NateTharp.com

Smart Car + A-Team Van = A-Team Smart Car

It really doesn’t get much better than this.

“Cowardice asks the question, ‘Is it safe?’ Expediency asks the question, ‘Is it politic?’ Vanity asks the question, ‘Is it popular?’ But, conscience asks the question, ‘Is it right?’ And there comes a time when one must take a position that is neither safe, nor politic, nor popular, but one must take it because one’s conscience tells one that it is right.”

- Martin Luther King, Jr.

We’re finally seeing some decisions being made on conscience. Time will tell if they are in fact right or not. But the means by which decisions are made is a refresshing change.

“Don’t worry Craig, the war is over and you lost. But Germany and Japan lost too, and they’re doing alright.”
- Friend to Craig Fergussen just prior to Craig checking into a U.K. drug and alcohol treatment center.

With the way the world is right now, we could all probably use a little pick-me-up like this to help us see the big picture.

The under-the-radar and highly underrated social networking site Virb has relaunched their site with an amazing new design and a slew of new features. The site has made aggregating your footprint on the web extremely convenient, and personalizing the appearance of your profile without crapping it up like you can on MySpace is very easy as well. One of the biggest announcements just might be their expanded partnership with MediaTemple, the world-class hosting provider.

When would be the best time for a career networking site to really find it’s footing, release some great new features and gain name recognition with the public? Well right before a major recession of course. And that’s exactly what LinkedIn has done. They couldn’t have timed this better if they’d planned it.

Some sound career and life advice from Derek Powazek and his series of work stories titled “Things I Learned the Hard Way.”

A Berlin-based artist has interpreted some of the iconic aspects of living in New York in Lego form. The taxi lights are a great educational tool for travelers.

Andy Budd on Social Media Consultants and their effect [read: harm] on the realm of social media.

It reminds me of a guy I met while traveling many years ago. He was an ethnographic researcher employed by a big oil company to asses the impact oil pipelines would have on the indigenous population. He loved tribal culture so much he desperately wanted to work in the field, even if that meant being partly responsible for the destruction of the very thing he loved.

That may be the true measure of a professions success. Doing more good than harm.