Techmamas

Nine-year-old's "How to Talk To Girls" To Be Made Into Movie

I just read on the Huffington Post something that should inspire kids to keep on writing: "Twentieth Century Fox has purchased the options to nine-year-old Alec Greven's book, "How to Talk To Girls.".

Here is the YouTube video of his interview on the Ellen Show:

For aspiring young writers, here are some websites that allow you to publish your own books:

In The Motherhood: The Webisode

I am a big Chelsea Lately (Chelsea Handler) fan, her show is my comic relief after a day of chasing three boys around... I happened to find this site that has mom related webisodes, and guess who made an appearance? Well none other then Jenny McCarthy, Leah Remini and Chelsea Handler..... Click here to take a look, it is funny for anyone that has fuzz growing on their sponges....

Do you think Chelsea Handler has a vanity Google alert set up and will see this post? Do ya, do ya? Maybe she will even comment when she realizes she has a crazed techie mama fan that has found a new place to watch her online (which is where I hang out most of the time).

SNL Tina Fey Skit Fueled Surge in Hits on the NBC Website

I just saw a post listed in Techmeme today from THR.com that discussed that "NBC's Web sites sees surge in traffic". The Tina Fey/Amy Poehler SNL video (their spoof of Sarah Palin and Hilary Clinton)  became the most watched viral video on their site while the instability of wall street brought viewers to CNBC. I thought the Tina Fey/Amy Poehler video was so funny, that I transcribed it to a post at the Silicon Valley Moms Blog - and added some great links to support some of the funny lines. Click here to read the transcript and see the video.  The video I loaded to my post was from Hulu, NBC's free video streaming site. VentureBeat pointed out that although NBC has the Hulu website with free videos, it has already sold 1million shows on iTunes since it started back with this service over 10 days ago.

Viral videos are very popular with moms, the "Mom Song" video was not only the buzz of discussions but was also emailed to me numerous times... My blog, Techmamas,has a category for web 2.0 humor where I list some of my favorite viral videos (like Facebook for Real) that have inspiried me to pass the links through my online social networks like Facebook and even email my friends.

Related links:

Hulu.com video streaming website

Apple iTunes TV Show download page

Interesting that viral videos are now also a proven winner for website hits.

I See Funny Bloggers: The Bloggess

So, If I blog about "The Bloggess" will that get me "Kawasakied".  Or is it Bloggessed? You see, I did pass the word out to vote for my SXSW panel called "Moms Who Tech".  I am not shy about my devotion to spreading the word about tech savvy moms so I will admit one of the emails sent out was to Guy Kawasaki. Guy Kawasaki is a Silicon Valley icon - and happens to be the guy I use for an example of the right way to have an online presence for a class I teach on that subject.  He also is supportive of mom bloggers, and even made time before his big night before BlogHer party to meet with the Silicon Valley Moms Group Road Trippers (I was there taking pictures).

Tonight I checked my panel voting comments (hmmm, hmmm - still time to vote) and Guy Kawasaki himself left a comment to get Jenny The Bloggess to come. Now, I have read her blog before - she even guest posted on the site I contribute to called "The Momocrats". I decided to spend some time reading her blog again - and she IS one funny blogger... Seriously (I like to say that when talking about funny things), I first starting reading blogs because of writing like The Bloggess. The fresh, honest, don't take yourself too seriously kind of talk witty gals out for the night will say to their friends.  Being a mom has decreased my witty factor due to sleep deprivation, so it is nice to know that others can wit for me. When you spend your day reminding your sons only to pee in the bushes if you are in the wilderness, instead of a bush at the outdoor section of a restaurant - then comic relief is in order.

So for a fun break, take a read over to The Bloggess. And for more fun just go visit the Moms Alltop blogs. And if you have not had your fix, go check The Bloggess guest post on Her Bad Mother.  Cathrine has already made me laugh so hard, I can't wait to read the two of them together in the same page.

Nrrrd Grrrlss

I had the pleasure of attending the Girl Geek Dinner - Facebook Developer Garage last week. The Bay Area Girl Geek Dinner website mentioned the two livebloggers, Yours Truely and Valleywag.

I have to admit reading Valleywag is one of my guilty-nerdy pleasures, but their post did not include some of the most important aspects of the night: The room was filled with some kick arse tech savvy gals who were not only interested in the Facebook Platform API (and in the Facebook language FBML...) but also knowing how to using Ruby on Rails as the web framework to write a Facebook app - and then sell it (take those Easter Eggs to the bank)! We also heard from some fabulous Facebook fem product designers and managers at Facebook.

To top it off, I enjoyed hearing from Cyan Banister - anyone that is voted the sexiest geek alive is good by me. I mean, come on, The Sexist Geek Alive team did produce this catchy video:

I did jump at the opportunity to geek up with all the fun props at the dinner for a picture by Vanessa Naylon. As a 40-something girl geek mom of three boys - do ya think I could put myself in the running for the sexiest geek alive?

Maybe not, for now I am just happy to be hanging out with the other girl geeks.

Celebs, What - Without Tech?

Forbes just posted with details of Celebs who don't do tech... Not suprising, I mean come on - if you have 10 personal assistants, why not have other people answer you email? And George Bush saying "The Google", also not a surprise...

Katie Couric and Bette Midler Sing on YouTube!

I just got an email about this YouTube video of Katie Couric and Bette Midler singing together at the New York Restoration Project's Spring Picnic  - so I wanted to pass it on... And to think I went to a Karaoke bar in NYC while Katie Couric gets to sing with BETTE MIDLER!!!

TechMama Quiz: College Gals or Moms Discussing Facebook?

This discussion took place today at 4:30pm. The challenge is to guess if it is a group of college gals or a group of moms talking. The conversation is from my mom-of-three-boys memory so it may not be exact.

Person 1: Hey Person 2- that Facebook status you put up on your profile last week was amazing!

Person 2: (laugh, giggle, laugh)

Person 3: Did you see the link I put up on my profile about that Facebook in Reality YouTube Video?

Person 1: No, I missed it - I don't read the Facebook links posted as much as I read the Facebook status updates. A buddy of mine put a status update announcing a breaking news item - I could not believe it! I had to turn on the TV to confirm it was for real.

Person 3: What Facebook applications do you like to use?

Person 2: I don't like the applications where someone sends you a cocktail, I wish they would just message me to meet live for a cocktail instead! I do enjoy the Facebook game applications.

Person 4: I don't load the applications at all, I just read the newsfeeds and status updates.

Person 1: Did you try the Facebook Chat yet? That works great!  Now that I am on Facebook I am able to keep up to date with more of my friends, including those that I have not seen in awhile. I want to load Facebook mobile but have not had time.

Person 3: I loaded Facebook Mobile (she shows them the application on her smartphone) and enjoy reading the status updates on the go.... Person 4 is the one that got me hooked on this smartphone in the first place - I will get her hooked on Facebook! Infact, I am going to update my status right now that we are talking about Facebook.

CLICK ON THE "CONTINUE READING" THIS POST TO SEE THE ANSWER.......

Facebook In Reality: The Video - With Added Mom Thoughts

My friends all know that I am a Facebook evangelist, but some of my tech savviest friends still don't get why. I tell them that I can keep track of what my personal and business friends are doing, get invited to events and keep my network up to date on my blog posts and favorite links.... How joining Facebook groups has helped me do some amazing business networking at night while the kids are asleep....How Facebook has helped me deepen the connection between my blogging network by adding them as friends... Or how about one of my mom friends who credits Facebook with giving her the ability to keep up to date with her friends around the world?  Or another Facebook savvy friend who uses it to help build her business network.

I am working on getting as many mom friends on Facebook to see it for themselves. Many think I am some crazy techie when I tell them I want to create a Facebook group for the moms from my kids schools' to socialize, which will be easier then trying to run after them in my sweats during the craziness of school dropoff, pickup or class parties.

I mean, come on - do moms really have the chance to meet other moms from their kids' schools unless they happen to have a playdate or carpool to sports events? Isn't that process inefficient?

Maybe developing some Facebook manners will help my mom friends jump on the bandwagon....I already tell those bothered by all the applications not to add applications they won't use. I warn my friends in advance that I am thrilled to read their updates, links and feeds but please don't send me something that I tell my kids are bad manners in real life (i.e. POKING). I also say just ignore the sophomoric humor that exists on all social networks..

Talk about sophomoric humor, a UK comedy troup idiotofants.com did a great job of explaining how NOT to use Facebook (warning - as they would say in the UK - don't get your knickers in a twist that some of the following humor has some raunchy bits):

All I can say is that parodies of social networking applications that get millions of YouTube hits means that it is already part of the modern lexicon - and here to stay.  

YouTube How To: Pipe Cleaner Action Heroes And Cucumber Trumpets

I stopped by one of my morning reads (All Things Digital) and I found one post that jumped out at me: Kara Swisher posted links to YouTube videos where a now famous young geeky guy (Halley Joseph Eveland) demonstrates how to make pipe cleaner action heroes. I linked to that post for two reasons:

• As a mom of three boys with lots of pipe cleaners, I thought this would make a great playdate or dinnertime activity that can lead to play afterwards.
• (As my older son would say) "How cool is that" when a guy making pipe cleaner action heroes is featured on one of my (tech influential) favorite blogs: All Things Digital! Two points for the blogosphere and lots of hope for geeks everywhere (me being one of them).
• Halley Joseph Eveland's mom can never complain that he is spending too much time making pipe cleaner action heroes or wasting time making YouTube videos. Moms out there with geeky kids take note!

Maybe I need to do something creative with pipe cleaners, or let my son make a video of his outdoor rock sculptures........Any ideas for creative YouTube videos that kids can make?

My favorite video this morning already has 275,711 hits on YouTube and may be either distracting or a fun addition to dinner table: Cucumber Trumpets (and other musical food from Heita3)