FortySeven Media Blog

Banana Pianos, Play Doh Controllers & Fun: MaKey MaKey

2012-05-16T12:50:51Z

Have you ever wanted to turn Play Doh into an old school NES controller? Or use your stairs as a piano? MaKey MaKey is for you. It's a simple circut board that plugs into your Computer via USB and uses alligator clips to pass the signal to your keyboard keys. Not only do I want one, but I think it opens up a world of possiblities for my kids to learn, make and create.

Currently MaKey MaKey is on Kickstarter and has blown way past their initial pledge goal so if you want one of these I'd suggest you do it fast before they have to cut it off. But seriously - banana piano!!

Back it on Kickstarter

Why We Loved ConvergeSE 2012

2012-05-10T12:06:42Z

Nate and I had the pleasure of attending (and speaking) at ConvergeSE a few weeks ago, and while it's a little late for one of those “I take meticulous notes from every speaker and put them in one massive blog post” deals, I had to let everyone know what a great time we had.

Let's get this out of the way: ConvergeSE was by far the best conference we've been to. The talks were great, the workshops covered all sorts of interesting topics, but that paled in comparison to the people we met and the conversations that were had throughout the conference.

I'm not sure what magic is happening over there, but Gene and his crew have managed to attract the coolest, most interesting people into one place and give them the space, time and situations to allow them to talk until awesome things happen. There was also a great balance of skill sets and that alone sparked so many conversations that would have never happened. In short, the vibe was unlike anything we'd experienced before. And we liked it.

There was incredible sense of community, devoid of what I like to call “rockstar-itis” where certain speakers might get the impression that they're a big deal and the rest of us aren't worthy to take up any of their time. Shoot, who says you have to be a speaker to have that mentality? Either way, it really felt like everyone was just there together to learn and enjoy each other's company.

ConvergeSE was by far the best conference we've been to.

Finally, I really appreciate the laser focus the Converge crew had on the attendees. It's so easy to let the focus of a conference become the food or the drink or the cool venues or even the conference creators themselves, but I always felt like the knowledge, conversations, and opportunities that would arise out of having so many people with complementary skills together was the most important thing. And that, my friends is how it should be.

ConvergeSE sold out in 2 hours last year, so make sure to have that clicky finger ready the day tickets go on sale next year. You won't regret it.

Update: Converge is coming to Florida in early October so you don't have to wait a whole year to see the awesomeness!

Go check it out here

Handy Shortcut - Email A Link With A Key Command

2012-05-09T21:14:39Z

When you find a cool site and want to send it to someone, here is a handy key command to know:

Shift+Command+i

This will open mail and put the title of the Page as the subject and the URL in the body of the message. It is very convenient.

You can also set it up to use Gmail or other mail service by setting it as your default account inside Mail.

Join us for a Live Kick Awesome Show before ConvergeSE

2012-04-23T13:25:18Z

You read that one right. Nate and I are bringing the Kick Awesome Show live to the ConvergeSE folks. If you're in town early (Thursday the 26th) and want to come hang out, watch us be goofy on stage, interview some of the speakers, eat some food, drink some drink, – you know – have some fun – come to the IT-oLogy center at 6:00pm.

More Details

Stupidity at 2500 Frames Per Second

2012-04-19T04:32:57Z

The 8 year old in me was greatly pleased watching this.

The Kick Awesome Show: Episode 38

2012-04-10T11:23:09Z

Episode 38 brings you Resposive.is, Docracy, what inspires us and our picks from DesignersMusic.

Watch it on kickawesome.tv

Paper for iPad

2012-04-06T12:56:31Z

If you're tired of going all analog on your Moleskine notebook and want to embrace the new hotness, check out Paper for iPad. It's a free app with several brush types availble for in-app purchase, and it looks like it's a ton of fun to use. I have a lowly iPad 1, but if you managed to snag an iPad 3 with the massively hi-res display Paper will be sure to please. Oh, you might want to pick up a stylus, too.

Paper is free on the App Store.

Keeping Track of Potential Clients

2012-04-03T14:58:16Z

If you're a small to medium sized web studio chances are you don't have a dedicated sales person. That's right, you get to do sales right along with taxes, accounting, client management, product managing - you get the idea. Oh, yeah and you have to actually do all the work and manage to get the site launched, too! No biggie.

One thing that we've often struggled with is that while your busy, you're not focused on getting new clients. But when you finish that massive job and there's nothing to work on - then you're like “Oh crap!” So here's two simple things to keep this from happening:

1. Don't stop looking for new clients, even if you're balls to the walls busy.

I know, your brain just doesn't want to deal with them. But jobs take a while to close. If you're not constantly talking to people you're going to have a lull in business. Maybe they won't even be ready until you're done with your current workload. You never know who's actually going to sign so don't count on anybody's word till they've signed a contract and given you a deposit.

Often times we don't even put a full quote together, just a rough idea to see if they're really interested. And if you end up taking on too much, you can always get some contractors to help out.

2. Keep track of your potential clients.

You can get complicated with this specifying where a potential client lies in the sales funnel (potential, met with, quoted, sold) and details about each step like date and dollar amount, but really you probably just need to remember to get back with them.

If you get a lot of requests through your contact form or people randomly call you write their name down. Every week or so go through your list and shoot them an email. Staying in contact keeps you fresh in their mind, and if you pester them enough they might just give up and hire you. I've landed a job nine months after initial contact just by continually emailing and asking them if they still needed help.

Many times people don't want to tell you no, but I keep emailing till I hear one way or another. Just make sure you're always nice and not mean about it.

3. One more thing! Qualify potential clients as early as possible.

You don't want to be calling someone for 9 months who only has $500 for a copy of Facebook. We have a budget dropdown on our contact form, but some of the cheap ones still slip through. Extract a budget from them as quickly as possible - you'll save everyone a lot of time.

Go forth and make the money!

The Kick Awesome Show: Episode 37

2012-03-26T15:30:24Z

This episode has a nifty icon font, a guide to better portraits, what you can't do with Javascript and our picks from DesignersMusic. And Tai Chi.

Watch it on kickawesome.tv

Cat Thief

2012-03-19T21:13:52Z

So we've got this cat. His name is Biscuit. And we've discovered he has a penchant for thievery.

His frequent target? The Apple TV remote.

The World Needs Your Side Projects

2012-03-15T20:11:07Z

Many of us have side projects. You know, that thing you work on when your “work” is done for the day. We have them too. They are a great way to play with something new or build that cool idea thats been bouncing around your head. They can even be your masterplan to escape the clutches of that boring life you seem to be stuck in.

We are currently working on one now, it's called Kicktastic. We thought it would be a good opportunity to turn our experience running a successful business into a product to help other businesses grow into bigger markets and pick up better clients. And it will be. It's coming along nicely and will be out sooner than we are ready for it to be, to be perfectly transparent.

In this process of distilling our years of business experience, it has made me stop and think about why we do what we do, as well as how we do it. I've found there's a common theme, especially to our side projects.

In what is often a feast or famine line of work, we want you to feast it up all over the place, all the time.

That common theme is helping people. That's the heart of FortySeven Media, and that's where Kicktastic came from. We have been blessed to get to know many of you who read this blog, and we want you to grow. To do well. To provide for more than just you and your families. In what is often a feast or famine line of work, we want you to feast it up all over the place, all the time.

But that's just us. We know you have side projects, too. We've seen some of them. You folks have big dreams, and we like that.

Now, about your side projects. Those things are important! Don't give up on them just because some investor crapped all over your idea. If one idea doesn't work out, try another. Keep trying until one of them works. You don't need investors, or anyone else's permission to do something amazing.

Tron Dubstep Light Dance

2012-03-15T18:46:19Z

Holy Smokes, you should watch this right now. Mixing up Tron, Dubstep, illuminated dancing and some genius coreography…it's just awesome. Checkout the thought and planning that must have gone into the jump cuts and part in the middle where they look like they're floating. So very cool.

via The Kids Should See This →

The Kick Awesome Show: Episode 36

2012-03-13T19:01:10Z

In Episode 36 we look at a sweet CSS3 animator, an even sweeter vintage hydroplane, what you missed at LessConf, dogs in Trees, folicular activity and our picks from DesignersMusic.

Watch it on kickawesome.tv

CSS Faux Browser Style on Your Images

2012-03-01T22:48:27Z

While working on the new 47m site we decided that we wanted our portfolio images to look like they were in a browser. Easy enough, right? But I didn't want to save out every image with some fake browser thing at the top. That would be a huge pain if we ever wanted to change the style in the future. CSS to the rescue!

Let's start with your markup:

I've opted for a pretty simple browser design, but you could totally get crazy with url fields, back/forward buttons. That would probably require an image, though and I was trying to avoid that. To get the browser are at the top we need the containing div to use the :before CSS selector.

Then add some CSS:

.faux-browser:before {
    content: "";
    background-color: #b3b3b5;
    background-image: linear-gradient(top, #b3b3b5, #999999);
    height: 12px;
    display: block;
    box-shadow: 0px 0px 5px 1px rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.20),
                0px 1px 0px 0px #e3e3e3 inset;
    position: relative;
    border-top-left-radius: 3px;
    border-top-right-radius: 3px;
    border-bottom: 1px solid #9c9c9c;
    width: 100%;
}

That looks pretty good…now what about the bottom? Just add a border to the image:

.faux-browser img {
    margin-bottom: 0px;
    border-bottom: 7px solid #999;
}

And there you have it! Stylish fake browser chrome on your portfolio image. You should know that I've not included other vendor prefixes above - you'll need to use something like Prefix free or roll your own. Also, the :before selector is shaky in IE8 and below. We've just defined fallback styles for those browsers. That is all - enjoy!

Tumult Hype: An Easier Way to Deal with CSS3 Animations

2012-02-28T03:59:27Z

Do webkit transforms make your head spin? Wish that cool thing you just did in CSS3 actually worked in more than 2 browsers? Hype to the rescue! It slaps a GUI on what you want to do and spits out CSS and Javascript code for those browsers that aren't in the cool club yet. Did we mention it supports mobile browsers, too?

Hype looks very promising!

Go check it out