Insights

Remembering Anton Hammerl, 1969-2011

This post is on behalf of my friend Debbi Morello.

On April 5th, 2011 South African photographer?Anton Hammerl went missing?after coming under fire from Gaddafi loyalists near the oil port of Brega in Libya.

Many of you may remember back in April my plea for assistance in raising awareness for four journalists detained in Tripoli for no apparent crime, and with very little word about one of the journalists believed to be one of the four, Anton Hammerl.

Thousands signed a petition, hundreds more waged campaigns across the country for the two Americans being held, James Foley and Clare Gilles. With a great deal of pressure, diplomatic negotiations and prayer, the four journalists were finally released from a prison in Tripoli on May 18th: Clare Morgana Gillis, James Foley, Manu Brabo and Nigel Chandler ? but there was no news of Anton.

Tragically, Anton Hammerl was shot by Gaddafi forces and left to die somewhere in Brega. Gaddafi’s men took Anton’s identification and for six weeks the world and his family was led to believe by the Libyan regime that he was being detained and was still alive.

But Anton’s family would only learn the truth when Gillis, Foley and Brabo safely crossed the border out of Libya.?Anton’s family learned from eyewitnesses?on May 19th that his injuries were such that he could not have survived without immediate medical attention.

These words appeared on a Facebook page for him:

“At 10pm BST (11pm SA time) this evening we received devastating news regarding Anton Hammerl.?On 5 April 2011 Anton was shot by Gaddafi?s forces in an extremely remote location in the Libyan desert. According to eyewitnesses, his injuries were such that he could not have survived without medical attention.?Words are simply not enough to describe the unbelievable trauma the Hammerl family is going through.”

Anton, 41, was a former pictures editor and chief photographer for The Saturday Star in Johannesburg, South Africa. He moved to London in 2006 where he became a freelance photographer, shooting both news and corporate work. He had gone to cover the fighting in Libya in late March as a freelancer.

Raising Funds For His 3 Children

This site was put together by family, friends and colleagues of Anton with the goal of raising funds to help secure the future of Anton’s three children, 11 year-old Aurora, 7 year-old Neo, and 6 month-old baby Hiro.

Anton’s wife Penny wants the funds collected to go towards the children’s university education,?Friends of Anton.

If you tweet this, please include the hashtag #friendsofanton

If your budget doesn’t quite stretch to the price of a print, you can make a tax-deductible donation with your credit card or PayPal account. All proceeds will benefit Anton’s children and each donor will be sent a receipt for tax purposes.

Acclaimed Photographers Donating Images

Some of the biggest names in photography have agreed to donate images to support their fallen colleague.

These prints are valuable collector’s items and they make unique gifts.Friendsofanton.org would not be possible without the generous support, advice and donations of services from PhotoShelter, Emphas.is, The Steven Vincent Foundation,?digitaltechparis.com, Human Rights Watch, Committee to Protect Journalists, and Reporters Without Borders.

Hammerl’s remains have not yet been located and returned to his family.?On 8 September his family and friends will be reflecting on Anton’s life at a memorial service at?St Bride’s Church, Fleet Street, London, EC4Y 8AU.

The Could and Need Effect

There are two basic ways of deciding on a course of action – the Could and Need Effect.

Both similar. Both different. Both entwined. Both separate. But each one defines your success and longevity.

Ask yourself a question and approach it from Could and Need to decide your next step.

This bill could wait until next week. I need to pay this bill to keep my business open.

We could make a change in design if necessary. We need to start from scratch.

This could help our strategy. This needs to be in place for any of our strategy to work.

Similar paths, but very different forks in the road at the key junction.

So. Could you, or do you need to?

Enough With The Opt-Out BS, Klout

Klout sucks. Not because of what they’re trying to do, in measuring your online influence (although I’ll be the first to admit I’m not a fan of that approach for a number of reasons).

Nor do they suck because they’ve engendered a mindset among people to try and grab Klout Perks, based on that perception of influence. Heck, you’ll always have folks that do nothing but want everything for free, so may as well have somewhere for them to spend their time and energy.

No, they suck because they’re stuck in the mindset that opt-out is better than opt-in.

Meaning, they don’t give you a choice when it comes to having a “profile” of you. It doesn’t matter if you sign up to the service or not, or whether you connect your accounts to grow your Klout score.

Because Klout automatically gives you a basic profile anyway.

No permission – there you are, as bright as day online, with whatever score they deem you fit to have based on their perception of you.

Note: I understand that by accepting the Terms of Service on the likes of Twitter, etc, your information can be shared. I’m not sold on that being turned into a full-on profile on another site, though.

I’ll admit, when Klout first came out, I was curious as to how it worked. As someone who needs to connect clients with perceived influencers for outreach and promotional programs, it seemed an interesting way to find those that could help.

Then the flaws appeared.

Just using my account as an example, I recently disconnected all my accounts from Klout, with the exception of Twitter as it wouldn’t let me disconnect that.?As a result, my Klout “score” (or influence) dropped from 75 to 63.

So, even though I was still active on the networks I’d disconnected; even though I was sharing the same amount of information, and interacting just as much – if not more – on blogs, Klout felt I was less “influential”.

What they were really saying, though, is that because I wasn’t participating by their rules, I was less influential. Never mind the fact I was still getting “reactions”, if you like, for my interactions online – if Klout didn’t see them, they never happened.

Because I’ve written a fair few times about my lack of “trust” in how Klout perceives influence online, I thought it’d be hypocritical to keep an account there. So I went to delete, which is where the fun began.

I followed the instructions on their site to delete my account, and received an email from Lan at their contact centre advising my account had been removed. This was almost a week ago, and I was advised it could take a day to clear their system.

A week later, and I’m still there, even though I have no desire to be part of the Klout game anymore, nor do I wish to be “on display” on their site, since I (initially) never gave permission.

This is where the opt-out bullshit needs to stop.

It’s more than 10 years since Seth Godin wrote about Permission Marketing, and yet here we are, still being added to things we didn’t have a say in. Fair enough, I added details to Klout, but the initial permission wasn’t there. As it isn’t for anyone.

And to remove yourself, you have to go through hoops to get it done? That’s crap.

It’s not just Klout. Facebook is as bad, as are many other social networks. I had the same issue with Hashable, and got into a debate on Twitter with that service’s founder, who decreed, “Hashable’s not the kind of service people leave, hence there’s no need for an option to delete your account.” (This option was later added.)

Yes. There. Is.

You don’t add people to something and not ask them their permission (unless there’s some legal reason to do so). Especially when that information is there for anyone to see, and make a snap judgement on.

For example, some companies are using Klout scores in the hiring process. If someone has a low score because they don’t know they’re on Klout, and get passed by for a job even though they’re the best qualified, that makes your system screwy (it also doesn’t say much for the research angle of the company in question).

So, please, Klout, and anyone else that puts people onto their platform then makes it almost impossible to get off – be smart. Make it easy to leave. I was able to delete my Empire Avenue account with a single mouse click – why should it be any more difficult than that?

After all, it’s not like you’re just looking to have numbers to show off about your platform to possible investors. That wouldn’t be a reason to keep people on there that want to leave.

Right?

Update 26.10.2011: Seems the link to remove yourself from Klout is now showing an “invalid request”. You can try this one instead.?

Note: This post is about Klout and its practices. I have nothing but good words for its CEO Joe Fernandez, who’s always responded to criticism about the service and looked at ways to improve.

~ Update: As of November 1st 2011, you can now?delete your Klout account.?

image: remuz

Why You Don’t Need to Impress Me

No, this isn?t an ego post. It?s not driven by,??Oh, I really need to impress that Scottish/Canadian/Brit (what the heck is he??) Danny Brown guy.?

Screw that ? ego is for chumps (hat tip?Shannon Boudjema?for the phrase).

But you seriously don?t need to impress me.

I?m not your life mate. I?m not your boss. I?m not your editor. I?m not your parents. I?m not your font of all wisdom.

But then, you don?t need to impress these people either (more on why you don?t need to impress your boss in an upcoming post).

Nope, the only person you need to impress is yourself.

If you blog and you hit publish and know that you?re happy with the post, that?s all that matters.

If you?re in business for yourself and you know you?re doing the best you can for your clients, that?s all that matters.

If you?re employed and know you?re doing all you can in your role, that?s all that matters.

If you look in the mirror at the end of the day and know you did every thing you could that makes a difference in whatever you do,?that?s all that matters.

Impress yourself. The others will follow.