Argentina Was Not A Team

Image by Andrés Moncayo via Flickr

Brazil: The Overconfidence Of A Soccer Superpower

Either that or it was a team that melted in the face of a superior team: Germany. But my parting thought for the team I was rooting for is that Argentina has many great players, including Messi who is widely touted as the greatest player in the world. But soccer is not golf. This is a team sport.

Diego Maradona gets to take responsibility. The best soccer player of his generation was not that great a coach. Martin Scorsese could not act if his life depended on it. My favorite actor likes to say, "I don't know direction."

Brazil And Argentina: My Choices And Those Of My Favorite Actor

Diego kept saying to the last minute that Messi and one other player were the only players guaranteed spots on the Argentinian team. That attitude can boost your ego but it can be hugely detrimental to the team's morale. And Diego did not give enough respect to Messi himself.

This is like how Bill Clinton never really got over the fact that it was Hillary not him who was running for president. After Hillary lost in South Carolina, they gave him the microphone and he started talking about his foundation and how that work is "important." You saw Diego on TV as much as Messi.

Argentina fell like a house of cards today. How the mighty fall!

Brazil has a Pele hangover. Argentina has a Maradona hangover. I do too. That is why I picked those two teams.

There is always next time.

Right now it is looking like Germany will take the cup. They have done it many times before.

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Soraya Darabi

Fractals: Mandelbrot
Fractals And FoodSpotting
FoodSpotting Is The Next FourSquare
Going Backwards: FoodSpotting, FourSquare, Twitter, Facebook

sorayadarabi on Twitter Half a million followers.
Soraya Darabi| Most Creative People 2010 | Fast Company based on her success as manager of digital partnerships and social-media marketing at the Times, where she was hired at 23. "Soraya was dazzling when she showed up at The New York Times, trying to tug the Gray Lady into Facebook and Twitter and all the social media," says columnist Nicholas Kristof. "I often travel to exotic foreign lands with a local guide and interpreter, and Soraya played precisely that role when she led me into the world of new media. The only reason I have nearly 1 million followers on Twitter and 150,000 fans on Facebook is Soraya's guidance." Darabi herself has nearly half a million Twitter followers, which means that when the Freelance Whales play at her friend's loft party, they wind up as a showcase band at South by Southwest, in Austin. She's earned a reputation among the digerati as someone who intuitively, if not effortlessly, understands where all this social-media stuff is going. "Soraya knows how media companies can take advantage of these practices -- if they're willing to take the risk," says Alice Marwick, a researcher at Harvard's Berkman Center for Internet and Society. ...... Greenwood: "She's been one of my go-to people for what's going on in social media and how companies are innovating from a brand and marketing perspective." ...... "I get information from my peers," Darabi says simply. ..... Drop.io, with Nicholas Negroponte on the board ..... Presslift .... Now Darabi is working on a suite of similar verticals for fields including education and possibly entertainment. ..... Darabi's own entrepreneurial drive -- "We need more young women starting companies" .... "We're living in a world right now where the 26-year-old founder of a PHP platform [Facebook] has more power than the president of the U.S. in terms of his reach on a day-to-day basis," she says, dismissing talk of a social-media bubble. "I'm not sure social media has been overestimated yet." ......






Soraya Darabi Leaving NYT For Drop.io's New PressLift | Mediaite Big move in the social media world: Soraya Darabi, manager of digital partnerships & social-media marketing at the New York Times, is leaving the Gray Lady to join real-time sharing and collaboration site Drop.io as product lead for their new PR tool, PressLift....... behind the NYT’s multimedia Inauguration Day Facebook campaign, which won first prize at the INMA Awards for excellence in marketing (and encouraged excellence in hipster patriotism). Darabi’s department grew in prominence last May when the NYT appointed a full-time social media editor ....... PressLift, a new tool for PR professionals to share multi-media materials (without annoyingly clogging inboxes)..... a tracking tool to measure penetration and use. ....... couldn’t pass up the chance to join a savvy NYC start-up: “The New York Times was my home for over two years. I loved every bit of of the job. I’ve had the itch to work for a start up for a short while. ......uniquely positioned to understand the features and benefits of this user community .... Vindu Goel: “Soraya, what are we going to do without you?” ..... Dropio’s .... millions of users ..... Time named it one of the year’s 50 best websites .....
Soraya Darabi - LinkedIn named one of AdAge Magazine's "25 People in Media to Follow" on Twitter.com and was listed at #2 on "The Silicon Alley Insider 100" at the end of 2009. ..... B.A. in English Literature at Georgetown University .... B.A. , English, Art History , 2002 — 2005 ...... a consumate professional ....Her business acumen, enthusiasm, and generous spirit will light up the darkest of conference rooms. Not only does she have extensive technical expertise, but she's also an accomplished communicator and social network builder - a rare combination. ........ enterprising, hardworking, and smart ....... a deep understanding of the landscape of social networks ...... detail-oriented, responsive and full of energy ........ smart, dedicated and self starting ...... always positive and ready for new innovative tasks ....... a team player ...... will be a success wherever she is ....... creative, energetic, and so knowledgeable and enthusiastic about buzz marketing/social networking that I've found myself quoting her on the subject whenever it comes up ........... generous with her ideas ...... plain fun to talk to: she's smart and funny as well as sensitive and kind, but disarming because she somehow projects both a crazy confidence and a sweet modesty at the same time ......... an incredible person to get to know in the fast-evolving culture of New York digital media. ...brings all sorts of innovative ideas ....... Soraya has been lending her strategic advice, relationships and expertise to my non-profit for close to two years now. She is fabulous at what she does, is very knowledgeable, proactive and is able to think creatively. She is one of the most dedicated and hard working people I know and is a pleasure to work with .. April 6, 2009 ........Soraya will blow you away. She's ferocious and enterprising, and she finds solutions where others only see problems. While being extremely conscientious and professional, she is also visionary--with the patience and practicality to realize those visions. ........always one step ahead of everyone else and always at the ready to help the rest of us catch up. I can't help but learn something from her every time we're together. Her infectious charm helps her to get things done while gaining supporters and fans along the way ....... an ambitious young woman eager to succeed. ..... a blow when she left our company. ..... was the best manager and mentor that I could have asked for. I consider her a social media and marketing genius and a role model for young professionals starting out in the corporate world. She is extremely intelligent, organized and poised. As her direct report, I was constantly amazed at how she managed to dip her fingers into just about every pot of honey out there! World traveler, marketing maven, trustworthy confidant and witty joker -- she wears all the hats on the rack! If I could have stayed longer with NYTimes.com, I would have begged to stay with Soraya. ........ stunningly cutting-edge in every arena I've encountered her ...... consistently on the cutting edge of the online community, both professionally and socially ..... a networking wonder, and seems to know and have befriended virtually any and all movers-and-shakers within the online media world.Her web-savvy and creative vision are surpassed only by her drive and unrivaled work ethic ... April 6, 2009 ........ tireless in her pursuit to be all knowing on digital strategies. ....... succeeds at every turn ..... has an ear to the ground a hand on the key board and her brain hotwired to wiki-pedia of all these is to know in the rapidly changing world of digital strategies. ....... consistently energetic, competent and willing. She never hesitates to help out a friend (or colleague) and she exudes hard work and ambition. ....... a friendly and enjoyable personality in the office.
My Life in Beta (Tumblog)

Five Questions for Soraya Darabi of drop.io's PressLift ‹ Social Media Week
contributing to Social Media Week’s board .....
Flickr: Soraya Darabi's Photostream
Soraya Darabi | Guest of a Guest
The 2009 Silicon Alley 100: Soraya Darabi one of the reasons the New York Times became so Facebook-and-Twitter-savvy this year
Silicon Angle: No, Mark Zuckerberg Isn’t More Powerful than the President

My Comment

I don't know who you are, my first time at your blog, but you are so missing the point. You start with the nuclear button. How many times has a POTUS pressed that button that you know of? The number one way a POTUS exercises influence is not even through the veto power. That number one thing is media attention. Keyword: media. Have you heard of the term social media? Facebook has half a billion people. Obama does not have that many voters. Do you think everyone in America, or every voting citizen, or everyone who voted for Obama spends every waking minute trying to figure out what exactly Obama will order them to do at that very moment? No, stupid. So Obama has no power over them at all, right? But that would be trying to figure out the logic behind what you are getting at. And that would be a mistake. Because you conclude by revealing you have an ax to grind. Here is a person who is on the cover of a magazine that has had, well, Mark Zuckerberg, and Barack Obama, on its cover before, also Steve Jobs, if that means anything to you, and she is on the cover when Lady Gaga is on the list, Fred Wilson is on that same list she is on. Last year she was on a similar list put together by the Silicon Alley Insider: the AOL CEO was also on the list. I find that remarkable. Actually her Zuck remark was the most eye catching for me when I was reading the Fast Company profile on her. I am like, wow, I had not thought of it that way, but wow. Although I have heard of other respectable people in tech talk of Facebook as quite literally a country, like VC Brad Burnham of USV. I think Soraya and Brad are up to something, you are not.

Fast Company: Is Facebook Founder Mark Zuckerberg More Powerful Than the President? their power, at least in terms of reach of voice, is not so different.
Most Creative People event
Fast Company: Twitter, Facebook, Tumblr, LinkedIn: Multiple e-dentity Disorder





Soraya Darabi - The Daily Beast
Amazing Women Rock - Soraya Darabi (Internet RockStar) Darabi recently made the cover of Fast Company's 100 Most Creative People in business, falling between the likes of Lada Gaga (No. 1) and Andrey Ternovskiy (No. 100), the teen founder of Chatroulette....... says she'd "give anything to go back to college and double major in computer science." "Women are simply not taught to think technology and programming are cool and worth exploring until it may be too late," she says. ...... So how does this savvy non-engineer get a leg up in the Internet world? By harnessing the power of her social network, of course. "It's all a game of online telephone, and I'm tapped into a network that probably hears the message first."
Soraya Darabi - mediabistro.com
NYT Social Media Wunderkind Moves To Marketing New App "Next Tuesday will be my last full-day at The New York Times...It must go without saying that I will miss the beautiful brainy faces of my work family so very much."
Soraya Darabi on Hot Potato

Video: The Moment Project - Drop.io product lead Soraya Darabi shares her favorite movie moment

Soraya Darabi and Drop.io Want to Supercharge Social Media She's earned a reputation among the digerati as someone who has intuitively understood where all this social-media stuff is going
Soraya Darabi | CrunchBase Profile
When Your Profession's Landscape Changes - Shifting Careers Blog
NextGen:Charity : a conference on new strategies in non-profit and ... Speakers .. Seth Godin .. Soraya Darabi

Watch live streaming video from internetweekny at livestream.com

Events / Goods 4 Good
soraya darabi (sorayadarabi) on Vowch "She knows everything about launching products and campaigns with the social web, specializing in Twitter, Facebook, and digital media. She's incredibly passionate about using the power of technology to change the world for the better, and has successfully harnessed this power to launch successful campaigns to feed millions of hungry people and provide clean water for countless communities. Extremely bright and articulate, she is the go-to person for social media strategy."
Foodspotting | About Active Advisor .... loves food, photography and emerging tech so naturally ..... In 2010 she shared a spot on The Daily Beast's "Women Who Rule the Web" list alongside Alexa.
CatchAFire
Internet Week party report: It never stops | The Social - CNET News This one was the work of The New York Times social media marketer Soraya Darabi and Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey, who invited a few people to the outdoor bar at the Standard. Guests "checked in" to mobile networking site Foursquare, their friends dropped by, and soon the place had snowballed to such an extent that the guests decided to give the bar staff a break and relocate to the notably less highbrow Hogs & Heifers Saloon across the street..... some of the well-off dot-commers in attendance at the Standard, including billionaire Mark Cuban.
SorayaD's Music Profile – Users at Last.fm
2008 December « everydaytrash Soraya visited Brigitte in Malawi last November and took the photo above while accompanying her on a round of visits to G4G partners. On that day, in addition to pads of paper, the girls brought a couple jumbo bags of lollipops for the students at this school. What you see are a bunch of kids who have never had a lollipop. The reason they’re all looking in different directions is becaues they’re not quite sure what to do with them. I so wish I had video of this cross-cultural encounter!
SheFinds.com: Going Going Gone: Get The Last Vince Draped Dress Before It’s Sold Out Usually we don’t shop from the cover of business magazines–that us, until we spotted this drapey Vince dress ($285) on Soraya Darabi, social media guru, on the cover of Fast Company. We figured it’s perfect for work and nights out, and since we’re perpetual shoppers, had to ask her who made it. We tried to buy ourselves one, but it turns out, we weren’t the only ones coveting the dress–now, it’s almost sold out. Hurry, and get one of your own while it’s still available.

This Is Not Happening: King Dennis
Paul Graham, Brad Feld, Me, BBC
Me @ BBC
I Have Been Quoted In Fast Company

Blogger Stats

Image via CrunchBase

Weeks back (Redesigning My Blog) I got rid of Google Analytics (and Google Ads) from this blog to speed up the loading time. Every micro second matters. The faster the better. Readers like it fast.

Today I learn Google has integrated stats into Blogger itself. That is a good thing.

Mashable: Google Launches Real-Time Blogger Stats
Blogger In Draft Blog: Introducing Blogger Stats
Blogger In Draft

I just learned this blog had 335 page views yesterday.

I just published a blog post - Brazil: The Overconfidence Of A Soccer Superpower - like a minute ago, and it already has 13 views. Wow.

For yesterday I have a peak around midnight - that must be India - and another, bigger pick around noon, more like 2 PM - that is America. Bollywood, Hollywood.

Last week my most visited post has been this: Larry Ellison. That just so happens to be one of my favorite posts.

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Brazil: The Overconfidence Of A Soccer Superpower

Image via Wikipedia

Brazil has a special place in the soccer universe. It still is my favorite country to root for. Pele still is the best soccer player the world ever saw, the most famous athlete the world will ever know.

Brazil

But Brazil lost today. It was going to treat this game like it were the finals. I did not see much evidence of that.

Coach Dunga made two obvious mistakes even before the games began. He refused to put on the team some very obvious names, some star players. Why? Because Brazil was too big, there were too many good players to choose from. The coach is not the most important person on a soccer team, a VC is not the most important person on a tech startup team.

And he picked a wrong guy for team captain. I still do not know his name. His personal game was mediocre. But that can not be a deal breaker as long as you can exhibit leadership qualities. The dude got himself a yello card in a previous game, today he earned himself a red card. The yellow card rang alarm bells in my mind. The guy has a character flaw.

Instead of saying, we now have 20 minutes to even it out and still go win this game, let's go do it, the guy reduced the team size to 10 and brought the morale down for the team. 20 minutes were enough time. Kaka alone made two good attempts in those 20 minutes.

Brazil, great soccer country, lousy team captain, a coach lacking humility.

There was this pervasive overconfidence on the Brazilian side that prevented them from going for the small opportunities, learning the small lessons, treating the other side with sufficient respect when they had a one goal lead, and succumbing to frustration when that other side evened that out, and finally ended with a one goal lead.

Maybe the goalkeeper should have been the captain of the team on the Brazilian side.

Okay, so I am still rooting for Argentina. I am nervous the way I was not today. I was expecting to see Brazil win. But between Germany and Argentina, that is a hard one.

Soccer And Latin America
Lionel Messi (2)
Lionel Messi

Last night at Digital Dumbo I had an Argentina shirt on. One of the organizers invited me to the Dumbo Breakfast. Invite me for Dumbo Dumplings instead. (My Secret Sauce) Breakfast is a little too early. And, sorry, but today was Brazil's day, not Dumbo's, much as I love that place. I walked over there! Took me only a little more time than a train ride would have taken. But I hear flying is even faster.

July 1 Digital Dumbo: Do Not Miss

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FourSquare: $20 Million At $95 Million Valuation

Image via Wikipedia

There has been tremendous buzz today about FourSquare's new round of funding. This process has gone for a few, long months now. It has been one drawn out process. There has been drama. There has been intrigue. The sweet spot for me was when after months of talk Yahoo might buy FourSquare, FourSquare instead went ahead and stole a key talent from Yahoo. That's the way you do it.

Selling FourSquare Would Be A Mistake, Partnering Would Be Genius

When there was talk it might get bought, I strongly argued selling FourSquare would be a mistake. I was not saying, do the right thing, don't go after the money. What I was saying was, think about money, big money, do not sell.

I am not the first person to draw FourSquare-Twitter parallels. But I sure am one who gets the parallel. The two have had similar trajectories. At first sight a tweet feels as lightweight as checking in. What the.

Twitter had enormous buzz. It scaled but not as well as I would have liked. It made monetization moves, but much too late for my tastes. And it has done a lousy job of adding new features. FourSquare has scaled well. What is the FourSquare version of the fail whale? I don't know it. And FourSquare has been very impressive in the monetization department. But FourSquare has not impressed me in the features department. And I have to say that out loud because, unlike Twitter, FourSquare has competition. I hope this new round of funding allows FourSquare to cement its lead. I wish Dennis (@dens) and Naveen (@naveen) all the best.

Like Andy Grove said, only the paranoid survive. Checking in is the starting piont of the FourSquare experience. Companies for which that is not true - Yahoo, Facebook, Google, Twitter - are not serious threats, although all of them could use that key feature. Checking in in the mobile space is like the inbox in the email space, it is basic. But that check in as the starting point space has a few different players, and checking in is an activity that leaves much room for imagination. Could FourSquare ride that imagination wave? If it does, it goes IPO in a few years. If it doesn't, it should then go ahead and sell off. I am betting it will ride the wave. We shall see.

FourSquare has a shot at going IPO before MeetUp.com, a more senior tech company in town, senior in terms of years. Unless we get a few solid IPOs, New York City has not really arrived on the tech scene. Until then we should brag about our subway instead.

Ben Horowitz: Why Andreessen Horowitz Invested In FourSquare

Dennis not only created the vision for the company, but for the entire product category. Beyond that, he is very clearly the thought leader in the market. This is not at all surprising as he has been working on the problem for a decade and has highly refined his thinking through that period. ...... . He’s the kind of leader that great technical minds will be excited to follow: visionary, righteous, and competent. I am really excited to work with Dennis to help him on his path from being a great leader to a great Chief Executive of an incredibly important company. ...... at Foursquare is growing faster than Twitter did at this stage. ......Dennis and team have identified over a dozen different dimensions of the Foursquare product that must interact with each other in precisely optimal ways to achieve user delight. Years and years of research and sweat equity went into cracking the code, and the results are magical. ....... over 4.6B people have mobile phones and there are 1.7B people on the Internet. Already, over 200M people worldwide have smart phones and that number is headed north fast. ...... , major brands such as The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, Zagat, Bravo TV, Starbucks, C-SPAN, Marc Jacobs and over 10,000 businesses are currently working with Foursquare to build customer loyalty and drive traffic. Not many companies have their users turn into their sales force, and it’s definitely a good sign that this is happening around Foursquare.

This Is Not Happening: King Dennis
The FourSquare Appeal For Me
FourSquare Must Cut A Deal With Yahoo
FourSquare Office, Dropio Technology
4:16 PM @ FourSquare
Selling FourSquare Would Be A Mistake, Partnering Would Be Genius
The Foursquare Rap: Badges Like Us
Craig Newmark, Dennis Crowley, Jennifer 8 Lee: Koreatown
Dennis Crowley: I Underestimated Him

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Happy Social Media Day.


OLPC Tablet

Soccer And Latin America

Check this out. Each of the four quarter-final matches has one Latin American team in there. Is that something or is that something? Soccer is Latin America's game. Hats off to the continent of Latin America.

Brazil

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Brazil

This blog post made me smile.

Brazil has a soccer ball on its flag. The Declaration Of Independence is America. Soccer, now that would be Brazil.

The New Republic: How To Beat Brazil

When the whistle blows and the match begins, jog around the pitch slowly, laconically, grinning the entire time. Your body language should express an indifference to the game itself. In fact, let your opponent control the pace, let them have possession, let them think they’re in charge. When you do get the ball, pass it around a little, just to see how it feels. Isn’t the stadium pretty under the lights? Smile. Mostly, though, wait. Be patient. Don’t run hard unless it’s absolutely necessary. Just for fun, let the other side have a few shots on goal, so they get their blood flowing. Then, after twenty minutes without a single scoring opportunity, manufacture one out of thin air—a broken play in the midfield, a counter-attack, a foul and a quick restart—and once in front of the rival’s net, be merciless........ Playing against Brazil is an absolute nightmare. ...... My entire life, I’ve been watching Brazil play poorly and win consistently. They are the rare team that never seems to be in control of the game, though they always are. The truth is they’re not playing the same game as their opponents. They’re playing something else, a sport related to soccer, but entirely different. In their version of the sport the rest of us know, if they score one on you, they’ll score three. Once you’re forced to chase the game—as Chile was today—they’re more than happy to tear you to pieces. ....... You can’t beat Brazil squandering opportunities. You have to score early, and often. You have to make them come to you. You have to force their defenders to play defense full time, without giving them a chance to make those lethal runs up the wings. And most importantly, you have to beat them for a solid ninety minutes. How many times have I seen Brazil be thoroughly dominated for eighty-five minutes, and walk off the pitch smiling and victorious, as if they found the entire spectacle amusing? ........ This team is stronger on defense than any Brazilian side I can recall, and they’re remarkably consistent in the attacking third. Luis Fabiano is a straight-up murderer. ...... the Brazilian bench is deep.

Walking On The Moon

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