Coffee Maker Time Machine

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Way back in 2016, when I was doing audio-only podcasts, I interviewed Braydan Young of CoffeeSender. Cool concept. Sending coffee to folks as a thank you for attending a webinar, or accepting a meeting, or just because, well, who does not love COFFEE???

It was a good (not great) podcast, and I was still getting my sea legs on doing interviews. CoffeeSender (was) a fully integrated rewards, incentives, and perks platform for enterprises. Companies used CoffeeSender to send customers, prospects, partners, and employees - coffee. The recipient would get an email with a custom message and a $5 Starbucks eGift Card. That was, ah, pretty much it. 

I found https://nydla.org/coffeesender/ is still working on our website. I really cannot believe that is still working, I forgot all about it.

OK: let's all jump into the Coffee Maker Time Machine.....

This past week, I did a VIDEO podcast interview with Braydan Young. I have had no (zip, nada, nothing) contact with Braydan since 2016. I saw a post online about Sendoso, and said to myself: "Self, that is kinda like CoffeeSender but better." Surprise surprise: hey Braydan Young, watchabeendoingforthelastfiveyears????

Sendoso, the leading Sending Platform, helps companies to stand out by giving them new ways to engage with customers throughout the buyer's journey. By integrating digital and physical sending strategies, companies can increase the effectiveness of their existing go-to-market programs and improve their relationships with customers. 

Trusted by over 500 companies, Sendoso (formerly CoffeeSender) is an essential part of successful demand generation, account-based, and customer experience programs. 

Founded in 2016 by two guys, Kris Rudeegraap and Braydan Young. Co-Founders. College Buddies. 

Today, same two guys - plus 550+ more people, give or take. Sendoso is backed by $54M in venture funding and has a global footprint, with a presence in North America, Europe, and Asia Pacific. 

So, a couple of things. Did you ever have (zero) contact with someone for YEARS, and then pick up right where you left off? There should be a word for that, maybe like Schadenfreude or Gluckschmerz. My video podcast with Braydan was like we had a tee time set for next Saturday. It felt like it was 5 weeks, not 5 years since our last contact. That is a great feeling. Feels kinda like coffee in the morning. 

Also this: OMG - SENDOSO! 

I was an early user of Zoom, so I watched the past ten years of Zoom growth. I missed the last five years of the Sendoso rocket ship. But just doing a little research, I was blown away by what I found. It just goes to show that a good idea is a good idea, full stop. But the world is full of good ideas, right? Sendoso hit $24M in in revenue with 500 customers in 2020. How did they catch lightning in a bottle - or coffee in a cup?

I highly recommend watching the www.CoffeeInTheClouds.us interview with Braydan Young - it should be live no later than tomorrow. And any day now, www.NYDLA.org/SENDOSO will be LIVE on our website, a new value-added member benefit. Back in 2016, it was Starbucks eGift Cards. That was it. That was the deal. Here you go, here is a Starbucks card, thank you.

Today, think video mailers, custom gift boxes, printed success stories, books, beer, wine, even handwritten notes. Got something - anything - you want to send? Sendoso has you covered. 

They say nice guys finish last. 

Looks like college buddies Kris and Braydan are just getting started. 

What is the opposite of Schadenfreude???

NYDLA.org/SENDOSO is coming soon!!!

 

My eyes are up here!

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It's all about the eyeballs. 

 

A blog is a discussion or informational website published on the Internet consisting of discrete, often informal diary-style entries. Posts are usually displayed in reverse chronological order, so that the most recent post appears first. Like this one.

How do bloggers (video or otherwise) make money? The same way everyone else does: by offering something of value in exchange for money. The five main ways bloggers make money: ads, affiliate marketing, sponsored posts, products, and services. 

Some people blog to help a company rank on search engines. Or to share information about a given topic and become an expert in an industry. Or to attract visitors to a website, and turn those visitors into leads.

I started blogging around ten years ago. Not sure when, but I started an audio podcast around the same time. It seemed (at the time) that everyone was doing it, so I should do it. I did not want to be the guy that got left behind.

At some point, I started doing VIDEO podcasts, because (again) everyone was doing it. Blogging enables you to reach the billions of people that use the Internet. Blogging works as a method for attracting an audience because it provides something of value to them before asking for anything in return. 

Yep. Blogging, Podcasts (Video or Audio) will help you to attract an audience, establish authority, build rapport and engagement, create opportunities, organize your thoughts and learn, tell your story, meet new people, stand out, validate expertise, and eventually.......make money. 

Funny Makes Da Money.

When the USA first went under lockdown due to COVID, one group of professionals was devastated: Comedians. Doing LIVE shows at comedy clubs, college campuses, events of any size (live) went to zero. 

As a lark, we started doing video podcasts with comedians, Zoom Shows if you will. Some of our professional comedian guests had millions of followers on their OWN social media sites. Really famous people, not working. On Twitter alone: Patton Oswalt 4.7M. Jim Gaffigan 3.2M. Jerry Seinfeld 4.2M. So when we would record a Coffee In the Clouds - with COMEDIANS we would get millions of eyeballs to our video blogs due to their tweets getting retweeted. 

Why stop there, right? We did Coffee In the Clouds - with ACTORS, AUTHORS, MUSICIANS, ENTREPRENEURS. 

When an author has a new book, our video podcasts help them with pre-order book sales. When an entrepreneur is launching a new business, our video podcasts help them to tell their story. Video podcasts, reaching millions of eyeballs.

The one cool thing with VIDEO podcasts, is the data. You can see if someone watches the video, see if someone watches the ENTIRE video, or watches the entire video - and then FORWARDS the video to someone ELSE to watch! Many times, we can place a coupon or something "free" as a thank you for watching. 

Sometimes CEOs that we have interviewed have taken our video podcast interviews, and shared them with their own entire customer base. Folks with 2M+ followers on LinkedIn share their www.ZoomTalks.us interviews with their followers. Tweets getting retweeted, posts getting reposted.

Networking: Expert Level. 

When I look back on the past 24 months, our exponential growth at NYDLA.org all started when Zoom became a verb - and - when professional comedians were truly "Starving Artists" due to COVID. 

As of this blog (08/22/2021) we are still fighting COVID. 30% of the eligible population of the USA has not yet been vaccinated. The DELTA variant is running amok. We pray that we shall not go back under lockdown, we PRAY that we can go back to live schools, live events, and doing things - LIVE. 

No matter what happens for the rest of 2021, we shall be serving freshly brewed Coffee in the Clouds, powered by Zoom. 

ZoomTalks.us with Elie Honig - get

his new book for FREE! 

That works for me!

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OK, let's get to work!

There are some words that have so many different meanings, so many different definitions that we can get lost. 

Work is one of those words.

We can go to work, get to work, work hard, work fast, work slow. You can work a corner, work your way through college, work your way up the company. You can work alone, work on a team, or work on improving your teamwork. 

You can do police work, camera work, or give someone the works. A book can be the work of many hands, or it can be an early work by a major writer. 

A horse can be put to work, and then they are a workhorse. And clothes can become work clothes, if you only wear them at work. I am old enough to remember changing in to play clothes after coming home from school. After all, my parents worked hard for those school clothes! 

If you are still reading this blog, I may have just worked a miracle. If my plan worked, you are working very hard right now, trying to guess where this all going.

Sportscasters can work a game, politicians can work a crowd, and comedians can work a room.

It is nice when your boss "works it" so that you can take your vacation. Otherwise, you might work yourself into a rage, and then find yourself out of work. 

Ah yes, work can be a verb, a noun, or an adjective. 

The BIG topic in the USA today is this: are we going BACK? Back to work? Or, back to SCHOOL, for our schoolwork? As in, are we going back to a location where WORK was historically done. And the debate now rages on how location impacts the quality of work (or the quality of anything). 

Ah, did schoolwork become homework when we did not do it while physically AT school? Yeah, the schoolhouse just became "a house" during COVID. And schoolwork can be done anywhere, with or without a classroom, or a lecture hall or even in many cases, a laboratory. Hmmm, labor-a-tory. I feel a blog on "labor" is in my future. 

I feel that saying "at work" means busy, engaged in working. Like, when you are AT WORK you are engaged in one's regular occupation. 

When you meet someone for the first time, the conversation usually goes "Hello, I'm Tom. Who are you and what do you do?" We identify by our career, our occupation. We identify by our BODY OF WORK. 

An actor, writer or musician is judged by their body of work - not the location where said body of work was actually created. 

NYC became "The Big Apple" over the years, first, because it had a natural deep water port. Shipping and The Maritime Industry made New York. Wall Street, Broadway, were all are result of the location (proximity to the city) being mandatory. The more people who HAD to live in (or very near) the city grew and grew. You had to physically go to the office - that is where the files were, the corporate phone system was located, the typewriters, the fax machines, the copy machines, and of course, eventually the computers. Meetings were held in conference rooms, where "the work" of managing "the workers" was accomplished. If you missed a meeting, there was no recording of the meeting to catch up. 

The LOCATION of the work, historically defined... the work. 

Today, not so much. Humans crave touch, yes. Go to any airport, and see people hugging hello, and hugging good-bye. Handshakes and hugs are very important to the human condition. Physical touch, we miss it when we can't have it. A pat on the back, a "high five" after a good sales meeting, a fist-bump in the hallway. Yeah, those are the things that trigger the good brain chemistry, right? 

But we should not confuse physical location with the quality of work, or with the final quality or value of any work product. Especially when the "work product" we are producing might be teaching, training, coaching or mentoring. Humans are social creatures, and we crave connection and physical touch. It's in our DNA. Is this not why the Meetings & Events business is actually - a business?

"Work is not a place that you go to, it's what you do" is a phrase that we have all heard many times. Due to COVID, that has never been more true - for work, for school, for just about everything. Sorry, I just had to work that phrase into my blog. 

Sometimes, work sucks. But you know what rarely sucks?

Pizza! 

Who does not love pizza? Most of the time, we order pizza for home delivery, as least as often as physically going to, and eating in a pizzeria, right? Pizza is pretty great, regardless of location. And everyone has a favorite topping, yes? Or, do you order your Pizza with the works?

Pizza With The Works (Except Anchovies)

Breaking Good

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There is a very good chance that if you read the words, or heard someone say "Breaking Bad" it would resonate with you. A very good chance that you would associate Breaking Bad with the TV Series from 2008 - 2013 about a High School chemistry teacher diagnosed with inoperable lung cancer who turns to manufacturing and selling methamphetamine in order to secure his family's future.

The creator Vince Gilligan said that he thought the phrase "Breaking Bad" was a Southern regionalism from the area in Virginia from which he hails. It means "to raise hell," he says, as in "I was out the other night at the bar....and I really broke bad." 

If you Google it, "Breaking Bad" can mean to go wild, to defy authority, to break the law, to be verbally combative, belligerent, or threatening. To behave in a violent manner for no good reason. 

Can you Break Bad - and then Break Good? Or, can you Break Good from the middle, without the extreme swings of the pendulum? 

In 2020, Facebook was called "The Worst Brand of the Year" by many media pundits. Full disclosure: I use Facebook daily, and I am very active in selling, marketing and promoting Workplace from Facebook. I love the technology, and we plan on being the #1 reseller of Workplace, nationwide.

There seems to be two Facebooks. The one that has been a health misinformation super spreader during the same pandemic where it sought to present itself as a lifeline for connection. The one that explicitly allowed politicians to lie on its platform leading up to a Presidential election. The same Facebook, which has more users than the Catholic Church, whose CEO Mark Zuckerberg said he didn't want to be an arbiter of truth. 

You can't talk about Facebook's 2020 without looking at how it ended 2019, which was full-on PR crisis mode. CEO Mark Zuckerberg's performance in front of the House financial services committee was a disaster. Mark managed to embody all the worst impressions of a hubristic company, out of touch with its role in the world. Refusing to see the mirror being held up to its face, Mark had to live the now classic "Lying is bad" moment with Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. 

Over the last ten days, I personally experienced the best that Facebook has to offer. 

We lost both of our dogs Mandy and Colin within six months of each other. We have had dogs since the 80s. Norton, Casey, Bella, Mandy, Colin. All rescues, all Labradors - less Colin. We have no idea what Colin was, except adorable. We came across a post on Facebook that there was a dog "Konta" that needed to be rehomed. 

This was last Tuesday.

Via the power of Facebook, I friended the owner. Via messenger, we communicated. I shared pictures of our past dogs, our home, our yard. I was able to use Facebook to solicit "references" from friends and family - as the owner of Konta was being very (VERY) through. And, I admired that he was being so careful and protective of Konta. We chatted on messenger about how we lost first Mandy and then Colin within six months of each other. And that is how our home would be perfect for Konta. 

The new "Konta" Bench at the foot of the bed.

I think of the plot of the TV Series "Breaking Bad" and how such a nice person can become so twisted, so evil, so......bad. I guess that was key to the story, that anyone, under the right set of circumstances, can "Break Bad". 

I see the Peter Parker (Spider-Man) principle at play with Facebook. "With great power comes great responsibility" as Uncle Ben would lecture Peter. The paradox is that it seems to be much (much) easier for a company (or a person) to Break Bad, rather than to Break Good. 

Thanks to the power of Facebook, Konta Capone spent his first night in Boonton Township. Day One of the Konta Capone Chronicles was yesterday. Thanks to Facebook, we have a new rescue dog, and we also have new "hooman" friends - the previous family of Konta. I expect them to come and visit Konta at his new home at least once or twice in the future. They are welcome anytime - we are all one big happy family now! 

With Great Power Comes Great Responsibility. Breaking Bad. Most of us know these catch phrases, right? And, we know them because of media companies - like Disney (Marvel) or Netflix or Facebook. 

As of 8/8/2021 Mark Zuckerberg's net worth is $130.8B as per Forbes. Facebook, the social media network has become a go-to communications tool during the pandemic. In June, more than 1,000 advertisers joined a boycott to protest Facebook's lax policing of hate speech and misleading posts from politicians. In 2015, Mark and his wife, Priscilla Chan, pledged to give away 99% of their Facebook stake over their lifetimes. 

Breaking Bad vs. Breaking Good. I have just learned that Mark and Priscilla are spending many billions in an attempt to end, cure or manage ALL disease by the year 2100. Mark was 19 years old when he started Facebook at Harvard in 2004. Life is full of twists and turns. 

Life is full of breaks, good and bad. Breaking Bad is easier - Breaking Good is, well, harder - but worth it. Worth it by several levels of magnitude. 

And without further ado, I present to you.......  Konta Capone.

Thanks, Mark. 

“Chase the good, not the money, 

the money will end up following you.” 

— Tony Hsieh, CEO of Zappos

I'm feeling a little tipsy

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A gratuity (also known as a tip) is a sum of money customarily given by a client or customer to certain service sector workers for the service they have performed. Tipping servers in bars, restaurants, taxi drivers (including ridesharing), hair stylists and so on, but this is depends on country or location.

How did tips (and the amounts) become a social custom or etiquette? 

And, it is illegal to offer tips to some groups of workers, such as U.S. government workers, police officers, etc. as the tips might be considered bribery. 

And, sometimes a fixed percentage service charge can be added to bills in restaurants and similar establishments. Beware of hidden fees! Did you ever leave a tip - when there was ALREADY a service fee built in? I have. 

Studies of the practice in America suggests that tipping is often discriminatory or arbitrary: workers receive different levels of gratuity based on factors such as age, sex, race, hair color, and the size of the gratuity is found to be only very weakly related to the quality of service. 

Exhibit A: HYATT REGENCY RESORT

During a recent stay at a HYATT, I was charged a GREAT rate for a room - cool!  And then City Occupancy tax, HB Assessment, CA Assessment, a Resort Fee, and then (again) City Occupancy Tax and HB Assessment on the Resort Fee. Extra fees of $61.46 per day or $122.92 in total for two days. 

When I questioned the extra charges, I was told it was all on their website. When I asked what the "Resort Fees" were, I was told - they were not just a hotel, but a resort. But the "resort" was on lock down at the time, due to COVID-19. But the resort fees are automatic, even though you cannot use the resort. Sorry. 

Exhibit B: Angelina's in Florham Park, New Jersey.

We went out to dinner for the first time with friends, in like......forever. I had the Clams Oreganata and the Zuppa di Pesce. All of us had a great meal. It was a BYOB place, and we DID. We were really good on the BYOB assignment. 

When our waitress (Gabby) first came to the table, I whispered to her, "I get the check" to head off the classic fight for the check. Alas, there was a fight anyway, and we wound up splitting the bill, $59.24 each couple. Fine. 

I would guess that Gabby was in her 20's. Gabby was a very good server, a little ray of sunshine. 

Gabby got a $50 tip from our table, against a $120 bill. 

Epilogue

A tip is not a tip if it is forced upon you. From a theoretical economic point of view, gratuities may solve the principle-agent problem (the situation in which an agent such a server, is working for a principle, such as a restaurant owner or manager) and many managers believe that tips provide incentive for greater work effort. 

Why do we tip waiters, taxi cab drivers and bar tenders, but not webmasters, landscapers and others in the service industry? Also this: if you are going to have hidden fees, you better hide them really good. Because once a hidden fee is no longer hidden, those little hidden fees will become the only thing people will talk about. Heck, they might even BLOG on it. 

Gabby for the win. 

Oh, and HYATT, meet my new friend HILTON. 

A 2nd Bite of the Apple

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We're back baby!!!!  Jerry Seinfeld was RIGHT!

Last week was our first "sleepover" event in New York since COVID first hit in 2020. I live around 30 miles west of Times Square, so I am (was) very spoiled for years. $11.35 bus ride and less than 60 minutes later, I can be teleported from BOONTON USA to 11 TIME SQUARE. 

Man, did I miss our Lunch 'n Learns and Sunset Seminars in The Big Apple. Our Sapphire Sponsor Microsoft is so generous with their space at 11 Times Square. Events on THE INTREPID. Happy Hours at Beer Authority. Bryant Park. Oh, and the CONVENE! The CONVENE on 42nd Street is AMAZING. 

NYC IS BACK!  Yeah, but not every day. 

When I first started working in the "Distance Learning" world, there were people still using dial-up modems. Audio conferencing was still north of $0.15 per minute, so a meeting with ten people was going to cost "someone" $1.50 per minute. Unless, of course, you were going to use things like FreeConferenceCall.com or Skype for free, but then you looked like you were broke. And no one wants to do business with a business that looks like they are broke or have no money for tools, right? (Hello, I'm looking at you - Zoom Basic users....)

Yeah, The Big Apple is back baby!  But, The Big Apple might have been bruised. 

The economics of New York City (or any city) is based on volume. Commuters. Foot traffic. Every day. I just asked "OK, Google: how many people commute to and from NYC every day?" and she came back with 1.6M+ people flowing in and out of NYC every day, via bus, train, subway, and car. 

I was all alone on the bus to NYC. A bus that normally has "standing room only" during rush hour. I was able to get a room at the Hilton in Times Square for well less than $200 on Thursday night, with a free breakfast. I did notice that Uber, Lyft and Via were MORE expensive, due to a lack of VOLUME. Ah so - their business model is based on VOLUME. 

Here is what I know to be true. I will now be going to NYC (at a minimum) twice a month for stay-over events. I will go to NYC a few more times a month for "day trips" for meetings and events. I will go to Orlando, San Diego and probably Mexico at least once a year. And, I will go to London and Toronto at least once a year for major events.

The rest of the time, I will be working from BOONTON USA. I will be teaching, training, coaching, mentoring from BOONTON USA. I will be living, learning, working, playing from BOONTON USA in the heart of Morris County, New Jersey. Also this: Google Morris County NJ - it's amazing for business.  

This past Thursday was a blast. An afternoon in Bryant Park, after a great meeting in Salesforce Tower. A fantastic dinner at Capital Grille (thanks Star2Star!) and an amazing rooftop bar experience at The Knickerbocker (thanks Jabra!). But, I don't have to go to NYC tomorrow (Monday) or any day this upcoming week. Unless something happens, and then I'll catch the bus to NYC, but I will still sleep in my own bed that night. 

Distance Learning has become DIGITAL Learning, and now post-COVID it is all just DIGITAL LIVING. 

I love going to New York City. Just not every day. New York (or any major city) became "big" because that is where the business phone system was, that is where "the files" were, the fax machine, the computers, the (damn I'm old) typewriters were. How many of the things that you HAD to go "to the city" to access are now in your smartphone? And here comes 5G which will make business grade high speed Wi-Fi available to most of the country. 

LAST WEEK OF THIS MONTH, I shall fly to San Diego for our first major LIVE event of 2021. It shall cost me an easy $2,000 in airfare and hotel. Probably closer to $3,000 for the week, all in, when I add up all food and Uber and such. Now my brain compares $3,000 for four days, vs. 10+ two-day events in "the city that never sleeps" for less than $3,000. Yeah, I'm still going to fly to San Diego to hang out with a few hundred people LIVE (in the heat of the summer no less) but I am still crunching the numbers. I see the opportunity cost analysis of staying with NYC (ten times) vs. flying to San Diego (one time) clearly, do you? 

I think the biggest thing that COVID-19 did (to all of us) is it forced us to calculate opportunity costs. Going to the city to work vs. working from home. Travel vs. Not Traveling. Going to school "on campus" vs. attending a class in the clouds. "Zoom" vs. Hotel Room. Humans like to have choices. 

It was GREAT to meet people in real life. LIVE is better than VIDEO, 100% true, no debate. The brain chemistry is different when you are in the same room. It is visceral, you can feel human connection, or lack thereof. Note to self: always have breath mints - for you - and for them! 

And the steak that I had at Capital Grille was amazing. But you cannot eat Filet Mignon every day, right? All things in moderation. This is why I only blog on Sundays, and not every day. The people that I met (shook hands, and even a few hugs) will make our NEXT meeting on video that much better. Meeting LIVE and then meeting on video is always very different than only meeting on video and never meeting live. 

Yeah, absence (scarcity) makes the heart grow fonder. 

Scarcity: good for Zoom and Blogs and Filet Mignon. Bad for any business or for any city that needs (requires) high volume of foot traffic (or paying customers) daily. 

This Thursday's Commute to NYC

Happy Truth Dependence Day 2021

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Drafted by Thomas Jefferson between June 11 and June 28, 1776, the Declaration of Independence is at once the nation's most cherished symbol of liberty and Jefferson's most enduring monument. Here, in exalted and unforgettable phrases, Jefferson expressed the convictions in the minds and hearts of the American people. The political philosophy of the Declaration was not new; its ideals of individual liberty had already been expressed by John Locke and the Continental philosophers. What Jefferson did was to summarize this philosophy in "self-evident truths" and set forth a list of grievances against the King in order to justify before the world the breaking of ties between the colonies and the mother country.

Dependence: the quality or state of being dependent; especially: the quality or state of being influenced or determined by or subject to another.

Examples of DEPENDENCE

• The company was hurt by its dependence on government loans.
• Our dependence upon foreign oil makes our economy vulnerable.
• The country has a dependence on foreign trade.

I find it interesting, that our great country, our entire way of life was built on the concept of Independence. But everything that we talk about, everything that we fight for, and everything that we pay for is the opposite of living a life of independence.

The same country that was born out of independence is now very dependent indeed. And technology has always been at the heart of it all.

We fought for our independence in 1776. And we used the technology of the day (ships, muskets, cannon, maps) to fight and win that war. How long ago was that exactly?

From and including: Thursday, July 4, 1776

To, but not including Sunday, July 4, 2021

Result: 89,485 days. Or:

• 7,731,504,000 seconds
• 128,858,400 minutes
• 2,147,640 hours
• 12,783 weeks and 4 days.

It took me just a few seconds to figure out exactly how many days (or even hours) ago the Declaration of Independence was signed. But, I could not do the above cut and paste magic without - wait for it - my good friend Google and his father (the military brat who was born in the USA) The Internet.

As a self-employed businessman, I am very dependent on technology, and I am not alone. Business, Higher Education, Medicine, the world of Finance, and certainly the Military is very deeply DEPENDENT on many things, but none so much as our deep and growing mutual dependence on technology. Ships, trains, automobiles, computers, telephone. The mastery of the sea, air and space. All of this since our declaring our INDEPENDENCE.

From Google:

Independence is a condition of a nation, country, or state in which its residents and population, or some portion thereof, exercise self-government, and usually sovereignty, over the territory. The opposite of independence is a dependent territory. Independence does not necessarily mean freedom.

Catch that?  

Independence does not necessarily mean freedom. Freedom is not free, and neither is the Internet, or solar power, or electric cars, or any of the things that we connect to living in the country known as the home of the free and the land of the brave.

July 4th, 1776 was the date that we DECLARED our Day of Independence. Funny how we never declared our date of DEPENDENCE.

"We hold these truths to be self-evident....."

Monarchy asserts that all men are NOT created equal, that the King or Emperor possesses rights significantly greater than those persons subject to the ruler. A monarch has the ability to create, suspend or obviate existing laws by their own volition. Life could be taken by a King. Liberty could be suspended or destroyed by an emperor, and the pursuit of happiness did not factor into many lives subject to tyrannical rulers.

Today, Freedom requires the Mastery of Technology. No Question.

But also this: Freedom cannot exist without the rule of law.

Freedom cannot co-exist with lies.

Above all: Freedom DEPENDS on the Truth.

And the enemies of FREEDOM know this all too well.

No "Alternative Facts" allowed, thank you very much.

Our founding fathers were fueled on ideals that were once seemingly revolutionary: freedom and democracy. America was born from the idea of providing opportunity and equality for all. The Mastery of Technology made the USA possible. Lies stop us from reaching our full potential in business and life - and as a country.

America: The Great Experiment. Today: the misuse of technology (to spread lies and falsehoods) can destroy our country. And that's the truth.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Truth 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alternative_facts

https://www.politicususa.com/2021/07/02/rudy-giuliani-fox-news-big-lie.html

https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2021/06/facebook-insurrection-was-not-our-fault/619114/

https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2021/05/06/twitter-facebook-trump-posts/

Truth, Justice and the American Way