Andy Vota

Yesterday I had the pleasure to speak at a graduate seminar at UVM called Transportation Leadership. What follows are a list of links that I used in my talk…

• http://apps.vtrans.vermont.gov/vtransparency/Search.aspx
• http://www.walkscore.com/score/1-Main-Street-Burlington-VT
• http://gis.ci.burlington.vt.us/gm/
• http://www.tbd.com/blogs/tbd-on-foot/2010/12/metro-releases-real-time-bus-data-today-making-unpredictability-fully-transparent-5718.html
• http://developer.wmata.com/
• http://expressnightout.com/dcrider/nexttrain/station.php?id=81
• http://oobrien.com/vis/bikes/?city=washingtondc
• http://blog.programmableweb.com/2008/07/21/google-transit-feeds-and-mass-transit-mashups/
• http://www.fhwa.dot.gov/resourcecenter/teams/planning/gis.cfm
• http://www.programmableweb.com/mashups
• http://code.google.com/transit/spec/transit_feed_specification.html
• http://www.google.com/intl/en/landing/transit/#mdy

I’ve come across a few gems in the recent past and until now, I haven’t shared them very widely.

From a neighbor, on the topic of the job of mayor:

“‘Mayor is the only job where people get mad at you when it snows.”

From a colleague of my friend Adam, on the app Twitter:

“Twitter is for brands that want to be more human, and humans that want to be brands.”

My own, on my initial impressions of my first iPhone:

“It’s amazing, really amazing. It’s great at everything… except being a phone.”

And similarly, on the iPad:

“The iPad is a mobile device, for your home.”

I love stuff like this. It makes me laugh. I think it’s one of the ways that I like to find joy in everyday life, because expressions are things I collect that remind me of the people I heard them from, or perhaps situations I was in.

I like this blog post by Guy Kawasaki on how small businesses can use LinkedIn. Worth a read:
Ten Ways for Small Businesses to Use LinkedIn

Earlier this month I appeared along with Ted Adler on a local community access program. The station is Channel 17 in Burlington, Vermont. The program focuses on local media. In our 30 minute conversation with host Lauren-Glenn Davitian we discuss issues of websites and social media, along with a bit of a history of our experience at Union Street Media.

http://www.cctv.org/watch-tv/programs/union-street-media

My friend Adam Bluestein has been writing a lot of interesting stuff on his blog lately about the field of synthetic biology. Here’s a recent post I found particularly interesting: Synthetic Biology West Coast Style.

I’m organizing an event to be held at my house in a few weeks. Most of the people that I’m inviting are on Facebook, but a significant portion are not. Facebook does provide a way to invite people who aren’t on Facebook, by inputting a list of email addresses.

I wondered if this was a good solution or not. Some of the guests are probably not that familiar with Facebook, and I don’t want the invitation to be overshadowed by Facebook - my primary concern is to get them to the event. I added a different email address of mine to the list to test it out.

Here’s the email I got:

Hi Andy,

Andy invited you to “Andy’s Example Event” on Tuesday, February 3 at 6:00pm.

Andy says, “We hope you can make it. Thanks, Andy”.

Event: Andy’s Example Event
“An opportunity to meet So-And-So, ask him questions, and let him know what your concerns are for Burlington”
What: House Party
Host: Andy Vota
Start Time: Tuesday, February 3 at 6:00pm
End Time: Tuesday, February 3 at 8:00pm
Where: Andy Vota’s house

To see more details and RSVP, follow the link below:
> link to Facebook

Facebook helps you keep in touch with your friends and family and reconnect with people you lost touch with. You can share unlimited photos, plan events and join discussion groups. It’s free and everyone can join. To register, go to:
> signup link for Facebook

Thanks,
The Facebook Team

___________________
This e-mail may contain promotional materials. If you do not wish to receive future commercial mailings from Facebook, please click on the link below. Facebook’s offices are located at 156 University Ave., Palo Alto, CA 94301.
> link to facebook to not receive future commercial mailings

I clicked the signup link and was taken to a page about the event. So far so good. It asked me to indicate whether I will attend, will not attend, or am not sure. Fine. I selected “will attend” and clicked submit.

The next page was a Facebook signup page. I have three issues with this approach relative to my goals.

• First, there was no confirmation of the signup on this page. I quickly asked myself, did that work? I know it did, so it is silly that I was unsure, but a less savvy user might be truly confused.
• Second, the fact that it tries to get me to sign up for Facebook lessens my trust in the sender of the invite. If I’m unfamiliar with Facebook (perhaps I have been living under the sea for the past five years, for example) this makes me feel like I’m getting recruited to do something.
• Third, the disclaimer message. “This e-mail may contain promotional materials. If you do not wish to receive future commercial mailings from Facebook, please click the link below…” Now, this is by all accounts Facebook being responsible and protecting non-FB users from getting spammed by the likes of me. However, I could see how someone could easily misinterpret this message and think that they are on Facebook’s mailing list now and that they will get more emails from Facebook. That’s going to further degrade the recipients trust in me.

In sum?

The event I’m hosting is political in nature — it’s a “meet the candidate” party. I’m already trying to be extremely sensitive to the views of others, so I don’t think this is the right approach for me. My three objections are significant enough for me to choose another approach.

Next stop, evite?

American Public Media Works’ The Story on Wayne Goldman’s electric car in the 1970s.

Was looking for something on archive.org today and came across this: