I’ve owned and used Apple’s products for a very long time. In my last year of college, I built my first computer, an Apple II+ clone – sourcing and soldering all the individual components, circuit board, cabinet, keyboard, and it ran on Apple’s OS. That of course, endeared me to Apple early on. Of course, I’ve also owned many non-Apple computing products. When fortyninegroup was launched, I made the decision to always use Apple technology and the line “fortyninegroup runs on Apple” has been in our signatures since the company’s inception in 2008. And, having developed Apple Apps, we’re as entrenched in Apple’s ecosystem as any company can be. At the start of every day, I look at this keyboard, smile and think about what I’m going to be able to do with it today.

These moments remind us how rewarding it is to do great work, to create, to delight. They also remind us that the moments of life are fleeting. In 2005, Steve Jobs’s commencement address at Stanford summarized several life lessons and inflection points, and borrowing from Stewart Brand’s Whole Earth Catalog, suggested we “Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish.” The text of that speech is below. Thank you Steve, for everything.

Here’s the speech:

I am honored to be with you today at your commencement from one of the finest universities in the world. I never graduated from college. Truth be told, this is the closest I’ve ever gotten to a college graduation. Today I want to tell you three stories from my life. That’s it. No big deal. Just three stories.

The first story is about connecting the dots.

I dropped out of Reed College after the first 6 months, but then stayed around as a drop-in for another 18 months or so before I really quit. So why did I drop out?

It started before I was born. My biological mother was a young, unwed college graduate student, and she decided to put me up for adoption. She felt very strongly that I should be adopted by college graduates, so everything was all set for me to be adopted at birth by a lawyer and his wife. Except that when I popped out they decided at the last minute that they really wanted a girl. So my parents, who were on a waiting list, got a call in the middle of the night asking: “We have an unexpected baby boy; do you want him?” They said: “Of course.” My biological mother later found out that my mother had never graduated from college and that my father had never graduated from high school. She refused to sign the final adoption papers. She only relented a few months later when my parents promised that I would someday go to college.

And 17 years later I did go to college. But I naively chose a college that was almost as expensive as Stanford, and all of my working-class parents’ savings were being spent on my college tuition. After six months, I couldn’t see the value in it. I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life and no idea how college was going to help me figure it out. And here I was spending all of the money my parents had saved their entire life. So I decided to drop out and trust that it would all work out OK. It was pretty scary at the time, but looking back it was one of the best decisions I ever made. The minute I dropped out I could stop taking the required classes that didn’t interest me, and begin dropping in on the ones that looked interesting.

It wasn’t all romantic. I didn’t have a dorm room, so I slept on the floor in friends’ rooms, I returned coke bottles for the 5¢ deposits to buy food with, and I would walk the 7 miles across town every Sunday night to get one good meal a week at the Hare Krishna temple. I loved it. And much of what I stumbled into by following my curiosity and intuition turned out to be priceless later on. Let me give you one example:

Reed College at that time offered perhaps the best calligraphy instruction in the country. Throughout the campus every poster, every label on every drawer, was beautifully hand calligraphed. Because I had dropped out and didn’t have to take the normal classes, I decided to take a calligraphy class to learn how to do this. I learned about serif and san serif typefaces, about varying the amount of space between different letter combinations, about what makes great typography great. It was beautiful, historical, artistically subtle in a way that science can’t capture, and I found it fascinating.

None of this had even a hope of any practical application in my life. But ten years later, when we were designing the first Macintosh computer, it all came back to me. And we designed it all into the Mac. It was the first computer with beautiful typography. If I had never dropped in on that single course in college, the Mac would have never had multiple typefaces or proportionally spaced fonts. And since Windows just copied the Mac, it’s likely that no personal computer would have them. If I had never dropped out, I would have never dropped in on this calligraphy class, and personal computers might not have the wonderful typography that they do. Of course it was impossible to connect the dots looking forward when I was in college. But it was very, very clear looking backwards ten years later.

Again, you can’t connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something — your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. This approach has never let me down, and it has made all the difference in my life.

My second story is about love and loss.

I was lucky — I found what I loved to do early in life. Woz and I started Apple in my parents garage when I was 20. We worked hard, and in 10 years Apple had grown from just the two of us in a garage into a $2 billion company with over 4000 employees. We had just released our finest creation — the Macintosh — a year earlier, and I had just turned 30. And then I got fired. How can you get fired from a company you started? Well, as Apple grew we hired someone who I thought was very talented to run the company with me, and for the first year or so things went well. But then our visions of the future began to diverge and eventually we had a falling out. When we did, our Board of Directors sided with him. So at 30 I was out. And very publicly out. What had been the focus of my entire adult life was gone, and it was devastating.

I really didn’t know what to do for a few months. I felt that I had let the previous generation of entrepreneurs down – that I had dropped the baton as it was being passed to me. I met with David Packard and Bob Noyce and tried to apologize for screwing up so badly. I was a very public failure, and I even thought about running away from the valley. But something slowly began to dawn on me — I still loved what I did. The turn of events at Apple had not changed that one bit. I had been rejected, but I was still in love. And so I decided to start over.

I didn’t see it then, but it turned out that getting fired from Apple was the best thing that could have ever happened to me. The heaviness of being successful was replaced by the lightness of being a beginner again, less sure about everything. It freed me to enter one of the most creative periods of my life.

During the next five years, I started a company named NeXT, another company named Pixar, and fell in love with an amazing woman who would become my wife. Pixar went on to create the worlds first computer animated feature film, Toy Story, and is now the most successful animation studio in the world. In a remarkable turn of events, Apple bought NeXT, I returned to Apple, and the technology we developed at NeXT is at the heart of Apple’s current renaissance. And Laurene and I have a wonderful family together.

I’m pretty sure none of this would have happened if I hadn’t been fired from Apple. It was awful tasting medicine, but I guess the patient needed it. Sometimes life hits you in the head with a brick. Don’t lose faith. I’m convinced that the only thing that kept me going was that I loved what I did. You’ve got to find what you love. And that is as true for your work as it is for your lovers. Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven’t found it yet, keep looking. Don’t settle. As with all matters of the heart, you’ll know when you find it. And, like any great relationship, it just gets better and better as the years roll on. So keep looking until you find it. Don’t settle.

My third story is about death.

When I was 17, I read a quote that went something like: “If you live each day as if it was your last, someday you’ll most certainly be right.” It made an impression on me, and since then, for the past 33 years, I have looked in the mirror every morning and asked myself: “If today were the last day of my life, would I want to do what I am about to do today?” And whenever the answer has been “No” for too many days in a row, I know I need to change something.

Remembering that I’ll be dead soon is the most important tool I’ve ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything — all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure – these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important. Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart.

About a year ago I was diagnosed with cancer. I had a scan at 7:30 in the morning, and it clearly showed a tumor on my pancreas. I didn’t even know what a pancreas was. The doctors told me this was almost certainly a type of cancer that is incurable, and that I should expect to live no longer than three to six months. My doctor advised me to go home and get my affairs in order, which is doctor’s code for prepare to die. It means to try to tell your kids everything you thought you’d have the next 10 years to tell them in just a few months. It means to make sure everything is buttoned up so that it will be as easy as possible for your family. It means to say your goodbyes.

I lived with that diagnosis all day. Later that evening I had a biopsy, where they stuck an endoscope down my throat, through my stomach and into my intestines, put a needle into my pancreas and got a few cells from the tumor. I was sedated, but my wife, who was there, told me that when they viewed the cells under a microscope the doctors started crying because it turned out to be a very rare form of pancreatic cancer that is curable with surgery. I had the surgery and I’m fine now.

This was the closest I’ve been to facing death, and I hope it’s the closest I get for a few more decades. Having lived through it, I can now say this to you with a bit more certainty than when death was a useful but purely intellectual concept:

No one wants to die. Even people who want to go to heaven don’t want to die to get there. And yet death is the destination we all share. No one has ever escaped it. And that is as it should be, because Death is very likely the single best invention of Life. It is Life’s change agent. It clears out the old to make way for the new. Right now the new is you, but someday not too long from now, you will gradually become the old and be cleared away. Sorry to be so dramatic, but it is quite true.

Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma — which is living with the results of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of others’ opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.

When I was young, there was an amazing publication called The Whole Earth Catalog, which was one of the bibles of my generation. It was created by a fellow named Stewart Brand not far from here in Menlo Park, and he brought it to life with his poetic touch. This was in the late 1960′s, before personal computers and desktop publishing, so it was all made with typewriters, scissors, and polaroid cameras. It was sort of like Google in paperback form, 35 years before Google came along: it was idealistic, and overflowing with neat tools and great notions.

Stewart and his team put out several issues of The Whole Earth Catalog, and then when it had run its course, they put out a final issue. It was the mid-1970s, and I was your age. On the back cover of their final issue was a photograph of an early morning country road, the kind you might find yourself hitchhiking on if you were so adventurous. Beneath it were the words: “Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish.” It was their farewell message as they signed off. Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish. And I have always wished that for myself. And now, as you graduate to begin anew, I wish that for you.

Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish.

Thank you all very much.

This morning we officially announced that fortyninegroup is the new Sponsorship Sales and Strategic Marketing provider for Set Up Events.

Set Up Events was founded in 1994 by Bill and Lynda Scott. Bill has an extensive history in endurance sports and events. In the early ’80s, he worked at Southland Corporation, then owners of the 7-Eleven chain. Bill was behind the marketing of the famous 7-Eleven cycling team, with Eric Heiden (1980 Olympic Gold medalist in speed skating). Southland sponsored the cycling venue at the 1984 Olympics in Los Angeles, where nine Americans medaled. The 7-Eleven team turned pro after the Olympics, and went on to race the Giro d’Italia in 1985 and the Tour de France in 1986, becoming one of the major teams in international cycling. Which set the stage for the Motorola and US Postal teams to take over sponsorship from Southland in 1990.

Based in Wilmington, NC, Set Up Events has grown from 1 event in 1994 to well over 100 events in 2011 across 8 states in the mid-Atlantic region. Set Up is now one of the nation’s largest producers of triathlons. We’re extremely excited to be working with Bill and his team. As the sport of triathlon continues to grow, Set Up Events, and our Strategic Marketing and Sponsorship Sales will work to accelerate that growth with new events, new partnerships and new marketing initiatives. There’s something to be said for announcing this the week of  7.11 We’re looking forward to a great ride!

I had one of those “convergence of thoughts” reminders the other day. In the content and tech business sectors it has recently been impossible to go a day without a story on Netflix – further evidence this morning – a WSJ story on Netflix being added to the S&P 500 (kicking out the NYTimes and Kodak). Netflix is, to put it mildly, on fire at the moment. I’m not a subscriber or shareholder, and truthfully don’t have enough time to watch much recreational television. However a couple of weeks ago, I started ruminating over the value proposition of an unlimited $7.99 streaming option, that also allows me to view shows and movies on my iPhone and iPad, and also comes with a one month free trial. And I used that pricepoint to draw a direct comparison to unlimited mobile music subscriptions – currently at about $9.99/month from Napster, Mog, Rhapsody and Rdio (note – Pandora is not in this list as it’s a radio experience and not truly interactive). None of these services even offer a 30 day free trial – 14 days is the maximum. I think you can see where I’m going here… unlimited video – $7.99/month – unlimited music $9.99/month. (Napster also offers an $8/month annual plan but it can’t be canceled at any time like Netflix). The question in my mind has been, what makes labels (who are driving this pricing model) think their product is worth a 25% premium over video?

Earlier this week, I read a thoughtful post about Facebook Jumping The Shark on AdAge. In it, Judy Shapiro referenced a Clay Shirky blog article titled The Collapse Of Complex Business Models which draws inspiration from Joseph Tainter’s Collapse Of Complex Societies. In his entry, Shirky uses the analogy of cost-efficient television production to illustrate his “collapse” analogy. If you read the posting, you can see that it’s actually analogous to all 20th century media distribution forms  - print, TV, radio and of course, the packaged content that fills those media types.

So my convergence thought was the perpetual notion of collapse, as applied to the music industry, tied to this seemingly high value low cost offer from Netflix. Putting on the consumer’s hat it’s clear that the Netflix offer is a value proposition – it offers something the consumer can’t get (TV shows and movies when they want), something that they could want for a very attractive price, and I anticipate that the streaming subscription will be an enormous business for Netflix and their content suppliers. Conversely, a $10 mobile subscription for music is as dead in the water as a $10 online subscription was 5 years ago. A little business, with struggling players and no breakout service, with labels impeding the companies’ success (due to punitive content costs) and ensuring their own slow motion collapse. Razor thin margins for the services, and no money left on the table for marketing. And the collateral damage, labels are driving away innovation which has historically helped the music business model.

Back to the question – what makes music think their product is worth more than video? Purely on the basis of numbers, and the value to the consumer, if Netflix has set the market price of $7.99 for video, what is the potential market price for a mobile subscription music service? It certainly isn’t $10 – I’m going to say it’s $1.99 and it should just be buried in your carrier bill.

That’s what I’ve thought for a number of years and those are the thoughts that converged once again this week.

I’m by no means alone in my perception that Facebook’s mission is to become the Internet. I’m a proponent of open standards, open software, open platforms and an open internet, the past several months have made me feel that the online world is coalescing around two internets – Facebook’s version of the internet and THE internet. Like us, most companies have had to replicate their online presence on Facebook, as an acknowledgement of the traffic, audience and opportunity. And this replication process has become a business for us, as it has for other firms in the digital strategy sphere. Further, last month – for the first time – more referrals landed on our site from Facebook than Google. So why am I bothered by this?

Frankly, it feels regressive, rather than progressive. Facebook’s walled garden approach immediately recalls AOL’s halcyon days of 1995 – 2003, back when AOL was the internet for over 22 million dial up subscribers. And those 22+ million had not yet discovered that there was also an ACTUAL internet outside the walled garden. Eventually technology caught up with AOL, as those dial up subs migrated to faster connections, bringing down the walls on their AOL world and opening them up to the internet beyond the walled garden. So here we are at the end of 2010. A lifetime later in digital years. And Facebook has obliterated the objectives and promise that AOL once saw as their domain and re-imagined the internet as a 2.0 version of the portal – of AOL.

But hang on… because we’re at the very early days of the social web, a 1.0 period if you will. The social experience is now mature, and 25% of internet users are on Facebook. And yet, it’s only beginning. Which means Facebook’s easy growth is behind it, as AOL’s easy growth was between 1994 and 2001. The social web has already claimed one high profile victim – MySpace. And LinkedIn is clearly emerging as the victor over Plaxo in the corporate social network race. As the herd moves (and moves quickly) more fragmentation is on the horizon and new entities will emerge as both the social graph and social connectivity expand.

If you’re intrigued by the notion of this current status of Social Networking, where it came from, and where it could be going, TechCrunch (owned by AOL) has run a 3-part series on Social Networking – Past, Present and Future by Mark Suster of GRP Partners. In the series, Mark has effectively framed the growth of the social web as we now know it. I’ve embedded his entire presentation below, and it’s a worth a review. As is his narrative on TechCrunch – and if you want, you can read it on Facebook!

Social Networks: Past, Present & Future –

Huge performance at Ironman Arizona yesterday (11.21.10). Chrissie Welllington, 3xIronman World Champion set a World Record time for women at an Ironman sanctioned event. 8:36:13 – broken down into splits means 51:56 for the 2.4 mile swim, 4:47:06 for the 112 mile bike ride and an unbelievable 2:52.55 marathon run. And what does an 8:36:13 mean in terms of relative performance – that time was strong enough for 8th place overall among the men and women. She ran the fourth fastest marathon, and the second place female, Linsey Corbin, (who finished 20th overall) was a full 29:20 behind her. Chrissie had already put her stamp on the sport with 3 consecutive Ironman World Championships (2007-2009), but contracted West Nile prior to this years’s event and so dropped out. Quite the bounce back! Congratulations Chrissie!

My much-beloved 2008 Specialized S-Works finally packed it in about 10 days before Ironman Florida. Seen here, during an IM race in 2008, the bike was extremely fast and I continued to get faster with it over the 2.5 years of riding it. But 10,000 miles and the extreme South Florida conditions of heat, salt and wet road training caused the steering to literally seize, meaning it was not all that safe to ride anymore! The frame has been shipped back to Specialized for their assessment. I love that bike… with that kind of mileage on it, at an average of 20 miles per hour, I’ve spent over 500 hours in its saddle. And at $4k for a frame, $8/hour is amazing entertainment value – especially considering the fitness level those hours provide as added value and benefits.

So I decided to move all the components over to a new frame, a Cervélo P4. Fellow Canadians Gerard Vroomen and Phil White have been building incredible performance and aero speed machines since 1995. Cervélo is typically the most common bike in any triathlon transition zone and the P4 represents their current highest design achievement and performance statement. Certainly it feels fast – I’ve only done about 100 miles on it so far to shake it out. However, at this level of bike performance, there is only an incremental difference between any two bikes. The true speed comes from the person in the saddle and Pros of the caliber of Fabian Cancellera, Chris Lieto or Chrissie Wellington would have blindingly fast TT times on either of these two bikes – once their fit is dialed in. I’m just a racy Age Group triathlete, but all the 100 mile training rides in September and October is making the P4 feel faster than the S-Works. It’s certainly stiffer, and holds its speed more easily. We got the fit very close by moving the S-Works measurements over. And I’ve only tweaked it slightly since. The P4 lets me stretch out and get even lower and more aero than on the S-Works, which is probably contributing its sense of speed. I’ll miss the S-Works, but I’m already looking forward to putting the P4 to the test in races in 2011.

I read a local Miami story earlier this week that Charlie Crist, outgoing Governor of Florida was wrapping up his final responsibilities before vacating his office. It was anticipated that one of those responsibilities would include a full pardon of Jim Morrison, the late, lead singer of The Doors, for charges stemming from a March 1969 concert in Miami. The details of the event that night are well documented and certainly part of the Lizard King’s mystique and legend. Morrison, of course, died in Paris in July, 1971 while the two misdemeanors for which he was convicted (open profanity and indecent exposure) were going through the appeal process. And the convictions have remained in place.

The Doors music has moved in, around and through my life ever since Janice Youngren popped a quarter into the jukebox at McCracken’s Landing on Stony Lake in Ontario and played Riders On The Storm. In around 2003, while licensing content for MediaNet, I wanted to figure out how to get The Doors catalog included, as they weren’t available at all digitally anywhere at the time. An inquiry to my contacts Warner Music, who controlled Elektra (The Doors’ label), led me to Randall Wixen. Randall was the Wixen of Wixen Music Publishing, which administered the publishing rights for Jackson Browne and The Doors among other artists and composers and was the point of contact for any inbound business opportunities for the band. I explained what I was seeking to do – open the door to getting the band’s music out digitally, that I wasn’t looking for any exclusivity, and that the label would handle distribution. Randall was cautious, but explained what I needed to do to make my pitch. “Write a personal letter to each of the three band members – Ray Manzarek, Robby Krieger and John Densmore, as well as the Morrison estate. They will discuss it and get back to me.” And that’s what I did. A month later I called Randall, and he said the band had approved it. I thanked Randall, and asked him to thank the band for me. My next call was to Warner, to let them know. And a month or so later, we had The Doors music in all our digital services at the time.

Shortly after moving to Coconut Grove in 2000, I mentioned to friends that I wanted to see a show at the Coconut Grove Convention Center, and asked them if they knew where it was. Little did I know that I’d driven past it a hundred times already at that point. They responded by saying it’s at Dinner Key… that it’s the old Dinner Key Auditorium. To which I replied… Dinner Key… isn’t that where Jim Morrison was arrested? I was out of their orbit at that point, but sure enough, the drab, grey concrete bunker and former Pan Am hangar on Bayshore that I’ve driven past and run past thousands of times, and ridden by a couple of times a week for years (including this morning) is of course “that” place. Now though, it’s mostly home to gun and knife shows – and not much else.

So it’s to-be-determined if Governor Crist can accomplish what he’s set as one of his final goals in office, some 42 years after the alleged incident took place. I wasn’t there – I was way too young and living in Toronto, so I can’t say what actually happened that March night in Miami in 1969. However, this might be Jim’s best shot, and would wipe up a smudge for the Morrison family. And give Doors fans and campaigners a moral victory. At best it’s a curiosity… even more so when you watch the news coverage… a footnote of relevance in 2010… miles from 1969 but strangely not too distant from The Beatles’ decision to now be on iTunes. But then, if The Beatles’ catalog can finally be available to buy digitally, I’m beginning to think anything may be possible.

The availability of Beatles tracks and albums in iTunes is, understatedly, long overdue. The standoff and speculation has been documented endlessly elsewhere, as have the specific issues that have existed between Apple Computer (now Apple Inc. and Apple Corp. I’ll add a couple of points to the stories. Back in the early days of digital licensing… late 2001… exactly 9 years ago, MediaNet (then known as MusicNet) was partly owned by EMI, who hold the distribution rights for the Beatles repertoire. One of the first things I did at MediaNet was to analyze all the catalogs we were missing before launching what is now a laughably small library of 60,000 tracks from BMG, WMG and EMI in a legal subscription service. And I clearly remember, after alphabetizing my spreadsheet of outliers, going to Alan McGlade, MediaNet’s CEO and saying “Alan, we have a real problem with the B’s”. Because we were missing The Beach Boys, The Beastie Boys, Garth Brooks, and The Beatles. All EMI artists. 9 years later, the problem with the B’s is now down to 25% of that original assessment, as with The Beatles finally joining the party, it’s only Garth Brooks who is still sitting on the digital sidelines. Still, that’s 9 years… in case anyone was looking for further evidence that the music business moves at a pace best described as glacial. It’s also worth mentioning that The Beatles catalog was one of the last to be released on CD.

But I will also add this point. One of the top traffic drivers to this blog comes from a post I wrote about the 40th anniversary of the Abbey Road album. So in spite of the slow pace of adoption of digital distribution by Apple Corp., in the digital world the curiosity for and interest in The Beatles and their music endures.

I finished Seth Godin’s book LINCHPIN yesterday on a flight back to Miami from NYC. Without taking away from Seth’s premise, LINCHPIN extolls the merits of the creation of art as a core element of your life’s pursuit. Art, doesn’t mean sculpting, painting, while that is by virtue “art”(or can be), but as it pertains to business, it’s really about creating uniqueness through passion and discernment. Seth argues that the post-industrial work model has been inherently flawed, and through the creation of art and giving, work – both what it is, and what it will be – is changing. LINCHPIN is a great read – and a great thinkpiece on the ability to effect change in work and organizations.

Interesting times for the World Triathlon Corporation, owners of the Ironman brand. As 1) a repeat Ironman competitor myself, at both full (140.6) and 70.3 distances, 2) a professional who works with brands everyday and 3) respects the Ironman brand… although I don’t have it tattooed on me… it’s intriguing to watch the stumbles made by WTC this year.

Ironman is one of the most revered human performance brands on the planet. Not only is it an extraordinary test of individual physical achievement and endurance, it’s one of the only sports where normal people can line up alongside world champions on the starting line. Because of what it takes to just complete an Ironman, competitors are passionate about the mark, as they are about the sport of triathlon. It’s a lot more than a Sunday afternoon thumb exercise to do a triathlon. And to complete an Ironman is a huge commitment for an individual, and usually for their family. So finishers, rightfully or not, feel they own a piece of the brand, which is why you see so many M-dot tattoos on competitors. Additionally, the sport of triathlon is exploding – as these stats from usatriathlon.org show.

In 2010, in addition to launching several new full Ironman and 70.3 series events, here is what WTC has done:

• They launched a magazine, Lava. OK… with the dead tree business in decline WTC is going against the grain. How many magazines has Conde Nast, Time Warner or Hearst launched in 2010. A better question would be – how many did they fold? Look, Ironman is trying, and  I suppose WTC could know the print business better than the aforementioned publishers, however isn’t it a matter of priorities and resource management? Ironman’s website truly does not do the brand justice. Especially when you compare it to any other major sports brand such as the NBA, MLB or NHL, or even the sport’s governing body usatriathlon.org or Slowtwitch, a site that does a phenomenal job of covering the sport of triathlon. Add to that underwhelming video coverage of events, weak social network integration, no iPhone or Android Apps, no iPad App. But a magazine… ok… why was that a priority again? Ego battle with Triathlete magazine perhaps? Ironman is not in the content creation, content packaging and content distribution business – it’s a brand licensing and brand marketing business. But if you’re going to play in or make a bet in the content world – better to make that bet with a medium that is growing (mobile), rather  than contracting (print).
• 5i50 or is it 5150. I’m confused. Is that still an Ironman, or what. Ironman is a platinum brand. Diluting the brand, devaluing the brand equity correspondingly devalues the enterprise. Earlier this month, WTC announced a new series of Olympic distance races called the 5i50. Sure WTC wants a piece of the action in shorter, entry level events – what’s next, Sprint distance races? The number of triathlons in the US alone has grown from 800 per year a decade ago to over 1800 today, so inevitably some Sprint-esque WTC event series will follow the 5i50 announcement. This only serves to weaken the core Ironman brand. Maybe you’ve heard of baseball… it’s played everywhere. But there is only one World Series. Find a way to work with the shorter races – provide entries to various IM events for series winners in regions. In other words, support the feeder, aspirational races to the benefit of the IM brand. But don’t steamroll them or be threatened by them and try to own the sport entirely. Nurture and protect the Ironman brand.
• It’s evidence of a systemic problem when the three-time Kona winner speaks out against World Triathlon Corporation. Such was the case earlier this year, when Chrissie Wellington, Kona’s 2007-2009 Women’s champ wrote this thoughtful and articulate post taking WTC to task for performance levels, registration fees and prize money. Ironman made Chrissie Wellington, but now Ironman needs her to be an inspiration for others to aspire to her level of success, and WTC needs her to be a proponent of the Ironman brand, not a detractor. Good for her for speaking out.
• And lastly… Wednesday evening I received an e-mail invitation to a new Ironman “Access” program. For a $1000 annual membership, I would be given opportunities to register in advance for selected IM events, 2 VIP passes per registered event, a one year subscription to Lava magazine(!), a 2011 Lottery entry and second chance, a 2010 Kona DVD, 20% off IM merch and a membership card. I don’t need to say how I felt. Triathlon is already an expensive sport. $550 to enter an event. You typically have to sign up a year in advance of an event. There is no transfer policy or rollover policy if you can’t make a race. I was supposed to race in the Ironman at Couer d’Alene in Idaho this past June, but couldn’t because of a foot injury encountered earlier in the year. I would have given… given my registration to another athlete to enjoy but couldn’t. I’ve recovered enough to do Ironman Florida this November, but that’s beside the point. WTC is owned by Providence Equity, a Private Equity firm which purchased WTC in 2008. Like any good PE, they’re probably looking for 50-100% ROI per year, as they should… that’s their business. If it feels like WTC stands for We’ll Take (Your) Cash, that’s why. Last night, I received a second e-mail, with a link to a video from Ben Fertic, WTC’s CEO. 24 hours later, Ironman canceled Access, as a result of the howling negative reaction to the program. So did WTC float Access or test a response to the program across a group of active Ironman competitors. Was the $500K the program might have drawn in worth the beating the brand and WTC took? Wouldn’t the time developing Access have better spent working on product licensing, sponsorship, applying positive attributes to the brand through Mobile Apps,or tweaking the site perhaps??? Maybe these tactics are all in progress. If not, my company would be pleased to help.

The fact is, Ironman is not Coke. People don’t tattoo a Coke logo on their legs, arms, neck or torso. They don’t define who they are through the mark on a can of soda. But they do with the M-dot, the Ironman logo. As a brand, Ironman needs to protect the incredible equity entrenched in that logo, and bounce every dumbass idea for the growth, pimping and exploitation of the brand against a series of enshrined core values. And it’s a challenge, to Watch The Core… to preserve the core brand equity and grow the business. But then, so is 140.6 miles of swimming, biking and running.