I just posted an article onto Marketing Conversation called Gifting Bloggers Doesn’t Mean Pushing Swag and within minutes Stevie Wilson of LA-Story wrote the most amazing comment on the culture of swag that is commonplace in Los Angeles, California...

Swag is the name of the game in Los Angeles– in a city that lives and dies by celebrities getting swag and quite frankly are the least needy for that - because they have the $$ to pay for anything given to them.

This morning, Norman Birnbach wrote an article wherein he suggests that I emphasize giving swag:

One of his tips is to “Give swag” — a point that Chris Abraham emphasized in a recent interview. The reason is that blogging is often a second career and there are few perks so swag can make a difference to get bloggers to respond.

My friend Momotaro, the fellow who created the banner for Memes.org, was so amused by the first comment that someone posted onto my blog post, Don’t Save the Whales and Don’t Save the Rainforest Either, that he created the following anthology of really intelligent put-downs, I Hope a Whale Beaches Itself On You — it is bloody brilliant!

Here’s the content of the book — the manuscript if you will — and here’s the source:

Lisa Hayes popped me an article by Denis Hayes, a man who suspiciously seems related to Lisa, “Fantastic new article by Denis Hayes about energy policy — please feel free to share far and wide!” Well, I am the biggest fan of Lisa and so here we go — my attempt to share this article a wee little further and wider: Climate Solutions: Charting a Bold Course A cap-and-trade system is not the answer, according to a leading alternative-energy advocate. To really tackle climate change, the U.S. must revolutionize its entire energy strategy.

Firebrand was a client of mine. I got to hang out with Firebrand’s CJ Lauren and tour the Firebrand studios. My CEO, Mark Harrison, and I eagerly watched Firebrand from Berlin — until the house went dark and Firebrand was forced into bankruptcy when all their investors bailed on them — and us! Well, like a Phoenix, Firebrand has risen from the ashes in the form of Firemedia Partners. Good luck, guys! Here’s the Press Release I just received in my INBOX from Shari F. Leventhal:

A big part of what my firm, Abraham Harrison LLC, does is online outreach and blogger relations. We’re doing our first book promotion campaign for our client, Survivor Corps, and Jerry White’s new book, I Will Not Be Broken: Five Steps to Overcoming a Life Crisis, and we have been having a lot of fun and plenty of success. We are very proud and excited by our work on this campaign. Here are a bunch of the blog posts that we have been able to collect over the last few weeks of active campaigning of people and bloggers who have chosen to be responsive to our blogger promotion in the form of blog and forum posts (Via Chris Abraham and Marketing Conversation):

I am really proud of the work we at Abraham Harrison are doing on behalf of Jerry White's new book, I Will Not Be Broken: Five Steps to Overcoming a Life Crisis, and new organization, SurvivorCorps. So excited am I that we really created a gorgeous Social Media News Release (SMNR) for the project, for both I Will Not Be Broken and SurvivorCorps -- and I wrote about it over on Marketing Conversation. Via Chris Abraham - Because the Medium is the Message

Abraham Harrison is a company of 22 people stretching across 14 time zones, and living in five countries on four continents. We are of four nationalities and six ethnicities.

Among us we speak not only English, but Spanish, Afrikaans, German, French, Hindi, Swahili, and Arabic. Our people have lived in the US, UK, Canada, Mexico, Guatemala, Liberia, South Africa, Tanzania, Tunisia, Germany, Spain, India, and Egypt.

In this highly international, intercultural, interlingual company that is Abraham Harrison LLC, we meet on the internet and operate primarily in English - and we live our daily lives both on and offline within the constantly morphing cultural boundaries that is our modern cosmopolitan world.

It is no secret that I am a fan of NPR and a double-fan of Fair Game with Faith Salie. Well, I took the initiative to create a Fair Game with Faith Salie Facebook group. And, if you're a fan of Faith Salie then you should become Faith Salie's friend on MySpace (I had never heard of her before I heard the first show on WAMU in Washington). Come on and join the unofficial Fair Game with Faith Salie fan club!

Last week, Mark was contacted by a reporter from IDG who wanted to know about how Abraham Harrison LLC uses Google Apps Premier, and Mark Harrison, our CEO, obliged. The article was published online today, For Web Apps, Get a Service Guarantee, in PC World (via Marketing Conversation and Chris Abraham).

Ramiro Miqueli is a multilingual senior executive with over 35 years of international and domestic experience in Fortune 500 management, pre-IPO startup, operations and finance spanning alternative financial services, broadcasting, entertainment, publishing, manufacturing and Internet operations.

Born in San Antonio de los Baños, Havana, Cuba in 1942, Ramiro Miqueli completed Ramiro Miqueli's elementary and high school education and lived there until the age of 19. Cuba is the largest island of the Greater Antilles and is 90 miles from the USA between the Gulf of Mexico, the Atlantic Ocean and the Caribbean Sea. San Antonio is a typical small Spanish town located 18 miles south of Havana.

I will let my words speak for themselves, as published in this month’s Atlantic magazine in Lori Gottlieb’s article, Marry Him: The case for settling for Mr. Good Enough (gulp):

I know that Leonid Rozhetskin is in Utah or thereabouts along with L+E Production for Sundance on the strength of his production, Hamlet II but I really need help with my chess. Well, guess what? Leonid Rozhetskin was a champion chess player when he attended Columbia College back in the 80s. Leonid Rozhetskin, I need your help with my chess if you're still a chess maestro. Via Chris Abraham & Memes.org.

You know I have been rubbing shoulders with Hollywood producer Leonid Rozhetskin. Well, it looks like Leonid Rozhetskin and L+E Productions does a fine job of selecting scripts and projects because I got some breaking news: the Sundance Film Festival selected L+E Productions’ Hamlet II in its premiers category.

Jonathan Trenn sees the insidiousness in Facebook Beacon. Check out why he thinks that Facebook Beacon might just be a little sinister and how Beacon isn't really in your best interest,

"Beacon potentially violates the relationships that we form online. Ones that we in social media marketer so often say are built on trust and respect. Oddly, this happens with the retailer’s involvement. Facebook could easily come off as intruding into that relationship. This shouldn’t be underestimated. In a time that we’re talking about 'listening' we’re talking respect." Via Marketing Conversation and Memes.org

    The Powers That Be (PTB) of the Kid's Book Industry, the School Library Journal, are all conspiring to get my brilliant friend, Minh Le, a Children's Book Deal! So, why won't someone actually do what Elizabeth Bird commands! Via School Library Journal.

Minh Le's Über-proud fiancee, Aimee, pointed me to my favourite Übermensch, Minh Le of Bottom Shelf Books -- but, actually, not him but, rather, Saints and Spinners, with Children's Books That Never Were and Minh's contribution, Babar's Revenge: The Hunter Becomes the Hunted

I have been spending lots of time these last few days trying to track my experiences in Berlin thus far using my Blackberry, connected to Twitter via Google Talk IM, because all my of my friends want me to journal my first experiences. So, you can read about my experience in reverse-chronological order below of stalk me real-time over at http://twitter.com/chrisabraham

Mark Harrison popped me these BBC TV shows months ago and I only had time to watch them last night and they're very interesting and wonderful insight into the last century of public relations. This series, The Century of the Self, asserts that Sigmund Freud, Anne Freud, and -- most importantly -- Edward Bernays, were the godparents of modern PR, marketing, advertising, and also political strategy.

I am amazed. I am speechless. I am honored. I am pleased. I am embarrassed. No matter what the rush of feelings I may experience in response to the kindest of words expressed on my behalf by Mr. Dan Hull in Our Wunderkind in Berlin, the most meaningful thing Dan reminded me of was that "under 40" is still young. One often forgets that when surrounded by Überwunderkind who are "under 30."

Lots of people have so many great questions about the 2007 Energy Bill coming up and what the NET coalition is doing to push through an aggressive energy bill that would push CAFE standards for cars to 35 mpg by 2020 and the percentage of electricity in the US provided by renewable sources of electricity to 15% by 2020 that we have put together a list of answers: (Via Memes.org)

Being a Very-Minor-Almost-Imperceptible-Celebrity, I sometimes get to hang out with Very-Major-Totally-Obvious-Celebrities such as the Hollywood mogul and movie producer Leonid Rozhetskin of L+E Productions. What a cool dude.

I got a full day done but since we worked until 5 so neither Mark nor  I got up very early. Working. But good!

Mark and I dropped by City Hall, Rathaus Mitte, this afternoon to get myself registered, officially, as an alien in Berlin. This is the first step towards becoming a proper legal full-time resident of Germany, which should be pretty easy since I will not be working here, taking German jobs, or anything of that sort. Anyway, back to things. I will try to come here more often and let you know what's going on.