Instigator Blog

The folks at Pronet Advertising have just released a Flash-based online game called Search Engine Smackdown.

The game is simple - pick a fighter - Larry or Sergey from Google, Bill or Paul from Microsoft, Jerry or David from Yahoo, and duke it out by answering a number of search engine related questions.

How many people will really pick Bill Gates as their fighter of choice? Come on!

Some of the questions are easy, but others are definitely a bit more challenging. And, most of the questions are quite interesting too. You’ll have some fun and you might just learn something too!

I’ve already asked them to add a Pause button, and I’m sure they’ll make a handful of improvements over time.

Go play Search Engine Smackdown!

This is a great example of buzz marketing at its finest. It’s fun, catchy, and helps Pronet extend and develop its brand and reputation in the markets where it does business. Nice job.

It seems likely they will. Blogging is already darn close to being mainstream, and with the volume of social networks out there, including those geared to young people, it wouldn’t shock me if every kid on the planet had a blog someday.

My son is no exception. He’s almost two and a half.

At dinner I was talking to my wife about blogging. I said the word “blogger” a few times.

My son repeated me and said, “blogger.” (He’s got an amazing vocabulary for his age, don’t ya know! You should hear him say “humongous.” Anyway…)

He said the word twice, then looked at me and said, “I have a blogger in my nose.”

Yup, all the kids are going to be bloggers. And they’ll still be plagued by boogers.

Do You Know Where Your Nuts Are?

Um…yes? I think so…I hope so…

[tags]weblogs, blogging, writing headlines, humor, funny blogs[/tags]

Robyn Tippins and Shawn Hessinger tag teamed me with the “5 things” meme. I’d previously been slammed with the 5 things meme bug by Leah Maclean, and I had a tough enough time with that!

But after days of deliberation I’ve come up with 5 more things you didn’t know about me…until just now (assuming you keep reading; please do…)

1. I once wrote a book. It was called The Buzzword Bingo Book: The Complete, Definitive Guide to the Underground Workplace Game of Doublespeak. Technically it was co-written, but it’s a long story. I had 15 minutes of fame back in 1998 with buzzword bingo (more like 20-25 minutes actually.) Made it into the Wall Street Journal and everything. Before blogging took off (or even existed?)
2. In my senior year of highschool I played football - defensive tackle. I wasn’t particularly good, but the team needed some warm bodies to play. Apparently I was warm enough. More than anything this shows you the vast difference between Canadian and US highschool sports. I don’t think there’s a single highschool in the United States where I would have been big or strong enough to play football.
3. I’ve never smoked in my life. I’ve never even tried it, not once. Not a single puff, drag or taste. Never ever. Smoking just never appealed to me (and the peer pressure wasn’t strong enough I guess.) Having said that I was far from a choir boy…
4. Actually, I was a choir boy. Way back when I sang in the choir until my voice cracked horribly and I sounded like a dying sheep. That was the end of that. But back in those days the Anglican private school I went to (I’m not Anglican if you’re wondering) took choir pretty seriously. We even toured around.
5. I used to listen to Raising Hell by Run DMC nonstop. I’m not much of a rap or hip hop fan these days, but back in Grade 6, 7 and 8 (or thereabouts) Run DMC was it. I still think it’s a great album.

Now that I’ve suitably embarrassed myself I think I’ll leave it at that. This has been a very fun meme but everything has to disappear into the sunset eventually.

I do appreciate Robyn and Shawn thinking about me and tagging me…

Paul O’Flaherty recently tagged me to participate in the super villain meme floating around the Web. Maybe it’s not a meme, just something fun to try. So I gave it a go, and here are my results:

So Paul and I are both Apocalypse, although after that the results are quite different. I was almost Dr. Doom, and Magneto wasn’t far behind. I’m glad I wasn’t Mr. Freeze (lame!) and Catwoman would have been awkward, so I’ll take Apocalypse and make a break for it.