This blog I thaw today

It's been 159 days since my last post. That's 5 months and 7 days. Embarrassing.

So what did it take for me to post again? An Irish holiday? Longer days? The spring thaw? March Madness?

I like the thaw idea, especially since I can finally see patches of my lawn again, but there are really two main reasons why I'm writing again today...

MOVE OVER FAN CAM

Reason #1: Today FanChatter officially made money, so now every year when I wear green on St. Patrick's Day it will commemorate cash and not shamrocks. Thank you Minnesota Twins!



Yes, the Twins, my favorite team with the best logo in baseball (above), has partnered with FanChatter to offer our Big Screen Mobile Photo Sharing feature at all 81 of their home games this season at the Metrodome.

REWIND to last fall, when I needed a way to promote FanChatter.com and our new mobile photo sharing feature. I figured one of the best ways to reach sports fans was through the Jumbotron at the games and I bet that photos from your phone would look as good up there on the big screen as they did on our site.

My friend at the University of Minnesota sports office thought it was a cool idea, so he let me try it out at some Gopher football games. Fans sent in their photos, we put them on the big screen -- "powered by FanChatter.com", of course -- and I was right. The photos looked awesome. In an instant, the roving video Fan Cam was old school, and the new school was us. The fans had taken the cameras into their own hands. Me Media had hit the stadium circuit and there was no looking back.











The best part was how creative the photos were. The other best part was how quickly we realized the sponsorship potential of my little marketing idea.

FAST FORWARD back to today, where FanChatter Stadium offers an entire suite of in-arena mobile interactivity features led by Big Screen Photo Sharing. Every fan that sends a photo receives a reply message that can be branded with anything from product messaging to coupons to access codes for special offers and the list goes on. If you're a sports-minded advertiser and you're looking for a way to get into mobile marketing, this is it.

So I was busy even though I wasn't writing. Then tonight something else happened to help me break out of my slump...

THANK YOU MATT DICKMAN



Reason #2: Matt Dickman is the Director of Digital Marketing at Fleishman-Hillard in Cleveland and the blogger behind Techno//Marketer. He's also the guy who spoke tonight at the Future of Advertising gathering in downtown Minneapolis, which I attended.

Matt gave a solid presentation on trends in advertising and he showed me a lot of things I hadn't seen, like Hurricane Kohls. He focused on MicroMedia and told of how Twitter was buzzing about the Minneapolis bridge disaster last summer a full hour before any news sites had published a report. Absolutely amazing.

(Speaking of MicroMedia, I told him about FanChatter in hopes that he'll give me an honest review of the site and advice on where we can improve -- and I welcome the same from all of you out there, too.)

But it was his discussion of blogging that reminded me of who I need to be. How can I hope to build a successful web startup without the support of the blogosphere? And how can the blogosphere respect a guy who lets his blog hibernate all winter?!

He also talked about the strong relationships he's built through blogging and Twittering, and after I got home I helped him prove his point.

Watching by beloved Timberwolves finish off the sorry Clippers, I chattered via SMS in the Twolves group at FanChatter about reaching win number "SWEET 16". A short while later I received a mobile chatter alert on my phone. It was JJDacotah, a Wolves fan from North Dakota who I've never met in person, chattering back:

"sweet! didn't realize they played tonight. Off topic, my wife game birth to our second girl yesterday! Another baby wolf fan!"

I was amazed at how happy that made me feel to learn about this other fan's good news. The kind of news that makes you forget about basketball for a little while (and not mind it at all). I chattered back from my phone congratulating him, one Fan/Dad to another.

So I'm back. There will be lots more to tell about the Twins and Big Screen Photo Sharing with the Season Opener just two weeks away (exactly). And I look forward to reading Matt's blog as I commit myself to writing more in mine.

Thank you for reading. I promise the writing will improve as soon as I'm fully thawed.

Nothing Lasts Forever

A week ago my favorite player was traded away from my favorite team.

The next day a bridge I had crossed many times fell into the Mississippi River, killing at least five people including a guy I had played baseball against named Patrick Holmes.



I'm lucky I wasn't on that bridge. I'm lucky I get to feel sad about KG leaving for Boston and I'm lucky (if not crazy) to feel hopeful about the future of my Timberpups.

Two years ago, when I was still doing my sports fan TV show THE SHOW TO BE NAMED LATER..., we had an idea to have an 11-year-old Wolves fan interview Wally Szczerbiak after the final game of the season. Rumors were rampant that Wally would be traded that off-season, so we figured this might be her last chance to interview her all time favorite player.

So we got permission from the team, (show host) Jonny Voss came along to help out, I operated the camera, and here's what happened...



We learned later that KG left without talking to the media that night, but he went out of his way to talk to us.

As Jonny expressed in our lead out to commercial, we really did believe that the Big Ticket would be a Timberwolf for the rest of his career, just like those people on that bridge believed they would make it home safely last Wednesday.

Nothing lasts forever. Not home run records (Bonds hit #756 tonight). Not TV shows (no matter how much your local superstar athlete loves the one you created). And certainly not KG in Minnesota.

But we'll always have our memories (and thanks to DeROK, we have this heartfelt video tribute)...



And there's always hope. I snuck into the Wolves press conference today where they introduced the five players they received in the KG trade.


I chattered about everything I saw in the Go Wolves group at FanChatter.com, and my fellow Wolves fans followed along, responding to my chatter and challenging me to speak up and ask a question. I didn't.

But the back and forth on the site was great, and the new guys looked good (except for Gerald Green who looked tired/bored/sedated), and mobile sports fan chat once again proved to be pretty cool.

Even with no guarantees, life is good, isn't it?

Rock and Rollover

Wanna know what happens when you don't post for a while? Sooner or later, all hell breaks loose.

Today the dam gave way when it was announced that Kevin Garnett would be traded to the Celtics. Then the water rose higher when the Luis Castillo trade to the Mets was made official, all of which led me to chatter my afternoon away.

But more on that later. Let's go forward by going back, starting with July 19th (my birthday)...

On the day I turned 34, with my mom and dad and wife and daughter Audrey all there to see it (the first and only time that group has ever been assembled), I knocked in my baseball team's winning run (I play on a town ball team in the Park National League called the Minneapolis Lakers) with my first ever walk off hit. It was certainly a birthday to remember, especially since I was able to chatter about it from the parking lot while the crack of the bat was still ringing in my ears.

A couple days later, on our way back from a weekend away in Galena, Illinois, I stopped at the Field of Dreams in Dyersville, Iowa.

All around me were fans that had brought their own bats and balls and gloves to please the gods of baseball with games of catch and rounds of batting practice.



As I walked with my dog Lula Mae out from the corn and into left center field, all I could ask was "Is this heaven?", because it sure did feel like it.

Then I held Audrey as we ran the bases. Reaching third, we waited for the batter to step aside before we headed for home. It was Audrey who scored as I set her bare feet on the plate. What a wonderful place it is, that field where dreams come true.

My Mother in Law Daphne and I discussed FanChatter in the car later that day, driving through Iowa, and her questions helped lead me to another important revelation about the site...

"Mobile Sports Fan Chat" isn't just about posting from your mobile phone via SMS, because someday all phones will have browsers and all chat sites will be accessible by phone.

When we say "Mobile", we also mean "Updates". No other sports fan chat site notifies you by SMS or email when your friend has posted an entry. That means no other sports fan chat site can compare to FanChatter when it comes to breaking news or even just breaking commentary.

Thanks to my Mother in Law, I figured that out somewhere in southeastern Iowa.

Intermission:



Those were the days, weren't they?

So about those updates. Today I received a email from FanChatter (I've opted to use my Gmail account as my mobile "updater" for now because I can access it from my Blackberry and I prefer to chatter with a full QWERTY keyboard) that read...

(JJDacotah) KG to Celts? For a package of Ratliff, Jefferson, Telfair, Green and a pick? It better be for the one the Wolves gave Boston!

What was this? The Celtics deal was back on the table? Even though it hit me out of the blue, it made sense because Boston had picked up Ray Allen on draft day, meaning now KG could consider teaming with both Allen and Paul Pierce on a squad that would most certainly contend in the NBA's Eastern Conference.

The thing is, I found out about it because JJDacotah chattered and I received the update. Thanks JJ, whoever you are.




So history was made twice today, once by a couple of old teammates (McHale and Ainge, above) and once by a crazed Timberwolves superfan learning about the imminent trade of his favorite player... not on TV, not from a guy on the street, not even from a visit to ESPN.com... but from a new sports fan chat site offering mobile updates.

(Oh, and all the Twins got for Castillo were two minor league scrubs who can't hit their weight.)

Now that's a day to remember AND forget.

So why did I call this post "Rock and Rollover"? Well, I intended to mention that Audrey, who turned 4 months old today, completed her first full rollover this morning (followed immediately by her second, and third, and almost fourth before I stopped her from rolling off the bed). Then I was going to liken that (somehow) to FanChatter's 1-month anniversary (July 28, 2007) and how it was time for us to take it to the next level, just like my daughter. Time to rock, if you will, like Kiss on their Rock and Rollover album.

But this post was getting too long, and I'm only making it longer, so props to Audrey for learning to roll, and congrats to us for one month of chatter beginning with the NBA Draft and ending with my all time favorite baller being shipped to Boston.



Who said sports are boring in the summer?

Ready for takeoff...

First post. Big weekend.

Quick history: I used to have a sports TV show in the Twin Cities called THE SHOW TO BE NAMED LATER... and it was all about sports fans doing sports fan stuff. None of us were journalists or pros or anything and our viewers liked that. Sadly, not enough sponsors shared their opinion.

TV is a tough business (and, I might add, a declining one), so when my show went off the air I decided to turn my entrepreneurial sports fan ambitions to the Web -- the only thing more democratic than cable access.

That's how I came up with the idea that opened the door that led to the revised idea that was probably way too ambitious that showed me the reality that inspired the supporting idea that attracted the interest that resulted in the defining idea for FanChatter.

Web development is fun, isn’t it? And if you haven’t read Getting Real, you should.

So thanks my alliance with the Ruby on Rails virtuosos over at Slantwise Design (plus more thank you’s to more people than I can possibly mention now… although I promise I’ll get to each of you in time), last Thursday, June 28, 2007 at about 3:30 pm CDT…

FanChatter.com launched.

We’re billing it as the first fully mobile sports fan chat network. Tired of reading in blogs like Mashable! about all the MySpace-for-sports’s circling, I decided to aim beyond mere Web 2.0 toward the undisputed next big thing (that all of us have in our pockets).

FanChatter aims to “mobilize” the long and powerful legacy of sports fan chat rooms and message boards online. That’s why we allow fans to create their own groups by topic (just like your father’s sports chat site). But there’s a whole lot more than that on the way once we get the launch site working properly.

Yes, we stumbled slightly out of the gate. People couldn’t sign up because they didn’t receive the necessary confirmation link email. I struggled with posting from my Blackberry browser. And I’m not sure how well our mobile tools are working just yet.

But we’re up, we’re (mostly) functional, and we made our deadline.

The goal was to launch by the NBA Draft (June 28, 2007) and it just so happened that I would be in New York City (for work – I’m in advertising) on that date. My good friends at the Timberwolves (my favorite team for whom I did some of my favorite work) set me up with tickets, and there I was last Thursday night at Madison Square Garden watching David Stern read off the names and hearing the Knicks fans chant “Fire Isiah” (until they cheered him for getting Zach Randolph and dumping Steve Francis in a trade with Portland).

And all the while I was Chattering live and sharing the site with every fan I met. Only about two-thirds of my entries ended up getting through, however, but I met some great fans including a Florida cheerleader named Brittany who provided glowing background on both of the Wolves’ picks: back-to-back championship teammates Corey Brewer and Chris Richard (7th and 41st overall, respectively).

It wasn’t until the next morning, boarding the Sun Country flight back to Minnesota, that the true value of mobile sports fan chat became clear. Sitting in first class (it was the only seat left when I purchased my ticket and it wasn’t that expensive), I boarded first and found my (p)leather aisle seat near the front. The flight attendant offered me a St. Paul Pioneer Press newspaper. I found the sports page and saw Corey Brewer’s face. I looked up and saw… Corey Brewer’s face!

The Wolves’ first round pick was on my flight. I shook his hand, welcomed him to the team and told him I was happy he was ours.

Then, to my surprise, he walked right past me and took a seat back in coach! Brewer is 6’ 8”! He’s the reigning Final Four Most Outstanding Player! I never took (Wolves owner) Glen Taylor for such a cheapskate!

(To be fair, the flight was full, and the ticket was obviously booked within the previous 12 hours so there probably wasn’t much to choose from. Plus, he couldn’t fly Northwest because they were canceling flights left and right and he was due in Minneapolis for his press conference.)

I grabbed my Blackberry and fired off some Chatter explaining what I had just seen. I wondered whether I, standing at a lean 5’ 6”, should consider trading seats with the much taller draft pick. Then the doors closed and my device was shut off.

Well, I did trade seats with Brewer (in exchange for an autograph on my sports page and the photo below).


I also handed him a FanChatter card and wished him well with the team. Hopefully he checks out the site sometime. He really is a great kid. Very humble. Rumor has it he called me a “cool dude”.

As soon as we landed I chattered some more about my good deed, again from my Blackberry. I envisioned my friends reading about this unusual happening as it was happening.

Unfortunately, the site and my handheld weren’t on the same page. Nothing showed up. The great mobile sports fan chat happening would not be recorded on the new mobile sports fan chat network… at least, not on that day.

We ended up back-dating some posts that closely resembled what I wrote from the plane. I also posted the photo to Flickr and linked to it on my Chatter page. You can see it all here and here.

I’m hoping to use the story to get some publicity for the site -- a good deed with a coincidental/ironic twist.

I’m also taking our shaky start in stride. Again, Web development is fun, isn’t it?

This blog will chronicle the growth of FanChatter.com. I’ll provide the non-technical storytelling while I hope the Slantwise guys will offer their perspective on the stuff I don’t understand.

You know, I’m not sure what I want more – a hit site or an NBA title for Brewer and the Timberwolves.

In the immortal words of Yogi Berra, “Good pitching always beats good hitting... and vice versa.”