Inconsistency = Not Good

I find a headline that sounds interesting. I go to the web site. The site name is ISeeYou (I just made that up) all as one word. However, go to the bottom of the page, next to the copyright date, it says I See You. I look on the RSS feed, it says I See You. Another example, another imaginary web site with the name widgetri in lower case letters. On the footer, it says Widgetri. Which one is the correct one? Who knows? I tend to use whatever is on the footer or the RSS feed. If that’s the wrong, I don’t want to hear about it. Make a decision and stick with it.

Why is this important? One of the goals of brand identity is for large numbers of people to have the same image of a company. Same name, same logo, same impression. Since today is Apple Day, let’s use Apple as an example. They use the bitten apple as their logo, their name is Apple, and they are known for quality hardware. It is widely felt that without Apple’s brand, the company would not survive. That their loyal users are not loyal to the products, they are loyal to the Apple brand. This seems to be true. The tablet hasn’t been formally announced yet people are waiting in anticipation and are begging their spouses to allow them to purchase one. One can’t have loyalty to a product they’ve never seen, never used and hasn’t been released.

One other big difference

Many of the large companies that are not consistent (for example is it Walmart or Wal-Mart?) started prior to the internet, meaning print media prevailed. Wal-Mart Inc. is the company name and at one time their logos reflected the hyphen. When the internet became popular, Wal-Mart had a problem. People would go to walmart.com instead of wal-mart.com and there was inconsistency with the branding. They refreshed their logo to Walmart. They are consistent in using Walmart when referring to their brand and Wal-Mart when referring to their corporate name.

You aren’t one of the big guys

Big companies have already established their brand. Nike can get away with doing NIKE and everyone knows it’s Nike and the swoosh image. Best Buy can have a logo in caps and everyone knows it is Best Buy. There is only one Nike and only one Best Buy. These companies started their brands when print media was the only option. Today, millions of people have blogs and companies want people to share their experiences with products and services on their blogs and social media profiles. Unless a site has spent the money to globally lock down their brand, odds are there is (or will be) another site or company with the same name. Owning the domain name is not enough protection against that. Widgetri could have a highly popular blog at widgetri.wordpress.com when someone else owns widgetri.com. What will set them apart? What they offer and their brands.

Keep it simple

Pick how you want your company name displayed and stick with it. If you use lower case, be consistent. If you make the name all one word, keep it that way. Just because you see other sites being inconsistent doesn’t mean their decision is a smart one. This is the age of sharing online and social networking. When it comes to your brand, especially to avoid legal issues, be consistent not only with your marketing but with the quality of products and services you provide.

Or not. You’re probably not meant to have brand loyalty like Apple anyway.

I can’t go into specifics about anything but obviously, there are some things that need clarification. For the stupid.

Hello, my name is Tyme White….

I don’t date around, don’t have casual sex, don’t really publicly link to my offline friends on social sites, and I don’t cheat. I have high morals and I think honesty, loyalty, etc. are important. I am not obsessed with sex or having a man in my life.

I’m not the chick a guy will meet at the club and get sex from. I’m not the chick that expects to have her way paid for all the time. I’m not the chick that dates multiple guys. I’m not the chick that is clingy and wants to spend all her time with a guy.

However, if I do enter into a relationship, I will do my best to make the guy happy. Not getting overly serious too quickly, but I will appreciate he is in my life and try not to take him for granted. Hopefully we will learn, share things and grow together.

I’m not the chick that, if a guy comes to me about something, will say whatever words necessary to get him to shut up, and will betray him later on by lying and doing whatever I want to do. I don’t like hurting people I care about. It’s like hurting myself…I feel bad when I accidentally hurt someone.

Let me introduce myself again. My name is Tyme White…

If you thought I was dating someone, you were wrong. If you thought I was attracted to someone, you were wrong. If you came up with these ideas because of something said on Twitter, you’re seriously a dumb ass. If you thought these things, came to conclusions without asking me – fuck you and thanks for knowing me so well. If you came to an ever stupider conclusion (that I can’t say) and especially didn’t ask me – go to hell, fuck you, and karma’s a bitch.

If I were dating someone, I would focus on that one guy because um…that’s what I do. If the guy isn’t good enough to just date him why date him in the first place? And since when have my relationships EVER started out that way? They ALWAYS start out from a CLOSE FRIENDSHIP that developed OVER TIME because…

…wait for it…

I’m not the woman that has casual sex, dates around, etc.

Obviously I need to clarify some more…

If I ask a guy if he wants to hang out with me while I’m on a short trip…does that sound like we’re dating? I mean seriously, that would be a complete diss. To make the plans for the trip, completely exclude him, then – after I’ve been there a couple of days – invite him for a day or two. WTF? What it does sound like is a friend who was going through a tough time that could use a distraction for a day or two. That doesn’t mean he’d be sleeping in my bed. Why?

Aaah…you remember??????

That’s not how I roll.

When I am in a relationship, do I broadcast it, especially in the beginning? No…why….

Oh yeah, I don’t link to offline people on my social profiles and I’ve been there, done that. Especially in the beginning, I’d want it to be just about us. Not me, him and the world watching coming up with stupid ass conclusions I’d have to explain.

As much as I’ve been traveling what kind of relationship would that be? Where I purposely leave him out? Just pick up and go. Without a second thought to the guy. There are so many things here that are totally against my personality it’s laughable.

Except I am pissed off royally.

Do you know what it is like to have to explain everything?

You know I had to have a script written to periodically replace commenter information (email, IP) because I have stupid asses in my life that like to hack into shit? If I say a guy has a nice chest, nice legs, sexy name that somehow translates to some sort of higher level relationship. Yes, I can’t give compliments anymore without it getting twisted. Do you know what it is like to be worried your friends, who might not even be that close to you and heaven help them if they are, might say the “wrong” thing, drawing too much attention to them publicly because I have stupid asses in my life that don’t talk to ME about situations yet jump to stupid ass conclusions?

And let’s not forget praying that this time I’m being told the truth, the person will keep their word and is being straight with me.

That’s sad. It’s not normal. It’s definitely not healthy.

Seriously, get it together…

In life you will encounter toxic people. The type of person that knows they have faults, don’t resolve them, but are quick to point out faults in others. Willing to tear someone else apart to escape their own miserable life…they are too weak to fix. People who will drive wedges in good friendships because of their own insecurities. There are all types of toxic people with different sets of “symptoms”. In the end, they do not bring “good” into your life.

I try very had to bring “good” into the lives of those that are close to me. I try very hard to be loyal, honest, and dependable. For the most part, when my friends need me they know I will be there. Not only do we have fun with one another but we have a strong foundation. When the foundation begins to crumble and the “good” turns into bad (I’m dependable, loyal and honest – they aren’t. Not that I’m perfect but when I see something not working (or something outsides the boundaries I feel comfortable with), if I can’t resolve it, I’ll boucne), there is only one thing that can happen: the friendship, relationship, etc. crumbles.

If you keep toxic people in your life you become toxic yourself. If you’re one of those that want to be successful in life, your ability to achieve that success is directly dependent on you’re ability to remove toxic or “bad” situations out of your path. There are many paths to success but few ways to maintain it…the ability to make the right decisions the majority of the time over a long period of time.

It has gotten to the point where I don’t say anything about what is going on in my personal life anymore to anyone (but my crew) because of this. Stupid shit. This is why my Facebook profile is empty, MySpace is unused, comments are usually closed on my site and in a minute Twitter will go dark too. It’s not worth it. This is foreign to me because, at one time, I talked about personal things and my words touched people in different ways (didn’t really have toxic people in my life then). I miss that and I’ve become disinterested in many things because the thought of the drama turns me off.

The good news is…

Through World of Warcraft I’m meeting some really cool people and if I can force myself not to be dismal and trust a little bit, I think I can make some really cool friends. Of course, to not drag them into this craziness, I need to get rid of the toxic elements in my life once in for all. I went through crazy bullshit when I was trying to recuperate and I honestly wasn’t strong enough to recuperate and fight stupid shit at the same time. Unfortunately, that meant a lot of pain…some of it I still haven’t gotten over.

But I’m 100% healthy now and I’m done putting up with bullshit.

I’m not going to be the doormat. Not anymore.

And I’m tired of fixing shit that shouldn’t be broken in the first place.

To be triple clear….

This isn’t towards a guy I like that had things wrong (seriously, no guy on my mind at all – none). This is about people thinking weird shit that goes against my everything I believe in. That’s why I never wanted to be a celebrity – they go through this all the time. I’m focused on other things right now. A relationship isn’t a priority for me.

Basically…I want my life back. And I’m grabbing it.

I was doing so good not cursing too…and I know this isn’t going to make sense to many of you but I thought writing this rant would help me cool off. It didn’t.

What caught me at first was the brightness of her room. It’s pink on steroids. I, personally, couldn’t stand looking at that every day but I also realized how that color would not do well where I live. In the summer it would be fine but during fall and winter it wouldn’t look bright. It would have a dingy look to it (if one opened their windows). Artificial light would be needed to ensure the walls did not look dingy.

The second thing that fascinated me is that she seems genuinely happy…like she is a sweet girl. Then somewhere along the way I realized what “really” fascinated me.

She doesn’t have a website.

Note how many followers she has on YouTube. Can you imagine the interactions she could have if she had her own site? She has a contact email for business related emails so it isn’t as though she hasn’t thought of business opportunities. I wouldn’t be surprised if she didn’t receive tons of makeup samples. She’s probably interacting with people of all ages. Males will love her because she’s a cutie and women of all ages wear makeup. She even has a healthy following on Twitter.

But what really impresses me is that she handles herself with more maturity than many adults I know. She’s still having fun but she’s taking care of business. Getting good grades in school. Keeping her room clean. Handling her responsibilities. Making a VERY nice name for herself online…her parents should be proud.

Kudos to Blair. I hope she’ll be an inspiration to some to get off your butt and do something fun! Your passion to do something fun will show and, as you can see in Blair’s case, many times can turn into business opportunities.

Except that there were grumblings that the leaked copy had some sort of copy protection on it. If you purchase the download copy of the Sims 3, it DOES have Securom. The discs have “something” but until recently, it was unknown what it was. Dave B. from EA clears the air on what copy protection is on the game discs:

Hi

Thanks for your patience.

Until today I was unable to release the following, as the game had not yet been released. The game will still contain a program designed by Securom, however it will not be an installed DRM as it was in games like Spore and Red Alert 3. The game will perform a disc check every time you launch, so you will be required to insert your game disc before you can launch the game. This, of course, means no file will be installed on your computer.

Again I apologize I was unable to be more clear until now, however as the game had not released this information was not publicly available until now.

Regards

Dave B
EA Games
CSR III

Why they didn’t tell their community this upfront is beyond me. I’m all for protecting digital rights but be honest, especially when there is discord with users due to previous privacy invasion. Let’s be clear here: EA needs Sims 3 to do well. The Sims franchise is their cash cow. EA had a $641 million dollar loss last year. They have the delicate balance of protecting their digital rights and keeping their users happy. If their users are displeased with the deception, it could hinder the growth of Sims 3. Players can happily go back to playing Sims 2…which many prefer anyway. Sims 3 still has to evolve to be as content rich as Sims 2 plus expansion packs.

Shame honesty didn’t enter the picture.

That said, I have a copy of the game and next up will be some tips and tricks to help you play the game.

Mean What You Say. Say What You Mean

If you spend any time with children, you know they have to be taught what they can and cannot do. They have to be taught the difference between right and wrong. However, children do many things that aren’t “wrong”…the parent or guardian simply does not want the child to do it. For example, when a toddler figures out the remote control changes the TV channels most parents will tell the toddler not to touch the remote to ensure the toddler does not break it, but using the remote control is not “wrong”. See my point?

However, when the parent or guardian says, “Don’t touch the remote” the child should not touch the remote. He or she is going to and that is the learning process. The child has to respect the boundaries the parent puts in place until he/she moves out on their own.

The same thing happens in friendships, romantic relationships, and even online interactions except as adults we know the difference between right and wrong, good and bad, what will make someone happy or devastate them. There are boundaries we make clear not to cross or there is a price. That price can be very high. However, just like the child will push the boundaries so will people…if you allow them to. If you say “Don’t do something” there has to be a price if the person continues to do it, otherwise you will end up a doormat.

And that’s where my problems began. I became the doormat.

Yeah, I Said Earlier You Do It Too…

Here is a relationship example (and I know how much you guys love relationship stuff). I normally don’t read AskMen.com but I knew I’d find an example of what I’m talking about. This guy (Shawn) has a girlfriend of four years (he calls the relationship “great”). He’s interested in a co-worker who has a long-term boyfriend. He thinks he’s falling in love with the co-worker. Doc Love gives this advice:

What should you do about this whole thing? First of all, stop flirting with Shakira. Then go home and make a list of all the great things you have with Venus and start thinking about the idea of LOYALTY. If you can’t be loyal, guy, then get rid of your girl. You should be getting rid of your girl because you don’t like her anymore or you’re completely bored with her, not because you found somebody who appears to be better. And you can’t even compare them because your girlfriend has four years in with you and this new girl only has a couple of hours in. Duh.

Remember, guys: Loyalty is numero uno.

That’s the root problem: honesty and loyalty. Most relationships tank because of the loss of those two things. If a person is dishonest or not loyal, trying to forgive and patch up the situation isn’t the solution. It does aide the person to continue being dishonest and disloyal. What Venus doesn’t know is that she should be telling Shawn to go to Shakira when he has a problem, when he needs support, when he needs to talk, etc. At the time of that writing she didn’t know one of the people she trusted and loved the most was stabbing her in the back and consciously screwing her over, creating a painful situation no one should have to endure. One of the main reasons most relationships (of any type) fail: someone is being disloyal and dishonest. Look at the definitions of disloyal and dishonest:

disloyal –adjective
false to one’s obligations or allegiances; not loyal; faithless; treacherous.

dishonest –adjective
1. not honest; disposed to lie, cheat, or steal; not worthy of trust or belief: a dishonest person.
2. proceeding from or exhibiting lack of honesty; fraudulent: a dishonest advertisement.

Why would anyone want a person like that in their life? Most people would advise Venus to dump Shawn because he knows he is being disloyal and dishonest (he calls it being weak). Shawn will not turn strong, honorable, honest and loyal over night and he won’t whip into the complete opposite of who he is for another person either. He has to be that other person PRIOR to the relationship for it to work. The bottom line: When you have someone in your life that you care about and respect, the default action is to avoid hurting the person, not do the things you know will hurt/annoy/irritate/anger/etc. the person. When I mention an example like Shawn and Venus it is very clear Venus should dump Shawn. What about things like:

• Ever had the roommate you told not to touch your clothes and he/she did it anyway?
• Ever had the co-worker who eats your food when you told them not to?
• Ever had the boyfriend/girlfriend where you asked to call if he/she is going to be late and he/she never does yet will call their friends to tell them they are running late?
• Your girl/boyfriend promises to not cheat again yet…she/he does it again?
• Your friend says she/he will be honest with you but tells lies to manipulate you?
• Ever thought you resolved an issue with someone, was even proud of the compromise/sacrifice you made, only to find out the person betrayed you again?

See what I mean? The signs are always there. When a person continues to mistreat you (put their feelings over yours) there is only one option: leave them alone…not pray he or she will change. Trust cannot exist without loyalty and honesty. No type of relationship can exist without trust.

But let’s keep it real: If you allow someone to lie to you, be disloyal to you, hurt you, and mistreat you…there is something wrong with you. I refuse to be that person.

How Do You Stop The Bad Behavior?

For the longest time I would question things trying to make sense of why people did the things they did? What I didn’t want to admit: I misread some people in my life and I hoped they would change. I hoped they respected the things I’d done, the loyalty, trust and honesty I built on my side not to throw it away. I completely wasted my time because I was dealing with disloyal, dishonest and untrustworthy people.

And I accept it. If you have disloyal, dishonest and untrustworthy people in your life, you should accept it too.

People become friends (or greater) because you can trust them. Are couples happy when they can’t put their guard down because they can’t trust their spouse? No. Do you like going to work and your boss watches your every move because he/she doesn’t trust you? No.

Trying to make people fit into roles in which they don’t belong (and in my case they were trying to live up to roles they weren’t ready or possibly meant to have) just makes everyone involved miserable. Now that I see these types of situations like the playground fights we all have as kids, you either let someone walk all over you and become a doormat or you stand up for yourself, no matter how much it hurts.

I have no more questions. I no longer seek answers. I realized my mistake the other day and this weekend, I owned it (took responsibility for it). For those in the past that got away with it, I hope they enjoyed it.

If I can do it, you can do it. Stop being a doormat.

To Wolfe: Thank you.

• Working on Argent Tournament.
• Working towards a Netherwing Drake.
• Doing daily quests…daily.
• Working on the Explorer/Loremaster achievements.
• This week is Children’s Week.
• Just found out Dark Moon Faire started yesterday.
• Working on Sons of Hordir reputation.

There are a zillion other things to do in game that I have not begun to do. For example, while leveling to 80 I leveled so quickly (yes people, I said quickly) this happened:

I play a level 80 Death Knight and there are entire zones I have not seen:

• All the lower zones under level 55 (Death Knights start at 55).
• Obviously I missed at lot of Outlands (see the screenshot?).
• I haven’t seen all of Northrend (especially as new things are adding).

I’m definitely getting my monies worth.

With so much to do, along with balancing life and business responsibilities, one has to have the mindset everything cannot be accomplished at once.

RSS vs. Twitter

Reading Dare’s article today about how RSS readers are like email clients I couldn’t help but laugh because it is all about the person’s frame of mind.

When it comes to blogs and other casual content, this model breaks down. I really don’t need a constant nagging reminder that I haven’t read the half dozen reposts of the same tech news stories about Google, Twitter and Facebook after I’ve seen the first one. Furthermore, if I haven’t fired up my reader in a while then I don’t care to be nagged about all the stuff I missed since they are just blogs so it is OK if I never read them.

Simple solution: mark them read and continue on with your day. Better solution – unsubscribe to the feeds you never really read. Unless someone’s job revolves around RSS (for example, someone with a web site covering technology and the news he/she writes about comes via RSS) the unread items do not have to be read. Just like all tweets do not have to be read. Just like I don’t have to complete every activity in World of Warcraft. Or go to every party on Saturday night. Or keep in touch with every person I met over the years.

See the pattern? As always it boils down to freedom of choice. To get the news on Twitter as efficiently in RSS one has to either:

• Make a group to separate the “news” from friends and pray the “news” people only tweet about news.
• Keep Twitter open 24/7.

And let’s be real about the Twitter being efficient. Retweeting is the most inefficient way of spreading news. The people retweeting mean well and it is wonderful they share their finds. However, the odds of receiving the same news article multiple times on Twitter is much higher than in RSS.

Most people miss the majority of tweets they have access to and do not feel guilty if they miss the tweets – even from friends and loved ones. Add the same carefree attitude to RSS and the problem is solved.

Don’t let your frame of mind limit you.

Just like Stryker did in the movie. Look how crazy he was.

What is a Conflict of Interest?

Wikipedia has a good definition:

More generally, conflict of interests can be defined as any situation in which an individual or corporation (either private or governmental) is in a position to exploit a professional or official capacity in some way for their personal or corporate benefit.

Here are some examples of conflict of interest from the same article:

• Self-dealing, in which public and private interests collide, for example issues involving privately held business interests.
• Outside employment, in which the interests of one job contradict another,
• Family interests, in which a spouse, child, or other close relative is employed (or applies for employment) or where goods or services are purchased from such a relative or a firm controlled by a relative. For this reason, many employment applications ask if one is related to a current employee. If this is the case, the relative could then recuse from any hiring decisions.
• Gifts from friends who also do business with the person receiving the gifts. (Such gifts may include non-tangible things of value such as transportation and lodging.)

Now that we have a basic definition let’s get back to Stryker. In the movie, Stryker is a religious fanatic. He killed his wife and mutant son (not shown in the movie) because he felt the birth of his mutant son was a sign from God to destroy mutants. Stryker, holding military positions, had a conflict of interest. His desire to kill mutants over-shadowed everything and was fueled by the positions he had in the military – giving him power to do things outside normal realms.

That’s Easy to See But What About This?

Ok, Stryker is an over-the-top example of conflict of interest. Easy to see, right? Ok, let’s try a more subtle example.

Alan meets a girl (Crystal) and he thinks she’s really cool. He’d like to get to know her better and of course, have sex with her. Crystal thinks Alan is okay and would like to get to know him better to see if he’s boyfriend material. Crystal decides to Google Alan…and she finds his MySpace and Facebook profiles. She sends a friends request, which Alan accepts because he “can’t” say no and still want to get to know her (without angering her) can he?

Crystal looks at the MySpace page and notices there is a woman with the first top left friend slot. She looks at the comments and sees the same woman making comments that imply they are a couple, or dating seriously. Next, she goes to Facebook. The MySpace girl isn’t a friend on Facebook but there is another woman posting comments daily. Crystal knows what that means because she’s done it herself. She looks at both profiles and the relationship status is Single. Crystal becomes angry because she specifically asked Alan if he was single and he said yes.

Next time Alan called her, Crystal asked about the two women. Alan said nothing was going on, they were just friends…and implied Crystal was “tripping” (he is single…he’s not married). While he explained Crystal was looking at the two profiles, looking at what the women said, and thinking Alan must think she’s stupid.

See the conflict of interest? In case you don’t…Alan desire to get to know Crystal better overruled being honest so Crystal can trust him. She called him out and he continued to lie.

Conflict Of Interest Takes You Down the Wrong Path

Stryker’s desire to kill mutants took him down the horrible path of killing and destroying innocent people. Alan’s conflict of interest caused him to lie to a girl that might have been “wifey” material. You can always tell a conflict of interest…

… because the person won’t let it go.

No matter how many people tried to reason with Stryker, he wouldn’t discontinue his mission. Alan, when confronted with his situation, continued to lie about it. In both cases, it’s end-game. To “stop” Stryker would have to give up his military position and reform. If Alan wants any type of relationship with Crystal those girls need to disappear – not hide from view – disappear.

What Alan doesn’t realize is that as long as those two other women are around it is a reminder he lied to Crystal. They were important enough to lie about. How can Crystal forgive him for lying if the women he lied about are still around? Hiding them from view isn’t good enough because when they reappear, unless he blows them off, it reminds Crystal again he lied to her. If Crystal is important, he’d remove the one girl from the top friend slot (if she’s not his girl she shouldn’t be there in the first place), set things straight with both women (ie: blow them off cause they have different agendas) and never put himself in that position again.

How often does a single guy do that? Let’s say almost never and move on…

Spotting the Conflicts….

The more efficient you become spotting conflicts of interest, the more time you’ll save wasting your time on people who are in direct conflict with what you want to achieve. Stryker wasn’t trying to help anyone, he was trying to destroy mutants. Anyone siding with him thinking in the end good would prevail was wasting their time. Crystal, looking for boyfriend material, was obviously looking in the wrong direction at Alan. In Crystal’s case, she spotted it quick and if she walks away the time she’ll waste trying get to know Alan (while he gets it together) she could be spending on a man that already has it together. No one is perfect but lying is not a trait one should look for in the person they want to get involved with. In life, we’ll always be confronted with conflicts of interest…the strong people remove themselves from them because they realize, in the end, it won’t work.

You can’t “win” with someone that has a conflict of interest because pleasing themselves overrules doing what is right.

X-Men Origins: Wolverine: The Quick Review

The movie was good, definitely geared towards people not familiar with the comic. For those unfamiliar the movie has unexpected twists and turns where the balance of action/story is more balanced. For those familiar with the story (like myself) you might walk away wishing their was more action. They did a decent job staying true to the original story lines. I enjoyed it and I recommend going to see it.

Then came Twitter and the 140 character limit. The clean URLs were much too long. A flurry of short URL services popped up. I never liked them and contacted Twitter about them auto-converting URLs when I was within my 140 character restriction. I never received a response but read in multiple places Twitter converts URLs if they are over 30 characters long.

I started thinking about the history of new things online. A bunch of them pop up, a bunch of them hail. Most of them do. What happens to my links when these services go out of business? They die. I rarely link to my own articles but others do and their link would die. I didn’t like that.

I’m using WordPress and I decided to create my own short URLs. Why not take control of the situation and make it so people don’t have to shorten my URLs? I’m blessed to have a pretty short domain and I can get my URLs under 30 characters. There was just one factor stopping me…I became used to my links being made from the title. Then I thought about how often I actually used a URL on my site (or anyone else’s for that matter) to find an article. Almost never, it is very rare. I search instead. Isn’t that what most people do?

I’m going to try using short URLs. The beautiful thing about WordPress is that it has an automatic redirecting solution in it. My URLs usually are like this:

http://tymesaid.com/2009/title

I condensed it to this:

http://tymesaid.com/2009/a28n

But if I type this in the browser it redirects automatically:

http://tymesaid.com/a28n

I strongly suggest if you have the ability to make your own short URLs, to do so. Take control of the situation and have people come straight to your site – instead of using a third party.

The US Commerce Department delivered the semi-shocking news that total retail sales for January rose 1 percent, defying a six-month decline in growth and marking the biggest overall retail gains in 14 months. Of course, that percentage climb paled in comparison to the US gaming industry. Reporting on US software, hardware, and accessory sales today, the NPD Group revealed that industry revenues stood at $1.33 billion for January, a 13 percent climb from a year prior.

Considering that people are purchasing games it is not surprising that GameStop, a game retailer, is doing very well.

For the 12 months ended January 31, 2009, GameStop racked up a company-best of $8.8 billion in sales, up more than 24 percent from the year before. Profits were also up, as the retailer reported more than $398 million in net earnings, an increase of more than 38 percent year-over-year.

That doesn’t make sense does it? People are losing their homes and jobs in record numbers yet people are spending money on games. How can that be? Diversification is GameStop’s savior.

Learn to Read the Small Print

If you read the article on GameStop’s profit there is one part that should have stood out, since it explains everything.

Regardless of new game sales, it’s the used game business that produces the most money for GameStop. While used games represented just 23 percent of the retailer’s sales in 2008, they accounted for nearly 43 percent of its gross profit.

GameStop’s used games sales represented 23% of the retailer’s sales but 43% of their gross profit. Time for a business lesson.

Gross Profit = Sales – Cost of Goods Sold

In plain English, gross profit equals sales minus costs directly related to sales. The used game sales buffed their gross profit because they have few costs associated with them versus new games and consoles that need to be advertised and marketed. As people are pinched pennies they exchanged their old games for new games or purchased old games instead of new games. People exchanging their games builds GameStop’s inventory and there is a demand by gamers for games, even used ones.

The beauty of this: as a gamer, if I want to get rid of an old game, GameStop is the place to go. GameStop has a lock down on used game sales that other retailers wished they had.

The Lesson for You

If you are in business, if you can, diversify your offerings but not at the cost of losing quality on current offerings. In other words, do not stretch yourself too thin. GameStop compliments their offerings, without extensively increasing expenses, by selling used games. How could this work online?

One of the common mistakes I see – people and companies are too reliant on third party sites. If all your traffic depends on third party sites you are in trouble. Instead, start your own site and have your site be a portal to the third party sites. Perez Hilton is a good example. His site is the portal then he sends traffic to other sites (Twitter, YouTube, etc.). When Twitter goes down his site still performs as normal. If Facebook changes their homepage his site is not dependent on that traffic. However, he can interact with Facebook users and send traffic to his Facebook profile or fan page. Perhaps make new friends which will come back to his web site, where the meat of his content lies.

However, if maintaining profiles on social sites is too time consuming, do not spend too much time over there. Instead, use the power you have worked hard for on your site to send traffic to members on those third party sites. That will make them happy, most likely draw more people to the profiles and to your site to see who you give props to next.

Depending on the goals you are trying to achieve, there are ways to strengthen your foundation. Think about what GameStop is doing. New consoles and games are not making them as profitable as they are; it is the used game sales that is making them profitable right now.

I am writing about Wayne Sutton.

The Problem

From my previous article:

From a viewer standpoint, Wayne’s show was painful to watch because Wayne and his co-host were unprepared but most importantly, they had no control over the show. Wayne and his co-host are supposed to steer the audience in the direction they want their show to go.

Wayne (literally) is on almost every social network. It was almost impossible to follow what he was doing and saying online because he literally was everywhere. Just as a host has to guide his guest through a video or podcast, a “leader” in a niche or community has to guide their readers/followers. If the leader is all over the place, that leads to chaos.

I understand why people do this. With so many social media sites coming out it is very easy to get caught up in them, especially since they have the potential to be the next “big” thing. Being an early adopter on “the next big thing” has its advantages. Lack a focus is one of the main reasons why companies fail unfortunately.

The Change: Sutton vs. Scoble

To understand the change, I am going to compare Wayne Sutton and Robert Scoble’s presence at SXSW this year. I also wrote a critical piece about Scoble. Scoble recently announced he would not be making videos for Fast Company anymore.

Websites

Scoble: He made an announcement about his new venture, Building43.com, at SXSW during Gillmor Gang. People listening to the live stream or reading about the new venture went to the site, which is live but has no content. One does not need to be a rocket scientist to understand that a more effective approach would have been to make the announcement after the new site had content on it.

Sutton: Wayne started working on his sites before he left. When he reached SXSW his sites were in order and he was ready to go. He launched a new community portal prior to leaving.

Winner: Sutton

Content

Scoble: Robert and his cameraman Rocky are at SXSW. Perhaps they shot a lot of video and they will upload it later. There is nothing available now, while SXSW is going on. Nothing is on their new site.

Sutton: Wayne has been broadcasting panels and he archived the videos for later viewing. He has been taking fun pictures, and making new friends. Wayne seems to understand and grasp the idea of balance between performing and partying. He seems focused on achieving his goals. Wayne is loading his site with content yet still taking time to enjoy himself while interacting with people who reach out to him.

Winner: Sutton

Partners

Scoble: Robert and Rocky do not seem to be accomplishing anything productive to their new venture. Again, perhaps there are videos coming later but does anyone really care what happened at SXSW after it is over? It is hard enough to get people who opted not to go to care while it is going on.

Sutton: Wayne and Kipp seem to make a strong partnership because they have balanced friendship, work and “fun”. They can leave SXSW proud they had fun and accomplished something that will bring them closer to their goals.

Winner: Sutton

Reflection….

Wayne wrote about a conversation he and I had over a year ago. He said that conversation stuck with him along with other conversations he had with others. He took those suggestions and put his spin.

Let me be clear: my article is not about Wayne doing what “I” said. He is making moves that will strengthen his position to reach his goals. I spoke about the Suggested List on Twitter and how the list Twitter implemented skews the “Followers” numbers. The people or companies on the list were not added because of their accomplishments on Twitter. They are on the list due to their accomplishments off Twitter.

Social sites are great compliments to a blog/site. When a person places social media sites over their own, they are making a mistake that will catch up with them later.

In the End…

Let me be clear: I do not buy into Social Media Experts or even strategists because quality content (product or service) has always and will always dominate on the internet. People want to block the noise on the internet and focus on the content (whether it is fun, educational or business) that interests them. Which one you decide to be, the noise or quality, depends on what the decisions you make and your specific goals.

What I do recommend is positioning yourself so, if these third party sites die out, you are not dependent on them. I am looking forward to what Wayne does next. It is truly refreshing to watch the changes he is making. I wish him the best of luck and I hope he continues to have success.