Birchbox, a monthly curated box focusing on beauty products

I admit, I’d love to have a personal stylist/shopper.

But what about the masses? Especially groups that are far-removed from great shopping and lean on the Internet to help them stay stylish and current on new products and trends?

Although I live in a shopping mecca, I find myself wishing I had a stylist to keep me up to date and help cut the lines and crazy crowds.

These reasons (in addition to curiosity) led me to sign up for Birchbox (beauty), JewelMint (jewelry)  and Shoedazzle (shoes).

The Breakdown

Birchbox ($10/monthly)

• Celeb Backer: None, but celebs like Cynthia Rowley often “curate” boxes
• Quality: Luxury Samples
• Goal: Send samples, get feedback, sell products
• Social: Active Twitter, strong Facebook  & Blog, strong referral engine (points for referring friends)

JewelMint ($29.99/monthly)

• Celeb Backer: Kate Bosworth
• Quality: Moderate. “Costume Jewelry”
• Goal: Sell limited-edition celeb-backed jewelry at a reasonable price
• Social: Facebook community, Twitter, Blog, strong referral engine (points for referring friends)

ShoeDazzle ($39.99/monthly)

• Celeb Backer: Kim Kardashian
• Quality: Moderate (personally i’d compare to steve madden shoes)
• Goal: Create a fashion hub that anyone can join
• Social: VERY active Facebook community, Twitter, strong referral engine (points for referring friends)

 Although different in product offering and price, each service follows the same model:

1. Take a Quiz or “Style Profile” 

Answer questions and choose from a variety of visual options, which determines your “style profile” (conservative, trendy, wild, etc).

2. Sign in Monthly

Each month, you will receive a curated selection of products that meet your “style profile.” However, there is always a chance to request different items, or purchase items that do not show up in your selection.

3. Make a Decision to Buy, or Get Charged

The situation here is that you MUST login each month to either buy something, or decline a purchase – or else you will be charged that month.

Why I’m Fascinated

Social Shopping = The Future?

Finding a way to showcase relevant products that fit what your consumer is looking for (and save time browsing through pages of products) is amazing, especially when it comes to Fashion. Obviously Amazon does this incredibly well, but then again, it’s Amazon.

The Products are Awesome

I’ve had great results with the products I’ve purchased. Birchbox has introduced me to killer products I wouldn’t have found otherwise.

Great Customer Service

Twitter and Facebook have resources watching and responding to questions from buyers.

It’s Social

Each monthly subscription service has a model built around gaining referrals through social means – full integration with Facebook, Twitter, and the like. It’s made very clear how leveraging your social networks can get you free stuff.

Presenting on New Media & Millennials in Atlanta, GA

I’m a big fan of blogging.

Maybe that’s why I am currently leading a New Media Team while at my day job.

Or maybe it’s that reading mashable is one of my daily routines.

However you look at it, I like to call myself the CBO: Chief Blogging Officer. [Techyness note: I totally made this title up and the team makes fun of me for it.]

Each week, the team comes together to discuss what’s “going on” in the new media scene, and also to collaborate on our team projects.

A few weeks ago, our meeting was scheduled for shortly after Apple’s Macbook annoucement.We had to take “breaks” to check what the blogs were posting on the subject.

Calls like this one make me think back one year ago – our Blog v1.0 – the predecessor to the blog as you see it now. It was the day when our Facebook page was new, the Wikipedia entry had just launched, and we were the first (and only!) leadership program with a blog.

It’s interesting to work on blogs both personal in nature (techyness) and professional (imlp blog).  But on the techyness, I’m the solo blogger an operator. But working on a blog with a dedicated team while at work has led me to increase my knowledge on blogging, social media and how to manage a team… by just listening to my coworkers.

It’s important to understand the differences between the two – as they have different audiences and “goals” (yes blogs have goals too..)

Excerpts via GE IMLP BLOG

Skype Dates... Like the phone (but better)

Lately I’ve been spending a lot of time on skype.

When I told one of my (older, non-millennial) co-workers that I had a “skype date” – he looked confused (and maybe even a little concerned for my well being?)

I didn’t tell him that it was a dinner skype date.

My good friend Urban Dictionary defines it as “an event in which people contact each other using an internet phone calling program such as Skype.”

ex: “I’ll catch up with you later. I have a skype date with Adam. This is the best time to call him because of the time change.”

But what’s funny about Skype is that it’s become the necessary evil of long distance relationships fueled by collaborative technologies (not that I’d know from experience or anything…).

While I was studying abroad in Italy, I noticed that many relationships survived on Skype alone – you would always see the girls with the long distance relationships run to the quietest corner to whisper to their boyfriends across the ocean over the interwebs.  There was no privacy (and not much bandwidth either) – so watching them run to the corner made me laugh (but I was also a little jealous of the dedication to the cause)

But the term “skype date” is popping up — not just online, take the  Skype community forum features a thread on “Skype Love and Dating,” but also in movies — Megan Fox in Transformers 2 was blown off by Shia for a scheduled video chat date and was not happy about the outcome.

Why Skype, You Say?

1) It’s Free (non committal. good for people who have different carriers or travel frequently.)

2) You can see the other person (if you have a mac, a netbook, or basically a recently purchased computer)

3) It gives you that home-away-from-home warm fuzzy feeling that you’re talking to a real person behind all of those bits and bytes.

If you’re going to take the plunge and have a Skype Date, my Advice:

1) DO NOT WEAR A CORNY GEEKY HEADSET. for real here, would you wear your headgear out on a first date? No? Then don’t wear a weird headset. Try an iPhone headset with earbuds or at least something sexy.and YES gadgets can be sexy!

2) Look nice from the shoulders up. OK, so you’re not wearing pants. WHO CARES! But at least do your hair.

3) Keep it fun. Maybe suggest that the next skype date is formal and you expect him to wear a tie. Who doesn’t like a guy in a suit!?

4) Research how it all  works. You would look up driving directions if you were going out to dinner, right? Well, do the same with skype. Make sure your camera works. Check that your headset works. Nothing’s more frustrating than seeing you but not hearing the words coming out of your mouth (unless both parties know sign language.)

So, are millennials crazy for doing this? Yes and No. It’s great to keep in touch with those in different time zones (and where it would cost a small fortune to call) and it’s always fun to make funny faces at people over skype, or use the communications channel to decide what to wear. Just don’t rely on it as your only source of “seeing” someone for a long period of time.

Lay down the law, ladies. They should come and see you. In person. Or you’re taking away the video privileges of skype ;)

Dan thinks I'm interesting... and totally geeky ;)

Every homecoming queen has her king, and while at Syracuse, it was Dan. When he’s not wearing his crown (it’s ok dan!), he’s working at Syracuse University in the Career Services office.

Earlier this week, he wrote a blog post listing the “Official Top 10 Most Interesting People.”And included me.

I’m pretty flattered, but then again, shouldn’t the king think the queen is interesting?

“Feels like my first hello world, she’s my coder girl.”

“When it’s run time, we take it slow.”

wow. hahahahaha.

via GeekSugar and Dale Chase (who loves coder girls)

... I'd buy you a dSLR and lots of fun techy gadgets.

…I’d have a really sweet tech setup. (I already have the green dress) [via Barenaked Ladies- shoutout]

Nah, this is really just a way for me to show all the things I think are awesome… hopefully you do too.

10 Awesome Tech Gadgets and A Place to Store it All:

1. A Place to Call “Office:” Life would be different if I had one of these swedish beauties [you can't read it unless you speak swedish]

2. Really Huge Monitor: No doubt, a true setup isn’t a setup without a huge monitor hanging on the wall. Whether you use it to just watch movies on mute or just to display digital art, c’est necessaire. [I want this one. $2k]

4. A Sweet “Normal” Phone. Verizon Hub, Baby. [v-dog, $150]

5. Computing Power (main computer): Keepin’ it Pro. (sorry Laptop Hunters). [MacBook Pro ,~$2k]

6. Computing Power (ultra-mobile): When you need something super light and the main computer has to stay home… [Mac Book Air or anything from dynamism] oh and a case… [Kansai Leather Case, $450 / Nanda Home's lapsac $68]

7. The Ultimate in T-shirt 2.0: One option–threadless. [twitter ts by threadless $18]

8. Digital Camera: Canon all the way. Can’t go wrong with a wi-fi SD card that uploads to your laptop seamlessly and a compact camera or dslr. [eye fi sd card, $50 and Canon PowerShot, ~$250]

9. Earwear. You got it- Bluetooth never looked so sexy- Serena rocks this one in Gossip Girl [Jawbone Headset- it is assumed that you already own a blackberry or iPhone]

10. Skype Conference Phone: When you’re so money, baby, you’ll probably need a skype phone that allows multiple parties to.. well.. have a party. [IPEVO Conference Phone $199 or Yubz "Classic" Phones for a throwback $50]

Rarr...Captcha!

Last week, those movie ticket kiosks were on my nerves.

But this week, I wanted to focus on those fun little images we all love to hate: Captcha.

You know them- the images you have to decode in order to sign up for a new account (basically to prove that you’re human).

This post is dedicated to you, little buggers, for making me feel kinda dumb sometimes.

Formally known as “”Completely Automated Public Turing test to tell Computers and Humans Apart,” captchas as we know them today are the product of crazy awesome people/researchers @ Carnegie Mellon, who came up with the crazy awesome (and long) term as well.

There are a variety of captchas out there, working to determine who is real and who’s a bot – I’m sure you’ve seen a few options, from text (words, phrases), object recognition (now in 3D), math, and other weird captchas.

Some captchas use their power for good (like reCaptcha’s goal of digitizing scanned texts) and others for evil (like trading captcha solving for porn).

Even though they’re frustrating and kindof annoying sometimes, I just think about how wild the Internet would be without them. Maybe my next rant of the week should be focused on those pesky bots.

In Summary: hey, I’m no Wolfram Alpha, but I matter too.

Yep. That's Windows 98 keepin' this kiosk alive.

This past Thursday evening, I visited my local Albany, NY movie theater to go see State of Play with a friend. What I was expecting was to be entertained, what I was not expecting was to have my evening nearly ruined by a klunky user interface (UI).

If you just thought to yourself, “this girl is totally exaggerating,” you are 50% correct. I am, but I’m not, really.

It was at this point when I realized that not all movie ticket kiosks (kindof like men) are not made equal. Post-Google research showed that there are many companies who design and distribute these handy machines, but it just so happened that I happened upon a sub-standard one.

Sure, this situation vaguely reminds me of a Kurt Vonnegut novel, but there is some truth to it- there are some things that movie ticket theater kiosks should keep in mind.

1. Touch Screen Monitors are a Must: This local albany kiosk had some sort of old-school “the buttons on the sides do not line up with the items on the screen” issue. Not cool.
2. Don’t Time Out after 15 Seconds: The kiosk timed out while I was looking for my credit card. By the time my hand emerged from my (huge) purse with my visa ready to go, I was back to looking at the home screen. really? really?
3. Maintain ‘Em: After a flikr search on the subject, I found a hilarious picture of one kiosk running Windows 98 (see above- embarassing…shouldn’t it be showing the app dashboard) and a friend sent me an iPhone photo that depicts another with the blue screen of death.

Bottom line: Sometimes, it’s OK to embrace when something has reach it’s EOL (end of life)… and it’s ok to move on (like in the case of windows 98). We all did.

—————-
Blogging Tunes: Kate Nash – Nicest Thing
via FoxyTunes

“Let’s start a podcast.”

A simple statement from my friend Eric that launched something very web 2.0-y that keeps both of us occupied (& out of trouble!).

So what is Millennious?

It’s a new podcast from two millennials who love technology, life, and like to discuss how tech pervades every inch of our existence.

So taking a few hints from our favorite podcasters at This Week in Tech (TWIT), we decided to give it a shot.

You can listen to our podcast:

1. Via our Website at Millennio.us

2. On iTunes (this link will automatically launch iTunes on your computer and begin the download)

And we’d love to hear your feedback- so feel free to comment on our blog, e-mail us, or dial into our voicemail service at 646-495-9244 x 73505 (this will leave us a mp3 of what you have to say, so there’s a chance we can incorporate you into our program!)