While I think that I bring lots of energy and passion to my podcast, and am usually pretty articulate, I’ve never pretended that I have a great “radio voice.” Well, that distinction is made even clearer when you listen to my guest Matt Walters, a professional voiceover actor.

This podcast is truly a “must listen.”

Download the podcast from iTunes, or play it below:

Everyone likes to quote the opening movie line with the gravel-voiced actor belting out “In a world…” but in reality, the people behind the success of movie trailers, commercial reads, and cartoon voices don’t get the recognition that they deserve.

This week I speak with Matt Walters, and he gives some great tips for getting into the business, how he got his start, and some hysterical examples of how my tagline could be read.

Topics we discuss:
- The interesting (and somewhat deceptive) way Matt got his start by defying stereotypes and pulling a “Karate Kid” move
- The process of getting an agent and breaking into the business
- Techniques for getting ready and warming up
- What happens when you get a nasal cold
- The different way a voiceover actor watches TV

Check out Matt’s voiceover reel:

We then talk about the godfather of voiceover, Don LaFontaine. Reading his wikipedia page, and watching a video tribute to him, you realize how amazing this guy was. Can you believe he’s done more than 5,000 movie trailers and hundreds of thousands of TV ads and promotions?

We also talk about whether it’s better to have a big part in a small movie, or in his case, a small part in a big movie. Matt played Owen Wilson’s work friend in Marley and Me (also starring Jennifer Aniston).

Additionally, he achieved the rite of passage for every New York-based actor, landing a role on Law and Order.

Lastly, he played a mop-topped Paul McCartney for a Comedy Central promotion for Beatles Rock Band.

See Matt’s appearances:

But we weren’t done there. Matt was kind enough to indulge me and say “You’re listening to the Hopkinson Report podcast” in the following accents:
- British
- Irish
- Boston
- New York

It was quite entertaining. So if you’re looking for advice about getting into the business, looking to improve your podcasting skills and pick up a few tricks, check out the podcast.

Learn more about Matt Walters on his website.

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Jim’s guest is Deanna Zandt, author of a social media book. They talk about how she got a book deal, raised money to fund it, and how she got free pizza.

Download the podcast from iTunes, or play it below:

Deanna Zandt is the author of the new book, “Share This! How You Will Change the World with Social Networking” which you can find out more about at her website, DeannaZandt.com.

During our interview, we talk about the following topics:
- How the former corporate employee and self-proclaimed ‘webmonkey’ went from independent consultant to author
- The process she took to turn her training seminars into a book idea
- The “Jedi Mind Trick” philosophy her publisher uses, and how she used “the force” of social media to raise funds in order to work on her book
- How she used crowdsourcing on everything from the title to the cover — and how people reacted to it
- The free software program she used to dramatically ramp up her productivity during the writing process

And yes, she explains how she scored a free eye exam and free pizza along the way.

Give a listen.

Twitter: Deanna | HopkinsonReport

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Jim interviews top podcaster Adam Carolla, talking about his new format, podcast revenue models, and portable dishwashers.

Download the podcast from iTunes, or play it below:

For years we’ve praised the concept of “time-shifting” as a unique advantage of today’s digital media. No longer are we forced into a do-or-die option of being present at a live event or face the consequences of missing it completely.

We can use a DVR to record a World Cup game in the morning for viewing later that day, stream Saturday Night Live on our laptop via Hulu on Sunday morning, and forgo commercial-filled drive-time morning radio in lieu of an iPod’s worth of our favorite podcasts.

Since his live morning radio show was canceled in February 2009, that’s exactly what entertainer Adam Carolla (Loveline, The Man Show, Crank Yankers, Dancing with the Stars) has done. He’s amassed an army of loyal listeners that have downloaded The Adam Carolla Podcast millions of times, making his show a mainstay at the top of the iTunes charts.

But now he is “getting the band back together” and attempting to combine the best of both worlds. He’s brought back nearly the entire staff from his former radio program, including news co-host Teresa Strasser, producers, announcers, and even sound effects wizard “Bald Bryan,” who is able to insert his comical sound bites into the podcast on the fly.

However, in an interesting turn away from time-shifted content, Carolla’s goal is to get people to tune in daily to keep up with current events, essentially creating a drive-time morning show via podcast.

The format allows him to avoid long commercial breaks, escape the watchful eye of both program directors and the FCC, and do what he does best – rant at will on any given topic – packing the show into 90 minutes vs. the four hours of live drive time. The plan is to record the topical shows late in the afternoon or evening, so that they are ready for download each morning.

Will the new format be a hit with fans? And just as important, can he generate enough revenue to keep everyone happy? It’s hard to bet against him given his success thus far.

I sat down with Carolla in New York City while he was in town promoting another of his myriad of projects — with more and more of them venturing into the realm of social media — a user-generated video contest called the Klondike Everyman Challenge.

As a fellow podcaster that also enjoys weaving heavy doses of pop culture into the conversation, I brought up a unique similarity that we both shared: our families both owned ugly, hulking portable dishwashers in the 70s. This set off a classic Carolla rant that users have become accustomed to, reflecting back on his cheap parents and meager upbringing in North Hollywood.

On the topic of generating revenue, Carolla has been fearless in trying new ventures. While the daily show is entirely free to download, he urges listeners to support the program in one of several ways.

Revenue streams for the Adam Carolla Podcast:
- An archive 2-disc DVD box set of the entire first year of digitally mastered downloads (“We sold a few thousand”)
- A store with t-shirts, sweatshirts, hats, and stickers
- Pay-to-download for a select few podcast episodes
- Short pre-recorded and “live read” ads before and during the show, covering products as diverse as flowers for Mothers Day, souped up computers, BBQ grill accessories, and adult movies.
- Live, in-person performances in LA and other cities

So when I ask him what source has been most successful, he responds that any individual tactic isn’t a lot of money, but you start to get a cumulative effect with multiple sources of income.

Without missing a beat, he says, “You know, you add them all together and in the end you’re still broke, but eventually you have enough to afford one of those portable washing machines.”

Download the podcast from iTunes, or play it below:

Also see: Episode 47: Thoughts on Adam Carolla, Bill Simmons, and more

Interesting photo credits:
Yellow dishwasher: “Jeremy” successfully selling it for $40 on “Nova Scotia Classifieds” in 2007.
Connector hose: “FantasyGoat” on gigposters.com, using it as part of his still when creating homemade moonshine.

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Jim interviews the guys from Whiteyboard.com, a simple product with a unique marketing spin.

Download the podcast from iTunes, or play it below:

I love me a good whiteboard.

And why not? I’m a marketer, a creator, a speaker, an idea guy, and a project manager. I like mockups. I like sketches. I like seeing how a process could flow, and then erasing it with a napkin (can never seem to find that damn eraser) and then sketching it out again. That is what whiteboards are born to do.

The issue is that they are big, they are heavy, and they are expensive. Are those three things contributing to the downfall of creativity as we know it? Well, movies like Fear Dot Com, Year 1, Be Kind Rewind, and Who’s Your Caddy keep getting green lit. Maybe if Hollywood had more whiteboards, people would come to their senses.

Enter Jason Wilk and Sherwin Kim. The two entrepreneurs have founded Whiteyboard.com, a company that does one thing really really well: offer a low-cost whiteboard that can be put on (and removed from) any wall much like a piece of wallpaper. How low-cost? The largest 4′x6′ model tops out at just $30, and two smaller sizes are available for under $15.

In an age where I get pitches from lots of companies with complicated APIs, multilevel social network integration, and sparse business plans, it’s refreshing to see a concept that I understand right out of the box. Or poster tube if you will. What that does is then let me focus on the company’s marketing angle.

As background, Jason has gone through the famous Y Combinator program with another business idea. Y Combinator gives seed money at the earliest stage of venture funding to pay for expenses while companies are getting started. The company that I am most familiar with to have gone through the program is reddit.com, a social news site owned by Conde Nast.

The path for a new internet company is starting to fall into a template:
- A few geeks come up with a great idea (usually there is one CEO-type idea person and one behind the scenes programmer guy)
- Throw up a website and iterate your idea as quickly as possible
- Keep costs low and try to get some money wherever you can
- Use free social media and word of mouth to market and spread the news
- Try to get a story on Tech Crunch
- Drive people to the site, get them to register, try to get to a tipping point of users
- Hope to be the next Twitter or Foursquare, or get bought out by a major media company
- Profit!

The interesting thing about Whiteyboard, is that they did all of the above, but with a physical product.

The downside of this, as Sherwin explains, is that they went through a lot of pain on the product side. You’re dealing with prototypes, shipping costs, storage fees, and a lot of back and forth with overseas manufacturing companies, spanning multiple timezones and throwing in a language barrier.

But once they had their product down, the huge advantage is that when their media coverage hit, and thousands of people were sent to their website, what was waiting for the users wasn’t a quick sign-up form, an email or a video tour, but an offer to buy a product.

And since they were featured in such entrepreneurial, tech-focused, startup-savvy sites such as Think Geek, Lifehacker, and Tech Crunch, they were automatically focusing on their target audience.

Lastly, they are even viewing their office space in a non-traditional way. Is Whiteyboard going to be based in a sprawling industrial park in Newark, New Jersey? Um, no.

Their plan is to have an office on Hollywood Boulevard. But not only will it be an office, but rather an open-to-the-public workspace covered entirely in whiteyboards. Doing so allows the company to almost view this as a marketing expense, rather than a “facilities” expense. And for the people that come in off the street, it becomes a branding experience, allowing them to play some tic tac toe, or who knows, sketch out the screenplay for Who’s Your Caddy 2.

Listen to the full podcast interview here:

iTunes

Play it below:

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In this episode, I interview entrepreneurs Michael Lewis and Tim Kress-Spatz from Suite Arrival, a new business that lets you be discreet, get a treat to eat, and keep your travel plans neat.

Download the podcast from iTunes, or play it below:

We’ve all been there
Admit it, the TSA and the terrorists have combined to make it much more difficult to travel. Long gone are the days of rolling up to the airport for that 10:15 flight at 9:45.

Oh no… you’ve got to get there early, have all your IDs ready, make sure your bags are not too plentiful (the fees! the fees!) or too heavy, watch out for metal belt buckles, take off those shoes, remove those jackets, and take out your laptops (which can only add to the fact that 10,000 laptops are stolen from airports PER WEEK).

In my blog post about packing for a business trip, (What’s in the bag? How to pack for business travel plus Jim’s 5 MVP travel picks) I give several ways you can ease the travel burden.

But a new site called Suite Arrival (website | Twitter) has an idea so simple and so useful, that even a bumbling shoebomber can see the appeal.

If you hate the following…
- Having to pack mini-toiletries every trip
- Squeezing them into a baggie and running them through security
- Taking your favorite products that only come in 12oz containers and transferring them to smaller ones
- Shopping for your products once you arrive in a new city
- Arriving to your hotel tired and hungry, and getting charged $6 for a Snickers from the mini-bar
- When your wife or girlfriend finds “personal protection” in your travel case right before your trip to Vegas*

Well, then you might want to take a look at Suite Arrival.

* I joke! I joke! All of my readers are upstanding citizens and would never stray… this is just so the maid or your roommate won’t find these items stashed under your sink.

They offer a bunch of products for you to choose from, and have even packaged several ‘kits’, including ones for him, ones for her, an organic kit, an action kit, and a wanderlust kit.

If this is starting to sound like a commercial, it’s not.

Disclosure that I was not compensated in any way, and in fact, they want to give discounts to YOU. Just enter code “WIREDJIM.”

I just like covering cool people with cool ideas that solve real problems.

Once we cover what they do, we get into the conversation and discuss:
- How did Mike and Tim get started?
- How are they marketing their company?
- What are the biggest challenges facing them as entrepreneurs?
- What travel-based trends have they seen emerge from their service?
- How are travel needs different for a woman? (our third guest, Autumn, chimes in)
- What types of things they add on their 2nd and 3rd iteration of the website?
- What are the alternate streams of revenue they are pursuing?

So if you like to travel, but hate the airport experience, have a listen:
Download the podcast from iTunes

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This episode is an interview I did at SXSW with Matthew Inman, the author of the popular web comic called The Oatmeal. Find out how he went from social media favorite to a book deal.

Download the podcast from iTunes, or play it below:

Background
Matt got his start at online marketing and SEO firm SEOMoz. He went from there to coding an online dating site completely by himself in just 66 hours, and then turning around and selling it in only six months. The key discovery while he was there? The comics, quizzes and viral content he used to market the site were even more popular than the site itself. And thus while concentrating on just the viral comics themselves, The Oatmeal was born.

Topics covered:
- “From brain to page” … Who can build a company faster, a small company or a one-mail operation?
- What was the transition like moving from Idaho to Seattle during the dotcom boom and bust
- What is the current state of SEO?
- In the end, Matt feels that all search engine optimization comes down to two major things. Find out what they are.

How to use social media to build traffic to your website.
- To generate links to his bunkbed site, he created a funny 10 question comic-style quiz titled “How long could you survive chained to a Bunk Bed with a Velociraptor?”
- The quiz got popular and people shared it around the internet, were linking to the site and talking about bunkbeds, so the site was able to rank first for that keyword.
- Put it this way… I only made it one minute and 6 seconds.

How does Matt come up with some of his most creative titles?
- 5 very good reasons to punch a dolphin in the mouth
- 10 reasons to avoid talking on the phone
- How to use a semicolon, the most feared punctuation on earth
- How a web design goes straight to hell
- How to suck at Facebook

What is the best way to get on reddit and Digg?
Social news sites reddit.com (owned by the company I work for, Conde Nast) and Digg.com have notoriously fickle audiences. Companies know that getting to the frontpage can mean an avalanche of traffic to their website, but their communities also have the power to bury a story or give it a life of its own. While you might not like the straightforward answer Matt gives, it makes a lot of sense and he goes on to tell a few helpful ways to phrase your post to help things along.

How do you turn a web comic into a book deal?
Matthew is working on a book with publisher Andrews McMeel, who also did Calvin and Hobbes, The Far Side, and Dilbert. He took an odd route when approached by several publishers and an agent, and gives his advice to people doing web comics and wanting to get published. He feels the community ‘rewards’ him for being just an independent guy trying to succeed.

What’s next for the Oatmeal?
- Stand up comedy?
- Animated shorts?
- How are porta-pottys involved?

Check out a 3 minute documentary about Matthew on Carson Daly:

Twitter.com/HopkinsonReport
Twitter.com/Oatmeal
Theoatmeal.com
Book – Coming this Spring

Also see: Hopkinson Report interview with Alexis Ohanian and Steve Huffman, cofounders of reddit.com

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Today on The Hopkinson Report: Everybody Gets a Trophy!

Download the podcast from iTunes, or play it below:

I talk with former Wired Intern 1.0 Brandon Werner (pictured above) of The Modern Day Pirates about how engaging with different generations is changing, specifically that notoriously difficult market of 18-30 year olds, known to many as Millennials or Generation Y.

In this corner, Jim, the Gen X archetype. In the blue trunks, Brandon, paragon of all things that represent Gen Y.

Brandon and Jim discuss:
- How WW2 vets came home, reproduced like it was their job, and created the baby boomers.
- The relationship between Dr. Spock –not that one– and Baby Boomers becoming great, caring parents.
- Why we can blame Richard Nixon for 80s hair metal.
- Why each generation before has their own self-affirming name for Millennial.
- “The jock of today uses more computers than the nerd of the ’80s.”

Fast Facts:

Other topics covered:
- How video games are now the dominant form of media entertainment for Millennial.
- Social media is a direct result of young adults being the entitled “Me generation.”
- They’re happy to do some work at home, just let them use social media at work.

- There’s a new generation of young girls, sitting at home, talking about themselves. I couldn’t have said it any better than this video:

But wait, there’s more!
- Mobile mobile mobile! It’s the best way to advertise to Millennials and Apple, Facebook, and Google know this!
- On Demand is a necessity, they need to operate on their own schedule, especially if it gets to use through word of mouth.
- How the recession — Jim calls it “The great economic smackdown” — is keeping back the Millennials from potentially being “The Next Greatest Generation.”
- Why they’re being called “The Peter Pan Generation.”
- The infinite futility of voicemail and the incredible value of badges!

Get ready ready for your ears and eyes to bleed.
Brandon introduced me to a YouTube phenom named Fred. Thankfully, even Brandon shudders at the thought of this future. Of course, this episode talks about him missing his meds.

I couldn’t watch the whole thing to figure out which ones, but like Brandon and I talked about on the podcast, it has to be one of the anti-hyper drugs that parents are so fond of giving their kids these days.

Before you jump out of your 15th floor office window, here are the most shocking stats of all:
1) This video has 26 MILLION views (many of his others have millions as well)
2) He has A-list sponsorship via Toys R Us and Hot Topic, including a clothing line!

RANT OF THE DAY
Don’t end the podcast a moment too soon! During the final outtro music, I manage to squeeze an unbelievable basketball rant in about 14 seconds.

I finally figured it out! A revelation hit me while editing the “Generation X vs Generation Y” podcast.

I have a huge pet peeve with basketball players giving HIGH FIVES and HANDSHAKES and FIST BUMPS to teammates after MISSING a crucial free throw. This now happens at the college and NBA level.

You’ve all seen it by now. It’s the waning seconds of a game. The team is up by only a point, and the other team fouls. If the player does what they should and hit their free throws, the game is basically over. But they routinely FAIL at the one thing they’re supposed to do. Hell, Larry Bird’s FT% in 1988 was 94.7%!!!

But it’s not that they simply MISS the free throw. I’m not saying I’d make them in the same situation. But this is the problem:

The other players RUN up to them to give them a congratulatory handshake after this failure!!!

It drives me crazy! What do they even say to each other? “You just choked the free throw that will cost us the season… high five!”
I mean, seriously. Don’t you people understand the general concept!?!? When you do WELL, you get congratulated. When you FAIL, you should be feeling a bit of shame.

But now I know why: All the players are Gen Y!!!

They can’t do wrong and we don’t want any hurt feelings. It’s like a giant group hug.

“That’s ok D’BRICkashaw… don’t let those mean ol’ fans get you down. Aw shucks, you’ll get them next time. It’s not your fault.”

Well guess what … at least in college and the NBA, you don’t get a participatory trophy if you lose.

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How does a company turn their email file into a list of powerful social media influencers? They go to Flowtown.

Download the podcast from iTunes, or play it below:

Podcast Episode 101 is an interview I did at SXSW with Ethan Bloch of Flowtown.com, a service that turns email addresses into social profiles. After discussing the best way to survive the festival on no sleep and Green Tea, Jim gets down to business to find out Ethan’s story.

Topics covered:

About Ethan
- Ethan’s amazing start as an entrepreneur, importing video game components and driving $13,000 worth of revenue — at age 13!
- How marketing, finance, and technology have been the three pillars of his career thus far
- His move to San Francisco, subsequent job loss, and founding of a new business

About Flowtown
- A platform that allows businesses to connect with their customers
- Starting with their email list, Flowtown generates a list of the social networks their customer base is on, allowing them to write better posts, send better tweets, and more easily target their customers
- Not only does Flowtown return age, gender, networks, and the top 50 locations, but it then creates a sort of “iTunes Smartlist for Marketers,” showing the top 50 influencers that really move the needle

The Marketing Angle
- What is Flowtown’s approach to marketing their business?
- Where does Flowtown get their customers?
- Is all this a good thing? What about user’s personal information being exposed?
- Is email dead?

Advice for Startups
- What are the challenges of being a startup?
- What is the main advantages of being a small company?
- How the “lean startup” process enables them to make quick advances in technology
- Lessons learned through a failed project, which led to 3,500 new customers on their next project

Try it yourself
Check out flowtown.com and enter your e-mail address (it’s not stored) to find out which networks you’re on.

Follow us on Twitter: Ethan | Jim

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We made it everyone! 100 episodes! I’ll cover 10 lessons learned, the big party, and give some shoutouts.

Download the podcast from iTunes, or play it below:

Wow, 100 episodes – pretty amazing. I’ve been at this for more than 2 years, week in, week out, whether I was tired or sick or excited, I carved out a little time to try and share some thoughts with you.

Listen, I’m an oldest child, I’m a Leo, and obviously I like to hear myself talk. But I try to be aware of that and not get TOO full of myself. I realize this isn’t 21 seasons of the Simpsons or some of the other social media guys with millions of followers. It’s not the frontpage of the NY Times, the cover of Wired, and it’s not even a video podcast. Even 2010, some people don’t even know what a podcast IS.

Still, it’s a fun accomplishment, and more importantly, I think it is symbolic of the time we live in. It might well be the defining characteristic of the last 10 years.
A shift in media where:
- You didn’t need a TV studio or Hollywood budget to reach people with video, you used a flipcam and YouTube
- You didn’t need to be a newspaper journalist, a magazine writer, or an author with an agent to express your thoughts, you could start a blog
- And as we’ve seen, you don’t need a radio tower if you want to rant about anything from marketing trends to the iPhone

You could create a podcast, and if you had some good ideas and strung them all together, you could build a little community for yourself.

10 Lessons Learned

1. Strive for perfection
When I first started out, I wanted everything perfect. In fact, I probably waited an extra 3 months preparing, making sure every topic, icon, and piece of the website was working. What I’ve learned now is that it’s ok to let things go a little and publish, even if it’s at 90%. How important is it for me to stay up another 25 minutes on a Monday night removing every single “um” and “ah” from the show? Does that improve the show 5%? 20%? Do people notice? So do I still strive for perfection every week? Absolutely. That has to be the ultimate goal. I just don’t beat myself up if I don’t always hit it.

2. Networking and relationships
This became a common theme. The more hours you spend at your desk, the more hours you spend online, the more hours you spend cuddling with your iPhone, the more important it is to truly connect with people IN REAL LIFE. The relationships come back around to you many times over.

3. Running and energy
People often ask, how do I keep this going? Tuesday April 13 was a rare day, but I was up at 7am and went to the gym, went to a entrepreneurial breakfast event, worked for several hours, had lunch with a college friend, worked another 5 hours, went home and edited the podcast from 7-10pm, took a break and ate dinner, then worked on a side project from 10pm-3am. Crazy? Yes. But as long as you know when to roll with your energy, and when to let your body recover, you should do ok. I credit a lot of the energy I get to working out a 2-3 days per week, and running 2-3 days per week. Makes all the difference in the world. (see my podcast #89 on running).

4. Consistency
Anyone can start a blog, a podcast, a project, or a relationship. It’s being consistent once the initial fun part wears off. It’s not easy, but that’s when you can tell someone’s true dedication. (That being said, I’ll be honest in that it crossed my mind that #100 would be a good place to STOP for a little break).

5. Passion
Face it, if you’re not doing something you’re passionate about, you might as well go home. This could not be a boring podcast about something I was marginally interested in. It had to be high energy and only about topics that got me fired up.

6. Free at one thing, paid at another
This was harder to explain than I thought, but the analogy is across other areas. Musicians might not make money through music sales, but rather through concerts or touring. Authors might not get rich selling books, but can be paid doing speaking. And while I’m not getting paid specifically to podcast, I do it because I feel it’s a long-term commitment (personal branding, meeting new people, adding value to my day job, etc).

7. Speak your mind
Isn’t it great that blogs and podcasts and twitter let you vent? Be careful what you say, but don’t be afraid to say it.

8. Leave your mark
When you look back at your current job in 5 years, is there something you’ll be able to point to that will have stood the test of time? That you can be proud of?

9. Celebrate success
Getting to 100 episodes is less of a monumental accomplishment, and more about picking a date to kick off summer, pause and reflect, and spend time with friends. Take a moment to celebrate the little (and big) things in life.

10. Say thank you and give back
At this point in the post and podcast, if you want to jump off, fine. But Gary Vee talks about going above and beyond with customer service. So I’m taking the time to honestly say thank you to the people that have been along for the ride. That’s why I personally emailed each and every person that came to my 100th episode party the very next morning. So check out the people below, and I’ll comment what special thing they brought to the show, or a funny story, who knows Jim best, what’s to come for 100+.

[Full disclosure: I received forms of compensation from some of the parties listed below]

Wired – Thanks to Wired for giving me the opportunity to do this, specifically Evan Hansen and Annaliza Savage. They’ve given me the freedom to conduct the show as I’ve seen fit.

Rhonda Zapatka (left) – My friend Rhonda was one our party sponsors, and works at TrickleUp.org. Trickle Up helps ultra-poor people living in remote parts of India, West Africa and Central America to start or expand their own small businesses to improve their quality of life. Each year, Trickle Up helps start or expand 10,000 businesses around the world, over 90% of which are women-run. They are hosting two events in Manhattan: a gala affair at Cipriani Wall Street on Tuesday, April 20th, 2010 and a Young Professionals Council event on May 5, 2010. More info at TrickleUp.org.

John Murch – My friend Johnny was our second sponsor, and runs a cool site called ublanket.com. Ublanket is a way to take old shirts, put them together online, and “upcycle” them – take one item and make it into something new. Renew, Reuse, and Rethread those meaningful shirts into a useful product.

Jia and Federico – Sponsor #3 was Roomorama, an online marketplace for short term rentals. Use the service the next time you’re looking for a room for a few days while traveling, or if you have a spare room and are looking for an easy way to earn some cash. I profiled them on episode 26.

Diana Levine (center) – Diana was gracious enough to be on hand to document the event. If you appreciate her photos and want to give a shoutout, go to dianalevine.com, or better yet, help support her walk for Parkinsons. She was on episode 95 and 96. Also thanks to good friends (l-r) Helen Todd, Brendan McManus, and Chris McCann (far right).

Dave Delaney (Griffin Technology) – Dave was kind enough to donate several items from Griffin, including the Griffin Simplifi and Griffin Power Block Reserve. See GriffinTechnology.com

Mark Venezia and Jana Eggers (Spreadshirt) – Mark is VP of Marketing and you might remember CEO Jana from episode 78. You can see the 100th Episode episode shirt at condenast.spreadshirt.com (look at the first two items, then the back of the shirt). Use Spreadshirt coupon code WIRED100, and receive free shipping (first 100 orders only).

Adam Wallace and Brian Simpson (Roger Smith Hotel) – Adam and Brian are two of the coolest people you’ll meet, and allowed me to host the party on their amazing rooftop. Read more about the Roger Smith Hotel and their take on social media in episode 79.

Thanks to Naomi Less (the intro voice on the podcast), Bobby Shanes (episode 6), David FitzGerald (episode 7), Sarah Prevette (episode 59 and 99), Saul Colt (episode 41), Adam Carolla, and Bill Simmons (I call them podcast pioneers in episode 47).

Elizabeth King – You’ll remember her as the Outsmarting the SAT author from episode 77.

Brandon Werner – Brandon was proud to be intern 1.0, calling himself the buggy one that the early adopters got, before future interns Anuja, Juliann, Susi, and Kevin were upgraded. Brandon designed this blog, my business card, tshirt, and even a poster! His musings on design and geekdom can be found at Guns And Robots.com and The Modern Day Pirates.com.

At this point, there are just so many more people to thank, but you’ll have to listen to the podcast, so I’ll just do the ‘thank you to everyone I missed.’

What’s up for Episode 101 and beyond?

- More social media
- More geolocation
- More iPad and gadgets
- More interviews
- And interestingly enough, I’m writing a book and hope to take you through how I did it, from the design, to the website, and getting it for sale on the iPad

Most importantly, thank YOU, the reader and listener.

Jim

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It’s my 99th podcast
I’m having a ball
Sarah and Chris are here
I’m not really sure, but they’re entrepreneurs
99 podcasts of beer on the wall.

Download the podcast from iTunes, or play it below:

On this episode of The Hopkinson Report, Jim takes some time out of his SXSW adventures to have a chat with Chris McCann of Startup Digest and Sarah Prevette of Sprouter.com.

Hot topics for entrepreneurs:

- Why breakfast foods are the secret to business success and how Jim is going to corner the market with French Toast marketing.

- Chris shares his recent experience at an entrepreneurial conference in Dubai, the surreal “Las Vegas” of the Middle East.

- Sarah talks about Sprouter.com, which aims to bring entrepreneurs together to collaborate, share resources and experiences.

- Chris explains why startups near Carnegie Mellon will tell you about their business ventures, but then they would have to kill you.

- The most important lessons Chris has learned with Startup Digest, an international e-mail list to keep startups in touch.

- Chris discusses the up & coming cities for young entrepreneurs. He explains why NYC might be giving Silicon Valley a run for its money, and why everyone should keep an eye on those crafty Canadians (Sarah included).

- Why partnerships with experts can be a more efficient means of delegating tasks than taking it on alone.

- How and when marketing through e-mail can be effective.

- Seriously. Waffles.

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