The Planet Blog

Dec 12, 2007: The Planet Day. The day we debuted our new office space to employees, colleagues, customers and friends. The day we finally saw the new place we’d call home, and the beginning of a new and exciting chapter for The Planet.

We captured the events on film — the speeches, the awards, the ribbon cutting… lunch. (mmmm, lunch.) From that we’ve made a little montage of the day — the 2 minute and 30 second version if you will. We highlighted pieces of Doug’s speech, shots of the office, but most of all, the people who work here. At the end of the day, that’s what matters. The people make this company what it is. We work hard because we believe in what we are doing for our customers and for this industry as a whole. We enjoy what we do and where we do it. That’s The Planet difference. It shows through our work, the products we offer, the services we provide and the pride we take in our company.

CEO Doug Erwin often illustrates his ideal work environment with one simple phrase: Yabba Dabba Doo! He wants his employees to jump out of bed every morning ready to go with their feet hitting the ground running just like Fred Flintstone.

Here’s a glimpse of what makes this place so special. Yabba Dabba Doo, indeed.

-Ali

P.S. Here’s the YouTube link for your embedding pleasure: The Planet Day on YouTube

Have you ever wondered how fast The Planet’s network transfers files? Yes, we know that we’ve got great connectivity and screaming-fast interlinks, but our CFO asked us to indulge him in an experiment to find quicker ways to transfer data between our Houston and Dallas data centers: A Data Transfer Race.

If you’d rather watch the video on YouTube, Vimeo, or Facebook, we’ve got you covered. You can also consider this the perfect opportunity to “Friend” us accordingly.

P.S. Be sure you watch the last clip following the credits … Yee-haw!

Update: I read a few positive reviews touting Blip.tv’s quality and ease of use, so the video is posted there as well.

Stop laughing. Computers are cool now.

That’s what the sticker in my office says, anyway. (Given to me by our very own Todd Mitchell, thank you very much. He’s funny.)

To conclude my three-part blog, I thought I’d focus on some sites I think have really helped to define this new era of the Internet. Plus, it gives me an excuse to play…er, I mean research the Internet while at work. Bonus!

Let’s start with MySpace because, well, it’s the one I’m most familiar with. I’ve had my account since early 2004. I’ve seen lots of growth and changes with the site over the years. Many new features have been added, with better functionality, which makes it really easy to use, but even more it’s really easy to be addicted. With all of these upgrades, the fundamentals of MySpace haven’t changed; it’s a place to hang with your friends and make new ones via the interwebs. That plays a huge part in the site’s success.

In the beginning, the site featured blogs, profile customization, bulletins and comments from other users on your friends list. Today the site has expanded to video, music, instant message, mobile texting and news. You can even search job listings there! Part of what makes this site so compelling is that in order to participate, you have to be a member. You create an account because someone you know has one, and you want to read their blogs and have the ability to comment. Once you get involved, you’re addicted. You also have the ability to completely control who views your page. You can be as public or as private as you like. It’s really all about your comfort level, but more importantly, it’s all about you.

MySpace was founded in August of 2003 by eUniverse (now Intermix). The site was sold in 2005 for $580 million to Rupert Murdoch’s News Corporation. (That’s some serious moola for a site built on the geeky idea of making Internet friends.) The site is currently ranked by Alexa as #3 on the list of most visited sites in the U.S.

You Tube has become a crazy phenomenon. The idea behind it is quite simple: create a site with a simple interface where a user can upload any sort of video that exports into a format most browsers can view. And it’s free. Genius.

The world’s inner celebrity has come out to shine. If you aren’t contributing, you’re watching. If there is something you’ve seen on TV at some point, chances are you can find it on You Tube. If you want to show the world how you and your friends act the fool, just upload and share. Anyone who ever hoped to be some level of celebrity now has their chance, and they’re using it.

Google purchased YouTube on Nov. 3, 2006, for $1.65 billion in Google stock. I can’t even begin to fathom that amount of money. The site is currently ranked #4 in the Alexa rankings.

DIGG.com, which began as a technology-based blog site, is really a fantastic example of one that grew solely from social networking. Users contributed content by seeking out tech blogs, articles and news stories, and then posting them on the site. Now, it’s much more than just technology, with subsections ranging from entertainment, world and business, and gaming. They even offer video and podcast sections as well.

For a blogger, one of the pinnacles of success is having people “digg” your blog. Translation: having someone who reads it like it so much they link it on DIGG. Bloggers have become obsessed with getting their stories “dugg”- so much that the site has implemented practices for stopping spamming of your own writing. (But I’m not above asking you guys to click that little DIGG button on the bottom of this page. Click it. CLICK IT.)

Tons of sites have made an impact building the Internet to what it is today. These are just a few examples of sites that in my mind have been leaders in shaping the Internet culture. They’ve become regular phrases in our everyday lives translating into a major pop-culture phenomenon.

So, now my three-part look at the Internet Social Scene is done. I’m not sure what else I’ll be writing about in the future, but I’m sure there will be some topics that tickle my fancy.

If any of you, dear readers, have suggestions; please feel free to let me know! I’ll dig (ha,ha dig!) down and look into questions you have about Internet happenings, happenings at The Planet or anything else you might find interesting. The sky’s the limit.

If I can make it relevant to technology or the Internet, they’ll probably let me blog about it. Even nail polish and lipstick. Maybe. (What? I am a total girl, you know.)

- Ali

Long Distance Social Networking circa 1993:
Get paper.
Get pen.
Sit and hand write the first draft.
Massage hand for a moment to get the cramps out.
Find the nice stationary and the good pen — the one that doesn’t leak.
Write more.
Crumple up that first page because you totally left out a word.
Write more.
FINISH!
Place in envelope.
Write out the envelope.
Realize you left out the last page.
Argh …
Open (and ruin) envelope.
Write it out once more.
Place the letter (all pages!) in the new envelope.
Seal. (Ick. The glue is gross.)
Find a stamp.Um. Stamp. Where are they? Think.
Tear up your house looking for one.
“MOM! I need a STAMP.”
Bug mom to get stamps on her way home from work for two days.
Get the stamp and place the letter in the mail.
Wait weeks to see if your friend received it while everything in it is completely outdated.
Start over again.

Long Distance Social Networking today:
Log onto Myspace.
New Comments! New Messages!
JOY!
Read messages and comments.
Respond.
The end.

The above happens within a two-minute timeframe. Who would have known how vastly different the world would change in a mere 14 years. Really, five years if you simply go by the introduction of the Internet to the masses. It has changed the way we communicate in every capacity. Everything is faster, sleeker, wittier and smaller. Every day teeny tiny new little gadgets are invented to enable us to stay plugged into everything: our friends (and frenemies), TV, music, movies, sports, news, gossip … it’s never ending.

I find it all incredibly fascinating.

Technology is moving so fast that it’s hard for even the techiest of tech people to keep up. Web 2.0 applications and practices are in full swing with blogs and social networking sites becoming actual outlets for advertising and marketing opportunities. Not just a place to write about what you had for breakfast and saying “What’s up” to your homies. The entire landscape of the Internet has changed and in the grand scheme of things, it’s still in its infancy. As a result, traditional marketing and advertising practices are taking a backseat to more innovative approaches.

I’ve often been questioned by people who haven’t embraced the Internet (and more specifically social networking sites) as fervently as I have. They don’t get it. I might as well be telling them that I talk to monkeys. But slowly, even the most skeptical people are coming around.

My first foray into the realm of Internet geekdom was message boards. I found a couple that focused on topics I liked and I dove right in. Now, I’m a social person. I talk non-stop. (Go figure I work in communications.) I love to debate, but even more so, I love being in the know.

So the world of message boards was like a little piece of pixel heaven. I can talk, laugh, argue and always be in the know because the posts stay there. I can go to bed fully engrossed in a topic, then wake up the next morning and catch up on what I missed while drinking my coffee and lounging in my jammies. You can’t do that in real-time. If you aren’t there, you simply miss out.

For years, I was happy in my little communities. I knew everyone. Everyone knew me. It was like Cheers but with a keyboard and no beer. I made friends and attended “meet-ups.” I talked regularly to folks both on the boards and on IM from all over the country. Then one day, my friend Gabe sent me an invite to MySpace. I was totally confused. I had heard of Friendster and never understood it, either. I mean, why would I need MySpace? I have my beloved message boards!

I accepted the invite and let the page sit for months. Suddenly, all the people I interacted with regularly on message boards were getting pages. They started leaving comments and writing blogs. Slowly those same people started become more open and really letting parts of themselves show through. The blogs became personal. Pages were designed to reflect their tastes in art, music, film and TV. It really became and extension of themselves.

I know people often question the usefulness of social networking sites such as MySpace and Facebook. They want to know why you would want or have a need for those sites, when message boards are available and so prevalent.

There are two very distinct differences between the two:
1) Message boards are about the community more than the individual, and social sites are the opposite.
2) Networking sites allow users to control who they interact with.

With social sites, the user is the superstar, so to speak. The content is about them. It’s where they can show off their creativity and inner celebrity. And most importantly, they control who views it and who’s allowed to participate. All of this in conjunction with the explosion of YouTube gives the “average Joe” the ability to create their own community of fans and get a taste of celebrity life via the Internet. Think of it as the “Me” generation of the 80’s with a focus on celebrity status rather than financial (and less hairspray).

The Web has changed the way we think and interact, both in our personal lives and in business. Marketing and advertising companies have had to completely rethink strategies … but that’s something I’ll visit in part 2. Stay tuned!

I KNOW. That’s so old school. I’m bringing it back, though.

- Ali