Selling Tomorrows

How to Launch a Tweetup: Lessons from NASA

If it wasn't clear from my exuberant coverage a couple weeks ago, NASA PR completely rocked the tweetup of STS-129. Here's an excerpt from a piece I had published today in Bulldog Reporter on what NASA did right -- that any company can learn from and copy.  A white paper with the 35 things that NASA did right is coming out shortly.  Leave a comment or shoot me an email if you'd like to be on the mailing list for it.

If any of my #NASAtweetup tweeps are reading this, I'd love your input below on what YOU thought NASA did right in cultivating a community online.

"You may not have a spaceship, but your company has a fan base. Maybe they're customers who have relied on your product for decades and feel it belongs more to them than to you. Maybe they're engineers who appreciate how hard it is to create new kinds of paint—or improve the flavor of Tastykakes. Maybe they're investors fascinated with the countries where your company does business. They won't think of themselves as fans until they're in a room with like-minded people. They won't think of themselves as members of a community until you bring them together. And you can't be accepted as a part of that community—reaping all the sales, visibility, credibility and even free labor—until you get tweeting."

Read the full article here.

Shuttle Launch: A Personal View from the Shore of the Earth

I’ll skip the poetry and just try and convey what went through my mind through the launch. 

 

The shuttle jumps so quickly from the ground.  The flames coming out the back. A rainbow made of fire. No. A fire made of rainbow.  Doesn’t make sense, but that’s what it really looks like.  There’s a full spectrum of reds.  Isn't it supposed to be white and bright?  What is this?  Burnt maroons, hot yellows in streaks, just like a cartoon rainbow.  It has texture like rough sandpaper. It’s SO bright.  I shouldn’t be looking at this.  No one should be looking at something this bright.  Am I blind? I tried to look away for a second to see if I could still see.  Couldn’t move my eyes away.  Must not be blind yet.  Who cares. Wow. The fire was long and wide.  And it isn't shooting out and stuttering back, but stayed consistent.

 

At the same time, there are the sounds.  You know that moment at the campfire, when some old, dry knot of wood expands and bursts with a crack?  It was like that, except instead of sticks it’s building-sized redwood tree trunks cracking over and over.  Some of the sounds were small, and they tapped my eardrums.  The bigger ones gently puffed against my face and neck.  There’s no pattern to it; no match-up to the shape of the fire.  

It's Not the Shuttle Launch that Makes NASA's Tweetup a Success - It's the Right Topic + Right People

Given some stereotypes of social media users (I just told a reporter from the German Press Agency that the Star Trek ones are true :) ) this group is not a bunch of people who prefer to stare at their iPhones instead of making eye contact.  In fact, their most defining characteristic is the ability to have a great conversation.  They're interesting and interested.  Their hyper sharing online translates into hyper helpfulness offline.  And given the friendly nature of the technical social channels, there's much more of a "we're all in this together" feel than you would find at a space-focused industry conference.  So this tweetup, far from comprised of 100 geeks who can fill out an online form really fast, is a precision filter for knowledgeable, passionate and uber-information sharing members of the new media. 

And since EVERY company works in a sector where people are passionate about its ideas, ANY company can enjoy similar success with atweetup.  No space shuttle required.

What Does a Shuttle Launch Look like from a Plane?

different view

Overnight Launch Schedule of STS-129

So while the rest of us are sleeping and slowly digesting astronaut ice cream, the STS-129 team at NASA will be hard at work. (This beautiful pic was taken by NASA this very evening!)

12:03am Clear Launch Pad

12:53am Fuel cell activation

2:03am   Countdown enters two-hour hold at the T-6 hour mark

2:18am   Clear “Launch Danger Area”

4:30am   Mission Management Team meets to give go for tanking

4:30am   Crew wake up

5:00am   NASA TV: External Tank fueling coverage begins

5:00am   Crew breakfast

5:03am   Countdown resumes at T-6 hour mark

5:30am   Crew undergoes final medical checks

5:48am   Liquid Hydrogen Low Level Cutoff (LLCO) sensors go “wet”

6:03am   Liquid Hydrogen “fast fill” begins

7:18am   LH2 “topping” begins (gaseous Hydrogen vent valve cycling)

8:03am   Countdown enters 2½ -hour hold (T-3 hour mark)

So I asked Miles O'Brien how Social Media is Beating Traditional Press at its own Game...

Miles O'Brien was a featured speaker at today's NASA Tweetup for STS-129.  After a terrific speech (watch it here via UStream)about how the internet has changed journalism, he was kind enough to share his thoughts with me on how the quality of information delivered via social channels can be superior to that found in traditional media.  Listen carefully because I think Miles coined a new term that should resonate in social circles...the "editorial commons." 

You can follow Miles on Twitter and check out his site here. 

Massimino: From the Hubble to Craig Ferguson

Astronaut Mike Massimino on the stage now...he's the first person to Tweet from space.  "That's one 140 character message for man, one giant leap for social kind."  Sorry.  Way to cheesy.  But how can you not revert to being 10 years old at something like this?  Check out the famous video of Mike fixing the Hubble, and then later on Craig Ferguson.

Description of 1783 Balloon Launch Could Have Been Written for Tomorrow's Shuttle Flight

 "On this day, before the eyes of an enormous gathering two men rose into the air...Two hundred thousand men, lifting their hands in wonder, admiring, glad, astonished; some in tears for fear the intrepid physicists should come to harm, some on their knees overcome with emotion, but all following the aeronauts in spirit...What with the novelty, the dignity of the experiment, the unclouded sky, welcoming as it were the travelers to his own element, the attitude of the two men sailing into the blue, while below their fellow-citizens prayed and feared for their safety, and lastly the balloon itself, superb in the sunlight, whirling aloft like a planet or the chariot of some weather-god-it was a moment which never can be repeated, the most astounding achievement the science of physics has yet given the world."

-Sebastien Mercier, the first utopian writer to link technology's ability to ease humanity's burdens to peace, 1783

"Rattlesnakes as Long as Gators" at Cape Canaveral...in 1960

Off to a good start with Jon Cowart, the Arez I-X deputy mission manager on the ecology of Cape Canaveral.

On a related note...Right around 1960, Jay Barbree of NBC, the only reporter to cover every spaceflight from Sputnik onward, found the Cape Canaveral of 1960 a place where "bear-shared the natural habitat with alligator and deer, and Indians buried their dead on sacred mounds."

  "...taming the Cape was tougher than expected. It wasn't only the persistent mosquitos but rattlesnakes -rattlesnakes as long as gators-that had driven most of the early pioneers away." -"Live from Cape Canaveral"

Time lapse video of STS-129 moving to the launch pad

Hey tweeps - How did YOU get ready for #nasatweetup?  This is was NASA was working on...