Posts from February 2007

We landed in denver at noon today and boarded a puddle jumper to aspen. Just as we were about to pull away from the gate, the pilot canceled the flight because of high winds. The flight was going to be extremely bumpy and there was a good chamce we couldn’t land in aspen

I was down that decision but when we got back into the terminal, the customer service line was two hours long and we found out that every flight to aspen was overbooked for the next 36 hours and that I70 was closed through the vail pass due to blowing snow and high winds

I saw a couple headed off with a United customer service person so I made Jessica wait in line for me and walked over to them Turns out United had a bus full of people from earlier flights headed to Aspen. I asked if there were any seats left and they said five. I told them I had five people going to aspen and she said to grab our bags and come with her

The gotham gal was working on another plan which was to hire a car service to take us up to Aspen when I70 reopened but she did as ordered by the customer service person and quickly we were all on a bus headed to aspen

The driver knew a back way around the vail pass and so off we went. Well it turns out this back way is a seven hour detour through the heart of the rockies

Beautiful country but not what the gotham gal and my kids had in mind this evening

To make matters worse, I just got an email from my friend david who scored me a ticket to see arcade fire tonight at judson church saying ‘I just saw the next great rock band’ Ugh

Anyway, we’ll be in aspen in a couple hours but my family may not talk to me for the rest of the weekend

When travelling I always follow the rule ‘when the train leaves the station, get on it’.Who knows if it was the right call tonight, but that’s what I did.

There’s been a ton of conversation on this blog and elsewhere about how to monetize web video.

I am not a fan of pre-rolls. I think they will cause many of the viewers to move on before ever getting to the video they wanted to watch. Post-rolls are also problematic because many web videos are not watched through until the end. Mid-stream or mid-rolls are more interesting to me and will probably emerge as an important monetization system over time. But the technology to do streaming ads/mid-rolls isn’t widely available yet.

So what to do if you’ve got a hot web video property and want to monetize it?

I really like what Wallstrip did today with Lifelock.

This harkens back to 1950s TV (the show itself harkens back to 1970s TV). Lifelock got a blipvert (the 3 second pre-roll ala YouTube) and then branding throughout the show. And then a post-roll which could have and should have been way more informative than it was. After seeing Lifelock all over the show for four minutes, I was wondering what they do. Lifelock provides indentity theft protection. I could have used 15 or 30 seconds on that at the end with no problem.

But this is an approach that makes a lot of sense to me. It’s not automated. It doesn’t scale. It can’t be targeted. And so it has it’s limitations. But for where we are right now in the world of web video, it’s a pretty clever model.

If you want to advertise on Wallstrip like Lifelock did, contact Howard. I am sure he’ll be happy to hear from you.

  When Craft? 
  Originally uploaded by fredwilson.

‘wichcraft opened its first store around the corner from our office here on Broadway and 21st about three years ago. I used to eat there at least once a week. I loved the sandwiches and the laid back vibe of the place.

Over the past year, ‘wichcraft expanded all over the city to midtown (46th and 5th), Tribeca (corner of Beach and Greenwich), Bryant Park, West Chelsea (269 11th Ave), The Village (Eighth Street and Broadway), and Soho (corner of Crosby and Prince). They’ve also expanded to San Fransciso and Las Vegas.

But they closed the initial location well over a year ago and I’ve been at a loss to replace them in my weekly lunch routine.

Late last year, right underneath my office window, I saw a ‘wichcraft flag go up and got really excited. ‘wichcraft is opening right next door on 20th Street between 5th and Broadway.

But as each week goes by, I see no activity that gives me comfort that my favorite sandwiches are coming back. I am now calling this store whencraft.

Did you ever see The Shawshank Redemtion? If not, go add it to your Netflix queue asap.

Anyway, Tim Robbins’ character writes a letter every week to the state legislature asking them for more books for the prison he’s in. He never gets a reply. But he keeps sending them. Every week, week after week. Eventually, he gets his reply.

I was reminded of that when I read this incredibly inspiring post by Andy Monfried who obtained redemption in the same way. Give it a read. It will lift you up this morning in case your morning cup of coffee didn’t do the trick.

Ted Stevens, one of the leading Republican Senators, has sponsored a bill that seeks to ban social networks, blogs, and wikipedia from schools and libraries.

The user generated web is the future of the web. Banning it from schools and libraries is like banning books from schools and libraries.

How can someone so powerful be such an idiot?

I remember when I passed the 100 member mark on my MyBlogLog community. I thought that was big.

Today I passed the 1000 member mark.

Kiltak was member number 1000.

It’s great that so many people have opted to join the AVC community.

I hope it’s doing it job, connecting readers and helping people meet others and find new blogs to read.

  Emily’s Valentine Gift To Me and Joanne 
  Originally uploaded by fredwilson.

From me and Van the Man

Emily gave these two petit fours to The Gotham Gal and me for valentines day.

When I was a kid, my grandmother would send a box of petit fours to our family. And I loved them so much.

To this day, they are my favorite sweet.

From Wallstrip

  Post Game Celebration 
  Originally uploaded by fredwilson.

I used to post a lot about my girls’ basketball games. It’s one of the great pleasures to be able to watch your kids play team sports. As part of my effort to be a little less transparent when it comes to my kids, I’ve toned that down a lot in the past couple years.

But this week has brought some amazing exploits.

Emily is the captain of the LREI Middle School GIrls Team which went 10-1 (just like her sister’s team did two years ago) and they are co-champions of the league and have the first seed in the playoffs which start today.

Jessica’s LREI High School team had to win the last five games of the season to get to the post season including a one game mini playoff yesterday against BWL to make the tournament. Down the whole game, they manufactured a strong finish to come out victorious. It was some game. Bella put on a show. Way to go Bella.

Now The Gotham Gal and I face the solomonic decision about which game to go to today. Of course, we’ll split up with one of us going to each.