“With Viddler within three days we were able to roll advertising. That’s ridiculous.”

An arrangement of short clips from our trip to Ireland.

Oh, Sarah, don’t sue me. Everyone should totally buy your music.

Robert quipped that he was happy that he stuck to his guns regarding longform videos of this type. He isn’t alone.

Not too long after the Twitter video was recorded, at Web 2 Expo in San Fransisco, I was fortunate enough to record an episode of LunchMeet with Eddie Codel.

Here is that episode (in the Viddler player because PodTech’s embed no longer works):

You may argue that Viddler hasn’t had the cultural impact that Twitter has had on the world – but you’re not sitting in this chair. Viddler has done amazing things since that day with a meager budget, only a small percentage of the man-power, and from locations that many think out-of-touch.

Many of these stories are about to be told on The Viddler Spotlight. Stay tuned.

It has been said that a great photographer doesn’t need the very best tools because it is the artist that makes something great, not the tools. Billy Disney, Viddler‘s own videographer, weighs in on the subject.

Watch more Random 60 videos here.

So far we’ve put in a stone patio, planted grass, put in a fire pit, planted a raised garden with rock wall and have gotten rid of an old ‘pond’ that was in the backyard. Eliza has a photoset on Flickr cataloging our progress with the patio. And here is a quick video showing the progress so far.

We’ve got a lot more to do and hopefully we will accomplish some of it this summer and fall.

(Watch in HD by clicking on HD on the player.)

We all had a great time and ended up coming home with about 40lbs. of cod fish filet each (there were 6 of us). I’m sure I can speak for the entire group and recommend Ann Rowe Charters (our photo is on their site too) to anyone that wants to have a great day at sea.

This episode was a long time coming. Gary and I had tried to align our schedules for a pretty long time but never were able to make it work. I’m glad that we finally did. The episode has a few hundred comments over on the show’s blog and I’m happy that I’ve been able to respond to nearly every single one.

Special guest, and Viddler Systems Administrator, James Cross and I discuss kid toys.

No question this time. Just Mountains. Special guest is Viddler’s Lead Designer Andrew Smith.

Special guest Nick Ogozaly and I ponder whether or not people should expand their horizons by learning to play an instrument in this episode of Random 60.

What do you think? Sound off in the comments.

Originally recorded in December 2009. First-frame photo credit: Eliza Devroe.

Kids + Snow = Generally an awesome time (and soreness).

Turn up your speakers for this one folks. My friend Eric Brophy and I (more him than me) have a chat about geocoding, mashups, Twitter, and the potential for other geocoded things to pop up in the future.

You can pretty much expect First initial, last name to be 85% geo in 2010.

No question this time around… simply sound off in the comments.

Duration: ~59minutes

In this presentation I cover how to measure success for a start up in a global market (read: the Internet). I tried my best to give an overview of some of the common pitfalls that startup companies seem to face as well as some possible solutions that have worked for me in my career. I tried to have a little fun too.

Notable links for this presentation would be:

• Viddler’s Business Services Web site
• Viddler’s video analytics announcement
• Wufoo for creating surveys

See also some excellent notes from my presentation by Scott Meade.

LessConf was thoroughly enjoyable and I felt privileged to have been part of it. Thanks to everyone in attendance for putting up with me for an hour.

Random 60: When was the last time you wore a suit?

I’m wearing a suit. Are you? If not, when was the last time you wore one? Simple question, answer in the comments.

Random 60: How do you heat your home?

What type of heat do you use? It seems the possibilities are endless. Wood stove, fireplace, propane, natural gas, electric, pellet stove, maybe you just run in place?, etc.

Sound off in the comments!

Random 60: What time do you wake up?

I wake up every morning around 6:45a. I love it. Back in 2006 I was getting up at 7. As I get older, I’m getting up earlier. But really, I enjoy waking up early and getting things accomplished. It is when I work best.

What about you?

Note: No Jeffs were harmed in the making of this video.

Random 60: What does “microwave safe” actually mean?

Seriously. Because it certainly doesn’t mean “not boiling hot and will melt your hand off if you warm up your dinner from last night in this crazy thing”. Someone please answer this riddle for me.

Don’t forget! You can view all Random 60 episodes in case you missed one!

Random 60: How do you get motivated?

In today’s random 60 I ask where you find your inspiration but after viewing the video I realize what I really meant was how do you get motivated? After you’ve been working for a while on a particular thing and you notice your productivity drop, how do you get motivated to continue?

I used to get up and go for a job. I need to start doing this again.

What do you do?

Don’t forget! You can view all Random 60 episodes in case you missed one.!

Random 60: What is your favorite music genre?

Special guest Jeff Johns, a friend and fellow Viddler team member, has a particular taste in music so I put him on the spot to name his favorite music genre.

My favorite music genre would have to be Rock.

What is your favorite music genre? Let us know in the comments!

Random 60: TXT or call?

Which would you prefer? Do you like getting text messages or would you rather someone give you a call and have a conversation about what they want? Are you like me and you’d like phone calls from family and friends for conversation but would rather a simple TXT message or email for business communications?

Let me know in the comments!

Random 60: I love leftovers.

One of my favorite foods is leftovers. Pretty much anything that is leftover from the night before will do – but certain foods stand out. Some, in fact, seem to be even better the next day than they are on the first day. Soups, Mac & Cheese, Pizza, Brownies, just to name a few.

What are your favorite leftovers?

This is my blog and I can post as many ‘hey my cat is cute and is sleeping’ videos that I want to, b’okay?

Part reason to play with 15 second videos again, part quick way to document that my office is clean at the moment, here is a 15 second video tour of my cleaned up office!

Welcome to Random 60 season 2! Sorta. Today we have a special guest, Kyle Slattery, who is a friend and fellow Viddler team member. Today’s topic, haircuts.

I just got my haircut and I usually just tell the lady at the hair place to cut as much off as she’d like to. What do you do? How often do you get your haircut? Answer in the comments!

So we decided to create a super simple video tour of our suite 4235 aboard the Carnival Miracle cruise ship so that others that searched for such things would find what they were looking for.

If you end up getting this suite, be sure to leave a comment about how you enjoyed your stay in the comments below.

Something a little, different – or maybe random – for today’s Random 60. I saw this interesting facts about water list and I figured I’d share my favorites for no other reason than because I think water is awesome.

Are you a fan of water?

Random 60: Can’t wait. on Viddler.

Wait, are you saying that you can not wait? Or, are you saying that you’d rather not wait? See, there’s a difference. But – even though I don’t like the phrase “I can’t wait” I don’t see any alternative that won’t peg you as being a geek or nerd.

It is one of those odd sayings that, it seems, everyone uses even though it is technically incorrect. Sure, it is sarcasm at its best – but it doesn’t make sense at all to say “I can’t wait to eat lunch.”. Well, yes, you can. And you know what? You probably will.

I know I know, I’m being overly analytical. It is my job as a dork. But, since I can’t come up with any suggestions to replace the phrase – I suppose I’ll just have to live with it. But, I can’t wait until someone comes up with something better.

Random 60: Watch those calories! | Favorite on Viddler.

Whether you are dieting or not it is always good practice to make sure you watch what you’re taking in. Calories can creep up on you. There are more calories in everyday food than most people would guess. In today’s Random 60 I use the extreme example of Ben & Jerry’s ice cream to make a point – that there is a crap load of calories in most food you’d pick up off of the shelf and whoof down before even looking at the nutrition information.

Here are some sites that will either help you track what you’re eating, or generally enlighten you as to how many calories are in some everyday foods.

• If you have an iPhone, try Lose It. It is an application that can help you track your food intake day-to-day.
• If you’re hungry, do not click this link. This Is Why You’re Fat is a Web site that shows you delicious food (read: not food that is generally a good idea to look at if you’re trying to lose weight).
• SugarStacks is a Web site that shows you the number of sugar cubes found in every day foods. Neat idea.

Have you ever been surprised by the number of calories in food compared to the number of calories you thought was in that food? And, do you know any good resources to add to this list?

Random 60: Back up your computer, right now. | Favorite on Viddler.

Chris recently had a complete hard drive failure. Fortunately for him most of his data, since he is a Web site developer, was “on the Web” somewhere. Everything else he had backed up on an external hard drive.

Consider this a friendly reminder from Random 60 to back up your computer today.

Random 60: What can save newspapers? | Favorite on Viddler.

Can anything save newspapers? Today I’m joined by Rob and Bernie, two of my coworkers, and we all have simple ideas that may help save the newspapers for us. For Rob he thought he needed to see more talk about technology in his local newspaper. Bernie said the main reason he gets the newspaper, like so many others, is to help his family save money using coupons. For me, I’d much rather an online solution by giving my local news on my phone or with alerts.

What would save newspapers for you? Would you subscribe to them in paper form or online?

Random 60: Stop complaining! | Favorite on Viddler.

In the world of social media everyone has a voice. If you only have 1 follower on Twitter (I’m cdevroe, btw) or the only friends you have on Facebook (I’m on there too) are your relatives – it doesn’t matter – you have a way to spread “your message” easier than ever. Why not make it a positive one?

It seems that people are spurred on to talk about the bad more than they are about the good. If your cable goes out, your car won’t start, or your cell phone loses coverage — you complain. This is understandable. I do it too. But all that does is spread that negativity. Lets stop spreading as much negativity and try to be positive now and then. Lets be real (don’t be fake-positive) but lets try to keep it balanced at the very least.

How? If you use Twitter or Facebook copy and paste this:

REPLACE THIS WITH A POSITIVE MSG – #r60 http://bit.ly/19r0Vm

Note: You do not have to do a video. A Twitter message, Facebook status, Flickr photo, or blog post will more than suffice.

If you have a blog, you can probably figure out how to tag your post with r60. We can watch the results on Twitter here.

Random 60: How many different kinds of fruit have you ever had? | Favorite on Viddler.

Did you catch that? Right in the middle of today’s Random 60 I decided to switch this episode from “favorite fruit” to something much more interesting – how many different kinds of fruit have you had?.

My favorite fruit is grapes, because wine is made from them. So feel free to answer both questions in the comments if the mood strikes you.

I’d have a very tough time putting together a complete list of the different kinds of fruit I’ve ever had in my lifetime. But I certainly know that I’ve never had every type of fruit on this awesome planet. So, today’s to do is to try a new type of fruit you’ve never had and report back here! I’ll report in when I’ve tried a new fruit too.

What is your favorite fruit and how many different types of fruit have you had?

Random 60: How would you use The Force? | Favorite on Viddler.

My friend Chris Coleman and I, from Panera Bread, discuss what we’d do if we had The Force. Chris, who I must thank for allowing me to use his shiny Kodak Zi6 to record today’s Random 60, says that he’d use Jedi mind tricks on dogs. Really, I didn’t want to know more. I think I’d use The Force for simple yet annoying tasks like trying to reach the TV remote when it is out of reach and I’m laying on the couch all comfy-like.

How would you use The Force?

Random 60: Getting songs stuck in your head | Favorite on Viddler.

Today’s random 60 topic was suggested by Sam. Thanks Sam.

Have you ever had a song stuck in your head? How did it get there? Maybe you listened to the radio, or a friend is addicted to a song and plays it over and over, or perhaps you were in the grocery store and heard it. No matter how it got there, for a while, it is there to stay.

Most recently I’ve had the song Jump Rope by Blue October surgically planted into my head by Chris because he plays it over and over (it is also the intro to today’s Random 60 video).

What was the last song you had stuck in your head and how did it get there?

Random 60: Game systems | Favorite on Viddler.

As it stands I have, setup and working, an original Nintendo, Xbox 360 (which I use for Connect360), and a Nintendo Wii. The Wii is slowly replacing the original Nintendo completely while the 360 ends up being my media center more than my gaming console.

I never play games on my computer anymore, though I only played games on computers when I was a Windows user. I do play games on my iPhone but only when I have nothing else to do. Papijump!

Somewhere around here I have a Playstation too.

How many video game systems do you own? Do you use them?

Random 60: Tons of notebooks! | Favorite on Viddler.

Ruled, unruled, graph, small, large, single subject, multiple subject, drawing, sketching, and loose leaf. I seem to have notebooks for just about everything and, I actually tend to use them! It never really dawned on me how many notebooks I actually had in active duty. And, since this is a random 60, I had to edit a few of them out!

I’d actually like to use them even more for very specific uses going forward. I sometimes get notes in my drawing pad, doodles in my note book, and water gets split on some of the graphing paper notebooks. I think I’ll try to focus them a little more going forward.

So, how many notebooks do you have??

Random 60: Laptop or Desktop? | Favorite on Viddler.

Laptops are more powerful today than the computer used to launch the Space Shuttle in the 1960s. That is a fact. Look it up. That said, some people prefer desktops with much larger storage devices, displays, amounts of RAM, etc.

I’ve been using laptops since 2002 and haven’t gone back to desktops since. What about you? Laptop or Desktop?

Random 60: Calendars | Favorite on Viddler.

I don’t know about you but I love calendars. If I didn’t self-impose a limit of two my wall would be filled with calendars of all types. Right now I have a stunning Hawai’i calendar hanging up (thanks to Eliza). It has photos from different islands that make up Hawai’i. And I also have a National Parks calendar that is a yearly gift from my brother-in-law from South Dakota, John. This calendar is big, has amazing photographs from many of the National Parks in North America, and is extremely well designed.

Do you have any calendars? If so, share them in the comments. Oh – and if you’re going to post a photo of your calendar just paste the link to the calendar and I will fix your comment to include a photograph. The penmanship episode really turned out terrific with photos so thanks to all those that participated over there.

Random 60: Dear American Idol, ditch the lip syncing, please. | Favorite on Viddler.

I’m really sick of the group performances on American Idol. Maybe they wouldn’t be so bad if they were live performances done by the contestants – but in fact they are being lip synced. Yesterday I said on Twitter that, while American Idol is a huge success, they need to ditch the lip syncing sessions pronto. People on Facebook agreed.

Lip syncing? During a singing competition? Please, please, get rid of the group performances altogether. It’d make the first few minutes of American Idol watchable.

Random 60: Nice weather | Favorite on Viddler.

Today was a beautiful day in northeastern Pennsylvania. It hit 70 degrees! Although I didn’t have the chance to go for a jog, we did get to spend some time on the porch enjoying the cool breeze.

What do you like to do on the first day of really nice weather?

[Testing: Download in Quicktime.]

Random 60: What is your idea of a vacation? | Favorite on Viddler.

Vacations mean different things to everyone. For some it means a trip to the beach. A weekend getaway. Time off from work on the couch with a bowl of popcorn and your favorite Paul Newman movies. A camping trip with friends from college. Hiking the tallest mountains in every state.

What is your idea of a vacation? What are you doing for your vacation this year?

Thanks to Eliza for today’s Random 60 idea!

Random 60: Cheap cookies | Favorite on Viddler.

I love cheap cookies. The cheaper the better. They are easy to find. Walk into your local grocer and look at the bottom shelf in the cookie isle, they are typically the cookies that are at a bargain price (sometimes $1 for a whole bag).

Chocolate chip, oatmeal, ginger snap, it doesn’t matter. All that matters is that they are the cheapest, most poorly made cookies you can possibly purchase. I love them.

Do you like cheap cookies?

Random 60: Holding onto wishes | Favorite on Viddler.

Do you hold onto wishes, or things, too long? I do too. There are boxes and boxes worth of stuff floating around in our apartment that I wish I could use, learn to use, or have the hope of using in the future.

Perhaps we’re holding onto these things too long and should just focus on the things we have time for right now. Then, when our interests move on, we can move on too.

What wishes are you holding on to?

Random 60: Penmanship. | Favorite on Viddler.

How is your penmanship? My penmanship is little more than chicken scratch. Since I’ve started writing more I’ve been practicing my penmanship. It is slowly getting better but I have a long way to go.

Here are some tutorials that I’ve followed, so far, that have helped my writing a little.

• Improving your handwriting.
• For reference: An image of the alphabet in cursive.

Yes I actually had to refer to an image of the alphabet in cursive to get back into the swing of things. That is how long it has been since I did any serious amount of writing in cursive.

Here is an example of how bad my penmanship is (click the image to zoom).

How is your hand writing? Come on, be brave and show it off in the comments!

Random 60: Are you camera shy? | Favorite on Viddler.

Do you find yourself shy around cameras? Maybe you have no trouble chatting with your friends at bars but the second someone takes out a camera, you find yourself hiding?

Today, we explore why that is with Donna DeMarco, Vice President of Viddler, because she is camera shy and would know best why that is. She says it is because “it is permanent, and she can see herself on the video”.

If you’re camera shy, share why in the comments!

Random 60: Doing what you love, not what you’re good at. | Favorite on Viddler.

Please consider sharing this on Twitter. Thanks.

I often find myself doing things that I really like to do, even if I’m not particularly good at them. Art, for me, is a great example. I like dabbling with watercolors, pastels, pencil sketches, and even digital art like Flip. Basketball is also another example. I love playing basketball but I don’t think anyone on earth would consider me very good at it.

What do you love to do even if you’re not particularly good at it?

Side note: Thanks for all of the excellent feedback I’ve been getting from the Random 60 videos. These have been truly fun to make and I plan on continuing.

Random 60: Reading. | Favorite on Viddler.

In this fast paced, Twitter-powered world it seems like all we do is consume shorter, and shorter bits of data. First it was blog posts, now it is micro-blogging with services like Twitter (I’m cdevroe by the way). I believe reading books can really slow us down, disconnect us from the Internet for a little while, and get us back to consumer larger ideas.

What do you think? When was the last time you read a book?

Random 60: What to do about Flickr? | Favorite on Viddler.

I’ve been a Flickr member since mid-summer 2004. I’ve been a Flickr Pro member for nearly as long. Yet, now that my Pro account has expired, I’m wondering if I will renew my subscription.

Why? I think Flickr is great. The Flickr team is fantastic. Nearly everything they build is superb. But with Yahoo! on the rocks (being the parent-company for Flickr now) I’m just not all that eager to fork over more money to a company that could, potentially, fall into some hard times this year.

What do you think I should do?

Random 60: HD TV – The choices are endless! | Favorite on Viddler.

In the market for a new TV? You’ll be going HD. But what to buy? LCD? Plasma? DLP? How big? 30-something? 46? 47? 50? 50+? What about the hrz? 60? 120?

I don’t know about you, but the possibilities are exhausting!

What do you think? What is the best HDTV?