Musicians and LinkedIn

I've been thinking about this over the last couple of days. Suffice to say my buddy and colleague, Rahsun McAfee has me inspired.

Why dont musicians use LinkedIn to their advantage. I know the site touts itself as being for the working professional (i.e. programmers, business nerds, and other suits), but think about it. Who is looking for a job ("gig") more often than the working musician. And where is the the value of networking EFFECTIVELY more prominent.

I've been a musician for nearly 12 years now, and I've played in bands that played in good shows, crappy shows, and more basements than I care to remember. I have seen how much having "friends" in the industry count for. But let's get one thing straight, a friend on MySpace counts for little more than an online doorstop when it comes to a band really being successfull. The best of the best MySpace friends MIGHT come to a show, but chances are, those are also your real life friends, who are gonna support you anyway.

What I think musicians can profit from regarding LinkedIn are the real movers and shakers within the industry. I wanna see who booked you for that show with the national artist that more than helped sell out the venue. I wanna see who recorded that demo that got you that show. And I wanna see who designed the t-shirt that you you sold at that sold out show...that you coincidently ran out of before I got one. There is value in those names.

Musicians have the benefit of an ingrained community behind them when they go out to a club. Why cant they make this work for them online, where the tools are already in place. Albeit a little more than scattered. Granted it takes a bit of a culture change. First bands have to create their profiles, make the band a company, and make sure the members all have their own profiles. Then you gotta get the people you work with (like your booking agents, merch designers, and producers/engineers) to sign up. But with a little work, you can give the value of a thriving community an exponential push that can be easily monitized. You might even be able to leverage it for that big break everyone needs to pay the bills.

Out of Hiding

It's been nearly a year since I last posted, and I'm just glad I remembered my login info. On the bright side I can say that I haven't been absent for nothing.

In the last year I started my contract with AJC, and after three months they took me perm. All I can say is, it's very different working within a large development group compared to freelance design. I've learned a lot of new skills, touched up on some oldie but goodies (javascript, I'm looking at you), and met some very talented people.

I'm not really sure how I can summarize an entire year into one post, but here goes nothing.

Worked with a million vendors, wrote code, maintained code, came back and rewrote some more code. Design debt sucks. Trained in Django, trained in Rails, practiced standards, and learned more javascript. Became confident in my position here, and started arguing design philosophy and usability best practices. Won some and lost some, but for all the debates, all the work came out better in the end. Built a rails site, built a CSS framework, reworked the framework, and reworked the framework some more. Decided I don't really like CSS frameworks, but sometimes they do help a lot.

Somewhere along the line I started meeting with the bosses' boss and pushing our agenda. I have to admit I like being in contact with the higher ups. It reminds me of freelance work, at least in the sense of having close contact with the clients. I think the work gets done quicker, and with less revisions that way.

This has been a rather rambling post, but cut me some slack. It's been a year... and a busy one at that. My resolution is to post more frequently.

Oh, I'm on Twitter and LinkedIn now too.

A Happy Turn of Events

Well, after two surprisingly short weeks of online tech screens, late night and early morning interviews, and getting run through the technical ringer by some of the brightest people I've had the pleasure of being run through the ringer by... I have officially accepted a position with the Atlanta Journal and Constitution.

I'll be working on standards based XHTML, CSS, and every other technology I can either get my hands on, or con someone into teaching me. It is going to be a great opportunity for me to work in a team with other people who seem very passionate about the same things I am. And more importantly, a great opportunity to learn some new tricks.

HeadWeight Design also has some very interesting projects in the works, and I am hoping to have some new stuff to put on display rather shortly.

The Power of the Blog

I have been pondering what to write about for the last few days. I updated the CSS for this site, setup FTP publishing, added new content, and revised old content. Then I got hit with writer's block. Isn't that how it always works? Ah well, better writer's block than designer's block I suppose.

This morning I went to check the site stats on Google Analytics, and I'm looking at hits coming from all over the world. This is a new occurance, and it pleases me. The best part is, they're looking at all the pages rather than just index.html.

I stopped to ponder what it was that caused this revolution of traffic to my "just recently budding" blog. Could it be the nifty new header image complete with pirate ship AND non-specific location of "internet booty"? Doubtful. I noticed that a hefty percentage of my traffic is coming from www.zeldman.com. I made a couple of comments on his blog a day or so ago, and apparently, when the whole sum of bloggers say "the comment is the lifeblood of the blogosphere", they REALLY mean it. Granted, I'm new at this whole blogging thing, but I think it would be in my best interests to keep it up.

HeadWeight 2.0

Well, I spent the weekend (sans Mother's Day) getting my blog integrated into my website and making the whole thing look nice and pretty. The resume has been updated, and the portfolio has been spit-shined too. I still have some designs for print to upload, but I will most likely do that this evening. I really like the direction that my work has taken with these last two sites.

Windy Hill Chiropractic has a great layout and the feedback so far has reflected a great flow of information.

This site could not have come out better in my opinion. I've always had trouble designing with myself as the client, but I am actually elated with the outcome. I feel the brand is very well represented. I wanted to communicate something that eye catching but also minimalist in a way. I also wanted to transfer a bit of my personality into the design itself. I was going for something was witty and clever. Let me know if you think I achieved that.

For the new incarnation of HeadWeight Design I subscribed to a stockphoto gallery. I figured I would give them a quick plug. Fotolia has a great interface and a huge supply of photos with great licensing option. Check it out if you need high quality images for print or web.