Fun!  MyYahoo! wants everyone to export OPML files and read them into MyYahoo! but they don’t want to have you do the reverse – read out MyYahoo! feeds and read them into Google Reader.  You’ll notice there are no instructions for that….

I tried a tip from Jeremy Zawodny’s blog - but it’s an old post and did not really work too well.  At least Jeremy Zawodny gets it….too bad Yahoo! doesn’t  "get it". 

It’s not about MyYahoo!  It’s about US – MyYahoo! gets demoted, in my opinion because it’s one way communication – Yahoo! wants your eyeballs – they don’t care one bit about the visitor.   Well, MyYahoo! just lost my vote.  You get my respect when I can both import feed to MyYahoo! and export them….allow me to decide where I’m going to read my data – don’t try to lock me into a bind – that’s why Yahoo! does not "get it".

Reminds me, while I’m on the subject.   Google’s management style has been criticized quite a bit for being too loose, too fly by the hip.  Yet, compared to Yahoo! and to other places I know of, there’s wisdom in being a little disorganized, if you want to call it that.

For example – so many companies spend time on "fall plans" and justifying every drop of money – fighting like a bunch of monkeys over scraps – and this happens every year – and meanwhile – while all this is going on – important work can’t be done as well because each part of a company is fighting for the scraps.   The companies fall behind to the competitors. 

Sure, I understand "green" money needs to find it’s way to the right projects – but in the process of haggling over every cent more is lost than gained.  I think Google has it right.  Rather than spending all their energy fighting over which project to fund – they make some basic decisions and let the rest just "happen".  But look at where Google is today…..if they spent all their energy fighting over every cent each department, group and project gets – they’d be much less left over to innovate – which is the engine of growth.

First carry away from this – Yahoo – make MyYahoo! feeds exportable – stop playing the game of luring people to use MyYahoo! then trapping them there – they should know better than this.

Second carry away – it’s better to be too loose in your management style than to be too tight – yearly budget haggling might actually cost more than it saves.  And I bet all of this haggling is to convince investors that company is healthy – the net outcome might be to make a company less healthy, less competitive.

Ok, I get it.  Be daring and innovative, and even though it’s risky, your actually 50 times less likely to be fired than if your just conventional and don’t make waves.  Did I get that right?  I think that’s what Seth Godin is saying in his latest post on the 50:1 rule.

"At least once a day, I get mail from people worrying that if they are too remarkable, too edgy, too willing to cause change and growth… they’re risking getting fired. I almost never get mail from people who figure that if they keep doing the same boring thing day in and day out at their fading company that they’re going to lose their jobs in a layoff."

"…..50 employees lose their jobs because the business just faded away for every one who is singled out and fired for violating a silly policy and taking care of a customer first."

What I get out of this – follow your dream – even if takes you to the unemployment line – because your actually less likely to end up there (and stay on that line) if you follow your dream than if you play it safe – 50 times less.

Just to keep readers of WebMetricsGuru.com up to date, I’m working on several high power interviews of well known individuals in Marketing including Drew Ianni,  the new ad:tech chair and host of ad:tech next week – in connection with coverage of Ad-Tech NY).  I know this is an interview Lee Odden wanted to do and I’ll try to live up to his standard of quality (Lee’s got one of the best blogs for internet marketing – i read it all the time).

I’m also working on an Interview of June Li who will be speaking at the EMetrics Summit in 10 days.  I should have both interviews posted here by midweek.

And while we’re at it, talking about interviews, I have done one hell of an Interview with Fred Stonehouse, over at www.ArtNewYorkCity.com; I’m told by friend, Amy Crehore, that this interview of Fred Stonehouse made Art History.  I hope so. 

One standard I have it to try to find out something about the person I’m interviewing that has not appeared anywhere else.  I did that with Joe Coleman’s interview in ArtNewYorkCity.com when I asked him what role the Internet played in Joe Coleman’s work – no one else ever asked him that. 

Keep an eye out for both interviews, Drew Ianni and June Li, next week – here at WebMetricsGuru.com