeline

I suggest you check out the following awesome 2004 retrospective "zeitgeist timeline" created by Google.  It is interactive and very cool!  You'll enjoy it...