Good Day Google+ - Music Soothes the Savage Plusser

Hey there, Google Plus! How you doing for being here today on Good Day Google Plus? And we've got a lively group for you today. The green room has been very active, and I'm sure we're going to have a wonderful show for you. I'm happy to be here. For those of you coming over from seeing Mia drive her Tesla, I hope you enjoyed the show there. I was having a great time, except she kept calling me, and she— when I was answering, and I don't know what was going on, she kept saying, Dennis, Dennis Littley, I don't know. So anyway, we're gonna move on from that, and I want to introduce everyone that I have in my panel today, and we're gonna just say hi to them, then we're gonna come back and talk to them about what they do on AuthorPlus, what they like to do. And for those of you that might have any questions, please feel free to leave them in the comments section and we will come right back to them. So I'm going to say hi first to Christopher Vogelman, Dr. Christopher Vogelman. So how are you doing today?

Doing very well, Chef. This is a great opportunity to finally meet you and the rest of the panel. I don't think I've ever been on a Hangout with everyone before.

I'm really happy to have you here. I love your comments. They're so quick and witty, and I've always enjoyed seeing them. I can't keep up with them sometimes answering. You're so fast with the comments.

It was that 8th grade typing class. I really— that was my best class in school.

I love— you know, I had it as a freshman in high school, and I'm very thankful. At the time, I'm like, when will I ever use this? I'm not writing papers.

I was expecting I'd have a second I got rich and famous, and who knew that we'd have personal computers and have to have keyboarding skills.

Very good, and I won't tell the joke I was just thinking of. Never mind. So let's move over and say hi to Captain Kirk Sherrod from Jerk's Corner. Hello. Where are you at? In Utah.

In Utah, yeah. Murray, Utah. Pleasure to meet you all and pleasure to be on the show for sure.

Absolutely. So how are things in Utah today?

Oh, you know, it's a beautiful day today. Here in the desert it gets kinda hot, but right now it's about 70 degrees, sun is shining, not a cloud in the sky. Great day to go for a bike ride.

Wow, only 70, that's pretty cool. We're steadily in the 90s every day now in Orlando. I mean, we look at the weather and, you know, 40 or 50% chance of rain and 90 to 94 in that range every day. It just That's what we got.

Well, it's a little bit different here. We have a dry heat.

Yeah, like, kinda like an oven, right? That's right.

About 100-some, you know, summer gets hot here.

You know, it's pretty bad here, but right now I was telling people this morning, they think I'm not quite right because I said it's really not that bad. Once you're outside for a little while, it doesn't quite feel as hot because the humidity hasn't really started yet. I think once the humidity's in full force then all bets are off. But for now, it's okay. Alright, let's move over to my friend Michael Mason. How you doing today, buddy?

Hey, Chef, I'm good. As we're talking weather, in English, it's 22 degrees in sunny Tenerife. In Mexican, about 71, 72. So it's just nice, just nice and calm, you know, not too hot. We've got a nice breeze, which is Nice. And of course we've got the pool right in front of the door if we need to dip and cool off.

So do you always have a nice breeze there? Tenerife is an island?

Yeah, yeah, it's an archipelago of 7 islands, and this is the one in the middle. And it's— we've got the Mount Teide, it's called. It's the— let me think— the 3rd highest volcano in the world, the highest mountain in Spain. And what happens is in the north of the island it's very wet and very humid, and in the south very dry. So depending on which climate you like, you can live in the north or live in the south, or if you're rich and famous, you can have a property in both and swap between the two depending on what weather you want, what climate you want. But it's a beautiful place to live. Cost of living is really cheap. The people are friendly. It gets much easier when you learn to speak Spanish. And people make the mistake of thinking that Tenerife is part of Europe. Technically it isn't. We're actually closer to Africa than we are in Europe. So you have to watch that when you're dealing with people doing business and things. The mentality can be very 20th century at times, but it's a beautiful place to live, it really is.

So is there a sovereignty for Tenerife, or is it their own country?

No, it's part of Spain and it's controlled by Spanish law. It's kind of a— you find yourself in interesting situations legally sometimes because you'll be looking for a European law that covers, I don't know, let's say the export of goods or the import of goods. If I buy something from America, for example, I might end up paying sales tax, shipping, and then when it comes here pay local tax and shipping again, even though the local tax is only 7%. So it's a little frustrating at times when you're dealing with bureaucracy because they don't understand that you've already paid tax on something. So you have to bite the bullet. But typically things— I buy things on the internet and I get them shipped over here, and I always pay less than if I was in the UK or if I was in the States. Because of the euro-dollar conversion rate, which helps as well. That helps doing business. But generally, you know, nice place to live, nice and relaxed. You just learn the language and learn the important phrase, "Mañana." Whenever anybody wants anything done, "Mañana." I've learned that phrase in Florida very well. Yeah.

It's like, "We don't do it today, we'll do it tomorrow or the next day." Gotta love it. It's that tropical climate feel, I guess. And then my last guest I have here on the panel is Sue Aston.

Hello.

And it's so good to see you again today.

Thank you for asking me to come on the show.

And you are going to be breaking some new ground for us today as we hopefully add a regular segment to our show where we're having some music on.

Really?

When I started Good Day Google+, I wanted it to be more of a variety show, and it was just It's been hard finding people to come on and do a dance number though.

Is that what you do on a variety show? You dance like this?

Dancing, comedy, there's a whole host of things you can do.

It's a variety. I have joined more communities trying to get people. Comedy, and they're far from being very active. So if there's any comedians out there, any dancers, any singers, any other musicians that would like to be on, just let me know. I'm always looking for talent. You know, well, think of me. Pretty soon I can come out and we can have a really big shoe.

I want to do plate spinning like on the Ed Sullivan Show.

I wonder if Topo Gigio is still alive. That would be great.

I can play the ukulele.

That would be fun. No tiptoe through the tulips, though, right?

No, that's been done.

I'll get my French horn out of mothballs.

We don't even want to go there, never mind. So Sue—

We're already talking about mopeds.

Let's get back to Sue, she's already blushing a little.

Oh, so exciting. Yes, fine, thank you. In fact, it's tropical here in Cornwall at the moment, and tropical for us is like 18 degrees centigrade. So yes, it's boiling here. It's normally, you know, very rainy and cold. So we're all having a good time.

So is that not normal for you? Is that warmer than usual?

Yeah, that's much, much warmer than usual. The weather is always very mixed here in Cornwall. I think because we're so near to the coast, it can change really quickly. So yeah, it does make it interesting.

Yeah, they told me that when we moved to Florida. They have a saying, if you don't like the weather, wait 5 minutes.

Yeah, it's like that here.

Yeah, but you know, it's all good, it's all good. We're happy where we are. I still would love to come out and visit you in Cornwall though. That sounds like a beautiful place.

You must. We have the most amazing food, Chef Dennis. You would love it. We have cream teas and all sorts of things.

I would love it, I would love it. We will get out there, I promise, sooner or later, whether it's with Mia or with my wife, one of the two.

That would be great. Yes.

OK, so we're going to get started now. And we're just going to go back through the panel and talk to each of our guests. And just tell us what you're doing on and off the Plus, anything you'd like to promote, anything you'd like to talk about, any projects. Just let's get to know you a little better and let our viewers get to know you more as people on the Plus and understand there is more of a persona behind that icon or your quick typing style. So Christopher, we're going to come right back to you.

I thought it was all about the fingers.

You know, it is, but that's a whole other show.

Oh, okay, alright. Well, let's see, I've been a chiropractor for 26 years and recently went into sort of deep, deep semi-retirement in order to start a new software and consulting business in gamification, which is a fancy word for behavior modification or guiding behavior through the use of game mechanics, through achievements, points, badges, leaderboards, all these types of things. But basically to guide people's behavior for social good and not for evil. And I'm in the midst of moving, which is why you see boxes behind me, and we have painters upstairs in the condo above because we're moving up one level. It's leveling up, just like in a game, and this time with a great view of all the monuments in Washington, DC. We're going to have the eastern view with the Capitol Dome, the Washington Monument, and the Potomac River, and be able to watch those planes come in and out of National Airport. So it's gonna be fun as long as those landing lights don't come straight at us. That's all I'm asking for.

I hate when that happens.

Yeah, it's awful when that happens.

I lived in a house growing up and we had an FAA training facility behind us, an Air Force base and that, and we were in that landing zone and we'd stand at the kitchen sink and the planes would just be coming right at you and you just sit there and go, Oh my, I hope it keeps going.

Well, what happens is that because of after 9/11, they have restrictions in DC airspace. And so what you have is the planes come down the Potomac and they wind their way around. And at one point, as they're coming down the Potomac, they head straight for the condo and the landing lights illuminate the condo. And then they turn because they're following the river down to land eventually there. So it's a little unnerving at times, but after a while you get used to it. And you have faith that they will eventually turn and not head straight at you.

So that would be a fun game to play with new guests to your house.

Oh yeah, it's actually— it does unnerve them if they're staying overnight. But it's a fun place. It's a great view. And this area is— there's always something entertaining and something happening. I mean, although I do spend a lot of time now going back and forth between Silicon Valley and here with my tech team over there near San Jose. I refer to myself as getting used to a bi-coastal lifestyle, but I'm actually referring to myself as bi-coastal curious.

I gotcha.

That's my definition.

I'm glad you said you weren't just getting used to a bi lifestyle.

No, bi-coastal curious. Get that hashtag, Kristen Breisbach.

Bi-coastal curious. He likes them on both coasts. Okay. So what kind of chiropractor did What kind of chiropractic?

It's bicoastal chiropractic.

No, not bicoastal chiropractic, although I have a friend, Monica Klein, she's a friend of mine who is a nutritionist out in Hollywood. We used to have a blog talk radio show where we talked about healthcare and nutrition, and we used to do— it was called Total Health Talk, bicoastal but straight. It's true. It's true. You could find all those things in the past, but I did a lot of— a wide range of things from the heavy-handed stuff to very gentle stuff with like the pressure that you could withstand, like 4 ounces on your eyeball, that kind of work. So I did a lot of different things, did some acupuncture, postgraduate school in that, and you name it, I've done it. And, but I did an undergraduate in psychology at Harvard, and then I went to chiropractic, and now I've kind of I'm going back to my roots in psychology, but this time it's psychology amplified by technology.

So it's going to be available on computers then, or how would we—

Yeah, it's going to be computers. I mean, I'm working on several different levels. My target market pretty much is Fortune 5000 companies. So, you know, the platform that we have, that we're developing right now, it starts at like $150,000. So it's out of the range of the average small business person, but I'm working out a model where somebody could use the same types of technology in a lighter version, and maybe there would be a subscription model that might be between $300 to $500 a month for entrepreneurs who really want to have a lot of stickiness to their websites and be able to attract people through engagement, keep their undying loyalty, and then basically sell them more stuff. Who wouldn't want that? Oh yeah, I mean, so I want to get eventually to a subscription model, but for the time being I'm mostly focused on healthcare healthcare, getting patients to be more compliant with their instructions from their doctors, take their medicines, their dosages on time. And of course, also just— I've got some weird connections too, which we'll talk about some other time, with Elvis Presley's youngest stepbrother, which is to create an engagement for his new series of movies coming out next year called Growing Up Graceland. He spent 17 years with Elvis. As one of the stepbrothers, but Elvis never called him step anything. So, but we'll get into that in a later time. So, I'm doing Hangouts with him too soon, so that'll be fun.

That'll be fun. Yeah, looking forward to that. And Kirk, you still there? Let's move over to you now.

Why, if you're hanging out with Elvis, I just want to be there when that happens.

Well, no, it's Elvis's youngest stepbrother, not actually Elvis.

Oh, yeah, he's—

with all the stuff you were talking about, all the technology, I thought maybe you'd figured out a way to hang out with Elvis, and I just wanted to be part of that.

Well, we can actually probably get the holographic version of Elvis, and you can hang out with him. So, no, Tupac.

See, now there you go. Did anybody see the Michael Jackson on the music awards? Anybody see the hologram that they did on there? I'm sure— I don't know.

No, I didn't see that.

That was amazing. If you get a chance to go see that, they did a song that Michael Jackson had never released, and they did a hologram of him on the show, and it was, it was kind of scary.

That's the next step, I think, is creating those kind of artificial intelligent holographic images.

Well, that's, that's what I am. I'm an artificial intelligent hologram right now, and I'm not actually here. I'm actually working in the bike shop, but This has been pre-recorded.

Pre-recorded.

I'm working on that, like, help me, Obi-Wan, you're my only hope.

Intelligently. Yes, oh yes, of course. Oh yeah, so hey guys, what's going on?

Why don't you tell us a little bit about your bike shop? I know there's a lot of people maybe have not seen you before, and I think you got a pretty interesting story there.

We just, we have a bike shop, we just, you know, it's just a plain old bike shop. We people come in and they bring their bikes in, they'll get worked on, and they buy bikes here. And, you know, a bicycle shop is such a neat place. When I was growing up, when I was a kid, it was just a place that I, I just had this idea, for some reason it was just this— maybe it was a comic book store for everybody else, or maybe it was a video game store for somebody, but for me it was a bike shop. And it was just the place I could go and disappear from everything else and just, just, I don't know, it just took me to a different place and I got so excited when I went there. I wanted to recreate that. So that's a little bit about what we are. We don't just sell bikes here, I was kind of joking about that. We try and create an environment for people to come in here and have an experience, a real true-life experience about buying a bicycle, owning a bicycle, and all the wonderful things that come along with that. Not all of the sad parts and all of the flat tires and all the mechanical issues, but we try and create that to be a great experience for everybody that comes in. And that's a little bit different about us. We aren't your average bike shop. We're a little bit different that way.

And you also have a kind of unique program for kids buying bikes too, don't you?

We do. It's, it's the kind of program where kids can be on the right bicycle at the right time in their life. I think a lot of parents try and get kids to buy a bicycle that's too big. I don't know, my parents used to do this with shoes with me. They used to buy some shoes and they'd buy them a size too big. "Oh, he'll grow into them." Well, you know, that's just wrong stuff. You can't— you're not supposed to grow into shoes. You're supposed to wear the right size shoe, and then when you grow out of those and wear them out, or, you know, burn them in the fire like I did, you need to be in the right shoe. You need to be in the right bicycle, just the right size. Otherwise, you're not happy on it. It's not fitting you. You're not going to be— you're not going to ride it. Not going to treat it good. So the way it works is if you spend money on a bike for a kid in my shop, we give you that same money towards the next bike. So they spend $100, we give you $100 towards the next bike. And we keep doing that until kids are 12. And that way they're on the right bike and their parents don't have to break the bank to do it.

OK, well, that's excellent. Michael has a question for you.

OK. Yeah, we've got— this is something that I found really unusual. I purchased a bike months ago, and for some strange reason, I ended up watching the how-to video. And on this video, it said, take the bicycle seat raise it up, if you stood on the floor, to belt level, so to your waist belt, you know, on your jeans, and that's where it should be positioned. And I thought, okay, I'll do that. And then I got on the bike and I thought, this just does not feel comfortable. And I had to lower the seat so I could touch the floor and I wasn't leaning over the handlebars. What do you guys do to kind of, you know, find the right seating position for, say, a kid or somebody who has it, or somebody like me that hasn't ridden a bike in a long time?

Well, unfortunately, what they're trying to do is give you a general idea of where that saddle should be set, and everybody's different. Everybody has different leg lengths and their upper body's different lengths, and the bicycles are different heights from the floor. And so that's just a general rule of thumb, but to be fit on a bike properly, you really need to have somebody that knows what they're doing set you on the bicycle and then set you up properly, whether that means adjusting the seat up or down or forward or backward, adjusting the handlebars. There's so many elements to that that it's personal.

Yeah. Well, good. I like your website. I'm looking now.

Thank you.

You work with Dennis Littley, I believe?

Yes, I do.

Yeah, he's a good guy for doing Hangouts.

Very much, very much so. Hey, one thing about our kid program is that if you bring that bike back, I take that bike back in. This is a direct push against Walmart. I'm just trying to get people to get on the bicycle that is correct for them and not a bicycle that's going to break down in 2 minutes. And then if your bike's broken, you're not going to be happy, you're not going to be riding that. So the whole idea is to get a kid on the right bicycle that's going to fit them. And even like Michael said, if it doesn't fit you, you're uncomfortable, you're not going to ride it.

That is a good point. And then different kinds of bikes for adults, anyway, for different kinds of things they might do, like mountain biking, or if they're riding over 10 miles, you know, there's other variables that come into play. And you really need someone professional to help you with it. I mean, Otherwise, we're just guessing, you know, what is right, and we don't feel right.

My brother's actually a professional bike fitter. That's what he does for a living. His company is called Precision Bike Fit, and what he does is he takes a machine and he puts you on this computer and sets you up on the bicycle and then makes sure that your left side and your right side match that bike. Perfectly because left and right, our bodies don't actually match. And so last year I've been having some calf problems. I was cramping in one calf about 60 miles out, and he said, he said, you've got some issues, but we don't know what they are. We tried nutrition, we tried all these things. I got on his machine and found out that my right femur was about 3/4 of an inch longer than my left femur, and so my left calf was compensating for that. So he adjusted the pedals, made some shims, and did some stuff on there, and now I don't have those issues. So our bodies aren't the same. They're right to left, we're asymmetrical.

Yeah, Christopher knows that because he's a chiropractor.

I made a good living correcting asymmetries.

Yeah, yeah, and it's amazing how, how much that will affect your muscles and your lower back and all of those those things. I found now that I've gotten fit on my bike properly, there's some issues in my lower back that have gone away also, and my gluteus medius has been stretched out a little bit, so I'm not— you know what I'm talking about. Don't you look at me like that.

There's no moaning before noon. No moon before noon, remember.

I didn't moon anybody. I was thinking about it. Anyway, it's a great thing to be able to learn how to get fit on there. And there's so many fun elements about bicycles. Everybody can enjoy one. That's the great part about it. That's the best part about my job is getting everybody on a bicycle that is having fun and enjoying.

Yeah, I think— Go ahead, Michael.

Sorry, another quick question for you. I love your website, by the way. Love the images. They're interactive. That's what people want. I'm a web designer, so I look at things like that.

Oh, thank you.

But I've got a question you're probably going to say no to. Do you ship outside the US?

Oh, all the time. I do, uh, I do so many bicycles to, uh, the LDS missionaries, the Mormon missionaries. I sell tons of bikes to them, and they're all over the world. So I have done that, yeah, many times.

Bookmarked, because we need a new bicycle.

Well, we can do that. It'd be better if you came over here and I could fit you on it properly.

Oh yeah, it's only about $4,000 round trip. Yeah, I'll do that. Nothing here.

You're a rock star, you got that. That's pocket change.

You need to come up with a software that puts us on a bike that can make adjustments for us. Have us sit on a bike here that makes it adjust for you so you can tell us what we need to do.

It's available. It's actually available. That's what my brother uses. All you have to do is go to a retool fit person and they can retool you, and then they can send me the data and I can make all the adjustments over here. Wow. Yeah, very cool.

Very cool. Gotta love it. Technology.

Christopher, there you go. There's your next thing we can chat about.

I just— I was thinking, yeah, using augmented reality. That would be really interesting.

Yeah, the only problem is I'm not a Fortune 5000 company yet.

You don't have to be Fortune 5000. I'm also looking for entrepreneurs with lots of ideas.

Well, I'm that guy. I've got lots of ideas. They might not be all good ideas, but there are lots of ideas going on.

It's fine.

Idea productivity doesn't mean— it means that there are a lot of them, not necessarily good ones.

I still haven't heard back from the Spam company with all the ideas I sent them, but you know, every now and then something works.

Spam, like the stuff you eat kind of Spam?

Yeah, I gave them a new slogan. What was the slogan? Spam, the other pink meat.

Wow.

Now granted, the restraining order didn't place that many restrictions on me.

That's funny stuff. They didn't use it, I'm so surprised.

I came up with a line of clothing made out of Spam, it was called Spamdex.

I like that one. Or you could have cards.

You spread it on or how does that work?

Actually, I told them they should move their headquarters to Spam Antonio, you know, I was an idea man, I was Rolling in it, pretty much.

They all have pictures of you on their dartboards at the office.

Yeah, well, what are you gonna do? So anyway, let's move on. And we are in about the middle of the show, so at this point I'm going to turn it over to our guest of honor today, and that is Sue Aston. And Sue is gonna not only say hi and tell us about what she's doing, but then she's got a little treat for us after that. She's gonna play something for us. So how are you doing in Cornwall, and what's up with you? You've got your show scheduled and I see a family show scheduled.

That's right, yes, quite busy at the moment to be honest. I've got a show on Sunday, my own show, which is me playing about 3 of my tracks and I've got some guests coming on. And I'm also having a little Rock Bun feature as well on my show because I love food. So yes, it's going to be a very varied show. And then I'm doing a hangout with Christine de Graaff next Sunday on My Music Hangout, and all of us in the family will be playing and doing a family concert. That's going to be really exciting too.

That should be fun. And what are the other instruments that will be featured in that family concert?

Well, basically all the men in the house, they all play guitar, different styles though. Dan, my oldest son, he also has his own shows. He's classically trained but also really into rock music, so his guitar style is sort of a blend of all those different things, but he's an acoustic songwriter. And my younger son Lee is a classical guitarist, and Phil is a heavy metal man. I didn't know that.

He's got the hair for it too.

I love it.

Well, he has. He used to have hair like Rod Stewart, Stewart, but don't tell him.

I could see him in that '80s glam era.

We have photos of it in Spam decks. I love it. He could be the poster boy for Spam.

I do not want to be that guy.

Well, we'll have to see if the rest of your family wants to do an appearance on my show time playing. I would love to have them all on.

That would be great. I'm sure they'd love to.

Yeah, I'll get my music up. I am talking to a few other bands coming on soon. We're working on a date, but you know, you think it would be easier to find people that want to come on and play than it would be.

Yeah, you would think so.

But anyway, we'll cross that bridge. We're still working on it. So you're gonna play something for us today. Tell us what you're gonna play.

Well, I'm going to play you one of my tracks called Nancy's Garden, which is off my album called Inspirational Journey, and there's also a video to it as well. People can have a look at that. But Nancy's Garden was inspired by a piece of folklore from down here in mystical Cornwall. In Cornwall, there's lots of beautiful coves, and they're very unspoilt, and there's a particular cove called Porthgwara, and there's a folk tale about a young girl called Nancy, and she fell in love with this boy called William, and they adored each other, but as is quite often the case in these tales, Nancy's father didn't approve, which was very sad, and forced William to go out to sea to sort of earn his fortune and prove himself worthy. And he was gone for about 3 years, and unfortunately he drowned and didn't come back. Ah, as always happens, it's a tragic tale. But it's called Nancy's Garden because Nancy used to pace up and down on the headland on a place called Hellas Point, and that was known as Nancy's Garden because she was always there looking out to sea, trying to see if her loved one was coming home. And eventually she went mad and I think she drowned herself, but they were reunited as spirits. So it's not all bad, is it? So that's what my little tune's about.

We could use a little more volume on your end.

Oh yes, I think Phil is sort of fiddling with the sound a little bit, aren't you?

There we go, that's a little better.

Is that a bit better?

That's a bit better. Aí tá. That's good. Okay, so I hope that it's not a mad song then, it's not something that's going to drive—

No, no, it's very relaxing and it'll chill you out. So we've got a few technical things to do sound-wise, and we— I haven't played on anyone else's show before, so this will be a challenge. To see if we can switch the sound settings round. So please let us know as it's going if the sound is okay. That's alright. So I'll just go and get my instrument, as it were.

This is groundbreaking for me here. Oh, we're going into a new era. Anytime you're ready, Maestro.

I'm just wondering if anybody else has done live music on a Hangout. I don't think I've seen it before.

Christine Degraffe has, yeah.

Yeah, she does the Dennis Littley. They do do the show.

Yeah.

Here we go.

I don't know if they're ready. Are you ready?

Wow!

Bravissimo!

Bravo!

That was amazing.

It's like spine-chilling.

There are children all over the world that are going to want to play that song and learn how to be that good. That's amazing.

Oh gosh, thank you. Did it sound okay with the sound and everything?

Oh, it was exceptional. It was great.

Brilliant, thank you. You never really know.

It was perfect. It sounded like a recording. The sound quality was amazing.

It was just like being in a concert hall, and I've been in many concert halls.

Really? Oh, well, thank you very much. Well, it's all due to Phil. He's very techy and he's very good. But it's always a challenge because it's such a new platform here on Google+. There's always something new to do, and you always have to make sure that you've done every single last thing. So I'm really glad that was okay.

I just want to know one thing. Do you have some sort of, some sort of cereal, like some whimsical flakes that you eat to sound that way? I mean, that was just That was amazing. It just flows out of you so easy.

Oh, thank you. I drink lots of tea, if that helps.

Whimsical tea.

Whimsical tea.

Don't worry me for so lat tea.

He's just as quick live as he is with his fingers.

Brilliant.

Well, here, let me pop some comments up for you. Standing ovation.

Thank you, Kim. Thank you, Rhonda.

Snowshoe is clapping, by the way.

So cute.

I know we couldn't hear it, it was silent, but it was— yeah.

Silent of the lambs.

Heslin Blore, awesome as well.

Thank you, Lynn. Thank you.

Just some great comments. Rhonda Green.

Oh, gosh. Oh, thank you, Rhonda. Wow. Thank you very much. Oh, thank you. Oh, that's really—

Double wow.

Oh, gosh. Thank you very much.

Jessica. Oh, thank you. I love this picture now on these things. It's really, really neat. So exciting to hear Sue ask in live. Truly a date.

Oh, that's so kind. Thank you all so much. I'm just relieved the sound was okay.

That was superb.

It was. Phil needs to take a bow for that.

Yay, Phil!

What was the name of that song again?

Oh, it's called Nancy's Garden.

Nancy's Garden.

Yeah, it's on YouTube if you want to check it out.

Oh, don't worry, it'll be on YouTube in about 10 minutes after this Hangout's finished.

Now you have quite a few on YouTube, and I think you have some that have quite a lot of views too, don't you?

Yeah, I do, especially the Homecoming. I think it's had over a million views on YouTube.

Wow.

So yeah, I think it just somehow went viral. I'm not really sure how, but it was on all sorts of interesting websites. Like, I traced it onto an American truckers website one time. That was quite unusual.

As long as it wasn't at a truck stop.

That's a whole other kind of show.

Is it really? See, we don't know what that is here in England. I have no idea, so you'll have to tell me.

Keep it that way.

I think I've seen that. I think it's on the inside of the stall. It says, "For good music times, call..." something like that.

We won't even go there. That's okay. That was really amazing, though. I am so happy to have privilege to have you on and play that for me.

Oh, it's really kind of you to ask me to come on. Thank you.

No, not at all. It was wonderful. So now we have one more guest we haven't heard from, and we're gonna move over to him. He's been so patient. And Michael Mason, I want to talk to you a little bit about— you've got some real exciting stuff going on with PlusMyReach, and a lot of us are using it and happy to have it.

Now you should all be using it.

That's right.

I agree. Problem we had, I mean, just so for the people that don't know me, I'm a web developer. I never call myself— well, I do call myself a web designer for people who— just to make life easier. But I'm actually a web application developer. I'll take a concept, whatever that might be, throw some code at it and make it alive on a website. And I've been doing that for about 20 years. Laurie, Laurie Lezere came to me, I don't know, a few months ago now I think it was, and kind of laid down the gauntlet and said, "I don't think this can be done. I've asked 3 development firms if they can do this." And I listened to what she wanted and I said, "Nah, it can be done." And she went, "Are you sure?" I said, "Give me 24 hours." 12 hours later I was producing data.. And the only problem was I couldn't verify the data. I had no way of verifying the data. And the data I'm talking about is when you have a Google+ event, how many attend, what their follower count is, giving you a total follower count reach of that event, and various other, you know, pieces of data. So we actually paid to have somebody compile an independent report so we could verify the data. And lo and behold, yeah, we were getting the data. And we're doing much more than that now. We're actually tracking posts engagement, videos engagement, events engagement, giving you your top engagers, top engagers by gender, top engagers by follower count, etc., etc. We're doing other things as well, like we've compiled— well, I think, let me think now— it's the biggest Hangout calendar available. Although we don't push it that much because we actually developed it for our use so that we could go out and find out Hangout hosts. Who are they? Where are these people? And we're finding people that are running live events, Hangout on Air events, any public Google+ event, and we've actually got a database now of almost 1,100 hosts and I think 4,500 events. And it's growing every day. It just automatically just goes out and it finds all these events. But the bottom line for us is we just finished a show yesterday evening where we've done 6 shows, or broadcasts I prefer to call them, where we're talking about monetizing Hangouts and the process that people might want to follow if they want to go down the route of monetizing their Hangouts. Getting sponsorship or product placement. And as you probably know yourself, Jeff, I've looked into this in some depth, read all the terms of service, all the legal stuff. As sad as it might be, I'm that sort of person. I have the time and I have the inclination. And curiously, while I was listening, I discovered that I have something in common with Christopher because I actually live on the arrivals path for the airport. And I forget how many years ago it was now, but I went to university and I did a uni— psychology degree myself. So Chris has the letters before his name and I have letters after my name, but I just don't use them. And, you know, Sue and I are from England.

Yay!

I ended up in Tenerife.

Oh wow!

There's an interesting story behind that, Sue. I actually originally came here to do a scuba diving course, and I was a qualified divemaster. And I had a choice, Tenerife or Florida, and I came to Tenerife. 2 weeks after coming here, I met Sandra. I didn't speak any Spanish, she didn't speak much English, but curiously we managed to work out that we'd like to go out for a coffee together and get to know each other. And little by little, you know, I got to learn the language. A few years later we had a baby— well, Sandra did the hard work. I'm settled here. So the standing joke with my friends in England now, Sue, so how's the round-the-world trip going, Mick? Have you left Tenerife yet?

Brilliant.

I was actually, I think, maybe a week or a fortnight away from buying a round-the-world ticket and just traveling.

Oh my goodness, that would be such a different— oh gosh, fancy.

So we've decided, you know, we'll put the traveling plans on hold until the children are older, and then we'll go and do our Our Own Thing.

Oh, brilliant.

I think we can make a beautiful song there. So it's either that or a Jimmy Buffett song in the works, one of the two.

Yeah.

I mean, just to come back to what you were asking there, Sheff, PlusMyReach was designed primarily to provide people with visibility on their reach for their Hangout events. But we do much more than that now. We can't really discuss what we have in development, but watch this space. We have a lot of exciting things coming up. And hopefully I've got a couple of meetings today and tomorrow that will make a big, big change for what we're developing and how we're developing. Um, we've actually put a few things on hold at the moment, and we're reworking some of the, the core code. And, you know, it actually took, I think, 3 weeks to do the intro video that's on the homepage. Because anybody who knows me or knows a developer will know, I came in and I did the intro and it was very much like this: Good afternoon, my name is Michael Mason, CTO and founder for PlusByteReach, a spectacular tool and it will help you measure your engagement. Every time, Lottie kept saying to me, "Just do it with a bit more enthusiasm." I said, "I just find it difficult. It's my baby, and I know how good it is." It's great when I hear other people saying, "Oh, it's great, and I've done this and I've done that." But I just can't seem to sum up that enthusiasm. So I reached out, and Chef, you did a short intro, didn't you? Aslan, who's watching. Ronnie Binzer, and it was just an off-the-cuff idea. I thought, you know what, why don't we just ask people who are using the system to talk about it, and I'll do a quick intro and a quick outro, and that's it. There. I don't want anything more to do with it, you know. As Chef knows and Lottie and others know, I actually prefer to introduce the show, mute my microphone, and sit in the background running all the gadgets and stuff. So being on camera I don't mind it, it's just sometimes I feel like a rabbit trapped in headlamps. What am I going to say?

I'm glad you came out of your rabbit hole to do this, because it is a really wonderful tool, you know, and I've used it and it's really been proving itself invaluable with sponsors and potential clients, you know, and I've got people now looking at it and They want to know more about it, more about the tool. I think it's going to end up bringing more PR agencies and more companies to Google because you're showing them a measurable reach and they have something to gauge it on.

Well, one of the things that we don't disclose is our client list, and I'm not about to, but we do have at least one global brand using plus my reach, we have others interested. And just as you were saying, the PR agencies are all looking at what we're doing now. And when we talk to them tentatively about what we'd like to do, they're very interested. And we, we have a meeting I think next week with a focus group comprised mostly of PR agencies, and it's going to be a blank sheet meeting. What would you like? I can code. We have coders, and I can tell you what the limitations are of the various platforms and what information you can get. I've been developing Facebook applications for about 10 years. I've only been developing Google Apps for probably 6 months, 8 months, and look at what we've achieved. And we're only just scratching the surface. Because one of the things we find, I think anybody would find frustrating, whether it be Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, whichever platform you use, you can broadcast a message.. And like me, I, I'll have different tabs open, one for Facebook, one for Twitter, one for LinkedIn, etc. But then to go in and measure that engagement and then communicate with those people is actually really extremely time-consuming. If I send a message out about a particular offer, product, or service, or let's look at it the other way. Say somebody makes an offer and I think, wow, I want that, and I respond, and I don't get any feedback from the brand. It's not because they're ignoring me, it's because they're too busy. So they need a tool that helps them measure that. This guy responded, this girl responded, etc. Here are your engagers. These are the people you need to nurture and work with. These are the ones that are advocates for your brand. So I think all social platforms are missing that, to be fair. All of them.

I would agree, absolutely. And here's a quick— Christopher says spectacular tool. I'm hoping he's talking about PlusMyPages there.

Yeah, it's a spectacular tool. And really, the videos, the videos I will never make public, Christopher.

They are private.

No, I need to delete those from YouTube because somebody might hack my YouTube account and gain access to I'm on a mission now, an epic mission.

Epic quest.

I actually did one and I was just goofing off all the way through the video, just messing around. And Lorry said to me, you know that 5-second section about 2 minutes in, that's really good. Can you do the entire 2 minutes like that? No. I had my personality removed when I started coding 20 years ago. Sorry. It just happens.

Well, if you ever have to make one again, if you get a hammer and you hit one of your fingers real hard, OK, and then try and do the announcement.

I need to tell you about PlusMyReach today.

It is a really good tool.

That's great sound advice. Smack your fingers with a hammer. You heard it here first. The chef said it. Smack your fingers with a hammer.

Tales of an Angry Coder.

Look at the size of that finger now.

Look at the tool. Sorry, what? What? Computer. Computer. Oh, God. No, I actually get a lot of enjoyment out of what I do with with, with, um, not the coding itself. That really drives me nuts. I can be up till 2, 3, 5 o'clock in the morning writing some code, but when it does what the customer or I want it to do and it produces a result, that's my aha moment. That's the moment where I can turn the computer off, go to bed, wake up the next morning and start playing with it and think, yes, got it. Yeah. When somebody tells me it's not possible, I just let them ramble on about how difficult it is while I write the code. That's what happened with PlusMyReach. Lorie told me it couldn't be done.

Well, I'm glad she did because we're all the better for it. I'm sure— it's just been a couple months. I can't wait to see where it's going to end up because you really have done wonders in a couple months.

I'm in this Hangout, I was thinking about what Sue did there. Obviously you fed the audio from the violin somehow into the Hangout because that—

Mysteriously.

Yeah, through osmosis or something, I don't know.

That's the one, it's always osmosis.

The quality of the sound, I got to listen to about 30 seconds because I handed the headset to my partner and she listened.

Oh, really?

I was going to put it on the speakers. I could not believe the quality of the sound. It was beautiful. It really was.

Thank you. Thank you. That's all due to Phil. He's so technical and clever at that sort of thing.

I had no idea it was going to be that crystal clear and have that much tonal quality to it. I was blown away.

Thank you, thank you very much.

It is the master of the violin too that had a lot to do with that.

Oh, I think so, yeah. I think the violinist— Sue, don't take this the wrong way, but I have a friend whose daughter is first fiddle and she's played at Covent Garden and other places. Now even though she's referred to as first fiddle, if I say to her, "How's the fiddling going?" She doesn't like it, she says, "I'm a violinist." I know, I know, it's a funny thing, I'm a bit like that as well.

I don't really call it the fiddle, but most people do tend to call it the fiddle. I did have someone ask me, "What's the difference between a violin and a fiddle? Is it a different instrument? Does it have an extra string?" And I had to say, "No, it's actually the same," without laughing, keeping a straight face.

Do you play any other instruments then?

Yeah, I play the piano as well, because I trained at music college, so I had to learn the piano really. I didn't really enjoy it as much. It's not the same as the violin, but I do a lot of my composing on the piano. It's very useful for that. Yeah.

Have you ever played any other stringed instruments? Can you change it back? Do you play the cello or—

I have tried the cello, yeah, I have, but it's quite a big instrument. Instrument, and I've got really small hands, so I didn't really get on with it that well. Really. Stick to the violin or fiddle.

You do fiddle. Yeah.

Very well. Well, I remember an episode, you guys probably won't remember, but the Beverly Hillbillies, I think it was, or one of them, they were talking about this symphony orchestra violinist, and he told them what he made, and they told him what he could make as a fiddle player on the Grand Ole Opry, so he switched professions.

Oh really?

Because the fiddle players were making a lot more in those days.

Oh yes, that's a good point. In fact, it's not such a great way of earning a living in this country because I used to play in lots of orchestras, professional orchestras, and it's really not very well paid at all considering the lifestyle is so hard, there's so much travelling, and quite often you don't make any travelling expenses or anything. Sometimes you don't even break even. So I sort of got out of playing in orchestras and thought I'd just do my own thing.

You've done very well at it, and we're all the better.

Thank you.

I'm so happy. So guys, we're coming close to the end of the show, so we're going to run through the panel, and if you have anything else you'd like to add in or share with us, now's the time. And so let's go back to Dr. Christopher Vogelman. And anything else on plans coming up soon? You have a show coming coming up?

I will have a show coming up but right now I am guestless so if anybody out there would like to be a guest on Epic Influencers next week let me know. I'm still a show without time slot so very flexible.

Me!

This is like Welcome Back Cotter.

What was his name? Horshack.

Yeah, Horshack. Well, you seem to remember that very quickly.

Porsche, Nazi.

Send me a little private message and we'll negotiate on things. I've got a couple people I'm waiting to hear from, but I'm more than willing to consider all comers, so to speak.

I got a few dollars. Is that what I have to do?

Yeah, you know, just a little bit under the table. You know, it's kind of like— it's like I used to be married to a Russian woman, and they talk about in Moscow you had to have your roof for your business, which is basically you pay off the local mafia to protect you from somebody else's maybe larger roof.

Oh, okay. So I can give you some money, but I might not be on the show because somebody else might pay you some more money?

I may outbid you, but eventually we'll come to an agreement.

So that was like a roofie or what?

Not a roofie, but they call it the roof, you know, your roof. But we're doing that, and I've got a development team. I may wind up talking to Michael about some of that development work or so, because I'm always looking for good coders.

Gotta love it. Alright, and Captain Kirk, what do we got planned? Anything coming up new or—

You know, we do have something coming up that's pretty exciting. Mia Voss is going to make an appearance here at Jerk's Bike Shop. That'll be in August. She's coming out here to buy a bicycle, and then she's going to, as she says, #pedalherhappyass for charity. So we're excited about that, of course, to see Mia and have her come out and have dinner. And I think, Chef, you're involved with that, so we'll have to chat about how we're going to do that.

Absolutely. I think that's one of our food and booze things coming up.

It is one of the food and booze. We will be going out to dinner, so that's part of that show. So that's an exciting thing. And you know what, this is a cool panel because everybody on here is passionate about what they do. Look at everybody on here, everybody, and they're successful and happy about what they're doing because they're passionate about it. So whatever you do, do that.

That's the key to being happy.

That's the sauce right there. That's the roux, isn't it, Chef?

That's it, that's it, baby. Gotta love what you do and you'll always do what you love.

Oh, love what you do and that's the roux.

That's what I thought you were going to say.

Don't forget to toot the glute.

And toot the glute.

What the toot the glute?

No, that's Mia with her—

yeah, anyway, we won't go there. He's just zany.

Yeah, it's just zany.

All right, Michael Mason, what have we got planned? Any— you have some shows coming up or anything?

Actually, we've just finished the 6th season shows about monetizing Hangouts? And curiously, not probably. We've had a few people go and going through the process, so watch this space for success stories. We're busy working on how to put that together and we'll have something out there. It's kind of nice to sit back and not have a regular slot now for a while. Because I can focus on the coding, on other things, and I have— my hat is tipped and I have great admiration to people like yourself, Chef, and others that have regular shows, always on time, always producing the shows, but I just don't think I could do it. I really don't. I wouldn't mind producing shows, you know, doing it in the background, but to commit to doing regular shows. As Christopher was saying, you know, finding guests is difficult, good ones I'll say, and finding content is also difficult, and then making it appealing so that it, you know, you can appeal to a wider audience. Because I personally feel it's actually a difficult thing to do. Some shows just lend themselves to a wider audience I would love to see more of Sue. I've got the video up now for Nancy's Garden. I've watched a little bit of it. I'm going to watch a little bit more. Oh, Nancy, no, it is beautiful music. It really is.

Oh, thanks.

It's nice to see you on the show. And you say you've got your own show as well?

Yes, I do a show about every 3 or 4 weeks. I'm quite busy doing gigs, so I try and make it, you at least once a month to do a show, and I've got one coming up Sunday at 6 o'clock UK time.

Something else that can be done, and I've tested this, is you record a show and then you create a Hangout event, and let's say the Hangout event is scheduled for Thursday at 8 o'clock, and you're out doing other things at Thursday at 8 o'clock, but it's not a live show, it's a recorded playing. Providing you can enter the comments into the event stream and respond to people, you would actually be surprised how many people do not realize it is not live.

Oh my goodness, I've never heard of that. That's incredible. So I could have a nap and still do a show? That sounds perfect. I'm having a nap right now, you just don't know it. Well, at least you weren't snoring.

Yes, thank goodness for that.

We've got some good developments coming up in the next few weeks and months, but it's like I say, it's nice to just be able to now sit down, relax, and start focusing on the core business. And you know, anybody out there that needs to know what Plusmariech does, how we can help you improve your engagement, reach a wider audience, just get in touch, tag me in a post, I'll be more than happy to jump into a Hangout and talk to you about it.

Absolutely, you gotta love these Hangouts. I was talking to a PR person this morning and just when I was talking about everything you could do, you could see her eyes just sparkling at the thought of something that she didn't know anything about, so it's fun. Gotta love it. So Sue, we have your show coming up, we talked about that, and then we have your family show. Yes, that's right. I'm looking forward to that as well because it'll be—

thank you—

everyone playing together. And will you all be playing at the same time?

Well, I think Dan and I are going to do a couple of each other's, um, Dan's songs and my sort of pieces. We're going to play on each other's. Then I think Lee, my son, is going to do his first ever little solo, um, So he's 15, so it will be a big thing for him to come on and do something, so I hope he does. And Phil's going to join in as well. He's going to be the rock animal, just to balance it all out with his head banging. Woo-hoo! So yeah.

That should be good.

Definitely. Yeah, it should be great.

That's wonderful. I'm looking forward to that, and thank you again. Thank you so much for playing live on my show.

It's a pleasure. Thank you so much for asking.

Thank you.

You know, that's what this show is about, and that's when I started it, you know, to get this kind of stuff on. So again, any comedians, musicians, singers, songwriters, if you have a story to tell, you'd like to tell it on my show, I would love to have you. And it's always a good day on Google+ when you get to spend it with your friends.

What could be better?

Have a great day, everyone. Bye-bye.

Thanks, Bob. Bye.

Bye.