Office Space

October 2, 2012
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My former employers at Mansueto Ventures (publishers of Inc. and Fast Company—not a shoe company or VC firm, as others have suggested the name implies) have a pretty sweet office. It’s so nice, in fact, that we often rented it out to TV and commercial producers for use as a set.

I spent about 10 minutes on YouTube and tracked down a handful of the spots that were filmed during my time there:

MediaSet, starring Hugh Laurie and Uma Thurman—my buddy Michael also caught House lounging on the couch that some of us used to nap on during all-night launches.

Fringe—shot in our boardroom.

Marriott—This was shot down the hall from my office; I heard that “smoothie” line about one hundred times that day.

Kit Kat—that’s a fake wall, for some reason.

I Can’t Believe This Is Really Happening

September 20, 2012
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In celebration of the collaboration between Volcom and Yo Gabba Gabba!, Biz Markie, Wayne Coyne, Jack Black, Mark Mothersbaugh and Jon Heder alongside the Yo Gabba Gabba! characters Muno, Foofa, Brobee, Toodee and Plex, got together to create a music video featuring an original song written and performed special for this magical coming together called “I Can’t Believe It’s Really Happening” performed by Biz and Wayne!

Yo Gabba Gabba! is one of those rare, bright spots of childrens’ entertainment that I actually enjoy just as much as my kids do. This is no accident, of course: Biz Markie and Mark Mothersbaugh have recurring segments on the show, and they regularly feature folks like The Flaming Lips, Mos Def, Amy Sedaris, etc. They even recently reunited one of my all-time favorite bands, Rocket From The Crypt, albeit for a totally goofy and forgettable song.

Also, a bit of trivia: RFTC‘s lead singer (and serial-band-starter) John Reis introduces every musical act on the show under his pseudonym, The Swami.

WordPress Powers Politics

September 19, 2012
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WordPress is the most powerful content management system in the world – today it powers just under 17% of the top one million websites in the world. Millions of people from across the globe turn to WordPress to build websites of all shapes and sizes and across all different categories.

Now that the political conventions are over and we have officially turned the corner towards the November election, WordPress.com VIP is proud to release this infographic which clearly shows that WordPress is now the backbone that powers websites from across the political spectrum.

WordPress Powers Politics - Infographic

via WordPress.com VIP

WordPress.com VIP Featured Partner Program

March 15, 2012
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Been working on this for a little while—awesome to see it live, and really proud to be working with a great group of launch partners.

This morning we debuted a project that I’m really excited about—our new Featured Partner Program. Our WordPress.com VIP team is now working with select partners to integrate their services with WordPress, connect them with our VIP clients, and collaborate to support the integration and provide a seamless experience for our users.

More info on our VIP News blog, and at TechCrunch and BetaKit as well.