In this edition of Web Enlightenment we'll be talking about the Culture of Whale Vomit and what you need to know about it.

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The Culture of Whale Vomit

Geeks are weird people - I was really reminded of this when I was at The Interactive Media Conference in New Orleans last week. This show is sponsored by Editor & Publisher along with Mediaweek (a Nielsen event) and I go because I am a judge of the EPpy awards - it is really a newspaper show , a show that in many ways is about publication websites and the technology they use - but at the core IMC remains a newspaper event.

It is no surprise that many of the folks attending seemed pretty depressed as they wondered if they'd still have a job when they got home. The trade show freebies were way down and there were numerous stories about how the same conference in 2000 featured a marching band (literally) and lobster at the meals. I was surely a fish out of water at that show and I needed to be awfully careful about how much joy I expressed - the web business is exploding and web professionals are taking on more jobs now than ever (including the crazy dot com boom time) but from a newspaper perspective that is "stolen" money. I knew at some point I'd stick my foot in my mouth but I was still a bit surprised when it happened.

During the session entitled: Traffic, Time On Site: What's More Important? we got to hear from a senior VP at CBSsports.com as well as the Editor in Chief over at TV Guide - and there was lots of conversation about what types of metrics are being used and how some of them are in fact pretty deceptive (like video "starts") but metric manipulation is hardly news, nor will it ever be. I was more interested in the assertions of CBS that as a result of all these problems they really only provide two figures to potential advertisers today - time spent on the site and unique visitors - and that any other metric is quite flawed, one of the most offensive being video "launches" (usually an aggregation of starts).

So in my typical Geek type fashion I asked a question of the panel:

"I know that much of the time, to make the sale, you simply have to tell advertisers what they want to hear and many of your colleagues are excellent at that deception for sure. Do you find that with CBS simply providing two metrics that your advertisers really "get it" now or are they still just as clueless as that stupid young media buyer you referred to who actually pays attention to things like CPM, Pageviews, and CTR (Click Through Rate) as they incompetently evaluate your site?"

I swear you could hear a pin drop - the panel was silent for almost a full 10 seconds before the CBS guy stammered and said: "I don't think I suggested my competitors are deceptive and I didn't call anybody stupid" while looking extremely uncomfortable.

So I replied: "Well whatever you may have suggested plenty of your competitors certainly are deceptive and we all know plenty of media buyers are stupid so my question remains whether or not your advertisers in fact have responded to your program of providing less problematic detail in metrics and do they get it now?"

Of course I didn't really get a proper answer to the question and I realize that if I had phrased it differently not only would I not have offended most of the people in the room I may have in fact gotten the information I was seeking. (note: a keynote speaker, founder of Newser.com also offended the whole room, it wasn't that hard to do)

The divide between web culture and newspaper culture was clear - and quite a wide gap indeed. It reminded me of conversations I've had with many Internet Entrepreneurs as they work to comprehend web culture.

Internet Entrepreneurs do need to understand a bit about web culture to reduce their difficulties. It is simple to think that web geeks are "horribly rude", a look at Webby acceptance speeches (limited to 5 words ) is always fun: gems like "No Shit, we beat Facebook" or "Seth, your fly is open" or "This award smells like butt" (yes these are all real 2008 acceptance speeches) do indeed speak to the geek madness. A good laugh but they don't really help you understand much of what is truly going on.

So with all of this in mind I thought you might enjoy a brief glimpse at web culture and the way that geeks tend to discuss web site quality, it says an awful lot about the semantic way in which web geeks encounter the world and how you might need to make a bit of an effort to not be offended by what they say. I'd tell you that they aren't trying to offend you but that'd be a lie, they have an awful lot of fun offending the world, there is no doubt about that.

When we look at websites there are 5 basic quality levels we use in geek to geek conversations:

• Putrid Whale Vomit
• Whale Vomit
• Sucks
• Acceptable
• Good

And so when you overhear one geek telling another that their site "sucks" you may not be aware that this is a way of saying they are middle of the road - should the same geek refer to a site as "good" it is very high praise indeed.

As Internet Entrepreneurs you want to keep this in mind when dealing with web geeks, they have a language, way of being, and a culture all their own that frequently involves putting any sense of decorum or politeness aside as they describe what they see in front of them in a fully unvarnished manner. As successful Internet Entrepreneurs can tell you - one day you will even learn to love it.

New Orleans Report - They Have Horses in the City

The big easy had lots of neat stuff to see and the hotel was right around the corner from infamous Bourbon Street but of course this farmer from Maine was interested in the horses they have there. The New Orleans PD has some amazing animals - they display incredible dressage skills as the move through the crowd and occasionally right up into a bar.

I've seen plenty of mounted policeman in large crowds, but I don't think I've ever seen a true and real horseman who was riding with incredible skill, has obvious love for their animal, and was actually quite nice to the crowd - especially when I mentioned that I had draft horses at home.