That INDIE Dude

Leadership: Motivation and Focus

Alex — Tue, 08 Dec 2009 12:45:18 +0000

It’s stinkin’ TOUGH to be a good leader.

From setting a good example to making the difficult decisions - good leaders are worth their weight in gold. But even beyond those things, one of the toughest responsibilities a leader will ever have to bear is his**(footnote below) constant self-assessment. A leader always has to not only make sure he’s the right person for the position, but also make sure he remains the right person.

In order to be best leader possible, one of the most important things a person can do is to accurately assess both their motivations and their focus. Both motivation and focus can be looked at from an “external vs internal” scale.

We can be externally motivated: flying on the whims of others, only caring what our bosses think of us, trying to keep everyone happy so we keep safely in our current position.

Or internally motivated: striving for personal growth, steady in our personal confidence, setting our own goals.

Likewise, we can be internally focused: Making every move in an effort to get ourselves in the spotlight, and hopefully in line for a new promotion.

Or externally focused: Striving for what’s best for the team, the biz, the family, the whole.

So where should our ideal leader fit? Internally Motivated and Externally Focused, of course! That’s the perfect leader: never shaken by outside commotion, goal-driven, and focused on what’s best for everyone.

Afterall - if it’s really good for the team, it should be good for the individuals too, right?

So take a few minutes and walk through your day for some common tasks at work - both the ones you love doing and the ones you hate doing. Where are you on the scales of motivation and focus?

I usually find myself just barely into the “Internal Motivation, External Focus” (IE) category.

Once in a while, though, I admit it - I get a fever for the spotlight a little too much and start focusing more on me than the whole. Sometimes this is OK because I’m working solo. Sure, I should be concentrating on the goals of the project at hand, but a little inward competition never hurt anyone, right? But it’s tough (and important) to leave that internal competition and glory behind when it crosses from motivation to focus.

One place where this happens for me is in the creative or performing arts. I love feeling the spotlight hit me for a minute. And when it does, why not concentrate on shining and snagging some attention! I deserve it for a good show, right?

I may or may not, but that’s beyond the point. By that time, my focus has switched to me, and I’m performing with a whole different focus in mind - personal glory rather than what’s best for everyone. The difference is often subtle, but in the case of a team, it can be devastating.

I’m not an advocate of ditching internal focus altogether. For instance, you shouldn’t be focusing on anyone but you for your diet, exercise, personal relaxation time, and anything that is you time. But when you put yourself in the context of a team or other bigger idea, you have to give up your own glory for the good of the team.

The best way I’ve found to attack a habit like this one is to continually look at the big picture. When you step back out of your shoes and look at things from a distance, you quickly realize that some of the actions you’re taking at this point and time for short-hand gain could have detrimental effects to the overall scheme of things. As an example, take my current business start-up.

I’m in the process of working towards a pitch for start-up funding for a company I’m part of. We’re very fortunate to be part of a program by the name of Bizdom U. At the onset, I and my partners realized we would have to modify our idea heavily to stay part of the program because of funding restrictions and other guidelines. But we were all in from the onset. We realized our egos would take a little hit, and we wouldn’t be looking at the same get-rich-quick amount of funding we probably had in mind, but we also realized that the resources, training, and overall mindset we would gain from Bizdom were well worth it. And that we possibly had our heads in the cloud when we began

Taking this tip of stepping outside into someone else’s viewpoint can be extremely powerful. Another place where this affects me in some big ways is presentations. I love to be eccentric and energetic. I might look good by myself sometimes when doing it (and might not at others), but if I step into another person’s point of view, I usually realize pretty quickly that the contrast I provide to me teammates is too big and distracting at best. If I step things back a notch I don’t stand out, but my team ends up winning.

And the best part? In these situations the best thing for the team is usually also the best thing for YOU down-the-line.

Along the same lines, I periodically drop down from my internal motivation to an external one. If the heat is on too tight, I might compromise my goals just to make sure I get everyone smiling again. Who wants more confrontation than is necessary?

But it’s that attitude that lets the other party run important negotiations, and keeps us squandering chances to grow. I don’t think I’ve let it win out in any huge situations lately, but I used to do it constantly in web-design: letting clients walk all over me requesting additional modifications for free that cost me hours, and were never in the original contract. The result? Well, let’s just say I’m not a millionaire yet

This is another place where it doesn’t hurt to jump outside of the box for a moment, but do so with some specific goals in place. I’ve found that one of the most valuable things I can do is to make a list of needed steps or resources to reach my goals and continually update it until I meet those goals. Then I more quickly realize when I’m giving in too soon and neglecting those needs, and I can see that my instantaneous gain by letting outside motivations run my life is getting in the way of my big picture goals and values. These nearly compulsive lists are going save my life one day!

Keep the self-reflection going! Do you have any other suggestions for a leader to keep his motivation steadily internal and his focus external? Share them in the comments below!

**As usual, I’ll be using “he” to refer to the leader in question throughout this blog-post ONLY because it is a post of self-reflection, and when I check in the morning I usually find evidence that I’m male. If only it were easy enough to defeat the disease of sexism with a simple “s/he” in every reference, I would gladly comply - but alas I’ve found that only fuels the problem by drawing extra attention to it.

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Is something missing?

Alex — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 04:23:06 +0000

It might seem subtle, but there is a major difference between strengths and skills.

A few decades ago, developmental psychologists figured out that our personalities are formed at a VERY young age. That age is still debated on, but there’s a general consensus in the psychology community that our personalities are decided by the time we make it to high-school. After that, we’re virtually resistant to change. The only “changes” that occur are further emphasis or de-emphasis of existing personality traits that have already been decided.

In other words - you’re stuck with YOU.

This was a pretty big find which affected a lot of people - among those affected pretty severely were those personal development gurus. You know, those people who write books and put on seminars teaching you how to be the leader you’ve always dreamed of being. In fact, when the news of personalities being fixed at such an early age made it to the mainstream, those personal developers took a bit of flack. If your personality is already settled, then how can a person hope to develop into a better leader? Isn’t “leadership” a part of one’s personality?

There are probably a few more steps in between, but my knowledge of the story picks up with now-deceased Donald O. Clifton, who coined the “Strengths” movement in the early 1990’s. The Gallup Organization picked up on his ideas and put them to press and media in a big way throughout the 1990’s and 2000’s, and the movement is also carried on by personal development all-star Marcus Buckingham since his split from Gallup.

Mr. Clifton’s idea was pretty simple: Since personalities are virtually set in stone, stop trying to develop against them. Instead, find the strongest areas in every individual and focus there. A person’s strength areas might be pretty well set from early on, but that person can still go through a ton of development on skills in those areas.

The programs he went on to develop are known affectionately by millions throughout the world as StrengthsFinder and StrengthsQuest, and continue to be very effective. I’m a huge supporter of the Strengths movement, and definitely believer in “strengths first” development. In fact, I think everyone reading this should stop right now, and go pick up StrengthsFinder 2.0 at your local bookstore before reading any further.

Recently, though, I found myself in an interesting position - trying to reconcile two pretty big perceived differences in leadership development:

1) Psychology and tons of success over the last two decades point to a Strengths-focused approach being by far the best way to go.

2) I’m pretty lucky to be participating in an extremely successful leadership development program at a world-class company, and it’s focussed on making sure everyone who goes through rounds out 8 areas that they’ve identified.

My question: Don’t those conflict?

I started digging around and trying to come up with some rational explanation that BOTH of these programs are in the top tier of success stories in leadership development — and they both certainly are. After a lot of searching, I believe the difference comes in “strength” vs “skill”.

The Strengths approach identifies specific strength areas. Out of 34 strength areas, an official assessment will only divulge to you your top 5. This is true to form: if your greatest energy is spent developing your areas of strongest aptitude, then why should you even know where the other 29 areas stand in your list? 5 are more than enough areas to work on. For an example, here’s my list of 5 with a pretty short description:

INCLUDER - People who are especially talented in the Includer theme are accepting of others. They show awareness of those who feel left out, and make an effort to include them.

IDEATION - People who are especially talented in the Ideation theme are fascinated by ideas. They are able to find connections between seemingly disparate phenomena.

WOO - Woo stands for “Winning Others Over”. People who are especially talented in the Woo theme love the challenge of meeting new people and winning them over. They derive satisfaction from breaking the ice and making a connection with another person.

STRATEGIC - People who are especially talented in the Strategic theme create alternative ways to proceed. Faced with any given scenario, they can quickly spot the relevant patterns and issues.

INPUT - People who are especially talented in the Input theme have a craving to know more. Often they like to collect and archive all kinds of information.

A strength isn’t as much an individual thing you do well as it is an area of your personality — it’s a subset of things that you excel at.

In differentiation, the leadership training I’m taking part in right now focuses on a specific set of eight skills and developing those skills in individuals who make it through the program. Here are the eight:

Vision - The act or power of anticipating that which will or may come to be. A vivid, imaginative conception or anticipation.

Presence - The ability to project a sense of ease, poise, or self-assurance, esp. the quality or manner of a person’s bearing before an audience.

Adaptability - Ability to adjust oneself readily to different condition.

Deep Thinking - A plan, method, or series of maneuvers or strategy for obtaining a specific goal or result.

Personal Growth - A process in which someone passes by degrees to a more advanced or mature stage.

Living the Culture - The quality in a person or society that arises from a concern for what is regarded as excellent. The behaviors and beliefs characteristic of a particular group.

Talent Development - To allow and foster the growth of others to develop by education, demonstration, empowerment and support.

Communication Expert - The imparting or interchange of thoughts, opinions, or information by speech, writing, or signs.

Notice a difference? It took me a couple times through, but pretty soon I started noticing a few interesting differences. The second grouping isn’t about an area of aptitude as much as it is about a set of skills. Those skills fit within some strengths areas, but NOT vice-versa. On the flip side, the first grouping (my strength areas) and the rest of the strengths areas are about identification of potential, and not necessarily leadership. In fact, if I remember right the StrengthsFinder series designates 10 or so Strength areas (out of the 34 total) that are well-versed for leadership. Surprise surprise: those 8 skills of leadership identified in the second grouping fit nicely into the “leadership” strength areas.

Put more simply: the company owning this leadership training program are only letting people through their screening process and into the program if they already possess strength areas within those 10 or so leadership areas. They aren’t developing a leadership personality in a trainee — they are merely taking someone who is already a leader and helping them to hone skills they already have an aptitude for.

Read through my strengths areas again, and it’s pretty easy to see that most of those leadership areas already fit in my zones of aptitude. ”Vision” goes with my “Strategic” strength area. ”Presence” and “Communication Expert” go with my “WOO” strength area. ”Talent Development” and “Living the Culture” match up with “Includer”. ”Deep Thinking” with “Ideation”, and “Adaptability” with “Input”. ”Personal Growth” seems a skill from a mix of “ideation”, “strategic” and “input”. They’re all there, and all skill-areas I have an aptitude in. Maybe I do belong after-all! :)

I’ve cracked the code, so now I can start to see where I fit. Personally, I feel the leadership skills I see most present in myself are vision, communication expert, and adaptability. As my strengths areas suggest, I’m always collecting information (input) and figuring how everything is connected (ideation) and plays into the big picture (strategic). With all that info, and a gift for seeing connections current and present, I’m a born “visionary“. Those same skill-sets of always collecting information and figuring out how it relates and works with everything else have let me spend my life thus far doing what I felt like doing at the time: from electrical engineering, to religion and philosophy, to graphic design and web-development, and now onto business. I’m built to handle differing and multiple roles; to be “adaptable“. And, my other strength areas of “WOO” and “input” are both all about getting through to people - which is where the “communication expert” skill-set fits.

So which of those areas are potential target areas for improvement? Well, all of them - especially the ones just listed. Like I said earlier: I’m a huge proponent of concentrating on what you’re already wired for. But since, as I also mentioned earlier, everyone in the training is sort of pre-screened for those aptitudes, we’re all candidates to work on all 8 of those leadership skillsets. One that I know I’ll really need to develop soon is “Talent Development“. I have a great way with people as things are, but I’m pretty unexperienced at spotting potential in others and developing it further. I think I’ll excel at it — but it’s an area I definitely need to put a few extra hours of practice in at. Another I want to pay particularly close attention to is “Presence”. I’ve been a leader in tons of organizations and a public speaker on hundreds of occasions, but I fear I’ve developed some of my skills in the wrong direction. A background in preaching at church and debate competition have left me overly sensitive the message, and perhaps not sensitive enough to my audience.

For both, as with any skill, practice makes perfect. That has to be guided practice though: understanding what you’re working on and why you’re working on it. For me, knowing that these are areas in which I have an aptitude to improve is freeing in itself - I can be confident I’m working on these because they are skills that I CAN improve. Other than that, I need to be prepared through studying each skill so I know what I’m looking for to improve.

That’s my story. How about you? What are your strengths areas? Where do you know that you have potential, but still need to take the time to really concentrate on improving? Leave some comments below!

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MORE is NOT always better.

Alex — Fri, 09 Oct 2009 13:00:32 +0000

We live in a world of technical advancement - and it ROCKS.

I’m about as proud as a person can get to live in this generation. I’m pumped that my cellphone is more powerful than my computer was 10 years ago, and ecstatic that I’m connected to billions of other people over the internet wherever I go.

BUT - I’ve noticed a trend lately. Among the hundreds of thousands of new internet startups this year who just keep giving us more features and technical possibilities, most are forgetting something very important: simplicity. Developers and designers are dreaming up wonderfully technical fixes to complex problems, but as a wise mentor put it to me, they are forgetting to “Gump it up.”

For some, it isn’t affecting their acceptance very much yet because right now they are only aimed at a very technically savvy (and ambitious) crowd. A lot of us won’t rest until we’ve been through every settings menu to look for a way to do what we want to do. But just because we’re that energetic about our searches for features doesn’t mean we should have to be. No matter who the company - new, old, big, or small - everyone out there with any sort of user-interfacing needs to be on a constant search to make things easier, more efficient, and - well - gumpier.

This is the beginning of a series of posts exploring some high-profile internet startups with some huge promise, but a serious need to put themselves in a new user’s shoes. Have any suggestions for future posts? Leave a comment below!

Start-Up #1: Foursquare

Foursquare.com is making waves right now as a big potential player in the micro-blogging market, especially after Twitter-inventor Jack Dorsey made a substantial investment in them last month. It’s been called by some the first true evolution in micro-blogging. Sounds exciting right? That’s what I thought (and still do, to an extent). But, they suffer the standard tech problem: it’s another awesome web and mobile application with a serious need for simplification.

When I visited Foursquare.com for the first time a couple weeks ago, I was pretty excited. The graphics are slick, and everything looks about as simple as possible. The main page predominantly displays some huge text with a seemingly useful message:

Check-In

Find Your Friends

Unlock Your City

GREAT! Those sounded like awesome promises. I was ready to go, and doubly excited when I saw they have an app for my Android phone. So, I scrolled on down to see the live streaming updates. They looked something like this (with the bottom update added for emphasis):

I was expecting to see updates telling me about the hottest spots in town, reviews from my friends, and requests for meetups. Unfortunately, things weren’t that simple. I was a bit taken back by some odd mention of mayors and an “adventurer badge”. What’s going on? I looked around the page but didn’t see any explanation.

Point of Simplification #1: What the heck is this app, and why isn’t it explained on the front page? Give me an intro video, 3-steps to usefulness, or something else. I don’t want to click around to figure out how things work, and (worse yet) many will just leave if they don’t understand what they see.

So, I decided to give things a chance and sign-up. I figured that would at least be straight-forward and the interface should be easy enough to use and figure out how things work from there. So, I clicked “Join Now”.

In the sign-up process, I was a little taken-a-back when I saw that Foursquare was only available in 20 cities throughout the US. Luckily I’m in one of those cities (Detroit), but would have been a little bummed if I got that far and my city wasn’t in the list. I was one of the lucky ones able to keep going though.

After a few more clicks, I was signed up and logged in. I immediately saw a dashboard that looked like the screenshot below:

I know that shot is a little small, so I’ll explain: there was a Top-12 list, a To-Do list, several scorings, and a mention of “badges” and “mayorship” on the right.

What in the world? At this point I felt like I was from a different generation or something. I’m a tech-nerd, and I still didn’t have a clue what’s going on. I looked around for links to a “tutorial” or “how-to-use” video - with nothing in site.

Point of Simplification #2: Again - what is going on? I don’t have a CLUE (or any instructions) on how to use this. Foursquare: you have to spend a few bucks to put a how-to-use video up. PLEASE.

Because I was SO interested in the buzz around Foursquare, I kept going. I found the Foursquare app for my phone and installed it - hoping that would give me a clue. BUT, again, nothing resembling anything familiar, intuitive, or simple. It’s not that there were overwhelming options like some apps, it’s just that I had NO idea what the few available options did. There was a list of local places and a map supposedly showing my friends (none shown - I’m a newbie), but nothing else.

I decided to try clicking my menu button, and up popped a couple options to add a new place. I was at a coffee-shop not already list, so I added it. That was simple enough, but once it was added I was again lost. I had the option to add a “tip” or “todo”. What are those? I didn’t want to give a tip — I wanted to leave a review!! And what’s a to-do?

Point of Simplification #3: The mobile app doesn’t give any clue on how to use it. Make some tool-tips or SOMETHING - just tell me what to do!

I still haven’t figured out exactly what this app does, but I’m still searching. It turns out that “tips” are something like reviews, but I’m still not sure about the to-do’s, badges, or mayorship. If I end up falling in love with this service, I’ll let you all know how great it is. But as it stands, this tech-nerd is just about scared away from using one of the supposed “next-big-thing” services.

The verdict: Foursquare needs some serious simplification and explanation.

If Foursquare really wants to be the “next big thing” in micro-blogging, they need to be as simple as Twitter’s original “What are you doing?”. Perhaps a “Where are you?” or, since Foursquare is built around auto-geolocation features, maybe a “How do you like ______?”

Whatever it is, there needs to be something to make it easy for every to start (and understand) in LESS than 3 or 4 steps - and it just isn’t happening yet.

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Entrepreneurship: A Few Benefits.

Alex — Thu, 24 Sep 2009 05:25:15 +0000

Why be an entrepreneur?

If you caught my earlier post, you read that I’m currently in the middle of a pretty big career shift from full-time free-lancer, to full-fledged entrepreneur. But why? What are the benefits? What’s in it for us entrepreneurs?

Before anything, let’s get one thing straight: if you’re doing it for the money, go elsewhere. Sure: every once in a while someone gets lucky with an idea and strikes it rich. But this is a possibility very different from the norm. The vast majority of entrepreneurs spend years of their life barely scraping by before even getting to a level of income that stops the debt from accumulating. Most entrepreneurs make substantially less than they would have made as an employee, and even those who eventually do strike it rich take decades to get to that point.

So if it isn’t the money, what is it?

#1) It’s a way to be leave your mark.

Even though we threw the whole selfish monetary gain thing out of the equation, you still stand to get some other recognition for making your biz go. IF you form a successful business, that probably means you’re finding a significant need somewhere and meeting it. Well, that need you recognized and fix you came up with could be YOUR legacy. To your children, your community, and whoever else. If you’re successful, you could definitely be looking forward to some media coverage, and maybe even an award or two. It’s OK to recognize the shallow selfish benefits as long as you see the big picture too. (That is, don’t start a company solely in hopes that you’ll be on the front-page of the paper… just be happy when you see your picture.)

#2) It’s a way to change and expand yourself.

In my last post, I gave out another one of my kooky theories on life: If you want to get more great ideas, you have to do something with the great ideas you already have. Call it satisfying the muse, call it Karma, or just call it coincidence - no matter what the reason, this is exactly how things seem to work. If you want your ideas to keep flowing, you have to make sure the old ones don’t go un-noticed or without value.

But that’s only one way you’ll be changing and expanding yourself. Entrepreneurship isn’t as much a career as it is a way of life: to an entrepreneur, their business ideas and execution are everything. They start seeing the world through the lens of their business, of risk management, of leadership skills, and CERTAINLY of the idealistic goals and dreams that led them to acting on their business idea in the first place. Living the life of an entrepreneur will teach you to overcome your fears, to stand firm during pressure, and to stay positive in the direst of situations. And if you have the thrill-seeking gene, you might need a good entrepreneurial challenge to keep you out of mischief

#3) It’s a way to change your community, and (possibly) the world.

Everyone has heard the old parable: “Bring a man a fish, and he’ll eat plentifully for one day. Teach a man to fish, and he’ll eat plentifully for the rest of his life.” Another way to say it is this: The only way to make real change in the world around you is if that change is economically sustainable. Replace that with your idea: what would a world look like where your plan could happen continually, because it was part of a profitable business capable of sustaining itself? Would that world be better place to it’s inhabitants? If so, you might have an idea worth pursuing.

Before you decide whether or not these benefits would be worth it, stay tuned for another list — the next one of a few of the not-so-desirable results of becoming an entrepreneur.

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STILL ALIVE!

Alex — Thu, 24 Sep 2009 02:47:15 +0000

Hey TID folks —

Believe it or not, I AM still alive I’ve just shifted off to a new phase of life, and this is my attempt to drag ThatIndieDude.com with me! Bare with me — I think it’s appropriate.

When I started TID, the goal was to focus on encouraging and inspiring independence and creativity. Here’s a quick refresher: Our 21st century world is largely one of just mundane improvements on the same-old-thing. That’s great: we need computers to continually get faster and cars to get better gas mileage. Unfortunately, it’s too pervasive. We also need ground-breaking, paradigm shifting innovation - and I’m afraid we’re too focused on the details to see those game-changing plans.

My goal with this blog was to explore and inspire that extra level - that creativity - in every area of life. I’m a firm believer that best way to make sure you are open and receptive to the muse of creativity and innovation is to appease it. That is, the way to get more great ideas is to do something with the great ideas you already have. That’s why I focus so much on independence from the man, the machine, and the societal & cultural expectations placed on us. The only way we get to act on our most creative moments is if we aren’t worrying about conforming to some set of norms.

Now that my little rant is over, here’s the shift that’s been happening in my life: I’ve been embracing that part about doing something with those ideas (no matter how small or BIG), and am redirecting my life from freelance artist to entrepreneur. I have a few ideas driving me crazy that are just too big for me to handle alone (and the muse keeps telling me they HAVE to be done). I’ve been accepted into Bizdom U and am currently training & learning from some of the best business minds in the world. The end goal is simple: I’m on my way to becoming equipped with the tools and skills to make some big ideas happen (and hopefully make the world better for at least a few people in the process). Oh - and snag some funding too

As a result, you’ll be seeing some changes around here. TID will be getting a face-lift in the next few weeks, and a good portion of my articles will shift a little bit more in the business direction. Don’t worry: I’m still an artist and designer to the core - I’m just finding a slightly different way to execute on those whispers from my muse. Stay tuned, and as always: feel free to leave some comments below!

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A Twitter Scavenger HUNT!

Alex — Sun, 22 Mar 2009 21:10:21 +0000

Hey everybody!

It’s been a long time with not many updates, but I’m in the process of ramping up to a complete VERSION 2.0 relaunch in APRIL! Woo HOO! We’ll have a renewed focus on promoting independent artists and their work.

In celebration, we’re sponsoring a Twitter SCAVENGER HUNT with a big PRIZE over at Tweet-A-PRIZE! We’re excited, and you should be too. Unfortunately, the deadline is in 2 and a half hours (7:30 PM EST) so run over there and enter NOW!

Oh, and you’ll need this - THE LAST CLUE: Clue #2-10: TID #Tpclue.

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Operation: BOMB iTunes.

Alex — Mon, 19 Jan 2009 07:22:39 +0000

Sure, I’m biased. I play bass for the band.

That doesn’t change the fact, though, that what we’re trying to do has the chance to have a huge impact on Independent music EVERYWHERE.

Two weeks ago my band, The Eastern Gate, released our first album on Amazon MP3. It had been a long delay, and due to financial reasons we weren’t even able to get the album mastered. We were all out of energy on the project, so the only promotion we did was the day of the release, and amounted to setting up a MySpace page and a Facebook event. We expected maybe a few would notice the event and buy the album. A few did.

Soon, those few had not only listened to our sample tracks and bought the album, but they’d also told all of their friends. Apparently some of those friends also told their friends too. By 6PM we were at #200 on the Amazon MP3 Top Selling Albums of the day. To put that in perspective, we ended the day right below “Elvis’ Greatest Hits” and right above “Hot Fuss” by “The Killers”.

Let me say that again. We ended the day ABOVE “Hot Fuss” by “The Killers”.

Other bands we were beating out? To name a few: “Master of Puppets” by “Metallica, “Rattle and Hum” by “U2″, and “Hotel California” by “The Eagles”.

Somehow, the word-of-mouth of our friends and fans was more powerful than the multi-million dollar marketing machine of the record labels owning those albums.

Well, as you’ve probably gathered, I have a theory that word-of-mouth is back to stay. That “somehow” is the internet and other connected technologies. As long as we can all communicate with each other in near real time, we can create that explosive mob-mentality. And with the current set of those connected technologies, we are ALL potentially connected at a moments notice.

Unfortunately, not everyone gets it yet, though. People with amazing abilities are working other jobs full-time just to get by, because they can’t make any money off of their true talent. Bands that “have what it takes” are still signing contracts with big record labels that only give them 10% of their sales. Sometimes they aren’t even allowed to play their own music if they don’t get the label’s OK.

Well, as far as I’m concerned, it has to stop. It isn’t a technological barrier anymore, it is an ignorance barrier. Put bluntly - the general population still doesn’t believe an artist can make it or is worth buying if they aren’t backed by a mega marketing machine.

I say it’s time to change that. All we need is proof.

Today — Monday, January 19th, 2009 — The Eastern Gate is attempting to rewrite the history books for independent music EVERYWHERE. We’re going to BOMB iTunes.

For the last four or five days we’ve been gathering as many people as we can to buy the album from the world’s most-watched music retailer (iTunes) on THE SAME DAY. By telling everyone we can, and getting them to tell everyone they know, we’re hoping good ol’ word-of-mouth will put us on the iTunes Top 100 Albums Chart. If this happens, we have a story worth repeating. We’ve proved that Amazon wasn’t a fluke, and that an indepedent artist really can go from no-name to chart-busting in a matter of weeks without the backing of a record label.

That is the type of story that encouragement and hope for other artists is made from.

So, here’s the question: will you help us?

Check out our website and listen to our tunes. If you like what you hear, will you tell others and consider buying the album?

Thanks for listening. Vids below.

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NEW DIRECTION for T.I.D.

Alex — Mon, 19 Jan 2009 04:14:53 +0000

Hey everybody!

It’s a new year, and That INDIE Dude has a new-years resolution: Make supporting indepedent artists and work a NUMBER 1 priority.

This was a no brainer for me — I’ve been having some problems keeping up to date on T.I.D. because of some cognitive conflict on direction. We’ll see if this helps

Look for updates to come supporting that new direction. We’re going to start interviews & other community dialogs to support independent artists, aim tutorials and roundups DIRECTLY at an independent lifestyle, and help the TID community interact a lot easier so they can use each other as resources. Awesome!

So, stay tuned — the first post in that direction is coming in an hour or two.

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LAUNCH: WeDesignChange.org

Alex — Wed, 22 Oct 2008 20:57:51 +0000

Today is a pretty big day.

Why? Because I’m launching my first non-profit project: We Design Change

After being involved in Blog Action Day 2008, I became pretty inspired by the huge levels of cooperation, networking, and just plain creativity throughout the blogosphere, but ESPECIALLY throughout the design communnity. We banded together over Twitter, we networked to keep our stories popular, we used our design skills to draw tons of attention to big issues, and we made our corners of the world look beautiful.

After seeing this awesome potential within the design community, I thought to myself that this HAS to be tapped and our efforts combined more often. We Design Change is the result of that realization.

We Design Change is all about bringing the creativity of designers and artists out there together for common causes. It’s a place to find fellow community members who want to use their creative skills to make a difference, network with them, and make something happen. It’s also a place to share what is already happening so we can inspire each other and get more people aboard our causes.

We Design Change, put simply, is a place for creatives who want to change the world.

So what are you waiting for? If you’re a designer, an artist, or just someone who considers themselves pretty darned creative, head over there NOW and become part of the community!

Right now we’re in community building phase. That means we just want to get as HUGE of a network together as possible. That means we need YOU, and every other creative you know. Spread the word! Things are focused around the members and community submitted links right now, but watch for more organization as things grow! Events, causes to hook up with, groups of designers working on specific projects, and more.

Thank you to Collis and all the people over at Blog Action Day — you guys put together a force to be reckoned with this year.

Thank you to everyone who participated in Blog Action Day — you’ve inspired me tremendously.

And THANKS especially to YOU: my reader — you’ve consistently made my dreams come true: through all your awesome comments and encouragement, the steadily growing number of daily readers at That INDIE Dude, and your INCREDIBLE response to my Blog Action Day Challenge.

Now it’s time for one more dream. But if this one goes well, it’ll hopefully have some influence on making YOUR dreams for a better world come true too!

Feel free to yell if you have any questions. And don’t forget to sign up and spread the word. No commitment, no requirements, just a common goal to use our creativity to make a difference.

-Alex

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B.A.D. Challenge donation: $123!

Alex — Wed, 22 Oct 2008 20:15:22 +0000

Remember that Blog Action Day Challenge? Well, Congrats: it came out to $123!

Sorry it’s taken so long to get the totals! I’ve been having some issues getting the true numbers for my RSS subscribers and new Twitter followers. It turns out FeedReader doesn’t keep any sort of accurate RSS reader totals — just a number that bounces depending on access to the feed. So, to correct for that, I’m going to take the HIGHEST RSS subscriber total I’ve seen in the last week (51) and use that.

So, here’s what the breakdown looks like:

TOTAL RSS Subscribers: 51
NEW Twitter Followers: (current [133] - starting [61]) = 72
Total money to donate: $123

Congratulations. This is your donation as much as mine. A big shout out to all the new followers and subscribers that made this happen!

I’ll be writing the check and handing it over to the Hillsdale County Salvation Army branch in the next couple days. I’ll try to get some pictures or videos to put up here when I do

FINALLY, I was so inspired by Blog Action Day I’ve been working on a little (ok, actually it is really BIG) side project. Stay tuned: I’ll be inmasking it in my next post (later today).

Thanks again!

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