RIP Bonnie

This episode of The Bunker Project is dedicated to the memory of Bonnie Sainsbury. She passed away a few weeks after the recording of this episode. She will be missed.

After FIVE long years, the Bunker Project returns for a special reunion and of course we produced a new episode.

This time we get together at Bob's new art gallery in New Westminster. Instead of drinking our traditional Brewmaster Black Lager from Okanogan Springs, Bob and I found a cool black lager from Steel and Oak brewed right here in New Westminster.

We start the show with a round table introduction segment and everyone lets us know what they have been up to during the last five years.

* Randal Orser* Stephanie Michelle Scott* Margaret Reynolds* Paul "The Rock God"* Bob Garlick* Marcel Lapointe* Bonnie Sainsbury* Astrid Lister* Satomi Hirano* James Karg* Ken McGrath* Andrew McGivern

Norm calls the voicemail feedback line to say hello and also asks the question: What is the future of Podcasting?

This is a great question and we tackle this question in classic Bunker fashion with lots of opinions and ideas on the topic.

Later in the episode, we each share a favourite Bunker Project Episode.

* The Chocolate Tasting Episode* Vancouver is Bullshit* Social Media is Bullshit* Simon King fills in for Andrew (at the BonJovi concert)* Matt Astifan brings a friend* The Halloween episode* Bonnie's Twitter Secret* Social Media Club joins the Bunker Project* Stanley Cup Riots (during the show)* The Bunker joins the Social Media Club* Japan invades the Bunker Project* The Mighty Quin visits the Bunker* DJ Lefty performs live during the Bunker* The Wix Meetup - podcasting 101* We are Bunker Bitches* James co-hosts the show (while Bob is away)* Astrid Christmas episode

Other topics include:

* Social Media Trolls* Instagram TV* The popularity of knitting* Podcasting vs Youtube for monetization* Greta Thunberg* and much, much, much more...

Apple Keynote: iPhone 6 Plus, Apple Watch, and Apple Pay

https://podcasthero.com/163survey

Are you an Apple Fanboy?

We start off the show with a Round Table introduction as usual:

The question of the night is “Are you an Apple Fanboy?”

Sanj Sukerkar – @genesysdesign

Not in the slightest… Android all the way.

Bonnie Sainsbury – @bsainsbury

She has nothing against Apple… if you like inferior technology

People have tried to convert her to Apple but have failed miserably because she doesn’t like being forced to do things their way.

Margaret Reynolds – @bc_insurancegal

Margaret prefers Android for a number of reasons. She used to use an iPhone and switched to Android and has been much happier since then.

Andrew McGivern – @podcasthero

Andrew is not an Apple fanboy but also isn’t a Google Fanboy either.

Andrew, despite not being an Apple fanboy decides to take the play the role of the Apple Fanboy because all of our regular Apple Fanboys are not at today’s Bunker Project show.

Only Andrew watched the Keynote (through TWIT due to not having an iOS device or MAC to watch it).

Andrew asks the group what they think about Apple limiting the live Keynote to Apple devices and browsers?

The consensus is it was a bad move to limit it to existing customers. Margaret believes it is rude to force the use of their own devices. Andrew said perhaps they do this to restrict access due to bandwidth issues. Even with the live stream being limited to Apple Devices they crashed the stream.

Sanj brings up Steve Jobs thanked Bill Gates for saving Apple with a cash injection back in the day. And the fan boys were booing during that announcement.

We talk about Windows 8 and why it got bad reviews and press.

Do people expect too much from new tech products? How much innovation can there be each time?

The battery life is apparently great.

The camera looks like it kicks butt.

Andrew finds iOS to be a little more stable than Android. The rest of the crew don’t agree.

Tim Cook said that Android is like Europe… it is actually made up of a whole bunch of different things. We talk about whether we should be comparing hardware sales by manufacturer or Operating System market share.

We talk about the iPhone camera technology.

Bonnie brings up the new Samsung Edge which has a screen on the side of the phone. We talk about whether that is useful or not.

Has Apple invented anything?

Bonnie said there is a guy that will give you $100 000 if you can prove that Apple truly invented anything.

Everyone agrees that Apple is great at marketing products that they repackage with style and design.

Bonnie doesn’t like when Apple Fanboys take to Social Media to say how much better the iPhone is even though the new features have been on Android for years.

Andrew brings up the point that Apple has less than 20% market share and Google has 80% market share in devices shipped. But Android has only 3% of the podcast consumption. Why?

Apple embraced podcasting early by adding a podcast directory to iTunes. This made podcasts very discoverable on Apple devices (and Windows PC’s with iTunes installed).

Google (with the exception of Google Listen which is now gone) has done nothing to increase podcast discoverability.

Apple made the Podcast App a suggested app with iOS 7 which increased the number of people using the app dramatically. Now with iOS 8 the phone is a native (and can’t be deleted) app. This will increase podcast listening dramatically again!

Bonnie listens to podcasts on the podcasters websites.

Show 162 – Social Media Marketing for Lead Generation

The Bunker Project – episode 162

The Bunker Project is recorded with a live interactive studio audience. Join us for a show in person in downtown Vancouver or via Google + Hangout. Or watch live on Hangouts On Air.

The Bunker Project is brought to you by Okanagan Spring Brewmaster Black.

Mavens in the house:

Andrew McGivern   @podcasthero

Bob Garlick            @bobgarlick

Marcel Lapointe      Retired From the Internet

Bonnie Sainsbury     @bonniesainsbury

Margaret Reynolds    @bc_insurancegal

Marcel Lapointe @ Retired From The Internet

Sanj Sukerkar @genesysdesigns

Randall Orser @numbercrunchers

We start off the show with Bob and Andrew dueling with their note apps… Evernote for Bob and Onenote for Andrew

Round table introductions: Question – What Social Media Strategies should a business use if branding and community building is off the table. An example is a subway franchise owner or a Telus Dealership or a Manufacturers Rep where the branding and community building is done by the parent company and not by the individual business owner.

Bonnie says Twitter is what she would focus on in this case. She said normally she would say Inbound Marketing all the way but in this case, she would tweet about the location and the business.

Margaret said the Subway owner could tweet about the fresh bread coming out of the oven. Bonnie and Margaret talk about hijacking a hashtag that is trending in the geographic area or about a local event.

Margaret says to tweet about the location. If there is a sale on a product tweet out how many are left in stock for the day. For a restaurant, it works very well. A cupcake restaurant in Vancouver tweets about the cupcakes they are baking and then tweets when they are ready and they get flooded with people coming in.

Sanj said that a guy ordered a Penis Enlarger online and when he received the package it contained a magnifying glass!

Sanj follows people on Twitter that are in his geographic area and are talking about topics related to his service which is web design and SEO. He then engages with those people and become part of the conversation.

Randall suggests Linked In for business to business.

Andrew likes the Hubspot model where you have a landing page offering a white paper or report for free in exchange for an email address or a social share.

Bonnie said not to forget that there is overhead involved with maintaining an email list.

Bob said that Bonnie is right about using Twitter. The tweets have to be relevant to your target markets current situation. You're at the parade downtown with your kids and you get a tweet with a discount at Subway. It is relevant and has a call to action. It is quiet now… come in now before the parade to grab your lunch without a line.

We talk in detail about some great examples of using Social Media for lead generation. Listen to the episode to get hear what everyone had to say.

Norm calls into the show… Is Microsoft back in the game, Surface Pro 3, what is that all about? And the price…

Everyone chimes in on what they think about the Surface Pro 3.

Is the Beats acquisition good for Apple?

We talk about all the reasons (other than the cheap headphones) why Apple will benefit from the Beats deal.

Norm calls in to ask Bob about the new Sony mirrorless camera? Is it worth the money?

Bob explains what a mirrorless camera is and why you might want to consider buying one. He has lots of suggestions about cameras.

Andrew talks about True Caller which is a great way to identify spam and annoying calls. And once you get a call from someone you don’t know you can label it so other users of the app can know who is calling when they get the call from the same company.

Show 160 – The Norm Returns

The Bunker Project – episode 159

The Bunker Project is recorded with a live interactive studio audience. Join us for a show in person in downtown Vancouver or via Google + Hangout. Or watch live on Hangouts On Air.

The Bunker Project is brought to you by Okanagan Spring Brewmaster Black.

Mavens in the house:

Andrew McGivern   @podcasthero

Bob Garlick            @bobgarlick

Marcel Lapointe      Retired From the Internet

Bonnie Sainsbury     @bonniesainsbury

Margaret Reynolds    @bc_insurancegal

Now onto the feature content:

This week on The Bunker Project we have a ton of voicemail feedback so we get into the questions!

Bonnie has a few new projects that she can’t talk about most of them just yet. One of her projects is to create a blog in a niche that she is not an expert in. She is going to be public about the monetization process of building the blog. Her community on facebook will benefit from her case study by using it as a resource.

Today she talked about two resources: JVZoo and WSO’s and Andrew put a comment on that post -> warning: WSO’s and JVZoo’s can be highly addictive.

Bonnie is planning to make some $$$ from this new niche site.

Bonnie also took a search course from Google. She liked the graphic search before. She learned how to search within a URL properly.

Bob talks about how he uses Google Power Searching.

Margaret has been writing Amazon Books and has 4 eBooks published so far. She has written about Gluten Free, Anti-Aging, De-Cluttering and more.

Bob asks Margaret if she is using the books to attract an email list. She hasn’t done that and isn’t into it at the moment.

Margaret says that Bonnie and she will be calling into the Bunker Show from Panama or Costa Rica when they cash out in their new business.

We talk about the Lifestyle Business model where you don’t actually have to be rich to live a lifestyle traveling and enjoying a 9 to 5 free life. All you need is a small consistent monthly income that is location independent.

We talk about how Google Hangouts are great for building community.

Norm Calls in and brings up how all our information is out there on the internet.

Margaret says the info is only out there if you put it out there. Andrew and Bob say that your info is being mined whether you are making it easy for them or not.

Bob advises criminals to stay off the internet.

Norm calls in to say that it is amazing that Social Media is only 8 years old.

Bonnie believes email forums and online bulletin boards were a form of Social Media. They performed a lot of the functions that modern Social Networks do. She said that the only real difference is that Facebook has a graphical interface.

We talk about MSN, ICQ, Classmates.com, Myspace and of course Facebook, Twitter, etc.

Bonnie said the mainstream tech bloggers are predicting the end of social media. That there is crazy talk. Social Media is constantly evolving but isn’t dying.

We talk about how the end of Net Neutrality could destroy Social Media by preventing new start-ups from entering the market.

Andrew said that it is not, shame on the Telcos and Cable Companies… they are doing what they should be doing which is looking after their own interests. It is shame on us… we didn’t stick up for an open internet so we should be pointing the finger at ourselves.

Norm calls in again to talk about the FCC and how the new commissioner is slanted to the big companies and Net Neutrality in the United States.

Andrew said that if there was a lot of competition the government could stay out of the business but since the companies are basically government sponsored duopolies

Norm calls in to talk about his second favorite podcast – The Tech Guy… the Bu...

Show 159 – Email and Productivity

The Bunker Project – episode 159

The Bunker Project is recorded with a live interactive studio audience. Join us for a show in person in downtown Vancouver or via Google + Hangout. Or watch live on Hangouts On Air.

The Bunker Project is brought to you by Okanagan Spring Brewmaster Black.

Mavens in the house:

Andrew McGivern   @podcasthero

Bob Garlick            @bobgarlick

James Karg             @twisted_majic

Marcel Lapointe      Retired From the Internet

Bonnie Sainsbury     @bonniesainsbury

Margaret Reynolds    @bc_insurancegal

Now onto the feature content:

This week on The Bunker Project we talk about how we use email and organize our data.

Steve Dotton will be joining us on a future episode of The Bunker Project.

He was on two Maven Interviews episodes… check them out here.

Bonnie keeps everything in her email inbox and just searches for what she needs when she needs it. She forwards important things to Trello. Bonnie also usees Onenote and loves the screen capture feature.

Bob uses Apple Mail, Bonnie and Margaret uses Outlook and Andrew uses Gmail web interface but is considering switching to Outlook due to the Onenote integration.

Bob wonders if people are actually responding to emails on their smartphones. He likes having his email on his phone so he knows what he needs to do but he waits until he is on his computer in order to respond.

Bonnie talks about how she uses to do lists in Onenote. Bob uses his calendar to add notes and to do’s.

Andrew explains how he uses Onenote to add all the tasks and notes he needs for a meeting or contact. Again the Outlook integration is key here.

Bob asks if Evernote can be used that way. Andrew prefers Onenote due to the structure and the Outlook integration.

Bonnie still prefers the Google Calendar so she bought G Shift. An Outlook plugin that syncs Google Calendar both ways with Outlook. Andrew loves this idea and is going to get a similar app… GSyncIt.

We go on a Vancouver 420 tangent.

More talk about Onenote..

James joins us on the show and talks about his new job he accepted in Banglor India. James is excited about the new opportunity and is looking forward to it.

Bob and James talk about the Start Up community in Vancouver.

Andrew talks about Mevio going out of business and how everyone had to get their files out within a week.

James talks about Newsle and how it works.

We have a good conversation about Heartbleed.

Bob wants to know if retail stores will be around in a few years? Can they compete with the online retailers?

Andrew takes this one… Its all about convenience and service. Bonnie agrees and says that people like to deal with good people.

James wants Amazon Grocery…

James mentions the #fail for Vancouver for disallowing Food Trucks at 420 Vancouver.

Marcel wants James to start a podcast called Slum Karg Millionaire. Bob wants to restart his Are You Still In Asia podcast.

Bob talks about being an expat.

And that is it for another episode of the now infamous Bunker Project show.

Call Toll Free 1-877-636-1474 and join the conversation on the show….

Thanks to Okanagan Spring Brewery for sponsoring the show!

Check us out on Facebook for comments and fun photos from the shows.

Check out @BunkerLive for tweets and upcoming show topics. If you want to make a comment or suggest a topic let us know.

Crazy Image Talk

The Bunker Project – episode 158

The Bunker Project is recorded with a live interactive studio audience. Join us for a show in person in downtown Vancouver or via Google + Hangout. Or watch live on Hangouts On Air.

The Bunker Project is brought to you by Okanagan Spring Brewmaster Black.

Mavens in the house:

Andrew McGivern   @podcasthero

Nicol Butler         @nicolbutler

Bob Garlick            @bobgarlick

James Karg             @twisted_majic

Randall Orser          @numbercrunchers

Marcel Lapointe      Retired From the Internet

Bonnie Sainsbury     @bonniesainsbury

Margaret Reynolds    @bc_insurancegal

The International Woman of Mystery @ parts unkown

Now onto the feature content:

This week on The Bunker Project we talk about where to find good images for your website or podcast. Should you do a Google image search and grab an image there for free? Where to get affordable images? How to edit images quickly without expensive software? Should you shoot your own images?

We were going to talk about this last week but after a great talk about Interview Techniques, we decided to save this topic for this week…

Other topics covered:

Andrew’s idea for a new business model for MySpace

Meow Meow Beanz ???

Caking Bad – the breaking bad cake contest

Fiverr – Huge debate over whether fiverr is devaluing the market.

Driving with John Chow

Gaming with James – Entertainment with James? Or is Tech Insights with James.

And that is it for another episode of the now infamous Bunker Project show.

Call Toll Free 1-877-636-1474 and join the conversation on the show….

Thanks to Okanagan Spring Brewery for sponsoring the show!

Check us out on Facebook for comments and fun photos from the shows.

Check out @BunkerLive for tweets and upcoming show topics. If you want to make a comment or suggest a topic let us know.

Thanks to our new sponsor Okanagan Spring Brewery for sponsoring The Bunker Project. Brewmaster Black is the most popular beer at The Bunker Project and is our beer of choice.

Please rate our show in iTunes – Every five-star rating helps increase the exposure of the show. Also if you like the show please leave a comment or ask a question below, on iTunes or at our Meetup.com page!

About The Bunker Project

The underground Bunker Project is a meetup focused on Social Media, Internet Marketing, New Media, and Podcasting. Set in the Bunker at the Barklay Hotel on Robson St. in Vancouver, The Bunker Project will appeal to those looking for cutting edge social marketing and new media information and to those who just want to socialize over a beer and exchange thoughts and ideas about social media.

Members will have the opportunity to participate in the Bunker Project Podcast which is recorded live at every meetup.

Hope to see you soon at The Bunker!

Your Hosts,

Andrew McGivern & Bob Garlick

|Podcast Interview Techniques and more…

The Bunker Project – episode 157

The Bunker Project is recorded with a live interactive studio audience. Join us for a show in person in downtown Vancouver or via Google + Hangout. Or watch live on Hangouts On Air.

The Bunker Project is brought to you by Okanagan Spring Brewmaster Black.

Mavens in the house:

Andrew McGivern   @podcasthero

Bob Garlick            @bobgarlick

James Karg             @twisted_majic

Bonnie Sainsbury     @bonniesainsbury

Margaret Reynolds    @bc_insurancegal

Now onto the feature content:

This week on the Bunker Project we talk about interview techniques for your podcast or web show.

The show has a different atmosphere with these low lounge style chairs.

Listen to the show to find out all about how to conduct a killer interview with great tips from Bob who has done hundreds of interviews with Business Book Talk, Crazy TV Talk, and The Bunker Project.

Other topics:

Why Twitter is still Bonnie’s favourite Social Network

 Andrew talks about why is apparently an asshole.

What's App and Instagram after facebook?

Andrew talks about the plan to scrap the Meetup Group and go with Facebook events instead.

Linked In pet peeves… there are quite a few of them!

Google Plus vs Facebook

Andrew gives his thoughts on the Zoom H6

Podcasting with digital recorders.

Gaming with James: Oculus Rift and Facebook?

And that is it for another episode of the now infamous Bunker Project show. Call Toll Free 1-877-636-1474 and join the conversation on the show…. Thanks to Okanagan Spring Brewery for sponsoring the show!

Check us out on Facebook for comments and fun photos from the shows.

Check out @BunkerLive for tweets and upcoming show topics. If you want to make a comment or suggest a topic let us know.

Thanks to our new sponsor Okanagan Spring Brewery for sponsoring The Bunker Project. Brewmaster Black is the most popular beer at The Bunker Project and is our beer of choice.

Please rate our show in iTunes – Every five-star rating helps increase the exposure of the show. Also if you like the show please leave a comment or ask a question below, on iTunes or at our Meetup.com page!

About The Bunker Project

The underground Bunker Project is a meetup focused on Social Media, Internet Marketing, New Media, and Podcasting. Set in the Bunker at the Barklay Hotel on Robson St. in Vancouver, The Bunker Project will appeal to those looking for cutting edge social marketing and new media information and to those who just want to socialize over a beer and exchange thoughts and ideas about social media.

Members will have the opportunity to participate in the Bunker Project Podcast which is recorded live at every meetup.

Hope to see you soon at The Bunker!

Your Hosts,

Andrew McGivern & Bob Garlick

Google + More

The Bunker Project – episode 156

The Bunker Project is recorded with a live interactive studio audience. Join us for a show in person in downtown Vancouver or via Google + Hangout. Or watch live on Hangouts On Air.

The Bunker Project is brought to you by Okanagan Spring Brewmaster Black.

Round Table Intros:

Question: What Smart Phone do you use and why do you love it?

Answers: Interesting choices in phones. Listen to the show to get all the details.

We also talk about how Craig Griffiths sent us a couple beers from Australia a few years back. Here is the video showing what we did with those great black beers.

Mavens in the house:

Andrew McGivern   @podcasthero

James Karg                @twisted_majic

Paul  Juzkow              @paultherockgod

Bonnie Sainsbury      @bonniesainsbury

Randall Orser           @numbercrunchers

Marcel Lapointe       @ NOT ONLINE ANYMORE

Margaret Reynolds    @bc_insurancegal

Now onto the feature content: 

Bob talks about his experience with his photography posts on Google + vs the same images posted on Facebook. He talks about why he thinks Google + is different from Facebook.

Andrew brings up the way Google + is structured differently with circles vs friends and the asymmetrical nature of it. Also, some companies are using G+ just for SEO benefit. Bonnie has some interesting points to make in regards to SEO and Google +.

Bonnie and Bob discuss the importance of interaction and the need to be prepared to close sales if a campaign is successful.

Andrew asks Bonnie if she has a Google + strategy similar to her Twitter strategy.

Bonnie tells us what she does and how she cross posts in an intelligent way.

Margaret brings up an interesting chrome extension that allows you to schedule posts to a personal Google + page despite there not being an API that allows for that. It does it by using the browser to actually do the posts.

http://marketingland.com/chrome-extension-do-share-allows-for-google-post-scheduling-11484

Andrew asks Bonnie if she uses Social Comments on her Blog.

Bonnie said she has come to the point that she doesn’t really care about the comments on her blog anymore. She likes comments on a How To type post.

Andrew talks about Brother and Twins and how the Facebook comments sometimes bring people to the blog because the comment is displayed on people's wall.

Bob talks about how he turned off comments on Business Book Talk and explains about his experience doing this podcast.

James brings up Google + Communities and said that The Craft Beer Network has 11 000 fans now.

Marcel said that the best part of Google + is Hangouts.

Andrew asks if anyone is using Google + Ripples?

Bob loves Google + Ripples.

Gaming with James:

Marcel was at the Titan Fall launch and was completely confused when he tried to play the game.

James talks about Awesome Games Done Quick which raises money for cancer.

More Flappy Bird talk…

And that is it for another episode of the now infamous Bunker Project show. Call Toll Free 1-877-636-1474 and join the conversation on the show…. Thanks to Okanagan Spring Brewery for sponsoring the show!

Check us out on Facebook for comments and fun photos from the shows.

Check out @BunkerLive for tweets and upcoming show topics. If you want to make a comment or suggest a topic let us know.

Thanks to our new sponsor Okanagan Spring Brewery for sponsoring The Bunker Project.

Show 155 – Flappy Twitter

The Bunker Project is recorded with a live interactive studio audience. Join us for a show in person in downtown Vancouver or via Google + Hangout. Or watch live on Hangouts On Air.

The Bunker Project is brought to you by Okanagan Spring Brewmaster Black.

Start off the show with Voice Mail Feedback from Norm.

Norm has two words for James…. Flappy Birds.

and Norm can’t believe that Samsung did it again… copied Apple again now that they are coming out with a fingerprint reader.

Round Table Intros:

Question: Do you think that Samsung is copying  Apple by bringing out a phone with a fingerprint reader?

Mavens in the house:

Andrew McGivern   @podcasthero

James Karg                @twisted_majic

Paul  Juzkow              @paultherockgod

Tony Amaral              @artsytech

Bonnie Sainsbury      @bonniesainsbury

Sanj Sukerkar            @genesysdesigns

Marcel Lapointe       @ NOT ONLINE ANYMORE

Paul the Rock God said that a CNN article said that you shouldn’t say you are a Guru, Maven, Rockstar or another name.

https://mail.google.com/mail/u/0/?shva=1#inbox/1441d41a711450f1

The article says if one of those words in your profile you may be doing Twitter wrong?

We talk at length about the use of these words.

Paul calls into the FeedBack line and he has a question about Just Unfollow. He is looking for tips on using this tool more effectively.

Andrew has used it in the past and recently checked it out again and noticed it had a lot of similarities with ManageFlitter.

Bonnie asks Paul what he is trying to do?

Paul is using it to grow his followers and to unfollow people easier.

Andrew talks about how he uses ManageFlitter to filter by multiple factors at a time.

Bonnie recommends using ManageFlitter to harvest followers from lists. And also to follow peoples following. What she means is by following the people your target follows then you are benefiting from the work they have done. They have vetted them for you already.

If you are farming someone’s list make sure you are retweeting them and @replying them so that they see you are interacting with them.

Sanj asks at what point do you feel that there should be a payback from all the work and time invested?

We talk about what kind of ROI we are getting from Twitter.

Norm called in to say he was listening to CBC Radio and the use of Social Media by Politicians?

We all agree we’d like to see Rob Fords Social Media accounts.

James doesn’t like Ask Me Anything sessions anymore because it is mainly used for product promotion. It's no longer cutting edge, just standard questions.

Norm calls in again to say that Windows 8.1 is a failed experiment?

Bonnie says that Norm must be an Apple Fan Boy…

She doesn’t think that a new version coming out means anything.

Some chat ensues about the good and bad of Windows 8.

Bonnie talks about how she uses Windows 8 and why she prefers it over Windows 7.

A long chat about Mobile OS vs Desktop OS.

More on the Podcast Patent:

Andrew talks about the patent troll, Personal Audio LLC, and how they are trying to force the Electronic Freedom Foundation to reveal the names of the people and companies that donated money to fight their patent. Not cool.

Andrew talks about how big podcasting is with companies like Podcast One entering the market to bring real money into podcasting.

Gaming with JAMES:

Show 153 – WordPress, iTeq & Twitter (fixed audio file)

We are back after a few months off!

We decided to take some time off after Andrew and Valerie had Twin girls. Bob told Andrew he is crazy if he thinks he can do the Bunker Project with two newborns and toddler. After the first few months, Andrew can say that Bob was definitely right. He recommended we take some time off until the dust settles and now we are back… but Bob is sick tonight so he is sitting this one out.

Twitter Mavens in attendance:

@paultherockgod Paul

@bsainsbury Bonnie Sainsbury

@terrythelocksmith Terry from Mr. Locksmith

@bc_insurancegal Margaret Reynolds

@itech Neil Kilburne

@twisted_majic James Karg

@tsquared Troy Tyrell

Bonnie says she is an avid reader of Brother And Twins and she recommends everyone read it. She particularly liked the latest post on Questions Mothers of Twins Hate to Hear.

Terry the locksmith’s son just had twin girls too. Cool!

James does a decent impression of Bob. James said the Bunker project is four years old… wow!

Today’s Bunker Topic is WordPress.

Why shouldn’t you use WordPress?

Bonnie said there is overhead associated with WordPress and that everyone thinks they are a web designer once they get started with WordPress.

If you are blogging you should be writing content and not wasting time creating headers and tweaking themes.

Andrew asks Bonnie if she recommends people who are susceptible to the distractions of WordPress to use Squarespace or Blogger.com

Bonnie says no but she does recommend Medium because it ONLY for blogging.

Andrew brings up a benefit of using a hosted service like Square Space or Medium your site won’t crash if you get a ton of traffic (mentioned by Oprah) like it will on a shared hosting account.

Bonnie recommends Medium because they advertise each other's blogs within the Medium community. So by being on Medium, you benefit from the community in Medium.

Andrew asks Bonnie if she likes the Minimalist feel of Medium. She feels more like a blogger on Medium and a marketer on WordPress.

Paul the Rock God says if you're on WordPress you can own your site vs.. not owning it on other platforms. Andrew says that you can pay a small fee to use your own domain on Blogger or WordPress.com and if you leave you can export all your data.

Bonnie said on Medium, Ghost or Svtle you can spend less time there creating shorter posts and get more exposure. Andrew mentions that is what Mike Elgin is doing but he is using Google Plus.

Ghost is trying to solve the complexity of WordPress but is opening the platform to developers to create widgets and plugins and themes. Isn’t it going to become WordPress?

Plug In vs. Widget?

Paul the Rock God asks what the difference between a plug-in and a widget is?

Bonnie said that a plug-in is a script that allows you to add functionality to a website without having to code it yourself. And a plug-in is a box that displays something in a meaningful way.

Neil gives us a more technical explanation for a plug-in. He says that a lot of the terminology is just marketing rubbish.

Neil says that nothing matters except what you want to put on your site. Whatever you do will automatically update on your website.

Terry said that if it is a business you hire someone to build your WordPress site for you and don’t worry about what a plug-in or widget is. If is a hobby fart around with plugins.

iTeq Global

Neil says that all the plugins in WordPress are a waste of time.