just tristan.: resolutions.
Bought the book, thanks for the recommendation. I hope to drink not one sip of coffee this year, too!
It’s about that time of year.
Last year, on dec 31, I met with my good friend nathan folkman for a cup coffee at cafe barrone in Menlo Park. That was the last cup of coffee I had. I realized I had no real need for it and wanted to see if I could pull off not drinking any coffee for a full…
All of the buildings and all of the cars were once just a dream in somebody’s head.
Venerable, indeed!
The venerable Asiatic sporters of ugly flower shirts finally have their own viral video, and it’s a Lady Gaga cover. It begins with an odd parade of young women holding clear replicas of traditional Chinese instruments, plus a keytar. Then, just when you might be getting bored, a giant cutaway doll house filled with old people singing Gaga rolls onto the stage. Their enthusiastic songs stylings are excellent. Their spastic, under-rehearsed choreography: totally hipster. The facial expression of the woman at 3:20 which seems to have people freaking out: very reminiscent of faces I have seen my grandmother make at her Peking Opera rehearsal nights, also a beloved and perhaps more dignified form of social entertainment among the older set.
As a teenager I was equally frightened and impressed with her transformation from quiet matriarchal power to theatrical crazy eyes, and I guess who wouldn’t be? A tip from the master (my Nainai): flatten your top lip down over your teeth and hold it frozen that way while you are singing to achieve pro-like excellence. Now you are ready to join the senior citizens choir and get famous.
Lana Del Rey, the noveua fave ingenue du los bloggers, drops a melancholic and heartstring-pulling lil’ number. I quite enjoy this by which I mean I’ve spent a good part of today listening to it repeatedly.
Perfect, haha!
How Mobile Payments Will Evolve In the Next Several Years
I’m pretty jazzed on mobile payments, and this is a nice overview of what’s going on in the space. My favorite thing currently happening, though, is over at TheLevelUp - sign up if you haven’t if you’re in Boston, Philly, NYC, or SF.
Mushroom (Taken with instagram)
TheLevelUp > Groupon
Can’t say enough good things about TheLevelUp from the fine people at SCVNGR. Their take on the daily deal concept has evolved to the point of allowing users to pay with their phones via their app at merchants who use TheLevelUp, and all you have to do to redeem your coupon is go to that merchant and pay as you would normally, and you get your discount.
So, from the perspective of a small business owner, if I am choosing to either run a promotion with Groupon or use TheLevelUp, I’m debating over whether I’d like to sell a bunch of coupons to a community of people who basically peruse Groupon and other daily deal sites, and in turn get a chunk of revenue up front from Groupon, or, with TheLevelUp, I’m only offering coupons to people that want to come in and pay and who will in turn get additional levels of savings to come back.
We all know that small businesses make money off of repeat customers. The Groupons of the world will hit a tipping point for businesses like this, and serve the Whole Foods of the world better in the future, as living social recently showed when they sold 1 million $10 for $20 coupons to Whole Foods.
Visiting with #babysadie (Taken with instagram)
