Rural Broadband Accessfor 55927? Don't Bet the Farm.

I'm having trouble remembering my new address. It's less of an address than it is a confirmation number: the house number an unrelated string of digits, the street name another string of digits without a directional. I keep wanting to add a North or South or Northwest that isn't there.

But one thing is permanently burned onto my hard drive. 
The zip code. 55927. 55927. 55927.

Picasa photo: roderick_clark

In looking for rural broadband service, I've entered my new zip code into the search engine of one Internet service provider after another: Qwest. Comcast. Frontier. Mediacom. CenturyLink. None provide broadband service to zip code 55927. I've felt like a gambling addict in Vegas, feeding quarter after quarter into a slot machine and fervently hoping I hit the jackpot with the next coin.

It's hard to believe that here in Bruno, a town of 102, we've had unlimited broadband access while  roughly 20 miles from the Mayo Clinic, broadband is scarce. Our new digs are outside of the Dodge Center city limits, falling smack dab in the middle of a triangle formed by the cities of West Concord, Dodge Center, and Claremont. It's a Bermuda Triangle of sorts for rural broadband.

Frontier expanded its broadband service to Bruno customers about four years ago, and I can't remember what life was like without it. Things may change in time. Perhaps Frontier will expand its frontiers. For now, our choices for rural broadband are HughesNet and WildBlue. Do you have service through either of those providers, or have stories about rural broadband in general? Would we love it if you shared your stories? You bet!

How to Sing in a Second Language

I'm in awe of people who can speak a second language, and even more, people who can write in a second language. The Internet has made translations more accessible through services like freetranslation.com and Google Translate. But it takes a human translator to take a second language and make it sing, a gift that apps don't have and bots ain't got.

As a marketing copywriter for the entertainment retailer Musicland, I often wrote ad copy that promoted CDs by Latino artists in markets such as New York, Los Angeles and Miami. I would create a basic copy treatment with a heading such as "Hot Latino Hits" (a heading that today still makes me cringe), and send it to a person who would translate the English to Spanish. The person I worked with was George Rabasa, who I'd known when he was creative director at Carlson Marketing Group. Today he's an acclaimed novelist and short story writer.

One Latino Size Doesn't Fit All

Starting with the basic marketing message, George would translate it into copy that culturally reflected and respected the diverse markets: the Cuban presence in Miami, the Dominican and Puerto Rican presence in New York, the Mexican and Chicano presence in Los Angeles. Having been raised in Mexico, George felt most at home in the latter market. But he knew how to infuse copy for New York and Miami markets with a Caribbean flavor.

Author George Rabasa.

"I wouldn't go crazy with the idioms," he explains. "I would be careful. I would use the rhythm of the language rather than specific words. By rhythm, I mean if you read Caribbean-inflected Spanish out loud or Chicano-inflected, they sound different, even if the words sound similar -- word placement, length of sentences. It's pretty subtle but it's there."

Tejano pop star Selena.

In 1995 Tejano pop star Selena was murdered at age 23 by her fan club president, and Musicland placed an ad of the star's CDs in Latino markets. The only thing I knew about Selena was that her fans had worshipped her. So, I asked George to write the ad in Spanish rather than translate an English copy treatment. I knew whatever I wrote couldn't begin to capture what her fans felt.

Second languages sing when spoken by human translators. There's a sense of judgment and nuance, an ear for rhythm, a respect of place and culture. Because I admire the ability to translate and I value service by a person, I've welcomed an affiliate partner, bewords.com, an online marketplace where you can meet and work with translators. Real ones. Check them out. Who knows, the translator you hire today may be the important novelist of tomorrow.

Listen to author George Rabasa discuss his newest novel, Miss Entropia and the Adam Bomb.


Author photo from georgerabasa.com. Flickr photo of Selena from hellboy_93.

When God Tells a Joke,Ask for the Punchline

The stormy weather of late and this lovely guest post at Marketing Mama^TM  about the spirituality of children made me think of this story.

About eight years ago I was home with my son Wyatt, then six, during a severe thunderstorm. I was afraid we'd have to take cover, and to cover my own nervousness, I lamely told Wyatt not to be nervous, that our guardian angel was watching over us.

"I know," he said. "God talks to me all the time."

"He does?," I asked after a long pause. What does He say?"

"He tells me jokes."

"What KIND of jokes?," I asked, after an even longer pause.

"'Why did the donkey cross the road?"

I marveled at how the joke either sounded like a) an adult's idea of a kid's idea of what God would say; or b), how God would communicate with a six-year-old boy who loved jokes.

If only I'd had the presence of mind to ask what the punchline was.

Thank you, Missy and Liz, for bringing this memory to mind.

The Myers-Briggs Minnesota Budget?

People who don’t want to agree won’t agree. But for people who want to come to an agreement, knowing what motivates the other person in negotiations is a powerful tool for achieving consensus.

In Minnesota, Democrats say the Republican-controlled Legislature hasn’t compromised on a state budget. The Legislature says they have already compromised, and that Democratic Governor Mark Dayton is being unrealistic.  If a budget isn’t reached soon, state government workers will be laid off as of July 1. Private contractors with state contracts will have their jobs and pay suspended.

Perhaps the legislative leaders and Governor should begin the special session with Myers-Briggs Type Indicator®  exercises.

For people who aren’t familiar with Myers-Briggs, the MBTI® is the most widely used personality assessment in the world. Conflict management, decision making and negotiations are some of the ways the instrument has been used for over 50 years. The guiding principle of the MBTI is that everyone has inborn strengths and blind spots, and that personality is the best predictor of behavior.

When taking the MBTI, the person indicates their preferences for a series of statements across four categories to determine

•      whether their source of energy is inward or outward  (Introversion or Extraversion)
•       how they process information (Sensing or Intuition)
•       how they make decisions (Thinking or Feeling)
•      the degree of structure or organization they prefer (Judging  or Perceiving)

Once a preference has been determined for each category, the four-letter personality type is revealed. There are 16 personality types recognized by the MBTI. Mine is INFP. Famous people who share that personality type include Princess Diana, Mister Rogers, Albert Schweitzer, the poet W.B. Yeats, and, I suspect, Governor Dayton.  


I’m not a certified MBTI trainer. I have, though, spent over 100 hours listening to candidate Dayton during the 2010 gubernatorial debates, rewinding and replaying the audio for video transcription. During those hours I heard these INFP traits:

• fierce devotion (to Rudy Perpich and his “None of us is as smart as all of us” motto)
• awkward verbal communication that turned eloquent when talking about intensely held beliefs (Remember the Cop Killer question at Gamefair?)
• an empathetic personality
• great distress over the inability to preserve values (proposed cuts to education and health care)

There aren’t many INFPs around; according to this chart, 3½ percent of the general population are INFPs, compared to 15% with the profile ESTJ (Extraverted/Sensing/Thinking/Judging) and 14% with the profile ESFJ (Extraverted/Sensing/Feeling/Judging). When you’re part of such a small population, it’s easy for others to think you’re odd or goofy or, God forbid, erratic.

I found out years ago I was an INFP when a supervisor told me that people in meetings felt I wasn’t “getting it.” Thanks to a supportive human resources person who shared this book, I learned that I process information in a roundabout way that doesn’t always make sense to others. I also learned to pinpoint my blind spots to interact more effectively with colleagues of other types. (When I become CEO every employee badge will list the employee's profile in addition their name.)

I have friends who are government employees, and friends who are private consultants with government contracts. I also have a deep appreciation for government services. For all of these reasons, I hope there won’t be a shutdown. Maybe it would help if the leaders learned their colleagues were an INFP, ESTJ, or ENTP. ASAP.

Find meetups with others who share your MBTI profile here.

Join a local chapter of the Association for Psychological Type International (APTi) here. 

Hey, this is important!

The first time I read an email that addressed me with the word "Hey," I was taken aback. To me, the word "hey" indicates belligerence, rudeness. "Hey, listen to me." "Hey, you better get out of my way."

Since then, I've been working with volunteers who are young enough to be my daughters and sons. (OK, I'd make a very young parent.) I've learned a lot, not just about technology, but also about communication.

A group email beginning with "Hey" indicates inclusion, casualness, energy. I've even gotten used to using it with the group. That's not easy for me to do. Like when a friend asks you to call them by a nickname you're just not comfortable with.

When the context is wrong, "Hey" doesn't work. It's probably not recommended for a job application cover letter. Or to communicate with people who don't know you. Recently I was checking my email and an on-screen message from Google flashed, "Hey, this is important." I immediately closed out the window and had the shakes for several minutes. I was sure someone was alerting me to a virus within my computer. Turns out Google just wanted an alternative email address for me. They still haven't gotten it.

"Hey" has allowed me to become generationally bilingual. I use "hey" for some and more formal greetings for others. An email from my friend Greg, an English major, is a work of artful precision, akin to a letter in a Ken Burns documentary.

He would take great umbrage if I addressed him with "Hey."

So if I've helped one person understand this next-generation salutation, hey, I've done my job.

Flickr photo credit: Booth365

Men are from Mars, USB ports are from Mayberry

For me, the most challenging part about starting my own shop is doing my own IT. I know enough about it to know I don't want to do it.

At 13, my son Wyatt is becoming a reliable resource. I’m also lucky to live near a shop that not only offers reasonably priced computer service, they know Macs. I even recommend it to my friends in the Cities, should they be in the mood for a leisurely drive.

Then there’s my husband Mike, who has become a reluctant IT person. The relationship makes for interesting exchanges, considering the doubled potential for Mars/Venus issues between spouse/spouse and IT person/computer user. The latest scenario involved hooking up my cordless mouse to my Macbook Pro.

“How would I go about hooking this up?,” I asked, the metamessage being, “How would I get you to hook it up?”

“You can do this,” he encouraged. He picked up the receiver in one hand and the mouse in the other. “This is the transmitter. This is the receiver."

Thinking of the Ten Things that Drive Users Crazy, I groused, “Why don’t you just say ‘This is Mr. Receiver’?”

Mike tried another tack. Holding up the tiny piece of metal, he explained,  “The receiver is Sara and the USB port is the Mayberry Phone Company. The mouse is Sheriff Taylor and he wants to call Aunt Bee, who is in the computer.”

Okay. That I got. I even grinned.

If communication is simple but not simplistic, relatable yet respectful, and leaves both speaker and listener in good spirits, it's done the job.