NGC Communications is huge supporter of surfing and a big sponsor of the local district of the Eastern Surfing Association.
I have been surfing nearly 25 years and live for the peak of the Atlantic hurricane season, which is underway right now as Earl, Fionna, and two unnamed disturbances behind them bounce off the coast of Africa and make the trek across the sea. This is the time to be ready for anything and to be prepared mentally and physically for the best surf the East Coast annually receives. Because, lets be honest, the surf most of the year isn’t that great on the East Coast so we have to take what we can get when we get it.
Earl shows promise for surfers up and down the coast. NWS and NOAA are reporting 12-20 foot seas starting Wednesday afternoon through Thursday night. Friends in Florida already reporting decent swell as it cruises and things in Charleston are expected to pick up today with the incoming tide this afternoon.
Check out one of the coolest hurricane photos I have ever seen – shot from the space station yesterday. Way awesome!
Hurricane Earl is photographed by astronaut Douglas Wheelock aboard the International Space Station on Tuesday, Aug. 31. American astronaut Douglas Wheelock of NASA has been photographing hurricanes from the International Space Station and posting them on Twitter. (Douglas H. Wheelcock / NASA)
The swell window for Earl is short, but looks like the best action will be (surprise surprise) the Outer Banks. Hint the sarcasm here because after living there for almost a decade, I can tell you, that if you can surf hurricane swell in Cape Hatteras you can surf anywhere in the world. Bar none. The Cape Hatteras Lighthouse is like a bulls-eye for storms. And, as a property owner still in Kill Devil Hills, its a little nerve-racking when a Category 4 beast is staring you down the Gulf Stream pipe.
Anyway, East Coast surfers get ready. This kind of storm is perfect – little to no damage to land since it isn’t expected to have a direct impact, and great surf as it skirts the coast from the Carolinas to Cape Cod. These types of conditions, btw, are for experienced watermen and women only. Novice surfers, stay on land. This is not for you. Tourists heading to the beaches for the holiday weekend, please follow lifeguard warnings, red flags, etc., and stay out the water. The rips are mighty out there and deceiving. A rogue shorebreak could sweept a 3-year-old out with no problems, so watch your kids and be safe out there.
I’ll try to post some pics over Labor Day weekend. Keep checking back. If you have some, email me at noah@thinkngc.com and I’ll share them or leave a comment below on where I can find them. Love to see could surfing shots and storms.
I had the privilege to speak with Mark Cuban last week during a visit to Durham, N.C.
Noah Garrett (left), president of NGC Communications, talks with Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban (right) in Durham. (photo J. Carpenter)
The outspoken owner of the Dallas Mavericks and HDNet, laid out his rules for business and offered unique advice to entrepreneurs and investors during his presentation at LTW’s Executive Exchange event at the American Tobacco Campus. In bullet-point fashion, he offered a no-holds-barred approach to laying out his work ethic and approach to running a succesful business.
He offered eight rules that he runs his various businesses with along with accompanying comments:
Sales cures all. Selling should be a priority in any company. We may use different tools and ways to communicate, but it’s still all about selling.
Best equity is sweat equity. One of the biggest mistakes people make is going out to raise money first. You need to think like a student; not how to raise money. Learn how to cut costs.
Everybody has an idea. The idea for your business is the easy part. The hard part is the preparation and to understand what you’re willing to do and how hard you are willing to work.
Don’t lie to yourself. Every entrepreneur has one, two, or three things they are good at; but sometimes we lie to ourselves. Basically, know what you suck at.
Kick your own ass! Somebody’s always trying to do what you do, better.
You don’t own your business. Your customers do.
Deal with setbacks. Every person and every business has them. Don’t get down about it. Work harder.
Culture is important. Make sure you love what you do and find people who fit the culture of your business.
Overall, I must say Mr. Cuban was a breath of fresh air and inspiring for small business owners like myself. I like dudes who just keep it real. Many times I attend events and functions where I hear the same `ol mumbo jumbo. This, my friends, was not boring and was not the same `ol mumbo jumbo.
Here are two links to stories that I wrote on Local Tech Wire that you might find of interest:
All the way home from my day trip the Triangle (yes, I got up at 3:30 a.m. from Charleston and drove up and back for the day for this) I thought about the similarities we have regarding work ethic and how we operate our businesses.
Although a big difference in bank accounts (lol) we are not that much different. I also believe “Sales Cures All” and that every entrepreneur should be good at three things and not lie to yourself about what you aren’t good at.
Thank you, Mr. Cuban for sharing your time.
If you’re ever looking for some good web content, check out his blog Blog Maverick. Definitely worth a read.
Spain was the big winner at the 2010 FIFA World Cup in South Africa. But, another winner is ESPN and other broadcasters around the world who reportedly logged 26.7 million hours of online viewing in the U.S. alone – clearly making this year’s soccer tournament the largest online sporting event in history.
Here are some final stats from ESPN, Nielsen, Univision, and others:
ESPN3.com clocked nearly 7.4 million unique viewers, generating 15.7 million hours of viewing. 355,000 people per minute tuned in for the semifinal between Germany and Spain, which makes it ESPN3′s largest average audience ever for a live online sporting event. The network’s World Cup app was downloaded more than 2.5 million times, and it was accessed by 1 million users per day on average.
Univisionfutbol.com site streamed more than 10 million hours of live video throughout the tournament. Users spent nearly 90 minutes on the site each day on average, with Univision tracking more than 265,000 unique media players. The network also had more than 450,000 users downloaded the Univision Futbol app since its launch. Univision tracked a combined 34.7 million visits across its online and mobile offerings throughout the tournament.
Akamai delivered more than 1.5 Tbps and 1.6 million concurrent streams at the peak across its network, serving live video streams for ESPN as well as Spain’s Prisacom, Mexico’s Televisa, and about two dozen other broadcasters worldwide.
Twitter tracked up to six million World Cup–related terms each day. This included “vuvuzela,” which inspired up to 280,000 tweets per day.
Nielsen measured the popularity of the official FIFA website, which was the biggest hit in Brazil, where 7 percent of the Web population, or 2.8 million people total, frequented it for World Cup updates. The FIFA site also was popular in the U.K. (6.9 percent of all British Internet users / 2.7 million people) and Switzerland (5.6 percent of all Swiss Internet users / 0.25 million people). Also worth noting is that most of the FIFA.com visitors are between advertisers coveted age demographic of males 18 to 34, with the exception of Germany, where 54 percent of all visitors were female.
MobiTV streamed 1.8 million hours of ESPN Mobile TV during the 31 days of the World Cup (this number includes World Cup coverage and other sporting events). The company noted that the game between the U.S. and Algeria had highest average minutes per user, and the game between Netherlands and Spain had the highest number of unique viewers.
So how does the World Cup stack up to other sporting events online?
CBS said its March Madness games had larger online audiences, clocking about 8.3 million unique users to its March Madness online player, which is more than ESPN3 had during the World Cup. However, ESPN had 15.7 million hours of live video verses CBS’s 11.7 million hours. And, if you add up ESPN3′s numbers with the ones served by Univision, you end up with 26.7 million hours of online viewing — clearly making it the largest online sporting event in the U.S.
ESPN paid FIFA $100 million for rights to the 2010 and 2014 World Cups, while Univision spent $325 million. With the next tournament scheduled for Brazil, where most of the host cities are only one hour ahead of EDT, the possibility of some prime-time telecasts could boost ratings again. South Africa is six hours ahead of EDT.
FIFA has not yet set 2014 game times.
And looking ahead, the 2022 tournament could be in the United States. FIFA’s executive committee will vote Dec. 2 on the 2018 and ‘22 sites, and while the first is expected to go to a European nation, the U.S. is favored for 2022.
Right now the U.S. has a petition with more than 910,000 signatures on it to bring the World Cup back to the U.S. You probably recall us having it in 1994.
With one million voices shouting “The Game Is In US!” you know that FIFA will hear us.
PR and Ad executives, pay attention. Next world cup in Brazil will be shown in prime time in the U.S. and if it comes back in 2018 or 2022, the revenue streams will be astronomical.
A quick note about tonight’s MLS All-Star Game from Houston, Texas.
Great marketing and PR – something the MLS league needs to harness and build on after the popularity of the 2010 World Cup that ended only 16 days ago. It’s really something to see 70,000-plus fans watching soccer – an exhibition friendly at that!
However, all the marketing in the world doesn’t make up for quality – in any sport or business. And, the players representing the “best” of the MLS should be ashamed of the poor performance and effort put in to a capacity crowd against Manchester United.
A 5-2 loss in soccer is a serious butt-kickin!
Tickets were sold and ratings will probably be high, but you can’t just expect fans to embrace soccer in the U.S. if our players and leagues can’t compete with the rest of the world. There’s still work to do.
Whether you’re a die-hard soccer fan or just a bandwagon fan because the World Cup is underway, if you missed today’s historic match between the U.S. and Algeria, you missed one for the ages.
It was the most unbelievable game I have ever watched. Seriously, it was a rollercoaster ride and my neighbors must think I’m freaking crazy.
Final score: 1-0 USA.
My nerves are shot and have goose bumps just thinking about Landon Donovan scoring that winning goal in extra time. Every soccer player in the entire world has dreamed of scoring a winning goal like that when the stakes are that high in the World Cup. It’s what dreams are made of!
The U.S. would be going home right now if not for that goal.
Cheers to him and the entire team. They never quit. They didn’t whine about the poor refereeing (again), and we actually won the entire Group C stage. We haven’t done that since 1930.
On to the Sweet 16 baby! We likely will play Saturday against Germany or Serbia.
On a sidenote, NGC’s men’s soccer team is tied for first in City of Charleston’s summer league. With four games remaining, a spot in the playoffs is almost assured and we will look to win it all come July.
Pakistan, home to the world’s second- largest Muslim population, said it has blocked social networks YouTube and Facebook as well as Web browsers on BlackBerry phones, citing concerns over blasphemy, according to wire reports on Thursday.
The “Everybody Draw Muhammad Day” Facebook page (which is May 20 – today) prompted a court order earlier this week on Facebook and YouTube is now under fire as well as Wikipedia and Flickr.
Check out this video from the Associated Press via YouTube.
The Pakistani government blocked access because of “sacrilegious” content on the video-sharing website, signaling a growing Internet crackdown against sites deemed offensive to the country’s majority Muslim population.
The move against YouTube came a day after the government blocked access to Facebook amid anger over a page on the social networking site that encourages users to post images of Islam’s Prophet Muhammad.
The page sparked criticism because Islam prohibits any images of the prophet.
The Pakistan Telecommunications Authority did not point to specific material on YouTube that prompted it to block the site, only citing “growing sacrilegious contents.” The government took action against both Facebook and YouTube after it failed to persuade the websites to remove the “derogatory material,” the regulatory body said in a statement.
It welcomed representatives from the two websites to contact the Pakistani government to resolve the dispute in a way that “ensures religious harmony and respect.”
The regulatory body said it has blocked more than 450 Internet links containing offensive material, but it is unclear how many of the links were blocked in the last two days. Access to the online encyclopedia site Wikipedia and photo sharing site Flickr also were restricted Thursday.
The government blocked Facebook on Wednesday after a group of Islamic lawyers won a court order requiring officials to restrict access to the site until May 31. It was unclear if the ban against YouTube would also be temporary.
The Web page at the center of the Facebook dispute — “Everybody Draw Mohammed Day!” — encourages users to post images of the prophet on May 20 to protest threats made by a radical Muslim group against the creators of “South Park” for depicting Muhammad in a bear suit during an episode earlier this year.
The page sparked protests from radical students in Pakistan, with some holding signs urging Islamic holy war against those who blaspheme the prophet.
A series of cartoons of the prophet published in a Danish newspaper in 2005 sparked violent protests by Muslims around the world, including in Pakistan, and death threats against the cartoonists.
Facebook said Wednesday it was investigating the controversial page.
“While the content does not violate our terms, we do understand it may not be legal in some countries,” the company said in a statement. “In cases like this, the approach is sometimes to restrict certain content from being shown in specific countries.”
Online reaction to the Facebook ban was supportive in the initial hours after it was implemented. But comments on Twitter — which was still unblocked Thursday and drawing new users thanks to bans on other sites — showed many Internet users were angry about the new, wide-ranging restrictions.
“Sad and embarrassing day in the history of Pakistan. Tough times to be a Pakistani. Questionable decisions in a so called ‘democracy,’” one user tweeted.
Pakistan blocked access to YouTube once before for two days in 2008 because of what it said was un-Islamic content. Turkey, Thailand, Indonesia and Morocco have all blocked access to YouTube in the past for various reasons.
It remains to be seen how successful the government will be at keeping Pakistan’s nearly 20 million Internet users from accessing the blocked sites. Other countries, such as China, permanently ban Facebook and YouTube. But citizens often have little trouble working their way around the ban using proxy servers and other means.
“What’s common to Facebook and Lashkar-e-Taiba?” one user on Twitter wrote, referring to a Pakistani militant group. “They are both banned in Pakistan, but Pakistanis can still find them if they want to.”
With content provided by NC STEM, MCNC, the SMT Center and other sources, this “STEM News” section has editorial plans to touch on legislative and policy issues, funding opportunities, industry impacts and economic development, knowledge workforce demands and transformation, discussions on 21st century schools, the importance of high-speed connectivity in classrooms, Race to the Top, STEM events, what local communities are doing on the ground, exclusive interviews with state and national thought leaders, and much more.
This weekly update will provide critical information and the real-world impact STEM has in North Carolina and nationwide. Additionally, Local Tech Wire will be inviting STEM students to its Executive Exchange programs, which focus on information technology and life science issues, and plans to sponsor a STEM-focused Executive Exchange later this year.“Local Tech Wire has been an aggressive provider of STEM coverage in the past, and we will be even more so in the future,” said LTW Editor Rick Smith. “Workforce preparation is a growing concern in North Carolina and the United States.
Companies need more well-educated employees who are skilled in STEM. Our intention with this new section is to help bring more attention to STEM. By involving students, we hope to ultimately encourage more young people to choose a career in STEM.”
“The reality is that North Carolina’s economic future is tied to having a STEM-educated workforce in all areas of the state,” added Karl Rectanus, leader of NC STEM, a state organization working with communities to ensure students engage in rigorous STEM education. “This exciting new section in LTW will provide leaders in the tech and business sectors information to help us all drive STEM education and our economy further faster.”
MCNC President and CEO Joe Freddoso said there continues to be a strong link between high-quality STEM education and economic development.
“Through Local Tech Wire, we will highlight the good work being done in communities all over the state, pose and inspire new ideas, share leading-edge news, collaborate with state and national experts, and increase awareness of STEM education to ensure all of our students are prepared for 21st century jobs,” added Freddoso. “This will provide an outlet to gain additional understanding of the role of STEM in our economic prosperity, improved healthcare, and care of the environment. Our future depends on it.”
“The importance of STEM education applies not only to students, but to the citizens of this state,” concurred Sam Houston, president of the SMT Center, which aims to systematically improve performance in science, mathematics, and technology preK-12 education. “The future of the state’s economy is knowledge based, and that begins with STEM.
Story ideas and contributions are welcome. For information about how you, your company, school or organization can participate, contact Rick Smith at Local Tech Wire (rsmith@wral.com) or Noah Garrett at NGC Communications (noah@thinkngc.com).
Gladys Tate knows that technology drives her students and wants to use it to create a virtual field trip with them. Her essay which described how she would use technology to increase the level of engagement in the classroom was selected as the winner of the Lenovo Technology Contest, a regional competition, sponsored by the BRAC Regional Task Force (BRAC RTF).
“We were quite impressed with the quality of Ms. Tate’s instructional vision, and there is no doubt that her students are the real winners,” said Jane Smith, education program manager for BRAC RTF.
“I can say this was a wonderful opportunity for educators to be heard on our innovative ideas for engaging our students and thus enhancing our country’s future,” said Tate.
For her effort, she received a Lenovo X200 Tablet. The contest was open to K -12 teachers in the 11-county BRAC region. Dozens of entries were received.
“As you enable your classroom of digital learners to be more aware of global culture, geography, civics, and international motivation, I hope you are able to get great use of the Lenovo X200 Tablet,” added Jason Mooneyham, Lenovo director of sales, U.S. Enterprise Division. “While it is only a start to what you truly need for widespread global digital communication and learning, I hope you are able to use it for the engagement and enthusiasm you strive to achieve each day in your classroom.”
Is the technology industry’s ominous skills shortage and shrinking talent pool a ticking time bomb? In the global war for talent, the education system in the U.S. is falling short while businesses scramble to find the best employees – wherever that may be.
There is a tremendous corporate movement happening in this country right now that supports building a knowledge-based economy and for U.S. businesses to take an active role in improving resources in academics and advocating for a technology literate 21st Century Student.
Expanding domestic companies are working to ensure that they have an ample supply of engineering talent to hire in the coming years to remain globally competitive. In addition to supporting broader educational programs, some companies have been funding classroom training and curricula in school districts where they have facilities nearby in hopes that it will help them develop “home-grown” engineers.
The debate to those corporate initiatives is this; while schools welcome the materials and much-needed resources, critics say the initiatives add a commercial agenda to academics. Is that bad? Perhaps, but, I certainly can think are far worse things for our slumping economy and poor educational outlook that this country faces in the future.
Continual changes in the dynamics of the global labor force are having a major impact on the way employers around the world conduct their affairs. Technology is shifting organizational missions, strategies and objectives and has been described as one of the five most important variables in the future of business. Yet, all indications are that organizations will face a technology talent crunch in the future.
Last year, more than 270,000 U.S. college freshmen were surveyed and only 7.5 percent of students said they planned to major in engineering. According to the Wall Street Journal, that’s the lowest level since the 1970s. The irony is that the number of technology jobs continues to grow but fewer young American women and men are choosing technology-related fields of study, even though the job pool is readily available.
State spending on K-12 education has grown in real dollar terms in the past decade. Declining housing values now threaten to eat into property-tax revenues; which also eats away at state budgets. Teachers, meanwhile, often welcome the lesson plans, classroom equipment and the corporate-sponsored professional development sessions. But, however well-intentioned, such corporate input may blur the line between pure academics and a commercial agenda, critics say.
Technology professionals must change their focus – from the “techie side” to the “user side” – transitioning from technology bells and whistles to more problem-solving. The move away from “bits and bytes” calls for a new kind of technology leadership. Also, recruiting and retaining skilled employees within a constantly shrinking talent pool will continue to be a critical component to the success of any business in the near future.
The criticism that corporate donations into public schools may be placing hiring priorities ahead of broader educational goals is legitimate. However, weigh that against the needs of cash-strapped school districts throughout America, it begs the question: How many public schools would be offering courses in aerospace engineering or robotics without such support?
If you think social media is just a fad and doesn’t matter to your business, think again.
We all know social networking has become more mainstream in the last year, but some companies have neglected to catch on to the movement or simply just don’t understand how it all works. Fair enough, but not understanding the business applications of these popular tools is no excuse for sticking your head in the sand.
Here’s a great example of how far social networking has come in a short time.
While enjoying some Olympic curling yesterday (yes, curling is a sweet sport and very enjoyable to watch), I was following the Olympic Pulse online through NBC, which is counting the average amount of Olympic-related Tweets every 10 minutes. At one point I saw an average of 890 Tweets every 10 minutes.
That’s impressive. I also was impressed that athletes were Tweeting from the games. And, while watching curling on television, the NBC broadcaster said one of the U.S. curlers was tweeting while competing. I checked it out and sure enough, the dude was tweeting from the ice between curling rounds. Now that’s what I call interactive.
I bet the count will be higher tonight when Shaun White and the snowboarders hit the half-pipe.
Join NGC on Twitter @ThinkNGC and we’ll follow the Olympics together.
BTW, I like the Tweeting while competing statement earlier. Think I’ll use that more often.
