Bye Bye Blogger

Dear Blogger,

You've been a reliable companion the past four-plus years. We've shared lots of stories -- some good, some bad. 2008 was our most active year together.

But I've found someone new. Someone fresh and open to new possibilities.

It's not you. It's just time I moved on. My new partner offers more of what I'm looking for.

Try not to be jealous, but it will be hard...for you, I know. I'm sure you've heard of the multi-talented WordPress. She is only four years younger than you, but that's generations in technology years. And WordPress dresses so much better -- she has style, in reserves. Plus, she's so dynamic. How can I ever get bored?

Blogger, you can read my stories on WordPress now.

Imitation -- the sincerest form of flattery?

This week, PUMP (Portland United Mountain Pedalers) unveiled a new name and logo for the mountain bike advocacy organization. The new name, Northwest Trail Alliance, sounds flat and uninspiring compared to PUMP.

The new logo, however, is what's really unoriginal. When you borrow another organization's logo, that's not called rebranding. Let's call it copybranding.

Seattle's Backcountry Bicycle Trails Club recently rebranded and chose a controversial name-- Evergreen Mountain Bike Alliance. Did Kris Schamp (former marketing specialist for Bike Gallery) unconsciously, or consciously, misappropriate the logo (below) that BBTC had used for over ten years?

The recently retired BBTC logo was created by Ross Cattelan, a long-time BBTC supporter and professional graphic designer. After I developed a concept with another designer, Ross added depth to the imagery and he created a new color palette that was used across all BBTC marketing materials (until last year when BBTC evolved to Evergreen).

Legally, Northwest Trail Alliance is not in danger of trademark violation. Its new design deviates significantly enough from the BBTC logo that it is probably not "confusingly similar."

When determining infringement, the Court considers the following elements:

1. Strength of the mark
2. Proximity of the goods
3. Similarity of the marks
4. Evidence of actual confusion
5. Marketing channels used
6. Type of goods and the degree of care likely to be exercised by the purchaser
7. Defendant's intent in selecting the mark
8. Likelihood of expansion of the product lines

A little market research and common courtesy can help ward off trademark suits.

Color Communicates

Project: New Website
Client: Cipalla Communications
Graphic Designer: Barbara Hartinger of Poetica Design
CSS/XHTML Development: Marketing By Marlow

Even communicators must communicate. Rita Cipalla launches Cipalla.com.

• "Your site looks great, very professional, easy to navigate."
• "I love the web site. Very cool-- very crisp!"
• "The vibrancy of color, the content of your test, your graphics,everything is TOP-NOTCH....just outstanding! So professional yet warm and engaging."
• "Very impressive website. I quickly and easily, with interest, viewed the whole thing. Very professional, to the point, and logical."
• "I like the feel and look of it. It says a lot without feeling heavy."
• "I checked your website. My, oh, my, it's lovely. I felt like I was floating through the background images -- very ethereal. The colors are great."

"Scott was so easy to work with. He was thoughtful, good-natured and ever-so-patient with the many tweaks and edits that I made to my web site during the HTML design phase. He willingly considered each of my requests, regardless of how small, and was honest in his assessment and recommendation. I'm very pleased with how my site turned out, and I continue to get great feedback on it."
Rita Cipalla, president
Cipalla Communications

Tour de Redmond

Sean Smith just launched the new Tour de Redmond Summer Bicycle Commuter Challenge, powered by Cascade Bicycle Club. You can check out the new bike commute challenge with my new CSS skin, based on the 2009 artwork, at www.tour.grtma.org.

Freelance Slackers?

Has the term "freelancer" developed a negative connotation?

Tuesday, a group of fellow West Seattle soloists met at Elliott Bay Brewery on California Ave SW. Kim Francisco of The Phoenix Studio and I discussed positioning for small businesses, and the perceptions of freelance workers.

The Bureau of Labor Statics reports ~10.3 million workers, 7.4% of the workforce, are employed as independent contractors. Despite the double-digit growth of outsourcing, it seems some folks affiliate freelancing with purposeless unattachment--the 1099 drifter. That's when I read David Scharfenberg's Gen-X op-ed in the Boston Globe.

During this economic downtown, if you only read or listen to Big Media news, then you may forget that the U.S. Small Business Administration reports that small businesses (under 500 employees):

• pay 45% of U.S. private payroll,
• generate 80 percent of new jobs,
• make up 29% of U.S. exports, and
• produce 13 times more patents per employee than large firms.

According to the last census, small businesses also

• constituted 99.7% of all employers
• employed 52 percent of private workforce
• accounted for 51 percent of the nation’s sales
• are most likely to generate jobs for young workers, older workers and women,
• provided 67 percent of first jobs
• produced 55 percent of innovations

To learn more about the rise of small business and the soloist economy, check out former Clinton speechwriter Daniel Pink's book: Free Agent Nation.

You can call me a freelancer or a free agent--just call me free.

The Haul of Justice: Bicycling Superheroes

Read a beautiful, inspiring story about volunteerism in communities.

Man in the Arena

--It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better.

The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, and comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who know neither victory nor defeat.

"Citizenship in a Republic,"
Speech at the Sorbonne, Paris, April 23, 1910
Teddy Roosevelt