Similar to the music, movie & publishing industries, the news industry appears to be well, done and quite over...

Just as entertainment industry is now locked in it's decades long and agonizing rebirth, and has long lost its grip over production and distribution... what makes the news industry believe it can maintain its hold over our airwaves, Facebook or Twitter feeds let alone maintain editorial control in this post-blog-o-sphere world? The "newsies" now finds themselves either colluding with their subjects or pathetically griping over lost market share to the plethora of all our other new news sources. 

In this delusional state "the press" lays licking the wounds it can no longer admit are, nor even perceive as fatal.

C'mon you good people of these inner-nets of ours. There has to be a business model, No? Perhaps these ancient old mastheads simply become the new news verification service; maybe they simply provide us a rubbery-stamp of validity, perhaps even just help us paint this din of opinion in colors that help us mix 'n match our favorite flavors to compliment the mad choices in our morning bean.

Of course this would not allow for the billion-dollar publishing houses NOR the rock-star journalist (sorry Wolf Anderson)... but maybe, just maybe there is a business model out there that can help stitch this together and aid in our cutting through the crap and put a few pennies into the pockets of the last of the very few people who, thankfully, are still out there and ready to give us "the story" - at least their sound interpretation of it.

Ideas?

So, here's the little "in progress" mid-streamer update on this "wish it were more of a" side, be less of a shitty twitter'er - project.

"You got to get to 10,000 followers :)" 
-signed (txt'ed) from a trusted, supremely talented and accomplished business man; a mentor and life long friend of mine.

Anxiety? How could a number-junkie excel-addict not be anxious over… his number?

So, you see… regardless of how well intended we are in expressing this, "it's all about engagement", the importance, our K-redability et al appears to be established almost solely by, that damned NUMBER. It would seem even the brightest among us eventually easy-out and focus on that one damned NUMBER, how many? How many friends does he have; how many connections. How many likes has he collected, how many followers… It's the easy damned NUMBER, the number that's not all that easy to achieve now that billions are seeking it.

For sure… I could simply go out and buy 5, 10, 15… 30,000 Russians and simply to put a big fat (K=1,000 times X) in my followers count. It wouldn't even be cheating, might have an upside, but it would be completely counter to the spirit of my mantra, "it's simple, not easy". You see, I hold the word "simple" far too dearly to waste it trying to make something, easier. Slog-on and enjoy, the slog I say.

By way of a quick and dastardly, backhanded aside; funny how nature dictates the loudest of those touting "its all about the engagement" are those with the biggest NUMBERs...

The NUMBER vs. the ENGAGEMENTs

The stated objective of this little project being... push this channel until I reach 2,000 was set, more to establish a time line rather than to seek the NUMBER itself. SO yes, I'm driven to reach this number. Driven, primarily as I'd rather finish this off and focus on other things. How's it going? Well, it's going brilliantly actually; and here's why...

1) I've met the collolry objective of "dusting" off the tools in the old toolbox, and have given myself the good reason to explore new ones...

2) focussing on engagement in pursuit of the NUMBER has actually lead to near a dozen or so fair engagements and one true assignment; I'll nurture the former and pursue the latter with vigour 

3) eh… the number is going up, weee! (I am a number-junkie after all, and as such, I enjoy counting by ones as much as 5s, 10s and 100Ks)

...here are some additional spin-offs.… ON K-redibility. 

Funny how we're responding to Klout & Kred scores. These number are likely more important than, the count, the number itself - Yet we all publicly cringe at the mere mention of these scores, hide and/or hold them close. Is it modesty or is it simply we don't understand, trust or are just plain old ashamed of what we may have had to do to grow them? (More thinking on this K-redibility, is, in the works).

As a another spin-off benefit to this "it's not about the numbers" be less a shitty twitter'er project; my Klout and Kreds are going uppity-up. I guess that's only a good thing right. Maybe even more of a good thing when I'm actually allowed to wave 'em around, tattoo 'em on my resume and/or paste them to the footer of my "not a blog", site… whatever.

I am certainly suspicious of the weighting both these scoring tools, in so much as my K-redibility scores have gone UP while I've been focussing almost exclusively on Twitter,at the expense of being formerly far more active on Facebook and Linkedin (I need interns! and not just for typos, spelling and grammer). 

…and then, there are a few unexpected spin-offs by way of: Pinterest & Instagram (which, I'll get to later)

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This is just a mid-streamer… In the original post, I mentioned my hope in my having my ah-ha moment, haven't yet. I'm simply suspending my mis-beliefs again; diving back into where I shouldn't have slinked out of; holding my nose and taking on this Twittering with a little more vigour and a, let's call it a renewed, bight and shiny attitude. I've reminded myself of how it's to be used. Re-learning can be as rewarding as learning after all. That said, sure I'm dusting off the old tools, but… indeed I've found some new ones too.

…and there'll be a lot more about this and that when I finally hit that 1/5th fraction of the damned NUMBER (my good friend) wants to see at the wrap of this adventure. (10,000/5 = yup, 2,000)

AND so... (my friends): If the sheer volume of my posts are annoying you… simply, work your lists better (I know, its not easy).

Update: March 8th (International Women's Day)... I now find myself at that awkward moment where I cannot follow all those I would like as I need keep room for following those who choose to follow... No worries, I've put you on a list; I'll get to following you again once I break free of these Twitter limitations.