Of trains, toilets and meeting people (no, not in the toilet, silly! :)
I just got back from a wonderful weekend in San Francisco "hosted" by internet marketer Ken Giddens. "Hosted" in quotes, because I did pay a big chunk of change for this privilege. OTOH, Ken paid out quite a bit of money, taking care of 3 nights' stay at the Hyatt Regency on the Embarcadero, a no-host "cocktail" party Friday night, and breakfast, lunch and dinner on both Saturday and Sunday. And these weren't shlock meals, either. Saturday night was an astonishing 9 course chinese dinner which included, among other things, Peking Duck (no, Chinese restaurants haven't seemed to change the name to "Beijing Duck".) If I recall correctly, Peking Duck is a dish for which you have to give at least 24 hours notice. Of course, if you are having a banquet for 50+ people--that probably requires quite a bit more than 24 hours notice. There was a bit of a sad note, too, as we found out that the restaurant had lost their lease and the next day would be their last day in business.
Staying at the Hyatt Regency is, in a word, spectacular.
They have an interior atrium architecture such that you have to wonder, "How did they do that?" The Hyatt Regency's (at least the two I *know* I've seen, and maybe there's been more) tend to like to create their hotels with HUGE atriums in the center of the building. They are breath-takingly beautiful. At the one we stayed at, the hotel room doors (all of them, AFAIK) faced the atrium. The rooms along one side seemed to be stacked in a sort of "reverse balcony"--the lower the floor, the less it's open hallway stuck out into the atrium. So, unlike a balcony, where your view is interfered with by the row below you, floor 5 rooms were along an hallway from which you could not see the floor 4 rooms directly below.
One of the great things I enjoyed about this trip was the fact that I was able to get from my house to the hotel entirely on public transportation. Bus to downtown San Jose, downtown SJ to the Diridon, SJ Caltrain station, Caltrain to 4th and King in Sa n Francisco, the muni from the Cal Train station to the Embarcadero. One of the things I love about public transportation is the chance to sit by, and talk with, people I might not otherwise run into. On the way up, I talked with a young woman who had been hired by Apple Computer 6 months previously to be the "feature programmer" (think music programming, not software programming) for the Apple Music Store. She had previously been a secretary at a law firm--but is an avid, very avid, lover of music. It's a good example of taking what you love, finding your passion, and you'll find the work.
The gentleman I talked with on the way back home (well, actually to Sunnyvale, since I had to stop off for my acupuncture appointment) is a software manager in the search engines area of yahoo. We had a little bit to talk about, since I had worked for Ariba, which is just a bit down the street from Yahoo. He indicated that jobs in the valley were beginning to increase; that it is now a seller's market (meaning, the job hunter has the power)--and gettinng harder to find the people they want. Unlike, he said, a few years ago, where there were 5 qualified applicants for every position. It will be interesting to see what happens...
I also discussed, but not by name, search engine optimizers. He said that most people are pretty poor at it. But even more interesting was he talked about these folks as "attacking" them. I even tried to clarify, that I wasn't asking about people trying to break in to Yahoo--and his response made it clear to me that those people he considered to be "attacking" yahoo were the SEO folks.
I asked him what were the major differences between Yahoo and Google search strategies, and he said (not sounding coy or secretive at all) that they are pretty much the same. That even the Search Engine Results Pages (SERPs) for the same search terms are pretty similar (a bit surprising to me, since that hadn't been my, admittedly limited, experience comparing the two.).
I asked him about whether Yahoo had something like Google Adsense. Now, you have to take on your best "Rodney Dangerfield" "I don't get no respect" perspective...because that's how he presented it to me: "Of course! We own the firm (Overture) that started pay-per-click!" Needless to say, I was appropriately, um, humbled (?).
Have you gotten this far? Is it because of the toilets?
. When I got into San Francisco...San Francisco which has had trouble getting conventions to come because of the (aggressive) homeless population...and there, on the wide sidewalk was a green very wide oval building. The serif lettering along it's forest green walls said "TOILET". Cool, I thought. What a good idea...public restrooms...in more public areas. Who'dda thunk? Now, this is an exercise in how blind we become to our home surroundings. For sure enough, when I was taking the "free downtown SJ shuttle" from the train station to the downtown public transportation "hub" on 1st and 2nd streets, surely there, right in front of my nose, was the same building: same shape, same color, same lettering. Maybe it's an epidemic??
Well, I need to get back to things. We'll talk again soon.
