HUGE , Carrot Creative neighbor (we have a view of their window) and recent Digital DUMBO host, organized an Internet Week event today at the DUMBO Arts Center.

A Job Grows In Brooklyn: Brooklyn-based interactive agency HUGE challenge you to steal their jobs.Think you’re good? Take it to the next level by learning from HUGE’s celebrated senior team. Find out what they’re looking for in the next big talent. Now that you’re a major player, how do you move higher? Where are the jobs in digital going? Developers, visual designers, project managers and interaction designers will learn to become more confident, more marketable and who knows, maybe land an interview with HUGE. We’ll share on-the-job insights and take you through examples of applicants that did (and didn’t) make the cut.

While there was no fighting or throw downs to removing the HUGE staff members from their current positions, the speakers each provided a great overview of their individual disciplines, what HUGE is looking for and what people looking to get a job (or new job) in the digital age should be thinking about.

Some key points for those who could not attend:

• The space is still growing. Digital is growing. Digital agencies are hiring for things that will be super relevant over the next 3-4 years. (Carrot Creative is too!)
• When asked who will be working in digital in 2015, most of the room raised their hand. One thing to learn: Your skill sets are changing.
• Working in digital is like working in dog years. If you’ve been in this space for a few years, it feels like 7 of your life because of how much has changed. (I really liked this quote by Nantini Rauch, Head of Recruiting for HUGE)
• When interviewing at digital agencies, show off your successes and show off your failures.
• Be willing to collaborate. If you can’t, good luck finding a job in the digital age.
  

Joe Stewart, Creative Director at HUGE was definitely the highlight (for me at least) with some tips to Designers:

1. Be terrified every day.
2. Never stop designing.
3. Embrace Arial.
4. Becoming a great designer has nothing to do with Photoshop.
5. CEOs don’t give a s*** about your kerning.
6. Don’t go back to school if you have a job.

In short: Do what you love to do. I’m glad that message came out of the panel as it should be the one thing everyone is thinking about these days. Work in a place that makes you happy, keeps you excited and encourages you to learn. If that’s not the current state, move on. You have to be happy and you can be.

This article is copyright © 2010 

I just returned from the Future of Media Panel hosted by I Want Media at NYU’s Arthur L. Carter Journalism Institute. If you missed it, check out the livestream here. It was interesting this year compared to last, which is a true testament to how things have changed in the media world.. Last year’s panelists included more of a traditional set including Michael Wolff from Vanity Fair, Erick Schonfeld from TechCrunch and David Carr from The New York Times. (There were others of course. Allen Stern’s CenterNetworks recap from last year can be read here if you want more.) The panel focused on a popular topic at the time “What is online killing/hurting?” Answers revolved around music, print, etc… you know the argument.

This year, we were over the fact that things were “dying” (for the most part) and focused on where everything is going to be LIVING. It was also a tailored conversation to each of the panelists and what they’re doing individually at their publications/sites. A look at the panel of speakers and you’ll see how all of them had something different to bring to the table:

• Nick Denton, Founder, Gawker Media
• Jack Dorsey, Co-Founder and Chairman, Twitter
• Bonnie Fuller, Founder, Bonnie Fuller Media (not in photo above)
• Alan Murray, Deputy Managing Editor and Executive Editor Online, The Wall Street Journal
• Craig Newmark, Founder and Customer Service Rep, Craigslist

The panelists were awesome. Just look at the list. You have new media, “old” media, non-media and then Twitter that falls into whatever category people are calling it these days. Twitter was the main topic of the questions as it is the main topic of everything these days.

Alan and Nick were the most vocal discussing their experience and debating whether or not advertising was the string holding media together (Alan says NO, Nick says Absolutely YES) Nick even went on to say that “newspapers don’t have material that people will pay for” stirring up some comments from Bonnie Fuller as well. Besides this one disagreement, Nick and Alan noted that they’re actually quite similar on their views. Nick even gets his Wall Street Journal news from Alan’s selective Twitter feed.

Craig Newmark was the show stealer with planned iPhone app sounds after his witty comments (Insert Sad Trombone sound here.) Craig also praised his nerd status and the fact that he is a bystander in a media world growing around him.

The moderator, I Want Media’s Patrick Phillips was the only “need for improvement” of the event. It really goes to show how a moderator can make or break a panel. You need someone who is snappy, on top of his panelists and able to shape the conversation. All traits that were visibly absent.

The good thing is that the panel was optimistic and open to the media landscape changing. That’s a great thing actually. There is opportunity for all involved. Whether it be new media, old media—it’s media and it’s changing. Whether or not you like it or are ready to adapt to it will determine how much it can grow to your own liking.

Some of my favorite soundbites from the panel:

Jack Dorsey:
-Twitter will be a success to the people at Twitter when people aren’t talking about it anymore. When it becomes a utility, that’s when we will consider it a success.
-Twitter is good at listening to our users. We took VC money to become patient and don’t want to do something that will not fit within the commuity.
-Twitter is not a search engine, but rather a Discovery Engine. News is breaking first on Twitter and people are realizing this. (Side note: Jack Dorsey goes to the NY Times for his news after checking the Twitter trending topics.)

Bonnie Fuller:
-People feel that there is an enormous need to be a star in their own lives. Reality shows aren’t needed when you have Twitter. You can do it there.

Alan Murray:
-There is a skill set needed for online. A certain attitude and personality is needed to write in this fashion.
-The Wall Street Journal has one big DON’T when it comes to social media: Don’t be Stupid.
-If you’re Bob Woodward, you probably shouldn’t tweet you’re going to meet Deep Throat.

Nick Denton:
-There is value of producing something original. It’s fantastic. People gather around original content because it’s so scarce.
-Gawker is Ivy Leage and Hipster gossip.
-I’m not selling Gawker Media.

Craig Newmark:
-I’m the Forrest Gump of the Internet.
-Trust is the new black. I read the New York Times because I trust their fact checking and sources.

This article is copyright © 2010 

Last night I had the pleasure of speaking at the Facebook Developer Garage hosted at The Sullivan Room. This meant a lot to me as I had spoken at the very first Garage here in New York two years ago hyping up the newly developed The Lotto application that we had built and wanted to meet with the up and comers. In fact, it’s where I met a former Carrot employee and one of my closest friends today.

Last night, when the opportunity to speak came about we jumped on it immediately. Sure, we knew everyone would be talking about Facebook Connect, the API…all the stuff developers want to know. But, from a business standpoint, the conversations we are having with brands and the need for custom Fan Pages is a topic that needed to be discussed.

Fan Pages are so important. We’ve blogged about them here. I’ve tweeted about it. Our clients are making kick ass strides in the space. As I said last night (in between telling the crowd to “STFU”) I highlighted the importance of claiming your brand on Facebook. Facebook Fan Pages are becoming the go to sites for brands to send their consumers too. It’s not the main websites anymore, it’s Facebook.

Other topics I discussed:

• Get a vanity URL. Contact Facebook and ask them for it. We did it. Check it out: http://www.facebook.com/CarrotCreative
• Keep the fan page exciting-content is key here. You need to have a calendar of updates ready to be pushed out to your fans. They expect that. Whether or not you’re syncing up Twitter or a blog feed, uploading new videos every week, the content needs to be timely and updated.
• Analytics. Facebook has one of the most unique analytic reporting systems around. Use them to monitor the growth. You’ll be surprised at all you can find out from these stats and how important they are to the client. Knowing that there was a spike in traffic based on a campaign provides ROI reasoning and important lessons to be learned for the next round of outreach.
• Watch how your fans are interacting. Our good friends at The Onion sent over some really cool stats for the presentation about the interaction on their page. Did you know that there are over 260,000 fans, approximately 5,000 interactions per day and a lot more liking than commenting than wall posting? Bonus Cool fact: People love to tag The Onion photos with themselves or made up people/information.

Thanks again to Andrew Cherwenka from Trapeze for getting us on the panel and to Facebook for the support of the Garage. This event is something we look forward to every year where we can hear the exciting stuff being worked on by some of the smartest folks in the industry. (Side note: AppSavvy was a bit self promoting for this crowd. This event is the time to learn, not promote as mentioned in the initial outline of the event. This is not the place to hype up what you’re doing and I think the crowd picked up on it.)

If we didn’t get a chance to meet, become a fan of Carrot Creative on Facebook and let’s hang out there. Or, send me a shout on Twitter.

This article is copyright © 2010