Stardust Global Ventures

Sheryl wrote Of Weddings, Honeymoons and Authenticity, and described some of our life activity to perfection. Since moving to Walla Walla, real life and the priorities that come for us as a couple together have been a central part of our life. Her post made me think about something I’ve been considering for a while now too.

For friends and colleagues who’ve known me a while, you remember I oversaw the Realtime Unified Communications Community for four years. I’ve worked in the communications and networking industry for 30+ years, written several books and countless white papers and documents. I also produced hundreds of interviews, podcasts, videos and product evaluations. Some of you may wonder why you aren’t seeing that today. I thought I’d take a moment to explain.

First, my work with Realtime was a paid position that ended in December of 2008. It was a collaborative experiment with one of my publishers to explore how the Web 2.0 approach and social networking could be used by the publishing business. Realtime is quite successful and we have an ongoing great relationship. The business simply moved in another direction.

I’ve worked as both an employee and an independent contractor since 1980, balancing the challenges of both. Longtime friends know that I’ve focused on technical education, information security, and other networking concepts far beyond telecommunications, VoIP and unified communications. All of those interests remain, but today I focus heavily on enterprise architecture for global business.

Sure, I still consult with businesses of all sizes. I’m a big fan of local business and likely to do anything I can to help a business in my community flourish. That goes for my network too. My community isn’t confined to where I live. It includes my network online, which is quite global.

If I write about a business or product here, it isn’t just to write or keep fodder moving through the tubes. I don’t cut and paste press releases with a passing comment. Mostly, I delete them. They’re obsolete. I may write an occasional review of a product, service, book or some such because I’m interested and it caught my attention.

While I work entrenched in enterprise architecture (MPLS, QoS, Unified Communications, informatoin security architecture, network management, etc.), I don’t write a lot about that here. That work is focused, at the detail level, for my employer, CSC. When I talk about it here, I’ll be more focused on general trends, strategies, best practices and such. My highly technical focus is something that is paid for, and dedicated.

We’ll both always write about the things that excite us. We are after all geeks to the core. Mobile and wireless technologies – the elements of casual computing and hyperconnectivity are key elements of our life. They help simplify life, enabling us to focus on the things we hold dear.

I expect to write more personal things online. The things about our life, where we’re headed, things we’re doing that matter to us. I want to start writing more. I think this is a place where we both want to share ourselves in a complete and authentic way. Not just work, but as people.

As people, we’re focused on the human and humane aspects of networking. That means engaging with the people I’m connected to. It means sharing more than ideas and success stories or touting the latest hot technology. It means being human and real.

Like Sheryl said in her post, we want a future life on the beach. That’s going to take some time, work and planning. And I expect we’ll share our journey to get there. And then, our life from there.

Every parent, teacher, educator and administrator in the world should watch this video. Twice. Then they should have to take a test.

This is the single most compelling talk from the recent 140Conf.

Our kids ARE the foundation that we’re building the world on. We don’t need drones and workers. We need thinkers and doers. Achievers and explorers. We need to teach our children to create, collaborate, build and network.

We need to do it now!

Don’t just shrug this off. Watch it. Share it. Spread the word. And teach your children well. Then teach help mentor three other children.

I hear all the time how it’s not only big business using social media, that small and medium business, SMB, is using it to better their position. But I disagree, though not across the board. Let me explain.

SMB may be using Social Media, or as I call it, Social Marketing. But not in my town and not in many towns across the US. Do some of them have a presence? Yes. Are some of them avid twitterers or on FB? Yes. But they aren’t using it. They are simply providing a placeholder most of the time, and if they’re doing more than that it’s for their own personal use not because they see any benefit or reason whatsoever.

Something we seem to forget as early adopters is that small towns are slower on the uptake. Not because they aren’t interested, but because change takes longer in a smaller community. The largest of the companies in small communities may not even have a web presence at all, and if they do, most of you reading this would be appalled at the low level, web minus dot 1 they employ. They simply don’t need more than that.

It’s not enough for the local smb’s to say ‘I want to be a part of the revolution that’s taking place’ because for them, if they don’t have a wide audience of viewers who will provide business to them via web tools etc. there is no added value, no reason for them to step up and be more current. How difficult do you think it would be to get a community of people to get behind web changes and really start doing the majority of their life on their phone or laptop? People in rural America are not doing that, and it’s not because they aren’t smart enough, maybe they’re smarter.

One example I have is our local newspaper, the Walla Walla UB (Union Bulletin). They are smart people backing smart people. They’ve been in business in one name or another since 1869. That’s a long history of providing a community links to it’s own world. The irony of this, they don’t have a need to upgrade much. They have a website and it provides what this community needs…for now. They aren’t in dire straights, ready to close their doors, in financial trouble of any sort and yet, anyone who visits their site and has been on the web for any length of time can easily see how far behind our times they are. It has nothing to do with how savvy they are. Nothing to do with how capable their employees are or even that they’re dragging their feet. They do not need to provide more. Their revenue isn’t tied so closely to how their website looks. They still have a print paper, still make money selling ads the traditional old media way.

Another example is a local tech company. A fabulous business that actually has a presence in other communities like Denver, which is certainly a more connected community, isn’t sure how to use social media/marketing, and wonder how to gain value from the current web 2.0 tools we all take for granted. Click through marketing shouldn’t cost $400 a lead because they’re used to getting it for $15. They have to find value and see the potential but it must be pertinent. What works for cities doesn’t always work so well in smaller communities. When the total potential customer base is only a few thousand, and they aren’t using web tools to find you, and will at best be intermittent, there aren’t a lot of reasons to really do more than dabble.

Small and medium business may be using social marketing tools and media in the city or places where it makes sense, but in a small community they’re not there yet. They don’t have a reason to be and until they see a reason, they will continue to do business the old fashioned way. And what’s wrong with that? As they say, if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. I hear that a lot, here. Still, I always thought Walla Walla innovative. A small city can move much faster, be a leading example of how to move into the next generation, than can larger, urban environments. I wouldn’t count these small thriving little communities out of the game. After all, a community that doesn’t rely on one industry is a self-sustaining climate. And haven’t they shown sustainability? They’ve been here a long time and not collapsed during the hard times they’ve seen affect the global community. They’re doing something right. 

Now, about the lack of 3G when 4G is already being implemented….

The story of The Whitman Mission is much more than captured here, but the highlights I’ve tried to capture via current online works, biographies of Marcus and Narcissa Whitman, as well as some of the local lore.

There are many places to look for information in this digital age, and no end of available links. Simply google Whitman Mission and page after page of history erupts.

I did not dwell on the massacre of the Whitman’s, but it is what brought about so many changes to history and why the Whitman Mission exists today.

I hope this brief travel through time will encourage you to look at your own communities, and of course, entice you to mine.

Yesterday I got into a brief conversation about complexity vs. simplification. It led to a real disconnect talking to someone with  enough experience to know better. He was explaining to me how complex networking is and why it has to be complex. And my point completely escaped him. Why? Because my point was to simple and he was one of those network-centri people who believes complexity is the rule of the day.

I explained how vendors and solution providers too often make things overly complex for bad reasons. The biggest reason is to create an arcane lexicon that keeps customers in the dark, perpetuating the illusion that networking and technology is so complex that a mystic shaman is required to understand it all. And that’s just plain horsefeathers.

This led me to think about today’s genre of tools we call social media. I detest the phrase social media. It’s nothing more than communications, but we continue to build the sense of mystery around human communication so that we can create a marketplace to enlighten the masses with our wisdom and mystical powers of understanding.

If you’re looking to one of these mystics to enlighten you, you are truly wandering in the wilderness. The basic skills and tools you need to make the most of NOW media and Internet technologies are the simplest communications skills you learned in kindergarten. In other words, you may need a little help with the mechanics of the different platforms, but you already have what you need for the operating principles.

In kindergarten, did you run around all day every day trying to make fifty new friends? I don’t think so. I know I didn’t. We build circles of friends and they grow organically based on our interests. The same holds true for Twitter, Facebook and all the rest. Let them grow naturally based on your conversations and engagement.

Simplicity is more powerful and more effective than any marketing tools, sales pitch, or magic pill you can buy. We’ve taken simplicity to heart in our lives. We’ve lightened our load on the planet. We’ve tightened up our web site look and feel again. We continue to simplify. Walking around town has become a part of our daily routine. Simple.

We’re focused on our local Walla Walla community and how we can help businesses here build. The local, or hyperlocal economy is the engine that drives the global economy. Big business is not going to provide the jobs to pull the US out of recession. Big business isn’t going to save the world. Big business isn’t going to try. Big business is about one thing, and only one thing – greed fueled by the profit motive.

Small and medium business, the macro-economy of the community is sustainable and thriving. Why? Because like a social network online, a city community is made of people engaged in one another. Invested in one another. And we get the greatest return by simply investing of ourselves.

Want to be more effective and powerful? It’s simple. Invest of yourself where you live both online and in the real world. Give your talents, resources and work efforts to the people around you and you’ll see far greater reward than in pitching a message at ten thousand nameless, faceless followers and loose connections. If you want people to invest in you, invest in them. Invest yourself.

While considering this project, it occurred to me part of what draws me here, has always drawn me here, is a sense of my own history. Walla Walla is not just a place for me, it’s a feeling. I realized during my tour for photo’s, the name Walla Walla means land of “many rivers”, but to me, Walla Walla is the land of “many opportunities”.

Join me as I share my thoughts on this beautiful little city. I believe you’ll see what I do, this truly is a special place.

As an aside, I will be bringing you new content from local businesses and people. I discovered while poking around, that while Walla Walla has certainly survived on it’s own, for newcomers to the community it’s hard to know what’s out there. Towns of this size always seem to promote things they love about themselves, but for tourists and possible new arrivals, well, there needs to be more, especially in today’s world of constant connection. People want a lot more than just a website with a lot of pictures and words. It can be overwhelming. All I can say is I’m working on it!

Here’s a little of my history:

My grandparents – Martin and Clarice Marbach at the Marcus Whitman Hotel, Walla Walla, WA.

Since we moved here, we go out for a walk almost every day. Sometimes more than once a day. We always take pictures, but don’t always send them as we walk. For many of our friends who wonder “why Walla Walla” we thought maybe you’d like to join us for a short walk and share what we see when we walk.

That’s right we’re moving again. Our friends know we’ve had our fair share of moves in the past year or two. Now it’s time for one more move. When we came to Spokane, it was for a job that looked really awesome for Ken; and it was for a while. But the company ran into some financial troubles and our life changed.

Sheryl’s Incidental Interviews have really gained momentum in the past few months. They’re a labor of love that Sheryl’s very committed to. Interviewing people for podcasts is one of her passions. One of the things she loves about them is the ability to do them from anywhere.

Ken recently joined forces with Lee Dryburgh as the Director of Conversations (and Marketing for you old skoolers) for eComm, the hottest conference in the communications industry. One of the things he loves about this role is that it can be done from anywhere.

Are you sensing a theme? Remember the old New Yorker cartoon that said “On the Internet nobody knows you’re a dog.” Well on the Internet, nobody knows where you are really because geography has zero impact. Zero.

We’re moving this weekend to Walla Walla, WA. Some of you may think that sounds farther off the beaten path than Spokane, but you’d be very wrong. Walla Walla is a stable and thriving community with two prestigious colleges, a great symphony, wonderful performing arts, and is home to 90 wineries. Walla Walla is the secret wine country in Washington, and it’s been growing steadily for the past 12 years.

We’ve worked with winemakers on digital media and social media tools in the past. Walla Walla, while home to some vibrant tech companies, isn’t entirely up to speed on Internet digital tools. But the connectivity is there, the interest is there, and the market is there. We’re going to bring social media to the region, and the great people and businesses of the region to social media. It’s an area we see as full of opportunity.

There are a number of other personal reasons, but the heart of it is that we’re thrilled to be getting out of Spokane, and we’re really jazzed to be moving to a community we both think is fantastic. We’re planning on moving this coming weekend, so we’ll be in and out online as we take care of packing, working and getting ourselves moved. Like always, even if we aren’t at the computer, we’re only a Blackberry away. We’ll be as involved as ever on Twitter (@SherylBreuker and @kencamp), and checking in on everything we’re working on.

And then we’ll be taking Walla Walla by storm.