Disqus - Latest Comments for Justin Thorp

Re: All Great Things End With Good Intentions

Justin Thorp — Tue, 11 Mar 2008 14:09:18 -0000

Dude, it was great seeing you! We definitely should catch up sometime. Plus I wanna come out to Boulder soon.

Re: Wanna Know How to do SXSW? Follow @andrewhyde

Justin Thorp — Wed, 12 Mar 2008 10:59:04 -0000

It was great seeing you there man. We should definitely chat sometime soon. I definitely wanna come out to Boulder sometime and hang with the tech community.

Re: There Were Three Type of People at SXSW. Which One Are You?

Justin Thorp — Sun, 16 Mar 2008 12:30:48 -0000

I was definitely the writer type and banged out a few blog posts from the bloghaus.

Re: Why I Intensely Debated But Decided to Disqus

Justin Thorp — Mon, 19 May 2008 09:27:30 -0000

Dude, I completely agree. I think one of the best things a company can do is get out there, meet their users, and listen. Your users will tell you what they want.

It'll take some work to get out there and form a relationship with them but when you do it will be the most important thing you ever did.

Re: My Three Rules of Blogging

Justin Thorp — Thu, 05 Jun 2008 19:07:52 -0000

Rock solid post. I agree with all your recommendations.

Re: Personal Brand is Like Coke

Justin Thorp — Mon, 23 Jun 2008 17:32:55 -0000

Right on!

Re: Its BBQ Time. Yes That Means SXSW!

Justin Thorp — Wed, 11 Mar 2009 15:00:23 -0000

See you this weekend dude.

Re: Entrepreneur in Residence

Justin Thorp — Tue, 24 Jun 2008 15:53:19 -0000

Congrats on the new job bro! I'm sure you'll do great at it.

Re: Event: Graphing Social Patterns East 2008

Justin Thorp — Fri, 30 May 2008 12:14:33 -0000

Hey Jimmy, Dave McClure the organizer of the conference showed me some places you can go to get a discount on the conf. May be of interest to your readers.
http://drinkingoatmealstout.com/2008/05/26/orei...

Re: Now is Gone: Book Signing and Chat Part II

Justin Thorp — Sun, 08 Jun 2008 15:18:09 -0000

Bummed that I missed the book signing. I see from your sidebar that you'll be at GSP east. I'll see you then. It should be good!

Re: Washington DC: One City, Two Cultures

Justin Thorp — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 10:00:57 -0000

One thing that I find interesting is that, while the NVTC has a formal organization with membership, the dc tech/social media scene is just this ad hoc group of folks that is able to perform a lot of the same functions and fill a lot of the same needs.

In Washington DC, we have associations coming out of our ears. I wonder what they'll look like 10... 20 years from now.

Re: Super Tuesday = Super Risk

Justin Thorp — Wed, 06 Feb 2008 09:32:49 -0000

I think right now all this is an experiment. One big hurdle that has to be overcome is how to deal with the deluge of new information that's going to be coming in. When you have a dozen young people running around with N95s, you're going to have a lot of video which is just noise but some that is signal. Just gotta find the good stuff...

Re: Making Money on Social Networks, Is It Possible?

Justin Thorp — Wed, 06 Feb 2008 09:34:13 -0000

Nick, don't know if you saw this article but it may be of interest:
http://gigaom.com/2008/02/05/who-will-control-a...

Re: How Can Social Technology Create Change?

Justin Thorp — Tue, 12 Feb 2008 11:12:47 -0000

I think a lot of the social apps that have brought about change are the ones that add the right incentive.

For example, with the Facebook app Causes, you add a badge to your profile that says look how cool I am because I associate myself with these causes.

For a while it was the thing to support the Creative Commons cause so everyone did it.

Re: There’s No Money in Blogging, It’s All in Community

Justin Thorp — Sun, 23 Mar 2008 00:29:03 -0000

I think the key is to not think about what you're going to get out of blogging but to think about what you can give.

As Gary said, "Give give give until your face falls off."

Re: Can D.C. Build A Startup Community?

Justin Thorp — Sun, 23 Mar 2008 10:00:02 -0000

Dude, one thing i've noticed is that there has been a lot of these meta discussions about building a community.

I just don't want those to get in the way of actually doing something. Seems like it'd be easy to get into a rut and just ask ourselves all day, "why aren't we more like silicon valley?"

Folks have to be willing to take risks. When they have an idea, go for it. One thing doesn't work then try something different.

Re: Social Media Brings Out the Truth in You

Justin Thorp — Wed, 26 Mar 2008 14:48:35 -0000

I completely agree with him. I definitely think more about what I say and how I present myself because I know what I saw or do could wind up in a blog post the next day.

Re: FriendFeed Launches API, Can They Take on Facebook?

Justin Thorp — Wed, 26 Mar 2008 14:52:18 -0000

Ugh... too often it's pitting one thing against the other when I don't think they're the same animal.

One BIG aspect of FB is that gives users a face to the world. There is a whole industry around MySpace profile's because it's seen as self expression.

Nick, there are plenty of folks who aren't as Web savvy as you. Their FB or MySpace profile may be their only representation to the rest of the world. This is something twitter or friendfeed doesn't do at all.

Re: MySpace Launching iTunes Killer

Justin Thorp — Thu, 03 Apr 2008 09:26:56 -0000

Dude, you seriously love pronouncing something to be the killer of something else.

If all MySpace does is allow stream, it wont' even get close to breathing the same air as iTunes. So much of the music experience is offline.

When I can listen to stream tunes in the metro on my way to work, it will be a different story. I'd LOVE LOVE LOVE to have Pandora on my iPhone.

Re: Gary Vaynerchuk Releases Book, Becomes a Hit on Amazon

Justin Thorp — Wed, 16 Apr 2008 09:20:53 -0000

Putting in my order for 2 copies right now.

Re: Will Social Defeat Search?

Justin Thorp — Thu, 17 Apr 2008 09:20:16 -0000

I disagree with Elliot. I think we can absolutely use the social web to "pull" information.

Last Friday, I was headed into Dulles for a late night flight to Dulles. I wanted to grab a beer before my flight and polled my Twitter friends where they thought the best Dulles bars were. I got responses back and in seconds.

I can see this happening more and more. I'll have a question and just be able to throw it out into the ether and get a response from one of my friends who is specialized in that area.

Re: The Techmeme Disaster

Justin Thorp — Thu, 17 Apr 2008 09:27:14 -0000

I agree man. The more troubling thing is if you look at the Techmeme Leaderboard and start reading the posts in the blogs there isn't much real analysis. These top bloggers are nothing more then Web 2.0 press release stenographers. As you said, it's just that they're louder and bigger than anyone else. I fear how much the echo chamber is making us more stupid.

Re: iGoogle Launches OpenSocial Sandbox

Justin Thorp — Tue, 22 Apr 2008 09:57:42 -0000

Would love to see more of a start page type UI for the home page of Facebook.

Re: Tech Cocktail DC 2

Justin Thorp — Mon, 28 Apr 2008 09:30:38 -0000

Tech Cocktail was awesome! I hope Frank and Eric will put one on again sooner rather then later.

Re: Will Brightkite Succeed Where Dodgeball Failed?

Justin Thorp — Sun, 04 May 2008 14:06:01 -0000

For me it's more... *sigh* just one more app that I have to use.

Re: Digsby Makes Chatting Easier

Justin Thorp — Sun, 04 May 2008 14:08:37 -0000

Digsby is AWESOME! A lot of us at the office use it.

Plus... the company is run by a classmate of my friend RIT. Steve's a really cool guy. Glad to see him get so much great publicity for this.

Re: Free Graphing Social Patterns East Pass

Justin Thorp — Tue, 27 May 2008 09:20:41 -0000

I'll see you there.

Re: A Landmark Moment for Google at I/O Conference

Justin Thorp — Sun, 01 Jun 2008 13:59:32 -0000

Was definitely bummed that I couldn't make it to the event. We did send folks though. Sounds like it rocked.

Re: Twitter Reduces Functionality for WWDC

Justin Thorp — Mon, 09 Jun 2008 22:37:48 -0000

I think saying that Twitter was useless because they turned off some features during WWDC is a drastic over reaction.

What does Twitter do?

It tells me what my friends are doing right now. It did that perfectly.

Everything else is gravy.

Re: Twitter’s Broken, I’m Out!

Justin Thorp — Wed, 25 Jun 2008 10:40:21 -0000

I really don't understand why people freak out so much about Twitter down time... except maybe for bored writers who are looking for the next Web 2.0 scandal to write about in turn driving traffic to their blogs.

Zvi, I'm confident that if plurk got the same level of usage that Twitter did, it'd crumble.

95% of the time I want to use Twitter it works just fine. Maybe I have low expectations but it does what I need and I'm sticking with it.

I think in general people need to chillax a bit.

If we're talking about potential competitors to Twitter, i'd be more concerned about Google. I'd read rumor somewhere that they're integrating the notion of "presence" into all their applications.

Re: Next 6 Months Will be Transformative for Social Web

Justin Thorp — Fri, 27 Jun 2008 09:43:43 -0000

For the last 10 years, it's been an exciting and transformative time for the Web.

Re: Gary Takes on DC Tech Events, Who Will Win?

Justin Thorp — Sun, 20 Jul 2008 14:37:35 -0000

"Gary Sharma announced to a few people early on in the week..."

LOL...a few people? I got the message 3 or 4 times personally. I then got it forwarded it to me by 20 different people asking me if I got it and what I thought about it.

He didn't announce it to just a few people. He seems to have spammed every techie/developer/socialmedia enthusiast in the dc area.

Re: Animoto Challenges Slide on Facebook

Justin Thorp — Fri, 14 Mar 2008 09:05:01 -0000

Animoto is awesome!!! They won a Web award at SXSW. On their main Web app, the sharing functionality for their widget is powered by the Clearspring Platform.

Re: American Airlines Launches Facebook App: Guaranteed Failure

Justin Thorp — Mon, 31 Mar 2008 15:10:58 -0000

I still pose the question... what facebook do you really find that useful? is there one that benefits your life on a regular basis? If there is, please blog about it because I haven't seen one yet.

Re: Six Apart Launches Facebook Blogging Application

Justin Thorp — Thu, 17 Apr 2008 10:31:09 -0000

Sweet finally a useful facebook application.

Re: Depressing Numbers Revealed for Facebook Platform

Justin Thorp — Wed, 07 May 2008 22:39:22 -0000

I think they need to work with some of their high profile top developers and have them create a REAL application that will inspire the next generation of apps.

Re: Facebook Completely Removing Network Pages

Justin Thorp — Sun, 11 May 2008 15:02:46 -0000

When they had Facebook App Garage here in DC, I was talking to a FB guy and he said not many actually used the network pages at all.

This is a BIG win for Ning. The network page in FB was the location which aggregated all the information about what's going on in a certain network. Now Ning is the only one that does that for a more niche network.

Re: AllFacebook 1 Year Anniversary

Justin Thorp — Sun, 01 Jun 2008 14:35:18 -0000

Congrats on making it to a year. I remember talking to you when you were thinking about doing the blog.

*Lifts coffee* Here's to your continued success.

Re: Why Did Facebook Give Up on Beacon?

Justin Thorp — Sun, 01 Jun 2008 14:36:20 -0000

Beacon is a fantastic idea. I hope they keep with it.

Re: Is Facebook the New Ning?

Justin Thorp — Mon, 09 Jun 2008 22:40:07 -0000

I think Facebook Pages has the potential to help power micro or sub-communities much like Ning but they'd have to build out the functionality dramatically.

Re: Updated Details on F8 Event

Justin Thorp — Wed, 02 Jul 2008 14:49:58 -0000

I'm assuming that I'll see ya there.

Re: First Look: OLPC Learning Clubs Popping Up

Justin Thorp — Fri, 01 Feb 2008 10:15:32 -0000

Thanks for doing a write-up on last night. I had a blast. It's an initiative that I'm very excited/passionate about. I look forward to seeing you at the next one.

Re: The Vine has been tagged in real-time

Justin Thorp — Fri, 08 Feb 2008 09:36:50 -0000

great seeing you guys yesterday! I look forward to further conversations.

Re: http://gary.tumblr.com/post/78887084

Justin Thorp — Wed, 26 Mar 2008 14:22:10 -0000

I think twitter just covers one aspect of what Facebook does. Facebook gives people an online personal home page. It allows them to express themselves in a way that twitter doesn't.

Re: Gary Vaynerchuk - The most unique Iphone in the world After 2 big...

Justin Thorp — Wed, 30 Jul 2008 15:08:47 -0000

Your hotel looks like a Kimpton Hotel (http://kimptonhotels.com/). Is it? They rock. I stay at those all the time.

Re: Twas the night before Austin

Justin Thorp — Tue, 08 Apr 2008 17:57:23 -0000

*What are you up to these days?*
Have been traveling like a crazy man

*Who/what is inspiring you?*
For me, it's getting to interact with those that I serve. When I get to hear there stories and motivations, it makes it all worth it.

*Who/what has changed your perspective?*
I dunno if i've had my perspective changed recently... let me think about this.

*Who did you meet that set you on a path of achieving awesome?*
I'm with Alex Harris. Gary V definitely lit a fire under my butt.

*Who do you miss the most?*
I miss all the folks that were hanging out in the Bloghaus. That space had a really cool energy and vibe.

*Have you been following through on the things you promised yourself you’d do when you got back from Austin?*
Trying to "give give give until my face falls off."

Re: What does creative mean to you?

Justin Thorp — Wed, 09 Apr 2008 09:41:15 -0000

Creative means having ability to think outside the box.

Re: The East Coast Revolution - SocialDevCamp East

Justin Thorp — Thu, 24 Apr 2008 10:19:46 -0000

So Alex, you coming out for the event?

Re: Keep your Audience Relevent - Not All Press is Good Press

Justin Thorp — Fri, 02 May 2008 11:41:20 -0000

Dude, right on post! Showing focused and target love has been my strategy as community manager at Clearspring. It's not been about going to the biggest conferences because there is very little chance of serious engagement. I've been going to BarCamps all over the country and they've been great. There are less people but I've been getting them super-engaged in our brand and platform.

Re: Is it possible to under-plan my trip to San Francisco?

Justin Thorp — Tue, 13 May 2008 08:05:19 -0000

If you're looking for a good hotel, i'd recommend this one.
http://www.hotelpalomar-sf.com/

Re: Growth and Change

Justin Thorp — Wed, 09 Jul 2008 21:13:50 -0000

Best of luck my friend on the new adventure.

Re: Anniversary Reflections

Justin Thorp — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 09:17:37 -0000

Congrats my friend on your accomplishments!

Re: We Still Need Better Filters

Justin Thorp — Tue, 18 Mar 2008 09:24:04 -0000

Dude, i totally agree! I think FB Beacon while not totally thought out was on its way there. I totally use my friends as a filter for what's good and what's not. With things like FB Beacon, SocialThing, or Friend Feed, I can see their behaviors, likes, and dislikes.

Re: Jeff Pulver Launches PrimeTimeRewind

Justin Thorp — Wed, 19 Mar 2008 09:16:16 -0000

While I TOTALLY dig the idea of the site, I find the cube UI enjoyable/cute for about 5 minutes then it gets annoying and I just wanna find the tv show i'm looking for.

Re: Books to Buy- Here Comes Everybody - Clay Shirky

Justin Thorp — Sun, 23 Mar 2008 00:35:43 -0000

I have been really enjoying this book! I'd recommend it. Seems like it's a natural progression... Cluetrain, Naked Conversations, and this book.

Re: Who is Technorati Trying to Reach

Justin Thorp — Fri, 11 Apr 2008 14:03:19 -0000

Yeah, I haven't used Technorati in months. Google Blog Search is just so easy and convenient.

Re: What are Your Social Media Tasks

Justin Thorp — Thu, 17 Apr 2008 08:53:54 -0000

For the last couple years, the first thing I've done when I get into work is make my morning stroll through the blogosphere in Google Reader.

Re: What Comes Next With Social Media

Justin Thorp — Mon, 21 Apr 2008 09:07:39 -0000

I'm with Matthew. You can't start conversations until you've won the respect and the trust of the community that you're there to serve. You have to listen to what people are saying and contribute to the conversation.

Re: On Managing A Community

Justin Thorp — Mon, 28 Apr 2008 09:07:43 -0000

Hey Chris! I'm the Developer Community Manager at Clearspring Technologies (http://clearspring.com/).

I use all of the techniques that you mentioned. One other thing I'm doing is going to A LOT of conferences, specifically unconferences like BarCamps, and using the events to engage folks within the industry.

I report to our VP of Product.

Re: Still Here

Justin Thorp — Thu, 08 May 2008 08:55:41 -0000

Glad to hear you're still alive and doing well. It's always good to take some time off every once and a while and get some perspective.

Re: DevCamp Explores the Social Web on May 10

Justin Thorp — Fri, 09 May 2008 13:40:54 -0000

The notion of the DevCamp actually started in the Valley with iPhoneDevCamp - http://factoryjoe.com/blog/2007/07/13/what-is-a...

Re: What Do You Think

Justin Thorp — Fri, 23 May 2008 00:55:13 -0000

Yeah... we now have all these different feeds of activity which get generated from our lives and the lives of our friends.

It'd be great to have an easy to use tool that made sense of all the data coming at me from my network.

Re: Have You Tried Freshbooks

Justin Thorp — Tue, 27 May 2008 09:01:50 -0000

While I don't personally have a need for FreshBooks, I know a lot of folks that use it and love it.

I've had the pleasure of meeting some of the folks at FreshBooks and they're REALLY cool.

They absolutely get the notion of community development and the importance of customer support for a startup.

Re: Develop a Strong Personal Brand Online Part 1

Justin Thorp — Sun, 01 Jun 2008 13:06:12 -0000

Enjoyed the post. I look forward to the next two.

Re: 100 Personal Branding Tactics Using Social Media

Justin Thorp — Mon, 16 Jun 2008 09:30:16 -0000

All the things you mention are great but are they tools for building personal brand or are they all just part of living an online life?

One of my biggest turnoffs when meeting someone online is when it looks like they're trying to follow some manual and do all the cliche online things to get their name out there.

It's not an equation. It's not do these 100 things if you wanna build your personal brand.

These sites are places that my community/friends live online. If I wanna commune with them... if I wanna stay connected with them, I exist in the spaces.

Maybe I'm just splitting hairs... but... yeah.

Re: Twitter now reliable?

Justin Thorp — Sun, 16 Mar 2008 20:37:08 -0000

That's awesome that the Twitter Dev team started a blog. just added it to my reader.

Re: How our digital lives are spreading out

Justin Thorp — Thu, 03 Apr 2008 09:15:09 -0000

So does your friend feed quickly become your main digital identity online?

If there is going to be one place online that is Justin Thorp, I'd rather it not be part of one centralized system. My blog is the center of my online identity and everything branches out from there.

FriendFeed is too much of a centralized decentralized social network.

Re: Walking around Paris with Dave Sifry

Justin Thorp — Thu, 05 Jun 2008 18:37:48 -0000

Hey Robert! Whatcha got planned when you're out in the DC area? I'm based out there.

We have a bunch of great start-ups in the DC area. I work at one of them (Clearspring - http://clearspring.com). If you'd like to meet some, i'd be happy to make intros.

Drop me a line - justin@clearspring.com

Re: A Silicon Valley-Washington DC conversation

Justin Thorp — Fri, 20 Jun 2008 11:26:29 -0000

Robert, I realize that this trip is mainly about digging into tech policy and meeting with folks on the Hill and at the White House.

Despite popular opinion to the contrary, there is more to DC than just politics. We have a bunch of startups that get quite a bit of attention on the international stage.

I'd be happy to help make some introductions, if you're looking to talk to folks.

Look forward to seeing you at the party on Wed!

Re: Daddy Becomes CEO

Justin Thorp — Sat, 03 Jan 2009 15:25:46 -0000

Dude, thanks for writing! Great way to stay in touch. :-) Hope you're having a great time in Seattle and having a great new year! Hopefully get up there soon.

Re: ShareThis Test

Justin Thorp — Tue, 21 Oct 2008 10:38:53 -0000

Hey Mark, my name is Justin Thorp and I'm the Community Manager at Clearspring (the parent company of AddThis).

I was curious why you chose to use Share This versus our product AddThis (http://addthis.com).

I'd love to hear your thoughts. Feel free to drop me a line - justin@clearspring.com

Re: Moving on up

Justin Thorp — Sun, 29 Mar 2009 21:59:27 -0000

Congrats!!!