realweenie

The Man Who Has Something To Say

I would like to make an important announcement here on the hot dog stand cleverly disguised as a blog.  I think I may have gotten that backward but it really doesn't matter.

If you don't know Jeff Turner . . . . I have no idea how to complete that sentence.  The purpose of this post, which I am publishing at 10:40 CST (that is the current time in fly over land where all the really boring people live) is to share with you Jeff's thoughts over the last 22 hours.  Follow the links and you can see more of Jeff and hear what he has to say about some of his many thoughts:

  Here is my cup, put some kool aid in it:
Overdressed for Seesmic
Re: Re: Re: Overdressed for Seesmic
. . an another
And More . .  

There is a gap in the broadcasts, we recently learned that Jeff sleeps for part of each 24 hour broadcast period.  He is working on recording his thoughts as he sleeps and looking for some technology that will broadcast them to the Internet so that we can stay updated at all times.

Here at the Real Estate Weenie, we are such fans of Jeff's that  we are working on turning Jeff's thoughts into a full length movie, or possibly an ebook.

Are we Sharing a Brain?

In the past couple of days I have read a few hundred blog posts.  My interests are pretty eclectic. 

The blogs I read cover real estate, local blogs, national news, science, photography, art, marketing, humor, writing, blogs and technology.  There is more . . .there are 90 million blogs . . .

I am not sure how to say this.  This post has been in draft format for a week now and keeps getting changed. 

There is an echo in the re-bloggoshere.  I small group of people who all interact with each.  There is a kind of common wisdom that we all write about and talk about concerning blogs and various web 2.0 tools.  It is nice to share a brain with so many others but I sometimes wonder if we would not be better off it we connected to people outside of the real estate industry.

I enjoy interacting with my peers, and plan to continue,  but I need to interact more with people who live in St. Paul if I want my business to grow.  If I want to expand my mind I need to interact with people in other industries and those who offer fresh perspective, or better yet a different point of view.  As I read blog posts I hear my own thoughts being echoed back to me, and I crave a new conversation.

When it comes to educational opportunities I face a kind of dilemma.  I greatly enjoy the interaction with others in the industry but I end up listening to a presenter echoing the same ideas I have had and tried.  I sometimes pick up a new idea or thought but usually gain more from talking to others and asking them questions than I do from the seminars or panel discussions. 

One of the people I share a brain with apologized for sounding arrogant and then went on to tell me that he is not finding much value in some of the educational offerings because they echo what he has already learned. He did not sound arrogant and I was relieved to hear that there are others on the planet who share my desire for education and new information.

My point with this is that I think it is good that we learn so much from each other, and it is nice to share a brain, as a friend of mine said recently "my best ideas come from other peoples brains", But the world is much bigger than the collective and we should not limit ourselves. We need to branch out a bit and learn more from other industries and from consumers and share our brain and collective knowledge with them.

Please see a related post by Todd Carpenter: I Fear you're underestimate my geekiness sir  Since Todd confessed on his blog I can say that he is the friend who apologized for sounding arrogant.  Todd is not arrogant by any stretch of the imagination. He is a geek though . . and I am not. :) LOL

A Video

This isn't really my style but I do love this video and have to share.  I think there are some interesting points in it about how we use the internet.

Who Influenced me in 2007?

I thought I would wait awhile before I posted this.  I am honored to have been included in the Inman News to 25 most influential bloggers in 2007.   

I read Todd Carpenters post, Todd is also one of the 25, and he listed people who influenced him.  Greg Swann, another of the top 25, wrote a post about how he was influenced by Dustin Luther.  I agree with Todd and Greg that these real estate bloggers are influential but they are not the bloggers who have had the most influence on me.  When I started my blog I did not know about them.  It is understandable, considering I am here in fly-over land and never heard of many of the greats until I was well established and not as easily influenced. (I am not easily influenced)

There are two women real estate bloggers who have influenced me the most this past year, and I don't think either of them has been writing a blog as long as I have been writing mine.  It is who they are, what they do, and what they write that I respect.  I see them as positive role models for real estate bloggers and for real estate practitioners.  I am first and foremost a real estate practitioner.

Our industry is fairly male dominated as is the world of blogs, which is one of the many reasons I decided to write about two women who have a positive influence on me and on many others.

Lenn Harley
Lenn has and does influence many.  It is because of her expertise in real estate, her amazing writing skills, and her willingness to share her knowledge with others on blogs and in forums.  One of the things I admire the most about Lenn is that she is not afraid to say what she thinks and what she thinks, is usually dead on.  She is smart, entrepreneurial and knows what she wants.  I called her one day last spring and told her that I am a major fan.  I asked her some questions and she gave me some great advice.  My goal is to take my own business to the same level as Lenn has taken hers. 

  Linda Davis
Linda is special.  It isn't just her wit and sense of humor that I appreciate.  Linda like Lenn is a true professional.  She spends time educating and helping other agents.  She not only has a blog about her market area and home town of Ledyard, CT, but she is also on the city council.  No half way for this lady, she is committed all the way and gives selflessly to her community and to the Realtor community.  She seems to have an unlimited amount of energy has she attends conferences, speaks on panels and takes a leadership role in several organizations.

There are others in my life who have influence, if you don't see your name here it is becasue I started with a list of 12, tried to get it down to 1, but ended up with two.  We all need to find inspiration and positive role models in our lives.  I am lucky that I found these two.

Ladies I do apologize for putting you on this evil blog cleverly disguised as a hot dog stand but Linda you do use the word "crap" in blog posts and Lenn,  . . . nah I had better not . . . :)

Found in the Re- Blogoshpere

The lovely and talented Jennifer Klausen of the Arlington Dirt blog, has red toenails and wears pink flip flops.  She took a short vacation, and wrote a blog post about it.

Jennifer is special, oh well I guess we all are in are own way.  She lives inside my computer, I like to think she is real.  When I saw the toenails I decided that she is real.  She leaves wonderful comments on my blog, which is why I wasn’t sure if she is real.  I think everyone who reads this should go to her blog and comment on her toenails.

Found on the Internet

Goodbye, Twitter. 03:17 PM September 25, 2007 from twitterrific

This cryptic message was left on Twitter on September 25^th.  I can only speculate as to what kind of twitteriffic experience led Jeff Turner to put this out there for his 73 followers.  We all mourned his departure from 3:17 PM, until 3:19 PM and then realized that we had to get on with out lives and get used to the idea of not twittering with Jeff.   

This evening I was greeted with this:

Some days I feel guilty about not twittering with my buddies, but I have to sit at a computer to do it.  If I remember to update it I often send a text message from my phone. 

Last night I logged into Twitter.  I now have some stalkers, Kristal Kraft, and Linda Davis:

 

If you have no idea what I am talking about, you are very lucky.  If you would like to find out visit Twitter, my twitter updates appear in facebook and on AllTAllDay.com, my mobile phone blog, and of course on Twitter.  I don’t twitter much, I go for weeks and no one hears a peep out of me.

 

 

Prostitution on the Internet

This is one of those very rare times when I won’t include  a picture with my post.

I do admire the way the Active Rain network supports freedom of speech.  On the other hand I wouldn’t want my local content right out there with posts like this one:Indian Escort

There really isn’t a need for me to say more.  The post has been flagged by members of the network but it will most likely remain on the Rain.

The post was taken down about an hour after I wrote this.  Jonathan Washburn of Active Rain stopped by to say Hah!

Jon, I took a screen print

(Click on print to make it larger)

Thanks for taking it down.  It was posted at 2:30 this morning.  It was up until this post was written.  There has to be a way to monitor the network without inhibiting freedom of speech.  The post was flagged by members the first time I saw it early this morning, yet it remained up.