OFFICIAL RULES

So you know how there are operations during times of war? Well, we have a war of our own to fight here in the tech world.

In a only-geek world, we will all fail. We all need to start evangelizing our passions and interests.

A lot of the talk around the blogosphere, the techosphere and even here at Blog Media Expo has been about “How will we get technology to the Mainstream?” The definition of mainstream as I see it is people’s moms, uncles, cousins, basically anyone nongeek. I use the phrase geek lovingly. I’m a geek, and if you’re reading this right now, you’re probably a geek too.

Startups like Twitter and Last.fm work really hard creating cool things for people to use. A lot of what we create is meant to make our lives easier and more entertaining. Twitter for example, lets you communicate in near realtime with people on an open and mass scale. Awesomesauce!

But what about Mom? Will she ever use Twitter? Does she have a need to use Twitter? Sure she does. Now it’s our job to show her why, and every other nongeek out there.

Operation mainSTREAM is an initiative that Strands is spearheading, and not taking lightly in any sense. We believe that companies like Pandora deserve to be known outside of our circles, and we’re going to get it done in a number of ways. We need your help though. And rest assured, we’re putting a lot behind this. I’ve worked for startups, I have friends who make great things for other companies, but they never get used by anyone outside of our respective spheres. We’re changing that.

oOo means “One on One”, and I was told once that One on One doesn’t scale. I call bull, lets make it scale.

To start Operation mainSTREAM we’re announcing a fun “contest” of sorts to start the ball rolling.

We’ll load you up with Strands invites, and you’ll send them out. Pretty simple. If someone signs up for Strands through you between October 1st and November 1st, you get credit for them. But invite as many nongeeks as possible, thats the point!!!

You can win a prize for you and for your nongeek friend. I happen to like Apple products and know a bunch of people who would love to join the cult There will be tons of fun videos like the ones I’ve been making too, and you should make them as well! Do a demo of Flickr or Delicious with Grandma and film it!

Along the way, we’ll be announcing other initiatives, meetups, and more so keep an eye on this space!!!!

Personally? I’m going to be visiting old folks homes, hanging out with some soccer moms, and hey…maybe some lawyers, to let them know why technology and your personal presence online is important.

Startups, if you’d like to join the initiative, email me at drew at strands dot com and we’ll discuss how you can help us geeks empower and teach our nongeeky friends on how to use your service. Strands would not be possible without your cool apps and sites!

So to get started, what is Strands? Strands is an internet site that lets you bring all of the cool stuff you do online into one place, where other people can discover it, comment on it, and mark them as liked or not. Songs you listen to, bookmarks you share, photos you take, videos you dig on YouTube. The more you interact, the better stuff you’ll find.