“While the 4 little piggies were engrossed in foosball, the big bad wolf huffed and puffed and blew down the plane.”

“Yoh! A motorbike ridden by a helmet. How is that possible?!”

Leave your captions in the comments below. Awesome.

From one baldy to another. Too awesome. You’re a legend, bro.

Every person has a different theory as to why they participate in social media. Some to learn from others, some hoping to teach others, most to be the first person to share something before everybody else does, etc. The one thing is, though, that we don’t really understand each other’s ways of doing things, so we just go about treating everybody like they’re at the other end of our game, without realising that we’re also on the other end of theirs. And if you’re not acting appropriately on the other side of someone else’s game, the game isn’t really successful.

Another of these ‘ways to media socially’ are the people who feel that every single part of their lives should be shared with the world. It’s no secret that I want to famous, so when I’m out doing things like comedy or MC’ing or attending rad shit, I wanna tell people. Hell, I’ve even shared about my morning bowel movements once or twice. But when it comes to the serious stuff, the really personal business (yes, bowel movements are personal, but they’re a daily occurrence and they’re funny) then that sort of thing shouldn’t be shared online.

This kind of thing needs to be shared with friends, loved ones, people who take a keen interest in your life and would be there for you when you need it the most, not the 1000ish friends you have on Facebook or your hundreds of followers on Twitter. Yes, some of them may care, but do you really need to share it all?

These are two examples lifted off Lamebook, but I’ve seen these kinds of status updates in both my Facebook and Twitter feeds by people that I know personally. I understand that sometimes you need an outlet, a place to vent and share your frustrations, but before posting this stuff, always consider what you would have done before the boom of social media. Would you have taken out a newspaper front page headline? No. You would have picked up the phone, or met up with a mate and spoken about it, live, in person. Every ounce of me wants to reply saying it’s not cool, but every time I let it slide. I understand that I’m on the other end of your game and you expect me to just understand. Well no more.

If you want to post personal things online which clearly should be dealt with offline, I’ll let you know, for free, just ‘cos I’m a nice guy like that. You have to learn somehow. And if you think your mates are doing the same, let them know, it’ll make for a much better online social experience. Although, it may affect the gems that hit Lamebook. Ok, use your discretion. Awesome.

I started writing a recap of the event, but Paul Jacobson beat me to it, and probably did a better job of it anyway. Overall, I’m lank excited about the Nokia Maps Player, and the Nokia Booklet 3G, which is one sexy little piece of equipment.

Read Paul’s post here. Awesome.

I don’t like receiving gifts. Birthdays, Christmas, it’s awful. And I figured out why: I feel awkward when someone gives me something. The very bizarre thing though, is that I love to give gifts. The look on someone’s face when they figure out what it is. Priceless.

Hypocritical? Of course. A problem? Absolutely.

The reason for this post is because in a few days time I’ll be celebrating my birthday, and as like all birthdays, everyone is asking ‘What would you like for your birthday?’. My immediate response is ‘Nothing, please.’ People don’t really like this answer. I have 2 major problems with present-receiving at birthdays:

1. I suffer from Reactophobia (or Doronophobia perhaps), often feeling a sense of letdown on the present-giver’s face as my subtle non-bounce-around-the-room reaction is, well, just that. Too much enthusiasm looks like you’re acting. There’s such a fine line.

2. Why – just because I happened to be born on a specific day – do I deserve to get rewarded? If anyone should get something, it should be my folks. After all, it was their hard work that got me here in the first place. If I hit 100 years old, now that’s a feat, gimme something for that, preferably in the shape of a little blue pill and a dozen beautiful blondes. Awesome.

So I’ll keep this short and sweet: Please don’t buy me anything for my birthday. You don’t want me to feel awkward do you? And I really don’t deserve it, all I managed to do to get to this point in my life was stay alive. It’s not rocket science.

Some people liked it, most thought it was a bad move. But…

The objective was to make a name for herself in the South African social media space. Whether it started out well, or not so well, today not many people are unfamiliar with the name Nadia van der Merwe. I can almost guarantee that going this particular route (the bad press) wasn’t her plan all along, but Nadia really did make a name for herself.

Did it play out how I would imagine she envisioned it? No. Did she fulfill the primary objective? Absolutely. How she capitalises on this now, however, remains to be seen.

The boys at Jo’blog were kinda jealous that we didn’t have any online social media resumé of sorts, and thought Nadia’s video was great fodder for a vid of our own too. We don’t look this good in lingerie, but we make out alright.

What comes up more often than not are people’s longing to either do comedy or get a tattoo, but they just never had the guts to go through with it, almost always blaming the ‘too scared to get on stage’, or the ‘permanence’ or ’soon-to-be-boredom’ with tattoos. It’s like a broken record.

I’ve been creating and writing comedy for as long as I can remember. I was fortunate enough to have a group of friends, including my family, who could see humour in everything, which led me to begin writing things down so that I could one day use it, either on stage, TV or in film.

A few years ago when I was doing video production I did some work with Riaad Moosa. On the last day of shooting, we were leaving the set and he shouted across the parking lot “Get on stage Don!”, after our earlier conversation about open comedy spots at Cool Runnings in Melville. It was an awesome thing to hear from someone like him. So I continued to write comedy, but never really considered getting on stage to actually use it.

Then last year we were invited to Missing Link for a talk by John Vlismas about creativity, and obviously used comedy as an example. One of the guys asked him how people can get into it and he mentioned the open spots on Sunday nights at Cool Runnings. At that stage of my life I needed something to occupy my mind and free time, so after the talk I asked John how to book a spot, and got the number. Three days later, while driving to a meeting, I phoned Whacked Management and booked myself a spot. I put the phone down and felt like vomiting. It was honestly one of the scariest things I had to do. Taking that first step was huge, but now it was done, and all I had to do was show up and perform.

Long story short, I performed my first gig (which very few people have seen) and even though I look back on it now and think it wasn’t even close to what I’d expect to be a good set, I walked off stage feeling like I’d wrestled a lion, and tamed the bastard. No-one can ever explain that feeling of total bliss. Too rad.

The thing is, the big step wasn’t actually getting on stage, it was taking that first step and getting booked in. Once I knew I had to do it, I knuckled down and made it happen. I wrote a set, I consulted friends, I perfected it so that I could deliver as effective a show as possible. Now I just can’t get enough.

This doesn’t only apply to comedy or getting a tattoo. What, in business, are you thinking about doing but are too scared to implement? Do you have an idea that could possibly help your business? The worst that can happen is you fail, but at least you can say you tried.

This post (although old, but definitely still relevant) explains how, while few CEOs are as candid about the potential for failure as Isdell, many are wrestling with the same problem, trying to get their organisations to cosy up to the risk-taking that innovation requires. “Everyone fears failure. But breakthroughs depend on it. The best companies embrace their mistakes and learn from them.”

It goes back to that saying “You always regret the things you didn’t do.” You’ll never know unless you’ve tried.

Just do it.