The SQUARED Root

Posts Tagged ‘root’

3.3.09: Happy Square Root Day!

Posted by Courtney Steen on March 3rd, 2009

Mathematicians the world over rejoice this day as they expound upon the mathematical unity and appropriateness of Square Root Day. We here at FG SQUARED are rejoicing too, and think people need to explore the perfection of this date to really understand how wonderful and rare an opportunity it really is, even if it reveals that we are a gaggle of true-blue nerds, geeks, and weirdos. (Come one, you all knew already, didn’t you?) So come along with us and take some time today to relax and indulge those secret parts of yourself:

• Be square: It takes a lot of energy to constantly maintain an acceptable and popular level of coolness. Take a moment to reflect on your inner nerdiness today. What are you really good at but have to hide for fear of others discovering it and exploiting your weakness? Rejoice! Speak Klingon, crunch numbers, surf the internet, play Trivial Pursuit (well), or talk to someone about the latest and most interesting article in Scientific American. Today geekiness is a strength!

• Explore your roots: Get in touch with all those people who ever taught you math and thank them for giving you a base so you could really appreciate today.

• Wear square: Forget all those form-fitting, stifling clothes today and wear something boxy and bulky and eminently more comfortable.

• Square your food: Cut root veggies in squares (I got that from somewhere on the internet), make square cupcakes or pies (pi’s—3.14 or 31409—ha ha, more fun with math!), make up dishes with 3 equal ingredients or 9 ingredients, or make up drinks and cocktails with 3 equal ingredients or 9 ingredients (I smell an FG SCREWDRIVER or FG ICE TEA cocktail coming).

• Hold a random Shakespearean square dance: Make up silly names; collect some psychologically unsound royalty, a few seedy tavern owners, and some wenches and witches; generate some good Shakespeare-inspired insults (http://www.pangloss.com/seidel/shake_rule.html); put on an Elizabethan collars; form a square; and get down!

• Water some roots—nurture those plants!

• Run your own pants up a flagpole.

• Triple-dog-dare someone to do anything.

And while you’re enjoying yourself following these Square pursuits, remember to give a nod to both the Gregorian calendar and the math community for bringing us a chance to indulge in an entire day of random Square Root-ness.

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Interactive Austin 2008

Posted by Cynthia Baker on May 30th, 2008

Social commerce, the use of social media in business, is putting companies on an even playing field; and the companies that aren’t getting on board are going to find themselves falling behind the competition.

Think about it – social media is everywhere! Wiki-ing, blogging, podcasting, twittering, FaceBooking, and MySpacing – this is how the world is communicating now. And if your company isn’t playing along, your message is less likely to reach your target audience. For this reason, major corporations, like Austin-based Dell, Intel and AMD are integrating social networking and other social media into their marketing plans.

To help companies get to where they need to be, interactive professionals in Austin that understand the power of social media in today’s world have converged to create Interactive Austin 2008. This forum which takes place on June 19th, is an event dedicated to educating companies on the advantages of Social Commerce, the importance of it in the rapidly changing corporate environment, and how to harness its power for profitability.

The event will feature two prominent keynote speakers. Brian Magierski, Co-Founder and Chief Development Officer of nGenera Corporation, will speak on “Social Commerce and It’s Impact on Business.” While the Vice President of Corporate Marketing & Communications for AMD, Pete Hayes, will speak on “Get into the Click Stream: An Alternative to Driving Traffic to Your Site.” Aside from the keynote speakers, this will be a day full of educational and informative panel discussions and case study presentations from Austin’s social media experts.

If you have a company, it would be a wise decision to attend Interactive Austin 2008. For more information about it, check it out online at http://www.interactiveaustin2008.com.

We will see you there!

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SXSW Festival Scheduler Rocks the User Experience

Posted by Steve Golab on March 10th, 2008

Late Friday morning, the South by Southwest Festival officially kicked off here in Austin. It’s that crazy time of year when aspiring rock stars, film makers, internet strategists, and other hipsters of every stripe converge into the downtown Austin entertainment district. Being the brainiac that I am, this year I decided to arrive twenty minutes early, so I was one of the first in line. Moments after I arrived, the line was snaking around the corner of the wide convention hall. Wow, was I relieved to be near the front, so I could quickly get back to my office across the street.

For those of you attending the festival, check out http://sched.org/sxsw2008/. It’s a slick and interactive event marketing tool that allows attendees to quickly make their schedule and share it with others.

For instance, here is my schedule: http://sched.org/sxsw2008/steve_golab. If you want to meet me at the event, this will give you an idea where you’ll be likely to find me. I doubt I’ll actually stick to the schedule, though, and also I may be changing it around as the event goes on.

If you are not heading to the festival this year, I still encourage you to check out http://sched.org/sxsw2008/ and http://sched.org/sxsw2008/steve_golab. This web-based scheduling tool is elegant and also brings high impact user experience of sorts. Try to use it, you’ll see what I mean. From an event marketer’s perspective, the tool allows exhibitors, producers, and sponsors to measure participant interest in real-time and better forecast where the crowds will be. If I had more time, I could probably rattle off eighty other benefits possible with the right social media marketing strategy in place. The tool itself is an attraction for the event and I bet it wins honors this year for the Interactive Awards. Rock on!

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