Web Secret #290: myCharge

Tomorrow, you'll be returning those unwanted gifts.

This is what you will get instead.

A couple of months ago, I was waiting to participate in a panel presentation, sitting at a table with one of my co-presenters, when she took out what looked like a palm sized greyish brick.

"What is that?" I asked.

"That," she said, "is something I cannot live without."

"That" turned out to be the "Hub 3000," one of a number of beautifully designed gadgets by the folks at myCharge.com aimed at helping us when our smartphones die.

The company makes a variety of ultra portable devices that provide emergency power for a variety of smartphones. The devices include the cables needed to connect your dead gadget and the built in plugs necessary to charge the devices in the first place. Confused?

Time to turn on the under 1 minute long explanatory video:

Dead electronic device?

Problem solved.

Web Secret #289: Google Zeitgeist

The end of the year is a time for reflection. Maybe even a time to consider its Zeitgeist - one of those German words, (coined in 1884,) that embodies an entire concept. It means the general intellectual, moral, and cultural climate of an era.

Until the 21st century, the Zeitgeist of a specific time frame was something gleaned retrospectively, over many years. For example, if you look back on the 20th century, you could argue that "the Zeitgeist of modernism typified and influenced architecture, art, and fashion during much of the 20th century."

In 2001, Google realized that with, (at that time,) more than 150 million queries per day, they had a unique window into what was happening in the world on any given day, as well as a fascinating retrospective on the peaks and valleys of popular culture during the course of a year.

Pulling that data together, Google began to publish their version of the Year-End Zeitgeist and reveal the collective focus of the online mind, highlighting the main events that drew the attention of a global audience. The Year-End Google Zeitgeist provides a glimpse at what captivated the world over the past 12 months, based on the most popular search terms on the world's most popular search engine. All of this information is featured in an under 5 minute video, and also broken down into charts.

In 2012, Google counted 1.2 trillion searches, in 146 different languages. Here is Google Zeigeist version 2012:



You can also look at search trends by country, by event, by film, by people, etcetera, etcetera, etcetera.

What is your guess about the soon to be revealed 2013 Zeitgeist?

Web Secret #288: The Grommet

Right in time for the holiday season, I am going to tell you about "The Grommet," a curated shopping website.

I can hear your virtual yawns.

Pay attention, The Grommet makes the online shopping experience fresh and inspiring. And I think their approach can teach all of us something about marketing ourselves, our clinical practices and our EAPs too.

Grommet's unique marketing approach is to tell a story. They feature a daily innovative product, introduced via a very brief video. The video explains why the product is unique, how/why it was invented, and how it is manufactured.)

Here are three of my favorite Grommets:

FREEKey


ila Security



Quivvers



Warning: extremely addictive site.

Enter at your own risk.

Web Secret #287: Today I found out

“Danger, Will Robinson!,” there is a website entirely devoted to useless information.

In my family, I am known as the queen of pointless factoids. I revel in this. So imagine how I reacted when I came across "Today I Found Out," founded in 2010, and based on the idea that it is always good to learn something new every day. TIFO aims to publish interesting facts that are highly researched by amazingly well credentialed authors.

Here is a sample TIFO story: "How One of the Most Beautiful Women in 1940s’ Hollywood Helped Make Certain Wireless Technologies Possible." Hedy Lamarr was not only the star of numerous movies, but a brilliant scientist and mathematician whose inventions earned her US patents. Fun fact: my mother once saw Hedy in a Paris hair salon shortly after WWII. She told me that the entire shop was staring, mesmerized by her beauty.

Here are some others:

The origin of the phrase "Close, but no cigar"

What started the "Cops eating donuts" stereotype

How about Fingers don't contain muscles?

Your welcome.