What is Scribnia?

Scribnia is a Boston based startup company that is working to provide an online community for users to review bloggers, reporters, columnists and other online writers. It’s a five month old company that is still currently in private Alpha mode but is expecting to launch publicly this week. Side note, if you can’t wait and want to try out Scribnia today, send me an e-mail. I’ll invite my readers as long as I have Alpha invites to give out. All I ask is you in public beta mode.

Scribnia allows users to rate writers on a scale of 1 to 10. There are also niche specific metrics that allow you to rate a writer based on criteria relevant to writers in that niche. For example, the profiles for sports bloggers like Bill Simmons or Josh Gans list the following three “Context Ratings” on a sliding scale:

1. Statistical Reliance

From “Distrusts stats” to “Stat geek”.

2. Tone

From “Light” to “Serious”.

3. Controversialness

From “Non-controversial” to “Controversial”.

This context scale is a great way to sort authors, but it has one downfall. For writers like me who bounce from subject to subject, site to site, the Context Ratings system isn’t able to capture all the niches multi-topic authors write about and instead hones in on one niche.

For instance, I’m listed in the Blogging sub-category, but I also write about social media, Boston, bicycling, business, sports, and news articles for The Dorchester Reporter. If someone reads just the posts I write at Sports Fan 4 or just the news stories I write for The Dorchester Reporter, they’re not able to fit that material into the blogging metrics. So, in other words it’s not a perfect system but for most writers who focus on one or two niches it works splendidly.

Scribnia Rocks

If Scribnia rocked any harder they’d be in danger of passing Dewey Cox on the list of people/companies that rock/walk hard. The site itself not only kicks major butt, but their contact points are all quick and know what they’re doing too. Scribnia really gets the blogging community, which is huge for a site where bloggers (and other writers) are reviewed.

For Scribnia to succeed they must successfully reach out to bloggers and give us a tool we’ll enjoy. Well, they use Twitter well (@scribnia) and their site gives feedback to writers, which near any blogger will tell you is much appreciated. It also gives bloggers another venue for us to post our opinions.

Speaking of Twitter, they borrowed an idea from the micro-blogging platform and have their own follower/following system implemented directly into the site. It allows reviewers to follow other reviewers and thus see what they’re reading and reviewing. It’s a great way to check out new authors and see what your friends think of other authors. Follow me on Scribnia. Scribnia also has a commenting and thumbs up/down system on each review. Following other users will allow you to see where they commented and which reviews they gave a thumbs up or down to.

So far, I’m really digging Scribnia and think you will too. Much like Yelp I’ve found the reviews are genuine, critical, and well written. They are really on their way to developing a database of online author reviews that will become the main stop for anyone looking to expand their reading collection. When it launches publicly it will become the top resource for online author reviews. So don’t delay, send me an e-mail today to get in before everyone else!

Write up a review of me on my Scribnia profile.

Here’s a few more posts on Scribnia from other bloggers.

• Community Blogging at Scribnia – The Lost Jacket
• The Future of Scribnia – Danny Brown/David Spinks
• Why Scribnia is Valuable to ME – David Spinks
• Scribnia: Connecting Blogs & Readers – Totally Incorrect

What I love about Boston Young Entrepreneurs meetings is that you get a broad cross section of business owners. There were people there from real estate, technology, banking, law, liquor brewing, government, non-profits and other fields. You really get a diversity of feedback that would be tough to replicate elsewhere.

Feedback from the Boston Young Entrepreneurs

Some of the actionable feedback I received was:

• Raise rates.

We’re a bit overwhelmed with projects currently and customers have been satisfied so it’s an ideal time to raise rates. We were worried we’d lose business with higher rates but it may actually increase the number of customers due to increased confidence and image quality.

• Expand into SEO (Search Engine Optimization) and SMM (Social Media Management).

 
We’ve found our projects arrive in bunches, so SEO could potentially provide additional constant revenue stream to balance out the irregular revenue streams from SMC (Social Media Consulting) and freelance writing.

• Provide case studies.

 
We’ve had some success implementing our strategies for clients and could increase our revenue if we provided proof of this success. It would also help better explain exactly what we do.

• Obtain market research (possibly for free from college libraries).

 
A perfect example of not applying your own advice to your own company. We’ve performed market research for our clients and emphasized it during strategy creation. Yet, we’ve not performed the same market research on The 42nd Estate and its industries. One of the reasons The 42nd Estate is the most successful company I’ve started yet is because we dove right in and got cranking instead of sitting around creating plans and never implementing them. However, the time has come to optimize our own business model and market research is a crucial aspect of this phase.

There was a whole ton more feedback that I received. One thing I really wish I had brought with me is a tape recorder to record the feedback so I could refer back to it. I’ve got a solid memory and most of the feedback stuck but I know that in a week or two the details will only get hazier. Alas, that’s why we live and learn.

Thanks to everyone who came out to hear the business model for The 42nd Estate and give that awesome feedback. Thanks to Devin Cole and the Boston Young Entrepreneurs group for organizing the event and promoting it so well. I really, really appreciate it! If there’s anything I can to help your business, let me know.

That is, up until a few months ago where I dove back into attending full blast. After attending a few meetings and learning about High Rock Associates, BeRewarding, and how to hire interns I’m now ready to present The 42nd Estate.

Swing by the Copley Library this Tuesday, May 19th, from 6:00 PM to 8:00 PM to learn about The 42nd Estate, what we do, how we do and why we do. It should be a lot of fun and if anyone needs any tips or help with their blogs, social media, or writing I’ll be more than happy to help.

Here’s the full list of details from the BYE blog:

Date: Tuesday, May 19, 2009
Time: 6:00pm – 8:00pm
Location: Boston Public Library – Main Copley Branch – Room C04
Street: 700 Boylston St.
City/Town: Boston, MA
Phone: 617-918-4303
RSVP: devin.cole.bra@cityofboston.gov or on facebook

Hope to see you there!

Head over to the site and celebrate with us as we give away $42 and a pair of Celtics playoff tickets.

Way to be The 42nd Estate, way to be.

Thanks to Josh, Justin, Eddie and John for joining me on what’s been one amazing ride so far, here’s to many more years to come!

The other two already announced contests are:

1. The Easiest $42 You’ll Ever Make

This contest is super easy. All you have to do is comment on the linked post (remember to leave your e-mail so we can contact you if you win – no spam, ever, we promise). That’s it. No linking, tweeting or any other -ing required. Just write a simple comment on that post and you’re automatically entered to win $42, sent via paypal. The contest ends on April 8th at noon (EST) so hurry up and write a comment!

2. Win a Pair of Boston Celtics Playoff Tickets

As The 42nd Estate is based in Boston, Massachusetts, we’re obviously big fans of the Boston sports teams (heck, we even have a sports blog focused on Boston sports). Two of our members are also season ticket holders for the world champion Boston Celtics and we decided to giveaway our first pair of playoff tickets!

To enter, become our fan on The 42nd Estate’s facebook® page. As soon as the playoff scenario for the Celtics is set in stone, we’ll pick one fan at random and award them a pair of playoff tickets to either the first or second home playoff game.

There you have it, two super easy to enter contests and another prize to come that will be given out via twitter.

EDIT: The Twitter contest is now live. A free portable iPhone charger! Retweet this tweet to enter. Contest ends Monday, April 6, 2009 at 5PM.

Well, a few days ago the cards arrived and they’re clean and slick but there’s one small issue. It’s barely noticeable but, well, check them out yourself:

Slightly slanted...it's still good, it's still good!

Notice anything a little off?

Yup, our site url at the bottom of the card is ever so slightly slanted. D’oh!

Now, I don’t believe in throwing something out just because it’s slightly imperfect, especially since the cards are still fully functional, but it taught me a valuable lesson. Never order business cards after midnight!

Now…that was the post I was going to write, but then I took another look at these cards. In particular, I opened up another box and took a look inside. Lo and behold, this box had cards that were not quite as slanted!

Still slightly slanted but with lots of white space.

Phew!

It wasn’t entirely my fault!

So, then I gave VistaPrint a ring, explained the situation of the some good, some not so good cards. They quickly explained that it was partly my fault due to not placing the card entirely within the dotted line border, but they would still credit me the full cost of all 1,000 cards and help me order up a new batch!

What amazing customer service! Even though it was partly my fault that half the cards look terribly slanted and cutoff, they still gave me a full refund!

Sorry to have misled you all for a few paragraphs, but that post title was just too good to not use.

So the real moral of the story? Maybe you should order business cards after midnight, but only if you’re a night owl and excel in these conditions. Otherwise, save it for the morning! Oh, and of course use Vistaprint for your business cards as they have amazing customer service.

The second post comes from one of my other blogs, My Last Name Means Money. The crux of Trickle Up Economics Beats Bank Bailouts is that bailouts beget bailouts and we see that today, with the first bailout causing no noticeable improvement to the economy, a second even bigger bailout bill is now working its ways through our political offices. The Republicans are right that these bailouts represent a slippery slope, however it is not the size of the bailout but merely that we’re bailing out failing enterprises and once we began to do so we removed a huge disincentive to fail. Now that failing can be profitable, will we continue seeing more and more large corporations reporting dire economic situations and accepting government bailout loans? Call me crazy, but I believe we should give out loans only when we reasonably expect to be repaid, not when the recipients are literally falling towards bankruptcy.

Check out these two posts and if there’s enough positive response I may post my updated thoughts on the latest round of bailout bills. Take care everyone!

At this point my mind was blown, not only had I just received snail mail it was also hand-written! Crazy!

As my eyes read the note this article about a local teen in Somerville collecting business cards in an attempt to set a Guinness record came soaring back into my conscious. After reading the article I sent Sophie not one but two business cards (part of a set of ten that I received for free from flickr).

As of this note, she’s received nearly 800 business cards so far. That’s 800 in addition to her already existing collection of over 2,200 business cards! She plans on submitting an entry to the good folks at Guinness Book of World Records once her collections hits 5,000 cards. If you’ve got a business card and want to help Sophie in her record breaking quest you can send them to her attention at:

Somerville Journal
20-40 Holland Street
Somerville, MA 02144

If you do send one, let me know! If you include links to your business (non spammy) I might do a shout-out post to those who help Sophie out…

It’s with great honor that we’re introducing Justin Wright as the newest member of The 42nd Estate!

For those of you who don’t know, Justin blogs over at Life of Justin about his trips, hiking expeditions, workplace shenanigans, skating and other interesting topics. Justin has proven himself quite adept at blogging and is going to be an extremely valuable addition to our team.

He’s already helped us out a great deal by creating the great looking logo at We Demand Videos! as well as submitting a few high traffic videos. His experience in web design, graphics, and social marketing will complement the many talents of the existing members of The 42nd Estate quite nicely and really help move the company a few steps closer to our goals.

Pretty big news, eh?

As you’ve surely surmised from the tantalizing title, this time around the web we’ll focus on The 42nd Estate and its vast repertoire of web-sites. The last time we spoke about my company we announced a few sites that we’re working on, one of which is a reviews magazine. Well, over on The 42nd Estate’s blog we’re taking a sneak preview look at OTIBR.com, Only the Internet’s Best Reviews. If you’re curious how the site will look make sure to check out the latest post there for two screen captures of OTIBR. We’ve also chosen a launch date, September 29th 2008, so keep your calendars free that day!

In other news around The 42nd Estate network, yesterday was wicked productive as we took a site from idea to purchase to setup to launch over the course of one day! The site is called We Demand Videos!

As you might’ve guessed, it revolves around videos of all kinds, from comedy to action to politics and beyond. We do not focus on any one niche of videos, but rather comb through youtube for videos we enjoy and nearly guarantee you will too. For anyone wondering what the deal is with the #42 and The 42nd Estate’s obsession with it, check out this video clip from the Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy movie, which should better explain it.

To anyone whose checked out my about page here and found it, ahem, lacking, well now is your chance to find out more about yours truly in a much more informative post where I introduced myself to The 42nd Estate’s fans. Check out that super awesome t-shirt I’m sporting!

Oh, and speaking of those wonderful fans of The 42nd Estate, we’ve setup a facebook page so you can show your support, get updates and be our facebook fans. While you’re there RSVP for the otibr.com launch too! Note the wall post announcing the DVD giveaway (more details to come).

Well, that’s quite the whirlwind of activity for this edition. Let me wrap it up by letting everyone know that I’m truly excited for the OTIBR.com launch, the recent addition of We Demand Videos! to our network and the other exciting events on the horizon. Thanks to all the hard working members of The 42nd Estate and our great fans all across the world.

That does it for this edition of Web Quotes and Counterpoints.

We are you are us.