My Academic Faux Pas

So I've been carrying around this big envelope with an authoritative Commonwealth of Massachusetts design on it for a couple years now. I've moved it three times and left it unopened but on my desk with a select few other items in my organizer.  You know, the vertical leather desk organizer that houses only the very major things.  The first few magazines that gave you paid bylines, a card from Mom and Dad, and an old financial statement from right before you went paperless.  Because really, where else does one store their undergraduate diploma?

For whatever reason I glanced at my diploma envelope today and realized something quite shocking. The envelope I've been carrying around had a return address of "MIT."  I went to UMass.  

The sudden discrepancy was of momentous shock to me so I ripped it open only to find an invite waiting inside, worthless now that I've missed the sign up date by two years.  A piece of junk mail that I've moved three times and glanced at (emphasis on the glanced apparently) every now and then.  I'd say the MIT invite is almost sentimental if only for the solid laughter and the "You really graduated from college?" moment it delivered.

As for my actual diploma...I've never even seen the thing.

Posted via email from LaurenProctor32's Posterous

Favorite Song On the Radio

For all of you psychology students who need a thesis topic, have I got a good one for you.

Please, dissect why it feels so much better to hear a favorite song on the radio than it does to simply play a CD or .mp3 file.

Of course the answer lies in the fact that it’s an unexpected surprise but I have a feeling there’s more. Is it partly because we relish in the fact that someone somewhere out there at a completely different point in their life might share this song with you and feel like you do? Is it because we crave familiarity and like to think that other people also want to hear the things that are our favorites? Or maybe it’s some sort of approval of our favorite things? Tell me everything that makes us feel that way.

Send me a thorough thesis and I’ll give you something (what it is will depend on how well off I am at the time). And then together we can figure out how to apply that beautiful “Omigod they’re playing my song” feeling to product perception and marketing.

***

And now for an artist you'll probably never hear on the radio but probably ought to listen to anyway. His name is Parov Stelar and he's an Austrian jazz electro guy who knows how to drop a beat.

Parov Stelar - "Matilda" (I can't even tell you how much I'd LOVE to be in this video, or at least throw paint water balloons around an empty room while wearing all white.)

Tech Talk: Google Voice Debate

Google Voice. In a way it looks like the next big thing in phone technology. It's supposed to become available to the public in a few weeks (you can check updates and progress here) and when it does, you will be able to use it to send SMS messages, record phone calls with the push of a button, read voice mails as text, and save everything forever. It also allows you to forward calls to one phone number, all your phones, or just some of your phone numbers based on who's calling. For now you have to forward your number(s) and deal with having anyone call your new number if you want to use Google Voice, but eventually they hope to allow people to port their numbers in directly if they wish.

It sounds amazing and it's all free, but before we go skipping through the park chewing gummy bears, there's definite conflict. For starters, when Google released a Google Voice iPhone app to Apple and it was rejected (the details here). The FCC is debating over what to do and we have yet to see that play out, but even if Google does win the battle and get to flex its muscles and threaten what profit means for carriers like AT&T, then what will happen to the people who use the program?

This could be one of Google's benevolent loss leaders that lays groundwork for establishing themselves in the mobile sector and helps them become more powerful in the future, but it's quite possible that Google will figure out how to monetize programs like this. One New York Times analyst pointed out that this could mean upselling an advanced version of the product (Chris Anderson's Free, anyone?) or using this as a platform for creating selling, targeting, and monetizing advertisements. Google always says, "Trust us." I hope we can.

***

In case your eyes are glazed, here's a solid music recommendation to melt the glaze away. Check out Flunk, a group best enjoyed while relaxing in a dark room. They've been around almost a decade but their Portishead-like sound will probably be worthy of chill Buddha Bar type mixes for decades to come.

Flunk - "Blind My Mind"