The Oatmeal at SXSW

While the majority of sessions that I'm attending here at SXSW are related to my work as a product manager, there were a couple sessions I wanted to attend for purely personal reasons. #1 on my list was Viral Marketing with the Oatmeal. Matthew Inman, aka The Oatmeal has been churning out hilarious, relevant and very relatable comics on his web site since 2009. His session at SXSW dealt with the history of his website as well as some of the tips and tricks he's used to expand his creative empire. Inman is hilarious in person and getting the back story on some of the comics and quizzes he's done was phenomenal. Here are the highlights:

-The name. "The Oatmeal" was a direct result of the first person shooter "Quake." When the game debuted, Inman was a huge fan of the multiplayer experience and his handle was "Quaker Oatmeal." He later shortened it to Oatmeal and that has been his go-to handle/screen name/avatar ever since.
-The quizzes. Ever done "How Many Hungry Weasels Could Your Body Feed?" or "Are Your Loved Ones Plotting to Eat You?" These, and the many other delightfully-named quizzes featured on the Oatmeal aren't just goofy diversions, they're actually a highly effective guerilla SEO technique. Inman's first solo venture was an online dating site which he eventually sold to a larger competitor. To drive search engine traffic to the site, Inman created quizzes like "How Many Five Year Olds Could You Take in a Fight?" On the results page of each quiz Inman placed a small link to his dating site at the bottom. As well as a snippet to embed the results page on Facebook, a blog, etc. The quizzes went viral and were enormously popular, so the link to the dating site spread like wildfire. By determining how long you would last in a zombie apocalypse and then sharing your score with your friends you were inadvertently boosting the the rank of Inman's dating site in search engine results. Pretty smart.
-PETA. A few years ago, PETA kicked off a campaign to try and convince the general public that fish were "sea kittens." Most people are opposed to eating kittens. So PETA figured that if people starting thinking of fish as cuddly, they wouldn't be so eager to catch and consume them. Inman immediately responded with his own site promoting the consumption of "Sea Bacon." PETA was not amused. Last year, Inman did a comic extolling the 5 Reasons Pigs Are More Awesome Than You (#1 reason - Pigs experience a 30 minute orgasm). PETA was so impressed with the comic (and apparently forgot about Sea Bacon), that they linked the comic on their website. When Inman saw the influx of traffic to the site from PETA's domain, he inserted some code to redirect hits from that domain to a new comic advocating the eating of horses. It took PETA 8 hours to catch the redirect and update their link.
-Bieber. Inman's friends have urged him for some time to do a comic skewering Justin Bieber. But after taking some time to research what exactly a Bieber was, Inman decided he was merely another reason to feel bad for humanity as a species and not worthy of a comic. He did create a quiz called "How Many Justin Biebers Could You Take In A Fight?" Recognizing that many quiz takers would post their results to twitter, Inman added Bieber's twitter tag to the automated Twitter export. So every time someone Tweets their Bieber bashing score, the Biebs himself gets a heads up.

SXSW Session: Dork Intervention - Bringing Design to Agile

One of the sessions I was really looking forward during SXSW was Dork Intervention: Bringing Design to Agile. In the past year Info Directions has adopted an agile development model for some of our new software features. The advantages to our development and testing processes are obvious. But as the product owner/designer, it has been a challenge figuring out how to communicate my design/system requirements to the other members of the team. I am accustomed to developing in a waterfall environment, where we spend as much time as needed hammering out the design and requirements before a developer or tester ever begins work. Now, we are expected to design concurrently with dev and test activities. So this session with Karl Nieberding and Kris Corzine of eBay, looked like it had massive potential.

Agile is Broken

The presenters discussed a case study from their experience at eBay. Specifically, how could they reduce the time necessary to post a listing on the auction site from an average of 45 minutes, to 3 minutes or less? The presentation was less about the solution (using bar code scanning software to rapidly input items with a web cam) than the process that got them to the solution. The presenters went through the pros and cons of the various models of incorporating design into agile: Waterfall, mini waterfall, just in time and exclusive design sprints. Ultimately, the presenters decided on a new approach they called Fused Innovation. Unfortunately, their explanation of Fused Innovation was pretty vague. I got the impression that they continued to mash up the first four methods until they found a hybrid that was comfortable and then ran with it. But it was tough to discern exactly how Fused Innovation could be duplicated. They wrapped up with a list of 7 rules of engagement. But these rules were par for the agile course. Nothing earth shattering.

Overall, I was really hoping for a great takeaway to bring back to IDI. So the Dork Intervention was a mild disappointment.

Stuck on Plane While the Bison Go Dancing

When it comes to booking travel, I'm a fire and forget kind of guy. I put in the time to find the cheapest fare, best flight times, etc. but once it's booked, I rarely look at my itinerary until a few days before I depart. So it was an unpleasant surprise to find out that Bucknell's Patriot League championship game would tip off at the SAME TIME my flight from Chicago to Austin departed today. The game was broadcast on ESPN2, so up until I confirmed my itinerary on Wednesday, i was pretty sure I would catch SOME of the game at an airport bar, or at the hotel in Austin. No such luck.

It's a strange feeling in this era of constant connectivity to be invested in the outcome of an event, and not have any way of following it. I'm so used to following scores on my ESPN Sportscenter, or watching the gamecast even if a game isn't televised. It's just genuinely odd to be in a place where I'm just totally cut off.

The good news is that the flight to Austin was smooth and upon landing, I had an email from BU President John Bravman informing me that Bucknell was going dancing. I'll be watching the selection show Sunday to make sure I'm not off the grid for Bucknell's first round matchup.

BYU: Not Much Honor in the Code

It's been almost two weeks since Brandon Davies was suspended from the the Brigham Young University basketball team for violating the school's honor code. Since that time, the story has grown more complex. Davies was suspended from the team for having sex with his girlfriend. This is a clear violation of the BYU honor code, which includes the following provisions:

• Be honest
• Live a chaste and virtuous life
• Obey the law and all campus policies
• Use clean language
• Respect others
• Abstain from alcoholic beverages, tobacco, tea, coffee, and substance abuse
• Participate regularly in church services
• Observe the Dress and Grooming Standards
• Encourage others in their commitment to comply with the Honor Code

Upon first reading about the Davies situation, I was furious that BYU would take this kind of action for what seems to be the typical behavior of the average American college student. Not only is the school ruining a stellar season for Davies, but the rest of the Cougars are clearly going to have to adjust to the loss of a close teammate. And their potential without Davies is not quite as promising. Then there is the personal impact of dragging a young man and his girlfriend through the mud for what appears to be a consensual act. I see no honor in an academic institution humiliating a student to satisfy their "code."

But I have had time to internalize the flip-side of the argument: Davies knew what he was signing up for attending BYU. As such, he has to live with the consequences of his actions. And given some time to reflect, that's a fair assessment.

So ultimately, what continues to bother me is that BYU and the pundits covering the story continue to refer to this set of rules which Davies violated as an honor code. Unfortunately, it has little to do with honor. When discussing the story on Pardon the Interruption, Mike Wilbon continues to invoke the University of Virginia as another school with an honor code. He's right. UVA does have an honor code. It's been around since 1842, and according to the school's website, looks something like this:

Today students at the University make a commitment not to lie, cheat, or steal within Charlottesville, Albemarle County, or where they represent themselves as University students in order to gain the trust of others. Because of this commitment, there's a strong degree of trust among the various members of the University community. Students are also expected to conduct themselves with integrity and are presumed honorable until proven otherwise.

Prohibition of lying, cheating and stealing seems a much more apt description of honor. So what does that make the BYU "honor code?" It is a religious, or moral code. And while the school may feel that those traits define an honorable existence, news outlets covering this story need to make a distinction. When ESPN continues to acknowledge this list of rules as an honor code, it begs the following question: If an individual breaks these rules, do they lack honor? The UVA code seems to pass this litmus test. If a person lies, cheats or steals, they are almost universally condemned as lacking in personal honor. But if a person drinks caffeine? Swears? Dresses like a slob? Has pre-marital sex? Do those activities connote a universal lack of honor. I'm guessing the US Marine Corps, which practically institutionalizes coarse language and caffeine consumption would assert that their membership still demonstrates honorable traits despite the rough behavior.

BYU is a religiously-motivated institution, and I would be shocked to see them amend either the terms of their code, or what they call it. But members of the media must adopt greater sensitivity in spouting the phrase honor code without any context, lest they begin to offend a broader sense of what is truly honorable.