Farmers: The original social network

Frank Lechtenberg, Nebraska farmer, founder of Marketing Talk Meeting

The most fascinating corner of communications technology these days is social media --Web 2.0 community applications like Facebook, MySpace, Ning, and Twitter. These sites share the goal of enabling people to network on the Web through user profiles, friends lists, private messaging, discussion groups, photo/video sharing and other tools.

Farmers have been Web 2.0 guys since the plow broke the plains, though. Being far flung in their businesses, they've always found venues of interaction--threshing bees, barn dances, church socials, going to town on Saturday night and just talking across the fence.

Rachel Happe, an analyst with Mzinga, a Boston-based builder of Web comunities, told me on Twitter recently that she admires the way farmers always have developed social networks. "Farm communities were the original social networks and my grandmother [Elizabeth Koester, Batesville, Indiana] was one of the hubs. Although she doesn't know Twitter, it's a dynamic she would understand. Farming communities were the original social networks as everyone needed each other."

A twist on Web networking is the tie-in of an actual face-to-face meeting. That's what farmers on Agriculture Online did a year ago, when they called a meeting of folks who participate in the Marketing Talk discussion group. It was quite a deal to watch farmers from seven or eight states get together face to face who had only known each other through the Web. Agriculture Online hosted the meeting, but basically stood aside and let the farmers/marketers carry the agenda.

Marketing Talk members will be meeting again next week in Des Moines, after another farmer, Chris Weydert, an Iowan, raised the idea of a reunion last month.

Last year, you got the sense that these guys learned about as much from each other as they could have from all the marketing experts in the country. There's nothing like networking with one's peers to get a bigger picture of the world.

We're looking forward to Marketing Talk II next week, Wednesday, September 3.

Here's where you can get more details about the event. Marketing Talk Meeting. If you're interested, there's still room for a few more folks.

Farmers' close calls: A split second gone bad

SMV signs mean slow down

A farmer started a discussion thread in Machinery Talk last week that needs some attention--some bold attention, like flashing lights and an ambulance siren.

I found it downright scary to read some of the "war stories" these guys tell, but do go ahead and read them for yourself: Machinery Talk.

Maybe these messages will save your life, or at least a few fingers. There are stories of near-death experiences, broken bones, smashed fingers, crushed feet, etc. And remember, these are from the guys who have lived to tell their stories--and who can still type.

Here's one example:

"The first year I was making large square bales of corn fodder the pickup plugged and I got off the tractor with the PTO running and pushed the stalks with my foot. In a split second my foot was grabbed by the stalks and I was pulled towards the stuffer fingers. I remember thinking so this is how I am going to die...."

Note the phrase, "in a split second." That's how it always seems to be in these stories, things go bad in an instant.

Here's another one to show you how it goes:

"I left [the big round baler] running when I got out of the tractor to check the strings on the previously made bale. As I was walking back, I noticed that there was a small wad of hay clinging to the frame, and I sort of unconsciously/reflexively swatted at it with my hand, to knock it off. Next thing I knew, my hand was sucked into the belt...."

Again, all in the blink of an eye.

Here's some of what's dangerous on the farm, according to gleanings from the Machinery Talk discussion:

* Getting high off the ground.

* Putting your hands around unprotected moving parts.

* Any piece of equipment that isn't working right.

* Servicing/fixing grain storage facilities--beware dryers and silos.

* Livestock behaving badly.

* Trying to do stuff with brute force.

It seems that one thing we need to learn to do before performing just about any chore on the farm is to pause, take a deep breath, and just spend a moment considering what we're about to do.

Harvest season is one of the most dangerous times of the year, safety experts say. Vow not to let that "split second" get you.

Windshield tour: No bin buster here

Soybeans in central Iowa, 8/14

Back in June, there was concern that the world would face food shortages because of flood damage to Midwest crops. But, this week, USDA reported that farmers now are on track to harvest the second largest corn crop and fourth largest soybean crop in history. What a turn-around--from food shortages to bin buster in less than two months. Yes, weather has been ideal, crop experts and meteorologists say. But is there more to the story than the USDA numbers?

USDA's reporting system, routinely criticized by some farmers, seems about as scientific as such a process can be--it's based primarily on phone interviews of 29,500 producers. In June, USDA agents even went back to 8,910 tracts in the Midwest to document the impacts of flooding on planted acreage and harvest intentions.

Windshield tours are a kind of sport for farmers. You really can't tell all that much from the road. But what does it mean when a whole bunch of farmers are starting to see the same thing?
My picture here was taken of a field I've been watching since the heavy rains inundated the ground last spring. It's about a mile east of the Des Moines River, and a mile north of I-80, pretty much smack dab in the middle of Iowa and the Corn Belt. It shows an area of late soybeans that were planted in a drowned-out corner of a corn field. As you can see, the planting got doused a second time. In central Iowa, you can find a lot of areas that look like this--late planted crops racing to get under the frost finish line. (Here are some other views from my tour this morning; it ain't pretty: August 14 tour.)

According to farmers in Marketing Talk, windshield tours from around the country are revealing a host of problems for Midwest corn and soybeans: spotty stands, heavy weed and insect pressure, disease, and so on. Others are reporting a crop that has shown great resiliency: "Cool wet start, and this crop sure looks like it's trying to finish out like normal," said one farmer in the discussion.

We all know these road tours are just a kind of talk show before the big game involving combines this fall. Maybe, though, the discussion helps us better understand the drama we've seen this year. And one thing seems sure: "Rough ride when combines start rolling no matter who is right," as one farmer put it.

Twice you're good

Sarah Lacy

Last weekend, Sarah Lacy, author of the new book Once You're lucky, Twice You're Good (The rebirth of Silicon Valley and the rise of Web 2.0), came to Des Moines to talk about her book and the lastest goings-on in Silicon Valley. Her book focuses on the entrepreneurs who built the Web (1.0) and those who are now creating Web 2.0, the technologies that are spawning all the new tools of social networking--products like Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, and LinkedIn.


I haven't read the book yet, but Sarah offered a number of thoughts that have stuck in my mind:

* The big wheels in Silicon Valley are mostly from the Midwest, have hard-core work ethics, and are still on the move. For example, Marc Andreessen, born in Iowa and raised in Wisconsin, co-developed the first big Web browser, and recently co-founded Ning, a platform for social networking.


* Many of the new entrepreneurs are not computer language coders, like the guys who built Microsoft and Netscape. They are creative people with a big idea.


* Web 2.0 is spawning a new work culture in which many more people are self-employed, using tools like Facebook and Twitter to make contacts and drive business.


* Social networking gives us the capability to stay in touch with everyone we know, or at least want to stay in touch with, starting for kids in kindergarten.


* Venture capitalists, who funded so much of Web 1.0, are often getting cut out of the 2.0 action.


* Web 2.0 means as much to people in places like Des Moines and Omaha as it does to San Franciscans. There's no reason that the next big thing can't be invented right down the street here, Sarah says.


* The smart guys in Silicon Valley still draw out ideas on napkins.

* Web 3.0 is still totally unimaginable. Will it have something to do with new ways of connecting people? Mobile maybe? (Mobile still has fundamental software problems, Sarah believes.)


What does Web 2.0 have to do with agriculture? This year, with all the new bubbling up of social media, reminds me a lot of 1995, when many of us took to the Web on Marc Andreessen's first Mosaic browser. How much did the Web change farming? As much as paved roads and the telephone? The next couple years, I believe, will bring similar, dramatic changes in how we communicate, conduct business, and enjoy life.

Stealing the show

Bob Schnell, Farm Equipment Manufacturing Association, announces new farm show

The announcement of the new Ag Connect Expo stole the show at the Ag Media Summit this week in Tampa, Florida. A big banner touting its sponsoring organization, the Association of Equipment Manufacturers (AEM), hung over the entrance to the Summit's InfoExpo, a trade show for the annual meeting of the nation's agricultural journalists.

Ag Connect had the prime booth space and attracted journalists from all the top farm media organizations. From all appearances, the Expo folks hit it out of the park with their big announcement. A long line of interviewers heard about the show's features: a goal of attracting 20,000 producers and 700 plus exhibitors covering 250,000 square feet of space "displaying the latest in equipment, technology and services." The show will debut in Orlando in January 2010.
But why another big farm show? We already have Louisville, Tulare, the Sun Belt, Farm Progress and others.

The U.S. needs a show with an international focus, and farmers can be better served with new farm show technology, including a card system that will enable data and info exchanges between farmer and manufacturer, organizers said. Orlando no doubt would double as a family vacation for both U.S. and international visitors. And, what else? Will AEM be a better organizer of a farm show than its competitors? Will they provide better services to manufacturers and the show goers? Their success in the construction industry says this group is well equipped to run equipment shows.

A new poll on Agriculture Online, however, suggests some early ambivalence about the need for a new show. "January is pretty full on the show schedule right now up north," said one comment to the poll. "Then there is the National Farm Machinery Show in Louisville every February, which seems to get bigger each year. Who is the target market for this new show?"

Based on the impressive media performance, there is going to be a lot of firepower behind this show. It will be interesting to see how big it gets to be come January 2010.