Category Archives: Announcements

Announcements

My Column Is Heading to CNET!

Posted on February 21, 2012 by Ben Parr| 13 Comments

Dear friends, colleagues and supporters,

I’m thrilled to announce that I’m joining CNET and CBS Interactive as a contributing columnist and commentator!

Ever since my departure from Mashable, I’ve posted my personal take on the big technology news of the day on BenParr.com. The response to my work has been overwhelming, and traffic to this blog has skyrocketed. Thank you all for reading, commenting and sharing.

But now I have a chance to make a much bigger impact with my writing. Starting this week, my commentary on technology, social media and startups will appear on CNET several times per week. I will not be doing any straight reporting — CNET has a talented team that already does an amazing job at that. Instead, I will be doing what I’ve been doing here on BenParr.com: breaking down the big issues and players in tech and explaining what it actually means for both the tech industry and society as a whole.

To do that, I will be writing a combination of thought pieces, analysis stories, response pieces and the occasional long-form column. My CNET column is called The Social Analyst, just like my column on Mashable. It’s going to have more bite than my old column, though. I intend to keep tech’s biggest names honest.

I decided to join forces with CNET/CBSi because CBS Interactive CEO Jim Lanzone and CNET General Manager Mark Larkin have an ambitious vision for the future.

CNET is huge: it is one of the 100 most visited websites in the world, but Mark and Jim are not content with resting on their laurels. I believe in their vision and their leadership, and I am thrilled to be working with them.

CNET isn’t my only gig, though. For the last few months, I’ve also been working behind-the-scenes on a startup, which we can’t wait to talk more about! My co-founder and I have a clear vision, as well as a duty to our investors, and we will move heaven and earth (and forgo sleep) to make sure our company succeeds.

My new role at CNET and CBSi is the best of both worlds. I get to reach millions of people with my thoughts on technology, but still retain the flexibility to be an entrepreneur, build amazing products and change the world.

Don’t take your eyes off of CNET. Big things are happening over there, and you won’t want to miss all the action. 2012 is going to be an amazing year.

Cheers,
~ Ben

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Posted in Announcements, Business, Entrepreneurship, Media, My musings, Projects, Social Media, Tech

I’m Speaking at LeWeb 2011 in Paris

Posted on November 21, 2011 by Ben Parr| 3 Comments

Hey guys!

I’m heading to Paris next month for LeWeb 2011, Europe’s largest and most prominent technology conference. And I’m happy to announce that I will be speaking on stage this year.

Founders Loic and Geraldine Le Meur have been so gracious and supportive to me over the years — I couldn’t say no to the offer. I’m thrilled to be making my second consecutive trip to Paris. The conference takes place on December 7, 8 and 9.

If you want to meet up with me, you can hit me up at ben[at]benparr[dot]com. And as always, if you’re interested in having me speak, you can hit up my Speakergram page.

I’m looking forward to some amazing adventures in Paris.

Cheers,
~ Ben

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Posted in Announcements

2,446 Articles Later, A Goodbye to Mashable

Posted on November 21, 2011 by Ben Parr| 80 Comments

Dear friends, family, colleagues and supporters,

Friday, November 18, was my last day at Mashable. I want to thank the Mashable team for 3+ amazing years. They truly have been the best years of my life.

I also want to thank everybody who has been part of my journey. Your help and kindness have been constant sources of strength. I don’t know what I would have done without you.

During my time at Mashable, I wrote 2,446 articles, explored the technology world through my column and interviewed everyone from Ashton Kutcher to Mark Zuckerberg.

But most of all, I learned so much from the thousands of entrepreneurs that I have met. I will not forget their struggles, their triumphs and their ideas. I wish I could have written more of their stories. It was a true honor.

As for what’s next: I am considering several opportunities right now and will definitely keep you all posted as to my future plans. I want to leverage the national platform that I have built and use it to help, empower and reach as many people as I can. I’m exploring options in the media world, the entertainment world, the startup world, the venture capital world and elsewhere. But as always, I’m open to suggestions.

I do intend to continue writing and commentating about the technology and entrepreneurial world, though. Therefore, I will continue my Social Analyst column on BenParr.com for now.

I remain an advisor to NerdsUnite Productions, Tracks.by, Code Academy, Women 2.0 and a few other startups. And I am always interested in working with other brilliant entrepreneurs with ambitious business ideas.

As I’ve told many people, the driving philosophy in my life is this: I have the ability and thus the responsibility to change the world for the better. I want to find a way to empower every person on the planet, so they can pursue their dreams. Today begins the next stage of my journey to fulfill that purpose.

If you want to chat, I can be reached at ben[at]benparr[dot]com. My Gchat is also ben[at]benparr[dot]com, and you can find me on Skype as ben_parr. And of course, I can be found on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and Google+.

Thank you all. I know we will have the opportunity to work together to make a dent in the universe.

Cheers,
~ Ben

Image courtesy of Flickr, Altus

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Posted in Announcements, Innovation, My musings, Social Media, Tech

Talk Nerdy to Me, Lover (An Announcement)

Posted on October 26, 2011 by Ben Parr| 6 Comments

I know a gal named Jen Friel. She’s dynamic, energetic and one of the happiest and most spontaneous people I know. She gave up having a home for a year, and she went on 103 OkCupid dates in nine months to study the science of attraction. And she blogged about every single one of her dates.

(You can read about them, if you’re brave enough.)

You see, Jen has a site called Talk Nerdy to Me, Lover (TNTML). It may not look like much (we’re in the process of a redesign), but the site has amassed a dedicated audience of young girls, social media nerds and curious onlookers. It has a slew of contributors talking about the intersection of life, sex, relationships and technology. And it has Jen, one of the most compelling people I have ever met.

For more than a year, she’s been able to live off the site and its sponsors, but now she wants to take it to the next level — to turn it into a brand that speaks honestly about the intersection of sex, technology and relationships. And a lot is happening to get that done.

I’m thrilled to announce that I am joining NerdsUnite Productions (the owner of Talk Nerdy to Me Lover) as a Senior Advisor. I’m not leaving Mashable — I’m as committed as ever to the cause — but I will also be immersing myself in the world of production as we work to to turn TNTML into a business and a bigger brand.

Jen and I (along with an incredibly brilliant and passionate team) are not only working on expanding the site, but on several related projects in television, media and more. I’m hoping that we’ll have more to announce early next year, but you can check out Jen’s announcement if you want some more info.

Technology has affected how we think of dating, sex, relationships and life, and that something that TNTML explores with unprecedented amounts of honesty and insight. I believe it opens up a huge opportunity. And most of all, I believe in Jen, a woman who is constantly underestimated but always gets it done.

We’re looking to build relationships with sponsors for Talk Nerdy to Me Lover, so if you’re interested (check out the video above for more), email us at sponsors@talknerdytomelover.com. And if you’re interested learning more about NerdsUnite Productions or becoming a contributor, reach out to us. We’re listening.

#NerdsUnite,
~ Ben

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Posted in Announcements

Three Years at Mashable

Posted on August 6, 2011 by Ben Parr| 5 Comments

I can’t believe it’s been three years since I wrote my first article for Mashable.

That article, Are Social Media Jobs Here to Stay?, was published on August 4, 2008.

Back then, I was a product manager, working on Facebook apps and working with my entrepreneurial mentor to grow Spine-health, a web health company. I was only a few months out of Northwestern, and I was living in Chicago, not Silicon Valley.

Oh, and there was no Google+, Twitter wasn’t even close to mainstream, Groupon hadn’t even launched, Android phones didn’t exist and George W. Bush was still President.

My, how things change.

I just want to take a moment to thank everybody who has helped me along this journey. Thank you especially to Pete Cashmore, Sharon Feder and Adam Ostrow for giving me the creative outlet that has been Mashable, to Jennifer Van Grove, who has been my long-time coworker and friend, to my entrepreneurial mentors Troy Henikoff and Mark Achler for guiding and advising me for so long, to my dear friends for keeping me smiling, to the fans of my work that have supported me these past three years, and to my family, who doesn’t always quite know what I do but love me anyway for it.

There are a few others that have a special place in my heart; you know who you are.

So what will the next three years bring? I don’t even know, so you’re just going to have to follow me to find out. ;-)

I hope it will be an epic journey.

~ Ben

Above: My very first interview after joining Mashable. The photo, taken at the New Media Expo, includes Walt Ribeiro, Gary Vaynerchuk and Justine Ezaraik (aka iJustine).

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Posted in Announcements

BenParr.com – The Redesign!

Posted on April 27, 2009 by Ben Parr| Leave a comment

Moving across the country and Mashable have killed my blogging on BenParr.com, but still thousands of people are reading my posts. So, with my change of location, I thought I’d throw in a change of design.

So welcome to the new BenParr.com, the beginnings of a more social, more interactive BenParr.com. The old design has been thrown out the window for this one.

Some of the new updates:

  • A completely new design: Thanks to a combination of my work and One Theme, I have a a new design. I have a new logo, new color scheme and a lot more space for widgets.
  • Faster website: This should deal with any load speed bugs of the past.
  • Navigation changes: You’ll notice that there is a new menu line – this is a quick nav to the topics I cover the most. On top of this, the menu is now on the right hand side, so that content is king. I also have two sidebars for more useful content.


Some of the things you can expect on this new website:

  • Integration with my Mashable Articles: There will be a cool widget with my most recent articles so that you can always see what I’m writing.
  • Integration with Tech&Beer and Engage Analytics: My two new projects are my tech show, Tech&Beer (more announcements soon, and my consulting firm Engage Analytics – updates from each will be pushed to BenParr.com
  • Social media streams: Since I can’t write as much (I will still write), I will help compensate by connecting to my social stream – my Google Reader shared items, my Twitter, my Facebook stream, and more will appear on the blog so you’re in the know about the best social media and entrepreneurship information.


What still has to be done:

  • Fixing bugs: The comments don’t appear in titles and there may be some IE6 issues.
  • Design tweaks: A slightly bigger font here, a slight color change there – nothing too revolutionary.
  • Old article formats: Some of the older articles didn’t take perfectly to the new design. I will deal with them as necessary.


Watch out for more changes and updates. In the meantime, please give me some feedback on what I should do next.

- Ben

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Posted in Announcements, My musings, Projects, Synergies

Tagged ,

Moving to San Fran: Tweeting the Cross-Country Photostream

Posted on April 9, 2009 by Ben Parr| Leave a comment

Hey everyone, it’s been a busy couple of weeks, thus my updates have been even less frequent than usual. Normally I like to make my blog more about how to make you more productive as an entrepreneur and as a person. I promise I will get back to writing great posts on entrepreneurship soon.

In the meantime, I want to tell you about upcoming changes and the Twitter photostream experiment I will be conducting while I travel from Chicago to San Francisco, starting next Monday (April 13th).

First, on the changes – I intend to completely redesign BenParr.com with a new interface. It will be a completely new scheme that switches the location of the menu and adds some integrated functionality, such as a widget that streams the articles I write for Mashable and integration with my new tech show Tech & Beer, which should be launching in May. There will also be some integration with my new consulting firm, Engage Analytics, which is nearly done as a website and as a company.

The second piece of interesting news is the cross country move. It’s going to be a grueling, wonderful 4 day journey spanning over 2,000 miles. I will be driving in my truck with a uHaul trailer hitched to the back. But if pictures interest you, I will be taking pictures across the country, in every state and cool place I visit. I will chronicle packing things up, visiting my hometown, my dogs, and the major sightseeing points – the Rocky Mountains, San Francisco, Salt Lake City, and yes, even Nebraska’s corn.

The picture above is the boxes being packed. I will be posting all of my photos via Twitter, but I will be re-linking my Facebook status to my Twitter account, so all of those pictures will be posted on my Facebook as well. Be sure to follow my Twitter if you want to see half the country in the span of 3 days.

Those are my announcements. Oh yeah, I’m going to embed a widget tomorrow to stream all of the photos from my TwitPic account so you can see the moving images. Hopefully this will be a good experiment in social media’s ability to share photos and experiences.

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Posted in Announcements, My musings, Projects

Announcements: Mashable, Tech&Beer, and Moving to the San Francisco Bay

Posted on March 31, 2009 by Ben Parr| Leave a comment

I have several major announcements to make, many of which you have seen if you’ve been following my Facebook or my Twitter stream.



1. I have left Spine-health:

If you did not know, I was the Interactive Content Manager for Spine-health, the web’s leading patient resource on back pain and chronic pain. I did everything from SEO (search engine optimization) to usability to adding new doctor-written content to the website.

I have nothing but the most profound respect for Stephanie Burke, Sylvia Marten, and the Spine-health team. However, I decided it was time for some changes in my life. It has been a great learning experience, and I am glad to have left on great terms.



2. I am now Associate Editor at Mashable:

I have been an occasional writer for Mashable since August 2008. But perhaps you’ve noticed a recent influx of articles from me in March, especially on weekends. Well that’s because I was training for a new role, as associate editor at Mashable. Mashable, for those who do not know, is a leading news and resource blog on social media and web technology. Now I get to talk about, debate, and discuss social media like Twitter, Facebook, iPhone applications, and more.

I can’t wait to discuss social media with the world! Interested in my writing? You can always find my work at my Mashable Author Page.



3. I have started an analytics and consulting firm:

Mashable won’t be my only job. I have opened up a consulting firm, Engage Analytics, which will provide strategic and consulting services in three specific areas:

  • Website Optimization and Usability
  • Web Analytics
  • Web and Social Media Marketing

For more details (and a rough look at the still-being-built website, visit here.



4. I am co-hosting Tech&Beer, a live tech entertainment show:

In the next month, Matt Schlicht and I will be launching Tech&Beer, a twice-weekly live tech entertainment show. On the show, Matt and I will bring aboard tech personalities, entrepreneurs, and celebrities as co-hosts. We will interview them and discuss the week’s major technology-related events with them. We will use audience questions and topics to fuel the show. And as the title may indicate, we will drink beer and have a little fun as well!

Each episode will air live on Ustream.tv as well as be recorded via Vimeo. If you’re interested in the show (either as a co-host, sponsor, or interested fan), be sure to email Mazy Kazerooni, our producer, at mazy[at]techandbeer.com.

Also, follow the Techandbeer Twitter account.



5. I am moving to Silicon Valley and the San Francisco Bay:

The final announcement, and perhaps the most significant, is that I am relocating from Chicagoland to the heart of Silicon Valley. I’ve lived in Illinois my entire life, with brief stints in Santa Barbara, Croatia, D.C., and Thailand. Chicago has been great, but I need a chance of scenery.

The Tech&Beer show will be broadcast from Mountain View, CA, and I will be covering stories for Mashable from the silicon technology hub. I leave for San Fran/the valley on April 13th.



I will have more to announce and discuss in the next few weeks, but wanted to let you all know now. . Thanks for your support. I’ll try to post more about all of this soon.

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Posted in Announcements, Entrepreneurship, Projects, Social Media

It's Official: My Novel's Done

Posted on January 24, 2009 by Ben Parr| 6 Comments

I’ll have more to report as I try to take this moment in, but I completed my first novel, a science-fiction thriller, at about 11:00.

Although the story’s done, I still have a lot of work to do. I’m going to take a break from it, read some fiction for fun, and then get this thing printed and do my edits. After that, I’ll be asking some close friends to read it as well and we’ll find out if it’s up to par.

In the meantime, here’s some statistics (as of 1/24/2009):

  • 44 Chapters, 3 Parts
  • 132,109 words
  • 528 Pages in Microsoft Word (double spaced)
  • 4 Years, 3 months to completion (though I don’t think any future novel will take this long again. After all, this is the first of a five-book arc)

I’m finally done. Wow.

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Posted in Announcements, Projects

Sorry for the Downtime

Posted on January 23, 2009 by Ben Parr| Leave a comment

Thank you to everyone who emailed, called, IMed, and tweeted me during my blog’s downtime yesterday. Nobody is quite sure what happened, though people had theories, but in the end I (eventually) got to my hosting and we went back in time and restored the website.

I’m going to be changing a lot of how I manage the blog. There’s going to be restore points because I’m going to use SVN and I will be redesigning the blog. This is a long overdue project I have wanted to undertake, but never had the time. But I anticipate a little more time soon.

Once again, thanks for the help everyone! Makes me feel warm and fuzzy inside you all care.

- Ben

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Posted in Announcements