Random Musings

my friend ryan king twittered about this site, howmanyofme.com

Joyce Kim is a very common name - i feel like i meet another joyce kim each time i go to korea. and a google search will show a good number of joyce kims out there who are kicking butt. my favorites include joyce kim, the artist who has been doing really well at the art shows this year, and joyce kim, the eye doctor who maintained the # 1 search result for “joyce kim” until the gigaom show launched and all the SEO juice that comes from the blogging community pushed up my pages in the searches.

but exactly how many joyce kims are there? 250 according to the site.

so to all my fellow joyce kims out there, drop a note below and include a link to your site:) lets make a big directory of all the joyce kims!

My friends in Korea are doing an amazing job putting together the first pan-Asia web conference - Open Web Asia ‘08.  The speaker list looks great. The timing is perfect as many US web companies are clamoring to get into Asia and as Asian web companies are starting to eye the US market.

If you plan on being around Asia in October, I would say this is a must attend event.   Also, side note on the location - there is a casino there for you gambling VC types;)

this week i had the most annoying interaction with a company that sent us a DMCA takedown notice. this company had no idea how to handle the situation and is apparently completely unfamiliar with the idea of letting fans of their product be fans.

quick facts - a soompi member posted a message about a particular product they liked and hotlinked an image from the company’s website into their post. we subsequently received a notice to remove the image. however, the notice did not give us a specific url that contained the content on question. rather, the link provided in the takedown notice took us to an area on the site that contained over 4000 posts. when we replied saying we hare happy to comply, but inquired for further information so we could locate the content, we were told that it wasn’t their problem and that we should take down all 4000 posts if we could not find it or suffer the wrath of their lawyers. (i know, how cliché)

here are three simple tips to future DMCA takedown notice senders - just so we can all get along here.

1.  when fans of your product or your customers are writing positive things about your product - LET THEM! encourage your customers to tell their friends about your product.  they are your best marketing asset and they are a heap load more believable than your own marketing team.

2. if you are sending a takedown notice, provide a specific link that takes us to the content in question. do not send us on a wild hunt when you obviously know the appropriate url. the DMCA states that you should provide “information reasonably sufficient to permit the service provider to locate the material.” so just send me a link that takes me directly to the content in question, not just a link that takes me to my website or some general portion on my website.

3. most websites are happy to comply with DMCA takedown notices, so be polite. do not start of the dialouge being rude and condescending. don’t try to bully. its just not necessary.  and related to this tip is my next point - don’t tell us all about what your big bad lawyers are telling you to do to us in an attempt to scare us. there is plenty of readily available information on the DMCA - we all know how this process works, so no need for huffing and puffing in an attempt to intimidate websites.

thanks. just wanted to get that off my chest.

it has been decided.  i will be going back to baan dada at the end of september.

a bit of background - i have always done a bit of volunteer work, trying to contribute where there was a need. i have worked on DNA exonerations for the Innocence Project, i have represented immigrant women who were victims of domestic violence at Sanctuary for Families and i’ve even done highway trash pickups (no, i wasn’t in trouble and doing community service!)

but nothing has touched me as much as my experience at baan dada.  maybe its the first world poverty versus third world poverty difference? maybe it was the loving and brilliant children at baan dada?  they are wise beyond their years due to their life experiences yet they keep their happiness and wear their hearts on their sleeve.  either way, they’ve got my support for life now.

why am i going back? because there is still so much work to be done. using the over $8000 we have raised thusfar, i will help with some of the building projects. i will send lots of pictures to show you all how much your donations have gone.  this is a real NGO doing real work.  no administrative overhead.  You donate $100 and we go buy concrete bricks to make walls the next week.

also, i will be working with the little boy you see in all my pictures and videos - puchada. he totally stole my heart and won’t give it back.  the schools there refuse to enroll him because of his vision issues, so i am going there with ted to work on a plan to get him in school. maybe there, maybe here.  either way, my #1 priority is to get puchada into school.  as an overeducated, ivy-league pedigreed nyc girl, it is completely unacceptable that a child as bright and inquisitive as puchada is rejected from elementary school.

so, if you want to help out, you can still donate to Baan Dada - buy some more bricks for me to move or you can put a child in school for a year! or you can donate in-kind.  i need monitors to bring to them because the monitors on the donated laptops are breaking, but i can at least rig a monitor to a laptop.  and if you have an old laptop (what, your macbook isnt the latest dual core! to donate, i will bring it.

thank you. i feel very lucky to have friends like you.

i think i need more rest.

if you are squimish, stop here.  right here.

2 Days later